The Thoughtful @ Places of Chaos
I began writing on a Friday evening. Writing again I mean! After about a year and a quarter – in the same city where I had last left it and with everything else around me vastly different since that last entry. I guess there are some promises one must live up to...most of all the ones made to oneself. For those of you who wondered why my writing suddenly stopped – It was a promise made to myself that I wouldn’t write until I resurrected a few things in my life. And all that I wrote during this period of promise had to be confined within the pages of my diaries.
I am in Mumbai – the place I always knew I had to be in! And yeah before I say anything about Mumbai, I must about Bangalore. Bangalore - which I left or rather had to leave and come here, Bangalore which I must admit I miss and miss like no other city. What that city gave me is something that would go beyond my love for any other place on earth. And of course, what it took away from me...
The last 1.5 years of my life that I spent at Bangalore have had a more profound impact on me than any other place and any other phase of my life. I started with Bangalore at a small place in Koramangala which soon went on to become the most desired place for me on earth. Thanks to the intense travelling entailed in my professional life at that stage I actually got to spend quite less time there and ended up missing all my weekends there. As much as I loved my place there, did I love the entire area – be it the parks around, the trees lined across the roads, the beautifully done homes housing boutique shops, the scores of couples who thronged the streets, the breeze and entire atmosphere at late evenings and just about everything else. Though today it’s been more than a year since I lived there, the place that Koramangala has made in my heart is going to stay for long. And some of you reading these lines would know what level of attachment I have with its streets.
While that was the shaded beginning of earlier Bangalore days, the city also had a second phase – the more important phase. This was the phase that made me look beyond my ideology, the phase that made me accept my destiny. This was the time when I got along and enjoyed with an entirely new set of people, when I realized some of the values and virtues of life which I had long forgot and this was the time when I reversed the fall of my life. As I wrote in one of my entries, this was the time when I halted my fall after reaching the bottom of ‘V curve of life’ and started on my course upwards. This was the time when I started taking it normally when one of your friends on FB declared as being married to somebody and you always thought she/he was seeing someone else!! This was the time when I could once again smile in contempt at the temples, churches and mosques and pass by them. On a lighter note, this was the time of Namma Bengaluru, the time when I turned to FM for some unexpected music in my life and the time when I finally started looking at the Kingfisher girls with the stare I should have had looong back :)
My talk of Bangalore would be grossly incomplete if I don’t talk about my last organization and my motive of being in Bangalore. I still remember the days when I was going through the selection process of this organization at my campus and I was so unsure if this was where I wanted to be. At that time I always perceived the IT industry as a place where one got lost in a crowd, where one’s self identity went for a toss within a population of a hundred thousand people. Looking back I realize how wrong I was. As somebody used to tell me at that time – “Abhimanyu, you’ll realize the exposure in these organizations once you are there, you are not going to be one of those many techies out there, trust me it’s going to be great learning.” About two years down, I feel how true the words turned out to be and I must admit that the organization gave me a lot more than what I expected. Most of all it taught me how to keep oneself motivated without the sight of result, how to continuously feel one is able to make a difference by one’s efforts in the overall scheme of things. Among many other qualities and values that the organization instilled in me, it definitely strengthened my belief in loyalty. I had a few great times there and the fondest memories during this period were returning to my alma mater for the last 2 years. I got the opportunity to relive those days, the days of IMT. IMT....Well a lot about IMT is still the same – like the breeze around, like the special maggi of DLP, like the dhobi, photocopy and the Nescafe guy – all of who instantly recognize you and make you feel so great. However a few things have changed as well - like the constrained infrastructure and the new buildings that are coming up, like few of the old faculty who have either left or are undergoing some programs at foreign universities. You tend to miss all those and the tennis court and the lover’s lane etc. etc. but yes what you miss most are the people with whom you used to walk around in campus then….of those late night strolls and coffee in dead chill winter and fog….of visiting the academic block high terrace and having a mess lunch with some more familiar faces around…..
I guess I would always be thankful to my last organization for giving me the opportunity to return back to my college in the last two years.And then came Mumbai!
My last memories of Mumbai were when I had come here for a professional trip, when I had taken time out to visit Hazi Ali and marine drive, when there was a lot happening in my life and when the end was just beginning!
Well what can I say about Mumbai - I knew I had to idolize with this and start feeling for it someday. I knew I had to make myself comfortable with it. One month over here, I have not found a single reason why I should like it more than my Bangalore or even Delhi, but I must admit that on numerous occasions, I have been completely awed by its pace. It is the maximum city, so diverse and there is much more to feel here in every moment than any other place. It’s a place which can mercilessly rob you of your entire existence and it is also the city where you can dream just about anything on the world and carve a path to make it a reality. It’s the city of the lingering presence…
I guess most of life’s battles ultimately reach such frontiers. May be it’s just normal to face such extremities in life. I guess it had to be the city of dreams – no matter how much I would have tried against it, sometimes the pull is just too strong - This one’s to settle all the past scores and make up for all that’s left. To Mumbai….to make the future on the foundations of past…. this entry is dedicated to them who were courageous enough to waste their life over their passion, who could never be practical in some affairs of their life – no matter what and no matter how much it cost them!! It’s dedicated to the hands that shock absorbed the thumping head on pillow and more than anything else its’ dedicated to Bangalore and my early days in that city. As the Beatle song goes –
There are places I remember
All my life …though some have changed
Some forever, not for better
Some have gone and some remain….
All these places have their moments
With lovers and friends I still can recall
Some are dead and some are living
In my life I've loved them all…
The Thoughtful @ Places of Thoughtful Chaos
Every business needs a breadth of fresh air – Guess I am having mine here. I am in Malpe about 12 kms from Manipal on this serene white sandy beach. Its 8:30 in the night and there is almost nobody at the beachside. With music in ears, breeze almost like a wind and the perennial energy of the waves washing my feet, I wonder if I ever had a better perch to write. The moonlight helped with the halogen has added the shine to the water. I somehow seem to disagree with them who feel that a sea is scary to look at during nights. Like Ernest Hemmingway I always thought of the sea as ‘la mar’ and something feminine, something beautiful, something which is unruly at surface but with huge depth inside, depth synonymous with the depth of a woman, depth which has precious and mysterious buried deep under, depth fathoming which is not the prerogative of the ordinary(man), depth which is manifested in so many other connotations by poets and writers. I’ve spent almost 8 hours today with this beloved of mine and I don’t want to leave this until morrow morning, not before the night is over when I see it at her unruly best. And I guess the night’s going to be long!! This giant is lying before me, showing her entire might and extent like a vast black carpet with dots of light scattered here and there and a lighthouse to guide those light bound ships to shore. Some light and a shore at the end of the day is what I guess all of us need in life!
I started thinking what does one want, what is one’s driver in life, what are an individual’s traits that make him happy in life and is it just percieved happiness that is ultimate aim in life? I think more than anything else all of us need an inspiration, a motive, a reason in life. This reason can be a goal in life, can be a person who might be the definition of life for somebody or it can be a long savored dream behind which an individual may have given his years or a life reared and gathered bit by bit over a couple of decades. This kind of goal or inspiration in life is like a light which drives and drags an individual and behind which the individual gives his/her everything and thereby passes the years of his/her life. If each one of us just think over, there is that one such light, that one flame silently burning at the back of the curtain which has dragged us to where we are today in life. However having said that the story doesn’t remain all this sweet always. There are instances when the driver, the inspiration itself turns sour, the dream suddenly vanishes or one realizes that the flame which the individual made his driving light wasn’t actually worth it. It is then that the true human spirit is put to test, the real mettle has to show beyond the facades of showmanship. In tests of such valor, either the spirit melts or comes up with something beyond the ordinary embracing that which may go on to become the true light in life. For all others who find their light in first go consider yourself just lucky.
I always believed that there are 2 things in one’s life which are the most crucial, and it is very important to be successful within these two aspects. One of these is the work that a person does – his or her profession. Work is going to occupy a very high percentage of our time in life and it is important that we love what we do (inspired by Steve Jobs). The other of course is the person whom we love or with whom we spend our life. I don’t know about the latter but the apprehensions that I had regarding the former in my life are probably beginning to cease. I think I am beginning to like my work. In the last 9 months, I have travelled across the length and breadth of the country and on multiple occasions, been home at some really decent shelters, tasted cuisine across all corners of the country and got the opportunity to interact and share the viewpoint of some great minds during the course of an interview. Most of all I got to be in touch with my friends while travelling to places and campuses – something which I have always been passionate about. I figured out in my life quite early that I loved visiting various educational varsities and campuses, being a part of the energy therein and in that brief moment make myself a part of them. At different phases in life different people have been my partners in this journey and quest which I started as early as late school days, but somehow I have stuck around and seem to be still visiting those walls of learning. Sometimes today when I go to these havens to make a pitch for my organization, the memories of being at the other side of the desk just comes alive. A smile is all with which I take that nostalgia and with a handshake at the end of interview – “Enjoy your time left in this campus. We will take care of the rest."
2010 is just over and I don’t know how to comment about it. Simply put it gave me moments too many – moments which would be impossible to forget, moments on the foundations of which my future will rest. This is the one year that I am not going to forget for the rest of my life and if I be succesful tomorrow would appear in my management speeches as the constituent of my story. About 2010 I would summarize as - There is far too much to die for but more than that to live for. As Ingrid Bergman says in Casablanca – “Play it, Sam. Play As Time Goes By.”
This is my first entry in the new year and it is special in a number of ways. It marks the completion of 3 years of my blogging. Though most of what I write gets buried in my diaries, I am happy that I have been able to put something on my blog at regular intervals. It also marks a stark deviation from the regular content of my writing, a change for the more meaningful, positive and worthy days in store ahead. This part of my life is called - The Prelude to Acceptance. I guess I would want to close the entry with a very beautiful line from an old Hindi movie song –
“Ki Hum Tak Tumhari Dua Aa Rahi Thi”
November 05, 2010
From Thoughtful Chaos to 'The Thoughtful'
"And I despise your books, I despise wisdom and the blessings of this world. It is all worthless, fleeting, illusory, and deceptive, like a mirage. You may be proud, wise, and fine, but death will wipe you off the face of the earth as though you were no more than mice burrowing under the floor, and your posterity, your history, your immortal geniuses will burn or freeze together with the earthly globe.
The above lines have been taken from arguably the best short story I’ve read – ‘The Bet’ by Anton Chekov. I don’t know why I’ve put it but somehow these lines symbolize the end of an epic period, they symbolize despising what was once most coveted, symbolize the eternal truths and learning which is beyond our comprehension at this stage in life.
It’s been just over five years since I lost my ethical virginity in life. Just about 5 years ago from now, one day I gave a speech in my college about what I thought was the best human quality – the quality of mercy, the art of forgiveness. I had crafted lines taken from the famous Portia speech in The Merchant of Venice – “The quality of mercy is not strained, it droppeth as the gentle rain. It is twice blest; It blesseth him that gives and him that takes….” Somehow of all the dialogues of all the plays of Shakespeare that I ever read, this is the one that I’ve always remembered and little did I realize the reason for such remembrance. That was then, but this is now and I guess this is when it makes much more sense. I wonder if there was the option of coming up with a contradictory speech – one that opposes the idea of Shakespeare in that dialogue, one that is against my own principles of idealism and standards in life but one which is more astute, more relevant and contemporary in the practical mayhem of today.
In these five years I’ve seen a huge bit of life and its elements. Life to which I am still trying to understand and the extremities and intricacies of which I believe would remain uncharted even with lifetimes of learning and experience. None of us can ever be mature enough and I believe that’s the innate beauty of life that even when one has seen something multiple times, there is a freshness that is still preserved and there is something that one can still look up to. Most of us have committed the same mistakes again in life and yet we are more mature than what we were last time though not mature enough to not commit that mistake again. And who knows may be in the final analysis it may not even be a mistake. The iteration goes on and adds some value somewhere. Somehow all of us are becoming more and more prepared to take our fallouts in life and that is such a distinct silver lining. Tomorrow when we look back we would be so proud of ourselves, this would be our story, this was how we struggled and yet persisted and hence reached few miles more than what we had set for at beginning. Yes - This would be my story. As if the final glory of life is a function of so many elements of past life - some mildly related, some heavily contributing to the function and some even disproportional. And most of these elements would be people themselves – people from our past and present. People who were in our lives and all their elements. People who are in our lives and all their elements.
I am at home – after about 6 months. The last time I was here, things around and inside were very different. To an extent, it’s strange how worlds can change and change to what extent within months. Six months – that was exactly the time duration I was given and less than that was all it took. This city from where I grew up and would become whatever I will morrow will always have the umbilical cord, that connection with me. Few of its places that bear testimony to the times then and now and which will stand tomorrow to see whatever (new) comes in life will have a story to tell. Stories which encompass the stretches of faith, hope and love, of belief and human spirit. Stories which will grow old with time and unfortunately and evidently give way to new stories. I don’t know what I want to convey here. In fact its been not two or five but all of fifteen long years (now you know the relevance of first line of this entry) since it all began and it’s just peaking. Yes, one has to hit the bottom of ‘V’ of life before one can be on course to its tip. As I’ve said before or have been told before – The phoenix cannot get tired of rising. It has to rise from the ashes – just again and again.
This part of my life is called ‘Losing the chaos’. Reducing the Thoughtful Chaos to ‘The Thoughtful’.
I believe in Angels. I still do.
August 24, 2010
Thoughtful Chaos @ Bangalore
As I sit here and write, moved by the myriads of thoughts and emotions, I feel there has been so much that has traversed in the past couple of months. There is so much that should have been captured on paper but could not. I wouldn’t want to accept that it happened due to paucity of time – because firstly there are a lot of truths in life which we don’t want to accept and secondly we always have time for something we like. I know this is going to be another one of those entries in which there is going to be my characteristic subtle and clandestine thoughts, my way of drawing parallels in life from past and present and relating them to quotes or instances. In simple words life’s philosophy in a revealing, yet largely symbolic and intriguing way.
There are so many things that we never forget in life. Or may be we can forget depending on what follows them and how those memories are taken ahead. Yesterday when I spent about ten minutes on the main road waiting for my cab, there were a few of these stray thoughts that brushed my heavens. I saw those cars waiting for the signal and disappearing in a swirl as the light showed green. I saw those bikers, the enthusiasts who once in a while broke the signal to march ahead in life. I saw a young couple each looking outside their respective window in a Merc overtaking an elderly pair on an evening walk smiling and holding hands in hands. I felt life in the fast lane among many other things and in that moment of extreme personal ambiguity and insecurity so many things crossed my mind at the same time. I realized that it must have been the moment of so many things. I realized that somebody might be having the happiest moment of one’s life then, somebody may be taking birth then, somebody may have lost one’s most beloved friend then and somebody may be performing the last rites of one’s love. I felt that somebody may be losing one’s virginity then and somebody who rightfully deserved that virginity be either experiencing the most remorseful moment of one’s life or be having a great moment somewhere else unaware of what the one lost. I realized that it may be a moment of lifelong realization for someone who would have finally realized how the path that the person treaded for so long was so terribly incorrect and that it were late now to change paths in life, while somebody may be really wishing to be back as one was in past after finally realizing its value. I realized that so many very important events were happening simultaneously though may be with different people and some of these different people may be in some way or very defining way interrelated with each other. I realized that some of us were running too fast, had become too materialistic, had taken the wrong path and that a lot of us needed to hold on for a moment, look at oneself, past and present, give themselves a bit more of direction, shed some unnecessary weight in life and gain some deserving ones and then carry on. I realized that sometimes each one of us want to feel the way we make some others feel. I realized. Finally! That’s all.
I’ve seen many battles in life, been a part of a lot of them and come to realize what ‘life’ itself stands for – over and again. If not for these battles, especially the ones lost and via which the gravest wounds were sustained – life would have been nothing. For the marks of the lost battles and their scars make the foundations on which the present and future victories rest, on which rest the hopes, the dreams. Strange and striking but so true – Dreams built on the foundations of failures. Essentially all these battles of my life had one thing in common. And with time I’ve come to understand this commonality which is that in the end it always comes down to the same question – Can you? The two words which appear before you at each of those difficult junctures of life and pose that humiliating question mark before you - Can you? How did the bravest and strongest of personalities of the world react when caught in the toughest battles of life? When pierced with the most lethal weapons and at their most vulnerable parts, did the pain show on their face, in their jeers, strained eye lines or clutched jaws or did they have a smile when faced with such predicament defying the laws of common humanity and exemplifying the spirit of supermanhood. How did the Achilles and Karnas, the Santiagos and Francisco D Anconias greet when confronted with the question – “Can you” and what were their answers each time?
I am in Chennai – once again. In the last two months I am here for the fifth time. The place about which I was told – “It is all I have”. This is the city of a lot of things. More than anything else, it is one of history, memories and dreams – in that order. History – of an entire lifetime, of pristine candlelight innocence and dedicated passion. Memories – of touching, facing that entrusted history and dissolving it into bloodstream trying to make it a part of you and in process taking so much which is beyond comprehension. And finally of Dreams – of everything, of another set of lifetime, of replacing the cast of Casablanca, of creating Chennai’s.
Dedicated to the lost innocence, idealism, to the undefined dreams and most of all to the lost loyalty. But more than that dedicated to all that very special that came as part of that history, memories and dreams. To never ending belief and faith. To Hope. Dedicated to them who always answered “Yes” whenever posed with the question “Can you” in life.
April 19, 2010
Dedicated to those very special moments, history and that someday.
So I just thought of writing something. With the MBA over and my useless self back to my hometown Bokaro Steel City before the joining date, I think this is arguably the longest stretch of time that I am going to spend in this place ever again. As I just turned around to look back, I felt I had lived a hell of a lot in the 24 years of my life. Just as anybody else has it, a lot of it was bad, some unbearable and some so nice that it made me realize what the importance of the word ‘life’ itself would be. I think I have learnt – a lot of it the harder way but it isn’t been so bad that I cannot take it in my stride. Yes, I think I am fairly happy and proud of the past 24 years and given a chance would love to relive again. If possible with a few corrections! But more importantly, would want to live again.
What is there that we remember of life? I just started thinking of the moments of my life that I remember, the standout instances which jut out and have imprinted forever - good or bad. Like the first taste of success in professional life or the day when the teacher put you on bench before your childhood crush, the time when your parents cried out of the happiness of your achievement or the moment when you were caught watching something objectionable on television. The instance when you felt your whole world breaking apart or the seconds when time went still following the most beautiful words you could ever hear in life. Each one of us has had his or her own share of these moments in life. And I feel how the personality of an individual evolves and ultimately how good or bad a human being one becomes is contributed immensely by these critical incidents of his life. And essentially this is all that has been life. The rest was just living. Because if there are just 24 days of my life that I can remember out of the 24 years, guess life is been as short as 24 days!
Among a few things that I want to touch down here in this entry, one is about those very special moments of life. The moments when you feel ecstasy, moments which are beyond the scope of any comprehension, the expression of which simply cannot be surfaced by any emotion. I guess moments like those are very scarce in one’s life and it’s really up to each individual as to how he or she views that moment and associates how much of importance to it. These are moments in the memory of which entire lifetimes can be spend.
Next I’ll speak about the past and present in one’s life. The boy meets girl phenomenon happens in a wide spectrum of age and a lot of times happens beyond just once. And hence there is every probability that with our past living, we start building our future. And does it affect the foundations? I guess it does. Sometimes making it stronger and a lot of times weaker, but it does. As the quote says – You cannot finish the book of life without closing its chapters. If you want to go on…then you have to leave the past as you turn the pages.
Also I want to write about the sudden right that an individual starts exercising on other following the start of a relationship. For x years of the past of the person you love (x = Age of the person) you know nothing, have no right over what he or she does, likes, meets whosoever, indulges in whatsoever and how he or she lives. And then suddenly you make yourself the God for the person driving his or her actions, deciding what the person be, how he/she dresses, meets whom, follows what kind of lifestyle and almost everything else. We want to change the person. As much as it the expectation of one to start afresh at each turns of life, is the responsibility of the other to not try to change the person and let him/her retain his/her identity – possibly one of the prime drivers which started the relationship and made two people get attracted and come close to each other. Also I believe this is applicable to a couple of 16 years to a just married of late twenties and as much the same to one who’s been on course of happily ever after for 20 years together. And as far as the past goes, guess we all can take it with the passion and magnanimity of this quote - I'm grateful to all those who have hugged you with love... coz for a moment they have taken care of my whole world...
Another great learning that I feel I have derived from life is that one is strongest when one has nothing to lose. Putting it in lines of a quote - The toughest of warriors fall weak before an ordinary man, with nothing to lose!! I remember having put the poster of a man getting drenched in rain and with his attitude the words reverberating – It’s so much easier when you have nothing to lose. Though thankfully or unthankfully I do not have that freedom and force in life today but I have been in its red and black and have experienced the force and courage that comes following the same. And I do have a very strong intuition that at least once in my life, I am going to share intimacy with that force and have that strength as part of myself once again. Here I am talking about the passion of a man (humanity I mean), a force before which I’ve seen everything else of the world bend and yes I can dare to say that. It’s about that intoxication that follows after the triumph of that spirit which dwarfs the pleasure of two lovers into unconcealed inebriation, or to which even the destiny salutes. In fact my whole life is dedicated to that spirit of man, that infallible, divine force which has been bestowed to humans and which makes him Godlike. Essentially this spirit has been characterized a lot of times in the real world as much as in fiction. Through my personal opinion, I believe Karna in Mahabharata or Hector in Illiad or in fiction Santiago of The Old Man & The Sea and in Francisco d Anconia of Atlas Shrugged has been shown to depict that spirit among myriads of other examples. But what I want to point out here is that the definition and scope of this divine and humanly passion is not limited to these very special mortals. It is essentially a part of each of us and at some stage or the other of our life, we do exhibit a conduct comparable to any great super hero that existed or was created by the ornamental imagination of a writer. It’s just that we are such for very special and limited phases in life following some trauma or challenge in life that sustains temporarily and if only, we could sustain that vigor for a lifetime, what a name we could make of ourselves. But anyways the silver lining is all of us have that in ourselves – what it is required to be Godlike. As Achilles quotes in Troy - I'll tell you a secret, something they don't teach you in your temple. The gods envy us. They envy us because we're mortal, because any moment might be our last.
Dedicated to that passion that gave life to veins someday and that which is due for a return before death.
Dedicated to that someday!
