The story of Archana

I am Archana - Akka. Studying in 6th standard in Glorious Techno School. And then she goes back to her own work unlike the others who were taught to crouch and sit after lunch in their bunker rooms so that visitors come and meet them and get introduced to them. And why this discipline - so that they can please the "Visitors". So accustomed they were to this word. It seemed to please a visitor was the sole aim of their Lives - which again I didn't know how long would last.

Well yes - an NGO i have been wanting to go for long. And especially one which housed children affected from HIV AIDS. The kids who were separated form their parents (as they themselves had died owing to AIDS) and their families obviously owing to social taboos associated with this disease. I was prepared for a trip, an experience, which would move me by maybe seeing the kids who I was expecting to have been affected by the symptoms of HIV or AIDS. But the experience was so different. Seeing the kids in the NGO, I felt these kids are so lucky to be living in the situation in which they are. Right from the food that they ate to the toys they played with or the schools they went to study, there was no discrimination or compromise with the quality. Aloof of the disease which has caused them to be a part and member of the bigger family, the life they led - am sure in normal conditions they wouldn't have been offered the same.

To quote - one kid was all decked up - why because he was going to meet the superstar Telugu hero - Ram Charan. Having a small piece of paper in his pocket to get his autograph he seemed all set to maybe have an experience of his lifetime. I wonder while he would be traveling for his tete-a-tete with Ram Charan, what all thoughts would be coming to his mind. What were in his stars that he ended up with a fate like this - to be separated from his roots and come live with a bunch of other kids, make awesome friends, be educated, cut birthday cakes every year and then become one of the lucky ones to meet the superstar.

And then I meet Archana, who sat beside me in the van while going to her school. She had struck me during her introduction, maybe I found her smarter than the lot. And then she hit off with me well - and how? Her love for watches and sharing the same birthdate was more than enough. Then I wanted to continue further asking her some more questions - when I stopped at one point, when I had this question in my mind - What do you aim to be when you are big enough? Didn't know if I should have proceeded with that question - for yes maybe I saw these kids living life normally, going to school and learning the same things like normal kids do, growing up like healthy kids do making me forget that HIV might take its toll anytime, anyday. Unaware, untouched by that thought, they still lead their lives happily, pray everyday during meals and make us, humans around them happier with their gestures, spreading all the more happiness and love around and most importantly inspiring us to live life with gratitude.

The fatality of ignoring our night-watchers!!

As I made my way amidst the hills of Yumthang valley and the other picturesque sites of Sikkim, I realised that the much anticipated trip was turning out to be little dangerous and lesser on the sight-seeing part. All owing to the narrow frozen roads amidst the hills, the pathways which could make anybody lose the lives of those who tread on it by a mere slip of the grip of the gear.

While I tried to keep myself calm by taking Allah's name all throughout the life-taking journey, I realised that even if we all transformed ourselves to the most adventurous and risk taking individuals, we wouldn't have dared to go beyond a point. And when we reach that point, we notice huge trucks and jeeps carrying the daily necessities of the armymen. And then I sit and realise why am i even scared. There are our night-watchers who valiantly and smoothly go travel all across these narrow life-taking roads just to save our lives. Living in bunkers in areas with the rarest of life to be seen. No electricity, no water, no food and all of it in temperatures which keep me clothed in minimum 4 layers of woolens.

Is that a life we all grow up thinking we would want someday? A life of not taking showers regularly, a life of living in negative temperatures, a life of living in closed spaces, a life of living away from your close and dear ones, a life which you know might end anytime any moment. And what do they get? What is it that keeps them driving? When I as a normal human was waiting for the trip to the hills to get over so that I am done living amidst the ruthless cold no matter how pleasing the snow-covered hills might have been, these night-watchers have made it their rozi-roti.

And when you read an article after coming back, that the wages of the night-watchers of India's borders have not been deservingly laid out, the incentives have been drstically reduced and all of this, infact, fails to be noticed amidst all the hullaballoo of the AAP and Congress and BJP making scathing attacks on each other and all the news channel getting the necessary TRP out of it. The article left me with the thought- where has our Indianhood been lost amidst all these. Why do we run after things which are in the moment and not care about things which require more attention. As Indians we get affected by seeing movies made of war and borders and armymen, but the impression is just to make the movie-makers earn their hard-earned money. Why cant we actually bother to cause to make things easier for our night-watchers who are there on their own- and yes all on their own. A mere trip was sufficient to make me realise what keeps us safe through the night, as our night watchers guard us amidst the terrible and most terrible of livelihoods.

At this point, we indeed have to understand that a Government doesn't become a common man's Govt until it caters to the most unnoticed and yet the most severest of issues. A leader can't be crowned a king just by making his followers rebel against the tenets of dictatorship but by bringing to light the most unnoticed things which have the maximum lives of our citizens at stake. Time to arise, time to get enlightened, time to make our night-watchers get the maximum out of their duties and make them earn more not in money but in pride.

Why fear the life of a Wanderer?

I hate this. Being driven to write a blog by seeing another blog post. A blog post in the lines of one which had always been in my mind since quite long flashes infront of me and urges me to write mine. That's a shame but yes can't really help this nature of mine which will unfold into blaming my schedule, my otherwise piled up tasks and pretentiously seeming list of priorities.

Well if it wasn't for a movie, a friend, a situation this impulse wouldn't have come. The impulse of yes, i can do it. I might be belittling myself by saying that it was just another bollywood drama which got this craving in me. But for a girl who hates travelling, the mere term named journey used to get her into her blankets and go into hibernation. But then the thought shouldn't just stop at the idea but should go forward. That requires planning and that's where I again want to go disjoint. Why plan?? Planing it out causes one to think within restrictions and makes one create apprehensions of the edges and boundaries being broken down by extrusions. As one good friend had someday said, my life is planned and that's what makes it boring."

Nothing said and done. Coing across a quote: "Drink every bit of the present and let it seep through you that even when your soul parts from your body it lingers in your bones", there is nothing less in me which doesn't urges me to move forward if not anything. When I see the graveyard by my window there is now an urge in me to go explore it experience the silence of the place, the serenity. The place Shillong never seemed so explorable until my friend who came down to this place all the way from an all india tour started carving out more beautiful pictures of this place than me who already spent her life growing up in and around this place.

Even when Andre Agassi loathed Tennis and still could arose as world no. 1, what's the harm in trying to break one simple conviction of travelling that one extra mile- unplanned and uncalled for. No awards, no laurels are there but the mere satisfaction of having taken that first step is worth enough to discover thyself underneath the baggage.

The only thing of lament persisting now is that it still requires that movie, that lady sitting beside a tomb to realize peace, a friend travelling unplanned, unscheduled - to inspire me. Nevertheless, hoping the inspiration takes shape to nurture further inspirations not for the world but for me alone to build that wall around me which I don't fear to leap over.

Life and its Unpredictability

Whilst all of the “Mahowl” of gearing up before the much-awaited internship phase of a lot of us, I just try to get myself all energized by conserving all of the energy by sleeping and relaxing and reminiscing all of the moments lived, experienced in the past one year. Just when you think of it you are struck by one massive force of life- its unpredictability.

Talking to a dear friend after ages; you are all set to listen to him bashing you up for being all busy all the time; but quite unexpectedly everything he says simply makes me feel all the more special and just makes me miss him, miss the good old days of chaddy buddying et al.

You wake up the other morning to the birth of two babies who have respectively brought immense joy to the lives of your cousin’s family as well as your friend’s family. That very moment you realize that its not always additions that life gives in form of its surprises. “Life Subtracts” too – well validated in the form of losing a friend in a massacre just before the term ends. Well that’s how life makes its calculations.

Life and its forces! You go meet up new faces- new born babies and as the day dries up you meet an old lady all fine physically but alas, she’s struck with Alzheimer- hardly can she recognize her own son, and to the dismay of many, nobody can say the reason behind her this state. A state totally attributed to life’s unpredictable forces.

An IIM Shillong phase un-awaited, uncalled for- and whoa! After one year I am sulking at the thought of not being able to live that life for two months. A lot of speculations over the one year; being a part of a committee learning to live with people’ expectations; trying to fulfill not only one’s own dreams but also others’, your learning curve definitely takes a high. Never indeed had I thought that after leaving a professional experience of 11 months one would get into a heavier dose of the professional experience and that too in the midst of academia. All through being part of one committee. Was that indeed possible in this year; I still am anticipating!!

Wanting to get internship in Bangalore and ending up in Delhi instead makes me complain; but here again I am sure that the void would be filled by life’s unpredictability. Bonding up with old friends after long, opening up to a whole new place and most importantly a 2-month period filled with experimentations is what I am looking forward to. After all life isn’t about bargaining alone. Sometimes without bargaining we get what we need and sometimes getting after bargaining also doesn’t pay off well. So, let unpredictability take its toll and thou shalt I myself roll!

To Randomness and Spacebound!!

Listening to the song "Spacebound" on replay, feeling all happy and trippy(not that i am drunk), but all in a different way; a way unexplained and uninterpreted just felt and felt by all your senses. Yes I am talking of the randomness which life gifts you, a bag full of randomness. Wish to have it or not, you'll still be blessed with it.

And why this craze, why to be so RANDOM, when life can seem perfect all organized to the minutest detail. BLAH! The simple answer is live the simple way- live it with randomness; no rules, no obligations, no boundaries - and am not talking of boundaries set by others, but by yourself. Its all about letting loose, letting it go, enjoying the small things of life. Like a friend said - "dinner parties...well ya they are good, but roadside junkies make life more spicy and F.U.N.!!"

If randomness had to write an autobiography on itself , it would say bunk - randomness doesn't exist in reading or writing, or in expressing - it simply can't be captured within the pages of a book; impossible to be bound within its covers. It is a one-way affair; totally. Just a doer and a roller coaster ride to make him take the trail, the unseen, the untaken and the uncertain.

Emotions, Expectations, Aspirations - well flashy right! All that matters is simply the urge to be happy and smile forever. Life without "Control", life full of "Freedom". Oops I forgot freedom doesn't even exist as its antonym is equally vanished from the book of life. Thats the transient mode one gets transferred to - that's what i call Spacebound.

And that's when you call yourself as the master of your fate, the captain of your soul!!

Choice! How right is it to make the right one?

Choices. What is it about making one? Why is life always up with choices? Why is it that when we have we are confused and when we don't we crave for them? Irony of living it is. Why can't life just give us one plain choice and make a straight easy way through it?

Well, only if life were so easy. It stands as a challenge for us by giving us a plethora of choices, when we do not need even a few. And gives us none when we crave for them. And most strikingly, when we are just trying to figure out a way through making the right choice we fail to realize that the best one just passed by and we missed it. And by the time we actually grasp ourselves back to this realization, we tend to ignore the ones remaining and lament at the one which we missed. Alas! real blasphemy it turns out in the end.

But still we have winners amongst us. And its not that the winners made the right choice. They converted the choices that they had into the right ones for them in the long run. That's how life is. Not about making the right choice but to survive with what we have and make the best out of it.

The option in front of us shouldn't decide what is best for us. It should be us who should convert the selected option as the best one. Mastering that art decides the winner.

Only if one learnt not to care much and be happy with what one had there wouldn't have been all this confusion but then what is that life which is not bothered with challenges and hurdles to strive further and further. What is that life which doesn't teach us to learn to fail and fail till we succeed.

Finally, in an urge to succeed, we chose to live and live with choices. What we learn eventually in the process of living is to be the writer of our fate and not let fate be the decider of our way of leading life. Life sets itself up in a way that tames us to mould it for our good, the ones who get tamed and carve the best artifacts out of it, end up taming life.

Indian women and sports

Okay, the title at the first glimpse might give you the impression of a truly feminist article coming up. Well, I wouldn't really defend in that case. But yes 100% assertion to this notion is also not there. I chanced upon writing an article on this subject after having read an article on the same lines by a writer of the opposite sex. You won't call him a feminist right? So, spare me also from the same honor.

However getting back to the point, why at all sports and why relate it to the gender presumed to be the weaker of the two sexes? Well here I would disagree with my own statement. Weaker? Why would that status be accorded to? Well maybe so, when comparison is done with men. But the discussion is not about comparing men with women. Its about Indian Sportswomen and their contemporaries outside.

Well, when we see the laurels and ranks achieved by our female sports fraternity, who would not strike a pride of honor. We have PT Usha missing an Olympic Bronze by a fraction of a second, Anju Bobby Geroge being the first Indian Athlete to win a medal in World Championships in Athletics. Saina Nehwal, having acquired the World No 2 ranking, Mary Kom, 5-time World's Boxing Championship. What more do you need?

This indeed shows that Indian women have the potential for grabbing more and adding more to the hall of fame of Indian Sports. Despite being born in a country known to have always outcast or neglected the apparently "weaker sex", we have names from this sex which would always be remembered not just by those aware in sports' trivia, but by all Indians.

Even within a state, I have witnessed my fellow friend who was state no 1 in Lawn tennis and then she went on to be India No 2. The same couldn't be said for the boys who played Lawn tennis in our state. So this in itself shows that once proper attention is shown to this section of the sports fraternity we can count more laurels for our nation.

Why stay behind, just by thinking it's after all women's sports? When we have women's football team at world no 53 and men's at world no 154, we can have many more such comparisons. But this isn't really a time to compare which sex is better, or which one has contributed more to the world of sports. Its more about exploiting the best out of the current situation, grooming the best talent, make the best possible efforts to let every girl try every sport she wants to. Because she has it in herself. Its just the spark which she needs. And believe me as a girl, when it comes to feminism, proving our worth is all that matters.