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Thursday, April 15, 2010

Paanch Saal ke Baadh : Vishu@Home

Waking up with mom's moist hands on my eyes making sure i wont open them until i reach the 'kani' set before our gods in the pooja room. Thick aroma of incense stick and fresh fruits all over the room. Ammamma as usual at her cheerful self munching a few 'mantras' and praying in her affectative ways. Meanwhile amma whispering 'open your eyes with prayers' on my ears. With a childish eager as i open my eye i see the 'vishukkani' set and decorated in the most subtle manner. Miles of Travel, Jetlag, eta's at work all these worldly headaches disappear for a few moments. We live for these small happinesses in life it could be a hug, a smile or even a beautiful sight such as this. I could not believe i have been escaping from this for last 5 years with an excuse tag 'busy at work'. 'VishuKaiNeettam' from elders at home, the only time the youngest in the family works as a boon for you. And the same line from acha after so many years 'spend it wisely'...lmao. Missed my sister 'Shyama' the only person i can give 'VishuKaiNeettam' in my family. After lighting a few pollution friendly crackers and gazing at those colours in the sky it was time to visit temples. Kalpathy also known as 'South Kasi' has more number of temples in a square kilometre than any other place in the world. With gods from each and every sect represented in the most ubiquitious ways. In my childhood i used to cycle from one temple to other for collecting 'prasadam' for my ammamma or for fake blessings while examinations. The ground infront of the temple is empty i wonder what these kids are upto these days? Moving like a battalion of ants from one temple to another in an ominous and pious atmosphere. No loudspeakers yelling out 'bhajans' and neither i see a big crowd pushing each other to reach to god first like a school race competition. All i see is a bunch of people with sandalwood pastes on their forehead and necks cladden on their new bright dresses. They are happy for what god has provided them today and it smelt like a visit and less of a ritual. Once back from temples, preparing coffee for everyone at home as a sign of my offering to all in our family and friends (9 to be intact). Visited my old buddies Raman and Shankars houses. If some one asks me who has been with you in your thick and thin's i would have a whole list of friends, but raman and shankar will be very close to my family's name. Their family is my extended family and am always welcome their at any times. Speaking long hours about 'Amerika', 'Obama' , 'Columbus Cricket', 'Alliances' time just whizzed by. On my way back visited Vijesh's house, my friend who will miss all the coming Vishu's and Onam's on earth. Dude must be watching us over from heaven and having a good time out there. Day was enlightened by 'gazzetted officer' friend Sreejith. He is an inspiration to us all for whatever he has achieved and still going great guns with it. Never seen a more thankful person in life, when we all thank those who have helped us in life in any small ways here is a person who thanks the each and every incidents and stays optimistic through out. Acha was cracking jokes about KSEB and the way they function, Sreejith made sure he complimented each of them with some deft examples. Mails, Phone calls from friends and that culminated my Vishu@home after 5 effin long years. Now i am preparing myself for Onam@home after 5 years. Will upload the pics soon and link it here...with them the whole blog will have more meaning to it.

Tuesday, April 6, 2010

Its Raining Kids

Hahaha the thought of it makes me laugh. Takes me through all those funny days we all spent together and how fast life is changing. A big percentage of my friend circle are either married or engaged. So there was a time along last year or two when i would see a new wedding invitation in my inbox every week or so. It could be my school friends, college mate or a colleague. As true Indians not a single one of them is wasting no time what so ever. I mean literally these days i get informed of happy news from every nook and corner. 'Da i am gonna be a father','Mother of an Angel', 'Sowmya is pregnant', 'By september i will be blessed by a kid', 'August 13 is her due date', 'May end to June early plan to make a visit Uncle' and the best of the lot 'Yes it happened'. Lot of good news all around and in a way it puts added pressure on my bachelorhood. There is a saying in hindi 'Bhagwaan jab bhi deta hein Chappar phaad ke Dethaa hein' it means whenever God gives you something he basically tears down the roof and let it rain on you. And it will be a tough ask to get these fine gentlemen and women of the next generation to call me 'ettan' (bigbrother) and not 'ammavan' (uncle). You all know am still a kid at heart :)

Monday, April 5, 2010

Three idiots or We idiots?

Aamir Khan, RajKumar Hirani and VidhuVinod Chopra garnered all the praise and accolades for the hit movie of 2009 '3 Idiots'. A movie made with a lot of heart and as any other movie from Mr.Hirani a lot of melodrama and a genuine social message. Well the social message part is where i am getting into. Movie basically says one must follow his/her heart and set goals which would keep him happy forever rather than seeking goals set by your parents and the society in general. Also it takes a dig at our educational system where we create a lot of 'blind followers' where in we must create 'free thinkers'. Thats when i gave a hard thought on why the heck am I a Software Engineer. Where in i should have followed my heart to become a '????????' Well i have no idea what i could have become not that still i can't. Time for a flash back.

In my childhood i wanted to become a pilot as i used to look at my dad in Airforce uniform and felt very proud about it. Though i later realised he was a field officer and never flew a jet. Someday i heard my grandfather boasting about Rajiv Gandhi to his drinking mates. Being a pakka congresswaalah he spoke in great regards about our then Prime Minister. That year in my class i proclaimed 'I wanna be the PM of my country' in some 'What do you want to be ??(timepass session)' conducted by our Princepal. Years went by and my love to sports kept increasing by leaps and bounds which made me think 'i should be a football player like Baggio or a cricketer like Cairns'. I thought for a few months 'this is it' a few heroics at local matches made me think am the king at sports. But once i started playing at different places around school and district tournaments common sense prevailed. And a one on one discussion wit my good friend Ramakrishnan cleared my head. His analogy was that 'You need a lot of contacts and hold to excel in sports or you need genuine talent unluckily we dont have both and we cant risk our lives for a non-existing future'. We were just 16 or 17 but i was amazed by his incisive lecture. So then again here we go back to square one.

After being rejected by National Defense Academy i have no other options left other than becoming an Engineer. Luckily all my friends were good at Science and Maths so i kinda studied with them moreover i couldn't have asked for a better group of teachers who taught me in Class XI and XII. Somehow i scraped through engineering entrance and thought of engineering as a backup plan. After 1 more year i'll give another try to NDA or will prepare for  IAS (lol). But the moment i set foot on NSS College of Engineering i was owned by it. There are some places you fall in love with the moment you set foot there, well my college was that for me. And then i had to do something with my life after engineering. I was good at computers (not very good) and a bit more at writing. I gave a few tries to write a book on something but lack of ideas and drive purged that vision as well. So computers it is and here i am with leading software company of India.

Moral of my idiotic story and many others who dont belong to the '3 idiots' category is that though we see a 1000 options at various moments of our life we cannot help ourselves by not taking the easy escape route and its funny many call it 'fate'. To become a 3 idiot one needs a lot of attitude, courage, foresight and a bit of luck. Not to forget the risk of ending up empty handed after all this. But the route which we take is a safe play, minimal-risk-maximum-fortune-wala one. And above all it fits like a 'T' into our Middle Class existence. So to all the 'We' idiots please do not have qualms on what ever you do and who ever you are today. Bolo 'All iz Well'.

'Give me some sunshine
Give me some rain,
Give me another chance,
I wanna grow up once again..(yea!! probably to take the same turns yet again in life)