Did I do something wrong?

In the past few months, I encountered a dilemma twice - Am I doing something wrong? Let me share the instances first.

Incident # 1

I was in Lucknow for Diwali and going to Gomti Nagar by my scooter. On one road, there was some barricading , leaving a part of road open. Since there was no sign like no entry or one way, I entered the road. However, it was a one way. I was told that the traffic police do not put up a sign so that the targets of challan can be achieved. At the end of the road, there were two constables for checking papers. Although my scooter doesn't have a problem of throwing excess smoke, it didn't had a pollution control certificate either. More problematically, the insurance was also expired and neither me nor anybody back home renewed it.
So finally, there were two options for me - first, get a challan, leave my papers with traffic police, pay some 1350 bucks in penalty, go to their office, and get the papers back after three days, as the office was closed for Diwali; and second - slip a 100 bucks to the constable and drive away in peace.
I chose the latter. Although I picked the most convenient option and there are a lot of justifications, like - it was 'wasooli' time and there was no signboard to declare it one-way. But somehow, no justification works when I feel guilty for bribing.

Incident # 2
I was in Vadodara, roaming around after a day long conference. I saw a small roadside 'gumti' selling dry fruits . It was run by a lady with two small and cute kids. It would obviously be difficult for her to sustain household with two kids. With this impulsive thought, I decided to buy some dry fruits from her. However, as my stuff was being packed, handcart-pullers standing nearby started running in one direction. It was a policeman removing them all from there, including the dry fruit shop. At that moment, I encountered the dilemma - am I helping a poor lady to sustain or am I encouraging encroachment? Finally, I took the stuff but got hooked to this chaos within.

I am sure that there was something wrong on my part on both the times. What I am not sure of is how wrong was I. There are deeper connotations as well but let those be food for thought for all of us.

The first blog

It's been almost three years, when I first tried my hands on blogging during my second term at IIMA. Soon after I left the whole blogging business and got busy again in the whole load of course work.
And yesterday, I found that long lost forgotten blog again. It was a surprise and a good one at that. There were only two posts and both full of nostalgia, even the title of the blog. With years passing by, the intensity of that nostalgia has definitely gone down but all that came rushing to me for once after reading this page.
By the way, that trip to Mumbai never took place and I went back home yet again to recuperate my operated toe.

26 January 2013

This is the date I had decided in 1999 after reading the story 'After Twenty Years' for all the friends to meet up. Yes, it wouldn't be twenty years but long enough to see us all meet our destiny. Somehow, the plan never took off.

This diwali, I tried organizing a get-together sort of reunion of the Lucknow University group - tried including all the friends who were in Lucknow at that time - 5 out of 12, and four of us finally joined. We sat for hours, chatted, discussed, teased, and shared. It was nice and nostalgic but at the same time, I couldn't help missing others too. Out of the missing, there is no news of two of us and two of us chose to connect selectively. Two are out of India and one was out of Lucknow.

Gunjan blew off the idea of 2013 reunion. He said that if he is a friend, he'll remain in touch and if not, he won't come anyways. I think he was right. Sometimes we have to let go and move on. There is hardly any sense in clinging to relations that aren't... and those that matter remain alive despite whatever.

There is this 1968 classic novel by Russell Braddon, titled When the Enemy Is Tired. Based on a prisoner-of-war's survival story, the novel subtly passes on the art of psychological battling. However, I'm recalling this novel today after reading over a year and a half ago because of one thought suddenly erupting inside my head.

In the novel, the protagonist, a military high-ranker, hesitates and fumbles in answering any question to anyone for one reason only - he was punitively taught in his childhood not to answer back any elder.

Somehow, someone somewhere sometime taught me something too - not to ask for anything. And just like the protagonist of that novel, who failed to answer the easiest of the questions due to a simple childhood preaching, I always fail to ask for anything. Now, perhaps, you'd know why I couldn't ask for your love ever.

P.S. to Publish (ed) (ing)

As if they were watching! So after one year of accepting my poem, Kadambini published it in October 2008 issue with editing out some key lines.

And yes, I got a letter of appreciation for Bonsai - a postcard shown here. Feels good again :)

गुंच आ के याफ़्त मी ना शवद आनम आर्ज़ूस्त

"It is more difficult and more bitter when a man fails alone."

Things Fall Apart, Chinua Achebe

"I'll end up alone, just like he did. Our trains on the same track. Ya sure, I am coming up thirty years behind but stops are all the same... bitter town, alone ville, hermit junction."

Chandler Bing (F. R.I.E.N.D.S., Season 2, The One Where Heckles Dies)

"It was a moment unlike anything Adi had experienced before. He raised his hands and started laughing even as tears raced down his face. His heart was bursting with happiness. He had never experienced so much joy in his life. He needed to share it with someone...someone close."

Bombay Rains Bombay Girls, Anirban Bose

I had decided for quite long now that I'd live alone and remain single. I was sure that I'll be fine, as I have my family and my friends and my students, and all of them love me. But then, you know how life sometimes gives us a reality check in the most innocuous and imperceptible ways. And as a consequence of the direct interventions of superior powers, one more of my percepts lies shattered...

Thence, I decided that despite being a loner at heart, I don't want to end up alone. There were times when this solitude was no longer so enjoyable, for it got immersed in loneliness. Those were the unnerving times and I felt like Chandler Bing.

Realizing that, I further realized that there lies the real irony of life.......

P.S. - The title is a phrase from Persian and literally means, "I am searching for the one, I know I may never find."

Publish (ed) (ing)

Kadambini accepted a poem for publication more than a year ago and it is yet to be published, so my first literary publication now belongs to Vagarth. And after that, another joy came today, when I got my first Real call of appreciation.

A critique-writer, completely unknown thus far, called me to appreciate my first ever publication - the Hindi Story Bonsai in Vagarth (October 2008) issue. In the past two weeks, I have got loads of congrats, appreciations, and applauds from friends and family; and I suppose, most of it was customary and out of courtesy. But getting an applause from a professional reviewer is really great.

And this is for the story I never really considered among my best works. In fact, both of my creations accepted for publication thus far are such. I never really liked either but submitted these only for publication coz of better salability. And the ones I really love and consider to be my best were never sent for publication, although I am pretty sure that those ones won't be accepted at all. Nonetheless, my favorites remain my favorites. Perhaps because when I read those ones now, I witness and relive those emotions, which obviously neither possible nor expected from others.

However, finally, after so long a rumination, I've decided to put up my poetry on a blog, to publish whichever I like the most among my poetry.