The Wish & The Battle Inside

How we keep postponing happiness and make it almost an elusive in an attempt to achieve something else. Some people look around and find a million miseries, some find a million joys... Some find the joys as small and ephemeral and , some capture even the smallest moments as everlasting smiles.

I was about to finish reading 'A Thousand Splendid Suns' by Khaled Hosseini today but with just 30-40 odd pages remaining I gave up. My heart was so burdened that I could not take it anymore, it almost felt like my heart crying and a thousand tears flooding it. This is one reason why I like reading... I like reading for understanding life. As life has uncountable experiences and even in a million lifetime I will not be able to experience all. Through books I can feel, I can feel the pain, the tears, the joy, the defeat, the victory. I am very selective about what I read and I get connected to books and the characters while I read them. I often find book sharing my emotions and touching me in a way that I almost find myself as a character in the book, living, breathing... In this book that I read, I found such a desperate struggle for life and such endurance of a human being that I could not surmise it in words. You have to read it and feel it for yourself. And read you must ...

Jah chah waha rah (where there is a will, there is a way)... I have heard this one way back in my school, read in stories about it and always thought of it to be some alien concept as I had a will but I missed my way. When I was in school and I got first ranks, I got this good feeling of all the things that I could be and then I never became any of them. I was just carrying my dreams but stuck with life essentials not knowing how and when to make them real. After I landed up in my new job I decided to fulfill the dream that I carried with me for long.. to teach.. to teach with a motive to achieve still something bigger, to educate the countrymen in an attempt to make my country a better place, with good government, clean environment, peace-loving people and much more. It's a little beginning at the moment with the kids of a school but I am gaining a lot of confidence and belief with each passing day. The bunch of kids I started with were very poor in studies and after putting in ...

My days could not be much brighter than this, this phase of my life is not Pursuit of Happyness but it is indeed Happiness surrounding me. I could not thank God enough for giving me this phase and I with Him, would also like to thank His most lovely creation- kids. The moment I enter the class I can see all tiredness rushing out of me and a new zeal fills up my body. I am greeted cheerfully by all and then I start with my regular activity with select kids. By now I have interacted with most of them and have assessed where they stand in terms of their studies. It feels good to know that most of them are good learners and are fairing pretty well. With a few of them, we are working hard and possibly we'll get through. These kids have highly influenced me with their way of living. How I almost forgot that I was a kid once and with time I have grown up into an adult and forgotten almost all the good qualities I was blessed with. There is this kid Ravi to whom I was teaching the other d...

Today I finally started off with my first day of TFI volunteer, at a proper school in Pune. Got up early and by 7.30 I was in action.. I reached this school at a calm place surrounded by greenery but this green was not managed, it covered half of what the school termed as a playing ground. Some kids here had broken slippers, some had no uniforms and some even had no pencils to write.. My own school days flashed in my mind and down from memory lane I remembered how I used to throw tantrums about the kind of pencil box, lunch box, bag I wanted to carry at school. These kids can't afford the tantrums. I lost and broke hundreds of bottles in school and every time got a new Milton one but they carry with them not to be reused cold-drink bottles. I was there till 10 and had to leave then for my regular office.. I so wished to stay there, it feels like an unfinished business. The fellows Kaushik and Swati are doing an excellent job there. I had four weak ones, lagging from the rest of t...

Quoting from a newspaper: "India is being shamed globally. It has been shamed by politicians and officials who have been exposed as callous and inept, and possibly* corrupt. Now India stands humiliated. The world knows the bridge we build collapse; that we cannot even keep loos clean. Who is responsible for the national shame? The guilty must be identified and brought to book. It may not store our reputation, but it atleast will show that we, as a nation, value our honour." Some remarkable statements made by the Indian officials: Lalit Bhanot(OC Secy Gen)- It is not such a big issue which we should be ashamed of... Westerners have different standards(of hygiene), we have different standards. Sheila Dixit (Delhi's Chief Minister), Suresh Kalmadi(OC Boss), Jaipal Reddy and MS Gill(central ministers) are either trying to hide behind the closet or prooffering ridiculous excuses in order to explain away their incompetence. Every inch of their soul is plagued ...

Moving on... is what you say but for me it was a ' bereavement'. This is what happens to me when I get connected. Is connection good or bad? Depends... how you take it. For me connection comes from heart. I came here with a friend and when I left I had so many people around me who brought tears in my eyes while saying goodbye. Being a man I had to control my emotions and move on without tears in my eyes...  MOVE ON.   This is the second time when I felt like moving away from family...  Nitin Sir you became a father figure for me. Prashant Sir that calmness you carried, you are a gem. Ketan Sir practicality and compassion... my first PM. Prem Sir for being there, a brother whom I never had, a brother who fought with me, debated with me. Sudip, Vinit, Sid for being the friends who kept me alive, my naughtiness going... you smiled at my first imperfection, I adopted that imperfection as a part of me, and captured your smiles. Yogesh, Jaspal, Giridhar, Kolan for being my...