Life of insanity !!

Just finished reading Paulo Coehlo's Veronica decides to die . I find that I always find his passages very impactful . He has a amazing was of putting down life's great truths with some very simple words.

I have great respect for authors that can use simple words to convey the whole gamut of life. I always joke that I will one day sue authors ( primarily technical )who use really complicated terminology to communicate something really simple just for the heck of sounding intelligent. There is that complete other array of authors who try to make life sound more depressing that it is , the crime in their novels sounds more treacherous than it is ..all the stories are in darker shades of black ( i.e if there can be a shade darker than black , wherein lies the irony of their stories I believe ) . I can only manage detest for these authors.

Nyways coming back to this novel , I would think everyone should give this book a read , it very powerfully communicates the inevitability of dealth . If all of us believed our lives would end tmrw they would be so different , we will have not time for anything negative after all there is just one day left ...no one wants to die crying !!.

Rest I will leave it to Coehlo's words to communicate the meaning . This is written by a lady who had resorted to a life in mental asylum just because she found it too tough to go back to a normal society and confirming to the rules of the society . She thought living in a asylum was more of living because you got to be as insane as you wanted to and no one questioned it . But then because of a new young girl in the asylum who is about to die in a day she starts re-evaluating her understanding of life and insanity.

" But yesterday because of a piano and a young woman who is probably dead by now , i learned somthing very imp : Life inside is exactly same as the life outside . Both there and here people gather together in groups , they build their walls and allow nothing strange to trouble their mediocre existences. They do things becuase they're used to doing them , they study useless subjects , they have fun because they're suppossed to have fun and the rest of the world can go hang let them sort themselves out. At the very most they watch the news on television as we often did as confirmation of their happiness in a world full of problems and injustices."

The year of Art !!

I have decided to get back to writing my blog more often . I have so many interesting experiences happening around me and it would be a shame not to put them down in words .

I have been practically attending some or the other concert or a show every other week this past month . Added to that there has been the carnatic music class , the dance practices and the so called impromptu artsy stuff . It started with the Beyonce concert , that would be a tough act to beat in the shows i will ever witness in my life . The spectacle that was created in that live show was spectacular . The shows that came after that have been fun but now get compared each time to the Beyonce show and thus lose the race .

But then through all this there has been a new understanding or art and music . That art is of the higher realm , to be able to produce some kind of art a person needs to much more touch with his inner self , away from the head and able to listen to the voices around and inside him .

That is probably the reason why a brilliant piece of music or a wonderful piece of art has the capacity to instantly touch people because it touches the core of what we are and does not pertain to the logical understanding that each one of us develops out of our own accord.

Found this poem in my notes . Its in the book "Eleven minutes" . A simple and beautiful poem

For I am the first and the last

I am the venerated and the despised

I am the prostitute and the virgin

I am the mother and the daughter

I am the arms of my mother

I am barren and my children are many

I am the married woman and the spinster

I am the woman who gives birth and she

Who never procreated

I am the consolation for the pain of birth

I am the wife and the husband

And it was my man who created me

I am the mother of my father

I am the sister of my husband

And he is my rejected son

Always respect me

For I am the shameful and the magnificent one

Hymn to Isis , third or fourth century BC

Destiny

One of our all time favorite topics . Is there something called destiny , do we create our own destiny , is it all upto us ?

For me my opinion on destiny has been changing over the years but the pattern has been somewhat like this . When things are going great then it is I create my own destiny , when things hit a rough patch or more accurately when I have trouble keeping up with some of my tough decisions , then it is destiny and that is how it was meant to happen .

So past few years have gotten me to think on this subject believing and unbelieving it at the same time . It was only recently when I read an excerpt by Jaggi Vasudev that something struck a cord . He says 100 years ago if a 4 year kid died of a disease we would say it is his destiny . Today we have methods to make sure that a 4 year old kid does not die , what happened to his destiny now , we have changed our destinies.

Man has been meddling with nature in so many ways , when the first ice age occurred that destroyed all dinosaurs it was the destiny of dinosaurs . But now if we drown due to global warming it is destiny , we have created this . Man is becoming his own creator in certain ways .

As we are becoming more aware of our surrounding and the laws that guide it , a lot of things are coming out of the purview of destiny . It is only the things that we dnt understand that still fall under the label of destiny .

The thing that got me thinking more deeply on this was showing of horoscopes before marriage that is still very religiously followed in india . 50 years back a girl was married of to a guy from one of the families that were related to us or stayed in the same village as us . That was the extent of our social circle and so the girl's destiny lay in that village . Now we use the internet to find matches and are reaching out to people who we could not have contacted or even thought about 50 years back . So internet has changed our destinies in a certain way . Even after meddling with our destinies in so many ways we still believe that the stars above will tell us how each one of our lives are going to be .

Sadhguru says if you were to leave your life and death both in the hands of the creater then you can say " Ohh this is my destiny and this is how it is supposed to be " but now we want to meddle with our lives as well as our death and still believe destiny will take care of everything .

Maybe that to an extent is the problem with India too , we still believe God will come and take care of everything for us . It is high time we realize he will not , either we stop changing all of his creations to suit us ( which we would not ...) or take things into our hands and build them up responsibly.

Miracles do happen

I wrote the last blog about how I had decided not to run the race and was really disappointed about it . My friends and my sister kept telling me till the end something would work out but I was the one who had run with painful knee and I knew this was not something that is going to work out .

The come friday I just dropped in my running shoes , just incase I felt like running . So while driving to duluth my friends kept coaxing me alteast run a mile , how can you stand there and look at those people who are running ...all the while i kept saying ya we will see . I was so terrified I will have to make a decision in the morning about running the race that I could not sleep the whole night . I kept looking at the alarm clock just hoping it will not go off .

So when I got up in the morning the easiest thing seemed to be to just put on my race clothes, get there on track and hope that I can pull myself to the 3rd mile so that my friends can come and pick me up .

Well the race started and in no time I was at the 3 mile marker , my friends were out there waiting for me , surprisingly no pain yet ..i told them meet me at 5 mile marker , i will drop out there ... they met me again at the 6 mile marker , no pain still . I told myself if I can make it to 7 miles without any pain I am finishing this race by hook or crook . So miles kept going on and I managed to run all of . All the while I kept telling myself this could not be happening , this is a miracle and I am so happy I am a part of it .

In retrospect it just seems like if you really want to do something , things have a way of turning out ..my sister kept telling me that all along and then all the wonderful friends I have who gave me the push at the right moment . Had they not pushed me I would have been standing on the sidelines wondering how it would have been if I had run .

The more I run the more it is turning out to be life changing for me . Running no longer is about physical fitness , it has a lot more surreal experiences attached to it and I am lucky to have experienced them .

Disappointment

Ok , so I never thought not being able to run the half marathon would be a thing that will cause me so much grief . I actually cried coz I am able to do it which surprised me a little coz I am not the one to get all cry baby if small things dnt work out .

Thats when I realized how big a deal this half marathon has become in my life . It has become a part of my identity , defining the person I am and seperating me from people around me .

When I finished my 10 mile run last year , it was accomplishment that stood way up all other stuff and I wanted to top that with the 13 mile this year . Although I started training officially only 2 months back , all this while I have been doing stuff to get my body in good shape for this year .

And the last thing I thought would just happened . I got a runner's knee which prevents me from doing the thing that I want to do right now ..run . I still did not give up.. new shoes , swimming , rehab exercises and a hope that all will turn out well kept me going .

Then it all came down to yesterday , if I can run 3 miles without pain today I told myself I will run the half marathon on saturday . 2 miles down , all well , no pain ...i thot this is it and then quarter a mile later the pain came back again from nowhere . Thats it all my hope was broken there .

I still have a choice I can go sweat it out and see if I can run the half marathon or just listen to my body right now and say probably this is not the right time .

But i guess this one time around I will let my body win over my mind . Though the decision of giving up this goal is going to be a painful one to make ..both literally and figuratively ..:-)

Wardrobe Affairs

Staying in minnesota one of the major decisions you have to go through each day is how you are going to dress . Doesn't seem like a big deal but you have to be in Minnesota to realize the dilema that one has to go through everyday before deciding what to wear.

So how does a typical day start . You look outside your window , it seems all warm and sunny , had it been some other place you would have just stepped out wearing a normal t-shirt and jeans or shorts , its sunny right . But having become somewhat of a veteran here you should know better . So you sleepily open up your laptop and check the weather ..well seems like a warm day but you see again being the veteran that you are you look up the windchill ..ahh there you go the windchill is going to bring a temperatures really low .

My first orientation letter in minneapolis they taught us the importance of dressing up in layers and over the years I have to appreciate the wisdom behind it . So how does the process actually work ..you see in winters a typical day would be around -20 but then windchill might make it -30 , thats the outside temperature but then most of the inside places have heating , some places have more of it and some places and you need to be armed for all these situations , have the appropriate amount of layers .

Usually the it is transition between seasons the is most treacherous time . Even weather forcasters in minnesota have a tough time predicting at the beginning of the day how the temperature is going to be at the end of the day . So you are there standing in front your wardrobe deciding should I wear a full sleeved t-shirt or sleevless , should i wear a jacket - a fur one , fleece one or leather one ..will it get warm , how windy wil it be , what if it becomes cold should i take gloves - single layered or multi layered ones ( you cannot drive you car sometimes with the single layered ones bcoz your hands become too cold ) ....

Having expounded so many energy on making these decisions early in the morning you are all tired by the time you make your way to work and all the time you are keeping your fingers crossed hoping you made the right decisions for the day :-)

The spell is broken

My writing curse is broken and I do feel like writing a lot again .My recent interests are running into all kinds of public policy books and a general interest all around about what should be done by us , responsible citizens of India to change the country .

But before I start talking about India , I read this interesting thing in a recent book called the future shock (again will have to be another blog on its own ) . As our civilizations are expanding and we are moving away from home and leading a nomadic life , what happens to social responsibility structures. In earlier times people used to stay in the same place , go to the same church , have friends and relatives in the same area so it made sense for them to contribute to their communities but with this ever changing modes of our lives we no longer can call one place , or one set of friends or one even one country our own . Like the old adage we might not be here to eat the mangoes from the mango tree that we plant right now . So how does one determine ones social responsibility in these times , is it to your current place of residence , or to the country which sweated it out to provide you education , or where your immediate family stays . People talk about helping folks back home but what about the place which is your current home , do we not have a social reponsibilty towards this place .

Honestly for we whenever I volunteer at a american organization I just keep thinking , these people here have everything and they dnt need too much of my help , people back home lack even the most basic amenities , I could have been using this time to help them out and there goes my feeling of social responsibility . I feel more at home at the immigrant center coz it feels like more like helping folks back home.

Ultimately it becomes a question of who do you choose to help in this big wild world . One thing is sure to me , we are one of few chosen ones to be born with such privileges and we have been granted them so that we can bring about a positive change in this world. We just have to find a channel to be effective enough .

Once you start thinking of channels the first thing that comes to my mind is politics. No matter how corrupt or meaningless politics seems today it remains the first and the foremost channels for improving a society . Having said that it just seems too much out of the reach of a common man to try to step into the murky waters of politics and effect a change .

Then again there are the NGOs and the countless issues that each one of them is trying to address . As some one said with almost everything it is like standing on a grocery aisle , looking at the countless varieties of bread and choosing which one you want...:-)

The only thing that is clear to me as of now is I hold a social reponsibility to everyone around me but maybe because I understand my home country better I would be more effective in bringing about a change there . Acc to me the only issue that a country faces is the lack of self respect and mutual respect for their fellow countrymen which we have a severe deficiency of .The channel however is not at all well defined and neither are the ends . The search for answers still goes on...

So what after you settle down ..?

I was talking to Karin the other day and she asked me if still wrote my blog and I said well I used when I was settling down in this country but now I dnt . She told me I should continue writing since I have more of insider's view now .

I guess as the struggle goes down so does the creative instinct , now I no longer have stories of fighting the winter cold or almost failing in a class . Its the more comfortable life of driving the car , doing a job that you like , a kind manager , a beautiful house and time to pursue all kinds of hobbies .. in short living the american dream ...

But there is a lot more about the american dream that has enchanted me in the recent times ...Watching Obama become President has been like reading one of those old autobiographies of a leader rising from nowhere to take over the world . This man did everythin gthat almost no one does these days , he dreamt big at such a young age and had the conviction and the integrity to hold himself up through the entire process . I just saw the last season of West Wing where Matt Santos had a similar run and I could not stop but think , these are things that happen in movies not in real life..a man choses to hold on to his integrity, never to use negativity against the other guy , believe in himself so much that even though there are so many liabilities holding up against him he continues to soldier on .
We indeed have been very lucky to watch all this unfold right in front of us . I dnt know what it does to america but it sure has given a hope to loads of young people out there that if you need to something to change you have to get out there and believe that you can do it .

Teaching me more about the american dream are my students at the SHAPE center . This is center for immigrants from different countries who have come to US to find a life that is different than their war stricken , poor , corrupt nations ..where the situation of your birth counts more than your talent or your hard work . I was once talking to a Somali women about what are the common things that they see in their country . She looked down at the list which had things like telephone , refrigerator etc ..and said ohh these , we used to have them but now we don't because of the war .

I hear about people fighting with their own folks in most of the countries and then I look at the people that we see here in the US on a daily basis . You walk into a supermarket and you can easily see people from some 20 countries go about there daily routine buying the same flour to make chapati , tortillas or a pizza at home . Nowhere do you a sign of hostility amongst them , they have all learnt to peacefully co-exist with their new and old cultures. Then you wonder why people back home are still fighting with people from the same nation and it all starts seeming trivial.

Karin says she thinks americans are too cold and when she goes to India she sees the warmth in the people . I wonder where does the coldness in americans go when they greet you ,a immigrant to this nation with such warmth in their houses and treat you as a equal at work . At the same time where does the warmth in the Indians go when we go around butchering each other on the streets or backstabbing a colleague at work .

Ofcourse the above mentioned stuff nowhere negates the overly materialistic and lonely america , the confused teenagers , americas global policies and ofcourse now the recession which is taking the whole world down with it . Those would have to wait for a later blog though . However this nation offers hope and opportunity to a better life to so many all over the world that I sometimes wonder if I can find the magic vial that holds the formula to this .

10 miles 

It all started with a meaty 0.5 miles almost 2 years back and culminated at a awesome 10 miles yesterday . Well I would not call it culmination , there might be many more races to come but ya this would sure be a landmark to mark it all . 

I have been running off and on for 2 years now and slowly but steadily improving on the scale . One thing is for sure  , once you get to a point say 3 miles its so easy to stop yourself there and not proceed any further . 

The way I like to put it is that after 3 miles it is all in the head . If you can run 3 ..then you can as well run 10 but it all comes down to pushing yourself not to stop and achieve your maximum potential . 

The preparation for the race started by a gently nudging by a friend saying I should give it a try .

I had been practicing for the last 2 months going steadily upwards from 3 miles to a high of 8 miles until 2 weeks back I started getting cramps in my leg and thats when I started worrying if I could actually make it to the race . 

But the race day came and I was there cheered by my friends who unfortunately had to get up at 6 in the morning to drop me . The race day was simply beautiful . Early hours of the morning there were around 600 women aged 20 to 70 all participating in a 10 mile run for the benefit of the girl child . It was the exact time of the year with fall colors just starting to set in and the trail being right next to the missisippi river . The whole ambience was just so great that once the race started there was no stopping back . I used to run and walk , take breaks while practicing but on the race day the adrenaline rush just kicked and there I was running 10 miles at a strech not stopping anywhere till I crossed the finish line . 

At the end of it I was ecstatic , it was unbelievable that somebody who used to huff and puff for running half a mile had finally cruised through 10 miles . This sure goes down my diaries as one of my proud moments . :-P

Predictability of Future 

This is a question I have been pondering over a lot over the past one year . How is it that some astrologers who know nothing about you can predict your life so acurately ? What kind of patterns exist in this world if any . There have been almost the same answers every where , yes life is predictable but ultimately it lies in the hand of the human being to decide his course .

Recently I came across this beautiful written paragraph of predictiblity by E.F.Schumacher in his book Small is beautiful ( which btw I think every Indian should read ) .

Here is how it goes  " When the Lord created the world and people to live in it . He must have reasoned with Himself as follows : " If I make everything predictable  these human beings , whom I have endowed with pretty good brains with undoubtedly learn to predict everything and they will thereupon have no motive to do anything at all  because they will recognise that the future is totally determined and cannot be influenced by any human action . On the other hand , if I make everything unpredictable , they will gradually discover that there is no rational basis for any decision whatsoever and , as in the first case , they will thereupon have no motive to do anything at all . Neither scheme would make sense . I must therefore create a mixture of the two . Let some things be predictable and let others be unpredictable . They will then , amongst many other things , have the very important task of finding out which is which ."

Knocking on doors !!

Coming to US has taught me the beauty of something I call knocking on the doors . Although I seem like a pretty outgoing person , I have my decent share of butterflies in the stomach when I have to go and meet someone new or talk to them . I always hesitate in going and knocking on the door but then life in the US has taught a little about how nothing really bad can ever happen to you , there is always the worse you can rely on to cheer you up .

Coming back to the point , I knocked quite a few doors in my two years here and I have recieved so much love and joy from behind these closed doors that I have become a ardent believer in this concept . The first door that I knocked was of the Minnesota International center which has led to me to the homes of three wonderful families who have opened up their house and heart for us . It has introduced to me to Karin and her family who are now almost like home away from home to me . The MIC also let me to elementary schools in Minneapolis , where I got an opportunity to have lots of fun with hundreds of kids from kindergarden to the 8th grade , each one has offered me something to cherish and remember throught out my life .

The next door that I knocked was off my next door neighbours which gave me a whole group of wonderful friends whom I cherish being with ...

Then comes the door to the Barbara center for dance and the fergueson hall for music ..I almost decided to turn around and go back half way . the dance class that I wanted to join was full and I had almost decided to go back when the teacher asked me to go down and meet cythia garner who takes modern dance ..I went down the door was closed ..my first impulse was to go back but then I stayed on ..the door opened and I was ushered into a beautiful world of dance , which has given me something more than just dance moves ...an internal joy which is hard to describe...it also introduced me to a world of totally different people ..the world of artists ..the language of the heart as opposed to the language of reason that I am used to ..

And finally the latest door that I went in through..the Mc Donald Home for children suffering from long term diseases ...once again a totally different world and a entirely new experience ...

Here is my story of knocking doors and I believe I will continue to do that for a long time ..

Graduation

I have been meaning to update my blog for so many days now but it has been by far the busiest holidays ever . So this blog is now going to be the culmination of three separate blogs .

First things first …I graduated …seems like a big word and I was supposed to and tried to feel something like an achievement done or something likethat..Unfortunately all it felt like was a nice big party day with the colorful robes, joking around with the friends and walking up the stage to receive the cover for my yet to be received certificate.

I was more excited about my one week in the wilderness of boundary waters trip as a commemoration of my graduation and to celebrate probably the longest break I will get before I start working ..i was shouting around at the top of my voice telling friends about this once in a lifetime trip , shopping etc etc .

Ever heard of smthing called how things can change in just one day ..thats what happened on this wonderful sunny Sunday in the May of ’08 . I was all dressed up to take my shinny new car to the temple and get puja done as per my dad’s wishes . The friend I was supposed to go with called in and said he cannot make it …hmm well I thought let me get some medicines for the trip just incase ..off I went to Boynton , got 12$ worth of medicines , came back joked around with friends ..just when I got a call from my trip leader ..” Hi Akhila , Laura here , I have a family emergency at home ..I am sorry but we are cancelling the trip ..”….5 sec down ..10 secs down …I was numb ..now this cannot be happening , I remember telling myself ..this was one of my most eagerly awaited trips and adventures of all times ….how can it go wrong ..I was finding it difficult to compose myself …went home called a friend , almost broke down …called one last time to confirm if all that I had heard 10 mins back was for real ..Yes it was ..Ok relax …lets put backup plan into operation ..prepone tickets to the family getogether …well as you might have guessed by the flavor of the day till now ..tickets are non-refundable , non – changeable…

Friends are starting to call in ..we have other plans for the day ..one deep breath , I composed myself and off we went in my shiny new phantom gray Toyota camry ..and well what do you expect …I drive beautifully on the highways ..my first time without a trained driver sitting next to me ..and just when we are near the lake we were meant to go to,on a local road ..My car's bumper gently kisses a red car bumper right in front of me …déjà vu ..the same numb feeling is returning to me ..10 secs blank out …well I pull over like a obedient immigrant following unknown rules in an unknown country . A totally disturbed young girl comes out of the car …I am counting my secs and there she goes ..crying away to glory …déjà vu again ..a total blank ..”crying for a gentle kiss?? “ …what do I do now …I faintly hear her telling me she needed to call some one to calm her down ..she is very disturbed etc etc ..next minute we are in the centre of a busy marketplace on a bright sunny Sunday afternoon surrounded by cops , paramedics ..the fair lady who I hit is barking out a story off how everything in her body feels numb (all due to a gentle hit at 2 miles per hour??? …Americans should be crowned hype masters ..!!!) …my other alien friends with citations in there records called up to congratulate me for joining the club of law breakers …:-)( a friend in need is a friend in deed ) …

As if that was not enough at the end of the day I gave my dear roomie a slight neck massage by pulling up the window when she was looking out of it ..don’t worry she is still alive ..:-)

Wow that was quite some day …!!!

And so it has been for the rest of the holidays till now…a vacation worth cherishing …starting from the adventures in my new car ..to jetsking at 60 miles / per hour with the water splashing on my face ..sticking up live earthworms to fishing rods and watching them being wasted away since the fish were too smart to get caught ..weekend at the resort like home of bemmu atta with wonderful dancing ,singing , cricket , pool with the family …stacking away donations at the Mc Donalds home ..followed by a weekend of blissful camping in Itasca state park munching away at barbecued mushrooms , sweet potatos , paneer with mosquito repellant flavouring ,canoeing and kayaking till all my bones broke and finally hip hopping away in the zenon dance centre …

With 2 more weeks to go there is so much more to come ..!!!

To just be

My dance and music classes this semester have been quite a revelation to me . It has been something like stepping out of my comfort zone and trying something new . Its not like I have not danced or sang ever , I have been doing them ever since I remember . Its was more about doing it in a different environment with a different set of people but mostly about learning art forms which are thought of and interpreted so differently .

When I learnt dance or singing in India , it was more about going over the sequences till you got them by heart and learnt well . We never talked about our body as an instrument for singing , stressing on different parts that could help acoustically if used in a certain way . While there are a lot more technical details that I learnt in these classes , that not what I want to talk about in this blog.

Today we went to a painting exhibitions by one of the people in my dance class. She had a bunch of these abstract paintings and I asked her why she made them the way she did . She replied that she painted mostly on intution , she just felt that something should look like smthing and then she did that . This idea was something pretty new to me . Being an engineer , for me every end result in guided by a logical reasoning as to why something else was being done .

Later on we had a discussion about this in the class , my class had a whole bunch of artsy people ...actors , dancers , historians etc . They all talked about listening to your soul or intution or inner feeling while producing a creative piece . In there words you need to just be and that is when you get your answers . My teacher is trying to design an ending for her dance piece and all she does is she "just let herself be " , till the piece finally enters her ....

A lot of my dance class has been about improvisation and understanding your body ...when I started it was all in my head zone ..I am slowly learning to let it just be ...and there is lies a totally new realm of myself that I never knew .

I am learning that in my life too ..I can think really hard about a problem trying to find answers for it or just planning things in a certain way ...then later on when I just stop doing that and let myself just be ...poof!!! the answer pops out ...

I do not know what to call this realm of myself ..something like muscle memory ..a new term I learned in the dance class ....my teacher tells us we dnt always have to remember sequences in our head ..our body knows the most natural sequence after a certain step and thats the way it goes ..it remembers them in the muscles ( if that makes any sense ..)

I would think this is what happens when you start to get in sync with what you really are ..than what you project yourself to be ..!!!

Human face

Saw , heard , performed a lot of acts ( all the world's a stage and so I think the word acts encompasses all that happens around us ) in the past few weeks .

Attended a play called women of persia ..which talks about the women of persia ( mother , daughter , sister , slave and queen ) who have been left behind when there men goes to war and what these hapless souls have to go through when led by there arrogant and foolish king the persians go to war with greece , tens of thousands of men die and the persian empire crumbles . A particularly touching scene was when after coming back from the war , the king has to face the spite of all his people ..but then the same people are forced to bow to the king against there wishes,when summoned by the queen mother .

The play was a actor centric play enacted in arena ..with minimal prop used , the background score was also sung by the actors and the persian chants just added to the whole feel of the play . The scenes where the actors grieve there lost ones shook me to my core .

Then I recently saw the bbc documentary on story of India by Michael woods . I recommend it to every India , this is a must see for everyone . It talks about India right from the time of rigveda to the british invasions . Through all of it you realise that India is basically a land of immigrants , first the africans settled in south india , the aryans from central asia came into india developing the manhattan of olden times , also called mohen jo daro , then the mughals and finally british . We are a combination of all these civilizations . The world has learnt to live conveniently with each other in India ,while respecting each others differences .

I also attended a lecture by the founder member of Engineers without borders , a organization which works with underprivileged people all over the world trying to provide basic amenities such as clean drinking water , sanitation facilities etc. I will need a whole new blog to write about all that I heard about that day . One thing I wanted to mention was that when the Professor decided he wanted to build a sanitation project in a godforsaken place in south america , half of the class offered to work on it . The professor was surprised and asked the people why they were never seen near his office earlier and all of sudden were all so enthusiatic . The students replied we are here bcoz we are bored of the meaningless engineering taught in classes (namingly solving problem5.1 to problem 5.5 ) ..since what you offer to do is engineering with a purpose we want to work with you .

Today I saw the movie Page 3 . A wonderful movie on human relationships and the fraility of them . The power hungry and the ways power can fight down a person's good motives and intentions . Once again to quote the movie ..."It is no longer good have a good motive , you should have the intelligence to make sure you can translate your motivation into the change that you want to see " , " Be in the system and fight the systems ".

So what do all these non relating stories have to say ....As my Professor once said ..We become engineers bcoz we do not want to have anything to do with the people , let the managers do that ..its only when we step out of the school that we realize that its what we had been running from that we need to deal with ....

All the stories talk about a part of the human face , be it forced reverence to a foolish king due to his stature , nobody dares to stand up against the king and thats what gets passed on to generations ...reverence of the people in power ...

The foolhardiness of engineering schools when they think that having taught there students how to integrate or build a circuit board , they have made the students ready to change the world.

The story of India made me wonder about the rights of fundamentalists trying to state that the ram mandir was at a certain place or the north indians should leave mumbai because they do not belong there . We are a country of immigrants and does anyone at the end of the day have any right to say that a certain place is ours .

People all over the world are trying to throw away others from their country because they are afraid of the people of foreign origin .They are afraid of being outnumbered or over thrown , there is so much of mistrust , fear and anger existing every where ....I guess we all need to learn from Akbar, peaceful co-existence is the need of the day and not rulers or dictators .

The same fear shows in the page 3, people who are all trying to hide behind the facade of power in the hope that it will provide them the happiness that they desire in there lives ...

I look at my own life and see influence of numerous human faces on my own life and my success and failures in dealing with them . The more I see of the world the more I realize how much this so called human face affects our lives and no matter how many technical , medical or economic advancements we make ....its the human face at the end of the day that shapes our lives ..and it is not until the time that we have unconvered the myth of these varied human faces that our lives will continue to be as chaotic as they are today .

Dharm

Just finished a brilliant movie on communal violence .."dharm " ..starring pankaj kapoor . It brings to light again one of the major issues that we have to deal being a part of such a diverse culture . India on its part has managed to not be a part of religious fundamentalism as compared to other nations on the earth but then we still have been part of it now and then in our own ways . Be it the cast system or hindu muslim communal rights ..they have affected us all in a way small or big .

When I was growing up we were a part of a small cosmopolitan township where caste , creed hardly made a differences . Friendships were being fostered there and it was just the person there that mattered , your ancestory did not mattered then . In our small happy world we never even managed to think that the caste , creed , status of a person actually mattered . Infact we convienently forgot that distinctions like that existed . The only distinction were the people you like to hang around with and the ones you don't .

The first time that I actually realised that distinctions like that existed where in my 10th standard when people in SC category were asked to register separately . It suddenly created a distinction which was no where to been till now . Unwantingly there was a extra line line added in my mind beside the introduction of the person . From now on it became a common theme in our lives , the people with quotas getting into colleges ahead of us ...it was a grudge everyone seemed to have ..but then later on that became a part of life and we did not think back on it ..

College was again pretty cosmopolitan , had friends from all states in india ..it never mattered where each one of them had come from , what they ate at home and once again the distinctions seemed to have been forgotten .

There have been shocks in between though ..like when 7 year old described to me how all her friends were brahmins , i did not even know a distinction like that when I was 7 . I also once heard a story of how my one of my uncle's got a tired beggar home one day to help him out and my grandfather just wouldn't have that person come into the house ..for he was a shudra ...

It was only when we reached andhra and after listening to my sister , family friends and my parents i realised how fundamentalist caste has become in andhra ...people group acc to caste in colleges and if they don't they are threatened by people from there caste . I heard my grandfather refer to one of cousins who had married a muslim , he thought that was one of the most demeaning things to do . My sister who has studied 3 years in andhra also seemed to grasp it ..she told me how people from different castes were really difficult to talk to .

Me being an outsider all this while had failed to realize the divide ...until it hit real close ....

seeing this movie now brought back all the memories ...the main character in the movie although follows dharm the way thinks it is right to the fullest , doing the toughest of vratas and working towards the betterment of brahmins ...his discipline is noteworthy ..but somewhere down the line he forgets that dharam is not just bettering one's self or betterment of people who we think are like us (due to some unfortunate ways of dividing people ).. its about rising above our differences and searching for the ultimate happiness or bliss ...and the person who will aid you in this process could very well be a muslim or a shudra ...

Coming to the US I have met people who have managed to go beyond the boundaries set by political maps and spread solidarity amongst people in the whole word.

Having said all this ...I know its easier said than done ..I myself get caught in some of its hassles and find courage failing me to get out it ...

Little men and women

Somedays we come across certain people who make us realize how blessed our lives our ....soon after landing into the US I went into walmart to get basic supplies ..My roomie and I were getting restless in line waiting for lady in from of us to finish her billing ....they dnt take so much time here in the US we thought ....

Then I just stepped back to look at what that old lady ..probably in here late 60s or early 70s was trying to do ...she had a neatly clipped together pile of discount coupons in a sandwich bag . She was handing them out one by one to the cashier to get her total reduced ...finally when the coupons still could not get the total down ..she started handing back her items ...

then she turned around to see the sea of faces acting as they were getting busy for the most important thing in the world ...and said apologetically ..sorry i dnt get make pay till next week ...
she then fumbled around in her bag for all the money that she had to pay the bills ..the bill however was now a dollar less than what she had ..she happily stowed the bill away and said alteast I am not broke...!!!


We had hardly walked out in the chilling cold to the next store when we saw the cub food guy shivering in the cold and collecting the food carts and taking them back ..just when a lady came in a big truck and bumped into the entire train ..no matter how much the guy asked her to back up ..she just did not ..he had to go back ..put each cart individually and make way for the lady's truck ...

I will not draw any conclusions for these events ..they speak for themselves...

Commemoration ....

The D -Day is finally here . I am going back to india after 1.5 years in the US ..i call it commemoration because it kinda sums up my blog ...i started 1.5 years back documenting my survival in the US ...and i managed to that for 1.5 years now ...

lot has changed ..i met so many wonderful and most importantly humble people ...learnt a thing or two about living life ...finally managed to get a a good gradepoint of 3.8 after all the ups and the downs ...grew my hair ..:-) ...njoyed nature at its best here in minneapolis ...financed myself on my own for 1 year now ..bought my own tickets...some rights , some wrongs ..overall it has been a very happening year ...

will all this in my satchel i head by to india ..every time i fly in the US and look down upon the lights of the towns below ..i always wonder how india looks from up there ..so that is the first thing that I am gonna see this time I fly back to india ...i can hardly understand how I feel right now on heady back to india ...have been waiting for this for so long now ..that when it comes you dunno how to feel about it ....time to catch up with my roots and eat some masale dar food ...india here I come ...

Evolution of Haricutting

From Kamruddin nayi (barber) @ Jhansi , Uttar Pradesh India to Aveda Hair Cutting Institute Minneapolis , Minnesota , USA ..its been quite a journey ....coming to think of it all the barbers and the barbarians :-) {female barbers } i went to signify a lot of important phases in my life ....

From our very loving , homely local kamruddin nayi ..who gave me and my sister exact same hair cut as he would give to any of the guys in our locality to Ghadse Aunty and Jumrani which were our first attempts at getting stylised ..though we would always lack the motivation and the urge to ask them to make it actually stylised ....that were our first attempts to look city like while sticking to what we were ..Gaonwale stuck in middle of nowhere in a town called Jhansi ...


Then came hyderabad ..where ppl charged so exhorbitantly and did no better than my small modest town Jhansi ...and then came the realisation that everything from now onwards would be charged ..even if the hairdresser was making a chit chat with you ..that was added to your bills ..nthin came free from now on ..and no one was actually meaning it when they were asking you how you were ...but still we are Indians and although we dnt mean to do it ..we are always genuinely interested in others affairs ..and so I will not call all of it a fake ..

Then came Rourkela..back to being in town ...Going to beauty parlours with friends where each was trying to look better than the other ...it was great fun ...once me and Aritra got the exact same haircut ..got quite a laugh for that in our daily mess chit chat ...!!! ..At that point it was all about friends and not about the beauty parlour ladies ...

And Now coming back to the land of Uncle sam ...attempts at trying to be American ...the first time around that I went for an haircut ..I was plain tense though it was just a haircut ..no thats not it ..it was haircut in a different country all together ....Used to the Indian way of haircut I nicely took a hairbath and went out into the chilling cold...5 mins down the line I felt my hair getting heavy and to my utter dismay my hair had all been coated with layers of ice..the water in my hair had frozen..!!!! It was only later that I realised that they give you a shampoo when you get there ..you dnt have to do that ...Nyways I made it there and then came the need to make the all american small talk ..ask any Indian to do that ..we cannot .....all the people around me where discussing everything with these hairdressers ..how on earth do you do that ..eveything done ..haircut over ..I forgot to tip ..!!! Big Blunder ..nobody does that ...

Ya but then its been a year now and this time around I just new exactly the right things to do and say ..not very well though ..still I can give a pat on my back and say ..I say Good Job buddy ..!!!

God knows which other hairdresses life will take me too..!!!

Fall 2008

Its been a year since I came to the US now .... feels longer than a year though ..so much has changed , I have seen so much and learnt so much in this one year .

Its fall again , the wonderful green all around , the river blowing from the missisipi river ..i remember writing about it all around the same time last year and feel the same kind of serene feeling I felt when I saw it the first time . Nothing stands before the beautiful missisipi river and the green carpets all around in bringing serenity and desire to do better to ones life.

I saw a movie today called aap ka aasman , a art movie ...it is the story of a mentally challenged child and his parents who are in great despair bcoz of their child . They discover a brain booster medicine which changes their child into a mathematical genius but at the same time makes him emotionally zero . He takes to drugs , starts hating his parent and ultimately assaults both of them . They then discover the antidote and bring him back to being a mentally challenged kid . They then encourage him to paint , since he seems to like that and eventually get him to present in a art exhibition ...

Gave a very important message to me ..sometimes we forget to appreciate what we have ..hoping it was something else ..but when it does become something else we realise thats not what we wanted ..

Another thing that I heard recently was a speech by Steve Jobs ..he mentioned that always remember that death is great leveller ..if you were to die today ..what would you have done ...
life is too short ..try living it and not watching it pass by ...