koolhead17
What will someone value when they are dying of thirst?
What will someone value when they are dying of hunger?
What will someone value when they are aging?
Value depends on necessity. And we all have our own pain and need. We value things on our needs and priority.
There lived a powerful barber. The rulers would bow to him during haircuts and shaving.
Those were the times when kings ruled the province. The acting ruler of thrown was a demon. He had all the vices. All he cared about is leisure: whoring and multiplying his wealth by putting more taxes.
King could walk free after committing any crime. Villagers would keep their daughters and wives locked behind doors to save them from him. He had a dozen wives and 100s of concubines.
But, the elder most son turned to be the opposite human. He was a virtuous prince. Also god-fearing, vegetarian, and empathic. He could sing verses from Gita, Mahabharata.
With time, the ruler kept adding his heinous act. It all came crashing the day he tried to molest the daughter of his head priest. She was only 12 years old. He apologized and blamed opium for the act.
The news spread across like wildfire. The prince felt ashamed of his father’s act and wanted to end it. The next morning, he summoned the barber and the priest. He was going to execute his own father and color it as a fatal accident. The plan was simple: Like every day, the barber will shave the king. But today, the knife will slip and choke the king’s throat.
After the king’s death, the prince got appointed as the new head of state and the kingdom flourished.
We talk about trust, friends, and relationships. Think about the love/crush at school/colleges. All the dreams we made together. How many of it stays to reality?
We human species are a slave to our thoughts. It’s tough to move past those promises and whatnot. When you were kids, you were different: you were more innocent and break free. As you grew up, society took over you and your consciousness.
Accepting what is present and learning from the past will cement your life for a better future. Moving on is tough, so is the cure for cancer and getting past the death of your family members. The day you accept it, life gets less painful.
I am trying to read fiction more these days. I find authors writing style my reason to read or re-read them.
From RK Narayanan, Khuswant Singh, Satyajit Ray, Gorge Orwell to Ernest Hemingway. I find they are writing uber-simple in a free flow. These are some folks I enjoy reading again and again.
There are some other writers whose writing I find extremely difficult to understand. Could it be because we have progressed in literature? Could it be their complex writings?
Any budding writer should focus on simple flow in story writing. It will get more readers, simplicity scales with time.
How much do we think about the past? The journey and co-passengers. I know a lot of us die with it. I also know many swear by the stories, epics.
When we dwell in the past, we become miserable or happy. We don’t see what’s there to offer us in the present. The reason being we are too blinded. We get so much busy with the gold that we miss out on the diamonds.
Does this mean we should dump the past and begin every moment? I think I doubt that be possible, the past, that shows us the present and future. We have to be aware of it, keep it as a learning and a page to our golden book of life.
The sky had dark clouds painted over it. It could rain at any moment. But for a kid wanting to meet his grandma, how much it mattered? My grandma lived in our ancestral village by herself. It was not big of a deal to take such walks. We had no such traffic back then and, cars, motorbikes were not owned by everyone. Cycle Rickshaw and Bullock carts ruled the roads.
I took a shortcut which takes via the kaccha road. Mom had packed my favorite dry aloo sabji and puris. I have been on this path earlier, but this time around, I was on my own. After crossing the bazaars, I walked by the mango bagaans and, that was my first stop. The mali was from our village; I got to eat some juicy Kalkatiya and Biju aam.
I continued my journey and, after another 20 mins walk, I noticed a big crowd gathered near one of the fields and, some kids were shouting: Kato Kato (bite it). I joined the possession to enquire more about it. I saw a snake fighting with a mongoose. The fight was getting uglier with time and, blood was all around. After 20 minutes, the snake gave up and, the mongoose tore it into pieces. It was bloody in the end. Some elders were dancing with bidi and lathi in their hands. I wonder if they had put a bet of mongoose.
In the last stretch of the journey, I sat near the Nahar. I could recognize our relatives bathing in it. Ajit waked by, completely naked, sat, shared my meal and, then we walked to our village.
Once home, grandma had also prepared some aloo sabzi, paratha, and kheer. She asked me why I came all alone and about the long walk. I told her everything. She advised me not to engage in any crowd.
It was 8 am and, mercury was at its peak, Delhi summer. I had last night’s hangover. I had met Matt during my Portland visit a couple of years back. Infrequently we were exchanging notes over email. He was in India for his Ph.D. thesis and wanted to meet me today.
In 2008-2009, Gurgaon was a work in progress, one side of concrete and another a cattle grazing fields. It was my first job. My salary was a little over 10000 rupees; I have had no option but to live in the little outskirts of the city. Matt took all the pain to come to see me from Cannaught Place, where he was staying.
Gurgaon had more laborers, migrant workers than the natives: Gujjars, farmers, and cattle herders. They were the backbone of the new modern Gurgaon with skyscrapers and gated communities.
We ended up walking to the nearby Taffri(cigarette, chai shop). I took my chai and bidi and, Matt reluctantly tried to sip his chai. He mentioned his purpose of the visit to India was to see how much it has economically progressed. How much of the caste system still prevails in the mainstream.
Udher Duur se bol kya chahiya (stay away, let me know what you want), shouted the shopkeeper.
The thick voice of the shopkeeper woke me up more than the chai-bidi I was sipping. The guy he was shouting at looked like one of the laborers, with his clothes torn and colored in white cement. His eyes were thick and, his beard reminded me of Bollywood’s dacoit. He must have been in his early 20’s. I liked his earring and, black Tabiz was out in public.
The next thing I was was Matt walking to the guy and making a conversation in broken Hindi. To my surprise, the guy replied, he can speak English and introduced himself as Mohan.
Matt: What is your caste? Are they you paid to do your work?
Mohan: What has caste to do with my work? I am working to pay my bills.
Matt: You seem educated. You could have done another job.
Mohan: There are no jobs. I have studied masters in arts. After months of the door to door job hunting, I made peace with this job.
Matt: Is it because you from a lower caste? Hence no one giving you a respectable job?
I thought Mohan had enough and, he might punch Matt. But after few minutes of silence, I saw tears flowing through his eyes. His reply stays with me and reminds me of him now and then.
Mohan: I belong to the majority caste of this country; we call it Poverty. I belong to it. I am working hard and someday will unshackle myself from it.
In the next moment, Matt hugged him and requested to pay for his Chai and Cigarette. Mohan politely declined and made payment. He disappeared in the crowd of millions of others in making their dream and aspiration of a better life.
How can we hate someone or something so passionately that we end up hurting ourselves? I know few people who can go at any length to see few others failing. They will go at any length for the same, even if it affects them: personally, professionally, physically, or mentally.
Our life on this planet is limited; how can we spend a chunk of it on hurting others?
We call it past for the reason it has gone. We were part of it at some moment in our life. It can be good, bad, or mixed. There could be many reasons for it, our relationships, learning, or how we lived it.
Our past gives us an experience. The enlightened ones learn from it and try to get with it in their present life. They don’t get biased. They don’t judge present on it. Our journey of life is constantly moving at a rapid pace. We cannot be two similar situations.
How long do we have to dwell in the past? How long we have to live in delusion? People move on, the relationship falters.
A lot of us live in false hope. Like some supernatural ways, everything will come back to normal, like the past. As a result, they don’t move. They suck in the memories and suck in a lot of energy for people around. They expect sympathy from people around them.
What would have happened to battles where the father loses his son? Would he continued as a leader doing his dharma or cried in remorse?
Why do make our own life miserable? Why can’t we accept as things are now.