Fundamental Right To live Freely!!

Its almost 2 in the night and i cant seem to manage any sleep. So, thought of penning down rather typing my thoughts.

Today, i saw a polish movie - "Your name is Justine", it was such a heart wrenching story about a polish girl conned by her German boyfriend and thrown into the dark world of prostitution for Internet porn. What really moved me was her desperation to be free again and her strong desire to return back to her country, to her grandmother. Poor girl is sexually assaulted, kept without food for days and threatened to comply and agree to her captors commands. There was a scene where she opens the refrigerator and finds nothing except a stale fungi infested slice of bread. She is so hungry that she eats it. In another scene she wants to escape and she simply cant as she doesn't have the energy left to jump off a window.

Of course in the end she ends up killing the guy who conned her and is later released after 3 years in prison and is back to her own country but it was too much of innocence lost. She thinks aloud and asks a question that in life where was the justice met and will her life ever be the same again?

As soon as i finished with this movie, while surfing channels, i came across the onscreen adaptation of A kite runner. I remember crying silently when i had read this book. Though by the time i started viewing the movie it was almost the end of it. But again the by lanes of Afghanistan, the poverty, the misery and the Taliban rule was overbearing to watch. I felt so bad for the young boy sohrab, who is orphaned and abused by his captors. In one scene, he tells his uncle that he is glad that he is an orphan since he doesn't want to face his parents as he is dirty. Again, it wasn't sohrab's fault.

I remember having sleepless nights in US, after having read A fine balance by Rohinton Mistry. Again similar misery with different characters and different setup. I know it is very fresh in my thoughts and i feel the pain and simply many who will read this or watch those movies, will shrug it as a movie or perhaps like me forget it in the mundane routine of work. But, the big question is where we are heading as a society? The news are buzz with plight of baby falak but isn't it our responsibility to give a secure future to our next generation. Technology has been indeed a boon but not a week passes where something really wrong happens to the kids,teens.Whether its teenage Adnan killed by his friends after having seen the news or another case of some MMS video being made.

Imagine, being put in a cage and not being able to move freely. We all claim that we are citizens of a free country but is this freedom? There is so much insecurity, so much of crime. I know perpetrators of crime will not cease but what we can do is generate awareness and help the victims to start afresh.

Right to Live and Freedom is after all a fundamental right, given by God and not by any court or constitution.

An ode to Steve Jobs

I know there are zillions of tributes to Steve Jobs already and twitter records, blog records have broken on the same but still i wish to express the loss I felt.
I have never met Steve Jobs, I will never meet him now but ever since i possessed my first Ipod mini and during my stay at US and even after i came back, i wanted to, at least once in my lifetime, meet this person called Steve Jobs.

I don't idolize people but he was one person i truly admired and wished i could emulate his convictions and beliefs. His comment Stay Hungry Stay Foolish is quite iconic in itself.

Steve Jobs’s most important contribution will be that he made technology about people and not about technology. The entire thrust of his career was about building useful tools that adapt themselves to the ways people already think and work, rather than asking people to retrain themselves to learn how to use their machines.

While other tech leaders have given lip service to similar ideas — especially in the past decade following Apple’s recent successes — only Jobs has been able to thoroughly inculcate this concept into a company and all of the products that it produces.

The point here is that, as much as Steve Jobs loved technology, he was also deeply curious about other aspects of life as well, such as music, world culture, and philosophy, and his life experiences in those areas had a significant impact on his humanistic approach to technology.

Jobs even traveled to India after he dropped out of Reed College. Although he didnt find the enlightenment he was looking for, his travels helped solidify some of his ideas about what he wanted to do with his life and the impact he could make back in America. During the trip to India, Jobs reported, “I started to realize that maybe Thomas Edison did a lot more to improve the world than Karl Marx and Neem Kairolie Baba put together.”

All of this, of course, advocates for a liberal arts education and a variety of life experiences in order to help you think bigger, understand life from lots of different perspectives, and discover more things that you’re passionate about.

Such was his mettle that even after being asked to leave the company that he started, he was recalled back and that too with more respect and admiration. Though he never spoke again to the person who fired him. He was a cancer survivor for long and his farewell email to all apple employees was so graceful and humble.


May his soul rest in peace and its a true loss for not just tech world but every person who uses technology.

Comics

Its mid night and can't sleep, suddenly my thought takes me to writing a blog, i thought of writing few days back about a nostalgic episode.

Recently, on a personal visit to my Aunt's house in Amritsar, I was reintroduced to something i cherished as a child. During my stay there, my teenage cousin volunteered to offer her study cum play room to help me deal with my state of mind. I was particularly feeling low and sad compounded by ill health and needed my privacy. Late in the night, when i couldn't gather myself to sleep, I looked up at a shelf neatly lined up with books.
Suddenly, my longing eyes chanced upon Archie's digests and it took me back to my childhood. As a child, i think half of my pocket money was invested in comics and prior to the pocket money stage, my parents made sure that I caught fancy to reading at a very early age. I remember my dad getting tinkle, chanda mama comics twice a month and later on preferences changed to Chacha chaudhry, Motu-Patlu, Champak etc.
The first slang words in my lingo came thanks to Archies, Richie-Rich, Asterix and Tintin. Frequent trips by my grandfather to Russia ensured a steady supply of Svetlana's folklore and Vladimir's heroic tales.
I had such a penchant for comics and story telling that at a very young age, i started writing stories of my own in class tests but moral of my stories matched the moral of the original text stories and my teachers always admired my creativity.

Chacha Chaudhary in Hindi is my all time favorite. The famous quip: Chacha chaudhary ka deemag toh computer se bhi tej chalta hai brings so much nostalgia with it. Still remember rocket the dog, Saboo the hunk and the round and saree clad chachi with her rolling pin.

Archies took my fancy to Riverdale American High school and somehow my loyalty always remained with Betty and hated Brunette heiress Veronica. In times of doordarshan, I learnt about Smooch and Smack from Archies. Asterix was very interesting and obelix was my favorite character because it reminded me of my obese but favorite cousin.

These days, I see kids taking more to Internet and online gaming, wonder the comics will remain in vogue forever. Request all of the readers to keep this world alive and encourage the next generation to take to these..Even to this day, comics are so entertaining and help bring the child out in us. Chacha chaudhary and champak with its fables is to be credited for my story telling creativity and interest in reading.

And chacha chaudhary will always remain my favorite comic in Hindi and Archies in English. Which one is yours?

Some tunes linger on in mind..

"Cant get you out of my head" by Kylie Minogue is the only apt song, i can quote at the moment to the following situation -

I have my own list of all time favorite classic songs. And there is distinct list for English and Hindi numbers. Some songs keep adding to the list but however more or less the top contenders have retained their spot. Hindi list is forever topped by Kabhi Kabhi from movie Kabhi Kabhi..and English list is led by Jon Bon Jovi's -Its my life.

But much to my amazement these days, there are certain tunes that seem to be stuck in mind and these songs aren't even my favorite. And for the past few days, wherever i go, either i am singing to myself these tunes or i hear them on the radio/tv etc.

First one is the latest number from movie - Murder 2 - it starts like "Ai kash tu hamesha saath hota, yun na dil rota...haale dil tujh ko sunaata dil agar yeh bol pata". I am certainly not a fan of Jacqueline or Emraan Hashmi and neither this song will ever figure in my all time favorites.

Second one is from the movie Lakshya," Kitni baatein yaad aati hain, tasveeren si ban jaati hain, main kaise tujhe bhoolon". I am more a fan of the video if this song, where both Preity and Hrithik are lamenting over their love lost.

The third song that completes the trio is " Ajeeb dastaan hai yeh, kahan shuru kahan khatam, yeh manzilen hain kaunsi, na woh samajh sake na hum". I don't even know the name of the movie and haven't seen the movie..except i remember the video there is some boat sequence.

What perplexes me is that none of these songs are my all time favorites? I don't even remember or have ever bothered to mug up all the lines..i only remember the first stanza of each one of them. Also, for the past few days, whenever i switch on the tv, one of these songs invariably appears on any random channel and like a sequence at least two of them appear either on the same channel or during channel surfing. Today even while driving my car to nearby parlor, song 2 & 3 came up in succession. Normally i wouldn't even bother to remember the songs let alone the sequence. But it has become way too repetitive.

I have tried to divert my mind to my current favorites but somehow end up singing to myself one of these songs even when i am not hearing them through any external source. Maybe, its a state of mind..but its freaking me out :)

Change

"Change is the only constant in our lives" - This paradox is so true..

Some people say that no one changes, that the leopard never changes its spots. But in fact everyone is changing every day, either for better or for worse. When someone changes for good, we welcome that change. When some one changes for worse, we despise it. Change is an inevitable reality. People change all the time. We may say that it is difficult for us to change but we inevitably change. Everything around us changes as well even before we realize it. Sometimes, change takes us by surprise and sometimes it hits us badly. Some changes fill our life with happiness, some create a void..

Even marriage, birth or death of a closed one, conflict with a loved one, movement to a new place, movement to a new workplace, everything is part of change. In relationships, people change all the time and it hurts really bad when that change swirls your whole life 360 degree. Instead of accepting change, we keep questioning our own self. In workplace, a new colleague, boss, junior or even a new cubicle demands lot of mental adjustment to change. It is all about accepting change.

There are 3 ways of accepting change - Accept it as a way of life, mull about it as to why it happened or try to change the change...I have been a strong crusader of second way but trying to switch over to first or third one.

It will take me sometime to switch my loyalties from second way but who said Life is a bed of roses????

Dreams

Dreams last as long as you let them ... both good and bad.

We sleep an incalculable number of hours in our lifetime. Sleep is necessary to the survival and also inevitable to dream world. However, even nowadays, the field of dreams is still very mysterious. Since the dawn of times, men have tried to analyze their own dreams, to include/understand them in order to better be able to include/understand their lives and their future. The premonitory phenomena of dreams is very fast.

Personally I believe that premonitions ARE a very real phenomena. They are much easier to prove than you would think. The reason being is that if a dream is going to come true it will come true very very quickly. So if its a premonition then you merely have to wait to see if it comes true. If we are truly connected emotionally to someone, we often get dreams which turn out to be true.

I have been quite curious to get my dreams interpreted. Dream interpretation has emerged as a vast field to explore. Sometimes i get dreams which are good, sometimes dreams are absolute nightmares. I have even subconsciously tried to change my dreams. Some dreams are recurring in nature, some are glimpses of past occurrences, some are premonitions and some mere reflection of mind. Good or bad, dreams are a reality and shall coexist with us, as long as we live.

I just want to end on a happy note that i hope that all my good dreams turn true and all my nightmares/bad dreams never actualize..

Wishful thinking :)

There is only one life..so watch out..What goes around..comes around?

What goes around comes around..

We all have heard Justin Timberlake crooning to this song but my blog is not about his song, its about this proverb.

Some wise people say its law of karma and some say its a good corrective tool or a repertoire. Generally the interpretation is that if you do bad to someone, bad will happen to you eventually. However, very few people perceive it positively i.e. if you do good to someone, good will happen to you.

When we look at live examples around us, we see Saddam Hussain, Osama Bin Laden and say they deserved it. Have any one of us wondered, that sometimes help reaches us unexpectedly. We may have jumped traffic signals when no one is watching but we did help someone at some point of time too by offering a lift. And when suddenly in the hot summer, when our car broke down, a complete stranger helped us with fixing it.

One of my good friend is a staunch follower of karma theory and whenever i do something wrong, he tells me its a bad karma you have earned and when i do something nice, he reminds me i erased a bad karma. Sometimes, I often wonder why I wasn't lucky to get the winning lottery ticket and why someone has all the luck? It may not be true that the person who got the winning ticket has the best karma in this life but he/she is certainly paving way for his/her next birth.

So, instead of pondering over whether it will come around to us or to people whom we want it to come, lets just try to fix things which are in our control..rest let the law of karma prevail..There is only one life so watch out..

"Do unto others as you would have others do unto you"