[kill_the_cat]

Hi guys
After reading these wonderful entries am posting an original poem of mine as well. Its in Hindi. Wrote it as part of my novel (Work in Progress) cum blog.

Na jaane kitna dard diya hai tujhko
Ab toh yaad bhi nahi mujhko
Ek baar khayal aya ki tere bina jee paoonga
Zeher zindagi ka pee paoonga
Khush tha bahut dukh dekar tujhko
Tab nahi ilm hua mujhko
Ki kitna mehenga padega yeh dil todna tera mujhko


Tooti hogi har ummed jab
Toote honge sapne tere
Tujhe jab laga hoga ki main laut ke nahi aoonga
Tab kya beeti hogi tujhpar
Yeh soch kar hi main paani paani hota hoon
Apne kiye par sharminda hokar
Yeh namkeen aansoon peeta hoon


Ab toh sanson se zyada aate aansoon hain
Tere bina kitna adhoora hoon main
Tanhayeeon main yeh batlaate hain
Tu meri lakhta jigar, tu meri jaan hai
Tu hi toh meri saanson mein basi hai
Tere sath hi toh ab janam janam ki yeh dor kasi hai
Samaj toh baad mein maanega
Pehle maine tujhko apna sanam maana hai
Hone do jo hota hai
Ab toh ta umr sath tera hi nibhana hai


Tujhe haq hai ki mujhe apne dil se nikaale
Maine itne angaare tere daaman mein jo hain daale
Na pata tha mujhe kya kar raha hoon main
Khata hui mujhse, baksh de aye uparwaale
Tu hai meri aur main tera yeh toh sab kehte hain
Ponch daal yeh aansoon jo teri aankhon se ab behte hain
Iss dil se ek hi awaz aati hai
Ki har pal bas teri yaad aati hai


Tujhe toh main keh deta ki mujhe maaf kar
Mere zulm-o-sitam ki har khata ko maaf kar
Par ab toh itna bhi nahi hai mujhe haq
Ki tere rubaroo hokar tujhko apna kahoon
Isliye fariyad hai itni
Ki ho sake toh mujhe yaad rakh


Tere liye hi main jeeta hoon
Mohabbat bhi sirf tujhse karta hoon
Sath phere bhi tere hi sang honge
Sirf iss janam nahi saat janam hum sang honge
Vaada hai mera ki tujhe ab aur nahi rulaoonga
Andhi toofan ho yaa maut aye
Har pal tera sath nibhaoonga


Tera dil bahut bada hai
Tere bina mera aur kaun khuda hai
Kabhi socha tha ki tere bina jee paoonga
Ab toh har saans ka rukh
Teri har saans se juda hai
Ek baar phir mujhse pyar kar le
Who ishq mujhse beshumaar karle
Jaan ke sath sath mere har zarre par
Apne beshumaar husn ka jalwa nisar kar le.

[Whetstone]

Creative i certainly aint...Just like to play around with words..and concoct abstruse stuff...i am a big fan of the abstract and the undefined!!
below is something i wrote almost 4 months ago...on my blog.

The sound of music
Permeated through the air
Weaving a magic as it wafted through

Human figures floated by
In the reckless gaiety
That the transcending moment allowed them

Looking up , she wondered
Where did the music come from ?
The almost melodious cacophony of sounds

It takes a while to realize
That the music comes from amongst them
The strings and the waves people form
In togetherness and in solitude

That's how the unchained melody is born
The coming together of them all
Impervious to the music they create
As if in some predecided harmony

Only if you listen carefully , would you notice
How each string is pulled with precision
Just at the right time

How distinct each note is
Carefully separated and yet collective

And how lasting the effect of each chain
No matter how insignificantly small

In the masterpiece that we create for ourselves
Each day, one note at a time...

[The Raven]

Something I posted recently on my blog. Can't categorize it exactly. But whatever. Comments are welcome.

Lands and People 1: The Idi Amin of Malleshwaram

Yesterday I was seeing an Indian movie made over half a century ago ‘Musafir’. It was the times when technology had not progressed and obscene amount of wealth was not being poured into films. But the movie turned out to be much better than any of the current day movies. The movie had a nice simple theme and executed in a sensitive manner. Even the songs made sense. It is the story of 3 families who come to stay at a rented house one after the other and their lives, their joys and sorrows, their triumphs and tribulations. The term ‘Musafir’ means traveler in Hindi, Urdu and Arabic. Here the tenants are called travelers as they travel from one rented apartment to another. The theme was kind of nostalgic one for me for I have been one such ‘Musafir’ or traveler. I have stayed in 11 different rented houses, three student hostel accommodations, one hotel room accommodation and my father’s home. That’s 15 different places in a span of 30 years. My mind went on a time travel reminiscing my life and times at each place.

My memories of my existence starts at a little house in an area called Malleshwaram in Bangalore. The house had a small verandah, a smaller bedroom and a still smaller kitchen and of course a bathroom and a toilet. It was way back in the early 1980s and the concept of combined toilet and bathroom was yet to become popular. The owner of the house was a genius who had managed to squeeze in 6 houses within his tiny strip of land, two on each floor. Four of the houses, the two on the ground and first floor and ground floor were rented out while the owner retained the two penthouse apartments, if you can call them that. We stayed on the one of the first floor houses. The other one was occupied by my dad’s childhood friend, who had a son called Gowtham who was around my age. He was the first friend I have ever had. The two houses on the ground floor were occupied by two couples, one of them newly married and the other with a baby. Anyway I don’t have too many memories of them except for one small incident with the baby and her mom, which I shall be narrating soon.

When light is scattered from an atom or molecule, most photons are elastically scattered (Rayleigh scattering). The scattered photons have the same energy (frequency) and wavelength as the incident photons. However, a small fraction of the scattered light (approximately 1 in 10 million photons) is scattered by an excitation, with the scattered photons having a frequency different from, and usually lower than, the frequency of the incident photons. Now where did this come from? Have no clue what I am talking about? Actually nor do I. No. I am not going nuts. This is a portion lifted from Wikipedia description of Raman Effect discovered by C V Raman, the famous Indian scientist and Nobel Prize winner. However, this is not the Raman Effect I am going to talk about here. The one I am going to mention is going to be a Raman effect of a different kind for the owner of our house was also called C V Raman and was no less an exceptional man in his own way. There is this old movie of Rajnikanth called 'Munru Mukam' where the villain says babies will stop crying if the mother mentions his name. Rajnikanth responds by saying that when mothers say his name, the child will not only shut its own mouth with one hand, but shut the mouth of the mother with the other hand. Such was the effect Mr. Raman had on his tenants. He was a dictator who ruled over his family and tenants with an iron hand, an Idi Amin in his own right.

Where there are dictators, there is usually a rebel faction. The rebellion against Mr. Raman was lead by able rebel general Gowtham and his faithful lieutenant yours truly. We used to hatch conspiracy after conspiracy to overthrow his evil regime. But our plans and courage lasted only till he was out of sight. The minute he was in sight, General Gowtham would immediately salute him smartly and wish him good morning. I would still hold out a defiant posse and receive a couple of taunts from Mr. Raman. Gowtham later explained to me that we were operating undercover and must not let him get scent of the rebellion till the time was tipe. Other than hatching conspiracies, we also indulged in scientific exploration, adventure, travel and commerce. We used to create controls of rockets on the walls with chalk piece and launch reconnaissance missions to outer space. We used to explore dark caves that used to be the lair of monsters in quest for hidden treasures– the area below the staircase was dark and used to be the abode of cockroaches and one may find a chalk piece or an old bottle or old bus tickets there. We used to go on long bike trips on the corridors outside our house on our tricycles. We used to collect old lottery tickets, shining stones; I don’t mean diamonds, more in the lines of pieces broken from marble slabs in construction sites, chalk pieces and ‘tick tuck’ , the name we gave to tablet covers for the sound they made. We used to run a thriving business in these commodities.

My parents were becoming gravely concerned about the influence Gowtham was beginning to have on me. He had become my friend, philosopher and guide. I often used to quote him as an authoritative source to support my arguments during verbal duels with my parents. My parents tried to counter this by trying to develop ’independent’ thinking in me by getting me books such as Knowledge Bank books published by Pustak Mahal. But reading general knowledge books is not a five year old kid’s idea of fun. Needleless to say, the books retain their brand new look to date, which cannot be said of many an other unfortunate book that fell into my clutches over the years. But the following incident confirmed my parents worst fears.

Every tribe has this coming of age ceremony, where young men have to prove their mettle by a feat of daring. So Gowtham devised one such task for us. Mrs. Usha, the tenant on the ground floor was standing with her baby in hand and talking to someone. So the task was this. We had to take aim and spit such that our spit landed exactly on the baby’s head. Gowtham, as the leader lead the way. He accomplished the task successfully and ducked before Ms. Usha could see who was responsible for the mucous fluid globule on her poor baby’s head. Next it was my turn. I prepared myself, waited for my mouth to fill and carefully took aim. The time of trial had come. I could not let down my leader at this crucial juncture. The rebellion against Raman needed staunch hearted men and I had to prove myself worthy of the cause. I managed to hit the bull’s eye but could not evade being seen for mama had become alert after the first attack on her beloved one. The impudence of attacking her poor little one a second time totally enraged her and she was at our door in no time.

My mom was rudely awakened from her sleep and had to listen to 15 minutes of the virago’s ravings. Anger is so infectious. By the time the lady left having blown the steam off, the devil had taken possession of my mom. She seized me and dragged me to the kitchen and lit the gas stove. And then she proceeded to heat a steel spoon and with that she proceeded to brand me on my forearm. And that is how I first got my first lesson on branding. I wonder how many people know the marketing term 'branding' originated from the practice of branding livestock and slaves with a hot iron. In Dutch ‘branden’ means to burn. From that day I was known as the ‘Spitting warrior of the steel spoon clan’. They say some people are born great, some people become great through their efforts while other have greatness thrust upon them. I would say some people are born with a silver spoon while others achieve a steel spoon through their feats of bravery.

But then all good things come to an end and same was the case with our adventures. By the time I was nearing my eighth bithday, Gowtham’s dad had decided to move to the defense quarters and my dad had got transferred to Kerala. But the memories of the house were etched deep in my mind and it was with a heavy heart that I took leave of the domain of Raman the tyrant. As the dialogue in the movie Musafir goes, you have to eventually leave every rented house and when you leave each one you will carry your unique memories with it.

[curtz-imi]

voice in my head....



There is a voice in my head, which says I am dead
I am not scared of dying but it's the voice from the past, which I dread
There are colours in my crayon box, which have lost its shades,
I am not scared of the fading pictures, but it's the face from the past, which I dread

Life has been a game of dots and spaces,
Where I have come across, lots of faces,
Life has been chaos of silence and noise,
But I can hide at any corner, but cant escape that voice.

There are shades of grey in my curls which indicates a part of my life is sold,
I am not scared of turning old, but there are stories still left untold,
There are feelings of past, which still leaves me most times cold,
I am not scared of the crawling within, but I want those stories to be told,

Life has been a game of dots and spaces,
Where I have come across, lots of faces,
Life has been chaos of silence and noise,
But I can hide at any corner, but cant escape that voice.

There are whiffs of fragrance in the air, which carries me to my past,
I am not scared of the memories, but it's the aromas, which never lasts,
There are photo frames of shadows in my walls, which remembers the old cast,
I am not scared of living with them, but it's the journey from cradle to grave which moves so fast.

Life has been a game of dots and spaces,
Where I have come across, lots of faces,
Life has been chaos of silence and noise,
But I can hide at any corner, but cant escape that voice.

ciao...

[ankur26garg]

Among the bushes of side-burns
lied that meandering white hair
just around my right ear,
giving me so much of fear.
On the roll was
my contemplation,
my day-dreaming
as i started thinking
Of those teeth
that would be gone,
Of those wrinkles
that would hone
and...
Of those bones
that would be week
and no-longer hold on to this geek..

As my thoughts crept into the grey days,
with the dusky sun burying its rays,
I looked at life...
those 'young', old days,
And before I could cry,
I smiled at myself...
looking into the mirror
that unveiled my hair
All I saw was just a thread
playing around,
grey and dead!

~Ankur~

[navneet023]

"MAKE HER SMYLE"
She's a small girl, only 8,
but she has seen a lot, mom says its only fate,
she wants to play,out wid the kids,
but mom says NO, perhaps coz she has AIDS,

she spends time in a room, wid the dead dolls,
so alone, that no one sees how many times a tear rolls,

She remembers when she was 7,
and her life seemed to b jus like heaven,
she remembers it was the same year dad died,
mom says he's on a trip, but she's seen that mom also cried,

She remembers the red hospital building,
mom took her there , a month after dad's funeral,
she remembers words like "virus" and "HIV",
she also remembers doc told mom she has a year or two,

She has seen on TV,AIDS doesn't spread by a touch,
still she's bafflled why she can't share Bro's lunch,
She prays to the GOD to be kind,
and make her family happy again,

Her mother's very sick nowadays,
that's why granny came to stay,
She can see life go out of her mom's body,
she frowns,perhaps that's satan's only hobby,

Her mother died yesterday,before her eyes,
and now she knows she's the next,no more lies,
she lives with the granny,her bro's safe 8 uncle's,
she misses a company,some1 to play with,

she uses crutches to walk,
and now its difficult to talk,
she doesn't eat much now,
but she mumbles a lot,

She prays to the GOD,to send her to her parents,
With whom she can live happily forever,
And she hopes there she can get friends to play with,
she hopes for a life without crutches,

I don't know her and you don't know her,
and perhaps that's why we don't give a damn,
but let me tell you,its worth a billion bucks,
to put a true smile on her little lips,

I hope someday I can make her happy,
just by being with her for a while,
She might be here for a shorter time,
but that doesn't mean she can't smyle.....

(copyright)

[puri.pallavi]

I wrote this for the Annual Alumini Magazine.
Have posted it at IBS Hyderabad Chronicles thread too..

A Life less Ordinary

The Journey of a Simple Graduate to Post Graduate to Working Professional.

From writing entrance exams to clearing IBSAT, to appearing for the Micro presentation to clearing the Interview, the joy in the voice of the loved ones when we cleared IBS Hyderabad gave us a sense of achievement. We packed our bags for Hyderabad leaving many hearts heavy.

Cut to ICFAI Tech, 3 in a room accommodation, no porters to lift your bags to any floor you are on, boys and girls mess separate, girls hostel shut at 9.30 pm, yes that’s where we landed up on the first day. The parents grew frantic looking at the make shift arrangement. Slowly things settle down and here comes the first event that the Class of 2008 put up, Masti Ki Pathshala. We saw the faces of talent in our batch; it was an evening to remember. The open theater got all of us not only close but also was the foundation of a journey not to be forgotten. The sections in first semester were like a group of inseparable lot.

The season of packing starts again, we were being moved to OUR campus, another issue to be managed by the batch. The boys were helpful enough to lift the bags and mount on the top of the top of the buses. We were steered through something that looked like a Jungle to this huge place that consisted of 2 unfinished buildings, a mess and far from completed academic block. The accommodation was 2 in a room. Slowly we all got engrossed in the academic and non-academic activities and some how gave up complaining. It was our place and it is we who make it or leave it alone. May be sub consciously we all decided to make it, to give it a character. One day the announcement of the fresher’s party came out way. All the 13 sections were divides into 4 clans- Mughals, Aryans, Nizams ands Rajputs. This is the time when the competition sunk in us; it was not only to be the best but also to make it an event to remember.

After the first semester exams, we headed to our homes; but even when we were home we longed to come back to the place that was now our home.
Series of lectures, presentations and cases followed but we could sneak in enough time to cash on the new found freedom. Oh and not to forget we got the Single occupancy and Internet too.

Cut to Nov 2008, we lost two friends in an accident. Jasmine and Prabuddha, May Lord rest their soul in peace. Yet again the batch stood but the grieved and gave extended our strength to them.

Semester two called for Summer Internship opportunites with the different organizations. We all wanted the best, to say the least. Internships gave us an opportunity to find which field suits our personality and interest. Many of us were focused and knew where do we see ourselves, but many were still in doubt. The internships gave us a bird’s eye view of the way the industry flows through the departments that we were a part of. Another season of grades, reports and presentation ended.

Cut to semester three- the season of specializations was here; trust me to find the best combination from the available subjects is a task on its own. We all got over this also. But suddenly we realized that we are sharing our COLLEGE with new faces. Then it struck us that the Class of 2009 was here. So we got a little jealous and took trips of the new comers, without offending them much.

It was our turn to give them a Frehsers Party, the planning and negotiations kicked off and we had a grand celebration by the end of it all. Semester three gave us new friends who may be a part of our line of business and industry. Now comes the baap of all semesters, Semester Four, PLACEMENTS and more PLACEMENTS. These words were ringing in our ear day in and out. The dream companies, profiles, package and et al were here. All we had to do was to be patient, give it our best and be happy for others or coax them. Anxiety and tensions grew by the end of October and many of us were still not placed. The process continued till January until then most were placed.

The season of separation was about the set in when we saw the cupid strike hearts of many. Congratulations to the happy couples who are married and are soon to be married. The farewell was more fun them teary eyed though all had their share of tears and private emotions. The Class of 2009 gave us a really great farewell and this called to the day when we finally packed our bags to leave for our homes… This time FOREVER.

Today we all sit in our corporate space and only remember the moments that will never fade in time to come.

The circle is not complete my friends, we shall be close no matter what, just a hand needs to be extended and there will be many who will hand hold you and help you through!!!


Ideas contributed by Raj Vardhan Bagaria
Written by Pallavi Puri

[navneet023]

A short poem, but close to my heart.

No More UN-ME

Its no more here,
the feeling is gone, and I dun care where,
I remember everything that happened,
but it seems like someone else' life,

I get surprised at reminiscences of past,
gettin' amused,"Why I treated myself like that?",
I can't believe it was that wat i tried to be,
must have been some1's spell on me,

And now I see things I never thought I'd see,
Just wondering how I let every1 do this to me,
Now that I see it, i realise I'm finally free,
And now I'll b 4evr wid myself, now that I am no more UN-ME.

[adityacooool]

Here is a short story i had written sometime back on my blog...

It was his birthday.
After a purfunctory lunch with their common friends , he took her to her favourite coffeehouse,ordered her favourite pastry,played her favourite song and knelt down beside her with a bunch of her favourite roses in oblation.
She knew it was coming & she was determined to get over with it as soon as she could or was possible.But she could not..it was not possible.It was his birthday after all!She sat motionless on her chair while her hand hung limply with the flowers.
He knew the answer-but he still wanted to hear it..hoping against all hope that she might...
Her silent tears told it all..Some things are not meant to be..
He put on his social mask and turned back to the jovial being he is..only she could see through the pretense..she knew he was putting up an act.She even believed that probably no one would ever love her the way he did.
During the years of togetherness-laughter without reason is what brought them close..He would crack silly jokes or pass comments just to see her smile.She would let go off all reason, her air of sobriety and giggle like a child.She felt so alive at those times!
Maybe this was the selfish reason why she could not let go even when she knew it was coming.Even when she felt the tension in their relation increasing with his growing desire to possess the object of his affection.
That night he did not sleep.
Neither did she......

[diva88]

They call me
'bad girl'

a girl with
'attitude problem'

a girl who does not follow
rules

a girl who does not want to know
how to cook curry
or wear a saree

_ _ _ _ _

I am
the girl who shouts at the society
and believes
that the day is not far
when there will be a
'Revolution'

_ _ _ _ _

They hate feminists
call them
'bra burning' bitches

They want freedom
freedom of?
freedom from?

Lost in its many connotations

it seems it means
anything
to anyone

_ _ _ _ _