An ordeal with strangers

Faces never seen, voices never heard, people never known sometimes make you think what you would not have otherwise. There have been such instances to pick from everyone’s life.

As I boarded the train for Delhi, I could see Saurabh sitting by the window. There were people giving a strange look at me as if I was an unexpected guest to their party. This is something everyone does. Have you ever felt happy to see some stranger in the train while you are seated, who could in no time grab your seat i.e. the window one that you preferred. As I made myself comfortable, I saw myself behaving the same way. A young couple arrived with their luggage at our bay. You should have seen my face for sure. I bet I would have made even a worse face than my co-travelers did when I had arrived. The obvious reason was it was me who would be sharing a part of the seat with another two people. How could it be possible when we were already 6 people comfortably seated as if waiting for the stupendous dinner to be served around the royal table like a big joint family where every other person hadn’t seen each other’s face since they were born. Mark the size of the joint family then. Well to put it straight we all belonged to the huge human family and were all strangers to each other. Now not making any fuss about we being strangers lets go back to where we were.

I was now wondering how we would share the luggage space; forget about seat for new two people. The extra luggage was thrown away into the upper berth as they made their way to make some space to sit with their best efforts and of course good manners. Now how could we stay back in mannerism? We jumped to our sides making some space for both of them. As they got themselves seated I wondered who could have been the person who had occupied maximum space before the couple had arrived. Now it was all level. Our shoulders started brushing and I could now realize that the train had started moving.

For the next 15 minutes everyone kept silence as if it were a ritual as the journey started. Then came the time when everyone got busy with their mobiles as I got a call from my Dad. Perhaps they must have realized that they too have people to call and inform that the train had started or may be they were going to reach soon which is just another 26 hours from now. Few people would have got excited because they have left to meet the desired loved ones which included me as well. But there were another set which seemed to be upset for the reason that they were moving away from their loved ones. And most importantly there were also people who belonged to the “don’t-know” category of any survey conducted in the news channels.

Soon after the train started gaining pace we started having small talks. It really amuses me to observe and watch what people do. One thing that was common in everyone’s mind was that, the 24hours of journey was going to be really boring if they didn’t start knowing each other. It was really interesting to see the way everyone was trying to break the ice and strike a conversation. I could hear someone say “Who aapka beta tha na?”, (He as your son, right?). How smart that guy must have been!! And guess what, slowly people started talking as if they have known each other since ages or have been waiting to meet for years together. As I got myself involved in few conversations, I realized that I had not yet known anybody’s name. Soon I heard Saurabh introducing himself to another guy, shaking hands after having one hour of conversation. This surprised me to an extent how do people introduce each other having talked about the whole world, when they have not spoken about themselves. This is when I came to know Saurabh’s name. He and Tejas, the other guy, later became my good friends to have a great company through out the trip.

But with in all this there was something which drew my attention to think over for hours together. There was this young couple who had joined us earlier in the morning while we started the journey. They were a couple recently married. May be a year only, I guessed it to be. I would be taking a few assumptions as per my observations. But my observations made me wonder on many things. They must have been a couple married a year back and for sure reasons they must have had an arranged marriage. The guy, was protective caring and loving. The lady, with her sweet smile, carried a little shyness around. They definitely were a happily married couple. But the striking thing was the love that existed between them. It was the guy’s warmth and the love for her in his own ways that made me think so. Their small talks with soft words and the understanding with just a mere eye contact were worth noticing. Why I say they had an arranged marriage was because of the bondage that could only be felt.

Love has always been a subject which I have not understood properly yet but had an idea about love marriages which people get bonded by the institution called marriage after falling in love with each other. Regarding arranged marriages, I had only subtle idea that two strangers meet, feel comfortable, of course considering every other aspect of life and get settled to begin a new life called marriage where they start exploring each other during the journey called life. But love-after-marriage was always an unsolved mystery for me. I agree that I have seen many other couples who love each other even if it were an arranged one. Some how I always doubted the existence of it in real sense. There was a different feeling altogether this time where I could feel love-after-marriage. To my understanding its not always love marriage which involves love in a relationship. Love does exist in arranged marriages as well which has made them successful over the years.

Love after marriage makes marriages successful in true sense.

Missing Arvind !

Negi is leaving tomorrow and somehow I feel, I would be missing a good human being around. A good friend who could give all gyan regarding how to go about pursuing a course in Australia to the gyan why he always had a contradicting thought to everything that he was said before him. A true character who could make a dead man laugh aloud and who could draw your attention to a very valid point by his all witty logic.

All the best dude for all your future endeavors.

Miss your gorgeous smile and the attempt to have the Aamir Khan IStyle !!

Have a great life and hope we could be together again in this short journey called Life.

AM I Being Myself ?

As I was walking down the road to my office building which sits close to my flat, I don’t know how and why I felt like writing things up which came shooting into my mind. It was after such a long time that I felt like writing. There was a gust of thoughts which had not come to me since long. Thoughts which were regarding me and I was thinking all this being a third person to me. The way I have been over these two years after leaving college. How I have changed as person personally, physically (may be not much as per others but I have: P), professionally and most importantly emotionally.

So what are the changes that I am talking about? A few observations recently on me put forward this thought that yes I have changed a lot over the period of time. But please don't ask me if they are for good or bad. Whatever it may be it is me. They say "the only constant in life is Change..." and how true has that proved to me! I had always imagined Abhisek i.e. Me as a person who would hardly come across changes when it comes to accepting it. I am resistant to changes may it be change of bed or room or seat at office or food point or anything you may say. And with this I remember I have changed my number! Gosh that is what I had never intended to do. Well, logically speaking I have not changed my number. My previous number still exists and I would continue to use that once I get my cell phone repaired. But for the time being that number is switched off and I have been using a new number which is not with anyone else except for few who have been in regular touch. But, after all I have changed my number and it’s been more than three weeks now. I have not given it to any of my friends from college or from yesteryears. Not that I don’t care about them or don’t want to be in touch with them. But I have not made an effort to circulate my number which I would have done by mails, orkut and sms to all of them few years back the day I would have got a new number. But why is it that I have not done it this time? I too don't know!

It was amusing to get a call from Parul yesterday yelling at me on my new number. She had been trying my old number since three four days but hadn’t got it connected. And finally somehow she got my new number from someone, I still don’t know who. But frankly speaking it was actually surprising to know this. I never expected her to try my number until my bday :P. Even that seems to be a bit over expectation but I never expected her call. Why I mentioned about her is that, this thing made me realize that I have not given my number to anyone and that’s how change has come within me. I have stopped listening to music! Whow !! That is impossible. But yes I have. I have stopped orkutting for hours now! I have learnt how to spend time alone at home; I have learnt how to enjoy a good book. Never thought in my wildest dream that I would complete reading books over night. Have been reading different books and the latest is of a different genre altogether. Its "Games Indians Play - Why We Are the Way We Are by V Raghunathan". That a great book and a must read for everyone who is an Indian.

Well, lets move on to something else. I told you, today I was in a writing mood after a long time. Visited few of my old friends' profile early in the morning. It was Adwitee and Sumandeep's profile that caught my eyes. Well yeah, they have been good friends from college but we weren't that great friends either. It was just by chance that I landed up in their profiles and many good memories came running to my mind. And this was the point where thoughts shoot up from all directions. Even if I had got a notepad to jot down I would have failed to do so. Anyways.. Having visited Adwitee's profile specifically took me back to my first year at college. I had roll no 1 and hers was 5. So we were teammates through out the 4 years in labs, vivas anything done in groups on the basis of roll numbers. So, she was a very good friend. The best days were when Sumandeep, Biswajit, Ajay, Dibya, Adwitee and I were involved with our attempt to create and publish a year book for our IT 2007 passing out batch. Those were the times when I realized how good these people were. Among the people I admire from the core of my heart, Sumandeep, Biswajit, Ajay, Adwitee and Dibya are the names that I must not forget to mention. The year book is still with me but I realized today that I have not opened the same since a year or so. The book which we had created for this purpose only to have a remembrance of those beautiful days is still lying in some corner of my cupboard. And it hasn’t caught my attention since long. That’s why I feel I have changed. Recently a very good friend of mine, Himanshu, had sent me a sms regarding the completion of 2nd anniversary of our engineering. Now when I had got the sms I felt nice to remember that day i.e. 27th April 2007. But somehow I didn’t feel anything different. No one to share it with who would understand its importance. There are hundreds of such dates which come across people. So how does it matter to others? It did to me on the first anniversary. But not on the second. And moreover, I too have moved on. I had always thought that I would miss my friends, college and those days. And I was not wrong. But I was wrong when I used to think that life would be nothing without them. Now I am living a life without all that. Nothing is similar to what used to be two years back. Prachi has been there through out but our relationship has also changed and this I can say is for the best. But we are no more like we used to be during college days. But somehow I feel I have been ditched by time. I didn’t have the guts to look back and take a turn. I did turn initially but like others who had preferred to move on I too did chose that path. And here I am writing this about my college days after 2 years of leaving. Now that’s what I had never expected. I had reached Kolkata and from there to Pune. But in all that I never wrote anything about college on my blog. It all was regarding my new life, new friends and new environment. I am guilty in this regard. I could have made a better effort to be what I wanted to be. There have been times when people have complained me for not being in touch. Now that’s harsh. When did I stop them from being in touch with me if I was not? Did I deny them not to be in touch with me? Well, I would prefer leaving this topic here. But somehow I feel I could have been more generous and not changed.

Well, as I said, lot has changed over these two years. Pallavi got married on 28th April! And that’s news!! I still can't believe that I wasn’t a part of her wedding just because I am hired by a god damn company which pays me some 20K odd bucks. This is what I had never thought. I always feared this life and life has proved itself over and over again. How true my parents have been in such matters. I remember when in college my mom saying me "beta, yeh sab dost wagera jo bhi hain...sahi hai lekin jab tum log alag jagah pe rahoge..no one would be around...n u wouldn’t even get time to meet them for years together...what will only matter is your life and your family"... and then I used to be so irrational in my thoughts... I never agreed to what mom used to say. But today as I see myself I somewhat agree to her words though not completely. May be I need to reach her age to agree completely. I had been to b'lore to meet pallu before she got married. and it was really great to be with her and himanshu. there were days when we all used to be with each others for more than one third of a day... but now we met after more than one and half years...that too just because pallu was getting married and she would be leaving India after that. And look as I write this she has already got married and has left India. So that’s how life has been changing. So how come I won’t change?

Well, all these thoughts have come across several times in bits and pieces. But I never had the will to pen them down. I had lost the zeal to write as I used to have few months back. I feel really weird now remembering that two days back I had updated my orkut profile and in that for the passion section I had written "none for the time being". How have things changed me really makes me wonder if I am the same person as I was. AM I being myself?