A Good All around at My Old School

Dear good friend VKG spoke to me after a long long time. He is one of the close friends at Indore with whom I have shared some of the fine moments of life.

Though IIMIndore is history now and I have no interest with IIMIndore, but some good three plsu years of life has gone there and many of the good things I had made it possible at Indore, Fellow Program, Broadband, Journal, Post Doctoral Program, international conference..... so many things. Everytime in those moments VK and Ashish had motivated me a lot.

Its good to know from VK about things changing positively at IIMI under the captainship of new Director. I have never met him nor did I talk to him ever, but from VK it seems he is doing a great job. I have seen this boldness in decision making with many people in academics and he has shown such charisma also.

I had a very wrong perception about him initially although my perception has no meaning, but one should not judge a person in short term, he should be judged in long term. when I look at him and his decisions, I can read noble intent that he wants to remove the weeds and bring fresh culture inside the organization where everything will be judged objectively.

Thanks VK, for showing me the real light. Any interest with IIMIndore ? definitely no, as some people illo treated me at the last two months of my time. But I have no complain.

Forgiveness is a great virtue and forgiveness means life moving ahead. Life moving ahead means more progress and more learning. Staying back with old stuff is painful and getting involved into the same set of mindness.

It gives a great relief to talk to VK after such a long time, it has been more than 13 months and time flies bullet these days.

Meeting with Sera Sera

It was a nice experience meeting with Sera Sera after such a long time. Sonu Nigam was also there in the meeting and its good to know what multitude of interest people puruse.

Life is teaching you baby, learn them and adapt them to the next level so that you cann survive in this dirty world!

Really dirty world with so meaningless creations, biological animals with no meaning in life other than giving pain to others

Fire and Ice

Fire and Ice

Some say the world will end in fire,

Some say in ice.

From what I've tasted of desire

I hold with those who favor fire.

But if it had to perish twice,

I think I know enough of hate

To say that for destruction ice

Is also great

And would suffice.
Robert Frost

(For Gaurav)

May Be Bhaiyu Will Read Someday

Maybe we were supposed to meet the wrong people before meeting the right one so that, when we finally meet the right person, we will know how to be grateful for that gift.
Maybe it is true that we don't know what we have until we lose it, but it is also true that we don't know what we have been missing until it arrives.
Maybe the brightest future will always be based on a forgotten past; after all, you can't go on successfully in life until you let go of your past mistakes, failures and heartaches.
Maybe you should hope for enough happiness to make you sweet, enough trials to make you strong, enough sorrow to keep you human, and enough hope to make you happy.
Maybe you should hope for enough happiness to make you sweet, enough trials to make you strong, enough sorrow to keep you human, and enough hope to make you happy.
Maybe the best kind of friend is the kind you can sit on a porch and swing with, never say a word, and then walk away feeling like it was the best conversation you've ever had.
Maybe happiness waits for all those who cry, all those who hurt, all those who have searched, and all those who have tried, for only they can appreciate the importance of all the people who have touched their lives.
May be you should do something nice for someone every single day, even if it is simply to leave them alone.
May be there are moments in life when you miss someone -- a parent, a spouse, a friend, a child so much that you just want to pick them from your dreams and hug them for real, so that once they are around you appreciate them more.
Maybe giving someone all your love is never an assurance that they will love you back. Don't expect love in return; just wait for it to grow in their heart; but, if it doesn't, be content that it grew in yours.
Maybe you should dream what you want to dream; go where you want to go, be what you want to be, because you have only one life and one chance to do all the things you dream of, and want to do.

No Need To Say Goodbye

It started out as a feeling
Which then grew into a hope
Which then turned into a quiet thought
Which then turned into a quiet word
And then that word grew louder and louder'
Till it was a battle cry

I'll come back
When you call me
No need to say goodbye

Just because everything's changing
Doesn't mean it's never
Been this way before
All you can do is try to know
Who your friends are

As you head off to the war
Pick a star on the dark horizon
And follow the light
You'll come back
When it's over
No need to say good bye

Now we're back to the beginning
It's just a feeling and now one knows yet
But just because they can't feel it too
mean that you have to forget
Let your memories grow stronger and stronger
'Till they're before your eyes

You'll come back
When it's over
No need to say good bye

How dreams come true

All your dreams will come true if you have the courage to pursue them, all alone, when everything is ripped off you, when nobody believes in your dreams and with no backing, if you still feel the power of your dream and are working to make it real. You have got it in you, what success is already. Rest is just a manifestation of the mind, what it asks for. Behold that part of life, for that may never return. Dream on, live on.

The Silent Love

I could reach airport just in time. This happens very rare these days when you go the airport some fifteen minutes before and spend sometime in the book store, flip through some good books and buy few of them; feel happy by seeing your books on the shelf and sometimes meet one of your old students in the airport with his wife, children, job worries and may be story of new assignments. While teaching at IIMs, I had those options of going early to an airport and spending time in the lounge, now you just have to run and run to come back home, complete office work and go back home, close your eyes, listen to some music and attend guitar classes and spend some stupid arguments on why vegetable prices are going up? Why certain things in life go up and come down but prices always go up?
This time it was different, why this time, every time I go to Kolkata, it is different. I have some love for this town but for all these years I have very few friends there, maybe I can hand count… Jayati, Rajiv, Cecil, Ashok and few more. But Kolkata is my beautiful city, embedded with lots of emotions and nostalgic thoughts, its maidan, early morning ride on the tram; I heard they are going to stop the tram service once the metro is extended and I pray they shouldn’t do that for God’s sake. Life is more interesting in Kolkata, you can walk along the ganges, you can sit down with your soul mate on the side of the river ganga and see the water flowing nearby; you can spend an hour on a queue in front of the kali temple, only to be told by the priest near the entrance of the sanctum that the temple is closed, you can write stories on Brajen Mukherjee road and get scolded by your friend’s father for the number of telephone calls he receives after people read the story in Telegraph autumn collection; you can go to Park hotel disk and spend whole time with Bala and miss your early morning flight to Indore, You can walk into Mirch masala restaurant and enjoy great cuisine there, Kolkata is everywhere in memory, heart, mind, soul……..
But this time it’s not about Kolkata alone, it’s the flight that I took from Kolkata to Chennai in the evening. Most of the time, I jump to a window seat and catch up my sleep, but this time in a hurry, I didn’t ask for a window seat and got an aisle one. The couple was next to me. I hardly take interest on co-passengers in flights and trains these days, so they looked like newly married love birds, may be flying to Chennai and then moving to Ooty or some other hill station. They were newly married; that you can always find out with Bengali girls, they will be loaded with bunch of bangles, red color or some heavy color saree, sindoor full on the head and may be outrageous lipstick colors on the leap and would be squeezing in with their husbands in between and putting you into a spin as the scene many a times looks odd to your eyes.

I didn’t take much interest on them till the food trolley came. The airhostess (rude one this time) asked me what drink will I have (as if they can serve me Tequila or some screw driver), so I wanted a Coke and they obliged. The man started making a sign and without any sound!! The airhostess couldn’t guess what it is, and lo…. Then the lady made some sound…..” da…da”. Ok it sounds Mirinda and when I helped them out with the word Mirinda, they were happy and by looking at my leap he confirmed and they took one Mirinda can.

Its not that they had no money, he pulled out a five hundred rupees note for Mirinda payment but they were sharing it among themselves and sipping from one can. It was great scene to watch for me. Their world was sound proof. They were deaf and dumb. Of course if you are deaf, you are bound to be dumb; but their love was beyond this physical deformities. They were expressing their love, care and responsibility towards each other like any normal couple. When the flight landed, the I guess the lady as bit scared, so she was holding his hand tight, the man looked at me and smiled, it was an assurance he was giving to me that she is well taken care of.
I was waiting near the belts for my luggage when they came with someone who looked like a travel agent to me. They came to say ‘thank you’ what she could utter was ‘u’. I don’t know whether I deserve a thank you from them or not but they were giving it to me and I was so happy to meet this young couple. The agent told me the boy is from a rich Bengali family, studied in some special school in London and the girl is from Bangladesh and they met in London and they are on their honeymoon trip.
I told this thing to Gaurav, Peter and Nitin. One of them joked saying ‘at least there will be no fights and verbal duels between them, they will try to understand each other only through eyes and hand coordination. Though their world is devoid of noise, it is free from so much of bad emotions, fights and verbal volleys that they will be a happier couple in life. It is important to understand that ability of words to express emotions are so limited in life that you can talk a great deal and communicate a lot through silence. Somebody said, if you cant understand my silence, you can never understand my words. Hope some of these women around us understand the value of silence and try to make life peaceful, so also do some men need to learn how to take care of emotions which are so precious that they are like water on the leaf of a lotus.