A Long Gone Friend - Posted earlier on a short story site!

A Long Gone Friend

You stopped looking for me long back, but I am still in hope that someday you will come back. Someday you will look outside your window in search of me, but alas! my hopes are slowly diminishing. Seated in my little abode, I keep wondering what has changed you so much. You used to be so happy, full of life but now I feel sad when I see you.

You must be wondering who I am?

I am a little bird ‘Sparrow’- during your childhood, you used to be so happy seeing me flying in and out of your house. Your mother always kept water for me in that earthen bowl that you made during one of your pottery classes. Indefinite times, I did my breakfasts or lunches with your family. That granite slab in your kitchen garden was supposedly the place where I used to find food for myself. I was part of your family.

You not only fed me but also gave me a home, my cute little nest, to live in. It was a project for your summer vacations to make a bird’s nest. You really enjoyed the task, and along with your Mom and Dad, you collected each and every twig, leaf, and grass strand – assembled it all into a beautiful nest all through your vacation. Yours was the best in your class. When your class teacher returned it, you brought it home, and placed it in between the branches of the bougainvillea hedge in your kitchen garden. Next morning when you curiously looked into the nest, you found me resting with my wings covering my face. Out of excitement, you screamed in joy and I fluttered away from the nest only to return the very evening.

When my chicks hatched out, you eagerly watched me feeding and taking care of them. You started putting huge quantity of food on that granite slab. You told your mom that I will require more to feed my babies. That was so nice of you! the first time I flew out with my babies, you were as happy as I was, or may be more than me!

Everything seemed so nice and good, but gradually you got busy in your quest to become somebody important in this world. I always prayed for your success, my prayers were heard. You got a very good job, handsome salary, all that you ever wished for. You got stuck in rut of life, why you humans grow up to be so weak? Material needs became more important for you, and you gradully forgot about me. The eternal happiness we both used to get seeing each other was gone.

I flew away from the abode you gave me. To my disappointed you never ever even noticed it, I kept coming back to see how are you, I would watch you rushing through your days sitting on that same hedge where you gave me home, but the hedge was hardly present now. The bougainvillea in your kitchen garden lost its glory. One day, you uprooted it to make space for parking your car. The cell phone you use is causing havoc on my species. Me and my friends are slowly disappearing, destined to get extinct soon.

I wish everyone starts caring for us… so that all of us can co-exist. 

When was the last time you saw me? A little vulnerable bird, does anyone care about us? I am your long gone friend!

Source: http://im.rediff.com/news/2013/feb/22sparrow1.jpg

Raghav Series - The Sky Divers, a collection from past

The Sky Divers

Source: http://www.easypcltd.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/Jo-2-sky-divers.jpg

As soon as instructor yelled, “JUMP”, at an altitude of 12,500 feet, all of us jumped from the plane without thinking twice. My stomach started rolling, soon I realized that the ground beneath feet is missing. A sudden gush of wind took me as high as 15000 feet, extending my free fall to 75 seconds from the usual 60 seconds. I had no idea of the directions but one thing I knew for sure was that gravity was stronger than me, pulling me mercilessly to the floor of the earth. Before I could gather control over my mind and body, I had taken three or four somersaults soon after reluctant jumping out of the plane. Ladies and Gentlemen, this is my first, and last, skydiving experience, ever.

It is ironical that even with 35 pounds of equipment on my body, I felt completely weightless, and my body was floating effortlessly. I could not decide that I am falling fast to death or flying freely. Furious winds were pushing me from one side to another like hay strand caught in the wind storm. While I was still getting in terms with myself, I heard a voice, a friend's voice, it was Gaurav, screaming out loud “Raaaaaaaaaaghav”. ... Why is he calling me?  Can’t he relax at such a height? Anyway, he got my attention, I manged to hold my neck in his direction and looked at him, while the strong winds were slapping hard on my face reminding me of my Mom when she is upset with me, and that is more than often. Gaurav shouted again “make a SWAN”. I recalled my training, revised all the lessons, but it took me a few seconds to realize that he wants me to make the simplest of all the flat poses in the free fall of sky diving. Gaining some control over my free fall, I tried to flatten my torso and straightened my legs together in the layout position. Finally, I got my first pose right in the middle nowhere. It felt good, and with every passing second, I was gaining confidence. We were five divers,Gaurav, Ashutosh, Abhijeet, and Peeyush. Using wind to our benefit, we came closer to each other to make a star pattern. It was a thrilling experience! And then with well choreographed moves we dispersed in different directions. Wow! I felt like a pro at Sky-diving.

Being a first timer, I tried some flat poses while descending to the ground, my friends tried everything from seated posses to compass moves, creating a compass like illusion by rotating their torsos to 180 degree and keeping legs stationary. It was inspiring and my conviction to do more was growing.

Soon it was time to touch the ground, so far so good. At about 2,500 feet, all of us were prepared to land. My heart was pounding hard – at this moment, I felt probably jumping mid air was easier, landing seemed way too tough. For Gaurav and Peeyush, it seemed like a cake walk, they treated it like any other sport. They were so good at adventure sport. Peeyush was best at free fall. His lean body helped him fall with ease. While Abhijeet was a veteran, Ashutosh (Ashu) and me were beginners. It was his fifth and mine first. Good thing with Ashu is that he is a quick learner and a committed student for anything in life.

As expected Gaurav, Peeyush, and Abhijeet were the first ones to hit the release pin, and they did it comfortably. It was a sight to watch for a first timer like me, a bridle (nylon webbing) came out first, and then unfolded their pilot chutes from the deployment bags. Now they were descending easily, cutting through the opposing winds. Ashu followed them, and then came my turn. I reached my Pilot Chute bag, pressed the release pin, at the same moment a bird flew above me. I panicked and my hand got stuck in the bridle and my chute did not deploy properly. I was spinning like a Top. My body turned upside down, blood was gushing into my brain. I could see hazy images of my friends who were watching me, they wanted to help me, I could see on their faces. Usually, they are never that kind to me. Today they seemed concerned, for once my situation looked alarming to them.

I felt my left ear being twisted to 360 degrees, it was paining now, I thought my ear is caught between the nylon threading of my chute. Then, I heard the voice of my Instructor again – “get up, Raghav, you have a class at 9:00 am, don’t you have to go to college?”, I opened my eyes. My Mom was standing near me, trying to wake me up from my sleep. I said “Thank you for waking me up, she din't even acknowledge and dragged me out of the bed, and in her commanding tone, asked me to get ready soon. I got ready, and rushed to college. I was late, and my professor did not allow me to attend the lecture.  

Roaming outside in the college campus, I had some happy company, Gaurav, Peeyush, Abhijeet, and Ashutosh were already there, they too had come late for the class. 

I saw them and felt relieved, five of us standing in the college ground, smiled at each other. Peeyush then said “Hey! There is a paragliding event set to happen in the city – wanna to visit?” I took a long breath, looked at the sky, and thought that it was rightly said by Leonardo DaVinci, "Who has been in the sky, will always walk looking at it, wishing to go back". Though for me, it was in my dream but who knows…

Raghav Series - Rendezvous with Rafting, a collection from the past

My Best Friend - Atul

I could barely count above ten and A,B,C,D.... was a Rocket Science for me. Then also, I knew that he is my best friend. He was and is my first social link which I established on my own. His name is ‘Atul’, not only he was my best friend but also somebody from whom I drew lot of inspiration. He always got first prize in drawing (his family trait), very good hand writing, fit for any sport, a sprinter, laughs like Shahrukh Khan even looks like him :) and an impeccably dressed person. Not from my mother but he taught me how to tie shoe laces, sounds funny though.

We were simply connected to each other. I remember eating all his lunch - out of two paranthas, he used to bring, one was always mine. Our classmates used to conspire, sometimes, to set us apart and were successful at times; I used to cry like a lost baby whenever he did lunch with others, ignoring me. But then Atul always came back. He was bad at expressing his feelings, he remains so today also. Hasn’t changed a bit in all these years.

My eye sight started becoming weak, 8th Standard onwards. I used to have problem taking down notes from the black board. So his notebook used to be my blackboard. Till 10^th Standard, I had taken my notes from his notebooks, though I started wearing spectacles but I was terribly slow at writing. At times he used to be very naughty by not letting me see his notes, he simply enjoyed this act of his. My class work was never up to date and I was too lazy to complete my home work. My school diaries were all painted RED with ‘Class work and Home work not done’ – courtesy Mr. Atul Kumar. On being asked by teachers “How many of you have not completed your homework, raise your hand”, I used to hide myself to get saved from a punishment or embarrassment, but my dear friend used to push my hand up in the air, getting me noticed. I was always upset with this act of his, but he never stopped. It annoyed me then but today it has enabled me to face my mistakes and learn from them because my good friend never supported or covered my mistakes.

Our houses were nearby; we were part and parcel of each other’s life. My mother recalls giving him medicine for stomach ache during annual day celebration- we were in 5^th standard at that time. His father, aunties, brother are all very close to me. I was a regular visitor to his home till they shifted from Munirika to Bahadurgarh.

Hustle and Bustle of life has pulled us apart, distance increased between us. Still, we remain connected.

I wept in solitude knowing that aunty, his mother, expired in an accident. I got to know it when I called to wish him happy Diwali two years back. I could not believe this and still I am not ready to accept this reality. I feel that she is very much around us. Instructions she gave us, food she fed us and off-course her smile all remain very fresh in my mind.

Last time I met Atul was to invite him for my wedding. True to my belief, without disappointing me, he did not turn up. Today, we rarely meet, never chat and are very allergic to calling each other on phone. Still, we are best of buddies.

You can never rate your friends because all are special, some are inspiration and some help us to liberate. Atul is everything for me. We were never friends in need but we will remain friends forever indeed!!

I should have written this long back but actually his comment on my last blog inspired me to attempt this.

V-Day for me in short....

My first Saint Valentine’s Day, post marriage was dedicated to world peace and harmony, though we never intended for it to be so J. Being Sunday I really had no option but to celebrate and why not.

I will remember this V-Day for a very long time, and for many reasons like the first after marriage, no time limit to come to home, watching a movie, and then the Indo-Pak food festival at Dilli Haat. All in all it was a great day and the last two events added lots of love and flavor to it.

It was just like any other Sunday, much required for me though. After changing my job it was the first weekend without any prior engagements. In the late afternoon we went to watch My Name is Khan.... halfway through the movie I was thinking is it a movie to be watched on this day, the V-DAY! Message from the movie was conventional, re-packaged with crisis facing the contemporary world; focusing largely on the plight of minorities and prejudice against them. But such movies should be made and served to the society and there cannot be a day as perfect as 14th of Feb to watch it. Well, I noticed for 2 hrs and 40 minutes, my dear Wife had wet eyes. I did not interrupt it at all. On the contrary, I was trying to figure out locations at San Francisco ( I tell you...those who visit seldom visitors are so curious).

After the movie, we headed to Dilli Haat for Indo Pak food festival. No idea whether there were groups from Pakistan or not, but Kebab Lounge from Noida had done a great job. They were serving cuisines popular in both the countries at a very exciting price menu. For having our share of Biryani, Mutton korma and Shahi Tukda, we had to stand in a queue which was ready to burst into the INA Market across the road. Finally, our turn came and the food was tasty and filling . Long live Indo-Pak friendship, food from the countries is as spicy as relations. I settled my dinner with Ice-cream while my wife opted for south Indian coffee...we are poles apart. However, I think poles apart hold the world together.

So this was in short the day in its totality.... count-down begins for the next...

Childhood

When I was five

Any height was easy to dive

But now I think twice

And they say

Mate! You’re confident

When you are a child

You don’t think otherwise

Because you’re still naive

World at large seems nice

And you go on doing things you like

Child’s heart is wide open

It understands no worldly notions

Now, notions are the main stay

Life is no more playing with clay

I wish to be a kid again

Play in the rain

Dance with the friends

Want to sing loud, dance on the clouds

I wish to be a kid again!

The Day when Luxury became Tragedy!!

“They came, they again conquered us and we kept saying that Sprit of Mumbai/India can’t be defeated.”

Let’s not fool ourselves anymore; the fact is that somewhere down the line we are failing as a nation. Last few days every Indian would have pondered enough to arrive at a conclusion that our individual and regional priorities are overshadowing our identity as a nation.

I also came to a conclusion that our political system needs to work on the rationale; right now it seems, only guiding forces are unguided emotions (jingoism). It is extremely sad state of affairs for the world’s largest democracy. Now, issue is not exclusively about terror and terrorism but also about the way we conduct ourselves. I am sure in a week or so all these events would turn into a hazy memory. I am ending these worries here only because each one of us knows these things very well.

Terrorism has gone parallel with the globalization and it seems that they have better global networking and cooperation among themselves. Nothing seems to curb their activities and it is for sure terrorist are not affected by recession. India’s biggest problem is that it had tried to be unrealistically super modest with its neighbours. Our geopolitical situation is such that, terrorism is always risk to us. For these terrorist, we manifest the western world due to our liberal outlook and secular style of living. Therefore, western world should understand our circumstances comprehensively and support us strongly to wipe out terror from the sub-continent. If we have a dream to be a prominent power center then we need to act like one, let’s not be soft on terror and we should now take them by surprise something they keep doing with us. West doesn’t actually know what terror is all about; India is surviving it for years.

Why are we calling it India’s 9/11… I don’t really understand; do we really need to follow these naming conventions. To be a super power, it is required to have your own standards otherwise we will always end up looking for imported solutions. Before this bloody event probably attack on Parliament was India’s 9/11. It is high time we should come above all this and understand that it is an attack on the very existence of India and a continuous heinous attempt to rip us apart.

It is the time to give real meaning to our independence and make those souls proud who altruistically stood for our freedom. Next time when we vote, we should vote for INDIA not for our petty individual identities.

“Understand yourself better to let others understand you better”

Wrote this immediately after 26/11...