Mom, I Love You...

I was 6 or 7 years old then…The venue is my uncle’s house and it’s the 14th day after the death of my uncle’s mother. As part of traditional belief or custom, there is a ritual to be followed by the son of the deceased at their residence. Accordingly, the morning of the D-day was very busy with visitors still pouring in with condolence and relatives being part of the rituals…By afternoon, the house was filled with just very close relatives and even that added up to atleast 30-40 people in there…

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A Detailing of the Situation:
If my memory hasn’t failed, that day there was some huge strikes going on all around the city protesting the attacking of a popular politician…the mob was angry that their leader was attacked and people were really into the roads to protest and show their support to their leader….As part of the protest, that day, there was to be a rally taking place with thousands of people participating. So from afternoon, the police blocked almost all roads and the roads were filled with the protestors walking in lines and moving thru every single street in the city…I still remember, the line took more than 2 or 3 hours to cross our house once started…so u can imagine how big the rally was…and the mood was ANGER..ofcourse…
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OK...let me come back to my story…so by afternoon, all these relatives that was left back at home naturally couldn’t go back to their respective houses due road blocks…so all the adults took seats at the balcony on the second floor of the building…and all the kids (including me) went to the terrace and continued playing…So now the scene is… “The adults in the floor below is sitting and watching the passing procession and we kids above playing…”

Now, what happened was…two of my cousins had a fight and they started up an argument…I got bored and started scribbling on the floor with a red brick in my hand…I was drawing pictures on the floor and the sides of the boundary wall of the terrace…and between was gazing out into the procession seeing the thousands of people passing by…

But, then…that happened before even I could realize…as I was standing at the edge of the terrace…one of cousin pushed the other one and she fell on me…in my panic to not to fall, the stone flew off my hand and fell down…just inches off from the passing public…[Now, remember, it was an angry mob…and if the stone had fallen into the group…it could have been mistook as some enemy group peltering them with stone and that could have resulted in a riot where these people could have just stormed into our house and thrashed all of the people in there…that day, I didn't know any of of the seriousness of the matter...Lucky for me, that the stone didn’t give me up on me that much…]

But, how lucky was I…bcoz, as soon as this stone fell on the floor…I saw my dad’s bro almost flying up to the terrace…His face was red…he was angry…and he was holding a stem of a banana tree…(actually I don’t know the exact word to be used for that DAMN thing…if u remember…u cut off the bananas from their plant as a one whole bunch…the whole set of bananas grow in a thick hard stem…usually, we pluck out bananas from this part and by the end, only the thick stem remains…Now, my uncle came up with this stem with no bananas, but with lots of protruding from where the bananas where once plucked…if you see the picture to the right...and imagine this long rough thing without the bananas on them...this remained after the traditional lunch which was always accompanied with bananas.)…Anyways, my uncle reached us and he just shouted out… "WHO THREW THAT STONE…?”…

I was really a kid…and STUPID too…not even realizing why he was so angry at such a small thing…I smiled and enthusiastically started answering… “Uncle…”

He didn’t let me complete…THUDDDDD….the rough end of the stem had already made it mark on my right thigh…Great, I was wearing a short frock, so the damn thing really could help itself on my thigh…I felt as if my vision was going off…I could feel stars flying all around me…I just couldn’t understand what happened a second back…I WAS LOST...all I could see is that my uncle dashing down the stairs the same way as he came up…

I was scared to dead…no voice came out of me even to weep..but my eyes were overflowing…my thighs were bleeding and giving a red colour to my white frock...and soon I saw the same uncle’s daughter coming running to me and pulled me to go down…she said, I was being called…I couldn’t move…I felt, that I was being called for more beatings…She dragged me down…as soon as we reached the second floor..it was my dad’s turn…not even asking me WHAT, he just dragged me all the way down the stairs to the ground floor…by holding my right hand…I literally hit each steps with the sides of my body as I was being pulled down…and shamefully let me admit…I was peeing all the way down due horror …

I was dragged into the house…and here my mom was sitting with many other ladies..none of them knew nothing of what happened outside…My mom suddenly saw my father fuming with anger dashing into the house dragging me on the floor all the way…She was terrified…her first reflex action made her carry me and push me into the bathroom and locked the door and guarded the door…I could hear her screaming and shouting… “WHAT HAPPENED…WHAT DID SHE DO…”…

I don’t remember anything after this…maybe I fell unconscious…maybe I forgot everything due fear…what ever…I remember, I hated my dad’s bro after that…and I hated his daughter more for taking me down…lol!!! Only days later, everybody knew the truth…that actually I NEVER THREW ANY STONE….IT JUST FELL OFF ACCIDENTLY… and the worst part was…when this stone fell..one of the old lady in the house lied that it fell on her head…when it really didn’t fall anywhere near her…that is what increased the intensity of the after effects…grrr..how I hated her, when I knew about this lie she said…Anyways, once my uncle knew that he mistook me…he pampered me with all sort of gifts to say SORRY…and in that age…those gifts were more than enough…I was ready for one more thrash…lol!!!

Only after years, I realized how bad that day turned out to be…Only then I could understand the real terror that might have happened if the stone had fallen into that rally…(afterall I was a kid..I knew nothing of politics or protests…uhmm…)…

And with this one thrash my uncle made on me…a big family issue broke out…my mom was absolutely not approving of my uncle thrashing me…FOR WHAT SO EVER REASON…I came to know that my mom fought every single person who supported my uncle, including my dad…saying… “I don’t like anybody hitting my daughter…I haven’t given that authority to anybody…and HOW could u thrash her so mercilessly with that stem which is usually used to thrash cattles…I can never pardon you for that…”…. This outpour made everybody angry against my mom…they raised their brows for my mom talking back to them like that… They tried KEEP QUIET and don’t talk like that…but my mom still protested…

Years later, when I knew this…I was overwhelmed…I doesn’t remember anything like that about that day…but knowing that my mom stood there protecting me did make me sooo emotional…and even today...as I type this in…my eyes r wet imagining my mom protecting me against all the relatives…

Mom, Thanks for standing up for me…thanks for supporting me…thanks for trusting and believing me...thanks for going against all your loved ones just to protect me… Mom, I love you…

I will always love you, Mom….

Heartfelt Valentines Wish to my Friend...

Ha, the day started out in the most weirdest way…the mobile cheated me…the alarm didn’t ring…I woke just ½ hour before the office working hour started…and had to literally rush thru the morning chores… guess what…mom never knew, that I was not yet in the office...she just thought, that I might be long gone…when I came rushing out of my room, my mom exclaimed… “Ha, U r not going to office today???”…grrr…I AM LATE…and …. I just blamed mom and dad for being careless and not waking me up…good way to go, girl…send in an sms to my colleague that I would be late for work…ofcourse with a different excuse that I weaved out of my imagination…

Finally I hit the road after a quick 30 mts rush at home…only to get stuck in the damn traffic…what the hell is happening today…every single person in the city overslept??? Nothing to do, I switched on the radio FM…and aha…there is the wish going on…Happy Valentines Day…Oh, Blast… to be frank…I had completely forgotten that it was Valentines day today…or rather it didn’t cross my mind that it was 14th February today…uhmm…great na…I needed the Radio guys to remind me…afterall…today is the day of Lovers…

Not that there is something to look forward to in this day…as life goes…once u cross ur teenage days, the importance of such days just goes off…and the best I can expect is a Valentines wish from my partner…hey, but need to agree to one fact…soon after I knew that it was Valentines, I got almost 6-7 sms wishing me for the day with nice and sweet wordings…Wishhh…I was young and back in the college days…atleast could have expected a gift…Anyways, I was rude enough not return any of the sms…Bcoz, I had to be at office ASAP rather than raking my mind for some nice Thank you messages…thus the messages in my mobile stayed Un-Acknowledged..uhmm..good for me..I saved some money…lol!!!(RUDE!!!)

Hey, that reminds me of that day, a page of my life from years back…and a gift…A Dairymilk Cadbury Bar…uhmm… I always cherished gifts…and this was from a friend… but when the gift was given on a Valentines day, it became a bit ODD…or rather awkward…the gesture was friendship, but it could be very well misinterpreted…I couldn’t say NO to a Dairymilk then…so, with the immature heart I had, I gulped the chocolate in and hid the wrapper into one of the books I had in my hand…I felt as if I was hiding a big secret…lol!!!

Today, I realize… stupid I was…I thought getting a chocolate on a V Day was a crime…and I had to literally work hard to hide the fact from friends and family that I got a Dairymilk…and as years passed by…the secret became a much known thing…I realized that chocolates were nothing…there were still bigger secrets that a V Day could offer…haha!!!

But the most funniest part of the whole is…its been years after the above incident…Few days back, when I was busy packing my personal stuff for the shifting…I found my MOST PERSONAL SECRET BOOK….hahah!!! yeah, I had this crazy habit of jotting down poems or short stories and even philosophies from my crazy imagination…I never let anybody read them for the same reason that they were real crazy stuff…When I got this book after almost 4-5years, with much amusement, I scrolled my eyes thru its pages…and Aha…there is something gleaming back at me in Glittering Attire…It was the Golden Wrapper of the Dairy Milk and the Purple Outer cover…the same one that I had hidden years back…

I could still smell the chocolate smell…I could feel my friend’s emotions when he gifted me that bar of chocolate…I could remember my enthusiasm in finishing it without sharing it with anybody…I could smile on the thought that after almost 10 years, I got to see that wrapper again…Suddenly I felt sad…why didn’t I save many such gifts to be unwrapped years later…which could have brought in a Special Smile in me…afterall, gifts however small or inexpensive will always be sweet and nice…They are meant to be Cherished and kept Close to heart…

Today, another Valentines Day is here…I have had hundreds of other gifts in my life…but the wrapper that I found inside that book will always stay the cutest and sweetest one…Because, all these years it was surviving inside that book which had my crazy secrets and finally reached me to remind me the memories of the past…the memories that was sweet and nice…

To my dear friend who gifted me that chocolate,

“Wherever you are today… Hope, you get to eat one of those Dairymilk bar…and let that remind you of this friend who is thinking of you right now…Wish you a very very Happy Valentines Day…!!!”

The Sun will rise Tomorrow also...

It’s a short and simple story… but one of the funniest and embarrassing one for the Hero of the story… I am no where in the below story…But I am closely related to the characters of this funny incident...

An Introduction

Back home, there is this traditional belief that a woman’s first delivery is the responsibility of her own family…that means, all the expenses should be taken care of by the girl’s parents…As per that, if a woman is pregnant for first time, once she starts the third trimester, her parents will go to her marital house and bring her to her parent’s house. This usually happens during the 07th month of pregnancy…and once she delivers, she will be at her parent’s house for atleast 28days and she will return to her marital house only after the naming ceremony (something like Baptism) of the baby…When the girl’s parent’s go to her marital house to bring her home, they usually take with them a number of food items…mostly sweet…and the number of dishes depended on the month she was in…Therefore, if she was 07 months pregnant, her parents will bring along 7 types of dishes…

When, Where and Who???

This happened years before…maybe somewhere around 1989-1990…in the backdrops of an one and a half days long train journey…Now, the main character is my own maternal Uncle who was still very young…The Supporting Actor would be my maternal Grandfather and the Old Lady who shared the compartment in the train is aptly the Villain…lol!!!

Why???

The situation is my aunt was then some 6 or 7 months pregnant expecting her first baby. Following the tradition, my grandpa accompanied by my uncle set out to my aunt’s marital house…which was some 1327km away from my home city…and naturally it would take almost more than 1 and ½ days journey by train…The main aim was to give her the food items as per custom and then bring her home…

What???

Now my uncle and grandpa started their journey with big packs of different types of food items…To avoid the ‘not so wonderful food’ served in the trains, they had packed lunch and dinner for the long journey ahead…Their compartment was not so full, but still an old lady with her husband sat in the seat just against them in the train…

Time passed by and by dinner time, my grandpa took out the dinner pack and they finished off the dinner pack…But Alas, the food somehow couldn’t satisfy my uncle… He started grumbling with complaints about how hungry he was feeling…After much grunts, finally my grandpa agreed to let him have a small share of the dishes they were taking with them for my pregnant aunt…

My uncle’s face lit with happiness…its been quite some time that he was laying his eyes on the packets of food…he was trying hard not to let out his desperation to put his hungry hands into those packs…The green signal from my grandpa made my uncle no more thoughts….he just tore open one of the packs and started devouring from it…In between my grandpa had left the compartment for the toilets…ofcourse warning my uncle not to eat too much…

The much awaited freedom was welcomed well by my uncle and he just couldn’t stop himself from opening the packs, one after another…taking one from this and one from that, he was taking maximum advantage of the time…(Poor Uncle, little did he know, that soon he was going to be the laughing stock of a whole compartment of travelers and it’s gonna stick to him through out his life…)

Bcoz, this eating frenzy of my uncle was being watched by the fellow lady in the compartment…She was alarmed to see the way this small thin boy eating out the packs…She had already started wondering, if there would be any food left that would reach its real destination…After much time, she couldn’t bear the sight anymore…Finally, she blurted out…

“Dear Son, Surely, THE SUN WILL RISE TOMORROW ALSO...”

My uncle was a bit surprised and confused on what did she really mean…and that’s when my grandpa returned to his seat…and my uncle enthusiastically asked…

“Dad, what does it mean… THE SUN WILL RISE TOMORROW ALSO...”

My granddad wondered “Why such a question…”…and the lady cleared his doubt…

Grandpa couldn’t control his laugh…and he explained …

“Son, she meant…Tomorrow also will come…don’t just finish off everything today…keep some for tomorrow also…She said that seeing the way you were greedily eating all the food without even thinking about your own stomach or health…that was the best way to explain the way you were gulping your food…NONSTOP…hahaha!!!”

You can imagine my uncle’s face then…even we could, when grandpa narrated this incident to us once they came back from the journey…and till date, my uncle feels sorry for that day…bcoz, we, his dear relatives, never let one chance to go off without teasing him with the lady’s dialogue…

“Son, THE SUN WILL RISE TOMORROW ALSO…”

My New Home...

So…finally, I shifted into my new apartment…a real spacious one…gosh!!! I feel I am staying at somebody else’s house…shifting from my old house which was more like a chicken pen…You make one step forward you reach the kitchen..one step to your left and there you are at your bedroom…one step to your right and you can take your seat in the sofa in the dining cum hall room…it was really a congested place…but now, at my new place..I feel I am at an open playground...I feel strange…I need to literally take many more steps to reach the hall room or the kitchen or the bedroom…to be frank, I grew really lazy that now I find it really difficult to make my way outside my own room…and don’t even remind me of the routine cleaning to be done in this spacious apartment…I would be dead….

Anyways…the shifting and all the PROBLEMS AND ISSUES that came along with the process really exhausted me of all the energy I had from the week before…Wish, I owned a Robot, who did everything reading my mind…bcoz honestly, I am dead tired to even open my mouth and instruct him what to be done…I wish I had a long long vacation from office, so that I could really get a gooooooood long sleep…and make myself to get along with the new home…Alas, vacation is one thing I wouldn’t be getting…atleast not for another few weeks…till then I would be sitting in front of the Computer holding myself from dozing off and hitting myself against the keyboard...

What ever said and done…keep aside all the tensions of shifting…the new home did give a big mental peace…at heart, I feel, a new beginning is right here…a fresh start…with good things to come my way and ward off all bad things away from my life…(now, here I hope, I can forget the irritation somebody gave me as soon as I shifted... for some stupid reason she had….Godddd!!!…at times, I really imagine, what is it that I can do for her to be satisfied and happy…she has the most silliest demands and the most unbelievable character and above all the most thankless nature…in the last 4 years of my association with her…that’s what I learnt about her…and every time I try changing my outlook of her, she find some way to reinstall it back in me…)

Anyways…I wasn’t talking about her…and prefer I don’t go forward with a discussion on HER…maybe some other time…and if I start writing about “My Encounters with HER”…I might have to write in a whole book…lol!!!

Back to “shifting story”…somehow, till date, almost all the house shifting that I have gone through was for sad or bad or maybe desperate reasons…Maybe some day, I would bring myself up to write about those days of my life…But this time, I did it for a better reason…something that was done on choice and not due circumstances…and I really hope and pray to god to let me soon shift to a New Home…a Home that can be called MY DREAM HOME…Maybe god stay with me to fulfill my long cherished dream of building my own home…and I am sure, that would be the best and happiest phase of my life…

Between, you can also pray for me...If you have a direct connection with him, the Almighty, please request him to fulfill my dream ASAP…lol!!!