एक रईस  था मैं
दरख्तों भरा बगीचा था
हर एक पेड़ खून पसीने से सींचा था
एक ख़ुशी का आलम था , और
चहचाहट थी खुशियों की
अकेला था पर गम न था कोई

फिर आप दिखे एक मोड़ पर मुझे
अपनी मस्ती में खिलखिलाते हुए
न जाने क्यूँ समझा मैं की साथ की जरूरत है मुझे
साथ देने को आपका उस खुशनुमा बाग से निकल कर धुप में

साथ रहे  सड़कों पर हम
जब कुछ नहीं था पास हमारे
आलम था गरीबी का फिर भी
उस साथ पर फक्र था हमें
हर लम्हे की ख़ुशी लेते रहे तुम और हम खिलखिलाना ही देखते रहे

आज बहुत कुछ पा  लिया तुमने ,
तो अब ये साथ सालता है
गुरूर है तुम्हे उस रईसी का आज
आज येही साथ काट खाता है तुम्हे
आगे बढ़ गए तुम उस धुप से

मेरे उस दरख़्त पर अब किसी और का बाशिंदा है
धुप में जलते पैरों के साथ
आगे बढ़ता जाऊँगा मैं अकेले ही
फिर एक बग़ीचा बनेगा सूखी ज़मीन से
सबक दिया है मुझे ज़िन्दगी का तुमने
इस सबक को भूल न पाऊँगा

the last rendezvous!!

when we met last, you smiled at me

that stroll by the trees, and the look in your eyes

the tinkle in your giggle, the breeze whispering

and then winds picked up speed

it was a storm,  which hit us in the face

the gust of winds that blew us apart

and i did not know when we met last

that it was the last time i met you

Reflections

well, here I am again at the blog, after may be the most happening 4 months of my life.....and here are the lessons I learnt while at living it....

1. Its always more fun at other's weddings....ur own is a "smile-till-your-cheek-hurts" affair, when u are made to pose in random ways with your "better half" on stage for the benefit of the photographer, who charges a bomb for clicking your snaps in god-forsaken stupid poses, and then takes forever to deliver the snaps to you - and you while away smiling to strangers while your good friends are giggling and laughing away to all those memories you are a part of....
2. Deciding a menu for your wedding ranks next to "building a red fort and staying in a shanty" experience- 'coz all those tikkas you planned to melt away in your mouth, are sovoured by the guests while you melt away to the glaring hot halogen lights of the videograoher:(
3. After being a staunch votary of love marriage, or atleast know thou beau for all these years, marrying a rank stranger is no difficult thing....in fact it has been "so far so good" approach....it takes away too many unknowns and risks away, and gets you to know one of the best people i have got to know- Snigdha:)
4. if you intend to get married in any time in near future, 
• try finding a job with industry where late stays are not the norm
• plan shifting to a house near your office so you spend least on travel
• find a job where you could work from home (option 3 for me)

I know this is random ramblings, but one thing you end up losing in marriage is "Focus" - with so many things around you changing, its difficult to sit back, channel your thoughts and actually sit and type for long...and so adieu this time around....

and i'll create a new world sans you

for the days i would be deep at sea,
venturing into uncharted waters,
the waves tossing me around
alone in the fog and chill
and when the skies thundered me with storms and lightening
u were there, dear lighthouse, to guide me home

for all those days when i had a huge catch
and the days i returned empty handed
u showered ur light on me
illuminated my way, embraced me in ur light
just to light me up-  away from darkness

when out at sea, i could see u from a distance
knew there was someone waiting for me back there
knew u ll burn urself away in the dark night
so that i could be safe, i could face the seas
i could survive the treacherous fogs

u gave me the courage to venture ahead
in life, go to the deeper seas,
stay out in the dark
and still find my way back fighting the odds
coz i knew u waited there for me
u were my pillar of strength, and the sense of direction in life

and,then today,
i m far from the shore in the deep seas, all alone in the fog and chill
the waves tossing me around
venturing into uncharted waters,

and the skies threatening me with storms and lightening

u seem to have befriended the clouds
they surround you, embrace u
taking ur faint light away from me
i have nowhere to go
i dont know my way back
coz the only direction i rowed to was u
i am lost and wandering
coz the only landmark my life had was u

may be u ll turn ur light off for me
may be the clouds wont let u spreading ur light again
may be i ll never embrace ur light

but i won't go down without a fight
i ll fight the waves tossing me around
i ll fight the skies and thunderstorms
and i ll keep rowing till i m dead or drowned
and may be i'll find a new shore to return to
and i ll be the discoverer
of the new lands
where the seas are calmer, and the clouds not so dark
where fogs go away when i reach the shore
the rocks not so trecherous, and the nights not so dark

dear lighthouse, i ll create a new world,
without you, and be the sea warrior again

The quest of happiness

beyond the mountains
and past that unsurmountable passes
there would be a place
which lies untouched

by the corporate liars that we are
untouched by the luxuries, we should live without, but cannot live without
where the air is not polluted by greed and one-up-manship
where the water is serene and pure

where the beauty is not measured by lowest deep cut blouses
and there's more to admire than skimpy business suits

where time is not dependent on blackberry schedules and outlook calendars
and you are not running for the next tight meeting

when all u meet is nature, beauty and a little bit of you
where the clear skies clean your views.....

Happiness - spelled for now as Sikkim, snow capped , in December....my next destination.....( the following pic made the decision)

Picture Courtesy - http://www.bcmtouring.com/forum/travelogues-east-north-east-india-f64/north-sikkim-switzerland-east-winter-t19019-2/

loneliness

there are days when the sun shines bright, and the bees and birds chirp all over,
the colors are pastel, and the contrasts amaze;
the sounds of music and chit chats muse into the ears...
and its a world full of frentic activity, me being the center of the universe


and today, the darkness crept over
the birds and bees shied away to their abodes,
the sounds died out into an eerie silence, blach shadows outstripped the pastel colours....


and u realised, center of universe is just another point in the universe

the uncomfortable feeling

have pondered over this even before - what are we running after ( here and here ). and somehow this is the dominant question which is coming back to haunt me again for the last few days. I did talk to a friend a while back about this uncomfortable feeling this week, and somehow i feel that the 2 hour chat just made me even more chiseled off simply because it made me put the hard things in discrete words - in essence making me  accept the things or thoughts i always chose to overlook.

so here's my dilemma - i have managed to reach a coveted position in my life- something others look up to - both professionally (where things speak for themselves), and personally ( well things don't really speak for themselves, but still)...from a material world perspective have done well for myself, have reached a decent spot in career, consider myself one of the luckier people around when it comes to career choices and education. Managed to get a good salary, bought the material possessions - car/house/shares/financial stability - all that people look for, and herein lies the problem - i need a new target now, because in its absence the same targets get rehashed in a bigger way, and come back and haunt you- now i need a bigger car, a bigger house, more money, and an even higher package, i seem to be perennially feeling dissatisfied with my job, what with looking for a fourth switch over a couple of years, with the first seven plus years in just two jobs. the issue seems to be that - these targets have been achieved, and since i could not really think on a different tangent...i am looking at going further along these redundant dimensions. Constant job dis-satisfaction is leading to too much heartburn, the current job is just perfect from a worldly sense- pays awesome, very little work, and great brand and job description, and I AM NOT LIKING IT. when people around ask me- why are you planning to quit, i tell them i don't like it, but do I really know what do I want. perhaps not- which reflects in my next prospective job- I know i do not like the work culture that exists there, but I am still going ahead simply because I want a change and a break, and I am ready to take the risk knowing fully well that I'll quit in less than a year. I am doing this since I feel decently insured for any fallback option  after that 1 year. I know i have another job waiting for me, and therein lies the problem - i am too complacent, too relaxed and too full of myself. It may sound arrogant to the world, yet deep inside me- i know I am not liking it. This is not me, this is not the same relaxed feeling that I had in the first 7 years of my job, then I was at peace with what I was doing, now I am not at peace with myself. Then i knew exactly what  i wanted, now i don't know what am i running after. PERFECT MIRAGE!!!

On a more personal front, I always had a vivid social life- lots of people around, lots of social activity and some great fun in small things. I always maintained ( and close people around me have heard this from me) - i have a lot of acquaintances and a few friends, i use acquaintances and allow friends to use me.  that was my motto in life- always, and i was really proud of the friends league- things have subtly change - the top line remains the same - lots of people around, lots of social activity and some great fun- but the context has changed- the undercurrents different - now i really yearn for the friends i could spend just any amount of time , i can have so much fun with so many people, but I really miss the heart-to-heart easy conversations, lunches and dinners are abound, but i miss the simple "chhole kulche" on a cycle with those friends, all the barista's and CCD and Costa coffees could not add up to a simple "chai" at HCL Manak building or at the Patel Chest crossing chai wala -simply because we now have friends of convenience- put up a status or comment on facebook, forward bulk SMS and emails, and you are friends, whatever happened to endless talks all night, and mindless gup-shap. 

OK ,these are all generic rants- why am I presssing with these ? Simply because these are things or traits I always hated, and the irony is I feel I am getting pushed to becoming the same stereotype i painted above, i know its hypocricy but i am "blogging" these thoughts instead of talking it out to someone in person. and thats the machination in my life that I am not comfortable with, my life is fast becoming an ordinary life - i was not made for the ordinary life, I deserve something special, something exciting - and i have lived the exciting life all these years......call me arrogant, but i will find MY life back so till I find my LIFE BACK, this blog gets the dose of my mind

The Theory of Relationships....

a few days i had posted(OK- copy pasted) from footloosedoll, about the pain of separating/break-up/letting go of someone you loved for dearly, last evening stumbled upon this. Similar line of thought....

In management - especially marketing courses we had these product lifecycle curves.....they start slowly, grow , and finally decline....

Somehow the relationship cycles are similar in nature, OK i know, a lot of people who are in love/relationships right now (really, or is it an infatuation??) would not agree to my theory of relationships life cycle...but may be would once they are on the leeward side of the curve Well, most posts mentioned above are from people who are at the extreme right end of the curve....they have been through a relationship, see sawed through the ups and downs, and are now feeling dumped at the other end. This is the basis of my now presented - "Theory of relationships" . All non-blood opposite sex relationships in the age bracket of 15-40 could be explained by the theory......don't believe me, read on The left part of the curve as shown above is like really something everyone knows....what with almost everyone i know having been through 1- Love affairs/romantic relationships

2- good friends/buddies/platonic relationships ( whether they exist in absolute terms or not is a different question altogether)

3- Arranged marriage mode/courtship period ; etc

however in each of these modes.....what really happens is this ( this is the consulting mind at its best....life through 3X4 matrix...he he }-)) ,

And now for the symptoms of each of these matrix elements

A1 - the most happening of the lot, in many cases this is the shortest period, sample this

He - will u be friends with me?

She - SLAP (scenario 1)/ (shyly) (smile) eh-huh-yes

Alternately ( the long route, also shared with the A2 phase) -

He ( sitting in canteen/bus/local train) (staring into oblivion from where the girl would emerge) sigh!!! ( for the first 3 months ) followed by sharing class notes/office work( people from IT industry would relate to this)/smiling shyly when meeting with group of common friends. 6 months later, the togetherness grows into the B1/B2 phase.

B1 - the most awesome phase in a life of relationship. movies. long drives, unending phone calls, gifts, flowers, whispering on the phone, blank calls( a relic of the long gone by time when we only had landlines, and the girl's mom/dad/brother/sister picked up the phone) - the time when u know all about the girls likings, remember about the blue orchid that the girl praised at a friends birthday party, and you decide to blow up all your pocketmoney/more "Udhaar" to gift her the blue orchids bouquet on valentines/college passout day/last day in office....u agree to buy and wear a red polka dots jacket since the lady in question thinks you look awesome in it, (while everyone else around including your street dog barks against it), u never think twice about flipping out your credit card in a shopping spree with the girl, at the expensive coffee shops et al, and only think twice ( and thrice and n number of times) when ur card bill finally comes in...."bhaiya ye paisa kahan se chukaoonga main......???". In most cases the near sightedness keep growing in the phase until u have lost track of all friends and the only thing that you could look at is the lady in question. There are certain catalysts to the buildup phase, which lead to immidiate target market capture - things like outstation trips/onsite trips together, driving back on a bike in rain, accidently barging into the girls room when she has just come back from washing her hair ( the evergreen scene is residential colleges/IIT/IIMs etc), kisses n hugs, the first time the girl shared some of her most intimate secrets soaked with tears, and the guy offered his shoulder/shirt to wipe them away....even more effective is the kissing away the tears from the cheeks sequence (some cheek some guys have....eh:))

In most case the delineation of the current growth phase end is in bed, when the relationship life cycle reaches the zenith....the guy is on top of the world, and the girl overwhelmed with the gifts/attention/affection she is showered with. ( Corollary of the theory of relationships - if people do not agree to the theory, they have not yet reached the zenith, as what goes up also come down - As newton's law of gravity prophesised)

TO BE CONTINUED.....

musings mood again

sitting at a dhaba behind my school with a good friend of mine, i had a aloo parantha and egg bhurji for dinner....well for old times sake, and this friend stares at the happy face that i had, and said..."aaj fir kuch nostalgic sa likhega tu blog pe".....well i can not make my friend turn out to be a liar, can I???? so here goes another senti wali post another week, another aimlessly wandering 7 days....since last wednesday --> work followed by awesome dinner with friends, work, allnighter party, drive out of town, little work, work, work followed by nostalgic dinner at a dhaba which goes back 20 years in my life ( the dhaba at refugee market behind my hostel at modern school....some old times)..... days just seem to float past, and each new week, each new day comes back with the same feelings, same old story...high time i changed this pattern.... break free from the shackles, do something different..... way back there was a difficult hindi word that i had learnt - mrigtrishna (mirage), and when i reflect upon the last week capped by the dhaba dinner today...it seems to be the story of my life....that hostel life probably was the age of innocence- of sweet nothings in daily life, of a life sans air conditioners, of a 50 rupee pocketmoney, of cricket sessions in the sun, of simply chatting all night with room-mates, and jumping the school boundary to go get a parantha from the dhaba at 1 in night....there was no hurry, fursat ke din....when we had ambitions, and the urge to achieve them.... when all these sweet nothings had a meaning in everyday life.... that followed engineering, in an era when there were 3 engineering colleges in Delhi-NCR, we were the achievers....cracko.....!!! a job on campus followed by a world tour all paid by the employers under the garb of onsite trips, a stint at IIM where loads of others want to be, a job with a top consulting company, a wallet full of more debit and credit cards that the actual cash i ever carried to the dhaba ( that used to be 3 rupees for an egg paratha, and i carried 5 bucks to the dhaba:)), and at the same dhaba, i was nostalgic, but not happy- not content.....whew.... am i the only cribber, ( i realised that most posts on this blog are cribs) or others feel the same too.....not that I am against parties, against pubs and discs and 5K dinners, but somehow nothing seems to beat the basic parathas n chai on the hostel rooftop....why is it so? even today I want to go higher up in the professional career, and may be i would, I m doing pretty well for myself, I have managed a GOOD(ok people who know me would pounce on me for this) work life balance, and i yearn for a little more.... PS- thank dost, hope u now know why is it called the refugee market, and YES, you were the only girl in refugee market }-)