Un-Defined

She opened her eyes to see him at a short distance from her. Instantly, a cold fear gripped her. She was afraid. Not of this man. Not of what she had done to him. Not of his damaged body that lay lifeless in the dark corner of the house she had called home for the last 11 months. No. It was something else. Something deep enough to unsettle her very being. Something strong enough to weaken her soul to the extent of causing such turmoil in her mind and heart that she could not bear to think about it for even a moment longer. She knew she had killed a man.

And she knew she had done the right thing. She did not fear the consequences of a murder. Yet, she was afraid. Afraid of that unknown fear that gripped her from within and suffocated her in a way that made her feel as if she were drowning. Maybe she was indeed drowning. Was that how it felt to drown? Surely she was unable to find her breath. And her body wasn’t following what her mind was saying. What was her mind saying anyway? That she had murdered the man she once loved. Why was she not crying then? Where werethe tears? How can she feel so numb? Maybe she was dead too. Dead by drowning in fear? Was that possible? Yes, that was it. She was dead. She had been dead for a long time now.

The constant fear of this man had killed her soul long before he could harm her physical being. Fear of those drunken eyes and how they glared down at her. The eyes that once had affection and love floating in them, had gradually given permanent refuge to anger and arrogance – arrogance that turned this caring, affectionate man into a monster. Her body shivered as she looked at the dead eyes that had humiliated her every night, the limp hands that had hit her face with any object they could find around, the broken legs that had not hesitated to kick her in the abdomen on the days she had taken the bottle away from him. How did it matter that her body still had life remaining in it? Her soul was long dead. She had been full of life once. But this man had taken the life from her and replaced it with fear. And when he left, he had taken away this fear along with him, to leave behind emptiness. That was all that she was now. A piece of undefined emptiness…

Agra Confessions...

This post is dedicated to all the awesome memories created during this very unplanned and unlikely trip - which in fact turned out to be a one very special and close to all our hearts. 

It was unplanned for we had not really been looking forward to it, had not anticipated that we would actually end up going for it (though the tickets were booked long ago!) - especially looking at the trend of our plans in the past which clearly indicated the fun part ended at the discussion stage. So, when at the last minute everybody managed to figure out an excuse to drop out from office for a couple of days, the plan was finally on!

Before I begin, here's an introduction of the characters:
Ankita: The Bride
Sneha: The late lateef
Mansi: The townie
Jinesh: A harrowed guy
Surbhi: A family girl
Suken: Let's not describe him :P
Aditi: That's Me!

Here was our planned itinerary: 

Day 1: Suken and Sneha to leave for Agra in afternoon

Day 2: Suken and Surbhi to attend the Sangeet. Jins, Mansi, Surbhi and I to leave for Agra

Day 3: Jins, Mansi, Surbhi and myself to reach Agra in evening. All 6 to attend the night wedding

Day 4: Fatehpur Sikri, Agra market

Day 5: Taj Mahal, Agra Fort and any other place feasible. Depart for Mumbai by night train

Day 6: Reach Mumbai

Here's what actually happened:

Day 1: Sneha manages to almost miss the train - again!

Day 2: Sneha misses us in the middle of the night...shares the phone with Suken?

Day 3: Surbhi raids the rooms

Day 4: Epic impromptu dance by Suken & Jins

Day 5: Monkey fight

Day 6: Robbery!

How did we manage to get so off the plan? Read on...

Day 1: The Ritual

As it is a well known fact by now, a trip cannot be complete unless Sneha manages to almost miss it. The record remains unbeaten till date - thanks to the fact that despite leaving well in time for the train (for a change), Sneha and Suken managed to enter the 3:00 pm train at 2:59:59 pm. Of course, we shall not blame her because it is obviously never her fault :)

Day 2: The Chaos

The Train: Adi, Mansi and Jins realize they are all in different compartments! Incidentally, Surbhi, who had booked her ticket separately manages to get a seat right next to Jins. So much for ladies quota! 

After about 5 trips to and fro between the 1st and the 6th compartment, and after having all the passengers in these compartments memorize our faces, Mansi and I manage to shift to the same compartment as Jins and Surbhi. The trip had finally begun! Fortunately for us, the uncle who was travelling with us had booked all 6 seats for his family, but could not be accompanied by them due to last minute changes. What was more fortunate was the fact that he had not cancelled those tickets - which meant we could have THE ENTIRE BOGIE OF 6 for ourselves upto Jhansi!

No sooner had we settled in when Surbhi does a Surbhi when she accidentally blurts out about her "family planning". (Please refer to the appendix for a full list of trip dictionary). This wasn't enough. So Mansi does a Surbhi too when she plugs her cell phone on charging and begins cribbing endlessly that it is not getting charged - only to have Jins point out that she has not put on the switch :)

Meanwhile at the Sangeet: Sneha was having a very nice time when she mixed some 2-3 varieties of drinks and started feeling reallllyy good. Things only got better when she started playing games.........

Back to the Train: Just as the lights were turned off and we were about to go to sleep, we get a message from Sneha: Miss you girls! That was it. Jins was offended that he wasn't being missed and we got extremely curious as to what made her miss us so much as to message us at such an odd time. She told us she was just playing games. Well, the next 2 hours were spent knowing more about the games Sneha was playing ;) For some very odd reason, only one of Sneha and Suken would talk at a time. Strange, isn't it? 

Day 3: Lessons of Life

This day turned out to be a crash course for Jins on "What Women Want". Okay I'm exaggerating. Actually it was just what we girls do that he may or may not have known earlier. We entertained him with a nice hour long session on how to spend an hour removing and applying nail paint and teaching him the difference between bright orange and neon orange. The session also added some more words from the female dictionary - the easiest one being "Awwwwww!!!". I can proudly say he has learned the usage of these words very accurately :) For those who think we girls completely overpowered him - hold on. He had his own fun when he taught us the mannerisms of an upmarket townie lingo which included some expressions such as being harrowed and mannerisms on how to make things look decent. 

We were having a good time enjoying the compartment to ourselves. But like everything good - this good time too came to an end - for an even better time. Enter Mr and Mrs Dadaji and his grandson. The three of them were travelling to Delhi to get the granny operated. She was such a sweet thing, smiled and said it all with her expressions, without uttering a single word for hours. Well, her husband more than made up for it. What started with a seemingly innocent query of "Where are you all headed to?" resulted in 2-3 hours of non-stop elocution by Mr Dadaji. In these couple of hours we got to know almost everything about him (quite an intelligent, learned, broad minded, interesting old man), his family (in all parts of North India), his achievements in life (being the Sarpanch of his village at some point), his opinion on politics (that was because we saw Mayawati board our train at some random station) and also got enlightened about some random topics ranging from India's freedom struggle, Gandhiji's biography etc. etc. etc. But the best part were the unforgettable 2-liner poetries he made up on the spot:

"Chai garam honi chahiye

Swabhaav naram hona chahiye"

And with that amazing session of chit chat we reached Agra...

The Wedding: Anki's wedding was bound to be the grand affair that easily qualifies for the title of a Big Fat Indian Wedding. It had all the essentials that a Marwadi wedding must have - an awesome venue in the Mogul Sheraton banquet hall, a royal dinner with more dishes than one can count, the Band Baaja Bride experience with extravagant dresses donned upon by both families, and of course, who can forget the belly dancers (Yes, that's right - belly dancers on the side stage throughout the reception procession)!

The expose: Well, Anki looked stunningly gorgeous. She made a beautiful bride :) Little did we know at that point that there was already another wedding being arranged at that very moment, right under our noses!  Enter Ms. Surbhi with her amazingly ancient cellphone. Surprisingly, we had noticed her spending a looooottt of time on her phone throughout the trip. Definitely something was fishy. So this time when she left her phone carelessly on the table and it buzzed, Mansi managed to steal it away and lo! The screen was flashing a message pop-up. The moment she read the pop-up, she left out a shrill scream and came running to Sneha and me. Our reactions were almost similar when we read the flash on the screen. It said:

"I hope I am not crossing  my limits"

Yes, it were exactly those same words. Surbhi was coming running behind Mansi to get her phone back, but of course, it was too late by then. Poor thing had to explain the entire story to us in detail. That's how we got to know of Mr. Jay (or Jai Ho! as Suken addresses him). Congratulations Surbhi! We let her enjoy her time and had our own fun seeing her blush at every mention of Jai ho!

The dinner: We wished her and then proceeded to the dinner area. Now, there were just so many options on the menu that we had a difficult time selecting what to eat and what to skip! Bust somehow, we managed to finally reach the Pav Bhaji counter. A point to note here is that by this time all of us were almost full, so we wanted to simply "taste" Pav Bhaji. Obviously, as everything else on the trip, this also had to go weird. So here's what happened. Suken got us a plate of Pavs and Bhaji. We finished the Bhaji but were left with Pav. So he went back and got more Bhaji. This time we finished the Pav but were left with Bhaji. So he went back and got some more Pav. Again, we finished the Bhaji but not the Pav. So he went and got some more Bhaji. And the same story repeated for about 5-6 times! As you can guess, we were too full for any desserts :)

The Pheras: Finally, the reception dinner was over and we had some time to relax before the actual wedding. So we freshened up and changed to something lighter, mingled with Anki's other friends, the normal chit chatting here and there. When the ceremony finally began, it was almost 3 am, and the bidaai was to happen after 7 am or so. We were too exhausted by this time to wait up through the ceremony, so we decided to head back to our rooms and take a nap so that we could be back for the bidaai.

Well, going by the exhaustion we had had through the 2 days, one would have expected us to be asleep within minutes. Once again that was not to be. As Mansi, Surbhi, Sneha and I got into our bed, we suddenly felt at a loss of sleep. Someone brought it up and someone else suggested that if we are not sleepy, we shouldn't let the guys sleep either. Surbhi, however, was an exception and still felt drowsy. So we told her that she can go to the guys room and go to sleep there. But first we must wake up the guys.

So we headed to their rooms and knocked. The moment they opened the door, Surbhi barged in, practically raiding the room. Before we could figure out what was happening, she had occupied the bed and slid into the blanket. The rest of us, including the guys, were left standing, surprised at Surbhi's speed of the takeover.

Anyways, after a while of nonsense chit chatting here and there, we headed back to our rooms, setting the alarm for 6:30 am. Needless to say it was snoozed and dismissed without even realizing, and we missed the bidaai. Sorry Anki!

Day 4: Expect the unexpected

The next day was thankfully pretty uneventful. after a quick relocation to another hotel, we headed out for a visit to the Fatehpur Sikri and Agra market. It was a lovely day and the place was even more lovelier - except for the honey bee hives that occupied practically the entire roof of the Sikri.

After a delicious lunch at the Sikri, we returned to the city for some shopping in the city. This is where the guys sort of underestimated the girls and had to re-do the shopping ;) After an awesome session of hogging on street food - Alu Chaat, Gol Gappas, Tokri Chaat, Rabdi and the likes - we headed back to our hotel. today we had planned for a night-out and couldn't wait for the excitement to begin.

Later that night, we and Anki's other friends assembled in our room for the night sessions. A night full of craziness, silliness, weirdness and madness had just begun. After a happening game of cards and some other silly games, Anki's friends had to call it a night for they had an early morning checkout next day. So it was just us from then on. At some point, Jins and Suken lost some sort of a bet and had to give us a dance performance. Surprisingly, they agreed!

What followed next was mind blowing. A 5 minute long duet performance on Chhammak Challo with atleast 6-7 different variety of steps, and all in sync! We were astonished beyond words! Not just were they both sporty enough to agree for the dance, but each of their moves, each one's expressions and each step! It had to be seen to be believed.

Day 5: A chase sequence and a robbery

It was our final day at Agra and we wanted to make the most of it. We woke up with the driver's call. He had already arrived and we were still asleep, too hungover from the previous night. Somehow we gathered enough motivation to get out of the bed and pack up our stuff for the day. The plan was to check out and keep our luggage in the hotel lobby while we go visit the Taj Mahal, Agra fort, Vrindavan and Mathura. then we would return to the hotel in the evening, collect our bags and board the return train. Based on the time our driver had explained to us, it seemed like a perfect plan. Of course, we had been forgetting that we had Sneha with us :)

The Taj was beautiful. More than beautiful actually. Floating amidst the winter haze and soft white clouds, it looked like a fairytale woven in dreams that had just decided to come down to earth to mesmerize us petty human beings with its spellbinding beauty.

We then moved on to visit the Agra fort where our guide had amazing stories to tell us about the Moguls and their court at the time. We then headed to hog on amazing parathas for lunch. With our stomachs full, we were now ready for a long journey to Vrindavan.

Here we visited the local gullies of Krishna's hometown. Later we headed to the newly built temple of Vrindavan - a massive structure with fascinating murals and beautiful lighting that threw lovely patterns on the artificial scenes created to depict stories from Krishna's life.

It was already evening by the time we departed for Mathura, so a little crunched on time. But we are not the people who give up so easily. Mathura here we come!

The departure: We could not make it to old Mathura. We did manage to see the new temple there outside the original boundaries, but were running too late to visit the Yamuna. So this had to be it. We needed to get going if we had any intentions of not missing the train AGAIN!

We were running so late by the time we reached our hotel, and the hotel guy just wasn't being cooperative. We were all completely harrowed! We were trying to gather our bags and other belongings, when suddenly some guests from another room came to the reception and began complaining to the manager. Apparently they had a terrible sleep the previous night because of some chaotic noises coming from the floor above theirs. Okay, we realized that should have been our noise. Hmm...glad we were checking out.

Quickly we rushed out of the place and got into our car. We had exactly half hour to board the train and within this time we had to manage loading our bags into the car, dodge the evening traffic to the railway station, settle the driver's payments and climb the bridge with bags and find the correct bogie. Oh, and not to forget the pedas! With pin drop silence we made our way to the station and having realized we had some time to spare, quickly rushed to purchase the pedas. Thankfully we were able to board with five minutes to spare.

Our trip had been a super success and it should have ended at that point (after another awesome dinner of course). But as it were to be, picture abhi baaki thi!

Robbery!: We were to reach Mumbai very early the next morning. A couple of hours before that, Jinesh gets a call from his brother in the US. Now some background here - Jinesh was staying alone in Mumbai at that point and since he was travelling, his house was locked and empty. Or atleast that is how it was supposed to be. But that is not what his brother told him over the call. He was in fact quite surprised to know Jins was still on the way, in  train. Who had spoken to him over video call just a few minutes ago then?

According to his brother, Jins had received his call over Facetime just 5-10 minutes ago. Though they were not able to speak, but the description of the background - a brown sofa, a well built guy answering the call - quite resembled Jinesh and his house. Was it what we were thinking it was? Immediately Jinesh's sister in law (in US with his bro) panicked. We were worried too. There was definitely something spooky here.

Either his brother had dialed a wrong number or someone had broken into his house. Wrong number over Facetime was not a possibility. So it meant a robbery was taking place at his house right this very moment! The thief must have picked up the tablet and when he saw the incoming call, he must have accepted it in his panic. So the guy Jinesh's brother saw on the video call must be the thief himself!

This was beyond anything we had ever anticipated. What could we do sitting here in train? Was there actually a thief at his place? Likely - he said. Just a few days ago there had been an incident where the rods of his window had been widened when they had been out - as if someone had tried to break in. Maybe the thieves had been keeping a close watch on his movements all along! And so this time they grabbed the opportunity.

Jinesh placed a call to his neighbour and requested them to open his house with the spare keys he had left with them. The neighbour aunty, very gutsy indeed, agreed to help. She went into the house and checked every corner of it to be double sure. No thief there. His ipad was also on the bed - right where he had placed it before leaving for the trip.

So no robbery. Thank God! But then, who was it that his brother had seen on the call? Nothing was making any sense. Well, nothing we could do at the moment. So we urged them to take it as a case of cross connection and ignore it atleast for the time being. At the back of our minds, though, we were all still worried.

Mystery un-revealed: We reached Mumbai before sunrise. Exhausted with the endless ordeal of even after event, we just wanted to go home and crash for a while before heading back to the routine of our jobs. Only, there was the mystery of the robbery yet to be solved. And solved it got. The next day Jinesh explained to us all as to what had actually happened. The silly error that led to this huge chaos. Here's the gist of it: Jinesh had visited the US just a couple of months ago and had taken a temporary sim card there for using during his stay. When he returned, he had discarded the number. But the telecom company had not. They had re-assigned it to some other guy (also well built, and who stayed in a house having brown sofas similar to the ones at Jinesh's place). His brother had the US number still saved, and that night, had dialed the US number instead of India number. The other guy had received it from his home in US and caused all the confusion.

Wow! Who could have imagined that! But we were all super relieved after hearing this. No robbery AND no mystery. And an awesome trip with loads and loads of memories. Well, all's well that ends well. But for us, it was a new beginning of a treasured friendship of lifetime :) Cheers!

Appendix: The Trip Dictionary

1. Family Planning: A planned outing with your family

2. Doing a Surbhi: Managing to innocently pull off a joke on yourself
3. Townie: A person who often attempts to flaunt his or her lifestyle through usage of superfluous words such as "harrowed" etc. or through high handed behaviour

4. Harrowed: Expression used by townies when they feel annoyed

5. Awwwww: A feminine expression used by girls to either a. express warmth or b. annoy guys

6. I do!: A term that always succeeds at scaring off guys
7. Decent: An act of good doing done solely with the intention of showing off your nicer side - just for the heck of it
8. Playing games: Left open to audience interpretation....

Ladakh Lore

Ladakh Lore

I had never believed it when people claimed Ladakh to be one of the most spell bounding places in the world. Surely they were exaggerating, like anybody who has had a great vacation with some great company. But I was proven wrong. This “Sacred Roof of the World” is truly deserving of all the appreciation that has been bestowed upon it, and perhaps some more.

This unforgiving terrain, wonderfully maintained by the Border Road Organization, mesmerizes each one of its visitor in its magical beauty. With almost all of the world’s beauties in one single place – a desert and a lake, rivers and plains and mountains, snow and sunshine – one does not know what to make of this place. What is it really? It’s a funny place if you ask me! Why do I say so? Take a look at the below 2 images yourself, and I can bet you will not believe that these are from the same river at different times of the year.

       

 
But then, that’s how Ladakh is. It is everything at one time, at one place.

We had been warned of the rugged roads that connect the vivid zones of Ladakh. But only once we took up the travel through them that I realized that all of its ruggedness – the roadless roads, the pine shaped rock formations, the arid mountains and the sandy dunes – were infact a part of what made Ladakh so captivating in the first place. You can’t help but wonder how, a place abandoned by rain and left so arid; contain so much beauty within itself. And then when you happen to spot of lush greenery in the middle of a desert, you start believing in the magic of Mother Nature.               

               

And just when you think you have seen enough of the ruggedness, you reach Nubra, where the double hump camels await you to take you on a journey through the sand dunes of one of the highest deserts in the world…

And that is not the end of the story. The icing on the cake is when you reach the next destination. After a 5 hour long drive from Leh, when you reach this signboard, be prepared to lose your breath:

Yes, it is THE PANGONG! Now, you may have seen Pangong a million times in movies – the most famous one being the last scene of “3 Idiots”. I am also sure you would have found it a lovely view when you watched it big screen. But believe me when I say that that was nothing compared to how you feel when you see it in real. The Pangong Tso is the largest lake at such an altitude ranges more 134 km and only about one third of it is in India. I am left speechless when I begin to describe this wonder. Its beauty is beyond charming; its clarity and vivid shades will leave you wanting for more. But if you were to ask me to define Pangong, I would say it is something that redefines “Blue”.

                            

I would love to go on and on about Pangong Tso, but I know that no matter what I say or how I say it, I will never be able to do full justice to its enticing beauty. So I will leave it for you to feel it yourself.

As for my final takeaway from Ladakh, I would like to complete the story with the people that make the place what it is. Every person you meet here will be wearing a smile on their face. Every person welcomes you into their haven with such warmth, that you would instantly feel at home. The spirituality that lingers in this place (brought in by the numerous monasteries, stupas and Buddha sculptures sprinkled across the region) is clearly reflected in the eyes of its residents, who seem so happy in this small little world of their own.

   

Ladakh is not just a place. It is a feeling, a collection of emotions, a form of art, which its connoisseurs would take back with them to treasure for a lifetime.

JULEY!

The Indian Revolution in the making?

This happened while I was returning today from work. I had taken an auto rickshaw home and when it halted at a signal, the auto guy pulled out and put on his Gandhi topi with slogans of the Aam Aadmi Party printed in bold black font on it.

I casually asked him if he was a follower of the party. And here is what he had to say:

"Yes ma'am, very much so! Kejriwal is a nice guy and his party is very honest. I feel everybody must support him. Yes, he has committed some mistakes. But then, who hasn't? They are new and also learning. They have only good intentions in their mind and that is what sets them apart. Sometimes you need to forgive and give a second chance to the right people. In fact, you must try and meet the members of the party to understand how committed they are to the cause. I got the urge to join just by looking at their will to do good to the country. You should join too ma'am, if you wish to support the honest ones in their honest cause."

And then it was time for me to get down, so he stopped at that. I paid him the fare and wished him luck before getting down. 

But what left an impression on me was how happy and proud he felt by being a part of the party. I may not be sure about the potential of AAP in making the country better. I may not be sure of AAP winning in the first place. But my heart sends out a silent prayer for them each time I see AAP's success - not in terms of the change they brought about in the policies of the country, but in terms of the change they have brought about in the people of India - by making them more conscious than ever of their role in Indian governance, by bringing out the goodness of the people and their will to do good for the country, by inspiring them to come forth and do their bit, and by creating a wave of this consciousness among each one of us. For this, I salute the party and wish it all the very very best for all its endeavors!

Something I wrote...

And here is my first official publication....!!! :)))

Yes! And here's how it happened...

Like most amazing things in life, this one too happened suddenly, out of the blue. As I have mentioned in one of my earlier posts, the journey from my office to home is a very long one. So to keep myself occupied during this time, I finish all my pending chores - making calls, catching up with friends, reading mails, listening to music, taking a nap, and of course - reading.

One fine day, as I was reading on my cellphone while travelling on this looong route after a looong day, I happened to come across Frank Zuben's blog post Whatbrickwall. It mentioned about Stella Wilkinson's upcoming Charity Anthology and called out for donations for this noble cause. It instantly caught my interest. I read through the post in detail and decided to give it a shot. But as luck would have it, the last day for the submissions was 28th February, 2014. And what date was it that day? Yes - 28th February, 2014. It meant I only had a couple of hours to spare if I intended to submit a story.

Well, what the heck! I opened the notes app on my android and began drafting something. Obviously, as it generally happens, words don't come out when you want them to. So after 5-10 minutes of pondering, I gave up and decided to instead just relax and take a nap. As I began to drift to sleep, my mind wandered to a discussion I had read earlier that day - something on "ignorance being a bliss". I wondered if that were really true. Hmm...food for thought!

I thought some more as my bus passed through the dense jungle of Aarey Colony in Mumbai. Surely ignorance cannot always be a bliss, right? Suppose...

And that's how an idea took shape. I could not help but put it down. I was back on my notes app and before I knew the story was on its way! 

Now I was getting excited. I had never written a short story before. Poems yes, blog posts yes, travelogues yes. But story - no! This was my very first attempt and I couldn't wait to finish it. Alright, in reality I was in a hurry to finish it - because my stop was approaching and I feared I would lose the plot due to over-thinking if I did not finish it in one go. So I kept writing and writing. I could not finish before my stop, but for a change shunned my laziness and got back at it after dinner. After a couple of edits, and hardly believing even for a minute that it would be selected, I drafted the mail to Stella and Frank. This was an anthology that already had 2 parts published. It was to have established writers from across 7 different countries. The book was to be a serious effort towards charity. Ugghhh! I definitely did not stand a chance at it. Yet, for some odd reason, I hit send before I could think twice. 

Fast forward to 10 days later.....I see a mail from Stella Wilkinson. The subject line read Surprise, Surprise! I could not believe it. I read it and re-read it, sure that it was just a polite thank you note for submission. Nah! IT WAS CONFIRMATION! Yes, the story was selected! They were printing my story!!! Thrilled would not have described it adequately. Thrilled to the power of 100 would come close perhaps. It was the best moment ever :)))

Fast forward 20 more days...And we did it! The book has now released on Amazon. All thanks to Stella, Frank and team and a big congratulations to all the authors. Each story is so unique in its own way. A thorough pleasure to read.

The concept of GOD...to believe or not to believe?

Let's start with a very basic definition of God: Almighty.

What does this imply? That He is the creator, the one who is most supreme, has control over all beings and non-beings.

Let's add to it what we like to believe (or rather already do believe): That He is the doer of good and will always make truth / good triumph over falsehood / evil.

And finally, let's add a reason for our belief: That whenever we are in times of crisis, He is the one we can always rely on to help us, to set things right, to get us out of our misery and lead us onto the right path.

Having said that, our definition of God today seems to have merged to include even our beliefs. Let me explain this better with a couple of examples.

The origin of religion actually began when man started worshiping the things that helped him survive - like fire and Sun and earth. Then he started worshiping the things that he felt could cause some disruption to him - for he believed that by praying to these elements he can pacify them to cause less destruction - such as praying to wind and rain to harness and not destroy his crops. 

He slowly started assigning entities to each of these elements, entities that control these elements. We see examples of this across several civilizations. Let me just state an example of the Wind God. He is is Aeolus in Greek mythology, Vayu in Hindu mythology, Shu in Egyptian mythology, Fujin in Japanese mythology, Fei Lian in Chinese mythology and so on so forth.

Once man had the entities in place, he began to observe and study in deep the factors that impact these elements. He started devising ways to appease the Gods. These later became the religious rituals. It gradually began to be believed that those practicing the rituals were to have a good life (good crop, good children, good health and so on - for each aspect of life had a God who controlled these aspects).

One such God that man believed in was the God of Justice. And while the concept of Justice was completely abstract and "defined" by man himself and not "observed" as in case of element Gods, the concept was so powerful that it gained instant popularity (or let's say in this case "followers"). Religion was defined as following the path of Justice and righteousness. 

This is where the problem begins. 

While we may be able to validate the impact of actions of the element Gods, what we cannot validate are the actions of the abstract Gods like the God of Justice. If our belief in God assumes him to do good to all, then why does bad happen to good people? Why is there so much evil still prevailing in the world? 

Such imbalances makes one ponder whether whether God does infact exist. If so, then does he have as much power as we believe him to have? If yes, then does he also use this power in ways that we have convinced ourselves of - to bestow justice upon all? 

Simply put, there is simply no proof of action of God and hence, the question remains open - does God exist?

Let me put it in the words of the famous Greek philosopher Epicurus who states this very straightforwardly through his trilemma argument:

"Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is impotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?"

Life in a metro...

It doesn't ever fail to surprise me how the human nature is so designed to adapt itself to the craziest of situations. And living in this city just goes on to prove this every single day. We have had a million fortunes (or rather misfortunes) of encountering the worst situations a nation can ever face - from minor disruptions such as power grid failures, breakdown of the train transport, potholes full of roads in between; to severe tragedies like strikes, floods and repeated terrorist attacks. Yet, what is truly astounding is the ability of the city to rise up from the dead every damn time and give it back to those who ever thought of it as a goner.

Well, in this space I'm not gonna write what we already know. This post is to rejoice and relive and perhaps even ponder over our (more often than not WEIRD) reactions and attitude towards the various challenges the city throws at us on a daily basis. This space is for my fellow Mumbaikars.

Let's begin from the beginning.

Mr. Hassled wakes up in the morning to a bright sunny day that instantly lifts up his spirits and for a little while he does not care about the many troubles of his life. He is optimistic that the day is set to be one of those smooth and easy ones without any glitches whatsoever. With this positive frame of mind he pours himself a nice warm cup of coffee and switches on the television to catch up on the early morning news. He tunes into one of the million new news channels to catch up on the Fatafat 50 headlines. The first few were about the gang rape cases in his city and the headlines went on to blame the government for the worsening safety situations for women  in  the country. Mr. Hassled couldn't agree more and himself mumbled a a couple of of inefficiencies of the government. The next few top news revolved around a famous celebrity being caught in a conspiracy, and left Mr. Hassled open mouthed. Then came the world news section and there were news about civil wars in other parts of the country, about the petrol prices rising steeply for the nth time in the year (again Mr. Hassled took the opportunity to blame the government for this) and some other irrelevant matters not concerning him directly in any way, that bored him and he was about to switch when came his favourite sports section. Today the news showcased the cycling rally in some country and apparently the chief guest - the prime minister himself - had participated too but had had a really funny fall while at it. The headlines, needless to say, did not miss a chance to point this out in the most awful manner possible (unless you feel something like "Rashtrapati hue Dhadam!" to be the right way to put it). Mr. Hassled couldn't control laughing out loud. He thoroughly had his share of fun watching the multiple replays of the poor chap falling off. His day had just gotten better with the humor slipping in so early on. He turned off the television and set off to get ready to leave for work.

Mr. Hassled worked in a private company which was located right in the opposite corner of the city from his home, and he needed to commute a nice one hour minimum each day to get to office. He normally preferred the train - which meant he had to take an auto to get to the station. Today, however, when he stepped out of the house, the road seemed abnormally empty. He couldn't help wondering what was wrong. Finally, curiosity got the better of him and he approached a fellow passerby if something was the matter today. 'Yes of course, don't you know it was the auto-rickshaw strike today?' told the man and walked off, leaving Mr. Hassled open mouthed for the second time in the day. He could not believe it - after all, hadn't it been just a month since the last strike? And why was nothing mentioned about it in the morning news? Atleast he could have left a little sooner had he known. Mr. Hassled began walking to the bus stop, cursing the news channels along the way for showing all the non-sense news all day long and missing out on the ones that truly matter.

He reached the bus stop after walking for about 5 minutes, only to see one bus leaving right before his eyes. His happy day was not seeming so happy anymore. He had to wait another 5 minutes before finally getting another bus. He was now really worried about missing his regular 9 am train. If he missed that, it would mean he would have to cross the bridge and get the next slow train - which would not only take longer but would also be more crowded. He got even more upset when he saw a long line of traffic piling up right in front of his bus. He began to fidget in his seat and couldn't resist cursing the system once again to the passenger in the seat next to him. At last, when he was about 50 metres from his destination, he realized the bus was not going to move further for at all for another five minutes minimum. Looking at his watch, he quickly calculated that the only way he would be able to get his 9 am train was if he got down right now and walked up the remaining distance. Without any second thoughts, he began pushing through all the passengers standing before him and squeezing his way between the thin and the fat and the sweaty and the ugly crowd all waiting to alight at the same stop as Mr. Hassled himself. Each one gave him a dirty look when he tried to bypass them. A couple of them would have even sworn at him, but our dear Mr. Hassled was all too hassled to take notice.

Somehow, he finally managed to get down. Not wasting even a second, he quickly paced up to the station and onto the platform where his train was to arrive any minute now! When he reached the platform he eagerly looked up at the indicator, praying for it to still show his train and not the next one. To his dismay, it did not show his train. To his surprise, it did not show any other train either. The indicator read "00:00".

What did it mean? He looked around to see if other platforms also had similar reads on their indicators. Yes, they all did. Then he heard it. The announcement came on in 3 languages - each confirming repeatedly, the cancellation of his beloved 9 am fast. His first reaction was disappointment. His next reaction was anger. His third reaction was panic and that made him rush to the main indicator to check if there were any trains slated to depart anytime soon. Thankfully, there was one on the opposite platform, and was to depart in another 2 minutes. Mr. Hassled wasted no time and rushed to the foot-over bridge to get tot he other side of the platform - only to find that he was not the only one rushing. The bridge was filled with a mad crowd of at least a 1,000 people all trying to get the same train as him. But our Mr. Hassled was far too experienced to be threatened by such scenarios. He took one look at the section of the platform he intended to reach (almost like vulture eyeing its prey) and gathered a renewed determination to reach there and get the train no matter what! And get in he did! Well, technically he was in - even though half his body was hanging outside clutching tightly onto the pole for support. But with his years worth of experience, it was barely two minutes before he was well inside, in the middle of the pool of a million other passengers tightly squeezed into every open inch of the compartment. 

As it often happens at such times, the trains run very very slowly, taking almost twice the time than normal. There would be a dozen signals on the way and sometimes, to top it off, the fans in the compartment would refuse to work - only adding to the frustration of the already frustrated passengers. The same was the case with Mr. Hassled. He could not believe his luck. First the auto rickshaws, then the trains. What was next? He feared the mere thought that something could get worse than this. He tried to wait patiently imagining and longing at the same time for the cool comfort of his chair in his air conditioned office.

An hour passed by and the train was only halfway there. Another half hour passed by and still not there. Another fifteen minutes. Another five. Then at last he was there. The last station! Mr. Hassled rushed out quickly, almost jogging over the foot-over bridge and out onto the roads.  Mr. Hassled couldn't have been more relieved.  He had already informed his boss of his late arrival. To his surprise, his boss was also going through something similar and for a change showed some empathy towards Mr. Hassled.  Having the office bit sorted, Mr. Hassled now walked with a little more patience than he would have otherwise.  Patience also made him focus on other matters he had ignored for the last hour.  He was hungry!  He looked around to spot the several food stalls by the side of the road selling a variety of delicacies - from idlis and medu wadas to wada pavs and samosa pavs, from chats to salads and not to mention fruit juices too! Mr. Hassled quickly ordered a fruit salad (he had recently taken up dieting after his female colleague had made a passing comment that made him extremely conscious of his extra flabs). He began munching on the pineapple and watermelon while walking. Of course, the seeds in water melon were discarded carelessly at the side of the road. The plants growing at those spots in the next few days would be our Mr. Hassled's contribution to making better the rapidly deteriorating ecological balance of planet earth.

At 10:50 am, Mr. Hassled finally reached his office - more than an hour later than a normal day. He looked around to notice that several other people were also just about arriving. The next half hour was spent in discussing the havoc and the varied experiences of a dozen other colleagues. When he finally got to his desk to begin work, his last thought was a relief that the next day was a holiday owing to the elections in the city. Well, finally a day off with nothing to worry about - he would wake up late and laze around the entire day, watch television and sleep tonnes. With these day dreams at the back of his mind, Mr. Hassled got to work.

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So what was so weird about Mr. Hassled or his attitude that we must ponder about? Nothing at all! This snapshot of a day in Mr. Hassled's life just gives us a refresher about a few of the justified reactions (or rather our RIGHTS) to a crisis situation:

• We have full right to enjoy baseless and nonsensical news shows and make them popular overnight. However, we are also obliged to accuse them of not reporting the important news and focusing on our entertainment more than our needs
• Anything that does not concern one directly can be looked down / mocked / laughed upon or just simply ignored
• It is also our duty to curse the system at every given opportunity. This duty must not be accompanied in any form of contribution towards bringing about a change in system
• Strikes may happen anytime, anywhere. Public transport can also go for a toss anytime anywhere. One must always be ready to dodge these situations without accusing the government. An action to make things right is completely unacceptable - well it is definitely unheard of so assumption is that it would be unacceptable
• It is okay to not be aware of the concept of a queue when living in a city. Such concepts are designed to bring about orderliness which ruin the madness of the city (which is a core characteristic and must not be fidgeted with). Instead, when encountering a crowd ahead, one is free to resort to any form of pushing and abusing to make way for himself / herself
• While the slogan says "Green Mumbai, Clean Mumbai", it is okay to compromise the latter half to achieve the first half. Thereby, any form of contribution towards making Mumbai a green city is acceptable. One may not worry about location fit of plantations for bringing about this super essential change in environment
• Any national / special holiday is meant to be enjoyed purely as a leisure day and one need not burden himself / herself with moral obligations that accompany such days