Republic Day

Watching the 60Th Republic Day Parade today gave me a sense of pride and despair at the same time. Pride at the achievements of science and technology which transcends into defence equipments and the cultural diversity showcased in the cultural floats. Despair at the loss of precious lives fighting against terror.

The announcement of Ashok Chakra awardees moved me to tears. Not just at the sacrifices of the brave soldiers and policemen, but also at the way we treat them. Disappointed I am with the way the News channels are obsessed with celebrities on the cricket field and the silver screen; disappointed with myself for not doing enough to find out more about the heroes who safeguard my life. 30 seconds of airtime is all we give the martyrs on every Republic Day while an actress spraining her leg while shooting for her movie gets half an hour of prime time for a week. How many of the Ashok Chakra awardees did we know of before? Well, for the NDTVs, CNNIBNs, TIMESNOWs of the world they are not sensational enough. Even the coverage of 26/11 attacks concentrated more on selling 'Exclusive' interviews with the survivors.

The debate about the necessity of a parade in a nation starving for want of two square meals a day has been going on for as long as the parade itself. For me the celebration symbolises a sense of belonging to a nation which has as many peoples as the variety of items in an Indian thaali  (plate serving meal in India), a sense of oneness. How many festivals do we know which are celebrated by the length and breadth of this country alike, for the same reasons, by the same name? Its also the celebration of a 'republic' which has survived strongly when her counterparts are struggling to; survived despite the internal struggles and differences; survived and lived to the fullest glory of the Constitution that the framers dreamed of. 

 Happy Republic Day!!! Vande Mataram.

National Pastime!!!

Nope....I am not talking about America-bashing or War-mongering or Stock market-tracking....

You might not be able to relate to what I say if you aren’t 20-something-single, especially in India, let me rephrase-if you 'weren’t' 20-something-single in India ever. Any public gathering you go to or don’t go to, the questions are raised; all people can think about asking you over the phone is this; all they ask your parents, relatives, friends is this. The protagonists are usually the old uncles and aunts whom you never knew existed on your family tree. But even the just-married-younger cousins can start probing; don’t be fooled by their preoccupation with the 'honeymoon'. I call it the "National-Pastime" (please don’t sue me if you or someone you know, already named it so / or has an objection in me naming it so)

OK, OK, before you lose interest let me state what the pastime is....'Match-making' and 'Talking marriage'...the question comes with quiet a few variations....

          "Are u still single?" (read "Are you out of your mind?")

          "Are your parents looking for a boy for you?" (read "Are they being responsible in life?")   

          "How can you be unmarried at 26?"  (read "Sacrilege!!!Sacrilege!!!)

          "Did you see that boy wearing the white kurta? What do u think?"  (Yes, decide your life partner at one glance at a wedding)     

They are satisfied if you say "I am looking but not finding". But if you make the mistake of saying what my blabber mouth usually does: "not right now", you had it. Then follows the plethora of advice ranging from: "you need a companion" to "The ticking biological clock". 

After many a slip from my end I learnt my lesson. All those people have made a good story-teller (self-proclaimed) out of me. I myself am surprised with things I can come up with on a moments notice and stand my ground for a while. One of them is about 'ACP Rathore' who is posted in rural Jharkhand and we are looking at a wedding as soon as he gets leave, steering the talk to regional imbalance or BIMARU states. 

The other fib being 'Abhimanyu', who is working for an infrastructure company and is on an assignment to Uganda right now. You ask why Uganda of all places....well, I have way too many relatives/friends in the US and Europe who will jump at the first opportunity to say they would like to meet him. So,Uganda is safe and its not unimaginable with India's Look-Africa policy. Also, it steers the topic to "International Affairs" far away from my "Domestic Affairs".

Everybody married wants everybody else to be married. Fiendish!! "I am suffering after marriage, how could you be happy staying single". I call it fiendish only because I see them constantly having their brawls with their "better" halves. Wow, what a way to shove the "marriage" card down my throat. 

While I was growing up I thought people went to weddings to wear nice clothes and jewellery. Then I grew up a little more and thought its an occasion to meet others, socialise. Now I think they come only to gossip and find out who is single-ready-to-be-noosed. People do you realise you are scarring me for life here!!!

I hope none of my 'well-wishing relatives' are reading this post. If you are then this is just a blog where I lie for lack of topics to write about.

(image source : blog.nextnewnetworks.com/2007/08/)

  

PRECIOUS SILENCE

Reassuring it is,

when you are with a friend,

but in silence with him ,

even more so.

Reassuring that there is hope,

that there is spring after winter,

that the sun will rise tomorrow,

that the blanket will give, 

warmth that the chill sucked out,

that beats of your heart,

will rhyme with the swinging branches,

that the rain will,

fill your heart with joy.

Reassuring that in life's different phases

he will be there to reassure you even more.

Good-Name hunting!!!

            The sweetest sound to ones ears is ones name. I believe in putting some effort in naming, whether a person, animal, thing or a blog. I promise its got nothing to do with the 'marketing' paper I took in which i flimflammed the examiner into believing that i was a Kotler family descendant. 

         My hunt to name my blog shook the 'resolute' in me for couple of days, yes that's not a typo i meant days. I dabbled with words like me, myself, confused, thoughts, dreams, born, life (definitely not in that order) with multitude of nouns , pronouns and prepositions and in the end came to the stage of naming my blog "i-give-up" and guess what, even that was taken!

             Rummaging around ‘blogger’ I hit upon a lot of interesting blog titles which had no posts under them. What sort of a sadistic pleasure are these people getting by registering a blog with 'hard-to-find' names and then not even using them?  

            I was concluding that if I couldn't come up with a name i sure shot couldn't write any posts. And then came the 12 o'clock revelation, 12:03 am to be precise when i was philosophizing with a friend about "in the end everything turns out OK, its only the interim period called 'life'" And voila!! my blog 'In between Birth and Death".....