September

September!! This month had it all. There’s a hell lot to remember. It was potpourri or emotions, wedding anniversaries, wedding, get-togethers’ and events one after the other. I got an ear piercing done which had been a wish for a long long time.

The must-say of all of them was the entry of a new guy, Mr Bijesh into our gigantic Appat family. My sister (cousin), Vidya got married to him on the 6^th of September. So September began with the arrival of cousins from all parts of the globe for this mega event. Laughter, preparations, guests, rush, anxiety…I enjoyed everything of it that a marriage can bring in a house once again after five years. I just love that atmosphere at home on the eve of our sister’s wedding.

Before and after 6^th there was a series of wedding anniversaries too. Among those, Gopimama (Amma’s brother) and Sathy ammayi were celebrating their 30^th wedding anniversary this year. Luckily they had it celebrated thrice this year, once in Delhi and twice in Thrissur. Happiness doubles even when a celebration is repeated. Enjoyed it thoroughly!!

Before anyone could think of something else came Onam. One thing I learned is; bigger the family become the heavier the happiness and celebrations are. And above all these, there was a reason for my weekends to glow brighter than Sun himself. That was because of my sweet little nephew. Ishaan. I haven’t found anyone who can keep people happily engaged as he does.

Talking about the resolutions for the year, reading has slightly shown sign of existence and jog will soon. But Aphorisms have marked a big come back with seven posts this month. This is happening for the first time after May, 2010. It’s not that I write for filling this blog with posts, but I consider this as a sign. A sign that I still can.

More the battles fought and the more I ride, the more I can write.

No values. No Homesickness.

A small thought flashed in me when I was standing in a store to exchange my old phone (just a year old) for a new one. That guy was checking if it was still working fine and me checking out the new phone literally like a kid who got a new toy. Then the sales guy placed a price for the oldie (which I agreed even before he told it) and happily left the place after settling the balance amount. On the way back home I saw a small kid playing with the outer case of a phone. That picture ignited my thought brighter.

We too had a time, when we used to make use of something we own until it was completely DEAD. That was not too long back. Everything we bought had a reciprocation of the value for money we spent on it. This is where we can see how acutely we have been infected by the brands and the ever-changing technologies. This have reached a chronic deep stage where one can’t resist himself from buying a new phone that’s launched or wait for it until the one he owns now is at least half utilized.

Homesickness is also en route to its destiny to be something like an imaginary emotion. Today in this big world nobody is too far from anyone. Internet is the home. Or in other words, first home and now the world is being reduced to that 5 inch (Approx.) gadget. Of course we do have benefits out of it. Nobody is alone in this world. Or on the funny side, nobody in the world will enjoy the thrill of even getting lost. I used to think, perhaps there wouldn’t be a continent in the name of America if Mr Christopher Columbus was a youth of the 21^st cent. Wow!! What a world would that had been.

We have a world around. With colours several times brighter than the 16M colours on the phone we can’t live without. It has birds, trees and sky that canvas a painting several times each second and much faster than Apple or Samsung can ever think about.

That’s the reason why we all feel an extra-charged energy flowing in us from head to toe after staying a day or two somewhere in the remote where technology is yet to reach. There we are close to nature. There we express more. A small smile that’s drawn on your cheek while chatting with an old friend is elaborated to a loud laughter when you meet him/her in person.

Gadgets, technology and social networks are having a good feast eating our sentiments, values and homesickness. The word ‘Real’ is soon to find a new synonym. VIRTUAL..!!

Yes! At times we are all living a virtual life. No values. No Homesickness. 

Revenge? Oh! I'm too lazy.

Intense emotion like anger involves a great deal of bodily changes that occur as a result of activation of the sympathetic divisions of the autonomic nervous system. At one time or another everyone feels angry. We are all the slaves of our emotions. 

The more you consider world as ours, the angrier you become. I’m a person who truly believes in unconditional relationships. I’m rather proud to say that none of my relations or friendships has a purpose hidden beneath.  Perhaps I never use them when I badly need them too. I get through my troubles normally alone. May be it’s a new form of complex; let’s call it ‘Rambo-complex’…ha-ha!!

Detachment is the best mantra. Because, the reciprocating affection may be conditional. We have no guarantee for that. This have shocked and disturbed me several times. Unbelievable is the way people misjudge an act of ours that’s done with pure intentions. The emotions triggered by this revelation slowly eats up our happiness, health, moments etc., and eventually we end up infected by the motive to avenge. By then a person is emulated to the state and stage of an insane in a mental asylum.

It’s true that there are persons, situations and dialogues that are always present in the atmosphere to drive your adrenaline at the same pace of an insane. Stay away. Interfere less. Speak no opinion. I regret the loss of happiness and the n number of pain killers I took during those so called “situations”. I’m solely responsible for my acts. Of course the justification made is that I cared all issues as my own and took initiatives. But, believe me, there is no room for revenge in my thoughts ever. I can’t let lose the little beautiful moments with which life is made of in the name of revenge.

After all who am I to avenge? I'm too lazy. I'm just going to sit here and let destiny mess them up. Remember! Negatives acted have reflections on the other side of time wheel. Let's think and act positive.

Me The Achromatic Communist

I don't fear revealing. I’m a Communist. In point of fact, we all are communists. I ‘believe’ in communism. In fact, a pious communist I am. I don’t take orders or work for them. I said believe in it. I believe in saying what I felt and apologize when I'm wrong. I believe in giving not only when you have a lot of something. I believe in loving without a color of flag or skin. Hence I can say that communism is also a thought like Hinduism. This is where I realize that I’m a pious communist.

Communism which means "shared" or "belong to all" cannot be as pathetic as it can now. A sword in the right hands kills for a reason, while for pleasure when in the hands of wrong. In fact at times when chat gains height from conversation to debate to contention, I used to reckon the essence of thought that was lost a long way back. People now are too much involved in the politics. Like once I had a Facebook status that the public watch news with the same spirit we had while watching wrestle-mania or WWF during school days.

I often used to be surprised whilst enveloped in a group chatting politics. They quote statements made by certain politicians and the counter attack made and so on. This really used to be surprise me by the way people enjoy the politic games showcased on news channels. Why complain the politicians for not ruling, the voters are neither interested.

Yesterday on Facebook, I read an Anti-Modi post of my friend who is inclined to some other political party. The yield of the post is him supporting his favorite party with a point of debate that indirectly means’ our party loots lesser than Modi’s so we are better than him. Inexplicable was what I felt for my young friend. Youth still support. Unbelievable it is. Have they lost their capacity to think? No wonder why they intoxicate the youth first. They want something like an object that doesn't have the ability to stop to think. Perhaps this is the one place which I would take to stand against Karl Marx. He said “Religion is the opium for the masses”. I would say, “Politics is the opium for the masses”. Not religion alone is responsible to take the blame for a politically infected population.

The country is filled with beasts in angel’s cloaks, which also includes some other struggling to infiltrate through the fight for throne in the name of Gods of all three colors of Indian flag and us the bloody voters. Nothing is going to change until and unless the attitude commutes. It’s high time to realize that those seen on TV or any other media or medium are not just scripted programs or game shows. The more I think about it, a revolution is inevitable. Guess we just need to suffer a bit more.

When we take the right step, everything eventually starts stepping right. For that ‘be’ a Communist. Not the political one, but the humane one.

I don't miss...

Missing… A word that’s used quite often to relate to someone’s absence or some material possessions or may be even situations. I have often felt that there is a circle of time where this feeling, “missing” will be the centre. Let me exemplify this with a short episode of my life.

Story starts breathing when I flew down for (just) five days to attend my Dad’s death anniversary rituals in September, 2012. Though 16 long years have already flown, I never felt losing that shiver of shock and hence I can never afford to absent myself from paying him those rituals. Five days slipped off like some instant evaporating liquid gas. The day to return stood on the calendar grinning at me. I had no choice but to leave. Though just for another sixty days, leaving Mom, sister and my little nephew is inexplicably painful for a ‘big’ kiddo like me. But, then for a boss and for a job that granted this 5 days for a big satisfaction, I didn’t wait to go for the second round of thinking. Then, though I loved my job, I was very badly missing staying with my family.

Now, a year later, when I got into a job that matched my then wish to stay settled, I ‘miss’ again. Now I have my family always just 180 minutes ride away whenever I think and the weekends bear more colour. But now, I miss that travel. I miss that change which we feel so instantaneously right from the smell of the place to the colour, voice, looks of the crowd when we keep moving from one country to another. Every day of those short journeys had something to credit to my account of experiences, good and bad though I never used to differentiate them. Whatever it may be, according to me an experience is a lesson that makes to bolder. So there is no differentiation needed.

So, coming back to what was intended to say, I ‘miss’ those days. Not that now I’m done with my family so I just want to get the hell out of this. I was just observing the normal human that I’m, from a different corner. “Missing!!!” I find it to be a synonym for either man’s unstable mind or his blindness towards what is left with him or what he is rich in. We keep missing until and unless a breeze of revelation blows which is a self-realising process.

Similarly, we also hear people cursing not the person, but his/her absence. Like in my case I can say, if my Dad was alive I could reach a better position in life and so on. But, I never felt that way, though it’s obvious that at times his absence have made me feel handicapped. Normally I have two quotes which I say to myself quite often. One is A. P. J. Abdul Kalam’s words, “As a son of God, you are greater than anything that can happen to you”. This normally gear me up to catch the bull by its horns. And, once I overcome the situation Joker’s words mumbles in me, “Something that doesn’t kills you, makes you stronger.” Then I see my Dad’s proud smile when I close my eyes after overcoming the hurdle.

What I have learnt is, you lose a moments happiness when you miss something. And, when you miss a person you ruin his/her moments too. “Live in the present’s reality, not in its expectation” should be slogan for a happy life. Realise before reacting and never overreact!!!

Mohanlal, Kamal Hasan and Shah Rukh Khan - My View...

Mohanlal, Kamal Haasan and Shah Rukh Khan. I don't have to be so eloquent to give an intro for these colossal figures who literally own their space in Indian cinema. I say three of them are kind of same for me. The first one being referred as the ‘Complete Actor’, next one ‘Ulaga Nayagan’ meaning universal star and the third ‘King Khan’. I consider these names to be a bonus for what they attained from decades of dedication.

Everything true! But then, I love all three of them equally but the eagerness to see their movies are not really balanced. So then I thought, though all three have my admiration or certain kind of madness which is the same destination arrived via three different routes.

Out of the trio, Mohanlal is the person whom I started admiring for his acting. Perhaps he was the first actor whom I started to recognize as a kid of 3 yrs. even now it is the same. He still stands there in my mind with ever youthful energy. Now, no idea of how much can I accept him as a person out of that big screen. In fact I have never been too keen on that area. But when he is on that big screen, he is the one! His style is something immaculate and way far from someone to emulate. So this is the reason why I feel an unknown energy which drives me restless to know the verdict of his movies after the first day’s first show. When the verdict is poor I switch off myself from that area and when its positive then the zeal continues it’s current until I watch it. His styles of acting, his gestures have always amazed me. The way he renders a character, the way he do stunts, the way he even holds a pen have something that’s rarely seen in any other fellow actors. So here is a person who tops ‘my’ list of best actors.

When it comes to the person with smile of a lotus, Kamal Haasan, as his name means, things are again something different. This is one actor whom I still keep on exploring.  He is the Universal Star whose popularity transcends all boundaries and language barriers. Frankly speaking, there is a dialogue in one of his movies ‘Anbesivam’ where he tells Madhavan’s character, “Communism is also like love, it is a feeling”. To be specific this is the point where I started to explore this man. Many of his ideas and ideologies about Communism, theism and love really coincided with what I had in mind which others either opposed or didn't accept. More than an actor, as per what I have known, he was grown up in the entire film industry as a whole and tried to learn in and out and also made use of it to speak about his gathered knowledge, which are mostly criticized. His movies always had this intensity of subject which often used to be too heavy for the masses to clench onto. He is another standing proof to personify a famous quote used to some ‘under’-recognized personalities, “He is someone born on the wrong side of the world”. 

In an interview, when asked about his amazing English accent and vocabulary, he had a very convincing answer. “I don’t have a Degree, therefore I never stopped learning” he said. That is perhaps an important lesson. And there is nothing more to wonder that this man who has no degrees to add after his name gave a speech at one of the IITs in the country with his signature cracked voice.

Now, there is another man in Bollywood. In fact, I have seen his interviews over and over again more than his movies. Now this is one guy whom I love him for the kind of person he is. Shah Rukh Khan. The best conservationist in Bollywood and someone who knows how to speak and market himself. The way he rose from negatives to zero and then to infinity is awe inspiring. He hunted down his destiny brutally. Transmigrating to a flamboyant and talky celebrity is the strategy of escapism he obtained to shield himself from numbness the death of his parents had already brought to his sister. He shamelessly acts before the camera, on stage, in public just to be “bloody successful” (in his own words) and people love him more than their lives. It is clearly evident that there is nothing less than being successful he dreams and starves for. And from my own experience, we may have a million dreams, but something among those which we dream while asleep and awake will be ours someday. Our actions and motives will drive straight to the destination when the desire and fire is reasonable and sincere. Wondering how bored will his actions and motives be for driving the same road and to the same destination again and again and again and this guy is as desirous as on this first ride.  

What I found out is there is an equal balance of determination and fire in them. Not to remain on top but to gain more. When one’s need was recognition, the other wanted to blind himself in the light of knowledge and another guy just fulfilling his dream again and again without the boredom of monotony. Eventually they had no other place to land other than on top.

I must accept a fact about the magnanimity of inspiration they have slipped into me. Can I call it inspiration? May be, yes!!

All are fans of stars...but not always for the same reason.

August

August - The month of anniversaries. Probably this is the month of flashbacks. Our father’s bedridden days until death. Everything happened in the August of 1996. I seldom open up myself on this topic. Seventeen years and nothing changed. They say time is the best healer. Time is, but scars remain. Scars that bears pain beneath it.

But still, August of 2013 had its moments of get-together within us and that fine breeze of calmness those moments blew. My sister, bro-in-law and my dear dearest nephew, cute but mischievous Inu, they have come to spend a month with us.

All these mixed moments make me restrained. Though traumas had happened, it’s good to see good moments also happen in the same life. Hence at times being restrained is the level we need to live in. Living unaffected. Which is practically too ascetic to perform. But there’s always calmness in the centre of a whirlwind. Alhamdulillah! For sending me to the centre at times. It’s too tempting to remain there.