Education- whats its worth really?

The next time you are travelling in an auto and find that the driver is only driving through the middle of the road, although the left /right lane is relatively free, you may assume that the auto is an illegal one without license and paperwork… cause cars in the middle of the road are more difficult to catch...or so says Rahul Bhai- an auto driver I met recently in Aurangabad.

I am appalling with names, so obviously I can’t remember his surname, but it was pretty impressive and a long Marathi one. He was dressed in a starched white shirt, had a mustache which will make our Sanju Baba cringe and was surprisingly well spoken. Hanging onto the front seat of the auto, where he was kind enough to make around 4 inch of space for me to park my butt, I took an instant liking for him. Usually autowallas are a pain...they take a solemn oath at the start of their professional life to harass customers and over charge them…but this one was jovial, smiled and seemed to take pride in his driving skills.

I guess I was easily recognizable as an alien in the streets of Aurangabad, as I spoke terrible Marathi, had no clue  how I needed to reach the bus stand and looked a bit lost at 8pm at night  (late by their standards, especially as I was in the outskirts of the city). So trying to be the good guide he started inquiring where I was from and what I do etc etc… once he heard I was from Kolkata, his affliction for me grew by leaps and bounds … further conversations revealing that he is a true blue fan of our Bangla’s pride…our DADA…our very own Sourav Ganguly….

So a healthy conversation ensued and I had a brief glimpse of his life saga which unfolded quite a few interesting facts… he was a qualified CA, had worked in a professional “Marwadi” CA firm for 3 years before deciding that all that sucks… he also showed off his skills at colloquial language having quite a few interesting abuses to add when he mentioned ‘Marwadi’ (no offence meant to anyone) saying he was underpaid, had to put in extra hours and the boss was more a leech than a boss… sounds familiar? Anyone?

So his next career move was an inspired decision- to move to  the city of dreams- Mumbai, to find a dream  job… he found one…as an auto driver. The money was better than his CA stint… he was his own boss and he could always get more money by extorting the customers… things went well for around 2 years, till about the time when all the Mumbai policemen learned he hadn’t had a license, his auto was illegal and decided to aid his illegal activity by dipping their beak into it… those a$$***s extorted the extortionist so much that bechara ran away from Mumbai…to Pune… 

His money extorting, auto-driving career again blossomed in Pune for a brief stint of around 1 yr…till the time when the Pune police smelled the rat which had escaped the Mumbai gutters… So fed up at not getting a descent income and continuous bribing of the officials for allowing him to continue his saintly profession he returned to his homeland…Aurangabad.

He says he now manages to earn handsome money… *he even tchtched at my pay package*, still continues to drive an illegal auto but pays less bribe. He vows that Aurangabad police are less greedy in comparison…*kudos to u all u Aurangabad cops Sir*… and  considering that he has learnt the tricks of escaping the cops from the dream city…these local ones in Aurangabad can do no harm to him… they are too slow…

So interestingly, while my journey of 5 kms and 30mins (and you think traffic is a problem only in Mumbai and Bangalore?) and 15 rupees came to an end…I felt that there was an important lesson to learn from this guy’s life… 

Does education really have any value? A CA qualified guy as an auto-driver…makes good press right? I guess this trend starts at our premier institutes called the IITs… where typically a mechanical engg works for a bank or a software firm… and continues all the way down to lowly Micobio graduates like me who worked in fields which had no relation to his education as such…. And we still continue to say that education is important…

And what about bribe? I don’t even want to get into that field… how is an auto driver allowed to run an illegal auto in Mumbai, Pune and Aurangabad for 7 years without ever being caught? Were there no honest policemen in the ranks? Or is it a coincidence that Rahul has evaded the honest ones so successfully…

Oh and BTW…. to all you feminists… Rahul added that the women policemen are the tough ones… they almost never ask for a bribe… I guess we need more women policemen…and if you can import some from Rajasthan (*they have the prettiest women policemen in India*) then maybe the job of a cop will be more attractive and honest…amen to that….

PS: this is a true incidence…not dramatized…. And Rahul’s isn’t the real name of the autowallah…

Snake scare

Last night, after a hectic day in the field, me and Prabhat (my roommate and fellow batch mate) had gone to the nearby Dhaba for a cup of tea… it was around 7in the evening and it was just getting dark…. when I say dark…it’s in the rural context, where its difficult for you to see your own hands at night- no matter how fair you are (not being racist)….

I was on the phone with someone and semi-blind as I am, did not realize that there was this huge crowd of around 15-20 people who had gathered on the highway (I live right on the NH50) till I bumped into one of the local lads… now I am clueless what his name is, though I have played/attempted to play cricket with him several times… seeing me, he started saying something in a very animated manner, in express Marathi, excitement evoking with every syllable…. As usual my abysmal language skills came to haunt me just about then; and I started screaming back “Hindi”..Hindi”, all curious as to why such a large crowd has gathered and wanting to be part of the fun(?)… hearing my anguish and understanding that I want “Hindi”…another guy started screaming “Aajgaar”…”Aajgaar”… while I was trying to be busy figuring out what I need to make out of that, one of the old neighbors in my village started giving me a demo on what he meant…

Trust me, watching Ranchho give demo with Pudine ki chutney is fun…but when your 65-70 year old neighbor “Kaka” tries to do an impromptu striptease, showing off his thighs under his dhoti and explaining that the “aajgaar” was as thick as that looks a bit gross...(“a bit” actually is the understatement of the year); its revolting to say the least… *sighs*

Anyways, enthused by Kaka’s demo, quite a few of the youth in the crowd started giving me demos of the “Aajgar’s” thickness- some showing off his muscles, some his  neck, some his hips….we Indians seem really fond of demos…. Possibly Aamir Khan in 3 Idiots is to be blamed for that…. …problem was, all this while I remained clueless what an Aajgar really was, till I remembered that a python is called “Aajgaar” in Bengali and seemed like even Marathi uses the same word. When I asked them, they confirmed yes it was a snake.

Another strange observation I made was, different people in the crowd seemed to have noticed different portions of the snake’s body. People, all animated and all excited, started discussing on top of their voice the size of the whiskers on the snakes mouth (?), whether it was a baby snake or not, how dark the circular rings on its body were etc etc… I realized that everyone who had appeared in the scene much after I had arrived had a clearer picture of how big the snake was, what it weighted, its color and the length of its whiskers and where it stays….Hmmm… Extremely knowledgeable herpetologist…

By this time, the crowd had thickened and more people had joined in… slowly the picture evolved that a python was found to be slithering on the National Highway, when a truck driver spotting the snake (which is known for its slow movement), caught the snake and threw it into the ditch beside the Highway to ensure that cars don’t run over it.  The crowd was trying to find the snake from the ditch…

On hearing this, my first reaction was excitement- I will finally get to see a python alive and in the wild…the second immediate thought was- are these people gathered to kill it? I started inquiring “why are they trying to find it?”… someone told me coz they want to save it and hand it over to forest Dept…. Can you believe the relief?

Python is one of the endangered species of snakes in India… and the only ones I have ever seen are in captivity. Somehow when I realized that the villagers were trying to protect the snake, it felt really awesome…here every day we see these people barred within the boundaries of caste, creed and what not other nonsense…and now the same villagers from all sections and age were trying to unite together to save a snake which they hadn’t even seen…

Search Lights, mobile torches, even Bike Head lights joined the attempt to find the snake. But, after 45-50mins of searching in the darkness, many a failed sightings and people scaring each other off deliberately, we returned home with no luck of capturing and saving the wild python.

However, more importantly, I learned an important lesson about human behavior that night…people might struggle to co-exist, but if they find a cause, they usually stand united…even if the cause may bring peril to them, like finding a snake which is known to be one of the most dangerous ones around…

PS: this is a true incident, this post is as true as it can be and i haven't dramatized anything, the site where this happened is >20 feet from my room..

In Search of excellence:

Picture this:

1.       A Tata Sumo or Force local jeep in a ramshackle about-to-breakdown-state runs along the worst possible roads in rural Maharashtra, carrying a minimum of 19-21 passengers…(against the usual carrying capacity of 8 people including driver)… People are content and do not complain- that’s the way they are used to travel- they are all smiles- atlast they have got a vehicle to travel in…

2.       Schools have a student enrollment percentage of almost 90%... some of the more “prosperous” farmers proudly claim that their ‘son’ studies in the local English medium school. One glance at their school copies, their English has been orphaned and mathematics defy the logic which it is known for… people are content and happy- at least their son is learning to speak “English”… no one knows or cares that they aren’t learning English which makes sense…

3.       You need to travel to Pune-130kms via road- National Highway 50…decent roads… you would expect to reach in 2-2.5 hours in the bus services…. The travel time as per official schedule is 4.5 hrs and you can’t and shouldn’t expect any better… People are happy- at least the road is decent and you get a bus…

4.       You go out to eat some food in the Dhaba/Hotels in the nearby Tier 3 city/villages… they charge you an exorbitant amount; putting to shame some of the eateries in metro cities like Bangalore, Mumbai, Chennai or Delhi/Kolkata… the food quality is crap, hygiene (what is that now?) is conspicuous in its absence and taste all but gives  you a heartache… no one is complaining… quality of food here is like this only…as long as you get food…

5.       You wish to buy something and travel to the local markets (usually 15away-20kms away)..all you get is cheap quality China maal or if Indian, some of the shoddiest products at not-so-cheap prices..no one cares…you atleast get electronic items or other items for personal usage….

Knowing me…this list can be endless… but it’s a bit late  at night now and I don’t wanna spoil my mood anymore… Just a few quick questions which I am trying to find an answer to….

1)      Why do these people not expect any better?

2)      Do poor people mean you give them any shit (pardon me) and they take it?

3)      Why is it that there is no say from their side on anything? I know you would tell me their voices are suppressed and all that …not all of it is true..When you want to be heard, you always find a way…

4)      Why are we so like this?

5)      When will we be having a mindset which accepts nothing but excellence?

6)      When will we start demanding quality as a right and not a favor someone does to us?

I am sorry; I always had issues with the words mediocre and average. Possibly because I was always told by my mom that I was an average student…  or possibly because I never learnt or taught anyone to use these words in my workplace… I don’t want us to be so adjusting…I don’t want us to be less greedy…I want us to demand more…. to only be satisfied once you get what you desire… nothing less…

Somehow, I don’t believe that as a nation we can be as crappy as this and still be proud of our ourselves*… for once…let’s first try and say we can set ourselves much better standards…then let’s talk about being a world super power… and in the process, if we end up not being a super power but a country known for its excellence in whatever it does…I guess I would still be happy with it….

*I am extremely proud to be an Indian…just don’t have much faith in the way we run things here these days… am not sure our founding fathers who wrote the constitution envisaged India the way it is today… a mass raped, ravaged, torn apart country fighting for everything and some bit of dignity…

Dozen tips for SRK… what he should do next...

Is official now: you need to be a complete retard to watch the movie RAOne…and unfortunately, dis Sunday, I was a perfect example of one (retard)…

After watching the debacle called RA One and claiming temporary insanity for the same, I now feel that the disaster that is SRK needs to revive to its former K-K-K-K..KKKiran glory…  So here are a dozen tips which will hopefully help SRK find the lost tag of Baadshah of Bollywood once again…

1)    Change his name to Salmaan Khan

2)    Make sure Rajni Saar is part of all his future movies…

3)    Visit every house in every village in India, creating a propaganda against Salmaan Khan

4)    While shooting, always be on save-d-ass mode…

5)    Get Team Anna to promote his future movies

6)    Produce Marathi movies in support of Shiv Sena and MNS violence. Create RAOne type avatars of Raj and Bal Thackeray for a Playstation game, depicting them as superheros …or supervillians… BAL.One and RAJ.One

7)    Bribe every Indian to watch his next film…take help of Suresh Kalmadi and A Raja for the same..

8)    Create fake Twitter and Facebook accounts and write great reviews of his movies

9)    Thrash Metallica's equipment in concerts so that more people are forced to watch Ra.One

10)  Agree to do a family's chores for a week for free if they watch the movie; once in 3D and twice in 2D

11) Get Kolkata Knight Riders Team to wear RAOne/G.One attires for all IPL matches…

12) Declare World War III and threaten that the only way to avoid the war is if all the world citizens’ end up each buying a ticket of RA.One in both 2D and 3D versions… get Digvijay Singh and Parvez Musharaf to support him…

Note: All these tips have been written with a serious heartache and intend no sarcasm to the human race and fans of SRK… Wishing him luck and another Chak De for Don 2…

For the not so faint hearted people who have managed to watch RA.One and survive the ordeal…. I salute and bow to u in deep respect...both at the same time, and leave you with the following RA.One jokes I found on the net*…

·         Govt has declared 26th October as a public holiday to celebrate the end of Ra.One promotion!

·         Govt of India just announced Rs 50,000 relief to all those who watched Ra.One. Rs.25,000 for those who left atinterval.

·         rocin, Disprin, Combiflam, Adol Panadol, Diclomol and all painkiller out-of-stock after Ra.One release.

·         Salman to SRK after watching Ra.One: "Mujh par ekehsaan karna, dubara aisi movie mat banana"

·         Even Ra.mu doesn’t want to waste time by watchin Ra.one!

·         Ra.One gives more pain than a wife - HARD TO BELIVE BUT TRUE.

·         Get Ra.One under Lokpal bill…! Put people who made such movie behind bars.

·         Ra.One was shown on an airplane. People still walked out.

·         RA1 is like Titanic. Massive size, unmatched luxury, same old story, and, at last, a total waste of money and complete Fail.

*Source: http://www.newsbullet.in/movies/25-more/20394-jokes-on-srk-as-raone-inspires-online-wisecracks

Torture of a tortured soul: my lifetime lesson in patience

I am just in the process of completing my thesis on “how-to –tolerate-crap-movies” and yesterday I had d ultimate lesson…Thanks to a stupendously flop Mausam; I now feel that I will be able to complete my Phd thesis very shortly… infact if you have managed to watch this movie in its entirety at one shot- you should get much much more than a PHd… a Nobel Peace prize and a Bharat Ratna for “Outstanding achievement in Indian cinema” should do it…or maybe just about…

And mind it- that would be significant in itself… assuming that you can still remain a follower of our Gandhian non-violence principles and receive Bharat Ratna for just being a audience…

Discounting the fact that I am incorrigibly attracted to Sonam Kapoor , I think the word timepass got a new dimension in Mausam. Thankfully, there aren’t any movie theatres in the vicinity of 20kms where I reside in Sangamner… or else I would surely have wasted a Rs 20/40 on this movie when it had released…but considering that I wasted 3 hrs on dis awesome creation, and equating it to d Time value of money and blah blah…. I seem to have spent a fortune…My Gwadddd….such a waste- please forgive me LORD…

Sample this- the story covers a span of some 17 odd years and the lovers have an incredible habit of getting separated every time they meet. The coincidence of their coincidental meetings in their coincidental lives is too much of a coincidence…I split with my girl friend 5-6 years (?) back and although am willing to auction both my kidneys just for a chance to bump into her again- such things never happen… shucks… movie life mast hain yaar…

Shahid Kapoor does his best to behave like an Air Force squadron leader…but looks too macho, boyish and artificial at the same time- that mustache doesn’t make you a man my boy(!)..  Sonaam Kapoor (- okay I know she isn’t d best of actors) looks enchanting… so no grievances in that Dept… even her artificial in-your-face blatant attempt to act is pardonable… Supriya Pathak- Sonam’s mother in d movie sulks the entire period- not sure how anyone can be so consistently sad and Anupan Kher is wasted with a blink and you miss role…

The movie covers all the major riots n religious warfare in the last 2 decades but fails to state any purpose for the same… Pankaj Kapoor’s direction makes you realize your worst nightmares and music is trashy… clearly Pritam has lost the entire original soundtrack collection from which he plagiarizes and is currently going through a UPA2 like crunch period… clearly India’s most brilliant actor Pankaj Kapoor should stick to acting unless he wants to turn a 2^nd class film director to obtain a gatepass for the Big Boss house…

The dialogues in the film is mostly forgettable  and ends with something as shady as:

“kuch maine khoya hain ,kuch tumhne khoya hain aur kuch yeh mausum ne khoy hain...chalo milkar eek ghar basaye……..”

ewwwwwww…unka toh ghar baas gaya- lekin mera dimaag ka kya?

Most importantly the film is 2.5 hrs long..and not even a period drama…. Who makes 2.5 hr movies these days?

I leave you with this:

I spent 5 hrs, innumerable pauses, a year’s worth of patience, half a packet smokes, interspersed with innumerable FB chats, to be resolute enough to watch the whole film… so unless you feel masochistic please avoid this torture at any cost…

PS: my first attempted Film review- temme how boring it is…

Khwabon ke Parindey

I wish I could think or write like a poet….or atleast I wish I could pen down a few lines of poetry whenever I wanted to or felt like …not that I have ever aspired to be one…just that off late I have been understanding and learning to appreciate the miraculous manner in which poets can join words into a beautiful flow, giving rhyme and rhythm to their sequence of thoughts…to compress their ideas to a few lines which touches us so easily… 

And there is always the other side…usual convention is that girls like d macho guys …. Girls somehow also swoon over even those few chalta hain type of poets….

 WTF…I always found poetry boring and an utter nuisance in school…never could understand a single line of what the poet meant (not sure whether i even cared what (s)he meant?); but I was expected to quote those lines in my English and Bengali exams…yucks…and now i feel inadequate to write a few of those lines which I always hated………life can change you…or watevah… but somehow it also makes you wish you were much much more that what you are….

 Possibly one more flaw of our education system is, it make you fail to understand and appreciate the good things in life… or possibly when you are in your teens, you are too immature to comprehend these subtle nuances, considering your interests and priorities are quite different at that time… but then life has its own balancing act for our own human frailties.... till I learn to understand them…i guess I will continue to feel a bit poignant with my own inability…

Leave you tonight with these lines from the song khwabon ke parindey- no guesses who wrote them am sure…

Ude, khule aasaman mein khwabon ke parindey
Ude, dil ke jahaan main khaabon ke parinday
Oho, kya pata, jaayenge kahan….

Rapist on the loose

House hunting is always difficult…but  now it seems I can get through to IIMs with lesser effort than this… after 6 weeks of  attempts outnumbering the hair in my head, and turning up with miserable results every time, it seems like we have attempted the mere impossible… I wouldn’t be surprised if India wins the hockey gold medal in London 2012 Olympics*, but I will be terribly surprised if I find a room in Sangamner in the next two weeks…

And with that, I am now realistically facing the prospects of being homeless in the very  near future…

The enormity of this challenge is compounded by several factors which count against me…

                                                           

1)      I am single…* and I used to be glad bout it!*… (sigh)..

2)      I am manageable to look at…and have a skin complexion which clearly discriminates me according to their standards...

3)      I have a criterion of a clean lavatory to be available either attached or near the room….

Now I can still compromise in the 3^rd factor…but on the first two, I have no control…. I just can’t help it… While house hunting in Sangamner, the first thing people ask is whether I am single or married… and can you even comprehend the shame of a 26 year guy having to say he is still a bachelor? There definitely must be something wrong about this guy which he isn’t revealing….

A typical conversation with a potential landlord goes like this:

Me: Do you have a room?

Landlord (potential) : are you bachelor or married?

Me (smiling): I am a bachelor (sic)

Landlord (potential) : what’s your age?

Me(faking another smile): 26 years

Landlord (potential) : *looks away…thinks for a few sec-the guy is 26 and unmarried-must have some past history which he isn’t revealing*… and you still aren’t married?

Me (another fake smile): No

Landlord (potential) : Sorry I can’t rent out my house to a bachelor…I have a daughter/mother/sister/wife/or any female relationship which you can care to think of…..

Me (frowning and thinking): *WTF…am I a bloody rapist on the loose or what?*

But honestly I don’t blame these guys… they belong to a section of society where guys marry at 22, girls mostly marry even younger … one interesting observation which stuck me a few days back is: in the last 1 month or so…the villages I have been to, I have either seen girls in school dresses (if they have one) carrying books, or I have seen girls tugging their kids along…. There just doesn’t seem to be any girl which doesn’t belong to any other category….at least not in public places… weird? expected? Something to worry about?

Whatever it is…seems like homelessness is the only option I am staring at right now…so incase you know anyone or have any contacts in Sangamner who is willing to rent a house…please let me know…till then, the only thing I can do is curse Nepolean…. It was easy for him to say the word impossible doesn’t exist in his dictionary….but then...Clearly he had never hunted for a rented house in Sangamner….

*India is still struggling to qualify for hockey in London Olympics 2012, but hopefully they will qualify and go on to give us a Chak De moment to cherish…

All I Need Is To Be Free

“A Little Sweet, A Little Sour
A Little Close Not Too Far
All I Need, All I Need
All I Need Is To Be Free”*

An incomprehensible concept...I am yet to grasp the true nature of the word Freedom....why is it so important to us all? Why do we keep reminding ourselves of this concept every now and then?

I don’t know...whenever I think , I feel that Freedom means different things to different people...and it is often a more overhyped word than it should be...but then that’s my opinion....

Sample this- during this year's Independence Day, I was in a village called Tirpad in Ambegaon Block of Pune. Usual village obsequiousness resulted in me being requested to deliver a speech at the local primary+ high school compound during the flag hoisting ceremony…

For those who know me well enough, you know I hate public speaking…so having little idea what to say (as is usual with me all the time) to those huge number of expectant faces I started with the question “what is the significance of 15^th August? And what does it mean to you?”

Though someone was kind enough to translate it to Marathi, not a single kid from the crowd responded… not a single one???????????? infact they were possibly looking disappointed that I dint take out my Harry Potter like wand and tell them some of the dark conspiring secrets of sorcery, or whether SRK was indeed having an affair with Priyanka Chopra…shucks…

I realized that all that we had been taught about country, independence etc mean little to us really… as in we love our country on a more broader and academic sense….but we never really understand what freedom means… atleast I never did… neither did any amongst the crowd of 350-400 people who had gathered in the village school compound that day… does it really matter?

Today evening, I was on Google chatting away with one of my friends who happened to mention that she is contemplating applying for higher studies, that too outside Kolkata as it will provide her the much needed incentive called freedom (from her over protective Bong parents in this case)..which lead me to think all this...

I guess freedom is a more panoptic notion than we care to understand… simply put- I guess the way each of us will describe the word is “ability to do what we want to do…” “Not having any restraints”etc… but if we allow such a scenario in the world then wouldn’t that lead to total chaos, anarchy and arbitrary behavior? So what is the solution then? I guess it is to behave in a way which is fitting enough for the society…ensuring everyone has equal rights etc etc… 

but WTH…isn’t this against the very idea of the word Freedom? The concept of doing what I feel like? I don’t know…seems contradictory to me…..and makes me think that Freedom as we know ,exists in a more mild or moderated version of the original word… a subjective principle; which we are so fond of believing that, we tend to believe in its totality… Absolute freedom seems to be an impossible concept..I may be wrong over here…but does it matter?

Anyways….i wasn’t lecturing… I usually do that with a live audience and when I have had a few shots… so incase you wish I hadn’t bored you and that I need to end this essay better …just hear this song- one of my a favorites of all time…

*Source: Song Mera Jahan from movie Taare Zameen Par

Making of my life...

Was watching Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara today for the second time and was touched with this piece of poetry at the ending.. a little bit of googling tells me that Javed Akthar has penned it (ofcourse-who can can write such beautiful stuff?)....check it out:

Dilon mein tum apni
Betaabiyan leke chal rahe ho
Toh zinda ho tum
Nazar mein khwabon ki
Bijliyan leke chal rahe ho
Toh zinda ho tum
Hawa ke jhokon ke jaise
Aazad rehno sikho
Tum ek dariya ke jaise
Lehron mein behna sikho
Har ek lamhe se tum milo
Khole apni bhaayein
Har ek pal ek naya samha
Dekhen yeh nigahaein
Jo apni aankhon mein
Hairaniyan leke chal rahe ho
Toh zinda ho tum
Dilon mein tum apni
Betaabiyan leke chal rahe ho
Toh zinda ho tum

A few months back i was undergoing a dilemma about my life on similar lines...I have always wondered  what i wanna achieve in life...and like everyone else with time my answer keeps changing...however, one thing i realized is that i want to experiment..its my life..and for some reason i dont want it to be the boring corporate types i was leading...i needed a change and a fresh new perspective to it...

I have always been interested in working in the social sector (not that i am too fond of the term "social")...and I came across an opportunity to experience this sector first hand through a Fellowship program i got selected into...I was scared...believe me... quitting a job which I enjoyed and absolutely loved doing was not the exact plan i had in mind (but honestly i dint have any plans in mind)...

Somehow i made the decision and here I am... 2 months down and i am absolutely cherishing the experience so far....With hindsight now i think i should have done this earlier...the freedom, the flexibility and the passion with which i manage my work now is incredible...

Finally, i think i am knowingly or unknowingly breaking away form that cocoon in which i had isolated myself...i can feel it..i know it deep inside me....and it helps...possibly staying and working with the grass root people disciplines and humbles you a bit ... 

I was always impatient at heart... but finally I am seeing those dreams which urges me forward each day....

finally, i am learning to live life like the free waves of wind which the poet talks about...to receive every moment in life with open arms and view them as new opportunity and new beginnings...

I can possibly safely say "Zinda hoon mein"...so don't just count me out...not just yet...