HKN : discover your destiny

Hope is a wonderful emotion. Abstract mostly, misleading sometimes and yet, a strange empowering force that makes our lives move ahead. Sometimes, hope is all we have. And then there are times, when hope is all we wish we had. To most of us, hope is a means. But to many more, it is an end.

These words are not mine. She taught me this. A pair of eyes I met on a wedding night. That night is long gone. The gaze has stayed.

It was sometime in January. Though the month should infuse energy, mark a new beginning, my year had begun terribly. The new-year ribbons were still hanging around in the cafeteria; the gossips from the party were still doing their rounds, when we were served a memo. Our business unit in India was being shut down. In four weeks, we would officially be jobless.

A dreary calm descended upon the forty of us. Infact, it was a morbid silence. To shout in angst or scream in disapproval, all we ended up doing was gasp in silence. Some of us were ready to rise in mutiny. And some appeared composed. While most of us assumed a demeanor of being stoic, the fact was there was none who was not unperturbed. Recession had announced itself last quarter. The possibility of finding oneself a job was not just meagre, but hinged on irrationality, perhaps even impossibility.

Ironically, in Delhi, January is also the month of weddings – the month of ostentation and revelry, never unbridled and often, uncouth. The blaring of traffic is quelled in cacophonous wedding music, the stench of the city gets lost in the auspices of the marigold, the dull dark horizon acquires a silhouette of lights – January always comes announced. And you have no choice, but, to be a part of it – either as a bitter commuter, or an irked neighbor; maybe, even as the credulous horseman on his fateful night.

A wedding would be the last place you’d go on the very day you lose your job. But such is the timing of misfortune and the ransom of friendship, that I found myself as a part of one such wedding procession. Lifeless, listless, the groom’s friend I was and in that capacity, found myself inching towards the wedding grounds with the rest of the entourage. Never before had the dance seemed more painful and the march more painstaking. And it was amidst all that chaos and agony, that I saw her for the very first time…

She was standing a couple of yards ahead of me. Clad rather scantily for a winter night, I could see her legs trembling, but her eyes were fixated at the grandeur all around. She was lost in her thoughts, unmindful to watch her step and almost tripped. That’s when she was brought back to her senses by a rather snide remark from someone around. And she walked along, her hands holding on to the large pot with lights placed on her head, her feet struggling to move in sync with the rest of the wedding band and light bearers. She must have been no more than ten, but then, it’s often in the insanity and inequities of a few, that many a families find their livelihood. Hers must have been one of them. But, it wasn’t her apathy that made me notice her that night. Perhaps, the way she stood amazed at what she saw, unfazed by her circumstances. Truth is, not yet have I known what it was.

Sometime later into the night, I stepped aside from the crowd to take a smoke. As I walked behind the food stalls to light up at leisure and with peace, I saw her again. She was seated on the ground with all the other ‘light bearers’ and ‘band members’ as they were being served food. She was clearly the youngest in the whole group and also, the weakest. Every time she would be served something, those around her would snatch it from her plate. Yes, the world is hostile but, was it not too early for her to fight for her dough? After all, at her age those hands were better placed to catch butterflies than to protect her food, whatever little came her way. And all she could do that night was to wail – in hunger, in agony, in maithili. Maithili was the language spoken in northern Bihar, the place I belonged to. I walked upto her and asked her not to fear and she could eat to her heart’s content. And I stood by her side, lest she is again deprived of her feast. And as she ate, I got to know her a little better. Albeit, factually. She was eleven years old and was from Kosi in Bihar. Her village was one of the many hundreds that were hit by the earthquake about six months back. Her father was a postman and her mother worked as a peon at the same school she used to go to. And then, in a matter of seconds on a fateful morning, her and the lives of many were reduced to a rubble. Thus began her journey through many hospitals, refuge camps, rehabilitation centers only to finally escape onto the unforgiving streets of Delhi. She misses her village, her friends but none as much as her mother and even her slightest mention brings a tear trickling down. As she was done and ready to leave, I asked her, ‘Where would you go?’ She said ‘To the bus-stand’. That’s when I remembered there was something I’d forgotten to ask. ‘What’s your name?’ And there was no reply. I could see her fading into the fog. Trailing behind the rest, neither too close and never too far.

A couple of days later on my way to office, I was doing my regular wait at a rather long traffic signal. Within seconds, the signal stop would get transformed into a moving flee market where everything from tissues to battery chargers to magazines would get sold. Amidst the flurry of men, women and children knocking my glass pleading, suggesting and sometimes even advising me to make a purchase, I saw her again. This time, she saw me too. And came to my car offering me a choice between Vogue, Cosmopolitan and Men’s Health magazine. I rolled down my glass and said I needed none. And even before I could ask her anything further, she moved to the next car. On my rear view, I watched her wandering into the myriads of vehicles behind me. The signal changed, the honking started and I had to go. And so did the moving market and it’s motley vendors.

Over the next few weeks, this became a regular feature. I would see her at this traffic stop daily. The only change would be what she sold everyday. Though I never bought anything from her, I used to give her a packet of biscuit everyday. A couple of times I did ask her name and even gave away mine. She never told me though. I quit asking. What’s kept in a name anyway?

And then one day, I couldn’t find her. Neither did she come to my car. Many a days went by and I realized I wouldn’t be seeing her again. For one, I wouldn’t need to go to my office and hence, that route. But really, why live in denial? I could stop at that signal everyday and even then, not run into her. Here was a eleven year old girl existing in a world surrounded by depraved people, rampant with dubious eventualities, gifted with deranged destiny. Anything could happen to her. She could trip again only to be run down by a car this time; Or get herself eIectrocuted by the wedding lights she carries; Worse, she could end up in a brothel for the rest of her life; Or escape to another city where she’d discover all these possibilities once again. I could only hope she comes out clean. And how well I knew, even hope has it’s limitations.

Today, as I drove back from another job interview, I was waiting at a signal and a bus pulled up besides me. I could hear someone calling my name and rolled down my glass. I saw her again. Sitting in the bus, dressed in uniform, calling out my name. The bus read ‘Asha Niketan‘ – orphanage and school. It meant the abode of  hope and a laughter broke out in my heart. The signal changed, the honking started and once again, I had to go. She was saying something but I couldn’t hear it. And as the bus started pulling away, she wrote on a piece of paper and thrust it out of the window.

It read ‘ASHA’. Meaning ‘hope’.

Maybe that was her name. Atleast that’s the way it’ll stay with me.

It’s a feeling so worse,

When my friend seems down.

I’d be a jester, a cuckoo or a clown,

I’d do anything to wipe that frown.

For all the joys she’s given,

And all my madness she’s forgiven,

In all times, good and bad,

For all my shades – black’n'blue white’n'grey.

To bring her to smile, there ought to be a way,

And even if death were to whisper, ‘No’ I’d never say.

To run to the heavens above or to earth’s end,

None too mighty, unto your smile, my friend…

If his story be spoken or tale be told,

May there be one thought that’d behold.

Never of all that was done or won,

Neither of all that was lost or shun,

His life was all about a dream,

Foolish, audacious as it might seem.

Don’t you make him one of a kind,

His dream was the legacy he left behind.

From where I stand…

What meets the  eye is what went by

Pain is to harbor a loss and nurse it everyday.

The rudder’s gone missing and the sails got ‘em wrong,

Listless, aimless, I am drifting along.

My ship cant sink and am not ready to perish

Estranged from the shores I left

I know not of the shores I’ll reach.

But everytime the anchor goes down,

My world halts for a moment,

And I hear murmurs of memories.

Transient is triumph, Indelible is a loss.

To come to terms with my loneliness,

I wake up to the rage of the seas.

And set sail again.

From where I stand, what I leave is a trail in time

The tear that trickles knows how I rue,

Of the day that I sailed past you.

The past two days have been momentous in terms of news.

Bandra – Worli sea link finally opened after over a decade of expectations and ofcourse, it’s cost a fortune.

Babri masjid report was finaly tabled. It took 17 years for a report. Just a few insignificant  developments happened over this passage of time. The incumbent premier has moved on to his heavenly abode and the main protagonist is meandering listlessly in what seems the twilight of his life and career. And ofcourse, we have had quite a score of riots and carnage in the meanwhile.

These two events – one that held a promise of skyrocketing a city’s aspirations and the other, that had the questions an entire nation’s conscience had to come to terms with – have prolonged themselves to obscurity and insignificance.

Mumbai has changed. India has moved on. The sea link will become an opportunity that was lost to time. The report will become a political placard that will get lost with time.

Once again, we are late in time. And once again, we are celebrating it.

What’s with us? Till when will we defend our mediocrity. And revel in it too.