Roti, Kapda aur Makaan

Insomnia these days has become a part of life. also what is surprising is that the time my sleep vanishes has been constant; @ 4 : 30 am and no matter what so ever i do after that, sleep doesnot beckon me. It is also surprising becoz these days in office have been pretty long and demanding and , a sound sleep is inevitable, but nevertheless..

Day before was a holiday and was one of the perfect times to write this blog but today morning sees more befitting. This thought is not that which crosses mind only as a passing fad but has been born on several occasions and i thought it would only be right if i put it here

One of these days, i was coming back from office and was later than the usual time, about 9:30 pm.It was raining very heavily and hence there was a lot of traffic and that only made matters worse.On reaching home, i found out that the main gate was closed and i would have to get out of my car in the heavy rain and open the gate to park my car. I was very tired and this only made matters worse since i am of the kind who doesnt like to get wet but options were few. I parked my car and again had to get wet becoz the aunty who serves the tiffin had not left the tiffin outside my house as is the daily routine and i again had to venture in that heavy rainfall for my dinner since I had not had anything after lunch and hunger was beyond control.

When i finally managed to reach home after this "excursion" of mine i was completely drained and mad with hunger. I flung my wet clothes to one corner of the bathroom, changed into my night dress and started having dinner. Post that, i ventured out into my lobby to enjoy the rainfall, which till sometime back was irritating me beyond control and that is when this thought occured to me.

No matter, how tired we are or how bad our day has been, at the end of the day we all yearn for one thing..to go back to that brick and mortar construct which we call "home". The serenity and peace we get lying on that bed in our own room is worth a million dollars and not even TAJ EXOTICA of Maldives ( i know becoz i have been there :), its really good) can offer.

We shed our clothes of the day as if we are shedding all the worries and tensions that stuck to them like a moth and get into a pair of washed loose fit night dress which gives us the comfort that is unmatchable at that moment to even the Giorgio Armani's of the world.

Hot home made dinner has been waiting to tinkle with our taste buds and we attack the food as drought stricken Somali has been subjected to food after a long time. The satisfaction we get after that food and the blessing which come out of our stomach can actually bless somebody with a 1000 years of life or 100 pandavas like sons.

Not every body is as lucky as us to get this. When i see the people who live by the road side i really feel sad as to how they would be dealing with natural misfortunes like heavy rain with no extra pair to change to, no house to go to at the end of the day to relieve themselves of the day's work and no food to satisfy that burning sensation of hunger which in itself can kill without the body actually submitting itself.

When i was young, i though "roti, kapda and makaan" is an old hindi "pakau" 1970's Manojkumar movie. little did i know that it was the slogan of the masses asking for the basics of life. As per me, from 1970 to today, little has changed, and though the slogan in itself might not be contemporary, the reality is. As usual getting figures by googling doesnot interest me becoz a milliion and some no here and there will actually not change the reality.

A sunday article "Swaminomics" in TOI spoke about the nutrition levels of food that is consumed by children in India. This is like talking about bidding and hosting for Olympic games when CWG is in such a state.

i am not sure or let me say i am very sure that this post of mine will do nothing to change the situation that we are in but any time sooner or later we get a chance of changing the way things are i think this should be part of our " Common Minimum Programme" as Leftist would have put it.

Take care!!

Wandering thoughts...

04 Sep. 10

My brother just reminded me that I had stopped writing “blogs”. Simply put, stopped writing. So why had I let all those unstructured thoughts vanish?

These days I am staying alone. It’s been about 6 months now and I just wander around the house alone. I walk to a nearby tea shop to have tea/coffee twice a day on weekends just as a pretext, though I have ample of milk and other ingredients required. I feel good when I venture out and breathe that air, see the people, the shops, the traffic.. (Some will say, don’t u have enough of them over the week?) no seriously..

I have around 300 contacts in my phonebook, some 195 odd friends on Facebook, am following 92 people on twitter and some 50 odd are following me, 15 odd BBM ( Blackberry messenger contacts), 1 wife and 1 brother. The reason I mentioned these 2 people separately even though they being part of all ( almost all..Thank god wife is not on twitter) the above social “networking” sites, r the 2 most and anytime accessible people in my life.( these days, even wife is not so easily accessible since she has found someone..JUNIOR).

When I was in Ahmedabad, my wife complained that I don’t give her enough time. I myself complained that I don’t give enough time to myself. Now that I have all the possible time in the world , I am complaining that the people I know do not give me enough time. I yearn for the phone to ring or the BBM to blink. Contradiction?? Actually no..

In spite of all of the above means and ways to stay connected with people, when you actually feel like calling someone and talking to them there is this small “jhijhak” whether that person will be in a position to speak to u or would like to do so. I was utterly surprised at myself when one of these days I asked a very close friend of mine on twitter if I can call him and speak to him. Strange? Actually very strange.

Our lives today are so hectic and we are so much under time pressure that our groups of interactions are getting smaller and convenience based. We get very little time for ourselves or our dear ones, that we want to try and spend that time just among those 2-3 people as per our convenience. Hasnt it happened that one of your old close friend is online and though u haven’t spoken to him/her for a long time, u get invisible..Not because u don’t want to speak to him. It’s just that you don’t want to talk to him “just now” because u only have an “X” amount of time with you which is truly yours and you already have a predicided menu for that . Just try and recollect from your list of “friends” that we have on our “lists”, when was the last time we spoke on a one to one and you will be surprised to find that you would not have done that with 90% of them in a long time unless the list is made up of only office colleagues !!

Times will change and I will be back with my family. These thoughts will again start wandering in the opp direction. .

*The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the view of the general public