STARS

Away. In some other world,
Atop. A secluded big hill,
Alone. Stood this grand palace.

An exquisitely beautiful woman,
Stayed alone in that palace,
If it was these times in our world,
we would have termed her Goddess.

Fortunately, it is not these times.
Its about the times when,
Women understood loyalty,
And commitment knew men.

In the bright sunlight that day,
this young traveler was seen.
He looked sharp, proud, tall, lean and
Everything woman would ever dream.

Young man walked towards palace,
he was in awe, completely spell bound.
Felt like walking in one of his dream,
couldn’t believe all he was surrounded.

Mesmerized with what he was seeing,
more beauty than his eyes can behold,
Then it happened, and was the beginning
Of the greatest story never told…

“What do you seek here and which way
do you have to go” asked the countess.
“I wish to go that way, no man ever dared
to go for his woman” replied the man.

Her teeth were lustrous diamonds,
Eyes were glowing emeralds,
The man wanted to tell her,
But there weren’t any words.

“Can you paint for me?” asked the lady,
“painting that is undying and it shimmers”
Thought the man and said “I can”,
“It will be a tribute to you, my woman”

“The worlds to come and lovers to kiss,
must know there once lived,
a woman so charming
and a man so devoted.”

The plan was in place,
and the man was determined.
He would need to climb,
the highest peak of that time

On that peak of mount Saturn,
Lies the magical urn, If he could jump from the peak,
after destroying the urn,
He would die but his love will become eternal.

That night the young man,
Kissed her head and said goodbye.
He will not see his woman again,
But will give her a reason to live by.

Today men and women have changed,
And love is not what it was.
After thousands of years and civilizations,
when men has fought numerous wars…
there is still nothing as surreal as,
kissing your lover under these ‘stars’.

FREE.

On that exquisite road,
One to the horizon,
Which is encroached by wild flowers,
Where you have empathetic sun.

When at every turn,
you are made to think,
how wasted your life would be,
if you had never seen...

The wind kisses your face,
And butterflies cross your way,
The indifferent cow makes you realize,
That this life is not a race.

You ride at your own pace,
Instead of those electronic lights,
There are these humble trees…
You stop when you want to,
And you resume when you feel like,
Here every decision is yours.

On that road you meet yourself,
and you know man is very small.
But you don’t want to compare,
There is just so much glee.
At that moment,
When you thank the heavens,
You know ‘you are free’.

Simple Man !

2009 is almost over. And ts that time of the year again...
I have started asking myself the questions. "What did I learn in 2009", "Was it a good year", "did I really achieve something this year" and so on.
I wouldn't be exaggerating if I say that 2009 has been one of the best years of my life. I did a lot of stuff I intended to do this year and I did learn some great lessons of life (the hard way off course). Let's do a quick recap of 2009 and then we'll talk about the learning part.
2009 opened with a pretty gloomy art-direction. There were people getting fired, salary-cuts, no pay hikes, share markets crashing, and so on. From January till June, the most used word in the city was 'recession'. For once there was something that we all could discuss and it didn't feature Tendulkar. I was working with a start-up company which was in an expansion mode, so recession didn't bother me.
There were some good things happening in my life from April onwards. I graduated to a E series phone, I had paid off almost all my debts and I started to work-out and was feeling good about it.
Then came July a disaster of a month for me. Let's not talk about disasters here though. Lets get back to the good things. 20th August 2009, was one of the happiest day of my life. My childhood dream of riding a Royal Enfield Bullet 350 has come true. I got my girl home that day.
Since September I am on a spin. Everyday has been just awesome. Life has been simple, exciting and enriching ; just the way I always wanted it to be. I did some great trips, celebrated Diwali with family, read amazing books,experienced great cinema, gazed star studded skies, subscribed to good magazines, had great food and expensive scotch. And most importantly I have met some really amazing people this year and I did learn a lot from them.
So, now coming back to the learning part. I didn't learn something which is as complex as Nash Equilibrium or Bernoulli's principle, its not something which we don't know. We have known it from a long time, but we don't believe that 'simple is beautiful'. Yes this has been my learning from 2009 and it has added a lot of value to my life.
I wonder why simple joys of life are becoming a luxury. Simple joys like walking in moon light, sitting by a pond, admiring the star studded sky, spotting some wild life, exploring a really clean virgin beach, sipping coffee with a special friend, having hot samosa on a rainy day, taking a day off from work when you feel like it, cheering up a friend, listening to poetry or songs from 'old is gold' folder, head banging on some good rock, planning a road trip with your brother over some beer, checking out a new restaurant, watching Popeye show with your dad, laughing out loud while watching Mr. Bean with your 5 yr old niece, going for small hikes on weekends, getting inspired by great young men around and taking a break from life for sometime.
I wonder why we don't have 'simple' love stories no more. A relation where a man loves a woman and they live happily ever after. Why do we have have issues like 'space', 'harmless flirting while committed', 'rebound love', 'confused love' and 'complicated love' ? Why do we have 'communication gaps' when we can stay in touch 24x7x365 ? Come on .... they didn't have communication gaps when pigeons flew with letters !!!
I might sound like an old man here, or a man who is too content at 27 but whatever it is 'I am loving it'. This surely is adding a lot of value and clarity to my life and it makes me happy.


P.S. : The title is not original, it is from the song 'Simple Man' by Lynyrd Skynyrd. Needless to say, I am hugely influenced by this song.

I don't belong here - Adolescense

I was not complete alien to a camera. I have used a friend's Nikon film SLR when I was working in Genpact. I really loved the sound of the shutter, the vision from viewfinder and the feeling that I have the power to steal a moment from time and print it on paper.
I had to lie to my dad that I need a camera for industry tours that were part of the MBA curriculum, else he wouldn't have let me buy such an expensive camera. But today no one seems to mind that harmless lie. So I bought myself a Nikon F55, a damn neat camera and we are still going strong.
As soon as I got my hands on the camera, there was no looking back. I was clicking portraits, landscapes, architecture, and just about everything except the factories on MBA industrial tours. I have always been fond of traveling and my camera became my best travel buddy. As soon as the lectures were over, I was out with my camera chasing birds.
The feeling was matured enough not to disturb a really busy man. It was just me, my camera and the nature. It was bliss.
It's hard to stay away from internet in a B-school. There are lectures to attend and pink newspapers to read. For everything else ... there is google. I started uploading my pictures on a few photography sites just to showcase my work. There were these great people (all over the world) who would visit and leave their comments. It really helped me sharpen my skills and learn new photography tricks.
It was time for summer internship now. There were companies visiting the campus and everyone wanted to be in DHL or Asian Paints or ICICI. I managed to get into Britannia Industries Ltd. It was a decent name to have on your resume. My project wasn't too far from campus, I had to go Thane.
My first day at internship. My internship guide comes on time. He was a small man, with small moustaches, small beard, small spects and a big belly. My summer project was titled 'Developing new Channels for Britannia', no Britannia isn't into broadcasting ... it makes good biscuits. So here I was at a distributor of Britannia in Thane, dresses in brand new Van Heusen formals, waiting for my guide to explain my job to me. As soon as the guide finished telling me what he has in store for me, the feeling returned like lightening.
Thane has a lot of industries. My job was to visit all the possible factories and commercial establishments in Thane and try to sell Britannia biscuits there. It was so hot. As soon as I stepped out of the distributor's shop, the 'I don't belong here' feeling was back.
I was walking in the sun, with a map of Thane and a list of schools, factories, BPOs and canteens I had to visit. Why can't they have summer internships in November-December?
Well those two months in Thane were horrible. I would leave everyday from my hostel at 9.30 and return around 7 pm. I just walked whole day in the sun, Thane-Mulund and more Thane. Will I be doing this for my living after I pass out of B-school ? The thoughts in my mind were scary. My priorities for the summer project changed. I didnt want to sell biscuits now, I just wanted to write a status against the names on the list given to me. I just wanted to visit them all, and finish it as soon as I can. 'I don't belong here', it echoed in me.
After 10-12 days, some of my hostel mates who had similar exciting summer jobs began falling ill. Walking in sun all-day was too much for the future managers, who studied in air conditioned class rooms. My room-mate at hostel stopped going out for his research based project. I remember once when I was leaving for another exciting day at work, he said "Health is wealth Uba". It just stuck into my mind that day. So after 15 days of roaming and no potential deals in my list, I started to take it easy.
If Thane had all the places in list, it also had lot of parks and lakes. So i started to explore things which were not in my list. Sometimes I would just sit by a lake in shade on a bench and observe people. There were these people beside lakes, who can clean your ears for a few bucks with so much of precision. So i saw lot of people who came, relaxed by the lake and returned with better hearing. Every evening when I called my guide to report the progress, the 'I don't belong here' will get louder and louder with every passing day.
The two month ordeal came to an end. One more day in Thane and I would have joined the 'lets make hearing better' team. After all we were good friends now. I submitted my report, got the project completion certificate and was waiting for the stipend.
All this while I didn't get a chance to click. The camera waited for me in my hostel, it suely wanted a new friend. I wanted to go out and click birds again. I wanted to click them without them realizing it. I knew I need a tele-lens for the same. So the very day I got stipend, I went to South Mumbai and got a Tamron 300 MM lens for my Nikon. Hell Yeah, a Tamron 300 MM.
I can see the Taj Mahal from Mumbai now.

I don't belong here

As far as I can remember, this feeling has been a significant contributor to my life. When I look back and try to look for its origins, I am reasonably sure that it was born during my college days.
Passing out from the grand 'Saint Xavier School' of Jaipur and entering the 'Rajasthan University Commerce college' was definitely something that gave birth to this 'I don't belong here' feeling. And the rest is history, we really have come a long way now.

After the college, I started working for GE Capital now known as Genpact. BPO was the big thing back then and GE was famous for sending its employees to USA, so I joined. After working for 14 months I just managed to go till Gurgaon and my accent was half American. My friends called me 'Dale Roberts' (my alias name for calling US customers) and not Devesh and I knew more about Wisconsin and Nevada than Rajasthan and Delhi. The feeling in me was nurturing in this all the more hostile place. When I looked around there were these people all around me who were happy with living in someother time-zones, who still have the Indian version of 'the American Dream' alive in them and who were intellectually excited about the part-time MBA programmes at office. Everyone around me was happy with the job, excited about the 'samosas and maggi' that we had outside office at 3 Am and enjoying the money (and swearwords) they were getting for making calls. My disinterest was showing on my face and also on my monthly evaluations. May be I wasn't good at my job and I just wanted to escape whatever the reasons might be, the feeling was getting its daily dose of nutrition.

I don't belong here, I once told it to my boss at GE. And he approved my study leaves for CAT (the MBA entrance test). So here was a call centre employee, trying hard to reclaim his identity and biological clock. The feeling did drive me hard and I managed to clear the test. The result was not too great, but enough to take me to a decent business school of India. I managed to get into K.J.Somaiya Institute of Management Studies and Research (SIMSR), it was consistently rated amongst the top 20 B-schools of country. I was happy with the effort and the result.

The year was 2004, the city was Mumbai and my exact location was SIMSR (Near Ghatkopar East). In the initial months, I met some really intelligent people from all around the country and I was feeling better. I could however, feel the competition and pressure to perform right after the first month. There were lectures, classes, group projects, assigments, tests, books, journals, library, lecturers, laptops, notes, computer labs, guest lectures, seminars, events, spread sheets, mathematics and so many other things that I didn't like. Well I am sorry to say, but the feeling was coming back to me.

I have just finished the first trimester with average grade. I want to finish the course and the 'I don't belong here' feeling is setting up in my mind. I managed to run away from my job but this is a professional course and I can't run from here. So what do we do now? In such times you take some decisions that change the entire course of your life. Let's buy a camera. A camera ? Yes a Nikon film SLR, was my answer to this dilemma.

To be continued ....
I don't belong here - The feeling reaches Adolescence