#BANGALORE MY DEAR HOME I HATE YOU.

[satosuguhastakenovermylife]

manifestation to make the rain stop 🕯️🕯️🕯️🛐🛐🕯️🕯️🕯️

[viswas]

Shattered Illusion

Dear Aunt,

You were born in Gangapur, Bihar, the fifth child in a schedule caste family. You had three elder brothers and an elder sister. Your don't recall your father, he died of tuberculosis shortly after you were born. Your mother was the sole breadwinner, earning daily wages through labor in construction sites. Your brothers squandered their lives and times smoking marijuana and playing cards. Your sister was married off at a barely legal age.

In a place where getting children to go to school was an ordeal, you were the first person in a long time to clear secondary and high school examinations. I have heard mom tell stories of you studying under the street light, just like Ambedkar. You got admitted into a science college and completed your B.Sc Physics. You then found a job at the motor company in Samastipur and became one of the first literate wage earners in our village.

When you had some work experience in the motor company, you felt the need to study further. So you applied and got admitted to an M.Sc Nuclear Physics program in Calcutta, West Bengal. I vaguely recall our family's excitement when we had come to see you off at the Samastipur station. You were the first person from the village who was going to do a master's degree. You were going to be alone by yourself in a different state, hundreds of kilometers away from us. I didn't realize then what a momentous yet scary occasion it was for our family. I recall mom asking me to study and become like you.

One of my fondest memories from childhood is at the Samastipur railway station. While we waited for the train to Calcutta to arrive, you would play Snake and Ladders and Ludo with me. I was so happy once when the train was 12 hours late. You asked me to study English well, you said it was important. You bought me English comic books from the bookstore in the Samastipur station. I was hooked. There was nothing I looked forward to more than being at the railway station, first to receive you and then to send you off just so I could read English comics and play games with you.

I recall the orange pen-pencil with the metal clip that you gifted me when you visited us one vacation. I was in the fourth standard then. All I wanted to do was write until the lead was exhausted. And so I came back from school and started writing, though I don't think I learned anything from the process. I finished half the pencil leads you had given in two days. When the pen-pencil was stolen the next day, I was shattered. Not for the beating that mom would give, but because I loved the pen-pencil, especially because it came from you.

After your post-graduation, you went on to do your Ph.D. By then you had become a legend in our village. Later, you found a job with the department of atomic energy in the role of a junior scientist. That was the first time I heard the word 'scientist'. Science became my favorite subject and I started paying more attention to it in school. I remember you talk to me about rockets and satellites launched by India. I was blown away by the idea of going to the moon and distant stars. Any time after that, whenever I was asked what I wanted to become in life, there was only once answer. For the first time, I became consciously aware of the importance of studying. I wanted to study well and grow up to be like you, a scientist.

When they diagnosed the defective valve in your heart, I was shattered along with the rest of our family. I recall borrowing a biology book from my senior and reading about the anatomy of the heart. I didn't understand much. The doctors were going to perform a surgery to save you. The whole family left for Calcutta together for the first time for your surgery. I was excited and sad at the same time. Sad because I was afraid you might die on the operating table. Excited because I was going to a city I had always heard about but never visited. It was my first time traveling beyond Samastipur. Thankfully, the surgery went well. You came out healthy. You went back to work, became a scientist and then a senior scientist. You were a tour de force.

Then you got married. Your husband was a scientist too. You were my favorite couple. I wanted to live with you. You told me to study well and you promised to take me to Calcutta if I did well in my secondary school exams. So I studied hard and tried to follow in your footsteps. I topped my class in every exam. Mom was proud of me. You said you were too.

You then visited us on a long break. You had a baby boy, my first brother. He was so adorable. I took care of him like he was my own child. I looked forward to waking up in the morning just to cuddle with him while he was sleeping. I looked forward to playing with him when I got back from school. He was going to be my best friend. Then one day, you both were back in Calcutta and life became less than ordinary.

Eventually, all my uncles got married, and they all had their sons. But your son held a special place for me. Years flew past quickly. I never came to Calcutta for an education. Instead, I ended up in Jamshedpur for my high school. I stayed in the school hostel. I still wanted to become a scientist.

And then I heard you were a mother again. This time you had a daughter. I came to visit you during my vacation. Your daughter was the most beautiful thing I had ever laid my eyes on. One day, I hoped I would also have a daughter like yours. She was so cute, I wanted to steal her for myself and take her back to Jamshedpur. Silly me. I was very happy. She was my first sister, the first daughter of the generation in our family. She was going to be like her mother and make us all proud. I couldn't wait to see what life had in store for her. I didn't want to go back to Jamshedpur at the end of the vacation.

Life went by quickly. I completed my high school and went on to do my engineering, again in Jamshedpur. Another vacation I visited you in Calcutta, you had arranged an internship for me in your office. You were writing C++ code that operated medical imaging instruments. I finally got to see you at your best. I had so much to learn from you. Meanwhile, at home, your daughter and I were forming a special bond. She doted on me. She was young and she was already wise beyond her years. I saw you in her. When the internship ended, once again, I didn't want to go back to Jamshedpur.

Unlike you, my achievements were nothing to write home about. I had much more to do. After graduation, I got a job in IT in Bangalore, Karnataka. I couldn't become a scientist. But I loved computers, so no regret there. Mom wasn't too happy about me going that far and working. It was hard for me to convince her but I did. She couldn't believe the salary I was being offered. As long as I wrote to her often and visited her every six months, she was happy.

You continued to scale greater heights. You went on to become a chief scientist, divisional manager and finally the managing director. You reached the pinnacle of your career. I would talk proudly to my friends and colleagues about my scientist aunt. They too were impressed with your story. No one I knew had met a scientist in real life.

Years went by and I got busy at work. I enjoyed every moment of it. I loved solving problems using computers. I was being paid well. I got to travel a lot as a part of my job, so I went to the US, Europe, and Japan. Here I met different kinds of people and got exposure to different cultures. I fell in love with travel. I made it a point to travel every year for at least a month. My manager was a very agreeable person. So long as I met my deliverables, he was happy to let me take a month off every year. One time, I spent an entire month backpacking Rajasthan, Punjab, and Kashmir. Another month I split between Ladakh and Andaman. Another year, I took an unpaid vacation with paid leaves altogether for three months and backpacked seven countries in South East Asia. I was now experiencing a life more than ordinary, one conceived improbable for someone from Gangapur.

Meanwhile, I had graduated from comic books to fiction and non-fiction. I read biographies of historical figures, scientists, musicians and social activists. I read about social issues and dystopian societies. I read philosophy and religion. I read world history and Indian history. I even got back into comic books. They call it graphic novels these days. When I wasn't traveling the world, I was living vicariously through books. I read for that exhilarating feeling of magically being transported to another place and time, into the shoes of someone I would never be, to earn an experience I could never feel otherwise. Reading exposed me to the realities of the world we live in. I traveled the world through books. It was a replacement for real experiences, yet it drove me to travel more and seek new adventures. I was quenching my thirst for knowledge.

Through travel and books, I became more aware. I learned about women's rights and LGBT rights. I thought we were poor, then I got to know about Sudan. I learned about environmental exploitation and destruction, yet I found beauty in this world. I learned of oligarchies, dictatorships, and failed political constructs, but I also learned about panchayats and grass root development. I joined anti-corruption and cleanliness campaigns wherever I could. I wanted to deeply connect with this world. I wanted to make a difference.

From you, I learned the importance of education. From education, I learned about protecting humanity and the world we live in. I managed to gather moss from the stone that you had set rolling.

Then you changed.

When you shifted your daughter to a convent, you told me it was because you wanted her to have a better education. She said she hated the idea of losing all her friends from school.

A few years later, when she created a second Facebook account and sent me a friend request, I asked her why. She said she wanted a platform where she could express herself freely and wouldn't be judged by you. She said you were going through her Facebook Friends List and asking about every boy in it.

Once when she visited me on a vacation, I took her out shopping. She only bought slightly less than knee-length skirts and shorts. She said you would never buy such clothes for her, nor permit her to wear them. She asked me not to tell you. She would stock them at her friend's house so she could wear them when going out, without your oversight.

Meanwhile, your son completed his high school and wanted to do automobile engineering. He relocated to Delhi for this. You bought him a bike and supported his stay in a rented house with his classmates. You asked him to prepare for his GRE so he could do his masters in the US.

By now you had become the go-to person for advice for everyone in the village. When one of my distant cousins was about to complete her engineering with top honors, you advised her mother to get her married. You even selected a Bihari boy from the same caste for her to be married to. While she was waiting for her final results, she was fighting with her parents to be left alone so she could make a career. She hated you for it.

Two years later, when you daughter completed her high school, she wanted to study fashion design in Bombay. You were dead set against it. You didn't permit her to leave Calcutta. Your reason was the increasing prevalence of rape in society.

She called me yesterday. She cried to me about her fate.

Once a symbol of woman's emancipation, you are now the symbol of your daughter's oppression. I feel like I don't know you anymore. What have you become, a metaphor for the difference between literacy and education?

Sincerely,

your once loving nephew

[hello-smoke-3d-blog]

To Ride and to Smoke.

what i wanted to write?

its been so long since i see you / written to you is the only thing i do remember since early 80′s and came internet which totally induced me to forget about writing.

‘am i 62 years, a man who love and hate everything in life now a days,

but during my 14th year there was an enlightenment about motor bicycle!

the first bike i rode is made in Italy, Suvego is the brand, 50 cc moped, single seater, that ‘s my Dad’s 1st bike to traverse between home and his work place, that is Nov’ 9th 1969, Bangalore.

My first relationship with a machine which was branded Rocky.

went on to drive many / all brand bikes made in India till 1985, 

then came the new gen 100 cc Japanese bikes, 

of which RX yamaha was the clear winner on throttle response, a clear winner.

then came RD 350 yamaha - now this is the bike till date which not everyone can ride - an arabian horse to be tamed in sync mutually to play around and i did very well.

it was rude, rough ride - call it an attitude,

what i love even today is to take the curves at continuous high speed - safely and the long night drives with powerful and rightly focused illumination with right wiring control to keep using the dim dip to enable clear vision at the max speed and to avoid optical illusions. 

those days no rules, but i followed except for the speedy curve maneuvering at the same acceleration/deceleration maintaining momentum and velocity , clipping on the long stretch at the safely possible speed - @ 170 kmph for few minutes was all i could do in those days - and one of the twin point sets gave up at that speed!.

it was pure luck i have survived many a rude & rough ride both on the high way and in city - that was irresponsible though, then corrected and become a pure breed rider still retaining the same caliber of man machine combo*

well, where is the smoke then?

to me it is always smoke of the bike and smoke for me during the break or a smoke break, so the two smokes have come together All along.

I still ride and smoke! relish, enjoy.

now 

the importance of this blog

is to keep oneself fit, healthy to

retain the adrenaline and oxygen flow in continuance in one’s own system to keep riding and smoking.

though i do not encourage smoking personally, i do understand it as the one’s dear friend while you are done with all and alone will be the only companion, burn it, not you*

thus i have invented certain natural remedy, prevention to keep one self fit

to ride and to smoke and live healthy long is the moto!

will do in the next blog.

till then

ride and smoke responsibly.