Sunday, September 2, 2007

When Something Becomes Irreplaceable

A few back I downloaded some songs I found in the "top 100" at billboard.com. I had done this last just a few days before my hard-drive crashed earlier this year. I had kept my collection updated till then, but after the 'catastrophe' I never minded old music ringing in my ears. Among the new ones there are two I liked a lot - "Hey there Delilah" and "Big girls don't cry". I also have a collection of video songs exceeding 4.6 Gb in space. It's been too long since I have updated it.

After attending the mock CAT in the morning today, I went to Hari Hara Kala Bhavan to attend a promotional meeting of eBiz. I don't mean to join that business group, I just wanted to know how they work. And as always, any such kind of meeting teaches tons of new ideas and makes us think beyond what we thought we previously could. eBiz is typically a networking marketing business. I somehow found that the people speaking there were doing just what I had read in all the books on business and money I had been through till now.

"Get A Life", which I finished a few days back was specifically targeted at the readers to teach them every basic of network marketing. Today's meeting just showed me how such ideas are put into work - though I felt things could have been much better and more professional - and how the people who have a peculiar Telugu accent and a similar mind-frame perform when they are put into this "people's" business. I am not a racist, but there are things that pinch me; I hate people who talk English without knowing how idiotic and foolish they appear. They forget that they need to learn grammar and teach themselves how to avoid using their mother-tongue-accent.

Yesterday evening when I reached home after 8 pm an old school friend turned up at my house. He lives in Amravati and was here just to attend this meeting. It was he who invited me to it. I took it as an opportunity to spend some time with him and also have myself get some more wisdom. I have always wanted to get along with my uncle who works with Amway's and attend his weekly meetings which are usually on Fridays and Saturdays. I never got a chance. I have read quiet a few books he gave me about his business and I enjoyed all of them. I find the products sold by Amway's more interesting. No other brand can compare the quality of their products with Amway's and no other brand can dare have such high prices!

Earlier yesterday, in the afternoon, I was out with my mother to purchase a new refrigerator. A couple of weeks back some part in our old one cracked and water began to leak. I am sure the company's technician would have fixed it for less than 300 bucks but my mother felt she should have a new machine. She told me that she was tired of seeing the old thing and that it has been in the house for more than eight years now. I simply said to myself "Oh! She is attaching emotions to the purchase". I always welcome anything new and I love seeing how my house is a home and keeps becoming much better.

I have a reason why I mention about this purchase: after having the machine installed and working yesterday late in the night, I stood in front of me to see that it was taller then me. I couldn't see it's top surface. Some months back I had a dream in which I saw a similar scene. In it I remember myself standing in front of a tall blue refrigerator with "Kelvinator" written on it. The one that stands in the kitchen now is tall but metallic grey in color, and has Samsung written on it. If Allah wants we can even fulfil the dreams we see in sleep.

On Wednesday my mother called me "haara hua aashiq" (failed lover). My beard had grown a little beyond the level of comprehension I can have here now, and even my brother had started teasing me. He called me "Devdas". He has done that several times before. I never gave any seriousness to it until this Wednesday.

People sometimes talk and then think about what they had spoken. Sometimes they think and then talk. The pity is when there is no thinking - neither before, nor after. They don't know what they are saying and they never desire to have a realization of that anytime. That was exactly how my mother was on Wednesday. I left the room soon after she said that. Everybody was laughing taking it as a joke and I smiled too. I don't expect any contemplation on this from anybody but somethings go beyond the necessary endurance levels. And this is when I understand that I need to learn more. That I need to learn to hear and see things which I don't want to have being said or done. I could have well understood this without an example of such intensity. That was definitely a Wednesday to remember!

A few days after I posted the update "Here Is A Challenge", one of my friends told me that I shouldn't have written all that when we miss so many prayers and listen to so much music (the starting paragraph of this post makes it apparent). He somehow failed to understand what I was writing. He related skipping of prayers as an act that would make me 'bad' or a 'person with bad character'. But I somehow felt that he had taken up that challenge! He never understood it.

Everyday when I go to sleep, before laying myself on the bed, after brushing my teeth, I sit and pray for sometime. There are several verses of the Holy Quran I recite to myself and all this takes around 15 minutes and sometimes more. But there is one part that makes it more satisfying for me. I recollect the names of as many people I can who matter to me and pray for their well being - many names taken and prayed for individually. I have been doing this for several years now and I pray for myself in the end.

There is again a specific reason why I have written it here even when there are hardly any people who know I do such a thing. Even my parents don't know it. Ever since the day my grandfather expired in February, I have been finding it difficult to skip his name when his turn comes in the order. I, so many times tend to pray for him too when I am supposed to pray for peace to be with him in his grave. I remember him daily and feel his presence around me for sometime. I don't know for how long this is going to continue. How much I wish he was still here with me in this world. How much I wish I could tell him how much I love him.

When I go further in the order, just before my name, there used to another name which I had to remove on purpose. That was a task. It makes me feel terrible everyday when I ardently and intentionally try my best to keep away from that name. It hurts me even more recollecting the days when I would pray so much for that person, and comparing those days with the times I had now. Those days had hopes in them. It's all a blank space now. People only tease me in every way they can.

On Thursday I gave a photo copy of my passport to my mother. She said the bank authorities wanted a proof of my address to keep my bank account running. It was a frustrating behavior of the bank again. This same bank account is the one I had used as a proof of address to obtain my passport and now I am using that very passport to help keep the account active and operational. It's so ironic they keep the regulations and rules in such an irregular and irresponsible way. Some say it's the system that must be blamed. But why blame some mechanism that has no life in it? It's the people who made this system who should be put to blame and the people who run it who must be punished. It's Allah who decides.

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