For Whom It Matters The Least

This is not exactly something new but since I burnt every scribbling when I realised they are useless, this might look new.
I am too lazy to type in Bengali (Bangla, to be exact)

Jodio tomar nojore ami nogonno
Tobuo amar hridoy jure sudhu tumi e tumi
Tomar du chokhe royechhe ontobihin pother disha
Ogochore tomar ami je pothe cholar ongikar kori
Gobhir rate jokhon duniyay sob sopno dekhe
Jege jege ami tomar e to protikkha kori
Tumi to jano na,jokhon tumi kotha bolo
Ami suni, ami bujhi na, sudhu dekhte thaki
Sopno kokhon eto bastob hote pare
Dekhi na sopno ami kono sopnosundarir
Sopno amar roop niyeche tomar
Tomar shihorito shorirer kothao
Amar okhondo shanti somahito achhe
Tar e khoje ami tomar shorir porjoton kori
Eso kache, dekho amar sorbosso diye tomai
Kemon ami valobasai nisso hote pari

(Thank you VinayNS for encouraging to translate and yet not praising me.)

Although I am insignificant for you
Still in my heart, its you and you
In your eyes is the direction for my endless journey
Unknown to you, i promise to walk on it forever
When at midnight, the world is lost in dreams
Awake, I wait for only your arrival
You know not but when you speak
I listen, I understand not, just keep on watching
Can dream ever be so vivid
I desire not of any dream-girl
My dream has taken your shape
Somewhere in your awaken body
My eternal peace is hidden deep
In search of that, i explore your body
Come close, watch how giving you my everything
I can become nothing in love.

(This is certainly my most precious post, costed me Rs 1100 to post this. Sighh!!)

Fictitious Conversation

This is a fictional conversation which doesn’t need telling. People are named like Mahdi, Maryam, Faiz or Alex, or even Kumbatata (probably, in African countries) but certainly not like Mr Trusting and Mr Suspicious. This is, once again, just a conversation I dreamt, last night.

The conversation went like this, or this is what I remembered when I woke up.

Mr. Trusting and Mr. Suspicious are two gentlemen, who are known to each other without being too close. Somehow, I suspect, Mr. Suspicious didn’t want it. Mr. Trusting is more of a happy go lucky type of chap.

Mr. Trusting: oi mate, good morning.

Mr. Suspicious: Morning Mr. Trusting

Mr. Trusting: How have you been?

Mr. Suspicious: me great mate, you?

Mr. Trusting: Can't complain. Tell me how was your day.

Mr. Suspicious: (slowly drawing guard) well, it was just another day.

Mr. Trusting: Uhu, how is...err...what was her name....Victoria?

Mr. Suspicious: (wondering whether Mr. Trusting knows that they are not together anymore) she is good. Thank you.

(Awkward silence as Mr. Suspicious is not committing anything and Mr. Trusting doesn’t know how to press on)

Mr. Trusting: (after a prolonged pause) Look how beautiful the west looks. (referring to the red sky just after sunset).

Mr. Suspicious watches it grimly. Sighs. Now speaking hurriedly

Mr. Suspicious: tell me one thing mate, who told you that is west?

Mr. Trusting: (visibly taken aback) well..ha ha (laughs somewhat forcefully) well, we all know that the sun sets in the west.

Mr. Suspicious: hmm. No mate. You think that is the west because we were taught to call it west. We don’t know if it is the west exactly. What if I want to name it North and everybody agrees to that.

Mr. Trusting: (completely perplexed) err, I guess, well, what's in a name, right? (laughs)

Mr. Suspicious: And yet, we must remember the name of the dramatist who said it.

Mr. Trusting: Uhu, never thought it like that.

Mr. Suspicious: Exactly. We keep on believing. Never question. That's how we are progressing.

Mr. Trusting: Err, should we question everything? (suddenly) are you a theist, mate?

Mr Suspicious: I am a what?

Mr. Trusting: A theist, do you believe in God?

Mr Suspicious: (carefully measuring his words) yes, I do.

Mr Trusting: Do you have any proof that he exists?

Mr Suspicious: (laughs) how else, do you think, everything is so organised? How can the universe be made without a maker?

Mr Trusting: But, could you prove his presence? I mean, you are assuming he is there because if you deny Him, you cant explain these. In other words, God is not a theorem which can be proven. He is more like a hypothesis, believe him and you can explain everything else. (breathes after speaking very fast.)

Mr Suspicious: Well Trusting, that's your way of putting things. I need not agree.

Mr Trusting: well, there I agree, You are free to disagree. (continues after a small pause) but mate, trust builds relationships. You have to agree there.

Mr. Suspicious: Can see what good trust is by the number of divorce applications. I say, why trust. Win trust. I ain't going to give it away.

Mr. Trusting: But, it is so subjective. Remember Aesop? If you don’t want to trust, nothing can make you trust.

Mr. Suspicious: Isn’t it better than to misplace the trust?

Mr. Trusting: But, not every trust is misplaced. I mean, if we don’t trust anyone, how will we know who is worthy of trusting and who is not? (speaks with vigour now as he remembers something) Look at my parents, they trusted each other, and it was an arranged marriage, they trusted blindly. Nothing could tear them apart.

Mr. Suspicious: And you? (knowing well Mr Trusting is facing a divorce case, filed by his wife.)

Mr. Trusting: (hesitantly)err, I misjudged.

Mr. Suspicious: see, that is what exactly I want to avoid.

Mr. Trusting is now completely clueless what to say. Mr. Suspicious looks satisfied, he has just argued and won against another too trusting idiot. Mr. Suspicious continues, the tone is somewhat sympathetic now.

Mr. Suspicious: look mate, I have nothing against you, we are good friends. You just don’t know what you are saying. Look at you, broken and ruined just because you trusted. Look at me, I don’t want to bloat, but see me, I am safe and happy because I don’t trust anybody or anything. Trusting means someone someday will misuse it.

Mr. Trusting: and not trusting means, you never know who just crossed you could have been the person who could have turned your life into heaven. There is no reward without a risk.

Mr. Suspicious: (back to the aloof tone after his valuable words are rejected and protested to) well then mate, do what you shall. Just don’t blame others for what happens to you. Guess you can never realise this truth. (sighs visibly)

Mr. Trusting: Guess what mate? I am happy. (stops Mr. Suspicious with a wave of hand as Mr. Suspicious was about to say something) and you know why I am happy? Because I don’t see the half glass empty. I drink the remaining half glass to the last drop. (again stops Mr. Suspicious) yes, I misplaced my trust. But guess what, I will do it again at the next opportunity. Only that way, and yes only and only in that way, I know I will find someone who will honour my trust. You, on the other hand, will remain in your guarded walls, and probably die with the regret that you couldn’t find someone who is worthy of your trust. But know it mate, you can never find them because when they pass you, you are too scared and suspicious of giving them a chance.

Mr. Suspicious: (fuming in anger now) Neither did I seek nor do I need your advice on what I should do. I wonder at your audacity though, a sore loser, who has nothing left to be proud of, teaching someone how to win things?

Mr. Trusting smiles.

Mr. Trusting: Good day mate. (Mr. Trusting whistles away)

Mr. Suspicious: Some idiots will die idiots. Why on earth do I waste my time with them?

(Mr. Suspicious drags himself away)

Waiting To Re-live

Surely I am a Muslim and we don’t believe in re-incarnation (except for Jesus Christ but then we believe he never died, God saved him on the cross) so title might be a bit confusing.
Let me quote Jasim-ud-din, "ghumiye achhe shishur pita sab shishur-i antore" (Every kid has his father sleeping inside him). Get the sense? Yes, I am a father of the best baby in the world.

My father is very fond of story telling. And he excels at it too, unlike me who can bore people to sleep when telling a story. And one of the stories my father fondly tells everyone is how I was a surprisingly brilliant kid in my childhood.  Leaving other stories for the time being, which you will find difficult to believe anyway given my enmity with IQ nowadays, let me tell you one which I like.


There is this book I received as a gift, even before I could read the alphabet. Its one of those books where each page has 4-5 lines and remaining are illustrations. The name of the book was "Tutu Bhutu", Tutu and Bhutu, a dog and a cat respectively, were the two main characters of that book. Here is the only cover page which I could find on the internet. Pardon the image size.

Forget the story of it, in gist the story was how Bhutu went fishing and had a feast with all his friends with the big fish he caught, let me get to the story my father would love to tell you a thousand times.

According to him, they read to me the book and I just loved it. The love went so crazy, that I will go around the house to find anyone free and give him the book and ask him or her to read it to me. I will sleep with the book beside myself and in a day, I would make them read the same book at least 20 times. I would even insist that they should laugh when I am laughing.

Now is the incredible part...I heard the book so many times that I memorised the book completely without knowing how to read. So, I can recite it from my memory, even pause at the punctuations and turn pages at the appropriates breaks. So, if you don’t know the story behind, you will feel a tiny kid is reading it fluently.

The second page of the book.

The childhood copy was of course soiled from so much of use and while my sister was growing up, she made sure its completely torn. Sadly, this classic, which could have taken any child classic including those from Lewis Carol, never received the publicity or popularity it deserved. I finally got a copy few years back at the bookfair when I was doing engineering and had to literally beg to the publisher to sell me the copy which was there for illustration purpose alone.

Coming back to the purpose of this blog, I always wished I could see those days. I never could. But now I know there is a strong chance. God has given me a great baby and hopefully he will soon be with me and I can't wait to see tiny Faiz running around with his copy of Tutu Vutu and asking all to read the same to him multiple times a day.

Time to re-live is probably so close.

My Review of Supreme Court's View

Indeed, I didn’t blog for a long time now. Actually, nowadays I need to write so much for my profession that writing for pleasure or for expressing my ideas looks like another tiring job to me.

Anyway, I couldn’t suppress myself, thankfully and incidentally the office gave me a week off as well, on something which is hitting Indian badly nowadays. If you are an India, or if you are someone who follows international news, you must have heard that the supreme court of India has recently banned homosexual relationships. As you would have expected, and probably supported as well, the waves of protests which are hitting streets are hysteric.

Before I go into the details, lets see what our leaders are saying. For the first time, except for when we fight against Pakistan, they are equivocally protesting against verdict and condemning the supreme court. There is indeed a competition which I noticed amusedly, who can go the farthest to prove that they are with the homosexuals. If someone is saying, the supreme court is wrong and this verdict pushed us back by 400 years, another is quipping with, I wouldn’t have been ashamed if my own son or daughter was a homosexual.

Not that I am uninterested in politicians. In fact, I believe they can show us the truth. Its easy, just believe the exact opposite of what they say, and you were never nearer to the truth. But, keeping them away for a while (they eat too much newsprint anyway), lets see what the intellectual class is saying. In this class we find our poets, writers, freethinkers(I don’t really know what this term means), progressive reformers and others.

Our first self declared homosexual of India, Prince Something (I don’t remember his exact name) said in a press meet, (in English so that he can be understood by the elite thinking class, Hindi is a language spoken by illiterates I guess) “It's all about which hole you enter”, sarcasm dripping out of every word. I thought about it for a long time, with my vivid sexual imagination running pretty wild, but still failed to comprehend fully what he meant. Perhaps he wanted to say “it's all about whose hole you enter”. This one makes sense in the context, else whether I sex normally with my wife or try the back-door for fun is entirely our choice and I don’t see this supreme court ruling saying anything about that.

Some poet, who declared himself as a homosexual way back in 1984, said today, did we fail to make the bigger part of the society to understand? No mate, going by the support, which you are receiving from almost every quarter of society, at least the powerful and the influential ones, makes me think like you have done good enough for your cause. Except for one quarter, which I proudly call the last defence standing, you have conquered almost every sect.

People call this sect, which I belong to, as regressive, blind, fundamentalist (which I am and I would love to explain why but not now), medieval or the popular term now, Taliban. I wondered about the meaning of progress. Given my English is as good as that of a Bushman of the desert, I went to online Harper Collins dictionary. They said “

1. Movement, as toward a goal; advance.

2. Development or growth: students who show progress.

3. Steady improvement, as of a society or civilization: a believer in human progress. See Synonyms at development.”

Sadly, I was disappointed with what the dictionary said. I thought of something like, Progress: a trait, displayed by individual, race or nation, in aping whatever the USA and the Europe is doing. It isn’t, poor me, poor homosexuals. So, the examples they gave, how USA and Europe accepted it, and how we should as well, to help our civilisation to progress, doesn’t hold much water as progress is not defined by our ability to copy the white skin.

I am just a poor blogger, hardly with any academic qualification, keep artistic education apart. The amount of newsprint and TV-hours they are getting, I can't dream of it, nor do I desire. I can't go on making the thing so complex. Nor I can be so glib. All I know, Bible said “wide and tempting is the gate/path which lures you to hell” (Christian readers, please supply me the exact verse, I am poor in memorising.) Quran and Hadith also predicted how sweet talkers the Satan and his agents are. Anyway, lets not get into those Taliban talks of Bible and Koran, outdated books with a faulty concept called God. Let's go back to science.

My parents insisted that I should study the science. I had no particular interest except in History and the answers are so tediously long that I chose the lazier science instead. So, I am somewhat comfortable here or at least I can pretend more convincingly here. Anyway, lets proceed.

Homosexuals are saying, law shouldn’t decide who we love. Slogans are coming like “let us make our own choice”. Yes very true. I say, lets be even more progressive. Let's remove the concept of incest. It is a backdated concept anyway. If you want to make love to your mother as a son, or to your father as a daughter (or even the other combination) law shouldn’t decide or interfere. After all, you are in love and scientifically, two biological bodies are performing a basic physiological act. So lets proceed with incest as well, I say. Next on our agenda should be animal sex, where if as a woman you want your dog to fornicate with you or you want to put your thing in a hole of a mare, the law shouldn’t interfere with “which hole you are entering”.

But wait, what is this I am reading? Times Now, the leading newspaper, in its Bengali version, Ei Somoy, runs a column where an actress, probably because she doesn’t have many films to do anyway, replies to the psychological problems of we, the common man. Forgetting for once what qualification does she have to take up that role or how we Indians love to say, even the excretion of celebrities smell so nice, lets hear her answer to a question. This one came after the ruling to supreme court.

The question was something like, a man asked, recently, with my wife's permission, I engaged in a sexual intercourse with a female cousin of mine. Now we think we should continue this relationship (the threesome, he meant I am certain) on a permanent basis, please advise. The answer was pretty sarcastic. She, the actress, said “wow mate, you have done great. Just enjoy till you can because as soon as the law catches you, it will end. You better run to Mars and continue there.” etc. etc.

I can bet my last underwear, ask that actress what she thinks of the supreme court ruling and she will shrug in as American a way as she can and answer in stammering Bengali, with a heavy and consciously inculcated American accent, with stress evident on her face to speak the language her parents speak and the Lingua Franca of the land she lives in, that she thinks that is horribly unjust. Why then, I ask you madam, you hide your disgust in sarcasm when someone decides to enter the hole of his female cousin, with his wife being the third party?

You call me Taliban, you call me fundamentalist, you call me medieval regressive and blinded by religion inhuman creature, justify your own damned double standard first. 

Thank you supreme court of India, thank you Australian government and thank you those few countries like Iran who, even at the risk of being tagged as "oppressor of humanity" are keeping the healthy society intact. 

Fulfilment

Today he kicked me finally. no you cant blame me. I am a widower and like most old Indian widower I am cynical and irritating. I badmouth, I curse and and I do all those things which will make anybody hate me. I don't want anybody in my room I don't want anybody touching my things especially the things which were hers. My grandchildren, both of them, hate me as much as I hate them. They are irresponsible impolite rascals. Why cant they let me live in peace! I don't need their mercy. All I need is my room, my medicine and my food. Yes, like always I still love good food. She, my wife if you cant guess, commented a lot, and she wasn't a great cook either, tried her best to give me foods I want. I can't eat ghaas phoos greenery always. We aren't grazing cows like I always used to say irritably. She never complained much.

I need to live with my only son who is a bloody rascal. Spineless creature who lives under the shadow of his wife. His wife is a creature from hell. I am glad my wife never had to tolerate her. She is devil incarnated. And, she has some enmity with me to settle score about. I don't know what and how this enmity was provoked at first but I know how much she despise me. And, I am pretty sure that its she who turned my grandchildren against me. I cursed her often. Mostly in my mind as I am scared of she making me leave this very household which I purchased and constructed with my blood. Never I took a vacation, never I bought a good shirt, never I bought a car so I could make this. And, although I am still the legal owner I am scared of getting thrown out of this house. This house, where memories of her till her last day is still alive with me.

It happened to me many times that they do things to irritate me. Like when I want to sleep my grandson and his bunch of scoundrel friends starts playing shrill and loud music if that can be called music at a horrible volume. My granddaughters friends giggle looking at my futile anger. Huh damn them all. I retire to my room which they ignored while renovating the house and removing the colour my wife chose thus my room isn't much to talk of. Moreover citing my bronchitis they didn't fit AC in my room. The fan makes more sound than air and still I am happy. there I still use a computer and listen to songs we used to listen together.

Today I woke up to horribly loud sound again. I was dreaming of her. Of our last vacation. I came out swearing at anything and everything. My daughter in law came out like she would be hitting me when I knocked at their door rather loudly she opened the door with displeasure and said how she would like me to go back to my room.

I went back muttering.

the maid didn't come today without notice. The princess who married my son was visibly perturbed. She had to cook and clean. Ohh such a great ordeal. The ordeal which my wife and mother did everyday of their lives. Then with eyes to burn me alive she came to my room to give me my lunch. The same vegetables and tasteless garbage which she cooks. She threw the plates on my table with less courtesy which you show to a street dog. I was mad. I gathered courage and threw my plates at her. 

"Get lost from my room you dirty lazy bitch" I shouted.

She went away swearing at me. I didn't guess what will happen next. Few minutes later she came to my room with her husband. Crying, sobbing like an innocent victim. My son used the tone which he never uses with her. "Have you thrown the plates at her?" he demanded shouting loudly.  

"Yes I did and don't shout u spineless slave of wife." 

"what what what did you say?" he shouted. I said "don't shout, I am your father" and I went at him holding my walking stick to beat him after twenty years. he defended himself and threw me back with a kick.

I am sitting now. I don't know which shock was higher, the physical one or the mental one. I was breathless sitting all shattered on the floor trying not to move.

He kicked me? I couldn't believe. Suddenly I remembered when he was in his mothers womb how I used to touch it and say "oi mate, kick me, come on gimme a kick."

He fulfilled my desire thirty years later.

I suddenly started crying taking her name.

Love Oh Love

Lisa charges high, if Lisa is her real name, for very few know her real name. In this city of Bristol, there would be a few who charge as high as she does and only hard cash in your pocket isn't sufficient for you to hire her services. She has the perfect taste in clothing, the best sense of make up, the make up which never looked as crude or as vulgar as her competitors. No, it would be unfair to call them her competitors as Lisa operates in a different circle altogether. She speaks perfect London accent, which makes her stand out in Bristol and impeccable vocabulary often makes her sound more like a teacher or lawyer than what she is, a high class prostitute.

She arrived in Bristol some 23 years back, if you believe the old sailor Cunningham, who was one of her first clients. A girl, fresh from Pampanga in Philippines, who couldn't speak a word of English, and was sobbing silently while her agent fixed her hourly rate with the interested clients of foreign flesh. She was thinly built that time, organs still blossoming to full youth, just like any other 16 years old girl you see on the street. Now she has the curves and measurements any man would die for but not then actually. She was sold for a very high rate after her virginity was proven.

Lisa didn't tell her story to many, she learnt how not to trust a single person in this treacherous world. Her agent, old ¨cooky¨ Laurel, told to a few with incomplete details. Like most pinays, she also landed in the England illegally, those were not the time of global village concept. She of course didn't know of this until she was taken into a small boat with 25 more, 30 miles from the shore of England She would be a nurse to old invalid rich men, who are kind and pays well and will treat her as a child, her agent in Manila told her. She didn't hesitate and paid the money she earned working as a hair dresser swiftly. She had a big family to take care of and her father didn't come home sober ever.

She realised the care the old rich men needed wasn't exactly what you expect from a hospital nurse or an aide to disabled. It was something else. She cried, but then like all others in her profession she adjusted to her fate. From the second year onward, she could send money home. She found peace. It was occasionally broken when physically violent customers had her but later she could hire two muscle-men to shove those customers away from her apartment.

There is something about Richard, Lisa thought while in the taxi. She is using a taxi today and not her car. She doesn't want anybody to know where she is going. She met Richard 5 days back. She was sipping her drink alone in Hobert´s when Richard approached. He later told he is 28 but at first glance he looked more like 25. He spoke and she didn't pay much heed. After all, every body wants to talk to her. But there is something in those words. He didn't look at her with greed in his eyes. His words were not veil to his suppressed desires to have her in bed. There was a certain innocence which touched Lisa and she turned her head and they talked amicably. When he asked for a dinner next day, to her surprise she agreed. After a long long time, someone asked her for dinner with no plan to sex afterwards.

Lisa pondered a lot after coming back from the dinner. For after a long time, she laughed wholeheartedly. His stories were not fascinating, often he spoke how idiotically he had behaved in certain situations but Lisa liked it. She was smiling thinking of the moments she just spent with a relative stranger. Oh no Lisa, you are 39, don't be absurd. You passed your teenage first love age 20 years ago. He is just being a nice chap.

But then who could control love in this world? Lisa wasn't any exception. When Richard called again next day, she cancelled a regular customer to go out with him. It was a magnificent decision, as it turned out to be. All day they laughed, she giggled like a teenage girl all the time, sharing jokes randomly and running around. At 39, it was tiring her but she loved this feeling. They layd on the green grass side by side, she could smell him, and watched the sky. Laying side by side when Richard hold her hand, she knew what it means and against all her reasoning she didn't withdrew her hand. Love oh love, what magic can you do to the most logical and bitter person in this world. Next night Lisa asked Richard for a Dinner at her place.

All day she spent reorganising her apartment, removing every last bit of evidence of her profession. She bought a new dress as she didn't want Richard to see her in dresses in which her customers saw her. She felt like a cleanly washed baby and bathed for long. With each scrub, she was trying to take off the years of filth that she has accumulated in the profession.

Richard came and they had the dinner, perhaps the most romantic dinner in her place ever. She was habituated of eating alone. At most, the maid servant accompanied her. All were asked out today, she didn't want to share this moment with anybody.

After dinner, still at the table, Richard did something incredible. After 4 days of companionship and 2 dinners together, he asked if Lisa would marry him. Lisa was speechless after 23 years. Last time she went speechless in sheer sorrow after knowing why she was brought to England. First time perhaps, in her total lifetime, she was speechless in happiness. She didn't reply for a long time.

But this dream wouldn't last long, just let Richard know of my profession. Her heart was crying, didn't want the dream to be over so soon, she was liking it. But truth must be faced. It can´t remain hidden all life and when it will come out, it will hurt them both. Sighed Lisa, Richard was still looking at her for an answer. So be it, she though and gathering all her courage, she asked ¨do you know what I do for a living?”

¨I knew it all the time Lisa, after the first drink together I asked about you from someone and I know exactly who you are. And yet, I am asking for your hand.¨

Lisa couldn't believe that. She tried not to cry but then all of a sudden she started sobbing and cried like a baby. Richard hugged her. Next morning they woke up in each other´s arms. First time in her life, Lisa made love and not served sex to someone.

The taxi is near the hotel now, the hotel Richard is staying, Ohh I forgot to tell you, Richard is vacationing here in Bristol with 3 more friends. Lisa paid the taxi and went to the reception and moved on to the room. Her heart was racing, she was praying she is looking great, all her professional confidence about her look was gone. Richard is going to formally introduce her to his friends today. She could hear her own heartbeat.

Just facing her door, she paused before entering. She would take some deep breaths and go inside. The door was slightly ajar and people were talking inside. So all the friends are here already. She could hear them clearly laughing, perhaps sharing a joke. One of them controlled the laughter somehow and said, “ this is incredible Richard, you are a genius.¨

Richard, her Richard, replied ¨didn't I tell you I could fuck her for free?¨

Tribute, Late and Insufficient

I am late, very late indeed in paying this tribute. It is about Mr Ziauddin Ahmed, my grandfather. If I start by his achievements, I would stop never. So, I better tell about his love for me.

At the age of 4, I left home with him for a 15 days trip, never missing my mother which was apt for any boy.

On his deathbed, he was telling me how important it is to get educated. Indeed for someone, who lost his father at the age of 3, he couldn't complete his formal education. But in my 30 years, I have seen very few, if not none, who can compete with his knowledge. He once told me that, he used to read from 10 pm to 3 am every night after handling his business day long. Finishing and recording 10 books in his mind tells all what kind of a thirst for knowledge he had.

I attended school very late for he believed he can teach better than those teachers. My academic records, if you have seen it, may certify his confidence was justified. It was him, with his unending dedication to education, told me to appear for my MBA interviews properly.

So many love stories end with death. I lost him when I was 24 and now I am 30. Never during my failures, my dark days, days when I feel I am living for no purpose, he fails to visit my dreams and tell me what to do, which direction to move.

I remember, when I passed my MBA from a reputed institute, few days later, he came in my dreams and said, I am so happy, but its time to go for PhD. I never went, I know my limited qualities and I am ashamed to meet him, even in my dreams. How I wish he was here, giving me confidence of doing the undo-able, like he did during the MBA entrance exam. I have lost my force, my way, my direction and my guide.

Now when my marriage is a failure and both of us considering divorce, when I am probably on the verge of losing my job, he just visited me today. He was sending me off to England, for three years, and hugged and cried, saying, what if I don't live enough, what if I die before you return, this might be our last meeting. And I was crying hugging him. Even death couldn't stop him from taking my care.

I am Indian, and I don't want to pretend to be something else, I don't believe in wearing the Peacock feathers to be a feather. If I am a crow, I am proudly so. Telling this because, once my grandfather, who never attended high school, pointed out 16 grammatical mistakes in a single leave application. The applicant was a girl with her master degree in English.