Cafe

This is what happens when you spend a lovely afternoon with a friend in your favourite cafe...

Her eyes mask the pain she feels

Her smiles mask the life she lives

Her face masks the person she is

Her heart masks the thoughts in her mind

Thus she remains the mystery she is…

It is just a line of thought that came in to my mind when I saw the pic.

Framed...in the most appropriate of frames...a coffee cup handle...most favourite place…

Fast

It didn’t take a face to face meeting

Or an intro from someone

She found me from a whole bunch

For whatever reason that I don’t know yet

We talked virtually,

about what we love the most

Movies and music where the main stay

She loved movies, which was my love too

Talks where short, but

the out comes where long

I found a friend,

I was looking for

The chats went on,

better each time

There I was,

with a good friend in hand

I was new and needed some help

She was there to give me some

Life went on,

months flew off in a blink of an eye

A good friend once told me,

“It’s going fast, way too fast”

That warning I didn’t heed to

I realized I went wrong,

after the whole thing came down

Some moment’s obscurity,

some moment’s stupidity

I got it all wrong,

because I came out too strong

It was my own doing,

that undid the whole thing

By the time I realized

I had lost a great friend

Then I heard my friend’s voice,

ringing loud in my ears

“It’s going fast, way too fast”

Now I realized what it meant

For I never took time,

to think twice before I act

It was my own doing,

that undid the whole thing

Years went on so did life,

but the memories never did

It stayed back real fresh

to make me realize my own bad

The other day I saw a movie

and I felt

“You would have had a great friend

if it wasn’t for your,

quick pace at the wrong place “

For that I had no reply

because I was right that I was wrong

For it went fast

Way too fast…

Benjamin Button

I just happened to hear this line in a movie that I saw the other day. Felt very much moved by those lines so thought of putting up on my blog. I am sure many of you might have heard this already, but still. I felt its the best part of the movie, at least for me. It one of those lines that pretty much sums up the whole movie.

“For what it’s worth its never too late or in my case too early, to be whoever you wanna be. There is no time limit, stop whenever you want, you can change or stay the same, there are no rules to this thing. We can make the best or worst of it. I hope you make the best of it. I hope you see things that startle you. I hope you feel things that you never felt before. I hope you meet people with a different point of view. I hope you live life you are proud of. If you find that you are not, I hope you have the strength to start all over again.”

- Benjamin Button,

The Curious case of Benjamin Button

Pain

You can’t let go

You can’t hang on

That’s what is going on,

The pain that comes from holding on

is far too much that you think,

“Just let go”

The pain that comes then, is

Something unknown,

something I dread

Holding on is also painful ‘cause

It’s no more like the way it used to be

The actions of whom you love the most,

hurts you so much to say the least

But there aint a thing that you can do about it.

Even if you try to help them,

in their arduous journey

They just don’t want to listen

For they have made up their mind

And that hurts you all the more

because then you realize,

that you are no more,

as significant as you were till now.

Then you have the option

to let go and try to move on

The problems and pains in that,

are something quite unknown

Once you start to try,

then you realize why

It’s not as easy as others say

For they have been a part of you

And it will be like cutting your heart out

while you are still awake

Even that pain,

will be far less than this

For its merely physical

The pain here is far more

because it hits you,

when you expect the least.

And for this you have,

no medicine that heals

For the wounds here goes

so deep inside,

that no medicine will

reach so deep inside…

No Space

Please note that all the ideas represented here are purely an expression of my personal thoughts. Many of you might not agree with what I say but I would respect it as your own ‘free will’. So please respect my ideas as an expression of my own ‘free will’.This article does not intend to offend any person or his/her ideas. Please do not take this as an attack on the moral ideas or beliefs of a country or any person.

It was a random scene that I saw that woke up this idea which was sleeping inside me since some time now. What I saw was purely unintentional and without any conscious effort. And it was the second time that I ended up peeping into somebody’s private life unintentionally. It was nothing, just a pair of lovers expressing their intimacy in the back of an auto rickshaw. The first time I saw that I felt completely disgusted and was thinking more on the lines of “What the heck do they think? That the rick is their private limo? How can one do that? When you know for a fact that the world has free access to whatever they are doing….” and things like that. I let it go as a random incident. Life went on for a couple weeks. Then one morning when I was heading to the gym, Bang!!! There I am again in a similar situation. But this time it was different, this time it made me think. In fact made me think is a very different direction. “Why does this happen?”

There I was with this interesting thought in my mind. Right away I felt I had to write about it. So I went on searching for answers for that very question. The resulting observations that I managed to make are purely my own by that I mean to offend no one by thinking in those lines and I do not have an intention to stir up a hornets nest over that. Still I feel the need to express my observations and if that results in a healthy debate I would be more than happy to take part in it.

The root cause for these things I felt was the lack of space; at least that’s the case in my city. The city that has space of every dreamer who wants to make it big and get a better life. The city that has space for the richest and the poorest in the country within a span of 400 sq. Kms. The city that has space for people from all parts of the country as well as the world. But unfortunately the same city does not have enough space for the people who are in love. No space or tolerance for the trivial actions that express their love. And if at all you try to express it in what ever space that you have you will end up being frowned, stared, commented and branded as some one who has no values. When people judge someone by saying that “They have no shame in doing something like this in public” the very same people forget that even they fall into the same category because they have no shame in staring into somebody’s private life.

Then I went further, Is that the only reason? Hmmmm nope…well another one that I found goes far deeper. It’s fed to you from the day you are born. Before you to let your thoughts run as wild horses let me break it. It’s nothing but our great misplaced sense of morals. Yes I said it. Let’s admit it we do have a lot of it. We frown upon anything that is remotely connected to the expression of love. If we don’t show it outside we will think about it inside and let it out when you find like minded people. Which I am sure you can find a lot in our country.

By this I do not mean that we should not have morals but it just means that not some misplaced sense of it. I am a person who respects every thing that my country stands for including the great values that it brings to this world. But we should not twist and turn it according to our wishes and to suit our needs. Unfortunately that’s what happens quite often.

To elaborate on what I have to say I would start from our own history. We are the descendents of the people who wrote down what love is and various forms of expressing it (Ya, you guessed it right). We are from the same country where you will find the most extravagant expressions of love carved on to our walls and painted in ancient texts, way before the moral brigade took over and started imposing their ideas. And no body says that people back then had low morals. Or what they expressed is never labeled as obscene and none of those people are branded as perverts. But why is it that today when a young chap wants to kiss his girl or hold her close he has to think twice. Why is it that one cannot talk about Sex openly? Why is it that when someone says that they have experienced the ultimate expression of love they are looked down upon? Yes we still do this even in this 21^st century when we claim to be galloping towards modernity. If you ask me even I used to think the same way when any of my friends (esp. lady friends) happens to say something like that. But in my case I feel that I need to open up a bit more to such things. We all need to. I am making an effort for it, so can you. For the very same reason that tomorrow I don’t want someone pointing fingers at me and branding me as something when I choose to express my feelings towards my love.

It’s about time this country goes through a phase of Liberation from its rusty misplaced ideas of morals. Yes you can term it as Sexual Liberation if you want to. Of course it can be in its own unique way, we need not copy the west in every thing that we do. We can be liberal and yet not go over the top with that idea. After all we are the people who mastered traveling through the middle path since centuries.

So go out there and express your love my friends, because the more the people see such things the less interested they will be in looking. Then they will automatically start getting used to such things and will accept it willingly or unwillingly. After a point of time even they will feel “Yes it is about time to change our perceptions of such things”. Now that’s just one way, I am sure that we youngsters can come up with millions of such ideas.

And folks this is what I managed to observe in a small span of time. Given some more time and some more brain storming sessions all of us will be able to come up with more and better observations.

Abyss

Getting over a love that never was

is quite a daunting task

We had been together for a couple of years

We had shared everything under the sun

We got to know quite a bit

better than anyone ever did

In the middle of it all

I started sinking deeper into her

I fell for her and never realized

I realized it when I started to notice

the burning sensation that over powers me

when somebody looks at her

The same overwhelms me completely

when she talks of some guy

It was a struggle to hide that from her

For I never saw any such signs from her end

More than these brief stints of possessiveness

I started missing her when she was not around

I started caring about her when she was not well

I started feeling her pain as mine when she was hurt

All these came up to such a level

where it had never reached before

Even in all this she never realized

how much I love her

May be it was me or

The way I said it

It never brought the desired result

when I finally said it

As time went on

I went on loving her more and more

without her realizing that fact

Even me not realizing the fact

that I am plunging deeper and deeper

Into the Abyss of love

Now I find myself in a place where

getting out of this Abyss called love,

that never was

Is the most difficult thing I ever faced…

The Role

The story has been written

The characters have been chosen

The writer up there was considerate enough

to fix up a role for me too

He gave me the script when I came down

I was playing the role that was given

The fellow players also played along

The play was going all fine and well

or at least that’s what I believed

Then at a point I felt

the lines that they where saying

was not at all there in my script

I turn the pages back and forth

only to realize that its not there

It felt like the whole play itself is different

So now I ask myself

Was I not part of this play?

or did I loose the script meant for this

Now I am wondering about a lot of things

Am I fit for this stage at all?

Did I enter at the wrong time?

or at the wrong place ?

Now I look around to make sense of it all

And to play along till

I get to the right place

Where I was supposed to enter

So I could play the rest of the role

And make it a meaningful character

In this elaborate play

That’s set on such a grand stage...

Light

He loved her like the night loved its moon

He missed her when she was away

like the night missing his moon

He told her what he felt

She told him what she felt

They never got together till the end

For she was stuck somewhere

He tried to help

He tired to pull her out

She just wouldn’t come out

He still had his faith

that he could get her out

He still loved her so much

She just could not see that

For she was in the dark

He wanted to be the light

that shows her the way out

of the mess she was in

She just couldn’t see

the light out there bright

or she just didn’t want to

look out at that

For the light was the truth

that she dreaded to see

He is still by her side

still holding the light

But only god knows if she is

gonna follow the light

And now he is wondering

if the lights are fading

He still wants it burning

but can’t stop its fading

For the air that it needs

to burn all that bright

ain’t just looking

or cooperating

For him to burn

As bright as he can…

s’Word’

We choose to communicate

We choose a means

We choose the most powerful

We choose the words

We mail, we text

So as to express

You feel your heart

You spell it out

You spell it wrong

They get it wrong

They feel it wrong

They feel it’s wrong

They interpret

Again and again

From left to right

And back and forth

They get the same

Because you ‘misspelled’ the same

They feel the pain

Of your mistake

They blame the same

On you and them

You come to know

Of the same

By the time

You get to know its

Late in the day

To change a thing

To express is right

You express it wrong

Then nothing is left

So choose wisely

Before you write

Or else you might

Cut yourself

With the mighty s’Word’

And for the ones who read

Take the pain of reading again

Or else it will pain again and again…

How much…

She was trying to say something

Since a couple of days

She finally brought it out

In her own ways

I for one couldn’t understand

What it meant or how much it means

So I passed it by in my busy routine

Not realizing how much it hurt

Then she decided to let me know

How much she was hurt,

She started it but left it unsaid

Now I wait for her to come back

And finish what she had left unsaid

For I am not god

To read what’s in her mind

It took me couple of days to realize

How much it might have hurt

Now my apologies wouldn’t stand

In front of the grieve she had to face…

For Her

When I walked through the fog

She was the light

When I walked all alone

Hers was the hand I held

When I had to talk

She was there to listen

When I cried

She was the one to console

When I wanted to laugh

She was there to make me

Now out in the dark all alone

I could not find her arm

I can’t hear her voice

I can’t feel her presence

I can’t see her glittering smile

Where did I loose her I ask?

To myself for an answer

But I find none,

Seems I will have to keep looking for her

May be she will walk up to help an old friend…

Hold On

When you try to ignore you can’t

For they are too close to you

When you try to forget you can’t

For they live in your heart

When you try to detach you can’t

For you can’t cutoff part of your heart

When you try to erase you can’t

For it will be like erasing half of your good memories

When you try to get over you can’t

For there are some people whom you can never get over

And when you try to stay and hold on you still can’t

For some unknown reason you just can’t seem to hold on

Still you try to hold on

For if you let go you might end up loosing a gem…

Significance

You feel that you are significant

They tell everything to you first

They ask opinion on everything to you first

They make you feel that you are significant

Then you also believe that you are significant to them

And one fine day when they start drifting

You are the last one to know of their decisions

Your opinion is one they are not looking for now

Making you wonder, where you all that significant?

If you can learn, it says

Significance in life is like a flame of a candle

One small gust of wind and its gone

Temporary like a lot others in life

But this shouldn’t affect your friendship

For that in itself is far too significant…

Leak in a tap

Your heart pulls you one way

Your brain pulls you in another

Your logic tells you it’s not wise

But Life ain’t all about logic is it?

You want to pursue what you always wanted

The one thing or two that would keep you happy

And satisfied through your entire life

But that plan is full of uncertainty

It’s a plunge into depths unknown

Where as you brain and the people around

Tells you to forget your heart and go with the brain

They tell that’s what’s good for you

A life that satisfies all your needs sans mental satisfaction

When you are pulled from both the ends

Each end so strong with its reasons

All you end up with is a confused state of mind

And with time that is dripping away as in a leak in a tap…

Confession

I have always wanted to

I have had many a chance

The moment I am about to do it

Something happens, that just stops me

I don’t know what might happen,

If at all I spit it out

And I also wonder if I ever will

This is the story of my unsaid confession

The confession that I always wanted to make,

And I never did

But now I wonder if it ever would make a difference

For the one that is late, is as good as none…

I can

I wanted it so badly

I tried for that too

But may be there was a bit more in me

That I could have used to get there

But when they broke the news that

I didn’t make it, it broke me

I came back with a heavy heart

And a heavy backpack

That felt all the more heavier

I was almost getting over it

But now again it’s haunting me

But am sure to get back

Better armed and ready

To show them that I can

Or may to show to myself that I can

For this was one dream that

I had given up some time back

I don’t want to do that again

Give up with out trying…

Late…

Your heart beats for her

But she never knows

Your mind yearns for her

But she never knew

Your soul waits for her

But she will never know

Because you never did

Tell her what you felt

For the fear of loosing

You held it to your self

It wouldn’t make a difference now

‘coz she had already,

Given all these to someone else

And it’s a fact that

You can give this only once

This time you where just plain late…

A friend of yours…

You know them since way too long

That makes the bond way too strong

There is not a day,

When you don’t think about them

Everyday there is,

Something that reminds you of them

Every time there is,

Something that concerns them, which concerns you too

There had been times when,

They needed a shoulder and you had one

They needed an open ear and you had two

They needed a pair of hands and you had a pair

And when you are lost and helpless

Deep with in the woods

When you can’t even shout out loud

For the fear of being hunted down

Not knowing which way is out

All they yearn for is their graceful exit

No my friend this ain’t your lover am talking about

This is just a friend of yours…

Anticipate

We all anticipate

We all expect

We all dream

We all plan

And suddenly when it all falls down,

Like a castle of cards

We search for answers

We blame it on fate

We blame it on others

Only to forget,

The root cause of it all

That we anticipated

That we expected

That we dreamt

And that we planned,

A bit too much

Based on things uncertain…

Let Go…

When I was born

I let go of my safety

As I grew up

I let go of my childish innocence

When I reached my teenage

I had to let go of many friends

As I knew that I can’t hang on to them forever

Then came a day when,

I had to let go of my parents and my home

In search of my own existence

Then came days when,

I had to give up my freedom,

In pursuit of something that won’t buy me what I lost

In the middle of it all this came someone

Who plunged in too deep to the bottomless pit

I now dread that it might be about time

To let go of that special someone too…

Beyond

Tonight I did it

I crossed the line beyond,

the point of no return

I went where my wild mind took me

Without thinking how much it will,

hurt or pain for some one else

Some one close, so close that

I held on so strongly

For I didn’t want to loose

Some one this precious

I have failed that attempt

Of mine to hold on

Don’t know what’s next

Today one more claim fell off

And shattered

It seems I was not as good

In understanding someone

As I used to claim

And for eternity I might not know

How deep the cut was

That I had caused

For my mindless act

I might have to pay a heavy price

I dread that, one thing that I dreaded most

For I have to take it

What ever the outcome might be

For it was me who crossed over

Beyond the point of no return…

Unlucky In love

He was a boy who was unlucky in love

The first girl he loved was pretty and nice

But she turned out to be his best friends squeeze

The next girl he loved was talented and wise

But it seems that she was never in love at all

The third girl he liked was an introvert and shy

But the whole thing fell off like a rock,

Before it could even take off

The last girl he liked was an extrovert and lively

But he later taught himself that it was not love,

For it was something more than a friendship

But not the love he seek

This is the story of a boy who was unlucky in love

And still it seems is searching for his true love…

After the Rain...

This is my personal favourite, for a simple reason...Its not what meets the naked eye, the drops are actually on the top of the leaf and the shot is taken from below...so I call it the Visual Illusion...

Alone...

I was born alone and fine

Into a world that back then was fine

As I grew I met many folks

Of whom some became my friends

When I was young I was all alone

If not for my summer time friend

During schools I met many in my way

But hardly any one was close to me

In my teenage I made my closest ones

But the journey of life took them far away

During college I made some friends

Hardly a handful was worth keeping there

After I left I still was close, but

Again the journey of life took them away

Still I try to keep in touch

Only to realize one day even they will go

For in this world you come, travel and leave alone…

Mystery

The world doesn’t know me

For I am a mystery

The people around me doesn’t know me

For they never asked me

The people who are not around me doesn’t know me

For them I am a stranger

I myself do not know me

For that is the ultimate question

The one soul who knows me

Is someone am yet to meet

To live and to die as a mystery

For that is my biggest dream…

Purpose of Life

It was a beautiful evening. It was very pleasant for a summer evening, thanks to the showers in the afternoon. There wasn’t much to do; it was like any of my other vacations to Kerala. I was just cooling my heels off.

That when I noticed a light green thing moving on my dining table. On a closer look I noticed that it is a small spider. It was very beautiful creature. Very different from the spiders that you get to see in Kerala. I quickly grabbed the mobile to capture it. He was giving a hard time; he was running here and there so it was quite difficult to get a nice shot. All the possible angles where explored to get that perfect shot. And I just kept clicking. What came next was something that I really didn’t expect.

I leaned down in front of him to get a nice close up shot. I guess it was his curiosity to explore or his discomfort that made him jump on to the mobile. I was surprised and scared at the same time and I dropped the cam. The moment I dropped it I knew it was a mistake; I grabbed the cam as quickly as I can to see if the little fellow is alright. It was a sad scene. The impact had crushed him. I was cursing myself for dropping the cam. Even though it was a reflex action I just couldn’t forgive myself.

All evening I spent thinking about my mistake, how even ones reflex action could cause such damage. I never wanted it to happen but at the end of it, it was my own hands that brought the tragedy. I felt that I should never publish that photograph as a mark of my respect to that creature.

On an after thought I felt - If this photograph is not published a life would have been lost for nothing. Every life has a purpose may be the purpose of that spiders life was to teach an important lesson to me and to anyone who is willing to listen.

How much does a person’s action conscious or otherwise affect others? That thought just got stuck in my mind. This was just one creature that lost his life to an unconscious act of a human being. There are so many creatures that loose their life or habitat due to our never ending greed and thoughtless actions. A lot many of us or rather all of us contribute directly or indirectly to aggravate that problem. It’s just that we don’t have time to think about them or we choose not to. We have our own silly lives to live. In that never ending race to satisfy our greed we forget that, this planet and the creatures in it will happily survive without us, but it would be quite difficult for us to survive if some of those creatures are not there.

That event changed me, I want to do something to make a difference, I just have to find out how. All of us can do this; you just have to find out how you can. From each according to his ability and potential, only then will there be a change. We are a part of the problem so we have to be a part of the solution.

The irony is that This is the only good image that I managed to get...

Exploration...

Compared to other days I had an early start for the day. It was the second day of a long weekend. My sister and her family had come by for the weekend. So I decided to spend some time with them since they where planning to leave in the evening. I was at my place for most of the day, so I got out in the late after noon. I helped my sister and family catch a taxi to there place and went to my aunt’s place. It was a beautiful evening, like many other beautiful ones that I had wasted without doing literally anything.

I am a typical human being the kind who always craves for company of his social mates. One of thing that I hated the most to do was stepping out for no reason and that too all alone. I had always believed it to be a dreadful idea. For some of you out there it’s a normal and simple thing to do. But for me it is one of the most difficult things. And this was something that I have always wanted to change about myself. Keeping that in the back of my mind I spent some time at my aunt’s place and decided to step out. Thinking that it was too late to go some where I decided to take a stroll around at my neighborhood only.

I had a place in my mind where I felt I should be on such a beautiful evening. I walked by the side of the road. I went farther and farther, my instinct was asking me to go for it. But my brains where saying not to. Caught in two minds I decided to walk some more. I reached the Bus Stop, and that very moment I saw a bus at a distance. There where no second thoughts, I boarded the bus. Through out the journey I was not sure if I will do this or rather if I should be doing this. But watching the sun in the horizon convinced me. I have to do this. I had to make two changes to get to the place that I had in my mind. I made the first change quickly. But luck and city traffic had other plans. I got stuck. I had to reach there before sun set since that was what inspired me to get on this journey, but now it’s clear that I won’t be able to. I was cursing myself for taking up this adventure. Committed to the cause I decided to push on. I had no idea what was in store for me there now. I changed again and slowly crawled through the city traffic. It was almost dark and I had no idea as to what I was going to do there in the dead of night.

I stepped out at the destination. Here I am at Bandra Bandstand; approx. half an hour late. And all that I could hear was the waves crashing on to the rocks on the sea shore. When I looked at the sea I could see lights slowly moving across the horizon. Towards the right I could see the lights of another part of the city. I grabbed a spot along side some youngsters sitting on the sea facing wall. And there was this couple sitting to my left. And in front of me in the blanket of darkness I could see blurred images making the most out of the gift of the night. I tried to give them their space by looking somewhere else. But it was a hard task, you where bound to lay your eyes on some or the other because there where so many of them. Once I realized that they where least concerned about the world and the people in it I grew more comfortable and tried to take in every ounce of the fresh air around. That’s when I noticed the jerks sitting on my side were just some desperados having fun by invading into someone else’s privacy. I felt sick to the core, why is this country and the people in it so intolerant and jealous about someone else’s happy moments. I knew I didn’t belong there. I picked myself up and decided to seek shelter on some lonely rock perched close to the water.

I carefully made my way through the hard terrain. To my surprise I found that there were so many people sitting there in the darkness. I tried not disturb them and was seriously reconsidering my decision, partly because of my self assumed sense of embarrassment of being a single jerk in the eyes of those couples. To my relief I found that there where families hanging out there. I made my way through and found a comfortable spot on a rock perched on the waters edge. I was feeling something that I have never felt before. I have never in my entire life enjoyed being lonely, and here I am sitting on a rock all alone in complete darkness, and enjoying every second of it. I was feeling as if I have learned to walk; only glitch being I don’t remember exactly how it felt, because I was not old enough to have too many feelings back then. But still it was some thing un-explainable by mere written words, indescribable by mere pictures. You have to feel it to understand it, the extraordinary feeling of Joy that comes up on you when you explore.

After spending some time there I decided its time to move on. It was a cold February night and I was feeling the chill in the air. So I made my way to the café nearby. There I found this table with only one chair on its side, I felt as if it was waiting for me all evening. I quickly grabbed my spot, and started enjoying the slight breeze that was hitting my face. I ordered a hot coffee and waited for the coffee to come. The place was packed to capacity and people where waiting to have a seat. Since I had a huge mug of coffee with me and loads of time I started observing people around me. I saw this lady working on her laptop sting alone which made me realize that I am not the only one with wacky ideas. Then I found this lady from Japan and her Indian friend discussing music. Then there was this bunch of foreigners. Who where waiting for a table to be empty. The place contained people from different parts of the world and different back grounds brought together by one cause; to have a coffee and have a nice conversation over that.

I observed many of them for some more time. You literally see life in front of you eyes. What people want in life, their expectations, their petty issues in life, their habits just to name a few. Everything right in front of you eyes. I noticed that people live with the slightest concern for the world around them. By then it was time to move on. I realized that I am pretty far from my place and I will have to get back. So I slowly picked up my self and made way through the small yet crowded roads to catch a ride. I was feeling a great sense of satisfaction, because today I learned to walk, to walk alone in my life and to enjoy that too. With this lesson in my heart I started my journey back. There was this great sense of elation in my heart and a belief that this is one journey of exploration that changed has changed me…

The Voyage

This is a Voyage that I am taking as a photographer. It only now that I have realized that I express better through the lens of a camera than through a tip of a pen....

And this Voyage is not over yet...

So here it is....

Please note that since the picutres are taken from a mobile cam and hasn't had much editing done it will blow up in to huge ones if you open them...