The Restless Mind: Between the Art of Living and the Poetry of Desire

 2019

Miscellaneous Notes, Reflections and Literary Expressions

1. Routine things give boredom. Too tough things will only add to your stress and anxiety. Hit the midway path. Tolerably challenging tasks get you into an absorbing flow.

2. As they say, having a compass pointing in a definite direction is more fruitful than having a detailed map.

3. Our brains are not wired to function in parallel processing like computers. Multitasking is a big fallacy. It just is a replica of the instability and restlessness inside.

4. **Melting of ego:** When one is so absorbed in a process that, instead of she doing the task, it is the task that is leading her.

5. Around 60,000 random thoughts flit across our minds daily. Meditation generates alpha and theta brain waves, the relaxing brain waves that get activated just before we fall asleep.

6. Those who move around a lot stand a better chance of living a long life than those who tire themselves out in gymming and hard exercise.

7. Even feeble moonrays can set in germination in seeds. All you need is a faint light.

8. **Passion, when recalled in the lap of luxuriant nature by a stream in the hills, turns hundred times sweeter with each passing moment.** My mind ran across your quivering contours. Your uncertain response, trying to keep you chained within the threshold, beyond which the blizzard of uncontrollable desire awaited with a glee. The confident shine in your eyes smothered down by the look of a woman lynched by desire.

The Last Caravan: Van Gujjars in a Burning April

April, 2026

It's burning in April, burning summers, hotter than ever. Do we still need more proofs for global warming? Climate skeptics seem to have leathery, insensitive skin, harder than even crocodiles to call it a hoax. Well, they seem to be different species altogether. 

Summers are getting hotter each season, and still we have global warming skeptics leading the world as the most powerful persons on Earth. They don't believe in climate change, destruction of ecology. All they are interested in is adding to business, more money. They are not bothered about at what cost it comes.

All that matters is just more money, more dollars, more real estate, more weapons sold to stage-managed war crises in different countries, so that the war-material mafia is able to increase its business by selling more and more weapons throughout the world.

In any case, that is the bigger world of bigger people engaged in bigger-than-ever follies that will spell doom for the smaller people like me and you.

Here in this countryside of Haryana, Rajasthani nomads, the migrant cattle herders, walk pensively in soiled whites and big red headgears. You can see them wandering in North Indian states, their famished, big-horned cows clogging the roads, creating traffic hassles.

People get irritated, repeatedly honk, mutter, but they respect cows, thankfully, and somehow digest the loss of precious minutes on the road.

I always welcome a group of cattle on the road because that puts a pause on blindingly running traffic.

And then there is an offbeat sight: a big herd of buffaloes, sleek, not too famished. The invisible citizens with their buffaloes. An unusual caravan passing through the burning countryside. Things aren't definitely ok when the mountain herders are forced to come to the unwelcoming plains. It seems like the last miles of an ancient caravan. Buffaloes, burning roads and the invisible citizens of mother India. The sad sight of Van Gujjars: a culture on its last leg.  

And I am surprised as I come across this big flock of buffaloes lining across the road, covering half of it, moving in rhythm.

It's very surprising. Even shocking. Even sad. 

Van Gujjars in this part of Haryana! Their buffaloes are not famished like the cattle of Rajasthani nomads who come from the desert, where the cattle have to fight for sparse blades of grass.

Van Gujjars, they come from the hills. Their buffaloes are fed on mountain grasses, but it's sad to see them seeking survival on leftover crops in harvested wheat farms.

This is late April, so wheat harvesting is almost complete in this part.

In their traditional pasture lands, the forest department officials turn more and more strict these days, and Van Gujjars are the invisible citizens of India, so they are trying to sneak out a thin trail of survival.

Things are getting worse politically as well. Van Gujjars are Muslims, Muslim herders, and that adds to the challenge that they face.

The old man, he drags his feet with effort, a long hennaed beard. A woman leads the herd. Another woman mans the herd's rear. The man is in the middle, sandwiched for safety.

People will be less rough to the women herders. At least this is what they suppose.

Their carts with cloth canopies, laden with their bare essentials, are waiting a few hundred yards ahead on the road.

Communalism is getting hotter, each mile more challenging, each step more challenging than the previous one.

Van Gujjars are Muslims in name only. What do they know about religion? The Mughals must have forced them to convert. Now there is a counterforce. And here we have a distinct culture taking its last breath.

It's a very sad sight to see this caravan of Van Gujjars with their buffaloes in the scorching heat of the plains, away from the lush, verdant valleys and greens where the buffaloes would eat nourishing, succulent grasses and herbs.

And now here they are, surviving on dried leftover crofts in harvested wheat fields, getting harsh words from passersby.

People are not as lenient as with the cow herders to these buffalo herders; obviously for the reasons that are an open fact now. So there are lots of harsh words hurled at them.

A big car stops while crossing the leading woman herder in front of the caravan, and the young man must have said something very obscene, because I see her touching her ears and saying, “Tauba, tauba.”

A very sad sight.

Forest laws are becoming stricter, and the movement of their buffalo caravan is almost impossible now through reserve forests and national parks.

This distinct culture is on its last leg. Undoubtedly. It's dying. 

I think in the coming decade or so they will be gone. They will be forced to sell their buffaloes, and then they will become labourers because they don't have the skills, they don't have education, they don't have permanent residence.

They are the unknown and invisible citizens of Mother India.

It will be quite challenging for them in the coming days, even if the government does its best to make them settle at a particular locality.

But even there they will find it very difficult to earn a living because they don't have any education or special skills to make a living.

They are just buffalo herders.

Barbarik of Chulkana: The Sacrifice That Preserved the Balance

Late March, 2026

This is late in March, and me and my brother are travelling in the countryside around our village, seeking out holy places, places not so well known, but carrying the same majestic, mammoth essence of divinity like any other lofty, popular pilgrimage place on the spiritual map of India.

They provide you the same share of divine prasad, provided you reach them with faith, openness, surrender.

And one such place is Chulkana, Chulkana Dham.

It celebrates the extraordinary life of legendary Barbarik, the grandson of mighty Bhim.

Barbarik was a powerful warrior, possessed three divine arrows given to him by Lord Shiva, and he had taken a vow that he would always fight for the weaker side in a war or dispute.

When the Mahabharata war started, Lord Krishna understood that Barbarik would keep switching sides, because the losing side would appear weaker to him, and in this way he would end up destroying both armies.

So Lord Krishna approached Barbarik in the guise of a Brahmin and asked for dakshina, and the dakshina was Barbarik's head.

Barbarik was a great sagely fellow. Even though a mighty warrior, he was a firm believer in donation and charity to a Brahmin who approaches one's door.

Barbarik agreed to the supreme act of sheeshdaan, donating one's head.

Chulkana Dham is the place where Barbarik donated his head to Lord Krishna.

His head was placed on the top of a hill, from where Barbarik watched the war.

At the end of the war, when Krishna asked Barbarik what he had seen, Barbarik replied, “It was just your chakra doing all this.”

Krishna blessed him that in Kali Yuga he would be worshipped as Khatu Shyam for his supreme sacrifice.

There is a saying, “Hare hue ka sahara, Khatu Shyam hamara.”

In Treta Yuga, Rishi Chunkat had his ashram here.

A sacred tree of peepal, said to possess miraculous power, is worshipped by the devotees who tie a thread to its trunk and branches.

Now this episode of Baba Barbarik shows that one ideology pointing to one extreme isn't good for cosmic balance.

Even a noble vow of ever supporting the weaker side, if followed without adjustment, would wreak havoc, because the position of strength and weakness keeps shifting.

And standing in this impressive shrine in commemoration of supreme sacrifice by this saintly warrior, I am wonderstruck at the spiritual power of ancient Indians, who could make such supreme sacrifices of even donating their head willingly without any protest.

There are larger meanings in these mythological sayings, and according to me, one meaning is that Mother Nature is impartial.

It's not about good or bad; it's about maintaining the balance.

Lord Krishna knew very well that at the individual level Barbarik is giving a supreme sacrifice, and that might make it look like this is not a good act, but in the overall scenario, when we look at the way the war proceeded between the forces of good and evil, between light and dark, this sacrifice was essential.

Because his one-sided, rigid adherence to the cause of the weaker side at any cost, without adjusting for the situation, would have wreaked havoc, and the war would have continued, because Barbarik would have continued switching sides, and only he would have been left at the end of it, with both sides decimated.

So it's a great spiritual experience to pay homage to this mighty sagely warrior.

The Angry Sadhu and the Contented Dog

March 1, 2026

Suresh, the tea seller, harks my attention in the busy narrow bazaar street passing in front of Parmarth Niketan Ashram.

He is a happy, dark-coloured man, smiling face, elegant manners, soft words. He is at peace. I cannot see the hard edges of restlessness in him.

I ask about his pet, Sweetie.

“She died a few months ago,” he says sadly, the female dog whom he loved so much.

The loss is visible on his face.

“She died due to kidney failure,” he adds.

His son is sitting nearby on a bench.

“We have another pet now,” his son informs me. “It's a Rottweiler named Jack.”

That's how life moves—losses, then new additions, change. There is nostalgia about the past, but then something new in the present to cling to.

I am having tea at his stall.

The tea man Suresh is now in conversation with a sadhu who is standing across the grills separating the narrow path from the riverside platform.

“What day is it today?” the sadhu asks the chaiwala.

“It is Wednesday.”

“Is it Wednesday?” he asks.

This query triggers a strong reaction in a woman passing through the street. She stops and starts shouting at the sadhu, a middle-aged woman beaten down by circumstances. She is draped in a worn-out shawl and carries a bag made of sackcloth.

“What did you say? You don't know how to behave with a woman? I will report you to the police,” she shouts.

The sadhu also gets angry.

“She is mad, a mad woman, okay! I challenge you to take me to the police. What would they even think about a mad woman's antics? She is a mad woman. She broke her daughter's head. She is a wandering lunatic. Her family has turned her out. Of course, the reason is her madness. Mad, mad.”

The sadhu is giving counter-punches.

“All of us are mad in our own ways,” I mutter under my breath.

“You should not get angry like this, Sadhu Maharaj,” I say.

The woman has walked on, but the sadhu is carrying on in the same angry pitch.

“Why shouldn't one get angry? One has to get angry in such situations. Otherwise, how will one even survive?” he justifies his anger.

He cites scriptures to defend his right to be angry under such provocative circumstances.

“Yes, I agree, it is natural to be angry.”

He is mollified slightly by my acceptance of his right to be angry.

Then he talks with ease, opens up, shares his story.

“What do we have? We have these dogs and cows for our family,” he says.

He then tells me the names of all the stray dogs roaming around.

“One of them bit me the other day.”

He shows me his middle finger.

“He bit me by mistake, not intentionally. He was thrashing a little puppy like a bad bully. I intervened to save the tiny puppy, and he bit me out of instinct.”

He points to the dog that had bitten him.

“But the next day when I fed him, I could see that he was very sorry about his behaviour. I could read this in his eyes.”

The sadhu is from Juna Akhara. Bhagwan Dattatreya is their patron guru.

Bhagwan Dattatreya had 21 gurus, he tells me, and one of them was a dog.

“Why a dog?” I ask.

“Because a dog is santoshi, contentment personified. A very contented being. Suppose you are eating from a plate on the ground, and a dog comes to sit nearby, keeps looking at you eating your food. If you don't offer it even a single morsel and finish your food, pick your plate and walk away, the dog will still have something to get contentment from. It will come and inhale the smell of your plate on the ground and draw some pacification and contentment from it. Even this much is sufficient to pacify its hunger”

He lovingly looks at the stray dogs whom the sadhus have given lovely names.

The sadhu listens to Osho ... on his smartphone, of course.

Phone is a must these days. Only very poor Babas don't have a smartphone.

“Osho is full of knowledge,” he says. “Osho tells very interesting things, but still he can't know the ultimate truth, because for that you need to have a guru to see you through.”

He says we ascetics give our guru the bigger place, even more than God.

“But Osho had life and living itself as his guru,” I say.

“Yes, but that is not as good as having a real guru.”

I want to say that Osho himself is guru to millions, so will his disciples get enlightenment?

But I don't say it.

The sadhu has regained his kind posture. He is smiling lovingly. Why spoil this by falling into arguments?

I think it is better to keep mum over points that might bruise someone's conception of life. Fight with your own opinions if it pays you in your career. Otherwise, it is a wastage of lung power and precious energy.

One need not carry weapons of oral armory in small talks within families, nukkads and bazaars.

The Milkman, the Dying Wick and the Invisible Hand of Fate

February 2, 2008

The cult of romantically gyrating, flute-flaunting and flirting milkmen and milkmaids was started by the most lovable of the lot, Lord Krishna.

Cutting across centuries, that legacy still survives, romantic linkups often coming dangerously close to the house-breaking taboos of extramarital affairs.

The milk-gathering sprees of milkwalas, our doodhwalas—the ones who, in fact, collect milk almost seasonlessly in the wee hours to ensure that milk reaches kitchens irrespective of cold, heat, rain, or whatever other hand the weather player might draw out.

The poor fellow gets up very early, picks up his bucket and drums, and goes on his milk-collecting spree. And in these wee hours, many romantic linkups do crop up, which act like incentives and rewards for the poor guy apart from his meagre take-home, cleverly contrived by mixing water in the milk.

One such gawala is Devender, the 30-year-old, affable, jocular, high-pitched, fair-coloured, short, square-faced and average-featured milk boy.

On the coldest of nights, when the temperature is around one degree centigrade, he gets up at 3 o'clock in the morning and sets out with his bucket and drums on his bicycle.

Now, selling milk is the most important part of household budgets in lower-middle-class rural households, where agricultural income is always falling short of meeting the budget.

The women contribute to the meagre budget through their buffaloes and cows.

Their life is full of struggle.

The husband works on small plots of land, or in some small-time business, or in some poorly paying job. Most of them drink, cramped by worries.

The hardworking women farmers take some solace and excitement with milkmen like Devender in the dark night in the barn, and the milkman duly reciprocates by giving them ample opportunities of cheating him by mixing water in the milk.

When they are caught, the poor chap has to run away after receiving a few slaps by the fuming husband, leaving his bucket there itself. Meanwhile, the poor wife has to bear the full storms of the fistwork, but nothing can be put to an end by the fistwork alone. Love, lust and romance are beyond the fear of fistwork. 

Their -- the farmer women and the milkmen -- fates are interlinked in such a manner that they cannot pull out the plugs from their respective roles. So, after a lull, after the shocking incidents, the storm strikes again.

You never know in what manner your fate is going to be affected by the sneeze and easy or uneasy turn of some unknown being in some other part of the world.

Coming to my own specific worries. The visit, after that postponement, to Djibouti had been fixed for the 4th of February, and here come the circumstances with their suddenly cropping situational snares.

Inder's would-be wife's grandmother decides to slow down the wick of her lamp of life to the barest minimum—that deathbed type of situation in which the last flicker is afraid to go down and the fuel is not enough for revival.

So, while the good old lady fights at the brink of the two worlds, the visit, after much haggling and arguments, has been postponed again.

Now I simply realize maybe our fates aren't in our hands.

We had planned meticulously, but who could have planned for the old lady's illness?

Hoping against hopes, let us hope for the best, the proposed visit might still happen somehow. Otherwise, I will have to take flight alone sometime in February itself and try to salvage our tottering business cart there in the charming, exotic chaos of Africa. 

****

When the Bigger Fish Ate the Smaller Ones

The start of the second decade of the present century brought new challenges.

Father left his body on March 1st, 2010. It was Holi that day, the festival of colours. And under the vastly changed domestic circumstances, I got caught up in a job in Noida, and Sajan started farming, and Sandeep was left alone there in Africa.

We tried our best to take care of our business affairs here in India during our spare time, but as they say, if you leave a cat watching over the milk, it's a folly.

After a few months, Sandeep arrived in India, and it was a nice story. He cooked up that Pakistanis plotted against us, and they poisoned the ears of the mediators who had links with higher political figures, saying that we were literally plundering them by giving them very small cut money, by undervaluing our price here in India.

He had exaggerated the price of used oil here in India multifold, so that angered them, and they got him arrested.

He said the flexi tanks were confiscated. The flexi tanks which Babu Bhai had invested in and which his son and his brother-in-law Inder had brought from China. I think USD 40,000 was invested in that shipment, which had reached Djibouti from China, and he said the flexi tanks were confiscated by the authorities.

In fact, he had to sell everything to secure his release.

So now he was penniless.

And to make it more realistic, he wandered around like a pauper for a few months. In fact, he even borrowed a little amount of money from my salary to make it even more realistic and convince us that he was really broke.

Then one day he informed us that his sister's family had sold land, and they had some money to invest in a fresh business venture. So he would be going with his brother-in-law to Singapore to look for opportunities in the dry fruit business.

So we thought he was exploring new avenues.

In reality, he went back to Djibouti to enjoy his life with Fatima. The consignment of flexi tanks had been safely kept under the watch of loyal Fatima, and then he shipped used oil to Dubai, and other deals also followed.

During those days, he made a lot of money and squandered a lot also.

The only credit I can give him is that he was never a leech, wasn't a miser, wouldn't stick to money like a leech. He would just squander it away. He would spend a lot of money on those around him, would try to present a picture of a mini king, or prince at least.

But in his extravagance, he forgot that he was crossing limits. In fact, he never had any compunctions or conscience to hold him in check.

And in the absence of that inner voice asking you questions, one can easily cross boundaries. In fact, one doesn't feel any type of guilt whenever he or she breaks any type of moral or legal laws.

Me and Sajan worked in our respective domains, thinking that he was trying for the dry fruit business in Singapore.

Then one day Babu Bhai called and told the story.

Babu Bhai was wounded, offended, seething with anger. He said Sandeep had cheated him of a big amount of money.

Only then I came to know that he was still doing business in Djibouti.

Babu Bhai told me that this is what Sandeep had informed him: that I was into a job now, and Sajan was not interested in business, taking care of agriculture.

“I am the only one who is left.”

So, being a practical man of business, Babu thought, since he is the one who is sitting at the station, he started dealing with him straight away.

We were kept out of the loop.

So he thought that it was a big business opportunity, but he missed the point that you need to have a trustworthy guy at the helm of affairs, like I was earlier ensuring that his money, his advance money invested in our venture, was never lost.

But now he was cheated, and only then he approached me, and then I told him, “You had decided to trust him. In fact, at least you should have discussed it with us. Now what can I do? I am nowhere in the picture.”

He had even duped another businessman from Punjab, a friend of Babu Bhai, who had also invested some money.

So his trading cycle had got onto a firm footing, and we could see its effect in the village.

The small, modest house was replaced by a lavish big building. Even the barn where they kept buffaloes had an air conditioner.

Being a stylish guy, everything had to be as per the latest fashion trends.

Me and Sajan raised the issues in social circles in the village, and when people started talking about his cheating of his friends, he called me.

And whenever he called, I would give him a piece of my mind, no-holds-barred outbursts.

But at least he was always courteous and laughing, because I am 11–12 years elder to him. He would always call me fondly, “Ustaz.”

And when one day I was giving him this lecture about morality and ethics, he very naturally, in a very serious tone, said, “Ustaz, don't you remember that story that you told in the afternoon, post-lunch, here in Djibouti, that a bigger fish eats smaller ones? Now please don't spoil my image in the village and don't side with Sajan. Be with me. You have much knowledge. We will rule Africa. You quit your job, I will send you your tickets. I always need your help.”

But I said a firm no, because when it comes to listening to the inner voice, I'm completely opposite to him.

The group was broken.

Me in a job, Sajan in farming, and Sandeep in trading in Africa.

****

The Accelerator Without Brakes

Sandeep had a rollicking life there, made money, made even more fun, spent even more, caroused furthermore.

He bought a nice-in-condition second-hand Land Rover, ditched Fatima, but not before paying her a big sum of money that would enable her to live comfortably. In fact, he even gifted the entire house full of items, ranging from kitchen utensils to computer. The entire furnished apartment went to her as a parting gift.

He shifted to a fancy apartment in the city centre, away from the suburbs. Clubs nearer, banks nearer, women nearer.

He even had an affair with the daughter-in-law of a minister. She was a college-going girl and would dupe her guard and vanish from campus to surface at his apartment.

He was a famous money thrower in weekend binges in fancy clubs.

But he was never bothered about putting on any brakes, and as you know, without brakes it's a perilous journey.

Those who believe that the accelerator, the pedal, is the source of their journey commit a big mistake because it is the brakes that are more important even than the accelerator.

During this phase, he even had the guts to go to Somalia and Sudan, where not many people would dare to go.

So no doubt, the man had guts and was always ready to take risks to pay for his flashy, rollicking style.

The pleasant entanglement of Africa: things can rise with unbelievable rapidity, but they can crash down in the same manner.

There is no institutional, organized, legalized buffer zone between your rise and fall.

Exotic chaos Africa is.

Rules suddenly melt and flow and take a different shape almost overnight. The trusted friends vanish like horns from a horse's head. Your trusted, friendly middlemen can turn sworn enemies overnight.

He seemed to have ridden his luck quite well for about two years, but then he ran out of luck in his relentless pursuit of more adventurism, unbound by any kind of moral compunctions.

Things must have crashed suddenly, maybe something of the nature that he had faked to dupe us.

He had to leave Djibouti. Under what circumstances, I don't know.

Next time when he called, he was calling from Ethiopia.

****

The Adventurer Without Brakes

Ethiopia has vast fertile lands, uneven and unkempt. To attract agriculturalists, they give land on lease at very cheap rates. And these are very long-term leaseholds, running up to 99 years.

These leaseholds involve huge tracts of fertile land, cutting across valleys and streams. Here the investment is about making it arable for agriculture by levelling, digging irrigation channels, and clearing the bushes and underbrush.

The government thinks that in this way agricultural enterprise will enter the country, and the fallow land will be brought under irrigation. The locals working on the farms will learn to grow coffee, sunflower, soybean and pulses.

Sandeep must have invested a lot of money in this venture. Later I came to know that he had taken agricultural tools, machinery and spare parts from India to start farming, and quite funnily, it included a tractor purchased with the money gifted to him by my bachelor uncle, who stayed in Dehradun.

I had once introduced Sandeep to my uncle, and my uncle took a liking to him on account of his free, open, adventurous spirit. He thought he was a simple man, with the lenient heart of a wrestler like Lord Hanuman, simple in mind and majestic in muscles.

And about this issue, a few years down the line, I would ask him, “You didn't even spare Uncle? Is it true?”

Very simply he said, “It's between me and Uncle. He was as much your uncle as mine.”

Uncle was no more by then, having died of cardiac arrest.

Coming back to Sandeep's African venture, there was an influential Sardarji in Ethiopia who had taken thousands of acres of land on lease, and Sandeep had taken about 500 acres from him on sublease for growing coffee and soybean.

As I went further down into the editorial burden in academic publishing, he called me once on the phone and said, “Ustaad, your brother is a king here. Fifty to sixty labourers are working under me. The tractors are working hard, the earthmovers are levelling a plain. It's going great.

“You even abuse me, but I will always respect you as an elder brother. Come here instead of stinking in that petty job. Stop siding with Sajan. He is a farmer now. With your knowledge, you can rule Africa in partnership with me. I will send you a ticket for Dubai. We will meet there. I will book a five-star for you to stay.”

In this way he boasted, but I am sure he was serious. I have absolutely no doubt that he would have done it had I said yes.

But my conscience wouldn't allow it. He had done us a wrong, which couldn't be corrected like that.

So again I said a firm no.

His life acquired the same pattern of overindulgence, of overindulgent adventure, crossing limits, fun, revelry, hard work.

But all this comes to naught without the lowest threshold of discipline, because without it things go out of control.

He was doing good there, but then ended up seducing the Sardarji's daughter. On top of that, he had married almost secretly here in India also. His wife stayed with his parents here.

The Sardarji came to know that his daughter had been cheated. Boiling with anger, he got him arrested because he had clout there, he had connections.

Sandeep spent about one and a half years in jail.

Imagine the conditions of jails there, because from 120 kg in weight he was reduced to 70 kg, but he survived the ordeal.

And once a leader from the opposition party was in jail for a month in the same jail. Sandeep built up a good rapport with him. The political leader, after coming out of jail, helped him in the case.

His wife was called to Africa along with his son. It was a kind of mercy petition, which got him released from jail.

He came back to India, left Africa forever.

“I have torn my passport to pieces,” he later told me.

And now here his affairs continued in the same adventurous way. He has a few women with him. Two sons have been born to his wife, and one of the women with whom he is having an affair—it was quite interesting.

Maybe she was as hungry as he, because the way this connection built up is quite interesting.

He was waiting in a queue at a hospital. His mother was in front of him, then Sandeep, followed by this woman, who had also come to the hospital with her mother-in-law, who was standing behind her in the queue.

And just look at the language of desire.

Without even speaking a single word, they had been just looking at each other, reading the silent words of desire in each other's eyes.

So what does Sandeep do here?

He simply opens the dialing keypad on his phone and slides it under his arm to the woman who is standing after him, and she types her phone number on it, and he gives it a missed call.

And from there the affair got built up, and he said she has been giving me one of the most wonderful times.

Imagine the way it started.

So apart from these fun and frolics, which are very customary to him and very natural, he has become a moneylender to petty shopkeepers and vendors who are always struggling to survive in these competitive times, and due to the urgent need for money, they take short-term loans, even at the rate of 10% monthly interest.

So that is like bloodsucking.

Sandeep roams in a black Scorpio as a moneylender to these sufferers.

But alongside, he has been drinking too much. In fact, so much drinking has taken place for the last few years that his liver almost collapsed, and only 20% of it was found functioning.

So he was hospitalized for a long time, but then recovered miraculously, and the doctor forbade him from even thinking about drinking wine, forget about actually consuming alcohol.

But after a couple of months of convalescence and recovery, he is up to his old tricks again and has started drinking.

So the other day, when I found him drunk on the canal bank with a few of his cronies, I put this question to him: “You should not be drinking.”

Then, in his customary careless way, he said, “Ustaad, do you want to live for a thousand years? We are here to live, have fun and die. That's life.”

So here he is, slowly wasting away after so much misdirected adventurism.

And he isn't even 40 yet.

The Mahatma on Our Banknotes: So Near, Yet So Far

January 30, 2008

The Mahatma's Martyrdom Day.

Sixty years ago, a sudden, irritated, hatefully squirming agent of the God of Violence tried to undo the decades-long work of peace, harmony, love and nonviolence performed by the angel of the God of Love.

But did those three metallic squirts of anger and hate succeed in their mission?

Definitely not.

Such luxuriant crops, as sown by the tireless farmer of love and peace, continue feeding the souls and spirits for generations before being slowly, slowly eaten up by the worms of time. But then seeds survive, and new saplings come with newer nourishment for the generations in the future.

So the only effect of those three shots, each of which was entailed by the saintly chanting of the Lord's name, was that Nathuram became known as a famous killer and that fallen, frail body, with its trademark beneficent toothless smile, proved the inviolable principle of mortality.

Long before the moment Nathu Godse decided to pull the trigger, the Atma had become Maha, the body had become a living force, the soul had soared highest to meet the true colours of harmony among humankind.

So the poor little idiot fired inconsequentially at the sacred, inviolable, impenetrable fabric.

For the people who have at least the capacity to understand and realize the comprehensiveness of that infinitely contouring love, up-curving to augment heaven and down-curving to dilute hell, the great soul is still there.

Thankfully, I do feel like one of these few.

India might be surging ahead, driven by its ant-swarms, surging monstrously, thoughtlessly, with their tiny pickings of status, progress and wealth, but there are a few sturdy ones who can carry the big chunks of his greatness, even as a reminder.

I, for one, taking myself away from the ant-swarm, stand and feel the true multitudinous vibrancy of the rainbow of his legacy.

The vibrancy is forever.

It will remain till the final flash of light is gobbled by the eternal darkness in the universe.

That toothless, benign smile still shows its unrestrained aura of goodwill, luck and blessings from the papery symbols of our consumerist monetary gallopings.

The Father of the Nation on the banknotes, so near to the heart in our purse, and yet so far.

In this consumerist war, without any principles, without any limitations, without any morality, while we rake up the soil and dust, the papery symbols of the acme of our modern aspirations are tossed around as arrows of these new wars.

The papery arrows, lethal, fatal most—these papery pointed, poisoned ends—are now constantly hitting the sturdy mortar of the great man's legacy.

And while they rout each other in the fight to surpass each other, they take a common, rejoicing, bantering ball-thrust at his lofty visage, hung like a portrait officially over the battlegrounds.

Apart from this, it being the second phase of winter, weddings have started taking place after the chilly freeze during the second half of December and January.

A nice little chapter in the lives of two souls getting married.

It definitely means, and is, one of the most beautifully carved-out social celebrations, provided we allow it to blossom properly.

Well, good luck to all those going to be married today.

The Hatchling, the Hawks and the Dream of a Writer

January 27, 2008

After that brutal judicial shake-up in December, this January has witnessed lots of hurry-scurrying on my part.

January has been unusually cold, with the temperature even hitting the freezing point on one mercilessly icy night. But warmed by the feeling of anguish born of that injustice, which stoned my hibernating self, I have now come to my senses.

The summation of my realization is: keeping hopes for justice, however strong and sturdy your case might be on legal, humanitarian and moral grounds, is totally wishful thinking, bordering on the illusionary utopian world.

The reason I remained in this self-congratulatory, self-wanting and artificial sense of being at ease with my status of a would-be HCS officer, waiting for his inevitable appointment—hasn't the recommending authority, HPSC, got a constitutional status?—was that I still somehow believed in the farcically utopian and obsolete principles of justice, fair play and uprightness at the highest level of the judiciary.

But as it was to inevitably, inescapably happen, I was jolted out of this make-believe world.

The palace which I had created from the masonry work of constitutionality, legality, government's obligations towards its subjects and things alike proved to be a brutal, fragile, wispy palace of cards, which was dismantled by a politically vindictive snort.

But those little papery beams and pillars of my illusionary masonry work fell on my head with a crushing weight.

That cry of being wronged was inescapable, but this cry has the force to shatter the glasses of fair play and goodness.

I know that now I have got every right to turn into a negative character. Even the law of redemption allows me to do so, for out of the cage now I fly aesthetically, flapping in the world, basking with its sky-high towers built on all the shortcutting rubble of illegalities, immoralities and inhuman wantonness.

There is always a danger.

Now that I have come out of the safe cocoon, which unfortunately was too small to fetch me any morsels of survival to fly in the larger world of bigger realities, there is always the danger that I will be arrowed down while on my straight, uncurving, undodging flight by some nastily manoeuvring arrow or a smart predator.

I need to bring a dodging, dribbling, flickering, camouflaging misdemeanour to my flight in order to save myself from the circumstantial, planned barbs and slingshots.

So, just like a funny, half-furry, tabby-adorned nestling out of the nest for the first time, I flap my wings, trying to be airborne, my heart thumping with excitement, fear and suspicion.

The big world with its bigger things appears like a miraculous maze.

But the reality is that there are hawks and predators in wait on neighbouring branches.

More than my flagging sense of new adventure and circumstantial flip-flop, it is the chance sighting by a cruel-beaked predator which will decide my fate.

A few sudden attacks, unwarranted ones and spurts will further shake me out of the still-remaining strands from the past world, and if I am still lucky enough to survive the predator's clutches, more on account of my good luck than the dexterity of new, inexperienced wings, I will, in time to come, become an expert glider on the slippery, murky path of this real world.

These newborn flappings have seen me knocking at a few corporate doors for the post of content writer also.

There have been a few feeble, meekly spoken dialogues on the shaky stage of business as well for the last two years. 

More than my own struggle by flapping wings, it will be the circumstantial snares or the incidental rosebuds, brought about by the chancey wind of fate, that will decide the outcome of my new journey.

Despite its uncertainties, this new flight is worth trying.

One more thing needs mention here. It is of quite some importance.

During that period of hibernation, and even before that, I always found the very idea of doing anything except reading and writing intolerable.

I remained there in the dream world of classical French, Russian and English literature—that world of balmy happenings, full of pains, pleasures, pathos, agonies and ecstasies, their stories etched almost permanently on the ever-fleeting, cascadingly changing face of time.

As immortals of the literary world write immortal lines which inspire generations, that world which is contained inside the pages of a classical book is beyond the swiping broom of time.

Open a classical book and you travel back to the time fabulously drawn out for mere mortals like us to become a part of it, to feel the depth of those generous nature-human bonds, to feel the pulsating, throbbing, exciting pace, so slow to us, of life taking detours through the chancey snares of fate, and humans sharing those purely loveliest moments defined by innocent talk among first-time lovers—those summers, those winters, those rains, those snows; in fact, almost anything and everything so full of grace, even the villainy of those characters appearing tolerable in the classical mould.

So for a long time, and almost full-time during these three years while waiting for the never-to-happen justice and while managing these business affairs, whenever I could find time, I remained a brooding, though happily, shadow over those ageless words.

Once you get lost in the pleasantly curving maze of that fascinating world, you get addicted to it.

You find the world outside so boring, so ignorantly kicking for mere mundane survival.

It was a classic case of addiction, to be frank.

Those were the only moments of ecstasy for me.

This was the only real world for me.

To be able to create such a world myself on paper became the driving force of my life.

So at this period of time, the only choice worth trying for was to become a writer, and that too of the category of classical writers.

But for that, I need to earn some money.

That is why I am being drawn towards business, because I do know writers struggle a lot economically.

I remember Munshi Premchand's only picture that is available, and a great writer, despite having tried his best to wear the best of clothes, one can clearly see his shoe torn, his toe visible.

So as far as surviving as a writer is concerned, it's a pretty mountainous goal indeed, especially so given the ever-existent paucity of freshly coloured, multi-hued ideas delving deep into the beautiful chamber of pseudo-reality—the pliable moulds which can be used for creating beautiful landscapes, fascinating happenings, softly soufling emotions, agonizing mischances, multiplexes of luck, fate and destiny.

Even language-wise, I don't think that I even qualify for the lowest rung of the literary staircase.

But then what is wrong in having such a delicate, supple, harmless dream?

Doesn't anything other than writing seem an exercise in futility?

As far as HCS is concerned, I always took it as a poor crutch which would help me in future to give support to my lame literary legs.

Yet every powerful flight of fancy is destined to end in a landing on the earth. Either it is the final, forever rest resulting from the crash-landing, or the betterment of senses due to painful realizations born of fatigued wings, forcing us to come back to the rest-inviting clarion call of Mother Earth.

Exactly the same happened in my course and case.

I was a ripe and ready case for the arrows of futility to shoot me down.

That judicial thunderbolt brought me down, shaken to the bones, with the charred and burnt remains of my former ideas.

I looked around and was awestruck by the real meanness of the real world.

Now, as an inexperienced participant, I feel just like a month-old hatchling out of the nest.

In these grim proceedings, I find that these forcefully marching proceedings can definitely make you oblivious of most of what you stood for in the past.

I believe that, carried by the swift currents of new happenings, I will be pushed further and further from my coast. I hope I won't be lost. 

A Prisoner of the Ruins at the Crossroads

January 24, 2008

Life being a very puzzling phenomenon, sometimes you come across circumstantial snares, sometimes you come across circumstantial rosebeds.

In my case, I have found myself walking voluntarily, involuntarily, into the trapping cleft, to be caught by the leg and brought down crashing in the dust.

The falls have been so many that now I no longer blame destiny or fate for my crash-landings. I am myself responsible for my crash-landings. It is me who has spoiled the script.

Maybe I have forever overestimated my calibre and skills, my capabilities, thus making the blunders of aiming for higher goals which are naturally, fundamentally beyond my capacity to achieve. Such egotistically carried-out pursuits become futile, as has been proven in my case.

It is me who has written all the lines of my script in a wrong manner. My assessment of myself is grossly skewed, hallucinated.

So naturally, I find myself surrounded by the broken shards of my half-built, unripe palaces. There are big heaps of rubble and rubbish, masonry work scattered around me.

I am imprisoned by the rubble and ruins of my immature pursuits.

A prisoner, a stark prisoner who has lost his identity among the ruins—the ruins which he has built around him.

A prisoner of the ruins.

That is what I am.

I just cannot see beyond my rubbish, garbage mounds. With every endeavour, I add to the filth on the peaks already littered with stones and rubble.

When will I reach the height, the peak of foolishness, in order to start doing things like the other people are doing? Even the so-called very dimwit people whom teachers in our class found not worth anything, even they are playing so smartly in the game of life as to have set up very nice economic bases.

So I find myself staring at the crossroads, puzzled and unsure about which way to go.

If I happen to focus on one thing, then these other options appear and tease me that they are more suitable. But just when I shift my focus to the appealing one, the nearer I move to it, the more butterflies titter in my stomach, and by the time I reach the option, it changes its shape and size to the extent of being totally unrecognizable.

In my entire life, I have never faced such a puzzling situation.

The dilemma stares with a cold, disdainful glare in my face.

Can't make much of the situation.

I know that from my own calibre's point of view, I will usually benefit from a job in publishing. But I don't have any experience, even though I have the skills to be a very good professional in the publishing world.

So content writer is the only option that seems viable as far as making a job opening is concerned, and still hoping against hope that maybe there will be a job option which will pay me just like a government officer and will give me an opportunity to use my full potential.

But I seem to have lost out on time.

Most of the people who are into such jobs start straight away after graduation. So that is the main problem here.

ELI Research, Faridabad, has contacted me several times over phone and through mail. It seems they are genuinely impressed by my portfolio, even agreed to think positively about my demand of 40,000 per month.

Just a few minutes ago—it is around five in the evening—I got one more call from them, saying they are really impressed by my CV.

The HR gave me another call.

This time she was really disappointed after hearing my hesitant, fumbling words meant to inform her that I will be out of the country for a few months, because the plan with Babu Bhai for an Africa visit seems to be now taking proper shape.

Now this means no employment opportunity as far as this company is concerned, but it seemed to be a very good company doing research and all this.

One more good opportunity gone down the gutter this time.

The indecision has been created by being tethered to the business commitment. Since all the preparations are now in their final stages, I don't have the heart to even just, you know, go to ELI Research just for the sake of it.

These are the cruel times.

Morality, ethics, friendship—all become drags in your march to boons and benefits.

How I wish that I could either get a very nice job allowing me to give my best, the vast amount of knowledge that I have gathered in almost a decade of my civil services pursuits, or get into some business opportunity that enables me to earn quite well, so that within five years I can help my family as well as make an economic base that allows me to go into writing later on.

The Obsolete Swimmer and the Two Streams of Survival

January 18, 2008

Earlier there was almost no choice for me. Haryana Civil Service, HCS, appeared to be the end and beginning of the world.

But following the principles of bad politics, Mr. Hooda still did me a favour. He untethered me from this painful peg in the ground.

In one sudden, surprising, off-balancing strike, he got this dog's bone—which can't be chewed, can't be thrown away—out of my bleeding jaws.

Though thunderstruck by this injustice, yet it was relieving in the sense that from now onwards no sham play of justice will continue, and the fact that justice is the ever-obelizing courtesan of the powerful politicians is proven clearly for all to see.

This jolt was rewarding in another sense as well. Its boiling, furious waters forced the wormy myself out of the archaic cocoon.

So, frowning with pain, bleeding body, I came out under the mercilessly glaring sun of exploding realities.

There was no make-believe, pseudo-sense of getting my job through the presumed uprightness of the judiciary at the apex level.

All I was required to do was to get into the hurtling waves of the mighty stream of survival as an obsolete old swimmer.

But I have surprised even myself in tackling the first waves crashing in my face questioningly.

In the month since that hyperactive crash-landing, after that three-year-long futile fight with the help of imaginary judicial wings, I have created two opportunities for myself: that of a content writer with the web portals providing software solutions, and that of a business adventure in East Africa.

But it seems too much for my historically choiceless self.

I am in two minds. In the seesaw battle of these two choices, their gleam fluctuates intermittently, making one or the other appear attractive.

Me, Sandeep, Sajjan, Anil and Shekhar have set up the system for the scrap business at the painful cost of our meagre resources, and just when the movement for importing iron scrap from Djibouti landed down, we find ourselves running out of money to start the export-import cycle.

I went to Ludhiana to meet Babu, who had purchased our first iron scrap container. I was able to convince him to invest in order to provide an ignition spark of capital.

Babu and his brother-in-law, in turn, appear to agree to visit the place to take stock of the material and offer us some terms of partnership.

So, as I have written earlier as well, we are planning to visit Africa.

I took Babu and his brother-in-law to the embassy for their visa processing.

The Embassy of Djibouti is situated in the semi-attractive surroundings of Bhikaji Cama Place, near Safdarjung Enclave and Vasant Vihar.

It is a small, two-storeyed block without the usual hustle-bustle of visa seekers. The flag lies limply.

It is eerily quiet in the reception hall. Two ladies, the younger behind the computer, the older at the table dealing with visa procedures, do their work in a relaxed manner without being pursued by the tactically lolloping tongues of foreign-visit-aspiring applicants, like you have in the embassies of developed countries.

As you open the heavy wooden door into the reception hall, you can at the most expect to meet another visa seeker there on the sofa.

The Djiboutian national sits in his usual aloofness and sense of loneliness. He is a handsome, dark man. He ponders over the magazines about his country and spends his time silently.

Between Old Gods and New Dreams: A Lohri Day in Delhi

January 13, 2008

It is Lohri today, the festival of North India, especially the Punjabi community. The festival is celebrated by lighting the torch of warmth, goodwill, joy and fervour against the freezing gusts of winter.

Wished Happy Lohri to Babu, Seth of Ludhiana.

Maybe the destinies of my poor group and his are linked. We plan to leave—me, Babu, his brother-in-law Inder and Shekhar—for Djibouti to explore the possibilities there, if everything goes okay.

My final round of interview with Netlink Digital Energy, Gurgaon, did not go well. From what I had done in the earlier rounds, I had gained immense confidence, which made me bold enough to demand a salary of fifty thousand.

In having so much courage, I surprised even myself. After all, only the IT people demand such figures.

Maybe at the last stage they were only planning to break my confidence so that I could be convinced to settle for a lesser figure. But the way I carried myself during the interview quelled any such action before they could even think of putting up any such effort.

I defended my salary on comprehensive grounds, covering right from professional acumen to philosophical overtones, singing lullabies for my quoted figure.

Now these days so many educated fellows wander around, and since business-to-business writing for web portals involves a prosaic, general, straightforward world of boring write-ups, it can be easily done by any averagely intelligent postgraduate or even graduate.

They can have a couple of eager, cringing, cooperative fellows for my salary, or even three or four for the sum that I quoted.

So most probably they would not have me. In any case that doesn't make any difference. 

After having gone through this drill with a successfully run portal, I went to New Delhi with Shekhar to get a yellow card for him. The yellow card is issued against yellow fever and certain other diseases after giving vaccination for the travellers bound for travel to African countries.

So we went to Ram Manohar Lohia Hospital, but it wasn't RML's turn to issue vaccinations that day. They said we could get the injection at NDMC on Mandir Marg.

Since we had enough time till 2 p.m., we decided to spend some time at the famous Birla Mandir and Saint Thomas Church on the road.

Now Birla Mandir is a big shrine complex, its yellow and reddish-violet domes shining brightly under the bright rays of the January sun.

Under the open glare of the sky, by its outer wall, you see the locker racks for mobiles and shoes, just as you take the broad, marble-paved flight of steps to the shrine facing the main gate, you see foreigners coming out of or going into the foreigners' visitor room.

On the deliciously cool marble floor, you walk with a superimposed sense of faith and sightseeing as a tourist.

In the front hall, a well-bejewelled and decorated couple, Radha-Krishna, welcomes you with beneficent blessings and cosmic love.

On the inside, you see balconies; pillars are numerous in number. On the walls you have bas-reliefs involving mythical scenes, comprising famous personalities from the world of myth, legend and religion.

Below are written commentaries, the sutras and their English translations, to allow the light of religion and faith to spread far and wide.

In the adjoining dharamshala and Gita Bhavan, you see devotees-cum-visitors thronging the pavilions.

The temple complex is worth watching, but somewhere deep in your heart you find that something is lacking.

Absent is that anciently intricate, ornate, multidimensionality-revealing sense of art and aesthetics, which was so famously carved out by numerous unsung artists during those pensively long-drawn-out hours, during those slow-paced, easy times in which our temple architecture came to acquire the rich folds and forms it is famous for.

So in modern temple architecture, you don't feel that soulful beauty, the intrinsic, basic, inherent beauty.

Modern man can only polish and varnish the outer core of stone. He can't go inside, can't penetrate deep to make the particular piece alive with the devotion of his blood and sweat.

So modern temple art is just a copy, Xeroxing, a gross imitation of the past.

You do not feel that unblemished harmony, balance and unity among different parts of a temple or temple complex.

Just a few blocks away, Saint Thomas Church stands grandly, unpretentiously, even sadly, as if brooding over those busy colonial days.

This red-bricked, long structure stands peacefully. Made in 1931, it saw sixteen years of British rule. The turret at the far end tilted, so a few metres of it had to be dismantled.

There was a quaint silence as we entered the gate and walked down the cobbled length of the wide yard along the length of the church.

The old caretaker, his other attendant and an old female servant eyed us approaching them with a bagful of mixed feelings—anxiety, suspicion, even curiosity—as I sought permission to go inside.

The caretaker waved to his attendant to open the back door by the back wall of the sanctum.

We entered the small room, parted the curtains and saw the long rows of pews.

The closed door at the other end dimly looked down the aisle.

There was pin-drop silence inside.

The fine wooden benches were as intact and compact as seventy-odd years ago. The sanctum, bearing the altar, cross and other offerings, was ordered, clean and peace-giving.

By the entrance door at the other end, there were prayer-book racks containing small-sized hardbound books.

But now it is a silent place.

God's image reposes in silence.

"Only on Sundays we have a dozen or so visitors for the prayers," the Christian caretaker mumbled with slight sadness.

But then, among Christians, the faith quotient is falling dangerously. The church now stands like a relic of the past, except on Christmas Day perhaps.

By the side of the church, St. Thomas School was buzzing with activity.

Bright-faced, energetic preteen girls in their school jerseys and skirts, scurried around the main gate with the agility of a unique type, like little squirrels—happy, curious, full of energy, full of life.

The most interesting and visible parts of their bodies were their full feminine legs. It was surprising to see them with such sturdy legs, even though most of them were just girls around the years of puberty.

We also got an opportunity to travel in the Metro.

Now this really is the pride of India, looking ultra-modern, clean, high-class.

Earlier I had doubts that the ever-jostling crowds of Indians would play spoilsport, but the Metro, its stations and escalators have been set up in the image of the Goddess of Cleanliness, and surprisingly the Indian crowd, which never goes by rules, follows the rules of smoking and cleanliness once inside the fabled precincts of the Metro station.

Metro rail is so user-friendly. You have screens showing the arrival of the next stations. There are verbal messages informing you.

Inside, people stand with decency.

All this is due to the high standards of order, facilitation and cleanliness put in place by the Metro staff.

It is just perfect, so perfect that people feel ashamed of putting a blemish on it.

So it runs ahead, chugs ahead, taking Delhiites on the paths of prosperity, career, ceremonies, get-togethers, dates and much more.

On the Tarred Road Between Job and Business

January 3, 2008

Now, to give a clue to how much puzzled I seem to be between making a career in business or seeking a job, I set out right on the next day after the interview in Noida for a business trip to Ludhiana.

I travelled in a car, a friend's car, on the National Highway.

Travel is pretty perspective-creating these days. It is, after all, the massive drive of development, constantly being upgraded, broadened, to add more and more economic vitality, to make it flow through the country's body.

Mechanized layering of tar and stone-crush is now very easy, so they do it more often. The road-making equipment and machinery have risen in the ranks; they have brought in new machines. So road-making and repairing have become much easier now in comparison to earlier lazy road-rolling days, and it takes less time as well.

So this Grand Trunk Road has become the high-speed corridor.

Now fast-speed cars, SUVs, public and private carriers go along thundering—easily, irritably, noisily, silently—all along the highway.

On both sides, you see a massive buildup of enterprise and business. Mammoth flyovers and bridges now provide an inescapable monotony, as if the National Highway would never have borne a different look at any period in the past.

The finger line drawn by Sher Shah Suri during medieval times has now become almost a living, growing, throbbing, tarred biological corridor, which has its own soul, perhaps even beyond the control of mankind slipping over its wheeled surface.

Ludhiana, the industrial town, is spread out like a large open-cast mine of labour, struggle, profits and gains.

It is a big city, like a big, irritable, slow-paced chariot of mammoth proportions. The mighty Sardars pull it along, possessed in a lighter, adventurous way.

Since it is a major place for scrap dealers and iron works, if you are not that energetic in your market manoeuvres, you tend to stick to any average, tolerable guy in the market instead of hunting around for better sources.

We had sold heavy metal scrap to Mr. Babu in the past.

He is a lighthearted, silently calculating young businessman, and I was successful in getting him interested in the business opportunities in Djibouti.

He has agreed to visit the place in order to see the chances of working with us in the form of a partner, and I think after some time he will fly with me to have a firsthand experience of how we are managing there.

Being a very clever businessman, he first wants to see our setup there, and he also knows that we are simple people, so seems to have some plans up his sleeve.

When our container of scrap iron landed in Ludhiana, we simply reached his scrap yard because somebody had referred his name. Since we were new to the trade, we could not bargain, and we got the average price.

But when the container was opened, he was wonderstruck because it was such heavy scrap, including heavy machinery parts and engines.

In fact, there were even heavy machinery rims of tyres which could easily be used here in India after painting.

So after that, he has been giving us some importance.

He knows that we are at a place where there is profit.

So I am happy that I have been able to gain his trust.

He has never travelled outside India, and if somebody who has never gone out of the country agrees to visit a poor country in Africa, that means he has started to trust you.

It seems to be an achievement.

Let us hope that we soon go to Djibouti with Mr. Babu and take him around on visits to various scrapyards, so that he gives us advance money, assured that he won't be losing it and that we won't run away once he sees our setup firsthand there, so that we can start a kind of business cycle.

With his advance money, we can pay the scrap owners there and bear the cost of cutting, loading and shipping.

And once the containers reach here, for the next lot again he will send us some advance money.

So this is what we expect.

As I sat with Mr. Babu in his posh office, almost as a partner, as a business owner, it gave me a very strange feeling that only yesterday I was there in the poor suburbs of Noida, in another plush office, but there as a struggling job seeker intending to join as a content writer.

So when I look at it—my destiny being stretched in two directions—it is a strange feeling. I don't know what am I seeking really. Seem to have lost the way during those hard days of civil services competition.