Hills That We Climbed

Wednesday, November 13, 2024

Travelogue: Office Garden

- Rahul

Tuesday, November 12, 2024

Thoughts: "When you grow up, your heart dies"

I happened to watch a 1985 film named "The Breakfast Club" only now, which is a story of five teenage students. The teenage students are discussing how bad their parents are, how they fight with each other, how they put too much pressure on the kids, and then this quote comes, "When you grow up, your heart dies"

Obviously, the brutality of this quote made me stop for a moment.

Now, I am way past the teen age, and I do not feel I have grown up to the point where my heard is dead, but of course I am "grown up" to some extent and the fact that this quote startled me also tells that I could understand it better.

This idea is true to a large extent. If we look at the evil grown-up people, certainly they were also innocent till some point of their life, certainly in childhood and many times also till teenage. But the reverse is not definitely true; and we can't say that everyone who is innocent and fair in teenage would become a bad person once grown up. There are all kinds of grownup people, good or bad, as there are all kinds of teenagers too, good or bad. But one thing is certain: the grownup people react to same things differently.

I think there is one thing that these teenagers in the movie would never comprehend, and it is that growing up is painful. Every grownup person carries certain pains inside one's heart, and most of those are unexpressed. Quite often, the grownup people take those pains to their ashes. And it is no funny matter.

Given a choice, many grownup people would also like to act and behave in the same idealistic, righteous and reckless manner which is trademark of the youth; but most of the time there is no choice. The burdens of expectations and responsibilities of the practical life weighs down people's hearts and souls. It is very easy to say, "when you grow up, your heart dies", but the process of a dying heart is more painful than the realization that it is dead.

This age-based conflict in human society is one more interesting aspect to our social life. Everyone thinks that only he is right, and the other person is wrong; while the truth is that everyone is both right and wrong at the same time in their own ways. All said and done, we all need to keep a tab on ourselves, even if we can't do anything about it.

- Rahul

Thursday, October 10, 2024

Thoughts: What is With Children and Water?

This morning, besides a very busy road, I saw a small girl. The road was not good, and it had cracks through which water from was flowing, perhaps thrown by some nearby shops. The little girl who was alone was carrying something; perhaps having bought it from some shop and returning to her home. She had stopped and was dipping one of her footwears in the stream of water. She was completely lost in thought, not bothered by the chaos of busy traffic and neither caring for safety or any concerns. She was totally focused on ‘understanding’ water. That moment and her state of mind felt totally like ‘nirvana’ to me.

A few months ago, I saw a similar scene where a small boy who was going somewhere with his grandfather, had also stopped and was completely immersed in thoughts and focused on a little ‘pond’ of ‘water’ on the road.

I wonder what was so special about these scenes that I paid attention? It is not that I was wandering around in an observation mode; I was actually riding and moving. But these moments got captured in my mind like still photographs. I think first, these moments were so ‘out of the ordinary’. In the adult world, we are so used to doing things on purpose and we are always on to something, that such moments of pure carefree indulgence feel strange. Second, I got curious also because I thought about the ‘state of mind’ of these kids. And I could not name it or could not find words to describe it. It was like a ‘blank slate’; and anything blank is so precious in the modern world because it is full of possibilities.

I hope that out of the many things frozen in my memory, these too remain safe and secure. The little kid checking out water on the roadside – what is with children and water? Perhaps it is better never to figure out.

- Rahul Tiwary

Sunday, September 22, 2024

Travelogue: Pune Local Train System

Local people will be aware but many of us do not even notice that like Mumbai, Pune also has a local train network. It may not be as extensive, but still for the areas it touches, it is pretty good and helpful. I recently had a chance to use a local train boarding at Pune Junction and I was highly impressed with how efficient and time saving the service is.

Below is a scene from a local unreserved train bogie:

The local trains have separate reserved bogies for women as well as physically disabled. The trains start at fixed time and reach each station at their designated time. Most of the local stations are small and less crowded and give an "old world" feeling, which is a luxury these days.

Below is a screenshot showing some of the stations, as taken from NTES website:

I have travelled in a local train on a weekend and hence I am not aware of how the traffic is during the weekdays which are working days for the employed.

During the years I was in Mumbai, being a student as well as afterwards, I used the local train network extensively. These trains are not designed for comfort but are highly efficient and time saving mechanism.

While traveling through a local train in Pune, I noticed that a parallel Metro Rail line was almost getting completed. I do not have information if local train network will be dismantled after Metro lines are fully operational on the same routes, but it is not a bad idea to do so.

And I must add that I travelled about 10 kms on the local train and the train fare was "₹5"! I could not believe my eyes if someone can still travel 10 kms for ₹5 in today's India.

I won't say that I recommend local trains to anyone, because these days such rugged experiences are frowned upon by the status conscious society, but if you appreciate varied experiences or want to have a feel of old world of Railways today, you can give it a try some day.

- Rahul Tiwary

Saturday, September 21, 2024

Hindu Temples: Radha Krishn Mandir, Near Harisabha Chowk, Muzaffarpur, Bihar

Wednesday, September 18, 2024

Memories: Ajanubahu

I was returning from my village after a trip, and my vehicle took a different route than usual, passing through a neighbouring village instead of directly approaching the ‘main road’. I have gone through this route a number of times in the recent past and I have always been a bit more curious, since this is a different village and hence houses and places are different. There is a big banyan tree at a turning, covering entire road under its arms. There is a school, painted as usual in pink, which government of Bihar has chosen as its favourite color for children. The road undergoes several steep curves, and I have wondered how everyone is always safe despite those steep turns. And there are two honeybee farms in that village, especially during the time of litchi and mangoes, and I have always feared for safety while passing nearby those.

This time, while midway through the route, as my vehicle passed through, I noticed an unusual old man walking on the road. He was going towards the ‘main road’. His arms were very-very long and appeared to be almost reaching his knees! This immediately transported me to childhood when mother told stories of some gods from Hindu mythology being “ajanubahu” (one whose length of arms reach his knees). Was this old man some god? He definitely looked like a sadhu or a spiritual person! When I reprocessed the flicker of glimpse in my mind, I noticed that this old man’s both arms hanged from his shoulders like trunks of a thin tree. I don’t think there was any deformity, but it seemed that since the man had become too old, his body had become weary carrying the weight of his mighty arms and hence those looked dropping from his shoulders. I also reprocessed his image in my mind to recollect if I could get his face, but I realized that he had put a towel (gamchha) over his head, as if to protect his head from the sun, and his face was totally invisible in the ensuing shade.

With no face visible and two long arms dropping to the knees, the old man definitely appeared as a ghostly figure.

Nothing miraculous happened in the following days, if you are curious, and I tried to tell myself that the old man was just an ordinary man and not really a god or a ghost. But this was the first time I had seen an “ajanubahu” and hence it has become etched in my memory.

Afterwards, I tried to search on the internet and got to know that Bhagwan Ram is known to be ajanubahu; many Hindu gods, saints and kings have been so too, and even Gandhi ji was one such person. Being ajanubahu is certainly considered auspicious. For this reason, I felt happy of having seen someone of such a virtue.

- Rahul Tiwary