Of Missing You

I've missed you. Terribly. Badly. Sadly. Madly.
Let's walk under the street lights,
Talk of love, loss, life,
And also about everything nice.
Let's pour out our hearts again,
Tell me about that girl once more
And oh! your favorite teacher too!
Talk me through your last day at school and the first day you won a quiz.
Tell me.
Come with me,
Let's make up new constellations as we spent the night star gazing.
In the morning I'll take you to my favorite spot in this city, we'll click pictures there and frame them.
If hunger bothers you, don't worry there is this place that I love but don't tell people about. I'll take you there and we can devour all the food you want.
But do not forget you'll have to hear me too.
You'll have to hear me tell you about my deepest insecurities,
How every time the clouds get together my face lights up.
I'll tell you about my dream
And how snow is so amazing.
Why I think surrealism is so important and violence, not.
I'll tell you things you should know.
I've missed you. Have you?

Loyola Love

Today is the 31^st of July. 2016. That implies two things: First, today is Loyola day! And Second, I've finished school already. But I couldn’t be less excited about today. Loyola has left such a lasting impression on me, it has polished my rough edges, taught me to stand a little taller, laugh a little louder and care a lot more. I remember when I first joined school in third grade I didn’t like it, and complained to mom about how “easy” maths was in ICSE schools (I did totally regret saying that in tenth though, before the boards, you know). The school however, as it turned out was not that bad a place. Few months in and I loved it, I enjoyed coming to a place where teachers were not only teachers but friends and guides, where seniors weren’t bossy and snobbish but cool and fun (also hot).

I had two sections when I began school. What actually happened was that a Father (or who i thought was a Father) told me I belonged to one particular section so i went there not bothering to check the notice for allotted sections. When the class teacher asked about my name not being on the attendance register i said, "Father told me I was in this section". After around two weeks the class teacher of my actual allotted section realized I was in school, she came to me and said that's your section, pointing to another classroom. So I had to go. The new section was equally great, and it made me understand how comfortable i had grown to be at Loyola.

But that is not all about Loyola! Frankly, there is just so much about Loyola i couldn’t fit it in here even if i tried.  Loyola led me to discover so many things, it honed talents, built some and the best thing it never imposed conformity rules about who one should be- you do you but be kind, that's Loyola. (it is also “ In all things to love and to serve.”) Thanks to Loyola I have amazing friends, great teachers, some stupid crazy memories but many totally awesome ones too. The nuances of the mundane survival in Loyola seem like one the most magical things that happened. Few days back while talking about Loyola, my friend and I tried to figure out why we love it as much as we do; turns out that it was not that Loyola just educated us in the conventional sense(which it did) but it also taught us about things beyond the pages of a book, of things that are so necessary for surviving today which come to us as second nature because they’ve been so deeply ingrained into our personalities. It completed a huge fraction of our being. L for Loyola, L for love. Loyola is and always will be “A school with a difference!”

Teacher 2014

I've been meaning to write this post for quite a while now, but due to my impending examinations (just 6 days away) I kept delaying it, putting it off until all my exams got over (that would be 15th of January) but being the impulsive writer that I am I couldn't really contain myself anymore. Too much to ask for.:P


So I've decided to put up what I learned this year in this particular post . Obviously I cant put up Everything, the highlights maybe. This is was typically different for me. I don't even remember this year in a proper chronology! As in what happened when and then what happened and so on (you get it, right? ) I don't even remember this year's festivals properly! (except Diwali somehow :P) So here it goes.

#1 People Are Not What They Seem, Always.
 When we meet someone for the first time we form an impression about them, positive or negative, but we always do. There are many things that contribute to this impression, for example you may have heard about the person from  gossips. And then when you meet them you already have a layer of introduction about them in your mind. As your conversations progress you form a rough idea of how the person perhaps is.
But then here lies the catch. People are not what they seem. The Sweet girl you met may not really be so sweet- well she can even be a serial killer, you never know! And the boy whom you found Super-Rude? probably he has a dysfunctional family and needs you the most.

 #2 Go back to the roots, Introspect.
When I began to really dislike One Direction ( You & I, was that even a proper video! >_<) I started to wonder why I even liked this band in the first place.What Makes You Beautiful came to the rescue, like seriously!
And then I realized as we grow we just keep going on with our choices without re-evaluating them, trusting that the decisions we made in the past were be right and will probably continue to be so. I think that's wrong. We need to sit down with a calm mind, go over the decisions, and think about it. Were the decisions worth it? Were they right? Did they lead you where you wanted to go? Would you, if given a choice, go back in time and take the same decision again?
 Only you can determine your life and your life is a result of the decisions you take, so be careful, decide wisely

#3 People will Always Judge you and your choices.
 
Yes they will. Irrespective of what you do. If you don't talk they'll judge you and even if you talk they'll judge you. You wear outrageously provocative clothes or a burqa, you top the test or score a zero, They Will Judge You. It is human tendency. The best thing to do, thus, is follow your mind, do what you want and not bother about log kya kehenge. Do Not Seek Validation. You are perfect, remember that.
 Your choices, your life, don't let anyone else be a reason why you change your actions or preferences.


#4 Dream big, very Big!

 Wanna score over 90% in the upcoming test? Why not aim for 100% ? you mayn't achieve it, but hey! You may as well. You might end up with a 95%, that's better than the 90% you were aiming for na? Just dreaming isn't of course of any help, you need to work for it. Work hard. "To have something you never had, you need to do something you never did."





#5 Be with the Right Kind of people.


Be with people who share your passion, feed your soul, care about you, understand you and don't ask you to change. That my dear friends, is a simple formula for happiness. Instead of being with people who you think you'll like, be with people who genuinely like you. It's tough to figure out but then nothing is impossible. Life is too short to waste on people who don't deserve you and make you feel bad about yourself. Never let anyone tell you that you're not good enough, you are, they are just too blind to see it.




#6 Don't cry for something you didn't fight for.





If you want something fight for it, give it all you have instead of curling up in a corner and sulking about it. You need to fight your own battles, no one will do that for you. It is your life after all.




#7 Make Peace with Yourself.



Yes, make peace With yourself. Some time ago I had read that acceptance is the biggest teacher and I outright rejected it. The year slowly taught me the same lesson. If you're bad at some sport or at being a good friend or any other thing for that matter, accept that you are bad at it. It Is Fine. Only after you accept it, will you be actually ready to do something about it. Bad at Cricket? Take classes to improve your game. Pat yourself and scold yourself too. But don't let others' words affect you too much.




#8 Take a Break

 In the rush of life today, we so often forget to slow down and be grateful for our lives. We are too busy with work. Take care of yourself first. Your health and mental peace come before any test/project/deal. Ensure it. Once in a while take a break, go out , breathe the fresh air, listen to the birds chirp, feel the ground, the grass, see the vast sky. Remind yourself why you are doing what you are doing and re-energize yourself for it. Put yourself first.

The Tremors

I had no intention of dedicating a post to this topic, I'm not much of a Geography-Geology enthusiast. But. what happened back yesterday deserves a post!

As all my class-mates already know, it's summer-vacation-time and we have our exams the very first day our educational institution re-opens. So yup, we are supposed to study this whole vacation for the tests! Not that I dislike the vacation study part, I personally take a lot of time to understand a single lesson, sometimes even four to five days (yes, that's abnormal I know) and am usually crammed for time to finish all my lessons. My speed, no wonder. So I'm really glad about the vacations. 
Yesterday I wasn't reading any lesson, I had decided to take a Two-Day-Long-Break to just, you know, rewind and refresh (ya, I know that's abnormal too :P ). So I was lying down on my bed wondering about the various ways our new Prime Minister-in-Waiting could change the country within the next sixty months, when my cell phone rang. It was my cousin and we soon began to babble about a melange of issues. After we finished all we could think of talking at that time, I handed over the cell to my sister who had just walked into the room.
I went out to the drawing room to catch up on IPL. Barely had I sat down on the sofa, when I felt the ground trembling. For a moment I felt I was imagining and feeling things that weren't even real.I told dad that I felt the ground shaking, expecting my statement to elicit a roar of laughter from everyone in the room, but thankfully it didn't. Dad said he felt it too. It suddenly struck me that it could be An Earthquake and within no time my mind flashed images of the moving tectonic plates, just like the ones i had drawn in my geography test back in eighth grade.

Without even a moment's thought I yelled "RUN!" and just as soon as I said it there was a second round of shake and this one was way more stronger. I bellowed out to my sister who was on the phone to run out and I dashed out of the house. Almost immediately my sister and parents followed. My neighbors too, rushed down the apartment,all in their night-suits (it was around 10 in the night, what do you expect?). Everyone began asking if everyone else was fine and related things. some of my neighbors who live on one of the higher floors said they saw their furniture moving. My mother was of the same opinion about our house.
After about 15 minutes of a desperate wait for nature's fury to stop all of us decided to go back in. As usual, I was the first one in. I entered my room to check if everything was alright, what hit was another sudden realization- I was shivering.
I don't know since when I had been shivering or for that matter 'why' I was shivering. I blame adrenaline now (fight-or-flight, remember?) . Soon everyone was home and we dined quietly and retired to our beds after having thanked god.

When I think of it now, I'm just so glad to have gone through this experience. It was such a different zone altogether. It makes me think how assured we are about our lives, of  how a slight tremor gets people rushing out of their homes. It makes me wonder about how guaranteed we take Nature and her laws, of how small and insignificant we, as humans, are compared to her.In all the chaos of the earthquake and the subsequent effects it had on people, one thing is crystal clear- The Earth does not belong to the Humans, Humans belong to the Earth.

A City and Two Sides.

I had written this piece a long time ago, in my summer vacations around an year ago when I visited my cousins in Patna. I happened to read it again and decided to post in up here.

It’s not even been a week here in Patna for me and I can already feel at home here. I agree Patna is not one of the best capitals in the country where one would like to rewind and refresh; you don’t have the benefit of great roads, cleanliness in every nook and corner, smooth driving, first class showrooms and so many more. There is a crowd at every second place, there are people talking way above the normal audible level, at some places there is not even something to call a proper road!

But then there is always a second side to the same coin! The flip-side, believe me, is indeed alluring!  You won’t see it sitting in a part of the city. It won’t come walking towards you to say "hello!"  But having said that, I would also say that goodness and beauty is subjective to every individual, I can only give you an account of how I experienced it in Patna.

Patna is the capital of Bihar. Here, you see people, irrespective of their social standing, enjoying themselves. People here are less bothered about who the president of the USA is, and more concerned if India will win every cricket match it plays. Every small shop has a TV where people flock to see cricket matches and cheer real loud even though they are thousands of miles away from the venue of the match. This is a part of the love and support that the Indian cricket team enjoys in the country.

The languages spoken here are also so diverse. Though my friends group it together saying its Bihari, but hey! That’s not the only language people speak in Bihar. You have Angika, Bajjika, Bhojpuri, Magahi and Maithili, each enchanting in itself. Each language has a different tone, a different texture and a different feel that it gives to both, the hearer and the speaker. When I think of making a generalization about the feel of the languages I can definitely say that it they are sweet, give a feel of belonging, and want you to understand them(or maybe that’s my minds playing tricks.) Bhojpuri, one of the loved Indian languages has its roots and also its maximum number of speakers, in Bihar, though not in Patna. In Patna, you get to hear almost every of the above mentioned language. The speaker speaks in his language and the listener responds in his, therefore when you go to a shop and speak to the shopkeeper in any language he will invariably respond in his mother tongue. If you, at any given point of time stand in a crowd and listen, you can hear the various languages all in the same crowd.

That’s not all. There’s a lot more than what meets the eye in Patna. I do not want to make it a boring essay by going more into details  but I can surely say that in Patna, yes, there is chaos, but under it there flows calmness and understanding.