Still The Same

I think I am still the same. Last week I had a dream which woke me up, though this is not the case most of the times. It was not any horrendous or perilous dream. But the reason was something which made me realize - my heart still resides at the same place, though I came long way from there. A part of the dream went like this.

I am on stage along with 3/4 people performing a scene where dialogues need to be delivered without any break. In other words, a very short crisp scene. I delivered my first dialogue properly thereby maintaining the scene, then I forget the next one. My chance was coming up. I was feeling restless. I was trying to recollect but without success. And then my sequence came. Abruptly I opened my eyes and was relieved to find myself on bed and not on any stage.

Frankly speaking, still want to go back to those days. No time is enough to draw me out from there.

Commendable Gesture...

I thought of writing about this incident earlier but wasn't able to do so because of my busy schedule. Anyway here it goes.

Anybody who uses Autorickshaws in Bangalore knows well the pain involved. Yours truly has experienced such troubles many a times.

About a month back I was searching for an Auto near Ulsoor Police station for Kumble Circle, M G Road. No autowallah was willing to go by Meter- "20 extra sir" "One and half sir" "No passenger from MG road sir"- giving banal excuses, that too at 2' o clock in the afternoon. Soon traffic light turned red and few Autos coming from the other end stopped. I started looking among the ones halted on red light. From one of the Autos someone started waving his hand, as if calling me. I went nearby to find a guy, about 28, sitting inside the Auto. I thought I misinterpreted and went ahead to look for the next auto standing in line. Then he called from back.

"Hey"
"Me?"
"Yeah"
"Searching for an Auto?"
"Yeah"
"For?"
"M G Road"
"Ok come in"

I waited for a second.

"Hey come on, signal will turn green."

I jumped in.

"M G Road will fall in my way. You can get down there."

"Thanks, Do You work?" He nodded." Where?"

"Earnst and Young". He told me his position too. But as it was not clear, I concluded it was something related to Chartered Accountancy.

When Auto reached Kumble Circle I got down and offered to pay the rent. He declined "Leave it to me, my pleasure. Bye"

"Bye Bye"

It was a very small gesture but still I guess, it will not happen with many. I found it good enough to write about. Who knows, may be that person visits this place and recollects the incident.

How to connect ...?

5 Happenings/Thoughts I came across in last few days. The question remains - how to relate all of them? I may be asked - why u want to relate them? I don't know.

1. Rajkumar Hirani launched his new film titled "3 Idiots", starring Aamir Khan, Madhavan, and Sharman Joshi, based on Chetan Bhagat's novel "5 point someone".
2. 4 friends started form the same reference point. 2 (X&Y) went ahead a bit as compared to other two (A&B) on first hurdle by successfully completing it. A always regarded this as "failure" at the back of his his mind. 6 years after that he came back with a bang and now with the same reference point he is way ahead of Y & B. X has been able to remain in the same league.
3. A blog of one of my college friends where he talked about "....if life came with a rear view mirror. To see how far is somebody whom you left behind. To see who's coming up to you. To maybe slow down a little at times......"- an awesome thought not easy to forget.
4. Who can be called successful? One who achieves what he wants to? One who do things differently and emerge as unique in his class? One who achieve fame?
5. You talk of choices either in two cases- you are master of many trades to make a choice out of them OR you are not even average in any of those trade to concentrate on that only.

Big Time Final Loser!!

I am a kind of person who is always happy with his past, never giving a thought to what I did - right or wrong. But lately some one's comment forced me to give a thought about it, though it was a sub conscious try but resulted in a factual conclusion. I do realized it and logically deduced it from my past life - I AM A big time FINAL LOSER.

I have almost always been able to come up with flying colours in whatever field I have given a honest try-most of the time in top 2. But may be I never gave that extra punch which separates the first from second, gold medalist from silver medalist and topper from others in the top group. May be being happy with my good satisfactory performances, I never strived for the best. At least, thats what my own history suggests me-

• Silver medalist for 5 district/state TT championship but won only 1 Gold in my whole TT career in school days.
• 2nd in class from VI to XI but never 1st, continuously for 6 years.
• 2nd in XII board results in school.
• 2nd in so many school events- kho-kho, carrom, chess, etc.
  
• Around 98 percentile in my CAT attempts but never crossed 99 percentile, the mark which makes the difference.
• In IIT always remained among the 2nd tier performers (may be top among them:)) but never moved to the top tier performers group.
  
• Lost the elections for House Secretary after coming up as top two consensus candidate; almost guaranteed victory before the election and the small losing margin made the loss worst.
• Most of my skits and plays fell short of the 1st position (always 2nd/3rd) for some or the other reason, irrespective of the applauses. (MM, my best creation, is the only exception which broke all records)
• In campus placement got interview calls from almost all dream companies from different fields (consulting(Mckinsey)/banking(Lehman)/analytics/tech) but finally made into a 2nd tier tech company.
  
• In professional life too - solution developed by myself is contesting with a competitor for the top slot, and is presently placed at 2nd position.

Though there have been few exceptions- JEE, MM, BTP. May be I have always been a jack of many trades but expert in few. But I seriously think that it is the attitude for the top slot which makes the difference. And as it is always known, best is always remembered while next i.e. second, though may receive applauses for very short time, is always next to best. May be someday I too will strive to move from rest to best category with that extra - I need to find that!!

I would DIE for THIS!!

I am in a old style house in a small town, sitting in aangan and reading the newspaper. The house resembles the one used in the film Swadesh. It is around late afternoon with dark clouds hovering around.

There is a gentle knock on the door. I being happy alone with myself got annoyed with someone's arrival at this time. I got up and went to open the door thinking some one from the credit card company must have come for promotion. On opening the door the person whom I saw standing there swept the floor under my feet. Oh my God!! It was SACHIN TENDULKAR, a person who required no introduction.

Me: Are baap re!!Aila Sachin!!
It was almost a shout.
Sachin: Looking at your expression I believe you definitely recognize me.
His childish voice immediately made a mark.
Me: hmm......Yes!
Sachin: Hope I didn't disturbed you?
Me: NO, definitely No; its just that I am not able to overcome the excitement.
Sachin: OK, you will settle down. Come...
He kept his hands on my shoulder and took me inside.

Sachin and me, both are lying on a mat laid in the aangan with a light drizzle outside in the courtyard and talking as if we were good old friends. This went on for long time.

Sachin: Hey don't let anyone know that I am here. Very rarely I get a chance to be away from the limelight and be of my own.

Time passed and it is late evening now. I realized that Sachin did not had anything to eat since he arrived at my house. So I thought of ordering pizza from US Pizza.

Me: I think yo umust be hungry by now. Is Pizza fine with you?
Sachin: No Yaar! No Pizza, no item from outside.
He paused for a second.
Sachin: Can I share the tiffin that you have ordered for the night.
This was like the moment of my life. Sachin Tendulkar, whom everyone in their life would like to at least see once in their lifetime, is sitting beside me and asking to share my tiifin with him.

But sometimes too much of excitement is really bad. It takes from you even the moment you are enjoying. I immediately tried to get up to inform my tiffin wallah to increase the quantity.

The moment I sat up, I realized that I have got up from my bed and may have slept a bit long than usual. So need to hurry up for office!! But yeah each and every moment of this dream remains in my memory.

P.S: Things to connect with the dream- recently I have been receiving too many credit card calls, even I accepted one of the offer after getting annoyed; recently had an argument with one of my friends regarding Sachin's down to earth qualities; have kept a tiffin waalah for dinner since May; once in a week the number or quantity of tiffin needs to get altered for various reasons; weather has been too good in Bangalore for a month or so which i keep telling to my friends who have recently moved in or out of Bangalore; newspaper has been a source of argument in my house; whenever we order Pizzas, we do it generally from US Pizza, the closest one.