21st CCD

Hi

A thought struck me few days back, I call it 21^st CCD now. You must be wondering what on earth is this!. It’s not café coffee day, it stands for 21^st century confused Desi (Or Indians from India).

Its about a Dilemma of how to remain stuck to Indian roots while still being in modern world. Like a guy, who spots a tee shirt and jeans with spiked hair in morning and by evening changes into a dothi* with neat jelled back brushed hair-do for the family pooja*. The conflict of interest you see here is making us change roles in real life. But at the end the ancient question that haunted mankind for centuries haunts this young generation in a new way “Who am I?”. Finding answer my friend isn’t easy because if you tell your friends they find you crazy although they are on the same boat, eventually the question will scare them too. And confronting parents with these problems is out of question for all the possible consequences. And the worst one being, your dad thinking my son/daughter is out of my hands or he or she doesn’t respect our values any more, which is very risky because at the end of the day you got to change into a long piece of dothi remember.  

let me give you another funny example, every Indian mother watching daily Indian soap want the lead actors (Preena and Anurag) who are deeply in love to marry each other and hate the one those oppose, usually the family. Then, when it comes to her son she wants him to marry the one whom she likes. In simple terms “arranged marriage”. If you try questioning her, all hell breaks loose and this time the worst one will be her tears and the bull’s eye arrow reply shooting straight at you will be “you have all grown up. Ha!!?... Now you think we are wrong?”.

At the end they are not Hippocrates they are confused too. J

Doti: is the traditional men's garment in the Indian subcontinent

Pooja: is a religious ritual performed byHindus as an offering to various deities

Bazaars of Malleshwaram

        Sun was shining brightly like he was in a fit of rage, it was like sun was threatening the earthlings to burn us down. Stepping out of the auto-rikshaw I took out my small black unattractive basic cell phone and after a wining battle I fight every time while opening its key guard lock it showed me 4:00 pm. Clutching it in my palm my legs turned to cross the road. Carefully calculating the change the driver handed me over before he started pulling the leaver that started the most adopted and survived mode of transportation in Bangalore which I can say is human among vehicles.

         In Bangalore during peak hours if one is thinking of crossing a busy road, let me tell you it’s not less than passing through the asteroid belt between mars and Jupiter. After placing my each step carefully I managed to cross the traffic. And started walk towards the class. My brain was in a full swing carefully constructing a mental map of shady spots on the footpath, while taking the input from my eyes processing it and instructing my legs to follow that path, and also balancing my center of gravity on that uneven path all simultaneously.

       
       After a long 2 minutes of hide and seek with the sun and dodging the people coming from the opposite direction I reached the entrance of the center which conducts the class. Every time I reach that spot an alarm rings in my brain, my hand reach out to my cell phone which all most every time is found in my right pocket. And yet another time my unattractive phone comes out to be turn into a mute. Each time it's in my hand I remind myself to buy an attractive new cell phone, a multimedia one. And when I decide on buying a new one something inside stops me, which I guess is my brain because it is   victorious each time against the key guard lock. Anyway, that is not what hit my brain this time. Actually it was time 4:02 pm that knocked my eyeballs and brain via optical nerves, I was 28 minutes early!

         Gauging the intensity of sun and calculating the change the auto driver gave me my brain forgot to register the least important fact then but a major fact now that I am early. The next thing that my brain was worried about was the boredom I had to bear sitting in the class room alone. That thought was equally scary as a surprise test in calculus. No activity and sudden loads of activity both are horrifying. I couldn’t use my cell phone because of a huge poster on the classroom door read switch off your cell phone which I never did but kept it in silent. So, talking to someone could be ruled out of “class-alone activity list” immediately, Talking to my brain or myself in a place where anyone could walk in any time is definitely not on a good idea and revising the previous class… came a thought which I blocked from attacking my mind immediately, I must appreciate my brain for the next thing it did. It immediately ran a search for alternating activity that could keep it busy. Then an idea was born, the one of walking the footpaths of Malleshwaram.

       The bug which once bit the famous explorers had me this time, having my own sweet 28 well now 27 or so minutes to waste. I made up my mind that I won’t be late to class and the most importantly that I won’t spend my auto-rikshaw fare shopping, then with all the determination to stick to my exploration rules. I started to walk on the footpath which looked like a elongated painter’s pallet with lots of colors blending into one another as people walked with bazaars on one side and trees on another and it looked as though the painter himself has stroked some woody shaded color which cling their roots deep down the earth’s crust as they are scared of the fast moving vehicles on the other side.

To my left were a line of shops

None empty and pale

With items displayed on the racks

Had glamour, dazzle and glare

Sale, sale, sale read the boards

Cotton and chiffon and silk

Then there stood the cool drinks shop

Which challenged sun with cold badam milk

Then I walked further which

took me to the lane

A shop firmed with rolling hitch

Displayed sandals and hung them in daisy chain

Then again I walk on the main foot path

To see some colorful stand

Had mountains of colored rangoli powder

Which none touched with hand

There was no end to the buildings lined

Like soldiers for the drill

Boutiques, agencies, offices and more

And suddenly I stood still

Time! It struck my brain as I saw a person look at his watch standing in a bus stand, and remembered my deadline. My hand pulled out my time piece, my cell phone. In which I noticed 3 notification, those were messages from 3 different classmates. The messages demanded me to tell where was I. my eyes swiftly shifted the sight to the top right corner of my cell phone to notice just 5 more minutes for class, my legs started running towards the class and my brain thinking and recollecting of the vivid beauty of bazaars of malleshwaram. The time I spent walking the footpath which I have walked many a times showed me thing I never notice, this walk showed me objects and people whom I usually dodge while on my way. It showed me how the colors and shade of life blended in the painter’s pallet and how it filled life into every object.

And while I climbed the stairs of my class i was glad to see my classmates waiting.