Eid Mubarak.. Life in Calcutta.

After a long time, I was working all alone and was alone in the streets of my home town...the city with inexplicable memories, each and every nook and corner. The calender earmarked it with Eid. One of the pious festivities that the Islamic world celebrates with one singular voice: "Mubarak (congrats)". This world has traveled all the lexicons from the Mecca to the Macau... Arab to Phillipines... "Mubarak..Eid Mubarak".

31/8/11. A day, that I revisited the by-lanes of city. Those, that I was regular, at a time when everything was new with the freedom of becoming a High School kid! Then college, brought in those places, vividly. Today, Eid glittered the lights through those by-lanes, bypassing the present day's chores of a PhD scholar, to a regular Bengali, loving to walk through the streets of Calcutta..

It was some nominal chores at my work place.. feeding the bacteria on some new "food beds"; spinning down the DNA; frantically finding the primers for a Gradient PCR...technicalities is so normal these days, for me. Then, I had promised a Biriyani treat for my mom; from the famous Arsalan. But then, you had to cope up standing in the queue for more than an hour to book your parcel. Wish I had Barrack with me to give me the taste of Arsalan's Biriyani on Eid MuBARRACK! ;) I retraced the pavement, and succeeded in buying the stuff from Alibaba. (It was good, but not like Arsalan's)

With the food packed in order, I boarded the auto, not knowing that my romance for this OLD CALCUTTA would change the day...still keeping pace with my mood!

The vehicle swerved through the Mullickbazar's vehicular debacle, to land up in Eliot Road. The name was common as ten years ago also, I was a common factor in these lanes,  twice a week. For my English tuition. The group that changed my outlook, happened to be formed in here and there you go; the names and faces came fluttering across my memory... (all settled in their own spheres...busy with life now).

Eid always brings in a jolt of breeze that suddenly start smelling like autumn. The genetical clock of the Bengalis start sensing time for the Pujas to arrive. The roasted meat, the biriyani, the flowers..they all intermingle with the smell of the old residential bricks that brings in the sense of belonging to the place, with your soul. This season I will miss a major chunk of the festivities... But I wish to rediscover Calcutta more...

This time, I will have my Nikon D5000 with me!

Drops...

They just covered me up, when I was just about to finish off the day's chapter at IICB, signing off at the gates last Wednesday. It was 10:37PM and I was little worried that I might be missing the K8, the only vehicle that could take me to my destination called home, at this dry hour.

Think of dry! It started with a few drops on my cheeks, eye lids and then in gripped upon the rhythm of tips and taps, with occasional slush from the speeding cabs and bikes that tread past the S. C. Mullick Road, Jadavpur.

Drops...

They made me swim through the sweet times. Those red eyed scoldings that I used to get from you and my mom regarding my special adaptive hobby to get drenched in the rain. That day, when I described myself to the lifeless tree standing in open air, drenching with the hope of getting some life back. That is how I described myself to you and described you to the rain. Our first date... started with and in the rain...

Life has taken several years to settle into this groove. The incessant trials to crack the competitive exams... "incessant"...again a colloquial for the rain forest, describes our lives; at present. Several miles disrupts our regular meets...skype/gtalk becomes life savers. I envy the several ads of cheaper local calls... (Why weren't they present when you were around!)

Last Wednesday, brought to me the essence of water to life. Life savers, no doubt. It had really been a strenuous day, but like the most suitable chemical reagent and justifying its title of being an Universal Solvent, those drops of water dissolved all those pain. Infused life and made me remember those days... shining within the corner of my eyes... when you were around.

Today, your smile and eyes are around me... in the Drops...

Courtesy: Kanad/ Joydeep/ Arijit. (Aug, 2011)

Same Place.

Recently there had been a commercial running on the Indian Television, depicting the inefficiency of a Maruti-Suzuki model, where a long lost friend chirps over a social networking side to her friend in the city, to meet up at the "same place". Perplexed, the guy moves into his car with very low fuel to search her. After crossing through the several "gallis" in Delhi, he found her in wait in-front of a cafe called "SAME PLACE", quite like the innmerable spots, in the city where i have had used to stand for you. Hours!

The dew settled in the long grasses of Maidan and Victoria Memorial; I used to trod among the longer grasses soaking my socks and boots in the moisture of purity; dew. You came and we used to move across the gates, trying to relive some past years and try to live in the present and look for the future. That "same place" will look barren, without your footsteps.

The commuters' platform railing of Esplanade metro witnessed by incessant hourly waits... Whenever I go to work, those railing shall bear the testimony of the "same place" where I used to wait for you... for the past 4 years! Love brings such thoughts, clouds them in your brain!

And then you ask: "What is the use to go and fulfill dreams, hurting and parting from so many..." The answer my friend is in the wind. That's life.. and that is how we have conquered the world since ages. Destiny unwraps the goodness of future...bright and high.

The flight alarm has started counting it's final few hours... funny how it came..I seldom remember... for it was just the other day we met! Today, US calls...its one "US" that becomes part of your life parting you from another "US". I shall wait for the previous "US" to take its shape, in full grandeur...same way, may be different time, but definitely the SAME PLACE!

New India. Age 20 years.

It started 20 years ago, on the same date of 24th July, 1991. Back then, I was in Standard 1. Never knew what was done by the PV Narashima Rao Government and the present Prime Minister, the then Finance Minister, Dr. Manmohan Singh. I only remember those years to be turbulent after the assassination of Rajiv Gandhi. Then two years later, it was 1993 bombings of Bombay. But, today we are supposed to enjoy the fruits of the nationalized as well as the international brands.

Those days, a BMW was a wow on the roads of Kolkata (the place from where I am). I still remember gazing at the pics of the bikes and the automobiles that originated across the border. Back then, it was only America for us. Tinge knowledge of the globalization settled our minds. Today, even a toddler knows about the Nikes and the Addidas, the Porsche and the Mercs!

Globalization have taken its stride to introduce international brands settle in India, providing jobs. Before '91 there were only the government firms and the few private ones like TATA or Bajaj or Reliance, to name a few, or the few Mehtas and the Agarwals' outlets. Now the norms of super markets, glitters India. 20 years into a realization, which I believe can bring about good stead for those 37% (Tendulkar Commission; 2007) individuals below the poverty line, in the coming years of another 15 years may be!

I am not a finance Guru, so that's much I can put my feeling forward. Anyways, its happy birthday to New India and Finance Policy!

Zindegi Na Milegi Dobara...

Life, there will be no second chance to live it!

Zindegi Na Milegi Dobara is a very nice film and I loved it to the full. But have we ever spared a second in thinking for the lives of those, who faces the tough truth, if they don't get blood on time.

Just think.

You have almost 6 liters of the  red fluid in you. Getting bruised and waste it  for useless things, are common. It will not matter if you part away with just 300ml of it, annually, to make things sweeter for you. Not even sparing 10% of what you have. But it means 100% for those you deliver it and those eyes that look through the glass opening of the ICCU/ICU just to see their loved ones, wake up from unconsciousness and wave at them! That's why I mentioned, what I felt: The currency of happiness is Blood. Donate it to receive your pack of happiness.

Think.... and then read on!

IICB Research Scholars' Association (IRSA), is quite analogous to the Graduate Student forum, at Indian Institute of Chemical Biology (A unit of CSIR), Kolkata. It, along with the IICB Club on the whole, had organized the noble event.


Every year, IICB conducts an annual blood donation camp in association with a government recognized blood collection organization like the Haemophilia Society of India, etc. The target is achieved amongst the faculties, office staffs and the scholars of the institute. I have been part of this process for the past two years, experiencing the support, co-operation and labour that goes behind the process. Since my B.Sc first year (2004), every birthday I made it a point to donate blood, once annually. It gives me immense happiness and I shall continue the good work, if I am alive for 55 years... In fact I believe, every individual, healthy to the core, should donate blood once a year. In fact, to ear mark the event, celebrate the "donation" on your birthday. It comes every year! From 18 years to 55 years, you can save many lives. In fact, each donation leads to saving three lives as the blood that you donate is segregated into Plasma, Whole and Erythrocytes, required for different purposes!


Here are some good facts, if you donate your blood:
1) The blood donation creates a positive stress in your body that keeps some of the minor hormones in good stead like the erythropoeitin, which makes your bone marrow work a little more than normal for four days. This is like an exercise that keeps your marrow healthy.
2) In fact, healthy marrow lessens the chance of marrow degradation, with age.
3) The iron store in your body is depleted, which is necessary to keep your iron storage machinery rejuvinated.
4) last and not the least, you get happiness and lots of good wishes that, I promise, will make you feel good!

Annual Blood Donation Camp, 2011.

Indian Institute of Chemical Biology (An Unit of CSIR)

Kolkata, India.

As part of a parting note, I would like to mention the following, that I made up today:

Maladies of Life are the thoughts to be Well!!!

Diagnosis of these Maladies is to BE Well....

By the way, Life will not always give a second chance ( Yeh Na Milegi Dobara!). So live it...let other's live!