indomitableness

An ode to the desert trees of Bahrain. 

In the parched realms, it seldom rains,

Life is sparse,  yet the hardiest reins,

In those barren lands to nature’s dare,

Trees stand resolute but few and rare.

Adversities turn to occasion for brilliance, 

Not soil sweet, strong winds built resilience,

In the arid silence, their roots entwine, 

With each storm, their strengths redefine.

Twisted but resolved,  the sentinels of hope,

Throughout time, they persist, they cope,

Silhouetted, against the expanse of sand,

testament to the enduring spirit of this land.

That old boat

When I looked at the boat, I got a bit emotional and reflected on the life in general.....

The Old Boat

Towering waves, I twirled with grace, 

Each fierce storm, a fleeting embrace,

Sang melody to the gulls, carefree, 

Flirted along fishes silver and glee.

To wind’s might, my sails aligned,

Salt and Sun in  journey intertwined,

Forces then I braved, as a child’s play,

Those memories now softly sway.

Old and abandoned is today’s reality,

Time is relentless in its truth or cruelty, 

To kings and paupers, its march unkind, 

In its silent hands, all destinies entwined.

 

At the piano

“I have never been in a haunted house,” said Anita to her friends. The girls were having a sleepover at her place, and the theme for the night was paranormal experiences. “But my aunt was in one such situation in her teens.”

“Sean had lived there with his parents since childhood. When the siblings grew up, they moved out of their parents' home to start their families but never left the locality. He moved to a house down the street from my aunt’s home and as he was married to her uncle’s sister, she used to call him uncle Sean.” 

“One night, their daughter, who was 7 at the time, complained about a terrible headache and the doctors failed to save her from a rare cardiovascular ailment”.

“I am keeping my fingers crossed that it won't be another of those creepypasta,' one of the girls quipped. These young horror story enthusiasts were not prepared to settle for just any story. Hannah’s yawning was a signal that they could get bored rather fast.

“My aunt learnt much later that this was one of those places where many households observed strange things at odd hours. If rumors were to be believed, the deceased souls found it difficult to depart if they died here,” Anita added to keep the interest. “It should come as no surprise that many visitors report strange happenings.”

“The family was devastated, and a sense of Guilt constantly gnawed at their heart, questioning if they could have prevented the tragedy, if they had missed a red flag, a silent sign maybe. Yet, woven through the sorrow was a fierce love, a refusal to let go. They clung to memories by putting up large, framed photos on the outside and feeling her laughter echoing through the inside.”

“They went away temporarily to another city after the funeral, leaving the house in the care of her close relatives. Sean's wife, a musician, opted for music as her therapy and solitude as the vehicle to get her out of this grief” Anita continued.

My aunt’s family often visited the house to ensure it was not falling into disrepair and one afternoon they took my aunt along. She was very excited to find a grand piano in the living room and could not resist the desire to try it. 

“You go check the house while I check out the piano” she told her father. Letting her try the piano, her father and uncle went to check out a few things in the house. 

As she played the piano, she felt something soft brush against her ankles. “It must be my dress”, she thought, dismissing the sensation, and continued playing. Trying to pull her dress up, she realized that she was only wearing a short dress. “Maybe it was one of the neighborhood cats, who strayed in finding the lights on” she assumed. But then, she felt it again.

Fear gripped her heart as she peered under the piano, searching for the source of the touch. But there was nothing there. She resumed playing, her fingers trembling over the keys, her mind racing with a mix of curiosity and dread. Suddenly, she felt tiny hands clasp her legs tightly, pulling them upwards. A scream caught in her throat as she struggled against the unseen force. She leapt from the piano bench and rushed to the basement door, her heart pounding in her chest. She looked up at the wall to notice the picture was missing from the frame.

"Uncle! Dad!" she exclaimed, her voice quivering with fear. Hurriedly, her uncle and father emerged from the basement, their expressions etched with deep concern. "What happened?" uncle inquired, his voice tinged with worry. With her breath still catching, my aunt began to recount the harrowing encounter she had just endured. As she spoke, her uncle's complexion grew visibly pale, and he whispered in a hushed tone, almost inaudible, "It's her."

 The girls were now closer to each other and looking at Anita with curiosity mixed with fear.

“My sister, a talented pianist, used to play this game with her daughter," he said, his voice filled with sadness. "In the evenings, she played the piano, the daughter would crawl underneath, grab her ankles, and push her feet up and down on the pedals.”

 A collective shiver coursed through the spines as the girls envisioned an ethereal presence in the house. Not as a mere ghost, but embodiment of a young girl's playful spirit. The home where she spent all her life has transcended the boundary of life and death to become a sanctuary for her, a place where she could continue to play around her beloved piano, even in death.

Just then, they all turned towards Anita’s piano in unison, did they just hear it playing!

 

 

 

The pink Diamond

 

Many million years ago, when humanity as we know it had yet to evolve, the world was a vastly different place. A place of primal beauty, where creatures roamed the Earth with no knowledge of language or civilization. Amidst this ancient world, there lived two lovers named Ron and Ana, their names unspoken but their bond unbreakable.

Ron and Ana were inseparable, their connection transcending the primitive boundaries of their time. Their love was wordless, expressed through their actions, their eyes, and the warmth of their touch. They shared a unique connection, a deep and unspoken understanding of each other.

One fateful day, a natural disaster struck their land. The earth trembled, and the skies rained fire and ash. Ron and Ana, like many others, perished in the cataclysmic event. Ron's body was reduced to dust, mingling with the winds, and becoming one with the elements. But Ana's fate was different.

As the disaster unfolded, Ana's body was thrust deep beneath the Earth's surface. Thousands of miles below, under immense heat and pressure, carbon atoms began to crystallize, forming a precious gemstone. Ana's essence, her very being, slowly transformed into a radiant diamond.

Time marched on, and life on Earth evolved in countless forms and shapes. Souls wandered the world, reincarnating into new bodies and experiencing life in its various dimensions. Yet, even in these new incarnations, Ron's soul remained restless, an undying ember of love that continued to seek out its counterpart.

Then, one day, something extraordinary happened. Ron's soul, in its eternal quest to find Ana, encountered a breath-taking sight. In a bustling city of the new world, he spotted the most beautiful lady he had ever seen. Her eyes sparkled with the same depth of understanding he had shared with Ana, and her presence held an inexplicable familiarity.

But it was not her beauty alone that captivated him. Around her neck hung a pendant—a magnificent pink diamond, a rare gem that glowed with an inner light, much like the love that had bound him and Ana together in that primordial era.

That night, as Ron drifted into a dream, he found himself in a realm beyond time and space. In the dream, he stood beside Ana, their essence transcending physical forms. Ana spoke to him, her voice a harmonious whisper carried by the winds of eternity.

"Ron," she began, her words echoing through the timeless void, "I have waited for you through countless ages. Deep beneath the Earth's surface, I endured unbearable pressure, my essence slowly transforming into this beautiful pink diamond. I've watched over you, as you continued your journey through time, seeking me."

Tears welled in Ron's dreamlike eyes, and he reached out to touch the diamond pendant around the neck of the lady who resembled his long-lost love.

Ana's voice continued, "Our love is eternal, Ron. It has endured through the ages, and now, we have found each other again. The diamond that you see is my heart, crystallized but still pulsating with the love we once shared."

In that timeless realm, Ron and Ana embraced, their love transcending the boundaries of time, space, and form. Even though they had evolved into new bodies and the world had transformed, their love remained a constant, an unbreakable bond that not even the passage of millions of years could erode.

As Ron awoke from his dream, he knew that he had finally found Ana. Their love, symbolized by the beautiful pink diamond, was a testament to the enduring power of love, a love that had traveled through time itself to reunite two souls, bound by a connection that not even the Earth's deepest depths could sever.

Ruminating

 

There is one thing in common among young hostel boarders and particularly those from engineering colleges. All have spent hours debating, arguing and fighting on topics ranging from anything to everything on their tryst to establish a point or two. Walls of our hostel rooms have been exposed to countless ideas, arguments and logical interpretations fueled by gallons of coloured liquids be it tea, coffee or any other fermented variety. There were some who built their arguments on a solid foundation of references and statistics while others relied on the strength of their vocal cords. 

My way of life was more like Winnie, finding more fun to talk with someone who doesn't use long, difficult words but rather short, easy words like "What about lunch?” ( A.A. Milne, Winnie-the-Pooh).

One live issue had been India’s post independence growth and development alibi our successive government’s inability to alleviate the conditions of the poor. My point of view has always been that it is not so much the politicians who failed us as much  our bureaucrats and technocrats did. 

Country’s fascination with engineering or medical professionals has deprived us of the much needed social thinkers and planners. This resulted in partial if not complete failure in achieving what we ought to have achieved through our five year plans. I acknowledge that we needed to achieve a lot and had to reach out to all corners of this vast country. Retrospectively we ought to have asked ourselves “how do you eat an elephant?” No offence meant to the elephant and planned accordingly.

We have miserably failed  to connect our villages to the cities, creating opportunities for those  middlemen who take advantage of the producers. When we build highways, we let our government run public works departments to design, build and maintain them, leading to another round of corruption for lack of appropriate checks and balances. A prudent way could have been to let the private entities build and maintain our highways while PWD monitors those, thus having two parties accountable for this rather than none. 

Unfortunately 77  years down the road, we still struggle to connect our people and bypass the unscrupulous brokers.

It’s not all that will agree with my opinion, they never did and some might ask me to shut up but I will end this by reminding what a young girl had once said. “People can tell you to keep your mouth shut, but that doesn't stop you from having your own opinion.”
― Anne Frank, The Diary of a Young Girl

A Fishing Port by the Night

 Today, I remembered that I do have an active blog but the reality is that I am a bit lazy to write.  

Here is a picture of a fishing port in Arad, Bahrain from last weekend

COVID-19 – Journey from Normal to the New Normal

Sooner we accept the reality that COVID-19 will not go away soon, the better equipped we shall be to endure it. Moreover, when it does go, it won’t be a definitive ending like a project completion, It would fade away rather slowly with only statistics to confirm its departure.

Our history syllabus although designed for a broad grasp of major historical developments, missed out on the pandemics of the past centuries. Absence of these from our collective subconscious left us out of depths when COVID struck. Microbes were the invisible enemy then as now and the survivors will be left behind licking the wounds like the in the past.

The Bubonic plague, which also originated in the East Asia continued for 5 years from 1347 claiming an estimated 75 to 200 million scalps. The Spanish flu of 1918 is more recent and continued for over a year claiming 17 to 50 million human lives.

If history is to be believed, a recession with unprecedented impact on the global economy is inevitable. The jagged rocks will surface as the tide recedes but we should use this crisis as an opportunity to rethink our priorities. Undoubtedly, one of the biggest lessons is the necessity of private and public investment in the health system.

The need for social distancing have shaken the foundation of the very first pillar of civilization, the construction industry. With lockdown in every other city, we suddenly found ourselves at the mercy of the new estate, the digital estate. Not able to reach the offices, the A-E firms finally jumped, albeit clumsily into the world of “work- from-home”.

Another equally old profession, teaching too witnessed similar paradigm shift. After a brief pause, schools restarted classes using available technologies as students got the taste of “Learn-from-home”.

In the coming days this clumsiness will disappear as the change become more pervasive and the technology further augmented. Before we realize the full implication of the changes, we will transition into the world where these will be “new normal”.

The lean business models and where the employer does not pay the utility bills or travel allowances is not expected to face resistance from the business leaders.

Let’s visualize together what could be the “new normal”, looking beyond face mask, 20 seconds’ hand wash, sanitizer and “work- from-home”:

• With more people working from home, the demand for office spaces will decline.
• As people get used to shopping online, the demand of malls too will also see a downward trend.
• When we spend more time at our homes, demand for spacious residences are bound to increase. This might very well set a trend of people moving away from the overcrowded cities.
• Freed up real-estate of the cities will require new functions and new visionaries will arrive at the scenes to redefine the societal priorities.
• A journey of trial & error will begin leading to innovation and trend setting.
• Multifunctional areas that support work & leisure together will evolve as people reinvent spaces for social interactions.
• The geographical boundaries and physical distance will become even more irrelevant as students in the remote countryside will access superstar instructors in megalopolis. 
• Reduction of the carbon footprints at individual levels is bound to bring the clean air & starry nights to our cities.

·     History will salutes the ones who embraces the chaos and opt for a seamless transition into the world of “new normal”.