Dombivili Diaries

I just returned from one of the best weekends of my life... Full of music, learning, fun and masti :D Thanks to Krishnan Keshavan for inviting me over to Dombivili... For those who don't know, Krishnan is this really cool dude. Very very talented musician (he sings amazingly well and composes tunes that you just cant get out of your head. They send waves of bliss flowing down you every time you hear one of them...) and one of the leads of The Bhakti Band (http://www.bhaktitheconcert.com/)
Its been a long time since I last posted something here. I thought this would be a good experience to share... Life was going on as usual; same arbit schedules of the average IITian, sleepless nights, snoring in classes, hanging out in Rahul's room (amazing view... He stays in the new hostel of IITB on the 6th floor) or Mugdha's lab at night, generally running around the campus doing arbit stuff, making plans to get up early every morning and making full use of the snooze facility etc... The latest YES!+ with Rashmin Bhaiya recently ended and 25 odd people became much happier, more content and more capable of living a happy and stress free life... :D
Then came the Ganesh Utsav and a five day holiday from acads!!! (5 days assuming a friday bunk in between... Taken for granted ;) ) I had made great plans to go ahead of what my profs are teaching... :P hahahahahahhahaha :D I'll never make the mistake of making such mindless stupid hopeless plans again... Energy may or may not be conserved in this universe... But students (if this doesn't apply to you, please stop reading my blog) can never go ahead of what their profs are teaching. You just cant find time no matter how many holidays in between you get. There's probably some law preventing this. The universe will conspire against you if you make such plans. Manage your time extremely well, use all the "free time" (defined: the time when the only option you have other than sitting and studying is sitting and staring at you nails) you have to actually study and you "might" be on par with what your profs are teaching... (again, if this doesn't apply to you, please stop reading this blog... :P ) Same thing happened to me... Wednesday went peacefully. Got up late after the 6 days of the YES!+ course, played guitar, studied for "some" time, chilled with friends etc... I got a call from Krishnan telling me he needs a guitarist for a satsang in Mulund. Now, I am a beginner guitarist. The maximum crowd in which I've played is around 20 people in our weekly IIT satsangs. And that too, I only manage to play few songs and had very limited knowledge of scales. I could never play unfamiliar songs impromptu. I told Krishnan that Im just a beginner, but he convinced me to show up. I ditched the IIT satsang (missed an awesome session with Rashmin Bhaiya, I was told later... But Im still happy I went.. :) ) and went to Mulund with Pramod Bhaiya's guitar (he has a semi acoustic... I just have an acoustic guitar.. cant be plugged into an amplifier).
The Mulund satsang was a new experience for me. First time I would be playing guitar on the stage, with real professionals. There was a professional keyboardist who was hired from somewhere. Krishnan on the vocals and few other talented singers. Amazing percussionists (tabla and djambe)... Just me from the beginner category. Luckily, my guitar dint get plugged in and the mike they kept in front of the guitar wasnt so effective. I was for all practical purposes playing just for myself :P and was only very faintly audible to the audience. So it wasnt so testing and I managed to pull it off with very few glitches. Playing on stage with professionals is a really challenging task. It needs extreme awareness and immense concentration... especially with a singer like Krishnan who raises the energy of the song so high and the beats get extremely fast. The experience was very painful and rewarding at the same time. I did goof up slightly at few instances, but managed to cover it up without making it noticable, thanks to the loud cover of the keyboard :). This was my first feel of a public satsang, with new songs and a totally new atmosphere altogether. Im very very grateful for such an experience. I learnt everything the easy way without having to go through any embarrassing situations on stage. After this, I got some confidence and realized that I'm not that bad a guitar player after all :D... Krishnan called me again to a satsang in Dombivili for the weekend and I just had to accept it... :) Once again, thanks to Krishnan for giving me this opportunity.
While returning, I was at kanjur marg looking for an auto to IIT. I saw a guy getting into an auto saying Hiranandani. I immediately ran after him and asked if he would drop me at the IIT main Gate. He said yes. We had a nice long conversation during the drive. He was into analyzing loan repayment capacities or something like that. He had met a lot of IITians and had a lot to share. We discussed finance, MBA, careers, IIT life, life outside and other things. I took his card and we bid goodbye.
We (me, Rahul and others) had a plan of going to Essel World on Saturday, but it got ditched due to unforeseen circumstances. So saturday, after lunch I left for Krishnan's house with my guitar and a change of clothes (plan was to stay overnight and return after the sunday satsang). I left at 3.30, but dint get an auto for a very long time. I saw an auto outside the main gate and a guy sitting in it. Many people go from IIT go to Kanjur Marg, so I just asked him if he was heading over to Kanjur Marg. He was going to Ghatkopar. I asked him if he could drop me to Ghatkopar station... His house turned out to be very near the station. So I went with him to Ghatkopar station. Again, had a nice long conversation with him about this and that. He turned out to be a final year PhD student in IIT. He too had done the YES!+ course. He said he loved it. But he had lost touch with the practices. He was really interested in getting back in touch and said he would repeat the course whenever he got the time. After ensuring he was on the mailing list, I bid him goodbye and soon was on a slow local to dombivili. I was worried I would be late as Krishnan had said satsang was at 5... :P Finally it started at 7.45. The time given was 7.30. At 5 there were some pujas there.
In the train, I met this awesome guy from Hyderabad. He was all drunk, though he was fairly conscious. He started talking about his life, wife and her family. He spoke about his job, mother in law, his brother and many other things. He had an awesome attitude. He kept saying "life me tension nhn leneka. Me bilkul tension nhn leta hun... me aisa hi hun. meri saas ko bahut problem hota hai iske waje se..." and more on those lines.. He said," maine biwi ko bola hai ki raat ko 9 baje aunga. par 5.30 tak pahunch jaunga. sahi time batao toh message pe message aega. aur meri biwi punjabi hai. Punjabiyon ka dimag hamesha bht garam rehta hai... sambhalna padta hai..." He narrated few incidents to illustrate his points. It was fun chatting with him (though I mostly listened while he spoke... :P u can never interrupt a girl on the phone or a drunk guy talking about his mother in law... )
After this interesting experience, I reached Krishnan's house by around 5.20. There he said me that the satsang is actually at 7.30 :P We had some time to practice etc... So we jammed a little. He gave me few tips here and there. I fixed my scale and timing. This satsang, I was the only accompaniment apart from percussion. So I couldn't hide behind the keyboard like last time!!! :P
And Krishnan, like a true professional, does a lot of improvisation and nothing is really planned on paper in his satsang. He moves with the flow. I was worried how it would go... I managed to pull it off :D No flaws... Krishnan blew everyone off with his amazing energetic voice... Everyone were dancing and singing loudly... It was lovely... And after the satsang, many people came to me and praised my guitar playing... Felt new and nice :D I gained more confidence on my guitar. We returned to Krishnan's house and chatted for some time. Krishnan's mom fed us really awesome rice, rasam etc... Home made food, that too south India food :D :D :D... reminded me of my home... Aunty too chatted with us for a while... After a good night's sleep, we got up; I did a bit of studying (had to... :P lots left over), we did a lot of jamming, came up with some amazing tunes ( I got to see a lot of Krishnan's talent this weekend :D the guy rocks.... \m/ ) watched videos of masters in action (Hariharan, Shankar Mahadevan etc...) chatted about this and that and then went for the satsang again in the evening. This time, I was more confident. I was able to play more fluently than before. Though, one of the female singers started singing, I couldn't identify her scale. Covered it with some other scale, but I wasn't satisfied... Neither was Krishnan... But at that point, neither of us could identify the scale. Apart from that one song, everything else was top class... :D People loved it. Again they jumped with joy, sang out, danced and rejoiced... Felt awesome to see that while playing the guitar to Krishnan's singing.
Again my guitar playing was much appreciated (turns out that glitch in identifying the scale was not noticed by people \m/ :) ) and I left Dombivili to Mugdha's house. Krishnan had to leave for another satsang immediately... I went to Mugdha's house, arrived just in time for the Aarti... :D Had an awesome dinner there with her, Pramod Bhaiya and few of her relatives. Then we left for IIT...

It was an amazing weekend for me :D I feel I have progressed a lot as a guitar player, thanks to Krishnan, for giving me the opportunity and experience and sharing his knowledge with me... I had a great time at Dombivili with the DOmbivili Idol, Krishnan Keshavan and I'm eagerly looking forward to the next time I get to play with him for a satsang :D

All the best for all your endeavors.... :D

Lunch with God!!!

Hi all :D
I got this beautiful story as a forward and just had to share it here... We don't realize the importance of the little things in life. They make life worth living and true joy can be found in these little things :) The story goes:

A little boy wanted to meet God. He knew it was going to be a long journey, so he packed few packets of wafers and a few bottles of juice and set out. When he had gone few blocks away, he met an elderly man. The man was sitting on a bench in a park, feeding some pigeons. The boy sat down next to him and opened his backpack to have a drink, when he noticed that the man appeared a bit hungry. So he offered him a wafer. The man accepted it gratefully and smiled at the boy. His smile was so pleasant that the boy wanted to see it again. So he offered him some juice. Again the man smiled at him. The little boy was delighted! They sat there all afternoon eating, drinking and smiling, but never said a word. Soon it become late and the boy realized he had to get home. So he packed his stuff and got up to leave. But before he could go many steps away, he turned, ran back to the man and gave him a hug... The man gave him his biggest smile ever. Later, when his mother opened the door to his bell, she was surprised by the look of joy on his face and asked him, "What have you been doing to make you so happy?". He replied, " I had lunch with God today!". Before his mother could respond, he added "You know, God has the most beautiful smile ever!".

Meanwhile, the elderly man, also radiant with joy entered his house. His surprised son asked him, "Dad what did you do today that made you so happy?". The man replied, "I had wafers and juice with God today!" Before his son could respond, he added "You know God is much younger than I expected!"

Too often we underestimate the power of a touch,

a smile,

a kind word,

a listening ear,

an honest compliment,

or the smallest act of caring,

all of which have the potential to turn a life around.

People come into our lives for a reason,

a season,

or a lifetime.

Faith... ??

Faith has always been a topic of conflict. Faith, by definition means accepting something without knowing all the facts about it. Its about belief & trust. We all have faith at various levels... Faith on our parents, friends, politicians (yeah right... :P ), doctor (if not, better change your doctor.. :P ), God (unless you're an atheist.. ), the architect and masons who built the building you're in right now (if not, RUN!!! ) etc... etc...
The most conflicting aspect of faith is faith in God or the unseen power. I for one am not an atheist & believe in God. To me, faith in the divine is knowing that life is a game... Chill maaro yaar; everything is being taken care of :) There is an up for every down. "Its the darkest before dawn"... etc... I feel having faith in the divine does not weaken you. It in fact empowers you to see things as a game; look at your problems as challenges and gives you the energy & enthusiasm to tackle them head on. I got this story in a forward. Wanted to share it... Many of you might have already read it... Here it goes anyways :

A business executive was deep in debt and could see no way out. Creditors were closing in on him. Suppliers were demanding payment. He sat on the park bench, head in hands, wondering if anything could save his company from bankruptcy.

Suddenly an old man appeared before him. “I can see that something is troubling you,” he said. After listening to the executive’s woes, the old man said, “I believe I can help you.”

He asked the man his name, wrote out a check, and pushed it into his hand saying, “Take this money. Meet me here exactly one year from today, and you can pay me back at that time.” The business executive saw in his hand a check for $500,000, signed by John D. Rockefeller, then one of the richest men in the world!

“I can erase my money worries in an instant!” he realized. But instead, the executive decided to put the un-cashed check in his safe. Just knowing it was there might give him the strength to work out a way to save his business, he thought.

With renewed optimism, he negotiated better deals and extended terms of payment. He closed several big sales. Within a few months, he was out of debt and making money once again.

One year later, he returned to the park with the un-cashed check. At the agreed-upon time, the old man appeared. But just as the executive was about to hand back the check and share his success story, a nurse came running up and grabbed the old man.

“I’m so glad I caught him!” she cried. “I hope he hasn’t been bothering you. He’s always escaping from the home and telling people he’s John D. Rockefeller.”And she led the old man away.

The astonished executive just stood there, stunned. All year long he’d been wheeling and dealing, buying and selling, convinced he had half a million dollars behind him.

Suddenly, he realized that it wasn’t the money that had turned his life around. It was his newfound self-confidence that gave him the power to achieve anything he went after.

All the best for all your endeavors... Have fun and enjoy life :)

The Old Carpenter

I came across this short story by Swami Vivekananda.... It was amazing & I just had to share it here. Thanks to Chaitali Joshi for sending me the link to IIT Madras' Vivekananda Study Circle which you should all check out btw... http://www.vsc.iitm.ac.in/
The story goes:

An elderly carpenter was ready to retire. He told his
employer-contractor of his plans to leave the house building
business and live a more leisurely life with his wife enjoying his
extended family. He would miss the paycheck, but he needed to retire.
They could get by. The contractor was sorry to see his good
worker go and asked if he could build just one more house as a personal favor.
The carpenter said yes, but in time it was easy to see that his heart
was not in his work. He resorted to shoddy workmanship and used
inferior materials. It was an unfortunate way to end his career.
When the carpenter finished his work and the builder came to inspect the house,
the contractor handed the front-door key to the carpenter.
"This is your house," he said, "my gift to you."
What a shock! What a shame! If he had only known he was building his own house,
he would have done it all so differently. Now he had to live in the home he had
built none too well. So it is with us. We build our lives in a distracted way,
reacting rather than acting, willing to put up less than the best.
At important points we do not give the job our best effort.
Then with a shock we look at the situation we have created
and find that we are now living in the house we have built.
If we had realized that we would have done it differently.
Think of yourself as the carpenter. Think about your house.
Each day you hammer a nail, place a board, or erect a wall.
Build wisely. It is the only life you will ever build.
Even if you live it for only one day more, that day deserves to be
lived graciously and with dignity.
The plaque on the wall says, "Life is a do-it- yourself project."
Your life tomorrow will be the result of your attitudes
and the choices you make today.

I guess we can all relate to this story at various levels. We have this amazing habit of doing something halfheartedly & then regretting/cursing ourselves after... This is probably one of the biggest impediments to us achieving happiness in life. We must give our 100% in everything we do. Then the results wont matter at all then. I guess moving under the assumption that all our duties are going to contribute to the building of our own house would take us a long way forward...
I'd like to conclude in Swami Vivekananda's own words, "Come up O lions, and shake off the delusion that you are sheep; you are soul immortal, spirits free and eternal "

GRA trip, Summer 2011

So we have this forum/community in IIT called the GRA. It stands for Group for Rural Activities. GRA has a simple yet very powerful purpose. It aims at giving rural exposure to the enthu IITian... We at GRA believe that our country will develop & move forward when our villages develop & move forward. To be a part of this, we first need to understand rural life firsthand, not through media or hearsay. So during the semester, we have many talks & presentations by people who are actively working in some rural area in some part of the country & we also make small visits to rural or related projects in and around the beautiful city of Mumbai. Apart from this, our main attraction if you will, is a 4-5 day camp at the end of every academic semester, where we actually pack few sets of clothes and a brush (some get soap too :P) and go live in a rural setting. We normally visit villages where significant development has been or is being done in a sustainable manner. Last year we visited Ralegan Siddhi, the village of Anna Hazareji, stayed there for 3 days & also visited a few projects related to watershed development in & around Pune.
This year, We visited 3 places over a period of 5 days. The first place we visited was an NGO named Shashwat in Bhimashankar, Maharashtra. It is run by an IIT alumnus & his wife, Mr. Anand Kapoor & Kusum taai... It was really inspiring to see an IITian (IIT Kgp, BTech Civil with Honours) living in a tribal area for so many years & serving the nation & its people. It was started for the victims of the Dimbhe dam construction. The tribals of that area were relocated very nicely on paper, but practically they were landless & had no water for irrigation. Kusum taai used to randomly go into the tribal lands & just live with a family & do all their general housework. She soon had an excellent rapport with them & soon she and Anandji started working there fulltime. Anandji made an excellent point... Never work "for" the people. Work "with " the people. You are not doing anyone a favor here. Its every citizen's duty to give back to his nation & people. We all are happily sitting in the comfort of our homes/ hostels enjoying uninterrupted power & water... We have no idea who is paying for it & how much.
We visited their tribal school & stayed the night with the children there. The school was really inspiring. They take in dropouts from other schools & turn them into educated responsible people. The kind of challenges they faced were immense & it was a real humbling experience for all of us.
We next visited a village called Hivre Bazar in Ahmednagar district, Maharashtra. Its a model village & one of the best. As we entered the village, we thought we were entering some university campus!!! :P It was that good... The person responsible for this village's present is its ex-sarpanch Shri Poppatrao Pawar. We were fortunate enough to meet him inspite of his extremely busy schedule. One thing I got from his speech was that he was extremely forceful & ambitious. He never feared any challenge. He was unanimously elected sarpanch for many terms & united the village & brought about many excellent reforms socially, economically and morally. We then roamed the village interacting with the villagers. We could see the difference in the attitudes of urban people & rural people. I was really impressed with rural India :) We asked a group of young guys if they never had any problem with so many rules... They gave a weird look & said ki "yeh apne liye hi toh hai. Isse humme hi faidha ho rha hai. Problem kyun hoga???" When we asked what happens if someone breaks a rule, they said its immediately reported & the person is fined or some action is taken. When asked if this doesn't cause strained relations, they again gave us those weird looks & said "kyun? kuch galat kiya toh fine dena hi hai na... Aur kuch sochne ke liye hai hi nhi..." :) I remembered Kusum taai's words, "I first had to unlearn all the horrible things I learnt in the city after coming here. Then I was happy once more & we could start working".
Next we visited an NGO called Snehalaya in Ahmednagar city. This visit probably touched the deepest regions of our hearts... It was an experience at a level beyond the mind or intellect. The NGOs focus is on women & children in red light areas & slums. They also help in treatment & rehabilitation of HIV affected people & children. The level of commitment & dedication of the volunteers was truly amazing. Some of us had tears in our eyes while we were visiting the projects & listening to the volunteers speak. They have many centres in slums, red light areas and in 2-3 different parts of the city where the children are kept in excellent living conditions & holistic development. The children were extremely happy & we couldn't see ny lack in them at all. We were told that they were put in the top schools of the city & were topping there too :) It was a really touching experience. One of the most active volunteers there who was overlooking the construction of a major HIV research facility & rehabilitation center was himself a HIV patient. It was great to see his gratitude t oSnehalaya in saving him & his positive approach to life. He knows he is going to die in few years. Yet he's doing great work for others like him & the organization. We also visited their childline office & got to hear some really interesting incidents they went through to rescue children.
All in all, it was a great visit, very very inspiring & humbling. We learnt to appreciate our lives much much more & got a sense of our responsibilities & duties... I'm looking forward to the next GRA camp eagerly... :)
Wait for more....

My First Post... :)

Hi to all!!! I've been thinking of writing a blog & giving a means for my creative energies to flow for a very very long time... But I was just too lazy... Finally I decided to just do it. So here's my first ever post :D
I'm doing my B Tech in the Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay. If you haven't heard of it before, please don't read my blog :P
The main motivation for writing this blog is for me to be able to share all the little & big incidents/anecdotes/tests/experiences that life throws in my way as I navigate through it & extract whatever learning/memories/humor they have to offer...
You will find mostly experiences shared here and probably some inspiring articles/poems and the occasional joke/riddle or as we fondly call in apna insti lingo, "fatte" also known as PJs or Poor Jokes- really horrible jokes that are so senseless that people cant help laughing- of which I am a master ;) as those who know me will testify...
A word about my blog's name... In case you didn't get it, its the full form of LIFE. I realized this probably when I was in my first year. About when I become very active with the Art Of Living & got a guru in HH Sri Sri Ravishankar (to be referred to fondly as Guruji hereafter). This is when I learnt a lot about life & met some amazing people who helped me in this amazing journey called LIFE :)
So have fun, enjoy this blog & all the best for all your endeavours in life :)