The Voice of Enigma
I have been listening to songs by Enigma since a long time now, and the more I listen, the more I fall in love with them. They are simply irresistible, it's like an addiction.
I was introduced to Enigma first by my big brother quite a few years back - he had just come back home, having completed his post-graduation, and had already become a complete Enigma fan himself. He had brought the computer back with him - we assembled it and turned it on. First thing he did after that: he turned on the speakers to full volume and played "The Child In Us". By the time the song finished, I was enchanted, to say the least.
The music takes over my mind and puts me into a sort of a trance, especially pieces in "Indian Chanting", "Between Mind and Heart", "The Dream of the Dolphin", "The Child in Us" and many more. The Gregorian chants add a completely different flavour to the music unique only to Enigma. Sometimes it haunts me. It cuts me off from the rest of the world. I am on my own when I am listening to Enigma pouring into my ears. Though the music may be a little loud for some, Enigma somehow has a calming effect on me - it makes me settle down, charge up my soul - really don't know why, but there's no music (other than Pandit Bheemsen Joshi's fantastic collection of Abhanga) that has a similar effect on me.
There's loads of other music that I enjoy listening to - but Enigma is just a class apart!
"Pakistan should think of declaring their bowling"
That's what Aussie commentator Dean Jones joked yesterday as India sliced, peeled and ground the Pakistan bowling apart at Lahore. On a cement-pitch like surface, the likes of Shoaib, Rana and Kaneria had no answers to Sehwag's flamboyance and Dravid's classic combination of defence and strokeplay. The bowling looked so lacklustre and hapless that even Pakistani commentator Rameez Raja had to say that he had never seen a Pakistan bowling unit looking so clueless. I couldn't agree more.
It seemed it was the Australians and South Africans who were enjoying cricket more than anyone else this weekend. Not only that they had a thriller of a match in the VB series at Brisbane, the two umpires officiating in the Lahore test (Darrel Hair and Rudi Koertzen) were also having a good time even as the bowling from both the sides suffered serious whipping. In the commentary box, Dean Jones kept chattering away with his usual witty remarks on the situation in the middle. Towards the end of the day's play, Mohammad Sami was brought on to bowl, who did not exactly look as if he was willing to have a spell. Looking at his tired and pitiable face, Jones joked that he must have lost the toss between the Pakistan bowlers deciding who would be bowling next (the one who loses the toss gets to bowl, of course).
Still, Sami is an honest trier. In that over, he bowled a fastish delivery which Sehwag fended off safely enough to gully. Sami went down the pitch and kept staring at Sehwag. Sehwag, batting on 230-odd at the time, waited, waited and waited, staring back. Finally, as if he got bored of it, he simply said, "
Chal, abhi ball daal". Sami didn't know what to say.
Tekdi
Tekdi is a Marathi word which means a hill or a small mountain.
For me, Tekdi is an institution.
The city of Pune is blessed by some really nice weather almost throughout the year, and a landscape that you will not get bored of that easily. This city is aptly called as the "Queen of the Deccan", a real jewel on the Deccan Plateau that occupies a major part of peninsular India. If I want to mention one thing that's really special about the landscape here is the necklace of hills that surrounds Pune and at a few places even penetrates deep into the city from three sides. These hills are favourite getaways for a variety of folks (not necessarily in that order):
a. Fitness freaks
b. Lovers
c. Senior citizens
d. Kids and their (usually panting by the time they reach the hilltop) mothers
e. Some really cute birds (read girls if you're a guy ;-))
You'll find loads of activity going on atop the hills in the early hours of the morning and in the evening. People coming to exercise will be seen jogging along the pathways (listening to iPods these days); lovebirds will usually be seen in pairs meandering along or cuddled up somewhere admiring the beautiful scenery (and each other, of course)...If you observe carefully enough, either of them will still give an admiring glance to some hunk or babe passing by; senior citizens will be seen striding past enthusiastically (I admit, these are the most enthusiastic and sincere people I see on Tekdi :)), but even more zealously, they will be discussing about the nation's state in world politics or some ongoing scandal in such a high tone that it could even be heard by Dr. Manmohan Singh sitting in his office on Raisoni Hills (that's in New Delhi, by the way)...kids will be running here and there playing around having their best time of the day...It's a really energetic and cheerful atmosphere up there.
It's precisely this thing that makes Tekdi an institution for me - it really refreshes my body and mind when I go there once or twice a week after work. You get to see so many different people having a good time, that it rubs on you automatically. I get to meet some old friends who I don't see too often these days; and all this happens as a bonus just as I try my bit to maintain my fitness! Tekdi means a lot more to quite a few other people than to myself - so much so that they go there every day and spend 2-3 hours there, have websites and community groups dedicated to Tekdi and what not...in fact, I know a few couples that met each other for the first time on Tekdi, grew in relationship and got married! Tekdi has become the de facto community centre for a good number of Pune's citizens now...
Set the ball rolling...
Finally I decide to write something voluntarily...and that's after a long gap of 5 years.
Last time I did this was in my second year in engineering, when I had written an article for our
college magazine. It didn't make for a very enjoyable or leisure-time reading (a little justified, though, as it was meant for the science section of the magazine) and basically just contained a compilation of some facts and hypotheses put forth by some scientists regarding a theory , saying, in a nutshell, that the Earth is a like a living organism. Personally, I had really liked the idea when I first read about it in an old issue of the
Geographical. (Interested folks can just google for "gaia hypothesis" and get a little too much of information - better read my article on it instead - it's short, concise and simple enough to be compiled by a rookie 19-year old. There's a tiny problem though - the magazine issue is no more in circulation).
So this is the first time after that effort, where people would get something to read from me which they
might find a little interesting. Proof of this statement: the only things I wrote in these 5 years meant for other people to read were examination answer books or documentation on software that I've worked on.
So why the title "Manache Shloak"? For the uninitiated,
Manache Shloak are a fantastic collection of short verses in Marathi (the language spoken in the state of Maharashtra, India), written by
Samartha Ramdas, a patriotic 17th century saint. The speciality of the
Manache Shloak is the simplicity in which they are written. They bring about the truths in life and guidelines for people to follow in their lives in such a simple straight form that they are hard to forget or erase from your mind. We used to have regular recitals of the Shloaks (verses) in primary school, and we students used to know literally hundreds of them by heart. So the title will keep me reminding of the bare truths they taught us, and also as a side effect, those glorious innocent childhood days, which remain to be "the best days of my life" until now.
