Dud Sea Scrawls The Writing, clearly, is not on the wall!

I was very much used to attending Republic and Independence Day parades but the practice had dried down from past few years for various reasons. I just watched the National Flag getting unfurled from Red Fort on DD-1 and stood in attention listening the band playing National Anthem. Many people have many ideas about Nationalism but what gives me the kick most is watching the Flag unfurl and singing Jana Gana Mana with others ( Doing it watching TV will come distant second ). Those 50 odd seconds which happens twice a year makes me feel I am an Indian more than anything else.

Its not surprising though. I have grown up watching parades by factory security group and school children for many years. Complete colony assembled at the parade grounds promptly at 8am to watch the march past and the drill. It was a treat to watch them especially some security guards/officials who had earned medals during their Army career. The sight of this one person who used to dress up with all those 15+ medals he had earned during his long career having fought all three wars and retiring from it due to the bullet injury in 1972 war will be in my mind forever. I sorely missed those parades during high school days but I had the satisfaction of participating in school troupe and later leading it. Though we never really got up early in the morning during hostel days, these were the days when we all bathed and wore white dhoti and shirts to hoist the flag. It was fun and at the same time wonderful experience!

Probably one thing I would regret always is not joining NCC. Since we had to go back to house in factory bus, staying back in school for NCC practice was not possible. I always wonder how it would be to paraticipate in R-Day parade in Delhi. No wonder it is the best thing which can happen to any NCC cadet. Atleast I should watch it as spectator once in my life ( Cheti - I am J !! ). I am not surprised Capn making NCC a major part of his life but I was surely surprised to read Chay was such an active NCC cadet!
This year I was thinking about all the options I had to sing the anthem along with others. I could watch the official ceremony where the CM participates but I thought I would need a pass for it or I could attend near by school’s function. When I was in this dilemma, I happened to read Kauphy’s blog about how she goes to her college every year. That decided my choice. I quickly called up my office Admin people to check about the R-Day events in my office. I had never visited office during these national holidays but this time I found the right opportunity. I also wanted to watch Dr. Kalam on TV but was bit held up in office the previously night. Anyway I always have an option to drop in at my friend’s place anytime during the day. Its always nice to have such good friends who remain the same irrespective of their marital status! Went home late and slept after keeping an alarm at 6:30 am !! Function was okay. There were more security guards than software engineers but my purpose was solved.

Friend called me up and asked about a meet. I called a common friend and asked about his plans and he invited both of us to his home for lunch Friends dont need any reason to meet. Do they?!
Whatever amount of mail or phone talk does not match up to few hours of face to face meet. Though we all know each other from a long time we use every opportunity to meet and buckwaas. After having an excellent lunch I was in no mood to get out of his house but my stupid friends had other plans. I reluctantly joined them. What the use of a good lunch if you dont take a nap after that! After watching us from years, host’s dad asked us to keep our friendship like this forever. Yes Sir

I had taken off on Friday too as we had planned a trek in Western ghats for 3 days. This was some other set of people some of them I had not met. I am not going to go to the details of travel but its suffice to say its one of the best one can hope for in this part of the world. We did not know about it much till we started doing it. Its simply amazing to see greenery around and finding small villages once a while. Most of the villages consist of one or two houses! The kind of reception we got was fabulous. These villages does not even have electricity. They have few acres of land and are satisfied with that much. One small girl told us that she walks 4 Kms to school and some times she is afraid to walk inside the forest! Damn we were walking inside it with torches and first aid kits and still finding it scary and difficult at times and these kids did that as part of their life. We were discussing how army jawans cross terrains like this with constant enemy fire from above and possible ambush from sides. Oh well, its for no reason they are admired the most.

I was thinking aloud whether these village people don’t want to earn more. Someone explained that they are just happy with what they have and dont really bother too much and it us, the city folks, who are after money all the time. We even met a couple who had went back to those jungles after having spent 15 years in city working for some factory. They felt the difficult village life was more contended than the dog life of city. Its amazing to see such a different culture just few kilometers outside town limits. Probably we all can learn few things about happiness from them. After three days of strenuous and yet fantastic experience with mother nature we came back to civilization. The taste of water was nowhere close to the one we got in the ghats. But thats life. Kuch paane ke liye khona padta hai. With a resolve to get back to Nature as early as possible and as frequently as possible we drove back and watching one of the most beautiful sunsets as the area we were travelling consisted of red soil and thus made the experience heavenly.

PS: I had forgotten to carry my camera but I dont regret it as I could not done justice to actual scenario
PPS : [ Patting self ] Two trips in two months. Way to go. Trip a month resolve is working out well !