2008-2009, the decade that changed the world...

On a warm blue September day in 2001, Mohammed Atta, an Egyptian architect from Germany, forced his way into the cockpit of American Airlines Flight 11 bound for San Francisco, flew it into the World Trade Center Tower 1 and changed everything. No hostages, No released prisoners, no cash, just this humble Al Qaeda goal: The destruction of free liberal Western democracy as we know it.

With the idea unleashed, the decade saw reproductions. India's Parliament in 2001, the Madrid train bombings in 2002, the London transport system in 2004, the Sharm Al-Sheikh hotel attacks in 2005, the Bali nightclub bombings in 2005, Mumbai 26/11/08.

Till the end of the 1990s, people saw terrorists as holding innocent people to bargain for something. The last decade has shown us the willingness of cosmopolitan, educated young, moneyed people using the Internet revolution that's happened in parallel, to be taken in by the appeal of martyrdom and spectacularly kill themselves for Osama Bin Laden.

The world scrambled to react. America led the excitement with the catch phrase, "War Against Terror" and the clear declaration, "Either you're with us or against us". "We're with you", India shouted, "We've known terrorism almost daily, now you know what it feels like to be us" and other such brotherhood ideas were loudly proclaimed. The Americans weren't listening and didn't care. The only time America did say, "What's going on here?" was in December of 2001, when some Lashkar people showed up in jeeps to blow up our Parliament and we said we might go to war.

As the decade rolled on, there were surprises, disappointments, optimism, shame, joy, elation and apologies, but none predictable. The sudden rise (and complete domination of) the Congress party from a position of relative weakness made pundits look foolish and made the BJP's India Shining slogan work against them as India shone essentially to, and for, the Congress.

Even though an economic rise was guessed, 8 per cent GDP or thereabouts as Europe shrunk, elated us and generated a lot of chat about the rise of a new India and its consuming power. A young nation gained confidence from earning and spending much sooner than their parents did, call centre jobs and a visit from President Bush ("We love you" our prime minister said).

And the poster child of this new India, certainly post elections, was Rahul Gandhi, proving his dexterity at balancing convoluted patriarchal alliances with new-age consultant thinking, all the while carrying his charm with the good looks of a Turkish lothario.

Some things came as no surprise: politicians held up bags of money in Parliament exposing bribes they said were offered to switch affiliation. This came some years after a news organisation held covert operations (coined "sting" to sound forceful I suppose) to expose a shocking new reality. Politicians caught on camera taking bribes in suitcases.

A large debate ensued about the venal and barbaric nature of the elected corrupt while those accused defended themselves by

a) claiming they were set up,

b) threatening and shutting down the news organisation in question or

c) trying to slither out through petty detail loopholes.

To the public, there was never any debate on whether our elected officials take bribes. It was certainty. What we refer to as everyday. The only sting operation that would have indeed shocked the people was if our politicians didn't take a bribe.

Later, a news channel did another sting operation exposing the movie actor Shakti Kapoor asking for sexual favours in return for giving a young lady a film role thereby starting a debate on Bollywood's casting couch. Again, the only shock for the nation here was that Shakti Kapoor sleeps with women.

Any highlight of these past 10 years would be incomplete without mentioning last year's events in Mumbai. Arguably, the logic and procedure had antecedents across the world and, therefore, it should have been no shock when men in their 20s with guns and backpacks showed up to kill and die.

Yet it was. Beyond of course, the shock of what they did was the shock of who we were. A crumbling city with inadequate security, a foolish elite incapable of erudite opinion, an intelligentsia with no political voice, an elite paralysed in its own elitism. This decade showed we needed to wake up, even if we had no idea what the hell to, where to go or what to ask for.

Post 26/11, much anger was aimed at politicians again. This time, I'd argue, misdirected. The urban public needed a target and they were the easiest. Foolish generalisations like they are all corrupt and thieves and criminals were really ways for the public to vent, forgetting that in a multiparty democracy, we had elected these very same people by large majorities.

And could throw them out. It wasn't an us versus them because they were us, just those of us we had put in power. Once the anger subsided and ridiculous attempts at civic action from clusters of posh people died down, everybody went about their business of not voting and not caring. The tragedy and the small burst of shouting that followed did help the politicians in realising that they need to occasionally care or sound like they do, so words like "good governance" and "public accountability" became the mantras of the most recent campaigns.

The interesting analysis post 26/11 that angered the media (and subsequently, the public) was how much was spent on security for a handful of VIPs while our biggest cities lay exposed to any kind of assault. One television channel asked a perturbed Murli Manohar Joshi as he walked in with his melange of black cats, "Sir, who is paying for this?"

This decade also woke up the other end of the economic spectrum, the poorest of the poor, and not in a good way. They'd had just about enough with the India of fashion shows and DLF SEZs and zipping Mercedes. They wrote a manifesto about armed revolution, called themselves Naxals, revived a dead 70s student protest ideology and took to killing policemen and stopping trains in the deep interiors.

One party that simply by fiery speeches and obstructing regular life gained attention and political legitimacy was the MNS, with an agenda against migrants to Mumbai, especially those from Uttar Pradesh. In a country otherwise economically powering ahead with attempts at decent government, improving infrastructure, progressive secular and liberal economic ideas with a middle class that aspired to a better life, one wondered where the MNS ideas came from.

And who voted for the mandate. As the TV debates between supposed urban intelligentsia essentially became noise and screaming matches, the MNS quietly got the votes to become a party to reckon with. We realised the only thing more worrying than an agenda of malice or absent security, was us.

On a less sombre note, Shashi Tharoor, our erudite world ambassador with the foppish Oxonian Merchant Ivory charm brought the proper British accent back to Parliament reminding us that the Raj did not die; it just moved to the External Affairs Ministry and posed on the cover of GQ.

We also found out Kapil Sibal, Cabinet minister, wrote poems (on his cellphone on long flights, like a frequent flying T.S. Eliot) whose literary merits were debated on national television. The main curiosity this aroused was what other Renaissance talents were there in the upper echelons of our ruling party? Maybe our finance minister Pranab Mukherjee was a ludo champion or our home minister P. Chidambaram made world famous lemon pudding?

So there you have it. The era that changed our lives, in brief. Winston Churchill had once said, "Indian politics is lunacy trying to reach its full potential." This decade, we came close.

He & She, an unfinished tale !

She came. He did not say a no, but was definitely worried how to tackle a growing girl. She was eighteen, he was twenty seven. Their relation remained undefined. They never tried to put it in mere words. They were happy, they weren’t confined.
She was a bright and vibrant Bong teen. She was good in her academics, extra as well as co-curricular. She won over hearts wherever she went. She thought she displayed dual nature…She loved the latest gadgets and gizmos, kept track of latest in cricket, hummed American numbers, she also loved the mountains, the Himalayas, the brooks down the hills, the reddened peaks in bright sunlight, the silvery snowcaps in the moonlight, the mountain tunes and dialects. She read the latest by Stephen Hawkings, the contemporary IT centric stories by Chetan Bhagat, also read Tagore and the Atharva Veda for its mystery basically chemistry. She was a juxtaposition of realms. Everybody loved her yet she loved very few – herself, her parents and nobody knew this but her God.
He was a hardworking lad, who knew nothing but work, work and only work. He was what one calls a successful IT personnel changing from Hewlett Packard to Microsoft. He had no mother, only a father whom he loved, admired and respected. He lived in an all equipped apartment in a posh Bangalore locality, was all given to his profession. He had a zeal, a zeal to reach the top, not stop and search for something higher than the highest. This took him forward. No girls in his life so far, no serious ones that is what he said. He was considered quite handsome, a man of attitude and he looked as good as a young Richard Gere in a two piece jet black tuxedo !
She had to leave the city of joy and move into the city of opportunities, future beckoned. She had a dream to fulfill. She was all lost in the new city of which she had read lots and dreamt hard of being in. She knew no one but one. Its he she knew for the past 2 years. She had met him in a crowed yahoo chat room. From there onwards all that happened between the both of them – numerous emails, few yahoo chats, pretty many smses n 3 phone calls. In Bangalore she gave him a call.
They met for a few times, she was staying in the girl’s hostel. Then came the all important moment, she moved in to live with him. Her higher education was on bank load and she still had further studies to do, to some extent there were financial causes behind her decision to move in, the rest remains unknown, perhaps they knew.
He was eager to help her in every possible way but couldn’t mould himself into this new situation so suddenly so kept a little constricted. But it was an innate quality in her, she made him her everything. She gave him the feeling that she felt comfortable in there in his three room flat, he settled in as well. She was working three nights a week in a BPO which paid her good. He was a rich dude that is sure but never let his money stink. It was going good for the both of them.
They hardly slept. He had work, she had her job and on nights when she did not go to the BPO she had college work to complete. They were busy bees – jobs, college and a tiny family of two heads. She didn’t know how to cook, their fooding habits were vastly different yet they managed quite well with a lion’s share of instant coffees, 2 minute maggis, fruit juices and pizza’s for sure.
However late she slept, she got up latest by 5.30am every single day. She took a bath before heading to make breakfast. Now this early morning shower had a great significance. She believed it washed off all the weariness of her previous day and prepared her to start afresh. She preferred water which was cold, shampooed her hair everyday, conditioned it, played with the soap bubbles, splashed water at an imaginary him, hummed continuously, sometimes bollywood numbers, sometime earthly rustic tunes, sometimes songs from the great man Tagore, sometimes English numbers… She stretched her arms as is dancing in a ball imagining he was dancing with her. She imagined him splashing water at her, as the shower did its job. All this when she perfectly knew that he was fast asleep in the next room.
But…
He stood right there, the door separating both of them. He woke up everyday, standing infront of the closed door, listening to her singing. She was a perfect singer, her voice different from all others he had heard before. There was something in it, as soon as he heard her sing, he could almost see the gleam in her eyes, her wet hair on her bare shoulder. Her voice mingled with the strong aroma of the shampoo created an aura he could have never imagined of before, one staunchly of feminine presence. He could make out if she hummed English numbers, but sometimes it was all greek, he knew it was ‘bengalee’…He had a strange feeling, he felt she was signing for him. He missed a lot about her when he is away for work but this part is what he missed most. When she put of the shower, the sound of the water splashing receded….he went straight back to bed pretending t o have just gotten up. She never found out that her songs never remained unheard !
He liked a lot about her. Perhaps for this reason their staying together was frictionless. He lost his mother at a tender age, he hardly had ever felt the feminine softness. But all of a sudden he was kind of mesmerized by her presence. This is crazy but the first thing he noticed about her were her nails. They weren’t coloured but they were long and well shaped with the extended portion perfectly white. There was something crazily refreshing about them, she never cared how they were…she had short hair, not straight, not curly, a perfect mingling of both. She wasn’t slim, she never wanted to be. She had a slight dimple on her left cheek. She was fair. In totality she was beautiful but most prominently she was different and never spent hours in front of the mirror. Whatever she wore she looked elegant in it. Her simplicity was her charm he thought. She had her values intact, she didn’t preached those, just followed silently. Being with her wasn’t a bore even for a millisecond, she could cheer you up always…She valued money…but no ones perfect isn’t it?...She lacked patience. If one paper went bad she would go on bothering him about it, apprehensive of the low marks it would fetch. She always wanted to do the best and do it in the shortest possible time.
She never believed in the fact that a girl needs someone to cling to. She took this living together a s a surprisingly refreshing break from her more or less single status. Though she knew this was transient, they would move on, separately…she didn’t want that moment to come. They were walking lonely roads, suddenly happened to meet each other and decided to make their roads meet. She made every relation out of him, she would keep her informed bout her marks…in Kolkata she kept her dad informed. He would be the first person to know if a guy in college asked her out. She knew not what to do when he came home dehydrated or with slight temperature, but tried out whatever silly stuff she could. Can’t say if it cured him but he forgot about the illness totally ! She loved to make coffee for him, that is what she could…mixing Nescafe cappuccino and hot steaming milk in his favourite coffee mug. On Saturdays, during her breaks, especially if the weather was cloudy she put on tender numbers and served cotffee on bed, he got up and at once knew that the day was going to be great.
He had never known that rains could be so great an experience. All that he did on a rainy day was to grumble that he missed a chunk of his important meetings because of these idiotic rains. But now he craves for a long rainy season in Bangalore because rains made her extremely happy. Previously he cursed the makers of his apartment for keeping an open air balcony because the rain water seeped through into the rooms but now he wanted the entire apartment to have an open and close roof. Occasional rains made her day, especially if it rained in the evening and she didn’t not have the BPO to go to, she at once made a call and asked him to drop home cause she was planning to fry pakoras.
“You are the new Chief Programming Analyst”, said the Boss. He didn’t actually know how he could measure his happiness, if there was an instrument it would shoot out of its limits. But he at once knew what he badly wanted to do, call her and tell her about the good news and what it in turn meant. “Yup, tell me”, came her voice from the other end of the phone. “I did it. I’m flying.”, told he. “Congratulations, I’m proud of you my boy”, she teased. He so loved the way she said that…he wanted to come home, hug her tight. He jumped into his car, stopped by at some restaurant to pack some food n drinks for the night, also brought her favorite flowers, with them she made his house home…and he drove as fast as he could to reach home. Up the stairs, doorbell !...No one answered. He craved to see that beaming face of hers. “Open the door”, his heart shouted silently. No one answered. He took his set of keys out, got in, she was not there, some of her things were missing too. He found a note on the table saying “He and She, an Unfinished Tale !”. Suddenly a thousand realizations started rushing into his mind. He would fly to New Orleans, where would she stay if he left this apartment…She had joined her job newly just fresh recruitments from the college campus, was a 2 year contract…She had to be here…He never asked her to fly with him, but he knew he badly wanted her too, he had never thought of this moment before…always thought let it come then…
He was onboard his flight to New Orleans. Lunch was served. He hardly ate. The thought of her leaving so suddenly bothered him, pricked him every moment. In the excitement of it all, he had managed to forget she lived and loved him. She took herself away, so that he could go ahead, be the man he wants to be…but he needed her badly. He put his hand inside his pocket to find that note, that handwriting he loved…
Perhaps he wanted to go back.

Where The Mind is Without Fear

WHERE the mind is without fear and the head is held high
Where knowledge is free
Where the world has not been broken up into fragments
By narrow domestic walls
Where words come out from the depth of truth
Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection
Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way
Into the dreary desert sand of dead habit
Where the mind is led forward by thee
Into ever-widening thought and action
Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake.

- Rabindranath Tagore, a visionary he was !

Thoughts...

It's a spectre, this world of shadows-
A throng of cavernous lonliness
No support here, not even a shore in sight to drown yourself at
All the elegance here is of disgrace
The splendour here is of dishounour
It's a spectre, this world of shadowns-
Many a moon have I lit and snuffed out
But couldn't snatch even a few winks of sleep
The night only brings wakefulness
It's a spectre, this world of shadows-
Here, the teardrops are stitched on faces that are borrowed
Here, in this world of spectres the path to the zenith runs through the nadir !...

Are we Indians now Prisoners of Birth ?

Jeffrey Archer’s best selling book “A Prisoner of Birth” left a lingering thought in my mind, are we all prisoners of birth or are we not?...India in the twenty first century is a global power, with grossly increasing GDP…instant coffees n instant emotions, the “short messaging service” riot, the 1 paisa/sec talking fever, short skirts n tang tops, tattoos, night clubs, discos, tata nano-the people’s car, the world wide web at the fingertip, withering love, relationships for a time pass, lonely mum n dad in a big house, son settled in America with a native blonde beauty…its Freedom all the way for the growing Indians…so we precisely aren’t Prisoners of birth…but maybe we are…we have lost what the freedom fighters wanted us to possess, aren’t we kind of swinging at the beats of the western world?...Aren’t we getting dominated by what our western counterparts love to do, aren’t we becoming prisoners at their hands since birth?...Progress is different from progressiveness and an intellectual mindset…upholding our heritage, our traditions, our sovereignty, our sobriety is what is progressiveness…but today’s youth believes modernity is in “Linkin Park” and progress is in minimizing what they wear…this shows a stagnant mindset, powerlessness to look beyond the external glory n look into the soul…so maybe we Indians have become prisoners in front of a fake western modernity.

Rabindranath Tagore was perhaps the first ever man from this part of the world to have been awarded the Nobel Prize, in his acceptance speech he mentioned how he believed that this award might be the foundation of a merger between the eastern and western cultures…We were two worlds before separated by oceans and mountains, different race, religion, colour and culture…an assemblage was indeed a beginning of the new world…Swami Vivekananda in his speech at “World’s Parliament of Religions” in Chicago 1893 had said that the western man needed eastern humanism to satisfy his never ending thirst and oriental men should in fact learn from the westerner his power to defy the odds n discover prospects, the work culture…his science…Mani Bhaumik, the inventor of LASIK, a LASER induced eye surgery wrote in his book “Code Name God” that a perfect understanding of life comes when we put a balance between both oriental philosophies and western intellect…there is no wedge between the both…So, a mingling of both the cultures is a healthy sign of globalization but what happens today is not what these great men had ever desired their countrymen to do…when an Indian frowns at the name of a “carnatic music conference” and empties their parents pockets to go watch the “Iron Maiden” perform live I feel sad…when an Indian thinks twice before making sure when Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose was born and when our Republic day is…but very well remembers when “Valentine’s day” is…I feel sad…Its unfortunate how the big cities especially the metropolis have fallen prey and have become slaves to this unhealthy modernism.

A teenage full of liquor, smoke, rock music, disc and a whole lot of cash leads to a very common scenario when the youth proclaims “Life Sucks !” on their Tshirts. Life becomes so artificial and void, often aimless. Life becomes imprisoned, stagnant. Life has a lot more to it than just the beer n hookah, look beyond youth of India ! Don’t make “drink till you drop” your motto…that makes you slave of that drink…you become a prisoner of birth…Discover a simpler life behind your masked existence…when you try to be an American, you just put on a façade…you try to put your origin, your roots, your identity behind the bars…Most of us are self proclaimed Atheists…only because we are afraid to show our true face to god…so better be modern and better be a so called “science and technology” patron and try to show the world that God is just a superstition !...But hey Science and Religion can coexist peacefully, both are inseparable part of Nature, indispensable part of creation…Being a prisoner of birth doesn’t only mean a physical bondage, a mental blockage or stagnation can very well portray us to be prisoners...the very thought that “If I dun wear a Levis to college then I won’t be considered modern” is what makes us the biggest prisoners…

A change is always welcome, and who brings in the Renaissance?...the new ‘Us’…the one who still feels that the sitar, sarod, santoor, veena produce divine music, the one who still feels mum made food is tastier than the tastiest pizza in the whole world, who still thinks his girl looks beautiful not in a micro-mini but in a saree !

Letter to a teacher....

Miss,
June was enthralled when she told me that you were asking about me and I was a little more when I concluded that you still remember me. Last time it was a hand written letter but since I'm spending all my day with the computer nowadays I thought I'd type in the letter this time. Well it has been two years almost since I last wrote and what a tension changed yet eventful these years have been. Now before I start blabbering all that was and is up with me, I must ask if you are doing fine ? Must be. How is everybody else at St. Agnes' doing?...Now this "everybody else" endearingly includes my teachers, sisters, the didis, the Rainbow children, the happy meal project, the chapel, the hall, the stage, the computer lab, the ground, the passageway that leads to the chapel and the connector between class X and the passageway to the chapel, which according to me is the best and most memorable part of the school. I'm assuming everybody is in the "pink of their health"….Mrs. Dhiman used to get so very angry when we wrote this particular phrase in our informal letters !!!....Now it is time I update you about me and my life….
Past two years have been a learning experience for sure and what is coming up is going to be so as well. There is a little nostalgia because I'll have to leave this place where I've been since my birth and settle down in a totally new place. But the excitement of going down south for engineering overrides the nostalgia. There's absolutely no longing for friends, you know why…..they come and go, if I'm leaving behind some here I'll get many more there. Moreover we are done with all the crying, when we left St. Agnes'…..litres of tears overflowing on the last day of school. We are still in touch…I mean all my Agnes' friends courtesy "internet". It will remain the same between us, we were in separate schools but now we'll be in separate cities. Pallabi's going Cuttack for architecture, Niti's going Gandhinagar for law, Sharmistha and me to Bangalore for engineering so we have a pan India friend circle now…..With mobiles and the internet we'll still be in touch, same with my Modern High friends. Now after so much of preparation and the tough time giving strings of mock exams, the ISC exams started. They got over soon and the big and bad ones started…the competitive exams ! After all the exams got over the results were due. 20
th of May, 3pm IST I came to know I scored a 94% in my ISC. And I was jubilant not because of my maths, phy, chem or computer marks but because of my English !!!! When I got my ICSE results I was all blue because I got an 88 in English so this time I knew I had to get some unbelievable marks…..Its true people say the boards generous one year and strict another but I knew my 25 marks answers were brilliant and my 97 was well deserving. Computers were not bad as well with 95, maths was on 94. But because I was sure not to study anything other than engineering the ISC results were of no use. The wait continued. Then one after another the entrance exam results were declared, my position is well poised with not qualifying in IIT (as expected), bizarrely bad ranking in AIEEE (totally unexpected), well deserved 5707 (All India Rank) in Karnataka Joint for non- Karnataka students and something that doesn't matter a 1143 in WBJEE. My first preference was NITs through the AIEEE but since I won't get them I'll have to access my second preference that is going to Bangalore and getting into a college there. With my rank I'll probably get M.S.Ramaiah Institute of Technology which is the best college in Bangalore and it has been a long time dream to actually be there. My stream will be Computer Science without question. So that is it …..I'm going to Bangalore where future beckons.
You can't imagine how tough a battle it is to surge forward when it comes to the entrance exams. My Karnataka Joint score was 83 and you know how many people had the same score? More than 600. When 600 students are tied at the same score they rank them preferentially …. By first checking physics marks, then maths , then chemistry and finally if everything is same they consider your age…the one who is older gets the preference cause he will not be able to appear for the exam once more and you will probably be. After all this the rank list is prepared. It's a tough system. And now that I'll be in a college there…..I've talked with a few from the College community on Orkut and they say it's a stupendous schedule with regularity being a must. Not like colleges here when you can think of giving college a miss if it either rains or is too hot ! So I'm up for the challenge and I'll try and keep good CGPAs (Cumulative Grade Point Average on a 10 Scale basis is used to describe the overall performance of a student in all courses).

I had gone for my Karnataka exam with one of the many agencies that conduct tours especially for exams. Sharmistha and me….first time beyond the city all alone without parents…was one fantastic escapade with us learning how to tackle situations on our own. It was an exam special train and the entire compartment had not another girl except the two of us. The students were mostly from Bihar and Jharkhand, who traveled to Kolkata and took the train from Howrah Station. On a general note, if you check out most of the rankers in all these all India exams are from Bihar and Jharkhand….they complete +2 move to Kota (in Rajasthan) and learn up all that can ever be and vomit on the question paper…..you'll find they have the whole of H.C.Verma learnt by heart. They were students as well so we had no problem…….but there way of communicating with each other is bizarre with continuous cheap humor and slangs coming at a frequency of 10 hertz ! Nevertheless we had something to learn from them …… how much they could study…we were influenced so much we didn't sleep for a moment on the train…..all night the whole train rang with the squalor of MCQs ! But all in all great experience …. Doing all the packing and cleaning on your own….studying as well. On the 4th of May we had our exam, after a whole day of tedious exam giving, we returned to our hotel to suddenly realize all our books and clothes and accessories lay scattered and we'll have to pack them right before 5 o clock the next morning…cause that's when we were scheduled to leave. We had to eat, pack take an bath and be ready…so we had our dinner and started packing at around 12 at night, it took 2.5 hrs then Sharmistha went to take a long bath cause we'd stay in the train for 2 days…..She was done in an hour and it was my turn. I took almost an hour and by the time we were ready all our luggage packed it was 4 o clock in the morning. No sleep. All the seven days including the train journey we hardly slept. So, we realized to stay alone and do all your daily chores and at the same time carry on with studies and exams ….its a must to skip all your sleep !

Since there was ample scope to be studying in the engineering colleges here acquaintances are considering going to Bangalore exceptionally crazy and unrealistic. They have a point to make……..that is students usually go the wrong way in a cosmopolitan city like Bangalore. But I have my reasons as well, if I had to go the wrong way I could very well have done so right here……cause Modern High School offered all possible ways to do so. And I had my classmates doing so but it's all upto me, isn't it ? My sole purpose of going down south is the prospect that it brings along with it. I had enough freedom right here I thought, and I can very well say I lived upto it…..My parents never sneek-peaked and I didn't give them reasons to ! So whether it is here or in Bangalore it is totally upto me ……. If I toil hard I get the returns and that is enough to keep me firm on the ground and focused in my work. No it isn't eying the fruit before the flower, it is just keeping a fixed aim.
You know what I realized …..life is really different from what it used to be in St. Agnes', it was perhaps the safest shore to harbour and the securest umbrella to take shelter…..it was a place where every wish is granted, every desire fulfilled, where every one loves you…..very different from actuality. That is why I sometimes feel I'm far far away from the school now……yet pretty close cause it is etched in memory as one fairy tale land….that I was in but will never be again..!!! It was good that I had 2 years of Modern High before going to college…..even this seven day trip to
Bangalore …..as if a trailer and the full length film is about to begin ! Life is all about new experiences ….and last two years I've had many. So will I keep on having….may get bogged down sometimes ……cause when it is a do-or-die situation for India in a cricket match it heightens the excitement but when it is a do-or-die in life ….it has to be overcome ! But at the end of the day you perform or perish……so with the zeal to outperform every obstacle I'm leaving for this happening city…."Four hundred miles away from home" !

I hope to come to school once before I go away,
Quite a long letter, sorry if there were any spelling or grammatical errors !
Priyadarshini.
19.06.08
5.47p.m.