All the random thoughts

"My name is Peshal Kumar", he said  "Special Kumar?" I asked, astonished a bit.  "Not special sir. Peshal"  "Well you do look special" needless compliment given that I hardly knew him.  Peshal Kumar was our driver designate after the original designate, Habib from Bangladesh, dropped us at the National Museum at Doha and then just disappeared after handing over the reins to Peshal.  Now the "us" here are all my destiny friends, as Qatar Airways dropped us at Doha while ensuring that all of "us" missed our respective connections. Since the airlines had already made up their mind to make us all the guests of the Kingdom for a day - complete with hotel, food voucher and a transit visa - we had no option but to oblige.  Wyndham Royal Heritage was a very nice sounding hotel and even though we didn't exactly know what the 250 Qatari Riyals would buy us in the form of food, it felt like a decent deal given the circums...

"Tell me oh God, I pray But who are they That want to rule and preach the world what's cool?"  "I did ask them, my son, 'whence this run For glory and fame and an everlasting name?'"  "We don't believe in you, God" They said with a haughty nod. "We want to be loved and respected and do more than expected. And if ever there is a need, To be feared and agreed"  "So, my son, I asked them all, 'do you want to be me, after all? For what you are chasing to become Is who I already am and some'" "They ignored and left me alone For them I am but a stone. But here's the secret I tell thee The desire for Success is the desire to be Me"  "Tell me oh God, I pray Isn't that the Advaitin's play To be on a journey To become thee?"  "Ah ! Now you see it It's the same but with lost wit. The Advaitin's journey is inside out And all others are outside out"  "And let me tell you ...

Open spaces.  It is always fascinating to venture into wild open spaces. More so when the current lifestyle is made up of a few restricted movements in a constrained space, called home, that is majorly occupied by fancy furniture from Ikea. Outside the home it is mostly a rush for the "driving in traffic" Olympic gold medal. It is all about navigating oneself thru intricate patterns made by a bunch of rapidly slithering crippled snakes, otherwise known as 'Vehicles', with names that make Greek Gods cringe. Where then to find peace and tranquility that one is supposedly destined to gather at the end of a frenetic day? "Onward ho" to the Open spaces then. It wasn't really an arduous Himalayan trek that one would be made aware of by all the new form of social media that normally makes a news item of anyone above forty climbing any height of more than forty meters. That too but the beauty of such an expedition lies in its obscurity, earthly simplicity an...

I stopped at the traffic lights. It’d take time for the green light to be back. I looked around and found many beggars getting up from their respective positions to seek alms from vehicle drivers or inmates. I rolled up my windows and drowned myself into the mobile screen. Best way to avoid saying No to the multiple attempts the beggars make for few rupees. Amazingly organized and coordinated, these beggars. The 5 or 6 of them instantly know which vehicle is allotted to them as option 1/2/3 etc. Each one approaches their option 1 first and then moves onto the other options. I am not sure if they have a revenue share model. The instinct of guilt, which is what makes people give alms, usually hits late. So, success, usually, happens at your option 2/3 whereas option 1 is mostly a denial scenario. Essentially each beggar approaching a particular vehicle driver or inmate is priming him or her to part with some money. Maybe not at the first instance but later. There must be revenue share m...

"Oh it is not much. About 5 packets of biscuits a day" I always nod my head and move away while doing some rough financial math.  Never daring to ask a follow up question though. Assuming  each pack costs about 10 rupees, that's fifty rupees a day. Fifteen hundred a month. I know these guys don't get paid more than about twelve thousand a month. So that's a good 10% of a very small monthly income.  He works as a Watchman at a medium sized complex. His duty falls sometimes at night and sometimes during the day. A portly young man of around 30 years of age, maybe. Wears a large Tilak on his forehead and patka around his head depending on the season and his duty timings. He feeds a good number of stray street dogs every morning or night. As if like a ritual. The dogs know the time when he will be ready to feed them. Mostly just before he packs up from his duty and is homebound on an old bicycle. The dogs come to him or just laze around the place where they know he wi...

At the Monda market today. There was a couple standing 3 feet away from me as part of the police enforced social distancing. They did not look particularly well to do given they came on an old Bajaj Chetak. Vendors of some other item in the market, I understood. They had to wait until I finished my shopping of groceries. "Aiyo !! The Goat is eating away the rotis" the wife yelled all of a sudden. Everyone around turned to look at their Chetak scooter. A Goat was dragging away a whole bunch of rotis that they probably got into the market to setup a short term fast food stall. Their daily earning is going for a toss for sure. I felt sorry for the Goat as the man, I was sure, was going to beat the hell out of it. The man looked at the Goat for not more than ten seconds. "Theek hai. Bhooka hoga bechara. Khaane de", he says to his wife. They both waited until the Goat probably ate about 20 rotis before walking away. There were hardly anymore rotis left in the bag. "...

"I have nothing to gain" The woman was probably in her late fifties. She had kind eyes and a smile that can be best described as sad. She was reclining against one of the poles of a ragtag makeshift tent. A variety of pieces of cloth were laid on the ground with different vegetables arranged or sorted in no particular order. The place was literally the middle of nowhere, at least from my perspective. Somewhere along the way as I drove from one small town to another, places that were well away from Hyderabad to be considered remote though not too far from it. The winter sun was kind yet scorching and it was still early in the noon. As I drove through multiple tiny hamlets, I stopped at this lady's makeshift store hoping to buy some good quality vegetables that are farm fresh. I had to ask her if she got them from Hyderabad to sell because then they would be from some freezer and can no way be called fresh. "I will tell you which ones are fresh and which ones are not. ...