i think your email id fell off when i re-organized my mailing list! sorry! but that was a month ago:-) read the monday morning mails more regularly :-)
:-) :-)
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friendship. and my mind turns to another time, another era, another place. west kidwai nagar in delhi, more than thirty years ago. what a wonderful place to have grown up in! so many of us from a similar age group and a similar wide eyed interest in all things life :-) never knew what a tamilian was, or a malayali, or a bihari, or a bengali for that matter! we were all...just friends :-) and that knowledge was enough. and religion was a matter of celebration and not division. hindu meant holi, janamashtmi, & diwali sweets; christianity was the sweetness of the christmas cakes; sikhism the experience of an abundant generosity. we were always out on the streets roaming wandering into each others houses, and playing! our playing seasons mirrored the rhythm of the world's tournaments. the durand cup brought the footballs out, wimbeldon the tennis racquets, the hockey tourneys our hockeys, and test cricket our bats and balls. how seriously we took our sports:-) summer holidays at kidwai nagar! long morning walks, some were up by 5 am and on their way to whichever park fancy demanded. daytime meant a trip to delhi public library in laxmibai nagar to borrow a hardy boys or a nancy drew. afternoons the gang (or part :-) would troop into the house demanding squash, custard or whatever goodies my mother (or other mothers :-) had conjured up. "the monkey army has arrived" my mother would announce and then sweetly watch her cupboard laid bare by the collective hunger of our youth. evenings would mean the sport that was the flavor of the season, and the night was a time to stroll out again. heart in hand, gazing wistfully at the balconies where love had gone seeking, hopelessly! we played a lot which makes we wonder when we studied! still that colony produced an amazing bunch of wanderers and achievers. from ladakh to antartica somebody from the kidnags gang has been there and done that! this habit of wandering isn't easy to drop! from the inlaks scholarship to board merit lists to gold medalists; from the indian army to the unindian mncs to the best universities in the world; they've all been graced by kidnags monkey army :-) they've done some incredible things to be honest but this story is not about that. its about the magic of friendship and the uncanny ease with which we have been able to slip in and out of each others lives, sometimes connecting after decades. its as if some distances never existed, as if we'd just gone home for a short nap. the kidnags bond never dies :-) the gang of loonies from the iit days, and the incalculable debts owed to sharad mallik (don't ask me what they are, its a very long list! have never forgotten that thai lunch at plearns on my very first day in berkeley, sharad :-) the explosion of learning and senses at iim cal, and the preciousness of the friendships made there. joka - where i learnt so much about love, and loss. and the amazing humility and heart of one man who has been a friend extra-ordinary - sunil bhaskaran aka neendur! one of the smartest, and nicest, people i know. and there is legion of my students who will attest to that too! and then the berkeley gang! where do i even begin. it took, as kirtana said, a village (and an angel called sriram :-) to finish my phd and what a wonderful set of friends those years in berkeley gifted :-) haricharan's temple and its divine sangha of paul, kitty, jill, kalpana, susan, heather, and everybody else; heshi, arjuni, keshini, and the rest of ammi's bevy of sri lankan beauties, maniam and the unstoppable malaysians; maresi, renate, and sylvia who made the workplace friendlier than a home; harinder, kirtana, alka, lijjat, namrata, prajwal, jalaja, and god knows how many others who kept hunger away, and with so much love :-) isha's teas, the thanksgivings dinners at roblyns, the kabab and out of the world coffee at peter saar's "klaus kabab & kafe korner", i'm already beginning to drool! berkeley was an experience bathed in love & friendship and the waves that were set in motion then continue to pulsate, and to grow :-) and now at amrita, the circle continues to expand gentle & easy. at first it's "sir" and then soon enough, "dg"! these friendships. they've been the marrow , the laughter, the music, the solace and the promise of this very life. they have taught much, they have given much (including a wife :-). in my deepest despair, they taught me how to fly, and when i did, they never asked where or why :-) in so many many ways more than family, in these friendships i discovered the joy of being free. and every time i thought i'd reached possibility's door, they showed me there was much more! to life then, a thanks and a prayer, that even as our hair gets greyer, may these hearts never age, and this "friendly fire" - may it ever rage! or something like that :-) for this week's poem we return to daniel landisky and the incomparable hafiz. what price shall we put on a friendship? who else to ask but the mystics! For a Single Tear I Know of a Beauty That no one has ever Known How could that be possible When I may seem So new in infinite time? It is because God belongs to only you! Did you hear that! Did you hear what Hafiz just said! God belongs to only you! It is the only reasonable payment for a single Tear. it may be past midnight, but there is a sun shining bright, and if not be friends by who else will i be bailed. all i have to left to say, is that there are places bright and gay, where it is still quite a monday, and yes you've just been monday morning emailed!
much love, d&s | | |
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