He loved the 4th wife the most and adorned her with rich robes andtreated her to delicacies.

He took great care of her and gave her nothing but the best.

He also loved the 3rd wife very much. He's very proud of her and always wanted to show off her to his friends. However, the merchant is always in great fear that she might run away with some other men.

He too, loved his 2nd wife. She is a very considerate person,always patient and in fact is the merchant's confidante. Whenever the merchant faced some problems, he always turned to his 2nd wife and she would always help him out and tide him through difficult times.

Now, the merchant's 1st wife is a very loyal partner and has made great contributions in maintaining his wealth and business as well as taking care of the household. However, the merchant did not love the first wife and although she loved him deeply, he hardly took notice of her.

One day, the merchant fell ill. Before long, he knew that he was going to die soon. He thought of his luxurious life and told himself,"Now I have 4 wives with me. But when I die, I'll be alone. How lonely I’ll be!"

Thus, he asked the 4th wife, "I loved you most, endowed you with the finest clothing and showered great care over you. Now that I'm dying, will you follow me and keep me company?" "No way!" replied the 4th wife and she walked away without another word. The answer cut like a sharp knife right into the merchant's heart.

The sad merchant then asked the 3rd wife, "I have loved you so much for all my life. Now that I'm dying, will you follow me and keep me company?" "No!" replied the 3rd wife. "Life is so good over here! I'm going to remarry when you die!" The merchant's heart sank and turned cold.

He then asked the 2nd wife, "I always turned to you for help & you've always helped me out. Now I need your help again. When I die, will you follow me and keep me company?" "I'm sorry, I can't help you out this time!" replied the 2^nd wife. "At the very most, I can only send you to your grave." The answer came like a bolt of thunder and the merchant was devastated.

Then a voice called out: I'll leave with you. I'll follow you no matter where you go." The merchant looked up and there was his first wife. She was so skinny, almost like she suffered from malnutrition.

Greatly grieved, the merchant said, "I should have taken much better care of you while I was alive. I could have!"

Actually, we all have 4 wives in our lives . . .

The 4th wife is our body. No matter how much time & effort we lavish in making it look good, it'll leave us when we die.

Our 3rd wife? Our possessions, status and wealth. When we die, they all go to others.

The 2nd wife is our family and friends. No matter how close they had been there for us when we're alive, the furthest they can stay by us is up to the grave.

The 1st wife is in fact our Spirit, often neglected in our pursuit of material wealth and sensual pleasure.

Guess what? It is actually the only thing that follows us wherever we go. Perhaps it's a good idea to think about where we want it to go.

Heaven ? Hell? It's better to act now than wait till later or tomorrow.

Tomorrow may never come. . .

Today is a good day to start courting the real first lady.

This Sunday we had invited nearly 6 families to our place over lunch. Though it was mainly for rehearsing the group Bhajan which we are planning to sing in our upcoming Dashara festival under the auspices of BACA. Since most of them happened to be Maitnils, I decided to prepare all the ethnic food of our region. As a result we had cooked Tisi Sajman, Oalak chokha, Kumharauri bhanta aa muniga, Kadima bhujiya chana daal ke sang and many other typical Maithil dishes, followed by Madhurs. It required lots of efforts to arrange for all these items. Tisi was the most difficult to arrange. And to make the Oal not "kabkab", we had to apply lots of innovation. Full credits to Seema as she managed all these items so well that every one was thrilled to eat and enjoy the food.

Since morning we were waiting for guests to show up and it was about 1'o clock when people started showing up. The space in my home was very congested and we accommodated everyone somehow. But more than anything else it was the togetherness, similar language, sharing the jokes and overall Mithilang in the air that we enjoyed very much. Once we had finished our foods, we started thinking about our Bhajans. We decided that there should be three Bhajans in sequence. It was agreed by all that first one will be the famous Bhajan by Maithili's great poet Vidyapati - "Jai Jai Bhiravi.." Followed by this will be either "Payo ji maine Raam Ratan Dhan Payo" or "Shree Raam Kripal Bhajoman". Finally we will have a Aarti Bhajan sung by Mukesh.

Since this was our first gathering, and also we were not sure as which all Bhajans we were to sing, we decided that we will have lyrics for Bhajans and if possible mp3 version of the Bhajans sent to all by e-mail. We also decided that we will meet again once before the real performance and everyone agreed for October 1.

Slowly people started leaving as everyone had to catch up with their arrangements for the next week. But we had a very good discussion started in general about our culture and topics related to Mithila. What interested everyone the most was a discussion I started on how to preserve our culture and motivate the next generation to be interested into it. There were many ideas, experiences shared and suggestions in that direction. I had in fact asked Raja Roy, who is publishing the souvenir for coming BACA festival to include a kind of interview on it. One suggestion from Prof. Vinay came to include the question as why the younger generation do not seek alliance in the Indian community. Over all it was such a good discussion that it lasted for almost 3 hours and finally everyone left at around 7:30 PM. I was so happy and satisfied to have a very good discussion that I am looking for more such opportunities. Toward the end of our discussion, Prof. Vinay had suggested us to join with one Prof. Ramashary Singh at Hamilton to carry on this kind of thought provoking discussions and how to pick some of the ideas for implementation.

One day we will. For now we are still debating the importance of Maithili for our daily conversation and continuing the Maithili culture in our way of life. But one thing is for sure that I enjoy more than any cuisines, the dishes prepared in our old Mithila way, do not know what could be the reasons but I enjoy them the most!

What a weekend was that! 

Last weekend was a very busy one. On Saturday morning I woke up hearing the door bell. It was 6:45 AM and the guy to change our garage door had already shown up. Then he started the work and it went on for almost 4 hours. The look of the house has completely changed with recent upgrades. I have got all the windows painted and each window has now got blinds. The look of the house has improved considerably. The garage door was the last on in series. Although the original door had still got 2 years of life if we had upgraded some of the parts but for some reasons I went for the new garage door. One was that the new ones are much lighter, insulated and do not require to be painted as it has PVC coat. The second reason is that the new door installation has insulation all over the doors and since we have a room just above the garage, this will definitely help in keeping that room warmer and as a result the utility bills will be chopped off in a longer run. And finally the changes of springs and  few other components were going to cost me at least $300 and the lie expectancy was maximum of 2 years or so. But overall Seema wanted a garage door with glass windows on top and so we finally went for it. The change has brought a new life in the look of the house.

After the garage door change, we started getting ready for Hursh's soccer match. The day was going to be the final day of the season. It was the match for consolation place (3rd place) and the boys played their hearts out but eventually they again lost 5-2. Hursh was playing great and he demonstrated a great improvement in his skills in the last match. He was very aggressive and his kicks were very powerful ones. One of his kicks was almost going in the net but unfortunately his own team mate came in way. That was gem of the powerful kicks he had that day. Other kick I will remember was one which went straight to the face of another player from opposition and he simply went down, such was power in his kick. But on one occasion, he unfortunately didn't tackle cleanly and that resulted in a collision with the player from his opposition and that knocked him down near 20 yards from the the goal post. The referee awarded a penalty kick and since then they could not maintain the lead. That time they were leading by 1-0. Finally the boys were very dejected and the other side played some outstanding soccer. Reid, Hursh's team's start striker and Mathew, the star defense playe,  both were not playing to their potential. Mathew was injured and Reid was emotionally broken down as previous night he had lost his baseball match as well. Eventually they could not put up a good show in last two matches, the semi final and match or third position, which mattered the most. Parents were also disappointed and we all felt that ours was one of the strongest team but unfortunately we just could not play together in last few matches. Ironically, Hursh's team had beaten all the top three teams very convincingly! Some of them were beaten with margin as huge as 4-1 and so, but then the win was not to be on their side when it mattered the most!

Finally we went for the trophy distribution and the top three teams were given individual medals and a trophy each. Hursh was very disappointed and I felt for him, for he is very competitive player and he always would tell me before entering the field.."Oh  we are facing yellow team, we will beat them!" and likes. That was his spirit and he always charged up the team to the fullest! But now there he was seating a bit disappointed. To add to their insult the organizer did not call his team after 3rd position and started randomly and they got trophies at the very end!  

But he was very excited even with whatever he received, though each one of them received that, it was more for participation than for what they played! Often the end result do not reflect the overall performance and this tournament was one of those!

Yash was very shy and would hide away here and there. At the end coach gave away some candies with pesonal remarks about each player. Hursh did not want to share his candies with Yash and that cause Yash to almost cry, finally he agreed to share a bit.

This is what they deserved:

Hursh and his teammates were having lots of fun otherwise. they were playing a lot in the field. He is able to do the jump and pulling up very well thanks to his teammates who showed him the way and he simply copied them:

We left for home and I finished some of my work for office from home. In the evening we were invited by Manish as they are celebrating Ganesh Chaturthe with great fun and flare. We came back in the night and I wanted to complete the scripts for my skit which I was hoping to be enacted duing the Dashara meet being organized by BACA.

Next day in BACA meeting I ran through all my propsed points for finalizing with the working committee but many of them are of diferent thoughts. While few of my suggested ideas were liked by them, majority of my thoughts were rejected, including my skit. I felt very disappointed and for a moment I decided to quit the association. It hurts and anguishes me, when people just try to follow the age old thought procrsses rather than live in the present world.  The group unfortunaely do not encourage fresh ideas and just want to satisfy themselves by fulfilling their immediate goal and be content with that. My thoughts are little different. I prefer involvement of people in general in all the activities. Anyhow, when I came back from the meeting to home, I requested Binoy Prasad, one of our members of BACA to drop by at our place and have tea with us. He and his wife came and we decided to have some Bhajans in chorus and include that as this year's one of the items in the function. I was very tired at the end of the day. But it was quite an eventful week.

At the very end of this blog, I would like to share a very funny photograph with you all. I could not stop myself but take this photograph, with due apologies to the father whom I could have never asked for permission for such a photograph, but they were walking allover and what a delight was to watch them move around on a lush green grass!

So finally Yash has grown up big enough to start his school. He has grown up and perhaps can't be called a kid anymore. Particularly the way he handled the whole affairs, makes me feel that he is no more a kid but very matured boy. Two years back I had never imagined that this boy will have a such a sea change! He used to cling with Seema all the time and there he was now, so independent! Amazing, simply amazing. In last 2 years almost every week we have noticed changes in Yash and he is becoming a perfect child. One example is that until six months back he did not know colours, shape, numbers or alphabets. In a weeks time he grasped everything to the perfection. so much so that he could start alphabet from anywhere. Like if I say F, G..and he will pick the sequence from there or say Q, R,..and he would start form S, T...and so on. That tells m one thing for sure that his brain is developed much more than what we could have expected, he is sure going to be something special, I am sure. He has shown amazing improvement in Kumon also where he has to tell words for the pictures. Recently he remembered few songs on his own and he sings often when in mood, like Hadi Ohm Hadee, Hadi Ohm Hadee...(Hari Om Hari..song)! It is very interesting to hear that. But he is extremely shy. If one starts observing him or if I go near him with camera, everything ceases and he starts hiding! He is shy to the EXTREME! Also, he uses both hands(it appears he is ambidextrous) so well that we are confused as which hand we should encourage him to start writing with. As a result he does not write at all. We will see what he eventually prefers himself.   

So here he is staring his first serious business of his life!

I decided to start late for my office yesterday. Around 8:30 Yash and Hursh were ready and all set to start for the school. Hursh is a seasoned player now and he was not that excited. Though his school had already started a day before on Tuesday and Yash had to start yesterday. Yash had already purchased his favourite Madagascar printed school bag. When I was all set to start I took their photographs:

He was very excited and Hursh was teasing him with what he should and what he should not do in the school. He was mainly concerned with the fact that if he does something awkward, principal should not call him from his class room as he would be embarrassed. But Yash was not understanding much of what he was talking about.

Finally Seema also came out and we were all set to start. We wanted to have some memorable photographs for the occasion, so here are they:

And one with me as well:

Finally we were all set to start. Although school is not far from our home, may be it is 700 m, we still went by car.

Once we reached the school, I was busy in recording as well as taking few snaps here and there and meanwhile Hursh left for his class. He was not very keen to see all of us assembling there. The occasion was very touchy one. All the parents were there and many kids were crying. But Yash was more than anything, puzzled as what was going to happen next!

Each kid was asked to stand in the line. Mr. LeGaree(Yash's class teacher) was busy in talking to all the parents and kids. Some of the kids were very bold and they were moving around and talking to other kids as well.

Finally the first bell rang and we were getting ready for the moment. After another two bell rings, the door of the class room opened. And that was the moment! A small step by little fellow is beginning of a LONG journey ahead! All the parents and kids went inside. I also went inside and did lot of video recordings.

After a while when all the students settled down, Mr. LeGaree came and started talking to each of the kids in a very mild and friendly way. That must have soothed each one of them. Then after a while he asked each one of them to respond with "Good Morning" when their names were to be called.  Few did and rest of them just raised their hand. When Yaaash (that is how most of the people pronounce his name!) was called, he could not even look at him. He was smiling and had his mouth opened and was trying to hide out..something we know about him, that he is extremely shy (Lajkotar as we call him)! Mr. LeGaree had to look around to find him! For most of the time he was watching everything happening around him! Then there was national anthem "O Canada..." and everyone stood up. To my surprise there were many kids who were reciting the anthem so well, much to my shame as I am yet to memorize it.

After that the attendance call continued. One boy was hiding behind his father. When his name was called, his father had to say that he was there hiding behind him. On the other hand there was a girl who was crying endlessly. The ambiance in the classroom was set to the perfection and the kids will start loving it in no time.

I had to leave for my office and seeing that Yash was not only comfortable but was enjoying the class as well, I left for the office. Seema was to drop me off at the bus stop and she went for other woks. Finally at 11:30 she went to pick him up from the school and he was waiting outside in a line with smile at his face! Much to the delight of Seema! She was so relieved to see that as some of the kids were crying or had grim on their faces! This is what something Hursh used to do long time back, four years back! Yash was very excited and happy. Seema was telling me that he was very keen to go back to the school again. That is a very happy development. So finally, Yash ban gaya gentleman!!   

We had been looking forward for this trip for quite sometime. It was Labour Day holiday here in Canada and Labor Day in the USA. I had taken off on Friday instead and left office early on Thursday to start the journey. Initially I had planned to start on Friday and return on Tuesday as I was planning for holiday on Tuesday. But Hursh's re-opening of the school and his soccer semifinal match on Tuesday forced me to change my program and instead we started on Thursday evening. It worked out to be good as we did not have too much of traffic on Thursday night and while return also on Monday we had very comfortable journey back.

We left home exactly at 5:00PM and up to Hamilton we were sailing through smoothly and then we faced a heavy traffic volume. That took away our nearly an hour. But our travel beyond the bridge in the USA was very smooth. We stopped at somewhere in New York state around 6:30 PM and then we continued for quite some time. Kids were having fun while watching the movie. The DVD player was serving its purpose very well. With just one stopping I continued driving till around 1:00 AM. We were too tired to drive further. In fact we had almost completed 3/4th of the journey so we decided to stop for the overnight in a motel. It was somewhere in Massachusetts and close to Boston. The motel was one of those Motel 8 series. We were too tired and soon we went to sleep. Morning we got up around 8:30 AM and started around 9:30 after having the breakfast served as complimentary by the motel.

We reached Augusta around 2:30 PM. This time driving was more of an enjoyable trip than a "task". Kids also had lots of fun and we enjoyed a lot. Maine is a beautiful state with lots of natural greeneries and its very thinly populated. Augusta is the capital but it did not look like a capital city at all. It looked more like a small city and there are no major landmark or any sort of buildings of prominence. When we reached at 28 Blaine Avenue, it appeared to be a very old street with buildings looking very fragile and antique. The street was not maintained well too. I was wondering whether we have come to the right place or not but Seema got down and when Mayurakshi opened the door we were relaxed. We had to park the car on the rear side of the house. Once we went inside the house, it appeared to be quite a good house and kids were busy playing.

In the evening we "attempted" to go to Portland, a nearby big city. But dependency on GPS let us down as we had used one 128 MB memory card in it and Pintu had loaded map for Augusta city only on that. There was no map for way to Portland. We lost our way and we moved around on highways for nearly 2 hours and finally reached Pizza Hut for our dinner. After our dinner we decided to go to K-Mart, as Seema insisted to see the store, we had never been to a K-Mart before. There was not much to see there but Pintu bought a inflatable mattress and a Nintendo Gameboy game cartridge for Hursh. He was busy in that game afterwords.

Next day we started for Acadia State Park. The park is amazing. It took us a long drive to reach there. almost 4-5 hours. We stopped at one Lick's for ice-cream and then carried on. There was a visitor's centre for which we had to climb nearly 50 steps! But for each visitor the office had tour guides to help you decide how to go about the park depending on the interest areas. In fact they used to highlight the driving directions as well on a map. That made our life much easier as we knew that what all we were going to see and enjoy.  

We stopped at one place and that offered a majestic view of Atlantic ocean. We did not enjoy much that after a while, as it was too hot to stand in the sun. We started further and stopped at another attraction. This place had a cave kind of rock holdings made by the water. The water splashing there gave us a beutiful feeling. We wanted to go clser and closer to that. Initially it appeared very risky and difficult, but slowly we made it!

At times I was worried for the kids but eventually with lots of cautioning and care, both kids made it slowly. The rocks had many imprints of dried sea plants on it which had solidiied in due course of time and since we had taken off our footwears, it caused us lots of pain. Beside the water was very cold and we could not stand there for long. It was very small version of rock climbing fo us as we had to find the rock folds to make three-point contacts, something I recalled from my old days of trekking and rock climing at Tekri, Garhwal. We had been o trekking course for almost a week under Bachendri Pal, the fist Indian female mountanieer to conquer the Everest.

We spent almost an hour or so at that point. We started for our ongoing journey within the park. On our way to the car Hursh noticed one larva and he was thrilled to see it for quite some time. Our next stop was at a sea beach. But since no one had carried swimwear we stayed there for very short time and continued. By this time evryone was hungry and we wanted food desparately. But the problem was that the restaurant was at the end of our one-way journey, called Loop Road, and if we skipped something, we were to miss forever. So our attempts were to cover as much as possible before we come to the end of our journey and stopped for lunch.

There was a very good  point, I fogot what that was called but it had a small passage between two walls made naturally by the two solod rocks and water used to come in with a huge foce and velocity and when thwarted by the rocks made a loud sound and the water used to look much whiter than milk! It was an amazing site or us and we must have spent nearly 30 minutes watching that. We finally had almost covered all the points of interest by now. We headed fo lunch but not before stopping at one point of interest.

This point of attraction had some kind of  some small trails as well and though not everyone was very enthusiastic about that, I pushed them to go for it. It was not a bad idea though everyone stopped in between once a couple returning from the opposite side told us that there was not something great ahead!

Next day we went to a city called Rockwood. The place was close to Augusta but we had no idea as what it had to offer to us in terms of sight seeing. We stopped near an Art Museum. Though we soon found that entry fee was substantial and enough to demotivate us to look elsewhere!

Last week I was invited at someone's place to attend a gathering to celebrate the birthday of their son.  It is amazing that how we are making friends now-a-days, indicative of the fact that I am really now quite "old". This friendship has developed through my son as they go to Kumon and Seema developed acquittance with another Seema, whose son also comes there. That is how we came to know about each other. Is it not strange that we are coming to know about each other thanks to our sons now?! Anyway, I was busy talking to the group there, and quickly realized that most of them were childhood friends. They were talking in great length to each other and were so natural in their talking and behaviour. As they were talking, invariably they would miss me as well as few others who were not from their "old" circle. I did not take it otherwise as it was purely unintentional and perhaps they were also unware of that fact. But it made me to think about my own childhood and my friends of those days. It took me almost 30 years back in time and I started recollecting my old days. And that is how this blog!

I had my childhood spent in two places in Jamshedpur. In the beginning we were living at my Nanaji's place where we used to live together and there were more than 10 family members living in a joint family of sort. Later on we moved to a separate home and we had a completely different set up resulting in new friendships.

L5/47, Kalindi Road

It was until 1978 that we lived at a place called Kadma. Jamshedpur is mostly influenced by Tatas. In fact the city came to its presence thanks to Tatas so it is bound to have their presence felt in every aspect of that place. If I could say that Tatas are as much present as O2 in air which people breathe in, it would not be exaggeration! This house, where we used to live was situated in a place called Old Farm Area. As the name suggests, it must have been a very open place before, good for farming and slowly as the population exploded, it must have paved the way for residence, "company quarters" as it used to be called. We were on Kalindi Road and the house number was L5-47. Kalindi Road was a small road starting from Main Road and going all the way to a field where it ended. There used to be a covered well in that field and we used to wonder as what could be inside that, till date I have not come to know as what was inside. Many kids would tell me that Britishers killed innocent civilians and buried them in the tank, must have been a made up story but that used to frighten me to no end! The Kalinidi road started from Main Road and there were many points of interest at that junction. First there is a big temple called Rankini Mandir at that intersection. There used to be many "Paan Dukaans", a typical convenience and smoke store  near the temple. There were at least 6 of them and all of them selling the same identical stuff. Just beside those Paan Dukans there was a gas station, Petrol Pump, what we used to call. Our school's field started from that point and it went all the way beside the Main Road. That junction also had a shoemaker's shop called "Mochhi Dukan". Babujee always had patented his shops and for our shoe repairs or any leather work, we used to come to him. 

This intersection used to become a very important place during Durga Puja as there used to be a very important Puja Pandal erected in open space across the road. Puja Pandal is a tmporaray shelter erected with bamboos and canopies and decorated so beautifully for almost a week  Puja Panadal is a very common arrangement to make a place for many Pujas celebrated by community, like Ganesh Puja, Saraswati Puja and Durga Puja mainly and many other events where public gathering is expected. It used to be water proof and rain or shine it was good for Puja. Of all the Puja pandals, Mandir's Durga Puja had most significance in our family. We used to go there for Pushpanjali. That used to be a tough exercise for us as we would not eat or drink anything until we had compleed Pushpanjali in that Pandal. It literally meant to offer flowers to God. In Hindu mythology there are both God and Goddess and Durga is one of the Goddesses who is believed to have derived all specialities from many other Gods and Goddesses to overcome the devils. We used to go with Nani to offer the prayer to Goddess Durga on Maha Astami (8th day of the Navarati festival).  After that we would spend couple of hours in and around the Pandal enjoying the foods, toys, shops and all other festive attractions.

Durga Puja used to be a very important event in my life. In front of our house there was a huge open field all the way upto the Main Road. I will write about the Puja in more details later on. Also our school Kadma Boys Middle School was very much visible from our house. It was so visible that when I was in grade 2, I would be watching all the time my house from the main door of the class room. We used to have two shifts in the school and every month the shift used to interchange. I used to go to home during the recess time and that used to be a good time to catch up with the latest happenings in home. But sometimes I used to be in school only. Particularly when we moved to the new house, we were more on our own and we would hardly go to our old house which we then started calling as Nani Ghar. 

Nursery School and Ganesh Puja Maidan 

Before I start recollecting my days in Middle school, I want to go back couple of years back when I was in Nursery school near Ganesh Puja Maidan.  That was a school run in two houses together by one Mrs. Sinha. I do not have a very clear memory of those days but I have faint memories of few incidents in that school. For a year Manoj and I were together in the school. And there were two brothers living in a house behind our street called Sanjay and Ajay. Ajay was of Manoj's age and we used to go together to school. It used to be a good walk and we would talk so many things together while on our way to the school. Ajay was very matured and he used to talk things ahead of his time. Incidentally this was the same nursey school where Ma and Ashok Mama (and perhaps Santosh Mama and Bharti Mausee too) had also studied. Ma used to share with me lots of  funny stories about that school. Let me recollect a few which Ma had told me about her childhood. It so happened that once it rained very heavy and Ma and Ashok Mama were caught in their way to home. As they were completely wet and all their books and bags were wet too, they started playing . One interesting thing during the rainy season used to be the drainage channels which we used to call as "Nalee". The city is very well planned and it has nice wide streets and beside each house there are "Nalees" to have a good drainage. The water flow in those Nalees used to be very forceful and one could enjoy watching the water flowing in it. I also used to enjoy like all the other kids by putting some flowers, leaves, barnches of trees which would fall after heavy storm and rain or paper baots ("naav") in the stream of water and following it all the way by running beside the Nalee. Ma and Ashok Mama being of the same like any other kids of that age started enjoying the water. However, they went a step ahead and started putting their slippers, books and eventually the entire school bag in the water and started seeing the free flow of those items in the stream. Finally when they reched home, Nani was shocked to see them coming empty handed! I do not remember what Ma told me about the events which took place after that, but then that is anyone's guess!

Coming back to the rainy seasons, we used to have rain coat and umbrella. Invaiably in a stormy season, our umbrella would turn the other way and we would be busy fixing that and almost always it resulted in breaking of some of the frames. But we used to have lots of fun standing under a big tree and getting wet little bit from the big water drops falling from the tree while it was raining heavily outside. I used to watch above and there used to be crows and other birds also getting little bit wet and seating on the branches. Then if it was even stronger wind it resulted in some branches of trees falling apart or some papers or clothes flying in the sky. The traffic in the street used to come to a standstill during such waether. I remember once we were on our way back to home. The weather was very cloudy and strong wind was blowing across. It was about to rain. We were thinking of getting a shelter under a big tree. In these inclement weather we used to carry umbrell but invariably it used to turn upside with few sokes breaking and at times if we did not hold that tight, it used to fly away. We used to be very afraid of using umbrella on a windy day. Suddenly we saw Babujee on the other side of the road. We screamed and he stopped for us. Manoj and Ajay crossed the road but I almost  ran behind them without checking the traffic on both sides, something which I am busy teaching Yash now-a-days! There was one scooter coming at a fairly good speed and he had to apply brake just to avoid an accident very narrowly. I was terified and on top of that, the person yelled at me. I could not see him eye to eye. Later on I saw that same person again at "Punditji Ka Dukan". There used to be a book store in Kadma market owned by one Punditji but it was so famous that it had become a landmark of the market. If someone had to give direcion, he would use Punditji Ka Dukan as a reference. The best part was that almost all our teachers were found there in the evenings seating on benches outside. It was more of a kind of Adda for a group of adults beside the book store. Invariably I used to come across our "heddu", our  head master, Ram Charitra Singh and few other teachers as well there. I used to be so terrified to face our teachers and we used to be well behaved and concsious. Sometimes few of them would talk to Babujee and would associate my being his son with the fact that I am also a student of his class. But those were happenings of later years. That day when I was there  I saw that person there in that shop whom I had a narrow escape the other day near my nursery school. I just wanted to run away and hide in one corner as I was so nervous. That person's heart melted to see me behave like that and he took me to a nearby Paan dukan and got me chocolates to befriend with me.

Nursery school was a very homely kind of place for me. I usually would be seating in the last row of the class and sleep for whole time. Once I got up and asked for milk  very loudly - "Duddhu". The teacher did not mind and continued the class but I insisted for couple of times more and then again went back to sleep. Milk was very favourite to me and  I used to drink that a lot. The setting up of Ganesh Puja pandal used to be one of my favourite activities to watch from the classroom. I remember once I watched for almost half an hour the unloading of bamboos from a truck in the middle of the field. I raely used to enjoy the class and always loved to watch activities going on outsie the window. In the recess time we used to have lots of fun. We used to play in the same Ganesh Puja maidan. Just beside that school was a  place called "Mangal Singh Ka Akhada" . As that name was very terrifying, I had developed a very monster like image of that person. I would never ever go close to that place for the fear that I might encounter Mangal Singh. someone had told me that he does not mind killing anyone. I came to know about him later that he had basically encroached that piece of that land and to justify his cause he started one Akhada there. I saw that person in real when I grew up and I was so curious but it was not that great to watch him, to be honest for he was not even close to be a giant or monster like persron!  

We used to catch butterflies during our recess time. There used to be one of our favourite called Gandhee Titlee. I do not know why we termed that so, but it used to be fairly easy to catch. All one had to do was patiently go behind that while it was busy sucking the juice from the flower and in a quick swing of hand catch the butterfly by folding the palm. Once caught they used to try their best to escape and therefore the wings would vibrate in a very quick motion but we used to have other motive. Someone had spread a trick that if we buried only the heads of that butterfly, it would become coins next day. Many butterlies must have scrificed their lives to make me realize finally that it was nothing but a wrong belief. I used to feel very bad whenever I killed them but the curiousity of seeing it beome coin used to take over the emotions! 

I left Nursery school and started my 2nd grade at Kadma Boys Middle school. Before that I had to appear in one examination of Grade 1 with other students. I had never appeared in any such examination before. Before I could finish everything, one teacher came and virtually snatched the paper from me. I did not like his rude behaviour. Later on I was explaining that to Ma and I described that teacher's nose like a parrot and so aptly started calling him Tota sirjee.I saw him many times later and each time he reminded me of that incident.

Topiwala Sirjee 

My first class teacher was one Mr. S.K.Sinha and he used to wear pure white dhoti, kurta and a Gandhi cap all made of khadee. He was called Topiwala sirjee. He was very strict and ahardwaorking teacher. I remember he used to carry a ruler with him all the time and that was his weapon to punish the students if they did not cmplete the homework or were not attentive in the class. I was put in the front seat by him as Nanaji had requested him in person. Those days parents used to request teachers to punish if we did not pay attention ot the teachers in the class, so much of trust they had on teachers!  But there was a big problem.

I was asked to seat in the front seat . I was so homesick that I used to always watch the home through the doors. I would watch who came out in varandah of our home and what else was happening in and around my house. I used to be more focussed at all those kind of activities than what was going on in the class room! I would always see my home through the doors and he was very annoyed to see that I was not at all attentive in the class but was watching out all the time!  I do not know why but I used to enjoy watching who came out or what was happening at my home, more than anything else. Finally Topiwala sirjee gave up and he moved me to the last bench. That place was den of all the stalwarts who had been in the class for few years atleast. Just like all the big particles settle down at the bottom, so were these big burly boys! One of them was Balkrishna Rao who was at least 5 years older than me and he was much like an adult. He used to make me cry by doing some of the activities which were more in line with gays and that used to make me so embarassed in the class. But at that age I was a very shy and timid child. I could not generate enough guts to complain to any of my teachers or in home to anybody. I could see my house from there through the doors.  One positive development was that I could not see my house from there anymore. Topiwala sirjee was so hardworking that he gave us tons of homework before Chhuttee -summer break. And he also cautioned that he would visit each one of us during the break. He indeed came to see me also once and fortunatley I had finished my homeowrk and was sleeping that afternoon. He discussed with Nanaji about my progress over tea and finally he left with satisfaction. Where would we come across teachers with so much of sincerity, dedication and concern for his students? As I grew up, I had so much of respect for him but soon he retired and once in a while I used to see him in Kadma Bazaar.

As I moved to my next grade, I had a new class teacher called Pandey. He was not that impressive but was very strict. He never tolerated any kind of noise in the class. Most of the times he used to give us some nice talk on general topics. I rememeber, once he was explaining about kid's mind. He gave an analogy for a child's mind to be a white sheet where we could put nice colours and images which will become parmanent forever. Same way, he warned us that we should think and assimilate all good things in mind because that will remain with us forever. Just like no one likes to see dirty and ugly things on a white sheet, we should also avoid the same in our mind. How true was his analogy and his that talk has been in mind so fresh even till date, after almost 30 years!

During that period I had many friends in my neighbourhood. Most of them used to live in Kalindi road. There were many but I used to play mostly with Nupa, Bapi, Bisu, Elvis, Nanu and few more. My friend circle was mostly kids from lower middle or lower income families. The entire neighbourhood was not that great. Just behind us were L/4 type quarters and one street below were N1 type quarters - one room house wherein mostly workers and employees of low income group used to live in. The overall set up was very terrible least I could say. But we had no other option but to play with them. Most of the kids were not serious about studies and sometime they would even miss the school and their parents were not bothered. The education was free from Tatas and therefore no one had any pain and perhaps they did not find study so valueable. Evening time used to be full of fun as we used to play with the kids. I could not get along very well with most of the kids. I wanted to dominate everyone and also was very possesive of my stuff which most of the kids did not like. But another problem was that Manoj and I had only one year difference and most of his friends wanted to continue friendship with him and skip me. I was left with no other option but start playing with girls and kids of younger age than me. There were some of the kids who were not clean and they used to have very foul language. But that was the price we had to pay.

In the school  too the students were mostly from lower income group and while some of them were serious about studies most of them were just there for the heck of it. Some of them were much older to be in the class but in a school running for free, no one was very concerned for these problems. Most of the students were not that serious about studies. Some of the older kids were a nuisance and they always shared with us things which we wee supposed to know couple of years ahead. Overall, it had a mixed kind of effect, while we were maturing much faster, we could not comprehend that what effect it might have on kid's mind if he is not matured enough to understand them. But whatever, I used to have lots of fun. Those days Kalindi Road was not pitch road. It used to have red coloured gravels which was called Murum. I remember running on that kind of road had its own pitfalls, like I used to skid or fall and would be bleeding. The best part used to be rainy time when water used to flow like a stream on the road and watching the colour of water turning into red used to have a great joy. I used to be so happy during the cloudy days and my creative side used to be at its peak. I invariably would like to draw something or paint. May be the inspiration used to come from the different combination of shiny colours on the big canvas like sky. Or since we all used to be confined inside the doors, I had nothing better to do anyway!

In the summer time whenever it rained, some of the kids would cover their heads and run to catch the mangos, Bel or guvavas falling fom the trees. There used to be lots of action during the rainy days. Ma, Nani and Mausi used to rush to get the clothes drying up in Aangan or get the pickles or genhu (wheat, Nani used to call that as Gahum) inside before it started raining. Normally the windows would start closing by the storms or strong winds and that will alert everyone about rain which was likely to follow. Those sounds used to trigger lots of actions thereafter. Normally we used to close all the doors and windows and lights were up. We used to feel very secured inside. Afterwords, when rain would stop, I used to have lots of fun watching the refreshing look all over. Of so many trees all over, Gulmohar used to be my favourite one. It used to be fully covered with colourful flowers. After the storm the ground used to be full of those flowers and that was a sheer joy to behold. The sky used to be clear but still some clouds would prevent the sun to throw light and as a result shiny sky used to make it so soothing to see anywhere. We used to play with broken branches of the trees and overall that usd to be the best time to have fun. Slowly life resumed after the rain for me and for so many others. People who had taken shelters under the trees used to start moving back to their destinations. The birds used to be back in the sky. There always used to be stray cows, dogs, goats and cats everywhere and they also would start coming back to their normal action. When I compare with the PVR receivers where one could pause the live TV and resume back afterwords, the rainy days in my childhood could compare well with that!  

Duing one of those rainy days I was home and Mausi had come back from school. She had taken a new bus named Rajnigandha. Around that time the long red bus had stopped and private mini busses started plying on the roads.Each of those buses used to have names like Jai Hind, Azaad Hind, Paalki, Khemka and what not. We had developed a very interseting passion with these buses as we wanted to collect the tickets of these buses. The ticket used to be on the holed computer papers and printed on that. Now I can associate the fact that back in those days the computers used to have punched sheets for the programs to run and once the change in programs were made those sheets became useless. The bus owners must have found it a cheap resource to print the tickets on that. But overall that used to give us so much of happiness that we almost fell in love with that. We started collecting the bus tickets of different buses. The school bus Rajnigandha had started a new kind of ticket and we were eager to collect that. When Mausi told me that it is with her, we could not stop ourselves and started running behind her. Meanwhile it was about to rain and so Ma left the Hansua (knife with stand fo cutting vegetables) open and I fell near that. It was a coincidence that my palm fell on the cutting edge of Hansua.  It started bleeding profusely. I startd crying and Poonam started screamin. Ma thought for a while that it must be something what used to happen daily in home, when we used to hit each other and cry and calling Ma. She did not pay any attention to that until Poonam started screaming - Khoon, Khoon....! Ma and Nani rushed to me. Neither Nana, Mama or Baujee were in home. There used to be a neighbour whom we used to call as Vinit Mausa, he and Babban were called and they took me in the middle seat and I was taken to the dispensary on his Yezdi motorcyle. It was drizzling and I could see the guilt, anxiety and sorrow in Ma's face. When I reached in dispensery, it would normally take a while to get all the formalities completed but doctor immediately asked me to be taken to the dressing area where I was given 7 stitches and little did I knwo at that point that I would neve be able to fold my that finger ever in my life. Till date I can not fold my thumb on right hand. I had to face so much of problem afterwords as I could not hold pen in my normal way and I had to start a new style. It used to hurt whenever I touched that particular spot but I do not know what went wrong but it could neve be recovered.

When I came home, Ma was so anxious to know as what had really happened. I had a big white bandage all over my palm. Every one in home was terrified and Mausi was very apologatic and she was hugging me. I did not know how to react as I had gone through a traumatic expereicne. Later on when Nanaji and Babujee came they also had lots of symapthy for me. In a way I started enjoying so much of attention and care or me! I remember that Ma sked me to seat right in front of the Chulha, while she was cooking food. I did no hav to study now. I was given a full glass of milk with creams on top of it - chhalee, as we used to call that. Normally chhalee was reserved for Manoj as he was considered by Ma as slightly weaker and she wanted to give more attention to his health.

Chulha

Those days we used to have a coal firing stove made out of buckets. The design was such that at may be one fourth from the top of the bucket, holes were made diametrically on both sides and iron rods were fixed diametrically across in those holes which would support the coal. Much like a charcoal BBQ grill. Then the entire top portion above the grills were thickened with clays and there used to be three pojected tops on the top so that cooking utensils could stay firm. I used to enjoy the preparation of the chulha with Ma. She used to do that at the exteme end of the aangan (courtyad). The activity was called chulha pajarna.

Ma would put some wood pieces first and then on top of that coal briquets were put. Sometimes she used a hammer to break them in smaller pieces. She used to put pieces of coal on top of each other in such a way that there used to be enough room for ventilation. Then some kerosene oil was spread and lastly firing the chulha with a match stick. Match box was kept dry and I remember so vividly the horse face made on the cover of the match boxes, so much that it has frozen in my mind and whenever I think of matchboxes, it flashes an image in my mind of that horse! After it required a draft to ignite the coal and wood pieces in chulha, so we would  fan from the bottom open space, from where normally the ashes were removed. The fanning action from below used to take the flame and heat to the top side and that is how the coal pieces used to start igniting. The whole process used to generate a lots of smoke and took almost 15 minutes. In all chulha could stand out as one of the best indigeneously developed equipment which was in action for our day-to-day use.

Each day Ma had to do that twice, once in the early morning and then in the evening-  everyday, non stop for years and years! Rain or shine, feeling good or bad, sick or otherwise, she used to do that! How many of modern peple can even think of doing this in the dark morning of a winter season? Ma used to prepare Nastaa for Babujee early morning before 5:30 on this chulha! Which meant that she had to get up much earlier than that. Once the Chuha was ready, it used to have a handle and she would pick it up and bring inside home. In the process one or two coal pieces would fall and I would be quick to put water on that and hear the chhunn sound and gulf of steam coming out from it! There used to be a very interesting game I played together with Ma called chhunn chhunn Baja. At the end of cooking when all the rotis were baked, the iron plate on which roti used to be heated, called tawa, remained very hot. Ma would keep us at a distance and put water on that which will sound like chhunn..... and lots of steam evaporating all over, enough to delight me! I used to watch that every day. In fact the entire Rotee preparation was a fun to watch. The dough preparation used to be a fun fo me. Ma would use a big open faced utensil called adhaiya and put 4-5 cups of wheat flour. The measuring cup used to be the empty coconut oil can, normally Shalimaar. The process of getting the top emoved was a very crude metod which used to generate shriiling sound. I had done couple of times. Whhat I needed was a rough surface and then run the top surface endlessly until with wearing action the top lid would break away from the can, resulting in a perfect measuring cup!

Once Ma had put the wheat flour in the adhaiya she used to make a hole in the  middle and pour water in that empty space and start putting flour on top of it until it had covered the entire water. Then the entire outer circle would become an empty and the middle portion as an island with flour covering the water. Then Ma would just make a smal hole somewhere and the water started flowing out from there making it look like an island. It may sound silly now but back in those days with no TV, no cartoons and no form of entertainmnt for kids, this used to be one of the most interesting and exciting game for us! 

I was extremely busy in last one month in various activities. There are many important events to share. Let me start from the most recent one.

August 22, 2005

I donated blood today. I have always thought of donating once a year ever since Ma had been to hospital and she needed bottles of blood transfusion. But I could not keep my promise to myself for a very silly reason that I am afraid of seeing blood. But today was a day when we had blood donation camp in our building itself. Since morning, I was contemplating the idea of donating but my inner conflict did not let me go until 3:00 PM when I could generate enough courage and went for this. When I went for registration, perhaps I was the last one for the day as they were closing at 3:30 PM. There were series of questions to be answered. After a test for iron level in my blood, I was asked to wait in a line for my turn. I was pleasantly surprised to see couple of my office friends lying and donating blood.

I am so scared of blood that I asked them to hide it from me as I could not have seen that. During the process of donation, one of the nurses came to me and asked me whether I was alright because I was kind of nervous! When I told the reason she encouraged me and that helped me to continue further without much problems. Finally it was over in five and half minutes only! Then there was a wait and so on and finally I was offered a glass of juice and some snacks. I did not feel like eating anything and took juice instead and that was it! I did not realize how the whole process was over in less than an hour or so! The whole arrangement was very nicely done.

When I came back from office, Hursh, Yash and Seema were waiting to pick me up from GO station. Seema had dropped me in the morning at station as she wanted to keep the car for the day. Hursh was very excited to hear that I had donated blood. He was one who had encouraged me once after hearing an advertisement on blood donation on radio, which concluded saying that "... it is sad that only 3% of eligible Canadians donate blood considering that we all have that!" That line is very awakening and Hursh asked me immediately that "Dad have you ever donated blood?" I told him that I had donated couple of times when I was young but not in the recent time. Today I was a proud father before my sons!  I resolved to myself that I will donate once a year now on.

I started recalling my last blood donation which was in year 1995 and that was for Ma. She needed nearly 5-6 bottles of blood to be transfused before each chemotherapy! We did not have many people to donate blood so we had to depend on others for this. The blood bank in Jamshedpur had reserve of blood and we managed from that. But I thought of that very deeply and thanked many from the bigger family of humankind as a whole; where there are many noble members who work selflessly and stand for a cause. Thanks to their donation, and before donation their concern for people at large, that we could go ahead with Ma's treatment. It was contribution of those people which enabled us to utilize when we needed it the most! I had promised to myself that beside repaying some of the debt by donating the blood for humankind I should be of some use to others as well. I had been dragging away from that and unfortunately it never materialized. That was then but I am proud to say I am on a different course now! I often ask myself, how much am I doing for others without any selfish desire? I don't feel satisfied with the answer myself, a lot is desired to be done!

August 21, 2005

It was almost 3 years that I had spoken to Manikant Nana. And what an interesting conversation it turned out to be! Let me first elaborate as who he is. When I was in my youth, I used to hear about one gentleman who used to live in the USA and was originally from my mother's village Hariharpur. This person had deep interest in the village and would visit once in a while and talk to every single person of the village in the most humble way.

As I was growing up, I saw a coloured photograph of Ma and few other family members taken by him. I would question myself that can there be a person so caring to bring happiness in everyone's life, agreed momentarily only but every time he could. When I was in my teens, I heard that he came down all the way to Hariharpur to marry off his daughter. Also he would spend hours and hours with my Nanaji, whenever he visited Hariharpur. He would take photographs, take video recordings and kind of interviews of all the prominent people of the village and record in voice recorder. I was told that he is in the process of writing a book an that is what=y he was compiling everything. 

When I left India, Nanaji gave me his phone number and asked me to talk to him should I need any help. When I came to Canada my beginning was very shaky and I found people here very different in their attitude. As most of my friends who were here for years, I noticed that their was a very different attitude. Let us put in this way, people here are very objective and straightforward, they speak their minds. Back in those days I was not prepared for such conversation as people would ask me directly as what help did I need or some would say simply what kind of help he could provide. To me all these appeared as if people understood my calls as if I needed help from them. I was little taken by surprise and resolved to myself that until I stood on own feet, I would not bother calling anyone again.

I felt that I had somehow established myself well in this country around 2000 and then I started calling all my friends in this part of the world. also by that time I had gone through a lot of transformation in my personality and what appeared to be very sharp in my early days they started blurring down to a large extent as I started understanding the intent of people. During those days I called Manikant Nana.He immediately recognized me though we have never met each other. We talked for over 2 hours in our first conversation. He talked about many things and we went over many topics. We have a few common interests such as Hariharpur, Mithila samaj and likes. We would correspond through e-mails and phones once in a while and it went on regularly for next couple of years. Then Nanaji died in year 2002. Manikant Nana is perhaps the biggest admirer of Nanaji's contribution to the Hariharpur samaj and in general he admires his overall vision and achievements in life. He was saddened by his demise and we had few more correspondence and then somehow we did not talk or correspond for next almost 2 years. Mainly it was because of my mistake as I had changed my job and moved from my previous home to another one an all my co-ordinates had changed. Right from office e-mail to my phone numbers. when we were talking, I came to know that he had tried couple of times to reach to me but with no success.

Recently, I had started writing my memoirs of childhood and I was writing a lot about Hariharpur and therefore my memories were very fresh. I had to ask and verify many information as well. He seem to have so much information about Mithila and Hariharpur that we went on. He clarified many of my information and also told me so many interesting information about my Nanaji's childhood. That has generated lots of work for me as I need to correct many of my blogs where I have put wrong information. He has amazing collection of stuff related to Hariharpur and I requested him to archive all those stuff on more modern media such as DVD or CDs. He needed some information from me and hopefully he will not find them so difficult as I am planning to send him all the details soon. He mentioned that he has video recordings, photographs and voice recorded of many people including my Nanaji with him. He has complete family trees of all the families of village. What a remarkable person he is! He told me that he was not sure who will benefit from that or who will carry them on but at least he has satisfaction that in next 200-300 years people of that village ever wanted to know more about their roots(which I am sure will happen), this will be a priceless contribution. I am very impressed by his passion for these. I was overjoyed when he shared so many interesting stories about Hariharpur and related ones. I have requested him to start a blog on that but if he does not, I will try to capture them as much as I would be able to. 

August 20, 2005

I became PMP certified. On Saturday I took the Project Management Professional examination at Prometric Centre at London, Ontario. Soon you would be able to see my name here. I am going through a very crucial juncture in my professional career. I started this mis-adventure in IT about 8 years back and now have started realizing that this was never my career goal. At the best it could have been a means to achieve my ultimate career goals but not something where I would have stuck, in a way! At this point I myself do not know as what are my goals and which way I want to go in my career path. Everything is very murky. I am trying to get some direction and so these certifications. Let us see how it shapes up in future.

I had missed my first PMP examination as I forgot to show up on that day. Let me explain further, as it sounds unbelievable but it is true! I had got "go ahead" from PMI in December 2004 itself and had registered for the examination somewhere that time. But I always found myself not ready yet, and kept on postponing. Finally, it happened a little too often and so the miss! I was shocked that I had lost nearly $500 as fee! But then next moment I determined that I have to conquer this in my next attempt, no matter how much efforts were needed! I contacted PMI and they did not even consider it as re-examination but as a new examination and I was again charged nearly $430 US, which roughly translates into $500 Cdn.

Meanwhile, my team lead Ron Naidoo cleared the examination. He had followed my advise, just like Manmeet Singh and Tunji Oreyingbo had. Everyone who took my advice had become PMP except me. Anyhow, the process to get a confirmation from PMI took a long time and finally I obtained confirmation on Wednesday, August 17th. I went to schedule the exam to Prometric site and it was all full. Since 2004 pattern is getting over by end of August, everyone wanted to take before that and so the rush! I was not sure what to do and suddenly I found slots available at London, Ontario centre. I immediately booked for Saturday at 1:00 PM.

I had now only over two days in my hand to prepare. But I was determined to clear this examination anyhow so started studying like crazy in my office and home. I was almost confident about the outcome a day before on Friday evening but as it was late in the evening on Friday, a day before the examination, my confidence started dimming. I had lot to complete but I did not have time! I finally resolved myself that I was not going to study a whole lot more but would rather focus on whatever I had covered until that point! I went to bed around 12:00 and next day morning I got up late around 8:30. I kept my cool and just focused on whatever I had studied so far. I had to drive a long distance, nearly 160 miles. Therefore, I took bath and was ready by 10:00 to start for London.

Initially, I had thought of taking everyone there as they could have enjoyed a new place but then I shot down that idea and went all alone. I had burnt a new music CD and the songs were very soothing and the driving was much relaxed and enjoyable. Half way through I had regained my confidence and started taking my own mock examination. I guess that made the whole difference. I learned a new technique now which works very well for me. I should stop my revision and studying book and other course materials at least by late evening before the day of examination. After that I should focus on something similar, like take my own mock examination. That way I could come to know more about my weaknesses and comfort level as well.

Anyhow, when I took the exit from 401 for London, Mapquest's direction really let me down. It had shown Highbury N exit and then mentioned that take Highbury South, and when I continued on Highbury South for almost 15 minutes, I started realizing that I was crossing remote villages. I made a turn and went the other way and then reached the centre in next half an hour. I did a good thing by keeping nearly 1 hour margin.

The examination centre had many people waiting to take the examination like they had nearly 5 people. Finally my examination started at 1:00 PM. I did not even know how I had spent 3 hours without even realizing that! The questions were very straightforward but lengthy. Options for answer were very close and that used to take a lot of time as one had to read again and again the lengthy questions! There were words like Most, First, Except, Only etc., to make the things worse. As most of the options could be right, one had to apply his judgment to get the option which fitted well for adjectives First or Only and likes. I finished all my 200 questions in nearly 3.5 hours. But I had nearly 60 questions marked for review. I went over again and just clicked on Finish button around 5:00 PM and it took almost a minute to tell me "Pass" . I was very relaxed as my hard work had finally paid off!

I immediately called Seema after the exam and she was very happy to hear the outcome as well. Then I drove back very relaxed but was feeling very hungry as I had not taken any food since morning (did not feel like!). But Seema had planned to visit someone so wanted to reach home as soon as possible. Once I reached home, the best reaction was from Yash who sat on my lap and asked, "Papa exam pass kar liya?"  

Hursh's playoff has started and he did not do very good in last game. Though his team tied with arguably the best team in his league but the goal tending by him was not that great. He was little shaky and may be pressure was telling on him. All though this season he had done very good goal tending and he became the first choice for his coach but perhaps he could not keep the tempo for the final playoff. Hopefully he will do better in the rest of playoff games and reach into semifinal stage. Here are comments from his coach about his goaltending from almost every game he has played:

....From what I saw last night during the practice and scrimmage(s) I think we're ready for the play-offs, Hursh again was phenomenal while I was going over some drills with him and when I looked over to check on the other boys doing their drills they were almost flawlessly. .....I would like to have Hursh in net on Wednesday he is on a hot streak right now!!! 

We had outstanding goal-tending by Hursh in both the first and second half, Hursh caught so many high flying balls tonight I think he'll have sore hands tomorrow!!! I have never seen so many incredible saves by one goal tender this season!!! great job guys!!!  Besides all of those great goals and great saves we had some fancy footwork out there tonight by Radi and Matthew and Adam, tons of pullbacks which led to at least 3 scoring chances and so much passing it was hard to follow the ball at times!!! 

We had stellar goal-tending in the first half by Nicholas and Hursh in the second between the two of them they only let in one goal the whole game way to go guys!!!

Just about everyone has had a chance to play in net this season and I have had some fantastic goal-tending that everyone should be very proud of, I would like to go into the playoffs with 4 goalies who will play in each of the games, the 4 players I have chosen are Hursh, Jason, Sean and Nicholas.  It was not an easy choice to make as we have also seen phenomenal goal-tending from Jordan, Reid, Raymond, Adam, Matthew and Ryan.  But I'm confident that with these players playing out and any one of either Hursh, Jason, Nicholas or Sean between the pipes we will do wonderfully in the playoffs!!! 

I have Hursh down as one of my goalies this week and hopefully I'll see as many fantastic saves as I saw him make at practice last night, but I still need one more goalie for the game. 

...and I can't forget the wonderful job the 2 goal tenders did tonight great job Jordan and again Hursh I saw you both make some great saves to keep us in the game!!! 

...and the second goal was scored by Matthew we also had fantastic goal-tending by Hursh in the first half and Raymond in the second...

He is perhaps shaping up very well as a goalie but he was not that sharp in the first playoff game. He is very exciting player though and would charge up the team quite well. He boosts up the team a lot and everyone is very friendly with him. But his interest is shifting more towards baseball now and he is requesting me to put him in baseball team next year and not soccer. We will see about that.

On other fronts Hursh is maturing very fast now. One of these days he called me directly on my office phone number and asked something like - " Dad, I am at your canada.com site and how do I see the mails?"

He wanted to check the mail from his coach, which she sends normally after every game. I gave him the instructions over phone and he followed them exactly and he ends his conversation like this - " OK, I am in now. Thanks. Bye Dad!"

How quickly this little sweet chubby boy has transformed and slowly entering in his youth slowly now! He is eight now! I know it is little far but he would be there sooner than that age, he is maturing much faster. He has a photographic memory and often he would ask very detailed question and his mom would become very irritated as she does not understand as what he is talking about! He would ask questions more for clarification purpose though, like " Dad, you remember we had been to States last time and there was a shop with Dunkin and we stopped there and ....and so on ..!" I understand his problem, because I am exactly like him, I love discussion with no purpose, like I love recalling old days and just discuss about that in the same way! I am to be blamed for what has transfered in him through my genes! Seema would truncate his discussion by asking questions like " OK, yes, then what...what is your question, I don't remember, but you tell me what is your question?" thinking that he wanted to recall about that trip and some related question he wanted to ask. But he would end very quietly -" No, I was just asking about that because we had been to that place!" Seema would become completely frustrated and pull him up a lot. And he would be very irritated now. He loves when I support him saying something like -" Yes and do you remember that day we had some donuts there and Yash had to go to washroom..." etc. and he would become very delighted in going back in the time! He is so close to my personality! Strange! 

I remember he has been very creative since he was 5 years or so. Once he asked me that -"Dad you know in Thursday my name is there, kind of ..!" And he went on clarifying that, " if you take out T and day from that it is my name!"  What can I say, I was little surprised to see his creativity! Then I took him once to baseball game last year as I had got a complimentary VIP pass from my office for two and I and Hursh went there. Of course it was embarrassing for both of us, particularly for me as I did not understand any bit of that game and he was asking me too may questions about game and I had no clues. All these were happening in the VIP row, where serious fans were seating! But that had its own impact and ever since that Hursh has been so engrossed in games, soccer, NHL, NBA, CFL and MLB that he knows everything about these leagues. He knows all the rules about theses games and all he has learned by himself. He knows their websites and it is amazing that he keeps latest information about the team rankings and what not. Once we were at Murali's place and he was sharing with us about his recent visit to Air Canada centre to watch NBA game as he had also got a pass from his office. Before he could say anything, Hursh updated him with score breakups at each quarter and who all were top scorers! Murali could not believe that how Hursh could remember so much about once particular game! He has amazing memory and inclination to his interests.

Recently he has started developing interest in Mathematics and English. He has been doing better and better in Maths at Kumon. But he is not doing so well in English though. But I am sure that he would improve in that as well, once he develops interest in that!

August 16, 2005

I discovered on web one of my relatives. It is a very interesting story! Let me share with you. I was looking for some details on Hariharpur as I wanted to see that if someone else also has similar interest as mine. I used google and I checked out one of the links. It took me to a guest book of a site where one Pranav Shankar has mentioned that his village is Hariharpur and his family is in Bokaro, presently he is in Dubai. It immediately reminded me of Arun Mama and his son. I had heard about this boy that he is doing so well and has been living in Dubai for quite sometime. I took a chance and sent him a mail. I was pretty sure about him being Arun Mama's son though I did not know his real name and if I remember well, he is more known by name Munna in his home. But perhaps I might be wrong on that name as well, for sure I did not know his real name. However, I was not sure about his e-mail.

It was Friday and when I came back on Monday there was a mail seating in my inbox from Pranav Shankar. I was very eager to read his reply. It was a very long e-mail and I could not believe the content of the mail. he wrote a very good English, almost flawless and more than his vocabulary and grammar, it was the content which touched me deep inside. I was not able to believe that someone of this young age could have so many brilliant ideas and determination to achieve so many goals in life. He is doing exceedingly well and he has transformed the whole family almost. I was very impressed by his reply and did not know how to reply. I took a print out of his e-mail and read again and again as it had touched my emotions. This boy had done something impossible for his family. He had helped his family to get his first sister married and for the other three sisters not only he is taking care of educational cost but even more importantly is giving a direction to the career. In such a competitive age in India, he has craved a career plan for each one of them. His dream to make his middle class family to a business class family really touched me to deep. I see a fire in him. He will do so many wonderful things in his life, I am sure. I was truly impressed, considering the kind of family background he has. I felt so good for Arun Mama as finally he must have some smile in his face! though he has been one person who always had smile at his face but deep inside he must have been a very devastated person. after all he had no life of his own for so many years, first he had to see all his four sisters married and then once he was over from that he had his own daughters growing up! Meanwhile the realities in Hariharpur have changed and his parents (Doodh Baba, as I used to call him when I was young!) could no longer live in village and depend on agriculture. I guess under all these odds Pranav did something extra ordinary and he has a long way to go, I am sure. He sent me his photograph, I am sharing that here.

I could have not believed such a wonder through web ever in my life!

August 3, 2005

I had met a person called Piyush Jha accidentally.  It was day of BACA picnic and one of our friends Rajesh Jha's car broke down. Initially we thought that it was battery problem and we arranged for a booster cable and his car started. everything seemed to be going well until at some point his car again broke down and for good this time. There wee some more members coming behind his car and they gave him and his family ride to Mississauga. I have CAA Plus membership and he contacted me as he wanted to tow the car to a garage in Mississauga. It was a very funny incident as he asked me to call CAA and say pretend that as if I was driving my friend's car which has broken down and they would send the towing truck. But as I started so, the CAA person asked me too many details about the car and perhaps she became suspicious of some foul play and she asked me to be there at the site with a photo id. And so Rajesh had to come to my house to pick me up.

As we were driving to the spot Rajesh introduced me to a person seating in the rear seat. He was his cousin and I asked him after a while as what he does. He replied to me saying that he is movies. I was not that attentive and thought that may be he is in movie show business like involved in organizing film festival events and related activities. But on further inquiry he said that he directs movies.

Now I was a little serious and asked like which all movies he has directed in past. Rajesh interrupted in between and said that he was here for his movie's North American premiere. The movie has Om Puri in lead role and the name of the move is King of Bollywood. I had heard about this movie sometime back as in one of the TV interviews Om Puri had mentioned about it. I could not believe that a simple looking guy has so many achievements under his belt. I felt very privileged and we went over many topics related to Indian Film industry in general and what kind of movies will work and under what circumstances and so on so forth. I was enjoying talks with him a lot.

Finally when we reached to the site where Rajesh's car was waiting, we had a long wait there for CAA guys to come and tow it to a garage in Mississauga. During that long wait for nearly 2 hours I had opportunity to talk with him in great details. I came to know that Piyush is an MBA from Bajaj and he had worked with Mudra for many years. Also he had closely worked with Mukul Anand, a very famous Hindi film director. I came to know about his future plans. He in