Stressbusters

Working late into the night in the office and trying desperately to find a research article from a heap of journals, you suddenly come across these. Small things that instantly pull the sides of the lips to a wide U (or a V)!

Months-old envelope sent from across the oceans on birthday. Reminds of happy moments and bubble wraps, followed by melancholic after-thoughts.

Half a year old train ticket, bought in Spain, en-route to a monastery with a friend. Realizations about being fortunate enough to have seen so many places. Smiles from ear-to-ear.

A filled-in diary given as a present a couple of years ago. Hand-written letters, memories galore and a spark in the eyes. Mixed emotions.

A picture of Calcutta while browsing randomly through Facebook. That heart-skipped-a-beat moment followed by the umpteenth-time realization that the City runs in the blood.

Instant stress-busters, I call them!  :-)

Fall colors

In school, we were often asked to prepare essays on 'Seasons of India' for our final exams. Given my limited writing potential, I would always ask Ma to write them for me and I would just memorize them and pour them out word-by-word in the exams. She would write about the six seasons- distinctively differentiating them with respect to the changes in weather, arrival of new fruits, vegetables, flowers and festivals. So while dub-er-jol (coconut-water) was a thing of Summer, pithe-puli (a Bengali dessert prepared with coconut and milk) would mean that Spring was round the corner. While unending rains would mean Monsoon, Durga Puja would mean Autumn and lightened up cathedrals and decorated Christmas trees would mean the arrival of Winter. No wonder, I started identifying the seasons not from the drop or rise in temperature but from the various activities and 'add-ons' they were associated with.

In Germany, however, seasons are different. They look and feel different too. Summer here means barbecue, beach volleyball, sunbathing and short dresses all around. Winter, which is painfully long, means intense cold, heavy snowfall, frozen nose, glühwein (mulled wine) and long overcoats and thick jackets. Winter also means Christmas markets, lights and candles and Christmas trees everywhere, and, gifts. Monsoon is vastly different from what we mean by Monsoon in India, and is marked by tiny patches of light to medium rains, severely cold winds and gloomy faces. Autumn, on the other hand, means unending Pujo posts on Facebook by friends back home, snapshots of the cloudless blue sky and kash-ful everywhere, Durga idols in the making, and acute homesickness. Maybe that is why, Autumn in Germany comes with a big dose of colors, that instantly lifts up the mood and partially takes away the pain of not being at home.

 

These pictures were taken while hiking with an ordinary phone camera, which, however did not manage to take away the essence of Autumn a bit :-)

This one I noticed a couple of days ago while coming back from the University. Red leaves adorning a window-sill. Colors never looked more pretty.

These were taken when I first came to Germany (strangely, it was in Autumn) two years back and decided to take a walk by myself in the hills one Sunday. Although I had no clue what awaited me, I was clearly bowled over. The sights mesmerized me, and I realized perhaps for the first time what Autumn meant. It meant a treat to the eyes.

This one, I used to pass by everyday while going to the University. The first time I saw it, it still had green leaves and I didn't give it a second look. But then the colors started changing and in a matter of just two months, the green leaves gave way to these dark yellow leaves. I wondered how something could look so beautiful and realized that Autumn, with its red and yellowish trees, fallen leaves everywhere, nice cold days, occasional blue sky, and, happy faces, did make up for the homesickness in the end :-)

Goosebumps

Just when you start thinking that life is full of shit because of personal shortcomings and non-fulfillment of trivial expectations, you come across something that makes you fall in love with life once again.

A busy day, a crowded canteen, young students chatting about latest gadgets, movies, women and researchers sitting and discussing about work, papers and journal submissions over cups of coffee. In the middle of all that, you suddenly notice a young couple at the far end of the table, engrossed in themselves. You don't give them a second look until you notice that the woman is covered from head to toe in what seems like a specially-made dress for patients, is completely paralyzed and sitting on a huge wheelchair with her head being supported by a metallic rod attached to it. Next to her, sits the guy, sipping coffee and cutting a large sandwich into tiny pieces. Once done, he takes up those small pieces one by one and starts feeding the girl, while gently stroking her paralyzed hands. You watch them in amazement, with tiny drops of water forming in your eyes. You struggle to concentrate on the discussion going on in front and realize that life surprises you the most when you least expect it!

Deadlines

I recently came across this picture on Facebook and let out a loud gasp. What a perfect way of depiction, I thought!

Deadline. One of the nastiest words ever invented and the most-frequently-used word I have come across in the last two years of my PhD life. From paper submissions to conference registrations, from assignment correction to course enrollment, this one word has been the be-all-and-end all of my existance. No wonder the office wall (now and forever) overflows with deadline notices, twenty notifications on the notice board stare back, conversations with colleagues almost always revolve around it, and I question myself for the umpteenth time what made me lose my sanity and decide to go into research!

When I started my PhD, two things amazed me to no extent. The #1 was seeing people talking about work and more work during lunch, dinner meets, social gatherings, parties, football matches, concerts and what not. I often wondered if they were crazy nerds whose lives always revolved around work and therefore they had nothing else to talk about or if they really enjoyed talking about work. The #2 was finding people never even caring about those well defined '9-6' office hours and sitting in their offices almost the entire day. Again, I thought of the same two reasons as I did for the first observation. People would often tell me that I would never know when I would start doing the same, and it'd made me laugh. After being in research for almost two years, I now know how absolutely right they were and how ignorant I was. Also, I have realized that there exists a third reason that surpasses the first two in terms of importance- the inability to abide by deadlines, and therefore compelled to #1 and #2.

From my experience, the entire before and after process of 'please-submit/register-by-#date-midnight' has been pretty simple and patterned. Ten days before the deadline, you are as relaxed as a multimillionaire cruising the Atlantic with beer in one hand and a gorgeous woman on the other. Five days before, you are as relaxed as an on-budget traveler traveling across Europe while calculating the daily expenses every minute. One day before, you are as relaxed as a minister the night before the election. You forget to eat, miss phone calls, check the watch every two seconds and panic every second while hoping against hope that everything will work out. You see the office lights of colleagues switched on till almost midnight (and ofcourse also your own), you hear the brewing sound of the coffee machine at wee hours, you get Skype messages from other ill-fated PhD students about why one should never do a PhD, you realize your heart rate going sky-high ten minutes before midnight, you curse yourself for wasting so much time during the day/week/month/year, you swear to God to finish pending work a week before the deadline from next time, and when nothing works, you cry in frustration. Then, if magically you somehow manage to submit/register before the deadline, you feel a strange calmness caressing you and paralyzing you for the next thirty days, until the next deadline arrives. And the process starts all over again.

When Ma used to lecture me on my inability to be disciplined and be on-time, I would always tell her that these things would normalize automatically when I grow up, claiming as if being older and wiser were correlated with being disciplined. Now when I see myself braving those innumerable panic attacks as I did a decade ago, albeit now on a bigger scale, I tell myself that these things would normalize automatically when I would really grow up, always knowing in my heart that one grows up by choice, and not by chance!

Kicker-ed!

When introduced to Kicker (the German name for table-Football) a couple of years ago, I knew I would be disappointed. It was quite an obvious inference given the fact that I found Football to be the ever-most boring game on earth and was often considered a 'let-down' by my Football-fanatic family. After coming to Germany, I figured that Football (or Fußball in German) here was almost synonymous to religion and there wasn't a single person who shared my opinion. So, as a perfect newcomer desperate to please the hosts, I feigned interest for as long as I could, while being absolutely clueless and uninterested in the game itself.

Then one day, God decided to punish me! We were at a farewell party of a colleague at a night-club and there was this huge colorful table in the middle of the room. To be honest, I was pretty impressed by the sight, but still had no clue about what it was. A couple of friends saw me ogling the table, misread my (poker-faced) expressions and decided to introduce me to Kicker. I was devastated when I learnt that it was a mini version of the game I hated most, but decided to play along. Thankfully, I have not regretted the decision ever since.

It is one of the most interesting table games I have ever played. Ideally, it is a 4-person game, two in each team,and the team that scores the maximum number of goals, wins. As one can see in the picture, each player has to use the figures to move the ball, and there are again a set of rules about how to use these figures. In general, the rules are pretty understandable and very much like real Football. When I first started playing, I loathed it with all my heart. Maybe I was way too biased and told myself that anything associated with Football was not for me. But then, without even realizing, I fell in love with it. I realized that it was not, afterall, about players trying just to put a ball in the goal. It was, infact, much more than that! I started learning the nuances of the game, found myself watching Kicker videos on YouTube, and most importantly, respecting the larger version for the first time in life. (Not to mention that the love was fueled by people telling me that I was quite a 'natural' at the game!) ;-)

Long story short, I now consider myself a Kicker-enthusiast who can't wait to lay her hands on the miniature figures whenever she is at a Kicker-party. Agreed, that I play surprisingly well only when under the spell of alcohol, but I do believe that I enjoy it to the fullest even without alcohol! Friends tell me that I become hyper-energetic when I play, shouting and screaming at the misses, overjoyed at the goals and I realize that, in the end, Football and I may not be at loggerheads afterall! :-)

The third eye

I have known her for ages; when we were still wearing pleated uniforms, tied our hair in braids on two sides, when men still hadn't made an entry into our conversations, when it was all about being naive and dreamy-eyed. I have known her since then. She always came across as a fun (and overweight, if I were to mention her statistics) girl, a girl who talked incessantly, was always up for some mischief, good at studies although she claimed she hardly ever studied which I never believed, had a great interest in drawing which was pretty evident from our Biology or Geography assignments, and who was someone whom I considered a very close friend. We both were in the same section for most part of our school lives, which was the third most important reason for our closeness, the first being our mutual hatred for our Bengali teacher and the second being our mutual love for food. After finishing school, we went our separate ways but still managed pretty much to stay in touch. We made sure to meet atleast once every six months, over fried chicken legs, icecream, gossip and those never-ending discussions on our infinite crushes! We hardly every discussed about the men in our lives, which was strange given that we were pretty good friends and talked about almost everything. 

Then one day she told me that she was dating a guy from college since the past two years. It wasn't surprising, given that she always had been very friendly and quite interactive with guys. It seemed they were very much in love, and were quite serious about each other. Once, I also met the guy. He seemed decent enough, skinny, but a super-chyangra like her! The entire time that we three were there, they pulled each others legs, fought like kids, made fun of each other and laughed and laughed. What a perfect match, I had thought! Then we both got busy with our lives, studies, future plans and met less often. However, we still managed to know what's going on in each others' lives. I was by then nursing a broken heart and trying to finish my studies, and she was preparing to go abroad for her higher studies. The guy I mentioned was also studying somewhere outside the city and was also planning to go abroad. The next time I met her, the guy had already gone abroad and she was still in the city, working. She looked sad, but full of energy, as always and we talked about heartbreaks, long distance relationship, old friends and food! Ten years, and how much our conversations had changed! She told me about the arguments and fights she was having, and I tried to offer suggestions and opinions, always realizing how much she still was in love. We started going out more often, with other friends and acquaintances. She had by then made many new friends and I too, although this was never a concern for either of us. I got to know some of her friends, a guy friend in particular, whom she was very close to and whom I was later introduced to as well. He was supposedly her FPG and someone she considered her best friend, her sink. Seldom had I seen such friendship, such compatibility, such closeness. How jealous I was!

She went abroad a few months later, and I started working in a new city. This time our conversation had one more thing in common- the pain of staying away from home. During those conversations, I got to know a lot more about her life than I did before. She was in a mess, as far as her personal life was concerned. I tried to offer suggestions, opinions, comfort, sympathy, but nothing seemed to work. I blamed her for not listening to my earlier suggestions, for not realizing the subtle changes in relationships and for keeping too high expectations. But then she always had been a head-strong girl, who believed in learning a lesson on her own than on advice. We talked on and off, her mood always fluctuating like sine waves, and my mood always stuck at being pathetic for own reasons. And then, all of a sudden, we grew up. We stopped complaining, accepted things more easily and learnt to be happy in small accomplishments. In a matter of months, I was talking about my new-found love in a new man and she was talking about her new-found love in her old man. We felt happier, calmer, lighter.

So much has changed since then; our lives, our priorities, our dreams, our conversations, everything. Through her, I have realized many emotions, shortcomings and characteristics in me I never knew existed. In teaching her small nuances of life and to let go of her fears, I have taught myself to let go of my fears. I feel happy atlast, for myself, for her, and for the biggest lesson life taught us!

Left behind

Thirty-five days. A presence. A house that so quickly turned into home. Nights that were no longer lonely. Mornings that were filled with conversations. Days that were blissful. Memories galore. Happiness that knew no bounds. And then they left.

An agonizing night followed. A painful week awaits. The room smells of them, the kitchen smells of her excessive use of 'panch foron', the bathroom smells of his body-oil and my eyes swell with tears.

Jena is never going to be the same anymore. I hear voices when I get up in the morning, expect a cup of coffee beside my bed-side table, that oh-so-familiar-female-voice asking what I would like to have for breakfast, to switch onto a Bengali channel on YouTube, or that I should start eating properly; that oh-so-familiar-male-voice asking me to work harder and waste less time, to help connect the long-distance calls or the borrowed TV. Every thing reminds me of them. The air-bed, the utensils, the refrigerator which still has left-overs from yesterday, the towels in the bathroom, the balcony, the perfectly-cleaned wardrobe, the stack of medicines, the ear-buds, the TV, the supermarkets, the ticket machine in the bus, city-center, the narrow lanes, the innumerable shops that were browsed through, cafes and what not. I search for familiar faces in the crowd at the market-place when I take the bus. I almost ring the bell at home and await a smiling face on the other side. I turn on one side in bed and try to cuddle her. I put on the ear-buds to get respite from his loud snoring. But there's nothing, only emptiness. That's how I feel too.

Being left behind hurts, it hurts big time. I thought I was familiar with the feeling. But I realized that it is impossible to be familiarized with loneliness. I complained to anyone who would listen that I was being pampered like hell, even spoiled for that matter. I now wish I was spoiled for one more day, just one more day. I wish I could see them, touch them, smell them, be angry at them and bask in their happiness for one more day. Pangs! Pangs that refuse to leave me alone.

The only solace, is that I have been able to plan and more importantly execute a vacation for them. Nothing has given me more satisfation than to have shown them around, bits and pieces of Europe, suggesting the local cuisines and drinks, taking long walks and river-cruise rides, explaining extensive details about each place, and, living a dream with them. What more can one ask for. 

I desperately try to get back to old routines, ignore the occassional lumps in the throat and do justice to the innumerable attempts made to cheer me up. I tell myself that it's just a matter of half a year until I see them again. Half a year, it seems like ages. I wait.