Holiday mood

The much deserved days have begun for me,since the beginning of the academic year, life has been a grinding mill kind of a story, i mean i was kind of grain and i was being ground. Only those who have actually worked in a boarding school where there is but little time for oneself understands what I'm actually talking about, the rest might just scoff and say,"What the heck? Life of a teacher is the most easiest." But little do they realise that each day of a teacher's life is filled with the schools activities; sometimes planning for it, sometimes discussing it with someone, sometimes thinking of the aftermath, sometimes thinking of the achievement but whatever it is thoughts are of school and its activities only. The people in the other offices can leave their task for some other day if not in mood but a teacher has to teach what one has planned for the day on that day itself. Even if one falls seriously ill, no other teachers will finish the others job, what is one's share has to be done by oneself, there is no bothering others about ones job. Well, i don't mind the preparing of my lessons( I hardly do that infact), i don't mind going to the class and facing 1000s of students, i don't mind standing the whole day so long as I can see the faces of all my students and I can see the satisfied smile on their faces( although my varicose veins filled legs do not agree with me); but what I don't like is the staying back after the school hours to watch football matches. Even as a student I was never interested in watching all kinds of matches and now that I am an adult with lots of responsibilities at home I despise these matches which keeps me in the school even more than before. I hate the study duties, where we've to wander around hitting on sleepy heads reminding the students to study,almost cajoling them into studying as if they are doing the teachers a favour by studying; I hate the meals inspection( it reminds me of my days in school where i had to go through the ordeal of the similar kind of food for meals); but hate it or love it,we must do it all.
But with the National day celebration the tough ordeal is over. I view National day with my eyes filled with tears of patriotism mingled with the sense of freedom from the next day onwards. It reminds all the teachers of the end of yet another turmoil filled year.

My Aimbitions in life

One month before the school shuts down for its winter vacation, eh?" Without turning towards the sound she knew it was her nosy neighbor who seemed to have something or the other to say whenever they met. Bhutan is a small country where everybody knows everybody- so much so that one neighbor knows exact details of what one has in one's house, starting from a small pin to the most expensive kira. As she passed this neighbor with a nod for an answer to her query, she thought that it was owing to insistent people like this neighbor of hers who made this line about Bhutan so true. She had a peculiar way of walking whenever she was troubled by a thought, she fixed her eyes on the hem of her kira, plodded with her heels touching the ground first, and then only making her toes land with a thump. Usually, on a normal day it used to take her twenty minutes to reach school but whenever she plodded in this fashion, deep in thoughts it took her more than half an hour.

She taught history in the school. While a kid, she used to excel in her academics and the whole town used to tell her that one day she would definitely become a doctor. She also believed the same. Well, in those days Doctors profession was always rated first among all other profession, so obviously anybody good in studies would be generously offered the dream of becoming a doctor when one grew up. Dreams were easily available like the wares in the Bazaar in the neighboring country of India, which she frequented during her winter holidays. You could pick one, strike a hard bargain; if it doesn't suit you then toss it away for another ware all the same. She nursed this dream of becoming a doctor till her sixth standard. She even bought First Aid books and books like where there is no doctor, probably hoping that it would give support to her big dream. It was during science period, her favorite teacher, because he was teaching them science- the subject she was required to learn to make her dreams real, asked them their ambition in life. "Doctor," she chimed with pride. Others followed with Engineer, teacher, farmer, the list wasn't that long. "Do you know that while you undergo the training, you'll be kept all alone in a big room…" He slowed his speech and lowered the volume too to add eeriness to what he was going to say. Selden had to strain her ears to listen with all heart because it was what she felt she ought to know."…there will be a dead body and you'll have to operate it and at times the body does spring up, you know?" he ended piously. That was the day her dreams of becoming a doctor last filled her heart and it was discarded like any other unimportant steps one takes in life. "What the heck, I'll become an Engineer. I am good in science," she said this to console herself. She had no idea whatsoever about the kind of work the engineers did nor did she know about any books that would help her in pursuing her new found dreams. She simply saw herself beside long bridges where hundreds of laborers worked with her. Seeing herself beside skyscrapers in her dreams, made her really fly high with hopes found anew in her heart. But then she reached the seventh standard and physics drew out every little hopes of engineering that evoked her new found dream. She wandered in the walk of life until one day when she was in class ten, she was asked to do a presentation by her history teacher. As she ended her presentation, the teacher applauded loudly and said,"Selden will make a fine teacher one day."

This prediction did come true, she became a teacher.

With the year coming to an end the workload burdened her: paper correction, filling the progress report, planning for winter holidays destination and she plodded slowly fuming over the nosy neighbor she had to put up with.

(Note to the readers, I've always wanted to become a teacher so I've fulfilled this dream of mine by writing this piece, I imagine myself to be Selden of this story).

Cupid Naka

My friends never forget to remind me that I am the biggest pessimist they have ever seen in their entire lifetime. They taunt me saying the sun must have forgotten to shine on the day I was born; hence I never seem to see the brighter side of life. What they don't know is that I came into the world in the darkest hour of mid-night. I used to feel that the hour I chose to make my entry into this earth was ominous of the dark and dismal life destiny had chosen for me. And very recently I took a personality test quiz in facebook and the result confirmed what my friends told me all the time, "Nobody likes you. You walk like a zombie…….." I stopped reading any further, pessimist that I was I didn't want it to ruin my entire day.

But the tremor of 21st September, 2009, that shook the whole eastern Dzongkhag changed the way I looked at life and people living it. May be God leaves its signs in awkward places so that we can earth it at the most unlikely places at the most unlikely hour. It gave the insight of the dark side of Mother Nature when she shook with her anger which seemed to have filled to the brim. So strong was her wrath that people started talking of more of her fury to follow. Following the cue, we chose the open fields to take us in its embrace to save ourselves from her wrath. It was way past mid- night but sleep had eluded the eyes of the people who had gathered in the public ground. People from all walks of life had bundled up in that ground, seeking mercy from the changing mood of Mother Nature. I cuddled up beside my seven months old baby, partly to keep her warm and partly to suppress the tremor in my heart (I was scared, really scared that day). "Are you new here? I've never seen you around here?" a male voice reached my ears. I turned around wondering who could be asking me that question. In the darkness I couldn't see their faces but the way they sat facing each other, I sensed their bodies speaking volumes about the unease they were feeling in being so close to each other. I realized the question wasn't intended for me. I wasn't eavesdropping but since they were quite near to me, my ears caught up their conversation. I came to know that the shy girl was a baby sitter who lived in the hospital colony and had come out because of earthquake but otherwise was never allowed to tread outside her employer's house. The boy was a sales boy of the most popular shop located in the heart of the town. Many easy talks and giggles later, I understood that the two had already discarded their uneasiness and had professed love so true to each other. As love seeped deep in their heart I felt my previous inhibitions about the earthquake changing and slowly I found the goddess of sleep blessing me with her hand

On that day (should I say night?) I remembered Helen Keller's Nature in not always kind and just couldn't help seeing the positive side of such a disastrous day. Nature had been cruel to many of us but for these two people who found each other in such hour, Ap Naka had become their cupid. Had there been no Ap Naka they would have never met each other.

Eerie night has come yet again!

It's way past my usual sleeping time but it seems my eyes are out to outwit the owls in the nearby roof, my eyes are wide open as if awaiting for something to happen. From somewhere afar I hear the jackals crying, there is an eerie silence in my room and I'm all alone. It was a similar kind of night that took my Grandma away from me. My grandma, I'll always remember her as a lady who lived in full dignity till the last breath. She was the kindest soul I've ever seen in my life.Every evening the two of us would sit outside on the verandah and I would put my head on her lap and ask her to tell me a story. Her grace filled words would tumble down from her lips, bringing the characters of her story alive. I saw monsters, crossed mountains and hills, drank water from the clear stream, sang on tree tops, found myself in the land of fantasy night after night.
But that night I knew from the way the dogs cried outside that it was ominous. I sat silently holding her hand. I knew she understood that I was waiting for another one of her stories, the world where the two of us traveled to every evening, she parted her lips slightly, a low moan came out. Then she closed her eyes and never opened them again.

Careful with what you say

It was my first day as a new teacher after completing my training. As it is the custom, I wanted to get acquainted with my students before embarking on our journey of teaching and learning. In my school time, I used to hate my Dzongkha teachers so much because all the Dzongkha teachers I got in my life were very strict. It could be owing to the strict teachers who use to make us pee in our pants with their mere eyes cast on us that I could never learn Dzongkha in my entire school life. So based on this theory embedded deep in my soul I made up my mind that if I ever become a teacher, I would never be strict to my students. So then I had become a teacher and now it was my duty to get started with the first ethics that I believed in as a little girl who would be scared out of her wits whenever asked to read her Dzongkha text.
Since it was my first day, I wasn't given any classes, rather I was sent on substitution to class IV B. I was received well by the class four students. After asking their names, ages and hobbies ( I couldn't remember any names if any of the kid would challenge my memory, Thank God they didn't think of that), we were still left with a good twenty minutes before the bell rang for the next period. So, I grabbed that opportunity to practice what I had always believed in. I cleared my throat and introduced myself, beginning with my name followed by the names of my alma mater. Then to while away the time, I started giving lecture on teachers and the role they play in shaping the lives of the students. "So, you all need not be scared of me," I beamed with pride for I was making them feel the difference between the teachers of our days and the new generation of teachers that I exemplified. I continued my speech with the same vigor I had begun with, "If you want I can be your friend, sister, even your mother�" Before I could end my glorious speech, Ugyen, a cute boy wearing specks and sitting right in the front bench interrupted me with his finger pointing towards the ceiling, "Miss? Miss? You mean you want to be our stepmother?"
Since that day I've slightly altered my speech, I forego the mother part, lest some wise student get the same wild idea that I'm thinking of becoming their stepmother.

(Based on a true incident narrated to me by one of my friend who is a teacher).

My first Dairy

The year I turned fourteen, for the first time I felt the need to keep a diary, the reason still eludes me but somehow I just felt the need. Now when I reflect back on that I almost feel kinship with Anne Frank (The one of Diary of a young girl fame?) but it's just our age that coincides, nothing more, I mean the age we first decided to join the company of our new friend so close, so dear to us- our diary.
My diary was the first true friend I ever felt so close to because I knew that I could share any secrets, any part of my life without any hesitation. I knew I can go on sharing my feelings without ever being judged about the kind of things happening around me. I simply loved bed time. I would snuggle up in my bedroom, close the door and start with, "Dear diary….blah…blah!" and the conversation would range from what happened in the shop on that day to the kind of thoughts that ran through me. I knew I could pour out any kind of emotions that ran inside me, for instance I asked my sister to give me money which she refused, mother's pet that she was she was equally stringent when it came to money matters. That's why my mother always kept her near the cash box while I was never entrusted with this responsibility. I hated this fact and it went inside my diary. I would write about going to a beach, building sand castle (I didn't have any romantic things to do on a beach than building sand castles back then), the sea wetting my feet and I dreamt of leaving my footprints in the wet sand and so many such dreams went into that diary.
A year passed in my diary's company and many of me had also walked into that small book that I lovingly kept under my pillow. It was after the pilgrimage to Bodhgaya, on our return journey I lost my bag and my precious friend which was in it. But all thanks to my little friend, because I had written my address in detail the people who had taken my bag in the darkness mistaking it to be theirs returned it. The first thing I checked was my diary and it was there. But somehow I smelt unknown hands shuffling the pages. I was right, those people who had found my bag were sherubtse college boys and they had generously read the entire diary and written their comments in the last page, the page that was for the 1st January of 1996. I felt sad thinking that I have lost myself to some total strangers. So, though not ungrateful to the people who returned my bag, I tore my diary and put it in the fire.

A Big Fat me

I live my life in two extremes, in my work place I am either the most noticed or the most invisible woman. When I say most noticed, people might start getting wild ideas and might imagine me to be the most beautiful lady ever born on this planet earth, actually I am just the opposite of that- I am the ugliest in my office and not to forget, the fattest. In the world of anorexic looking ladies, I'm a huge mound of flesh moving around with energy required to cause an earthquake. As I enter the door, the peon looks at me with the look that says, here comes 'seismic energy', that's the name they have given me. Don't make a mistake of looking for me by the name given to me by some Rinpoche which my parents must have lovingly called me during my childhood days because in my office they don't know me by that name.
I try hard to remember my slim and fit days but try as I may; I never see the picture of a smiling sweet and tiny girl. As far as my memory world takes me I see myself as fat and grumpy human. But yes at night as I lay all alone, never having had a boyfriend in my twenty three years of life, I try to picture my earliest days as a human. And I see people making my parents proud by calling me a healthy baby, a matter of pride for my parents, for a healthy baby actually configures to a well-fed baby.
I have tried every possible means to shed those bulging extra flesh on my body, from slimming tea, slim fast pills, slim sauna belt, dieting, fasting( Starving myself for days) to buying a treadmill ( it is lying around in the corner of my bedroom because I'm scared if I step on it, it might fall apart given my size). But all these methods have failed to leave their mark on my ever lasting fats. All these methods don't help me in shedding my fats rather every method I try takes me closer to severe bouts of depression. I sulk over this fact for days and the more I do that I become bitterer each passing day of my life that I spend on this earth. My hatred for my body is slowing spreading its wings and now I find myself hating the slim girls who parade proudly in front of me, sashaying in fashionable clothes that seemed to be sewn for their body. As I pass past them, my co-workers pull in their breath and make their already slim bodies smaller so that I can pass across them without tossing them out of the way. If I visit their cubicles, they shout out for the biggest chair so that I can sit beside them without the worry of the chair giving way to my weight. It pinches me right to my soul.
Now coming to the invisible part, although by my size one cannot miss me from a kilometer's distance yet when it comes to get-togethers, birthday parties, or any rendezvous among my office people, I am never counted. I become invisible then. Through their hushed tones I understand that some kind of get-together party is being discussed but as soon as I draw near them, they talk about the office work as if office work is the sole reason of their existence.
Night after night, as I lay awake thinking of the next day, I hate my parents for making me the way I look. But the instance next, I feel guilty to the core for harnessing such thought about the two most wonderful people who gave me life and all the love that I needed in my life.

My eight year old marriage

I grew up twelve years of my life seeing my mom do all the chores in the house on her own never asking my dad to lift even a finger to help her. She would prepare the meals, serve everybody then only eat, wash all the clothes and dirty linens, and make our house a beautiful home. May be it was owing to this early influence in my life that I grew this same ideals in my adult brain. Whenever I thought of a home, I thought of my finger prints in all the places to make it qualify for a home, from dirty linens to stocking the larder to ensuring everything good and clean in the household. So eventually when I got married, listening to my heart and not my parents, I saw my ideal home materializing. I fell in love by accident (that’s what I feel after being married to my husband for eight years), if it wasn’t an accident then how come I got so blind. I mean how I ever thought of making our marriage work in spite of our different cultures. But whatever it was that twenty year old girl, who said yes to a proposal that might not have been uttered for real at that time, realizes the depth of the relation that took me eight years to understand.
I almost worshipped the love in his heart and I followed in the footprints left behind by my mother though I didn’t have her blessings in that most beautiful decision of my life. I did things like my mother used to do in those days; I would get up early in the morning, start with the preparation of my home sweet home venture and conducted my duty of a perfect wife in every sense. But all I wanted in return was his faithfulness to our relation that I viewed above all relations in the world. Was that too huge a prize for him to pay in return of all the love I showered to him? I don’t know what response he’ll have for my query but I know I’ll never get the guts to set up this question in his face. Maybe it will take me another twenty years of my life to finally confront him with this question or perhaps it’ll be eroded and submerged under the falling debris of my breaking heart which forces itself to propel further to make this eight years old relation move towards eternity. Whatever it is, I know I am being buried under the avalanche of my misty eyes that brews the storm in my heart.

Lonely

Akon is almost literally crying with me, singing "Lonely,I'm so lonely,I've nobody of my own..."and it brings more tears in my already welled up eyes. Loneliness in spite of my two daughters screaming their hearts out.There are times in my life when I wish I could just be swallowed whole by the wide opened mouth of sorrows. It's so terrible having to live a life when life is the last thing on your mind. May be I never wanted life to touch my soul but somehow life meant for some other rubbed on me by mistake.
I've basked too many hours of my life in the sun of hoping for a better life someday, but that sun never rises its head above the mountain of my sleeping dreams. Dreams, I had a dream, of love in its purest form kissing my forehead and making me life's blessed few to walk on this place we call mother Earth but the footprints of that blessed feeling has long been washed away by the tide of marriage. Today as I sit shedding tears of hopelessness I realized the futility of living this life.

Life is running in slow motion and it seems to be prolonging the sequences of the events that are unfurling. I am old enough to know that life is a mixture of all things good and bad, but why does my life prolong the sad scenes all the time? I get up early in the morning and before any thoughts taint my system I cleanse myself by saying a prayer in my altar, it is a ritual that I follow every morning, except for those five days every month, when I am impure even to confront god. I do not claim any share in the prayers, it’s always for my kids, my husband, my family and others who need those prayers but I am never there; may be that could be one reason God forgets to grant me happiness. By putting this feeling in writing I don’t want to claim my share of happiness but it helps to shed the heaviness of the feeling that treads on me flattening the very reason of my existence. LIFE- Living In Fake Emotions, that’s what exactly I am doing I guess, living my life in the self made fantasy world, when this fake life bursts open I know I’ll be left bare with no emotions to cover any part of my soul. But tell me do I go on living this life with the expectations of this life bursting open any moment. Why can’t I choose the path that is the dead end of all these drudgery of living a fake life? Why can’t God just grant me my death because I don’t want to live any longer on this earth and be a burden on the people near and dear to me? I’m just plainly tired of living a life of hopefulness, which I know will never come true. But the day I stop hoping for a better event I know I would have ceased to be a normal human being, I am a normal human with normal dreams. I dream of a land where there will be smiles and laughter instead of the cold stare of sorrows. But on the other thought, sorrows are so deeply rooted in my being that if I suddenly get happiness I may not know how to live my life, okay, now I see why God never grants me happiness. Thank you God, in the course of typing this piece I got the answer to the question that has been haunting me for so long – welcomes sorrows in al your finery, I am not scared of you anymore.

My home mates

Well, if people with whom you share your room are called your roommates then people with whom you share your home should qualify for your home mates, isn't it? I share my home with my three home mates. But there is a slight difference between room mates and home mates, you can choose any number of your room mates but your home mates, you just get to choose the first member only, the rest follows like packaged free gift.
I met my first home mate eight years ago; looking at his size I was convinced that he is big enough to protect me from all kinds of adversities. Eight years of staying with him has proved I was partly right about my judgment, he does protect, I mean if any thieves break into my house I know there are two things that can never get stolen, all thanks to him, the two things are my television set and laptop. From the moment he opens his eyes till the time sleep shuts them down, he guards these two things like they are parts of his own body. I wonder at times, had he been born before the age of television and computers how he would survive. Any way, I know better than to argue with him over this, in this era we need to update ourselves with the latest happenings in the world, I don' t disagree with him but at times I do wish he would cast a loving glance at me too like he does on these two objects.
The other two home mates are packaged free gift from him. Physically they have taken his looks, anybody who knows my husband knows that they are the product of his hard labor with one look cast on them. They make me feel like world's most loved and most sought for individual- if I'm at home one has to be on my lap while the other has to cling on any part of my free body. Sometimes I thank god for making my surface area big for they always find one free area or the other to cling onto me. In bed, these two individuals though smallest in size need the major part of the space. Since the father has not much role, I've to sacrifice my share of the space. Any dishes prepared in the house indeed has my hand in it but the taste has to be theirs, on the floor you'll always find their toys, clothes, stockings, socks but never any of my belongings. Sometimes I have to stop and wonder do I exist at all. If one walks past my house, they will either hear Cartoon network or cricket or any sports for that matter, one will never hear the heart wrenching sobs of the daily soaps, isn't it always the mother's who watch those, well I don't.
I never get to watch any TV, I've to accommodate myself in a small space on the bed, I don't get to keep myself free at any time of the day YET an exulting feeling invades my heart from the three armies I live with. The kisses they shower on me, the hugs I get in between, their full stomach, the licking of their own fingers after a good meal makes my heart swell with pride. I call them three tyrants who force love out of me with every step I live with them and I thank God for giving me such wonderful home mates.

Colors of my life

My earliest days spent in the cozy world of my parents were bright yellow. I remember bright yellow sunshine of my life making me into a soul with sunny spirits. I was blessed with all that I could want in my life. It was light and bright. I remember myself as a plump girl with an easy sense of humor. I used to bask in the glorious yellow sun of my parents love and care. But that was my childhood days.
When adolescent years knocked on my door, it was like opening Pandora's Box, along with the charm of an early grown up life came the green color of my life. If viewed from seasonal point of view, I had entered the spring season of my life, where everything turns green. Indeed my world was filled with greenery but not the kind one finds in spring. I realized that I had become a green-eyed monster then. Jealousy filled me to the brim. I envied people whose parents came to meet them in the hostel while mine own parents were busy building their own respective homes. I envied those in love because I lost the people I loved the most.
Early adulthood was a different story altogether; maturity seeped in and I realized the futility of being green but a new color had emerged in my world-BLUE. I saw people in twos, in the moonlit nights, promising love to each other. I felt blue for I did not have anybody doing that to me. I would brood over this fact many a times and feel blue all over again.
But times have changed now, old and gray I don't measure world by what others have. My gray hair suits my gray world but no such worldly affections touch my soul. I stay locked up in my gray room locked in comfortably by the gray walls, I pray to God and ask for forgiveness for all thoughts I thought in my youthful wrath and silently wait for death to knock me hard.

The day I became Nopkin.com

I remember the famous dialogue from the movie OM SHANTI OM, where SRK is shown clutching an empty bottle and saying these lines, "If you desire something from the core of your heart, the whole universe conspires to make your desires meet you." I've been so touched by this dialogue that I actually feel its truth taking roots in my being.
Just the other day I was reading a book when I drifted slowly into soft sleep without actually intending to and I found myself enter through the spaces of the nopkin homepage which was kept on in my computer. I tried to stop myself; something inside me told me that those spaces were to be filled with letters and not my human body. But before I could stop myself, I found myself sliding past that box and virtually enter inside nopkin. Com. May be it could be because I was talking to a friend about the kind of things that were exchanged between myself and some other nopkin members and I was left wondering how true could be the truth hidden in the mask of all those usernames. So maybe it was my desire to know behind the username people that made me glide through the homepage of our very own nopkin.com.
First to click on me was a beautiful lady scoffing at her children, with her cancer eating her insides. Delicately as she punched her username, she just had to type B and I knew what was to follow, -ella. "Okay, so she is Bella!" I thought and she seemed to peer hard at me, I was scared she had heard me speak. She furiously typed her article for the day and submitted it. In the mean time, I felt another gentle tug at my heart; I knew it was another user clicking on me. I noticed she was slightly younger than Bella and somewhere in her eyes I saw a glint of unspoken grief dying to pour out of her heart; I thought," this must be Yoebum". As she typed her name I was convinced of my intuition working faster than Chacha Chaudhary's brain. The two nopkin ladies smiled, frowned, laughed and I thoroughly enjoyed the various emotions slipping through their being. It was a treat watching two beautiful ladies at the same time. I then felt a masculine touch, he had a naughty smirk on his face, and I knew that was for the two ladies. He typed, "Dream-dare. " Ah..ha! So he is the man who is a reader but not a writer." He clicked on a big "Hi Bella". Very soon I noticed our nopkin hero, Mr. SRK himself join the trio. After the hero's entry the director followed, I mean Futuredirector followed. I could see the dreams of harvesting real cucumbers instead of pumpkins in his eyes. There was lots of clicking and clacking sound all over me as the members joined one after another. But somewhere in the hearts of these people I knew they were waiting for Ata Nopkin to enter. Then the show stopper himself entered, and the articles submitted with different shades of emotions started appearing one after another. All members made a choice of their respective writer first and started reading. Comments were exchanged. Happy faces sat in front of me.
A tall slender lady in her twenties posed in front of me and from her wise looking eyes, I knew who she was. "Oi hang rang ancha ya?" She must have meant to yell at me while typing this for I heard it loud and clear which woke me from my wonderful dream. Thank you NEWMOON for intruding in my dream world with such a nasty yell.

( I wanted to include other members too in my this article but couldn't owing to the fear of some people getting offended, however if its okay, I wish to continue����.look out!)

My unusual dream

Yester-night as I sat near the bhukhari warming myself I happened to see the crescent moon peeping shyly through my window. The first thought that filtered through my mind was what the moon must be thinking reaching out to so many hearts filling each heart with a wish different from one. Then I went to bed with the moon over my head. I had the most unusual dream of my life. I dreamt that I was a soft fluffy cloud slowly drifting on the breast of a gigantic mountain. The mountain gave me its tender arms to rest on but a cloud that I was I found myself drifting slowly away from it. Its slow movement reminded me of my human self and the kind of walk that I walk. I never take hurried steps, it's always a slow trudging with my head bent, my eyes gazing on the road ahead of me as if boring holes in the pathway with my eyes before stepping on it. My cloud self was no different, it swayed slowly to the music of the gentle breeze, gently moving away.

I met birds of various hues and sizes gliding alongside me, they didn't cast a glance at me, I wasn't anything special, and I was just another cloud drifting past them. As time ticked, I noticed the birds appear like mere black speck way down kissing the earth. Whoa……! I was then flying way above the earth. At first it was scary but it didn't take me long to get used to the heights I was traveling. From my vantage point, everything seemed so small and insignificant. No! No! Let me correct that, it wasn't the things that were small and insignificant but with the increasing height my vanity was actually climbing higher, I was feeling more powerful. Soon I reached near the sun; I could feel the warmth of its rays perforating my being. I glanced down at the earth and what do I see! I was blocking the mighty sun. So! I had become so powerful that I could block the mighty sun too, huh? If pride could be carried in a container, there was no container big enough to hold my newly acquired pride. May be Pride was a new feeling that ever crossed my heart I didn't know how to feel it properly so I allowed it to take its own course and I glided in the path it was paving for me. Vanity and power took me to the new unleashed heights but that was not enough so I found myself venturing higher and higher thinking that with each new height, my power would go on increasing. I no longer looked down anymore; the ground was never my home. So, I went on, way up, gliding in a place searching for the vastness I would make my home. A small niche was all I had when on earth.

At certain point of my journey, I felt a bit of me going shallow…but I had grown too powerful to feel that. Before I could huff in boredom, I felt myself snap off like a string of loosely tied string of pearls. My movement had changed, I found myself coming down and with a speed never like before. I turned here and there and found that I was no longer the soft fluffy cloud but I had become the drops of rain, falling hard and coming down, back to the earth.

Talk to your heart

"Talk to your heart," he said nonchalantly and left me all alone to combat with my thoughts. So, then I picked up a conversation with my heart. Picking up conversation with your own heart can be a tricky affair for you need to think of the topic yourself. "Okay, dear heart, lets begin with the most formal question, what are you doing?" I knew there was a stare that said," Pumping blood in your system, what do you expect?" I laughed out loud and felt stupid having done that and checked here and there for any stranger crossing over the path I was walking on, on my way back home. I knew I had to trick my heart into giving me answers I needed to hear and not the basic scientifically truthful answers. So, I straightened my neck( maybe to boost my morale) and as I did that I remembered my mother who used to complain about the time I used to take in completing the task assigned to me. The reason still eludes me, what could be the connection between having long neck and the long time one takes in finishing one's task, I am talking about the sharchokp expression 'ngang ringbu!' But physically also I have long neck so in my childhood days I used to think that maybe all people with long necks take long time. I laughed out for the second time. My best friend should qualify for a giraffe then, for she takes one hour to just wear her school uniform forget about the other things.

Coming back to talking to my heart, I wanted to continue the conversation we were having before my mother called me back home. So, he was telling me that it was my face that drew him towards me. I knew the first thing I would do after reaching home would be to study my face thoroughly. As if by magic, I found myself in front of the mirror, I had lost the track of time since I was lost in his thoughts. I peered into that pair of openings in my face that helped me to see the world. "Your eyes had a depth," his voice rang in my ears. I searched for the depth, where was the depth? I stared hard into it, failed miserably. Then I shifted my glance slightly below my eyes and saw my nose. I remembered my father telling me that I have kneaded dough made into a lump and placed in the middle of my face for a nose. Another laugh exited from my mouth before I could stop myself. And that laugh pointed out my thin lips to me. How I would try applying lipstick on that thin rim of line I called my mouth. The lipstick would pathetically cling onto it like a man holding onto a twig when he is about to fall off from a cliff. "So much for an attractive face!" I heard my heart, who was a mute spectator till then speak. I said, "Shut up!" I knew my chance of talking to my heart had come to an end with that harsh line.

It was dusk; the evening star had come out. It was five hours after my first time labor room experience. Before, I had heard that childbirth is difficult, I don't know about the difficult part but anxiety did work at its best; for whole nine months I had carried this precious being inside me and when it was time for that angel to enter our world there were issues like, will it be normal? Will all its senses function properly? Will it look like the father or the mother (not that it makes any difference)? But when that loud wail filled the air it was a music no soul had ever thought of playing. Then, the whole night of tossing and turning, changing positions which hardly helps and the mighty push makes your eyelids drop down like it is made of lead. I had rested for five whole hours before my body started its normal function. I asked my husband to take me to the restroom of the hospital, which stank of God knows what. I remember my husband putting me on the wheelchair for I was too feeble to walk the distance to relieve myself. Then all of a sudden, I found myself all alone, walking in an unknown place. There was a small hill, it was filled with green grasses but there wasn't a single tree. I found myself walking with a swiftness I never knew I had in me. A stranger accosted me on the way. I never take note of people's appearance but this stranger had a look that was a personification of evil in its meanest form. I was scared but I didn't show it. He sneered at me," So, all set to go with me?" I didn't understand what this man was talking of but I dare not ask him this question. Where was I? Who was this man? Where was he leading me to? Why did I follow him? So many questions eroded my mind, had these questions been soil and rocks instead of thoughts, the landslide in my mind would be bigger than the landslide of Jumja in the Phuentsholing- Thimphu highway. I silently followed him like a tamed pet dog.

We traveled in silence till we crossed that small hill. "De…ma…." Both of us knew that somebody was calling out for me. He asked me," who was that?" "Huh?" I was too stunned by the query to answer promptly. He repeated his question with an angry glare. "My husband,'' I muttered baffled by the stupidity of the situation I was in. "Oh!" that was all he said. "You see, I just gave birth to a beautiful daughter………" I found myself saying. I wanted to shut my mouth with both my hands before I said anything more to anger him, he looked like one who got angry too easily. But I found myself telling him the entire feelings I felt since the day I learned that I had conceived my baby, the first time I felt my baby's tiny fluttering inside me, the onset of the big labor pain and the joy that filled my heart after a tedious eighteen hours of back breaking labor pain. When I finished narrating everything in detail, we heard my husband's voice calling out for me again. "You may go back to your daughter," he said and turned away from me but I saw the tears in his eyes as he left me all alone on that grassy area. So I turned my head towards the source of my husband's voice, I opened my eyes and saw myself in the hospital restroom, my husband slapping me and calling out my nam.

Cute little story of love

Yesterday when I returned home after a tiring day I saw a naughty smirk on my four years old daughter's face, it was so evident that I just couldn't ignore that and so I asked her," what's up?" I shouldn't have asked because what followed next was the same episode that has been running in my house since two years ago. She held out a five hundred note with that same naughty smirk," Phuntsho gave this to me." I went closer thinking that six years old boy surely must have taken it out of his mother's purse without her knowledge and with scolding well rehearsed in my mind. I drew close only to realize that it was a fake note that children often find in their sweets packet.
Phuntsho and my daughter met long before they became such kinds of friends. I was seven months pregnant with her when this Phuntsho was a toddler and his parents came to Paro on transfer. I became good friends with his mother and every time she came to my place, he would accompany her. Pointing to my bloated tummy he would say there is a girl in there. My husband who wanted a naughty little boy to play with used to hate this boy for saying things against his wishes and would snap at him," what makes you say that, there is a boy like you in there," and he would grin sheepishly at the mother realizing the hurt clearly written in her face. But by the time I delivered my DAUGHTER, Phuntsho's father left for studies and the mother son duo had to go back to Trashigang to put up with his maternal grandparents in the absence of the father.
After my daughter became two years old, Phuntsho's parents returned once again to Paro to become my neighbors. Their bond clicked immediately. Although my daughter was a late learner when it came to language skills, I found them communicating effectively and understanding each other so well. She would reply with mono-syllables to his never ending queries and it always astonished us how perfectly they mingled. They didn't have any other friends save each other for company. It was as if dawn rose just so that the two could get together and as night crept in she would dread having to let him go home. The same story came from his home too. Our houses would seem like childless homes, for they didn't shriek and jump around like the other kids in the neighborhood. It was as if they were savoring every moment spent in each other's company, every chance they got.
Then, Phuntsho started going to school and life became a huge void for my daughter. I could see an ache of missing him in her eyes for every half an hour, she would ask me," mama, when will school finish?" I wished I had given birth two years earlier than the time I did, at least they would have been in school together. I felt the pain along with my daughter. After school too Phuntsho would be locked in for hours on the pretext of studying hard for his academic excellence.
But yesterday with their exams over, Phuntsho had come over to our place and the two of them had been together the whole day. When he left he had given that note to her. To any other it was a fake and worthless bill but for my daughter it meant the world of happiness, how do I know this? Well, the way she put that note in her purse after holding it through out the time and falling asleep holding onto that purse and telling me all the things she was going to buy with that note.
I slowly slipped that purse out of her grip. As the purse slipped through her sweaty tiny hands, I saw a smile cross over my sleeping daughter's face, perhaps in her dreams she was already going to town with her Phuntsho by her side to buy the world of happiness with that note.

Light of my life

Atop a big black mountain I saw a faint light flickering. All around me were darkness I had so much grown accustomed to but that light beckoned me towards it and I just couldn't help but be drawn towards it. With hope anew I set off on a path too dark to show me the way to it. Wished the moon could have been in my favor but there are times in your life when nothing seems right save the darkness which binds you tightly with its sash. However, the prospects of bathing in the glory of that tiny light were too strong an urge to resist.

I tarried with my eyes fixed on my destination, I knew that if I only reached there my life would be filled with warmth and that same light would brighten my world too. But the journey was tedious: since I didn't have the direction and the journey was filled with uncertainties yet I chose to travel all along. My heart thumped louder than the tap dancers feet and every senses pricked open for any untoward happenings. The darkness had blinded me so much that I had completely forgotten that what I was going in search for didn't belong to me. I realized mid-way that I was being selfish by thinking of owning that light. I stopped in my tracks but when I glanced back to the space I had before I started, I saw nothing but darkness as thick as tar and then I looked ahead and saw the flickering light in the distance. Any sensible Human would definitely opt for the latter and I was no different, I chose to tarry on.

I stumbled, scrapped my knees but each time I fell down my determination to reach that light grew stronger. It awed me, it inspired me, it gave me the motivation to do what I had never done before- ask for something that was not mine. There was shame in my heart but I put the veil of hope of good things on it so that my heart would not waver. I trudged on not knowing that the beautiful light which emanated hope of light and warmth would betray me after all the stumbling and hurting myself.

After a long struggle I finally clambered onto the ledge were the light stood flickering. It was the most heart-warming thing my eyes had ever set their gaze on, a shiver ran down my spine. I steadied my gaze and stretched my hand to take it in my stride. My hands quivered like a habitual drunkard's hands but my hands were all I had to nullify the chasm between all the aspirations I had set off with and that heavenly light lighting that dark mountain, I had often called my house. But as soon as I touched the light, from a region unknown blew a cold wind and with a huff put it off. Everything turned dark and black like it used to be before I set off on that journey. I had nothing to take on my way back save the wounds from that journey towards that light which was never meant to be mine

MIDLI (heard of this dish?)

I think I can call myself a wizard in the kitchen; well that's how I would like to put my style of cooking in the kitchen. I like trying out dishes of various kinds not just the usual ones that we normally prepare to fill our bellies just for the sake of it. I'm calling myself a wizard because like a wizard (may be I should say a witch understanding my gender), I mix various spices, things that has never been mixed just to bring variety in our dishes. My husband a silent spectator but the poor victim of my culinary talent smiles silently knowing yet another odd food is going through his digestive tract.

One day I suddenly got the inspiration to try and prepare Idli (south Indian dish). So I went to my south Indian neighbor to ask the recipe. She generously offered me the recipe as well as the dish to prepare that special dish. Actually every time we went out, my husband used to eat Idli so I thought I'll serve him his favorite dish at home. Urad dal ( I was hearing this for the first time) is the main ingredient (if any body gets the inspiration to prepare the same). I soaked that for hours with a pinch of salt and waited for the magical moment of seeing a happy and satisfied smile on my husband's face.

It was almost nearing the time to prepare dinner, but I went to the kitchen knowing I needed whatever extra time I could catch hold of. So I prepared the batter, filled that in the Idli dish and put that on the gas. But to my dismay, when it was cooked, I found that my Idli didn't have that soft and fluffy texture. Instead it was hard like hardened bread kept for days. But the battle was not over; I do not give up easily. I sliced my failed Idli into thin, long slices and kept it aside. Then I fried that with tomatoes,onions, ginger-garlic paste and a lot of chili powder.

My husband sat down at the dinner table, I served him that wonder dish. I think I saw him frowning but before I could notice that he straightened his furrows on the forehead. I knew what he was thinking, "Not again!" but all that escaped from his lips was, "what's this?" "MIDLI," I said not wasting a second for him to gather that it was Idli but Modied Idli (Hence the name Midli).

Thank U SRK

Yesterday after closing my shop, I went home thinking of myriad of ways to please my angry husband. My husband usually comes to the shop immediately after his office hours, helps sit in the shop for two hours and we head home together but yesterday was different- he wanted to go to Thimphu and he gave me no valid reason so when I denied the permission he left the shop in a huff. Before I could conjure up any magic formula to thrash out his anger, I found myself hugging my elder daughter who has to come to the door every evening when I return from the shop and give me her I miss you whole day hug. Using gestures I asked her about her father and she made a grumpy face and pointed towards our bedroom, I understood he was still sulking. Husbands sometimes fulfill the criterion of your elder son. But at the same time in such times they can be like wounded lion, ever ready to attack with renewed vigor at the next chance. So I left him peacefully in his den.
He appeared dutifully on the dinner table, he is one person who never misses any of his meals. My daughter was watching DILWALE DULHANIA LE JAYENGE on Set Max channel. As I was serving dinner to them my eyes fell on the book I had just finished reading that day-Nicholas Sparks' Notebook. Immediately I remembered nopkin.com's SRK and his article I THINK I SAW HER which had appeared that day. I knew my next step, I raised my voice and said," Guess what baby? Today Shah Rukh Khan came to our shop." My daughter who is a huge SRK fan and was singing ruk ja o dil dewane which blared from the TV turned towards me with a "really mama" look on her face. "Yeah, and he promised me wedding," My husband who had picked his first morsel of food and was about to put that in his mouth stopped mid way and gave me a look that seemed to be saying," disgusting!" I knew I had his attention, so it was the best thing that I continued. "No baby, not this SRK from Bollywood, there is a man who calls himself SRK. I met him in nopkin.com and he promised me wedding." He had stopped touching his plate, he fully turned towards me,"… and?" I said I would love that. His jaws dropped, I know he had always taken my role as a wife for granted and didn't expect me doing this. I knew I was pulling the joke too far and wanted to cut it short before he got hurt so I said, " I am talking about the sequel of the book I just finished reading, The Wedding, another book by Nicholas Sparks." "Oh!" was all he could mutter. But after that he changed his mood entirely, he told me he had forgotten about his trip to Thimphu, SRK of Bollywood or Nopkin.com, he definitely didn't want to lose me, I knew that. I had won the battle yet again, I call that woman power.

My Talking Rose

My talking rose

When wakefulness knocked hard on my head, I realized that I had reached near an unknown garden. Right beside the gate was a lone tree precariously stretching its bare limbs as if to pick up any easy prey passing by and toss it into its lair. A black crow was perching on it. As soon as I flung the gate open, a teeny weenie voice from somewhere in my head shouted, "Stop! Take a step forward and you are doomed!" But the voice was so tiny that I paid no heed to it. As I put my right foot forward, a sudden gush of adrenaline gush flooded through me but I didn't have to drag my left foot, it simply followed my other foot which was leading it. I realized I wasn't walking rather my legs were taking me further deeper into that garden.

It was winter so everything in the garden was yellow and brown. The old leaves crunched under my feet as I trotted forward. A red rose blooming in that unlikely hour caught my eyes. It wasn't a perfectly beautiful flower that we normally find in the season but in that peevish winter scene, that rose was the sole eye catcher. As I drew nearer to that rose that same tiny voice from my head reappeared like Aladdin's genie appearing from his magic lamp, "Don't! This rose doesn't belong to you!" Too late! My hands had already snapped it off from its frail twig. I put it in my pocket and sauntered out of the garden like I had never ventured into it.

Upon reaching home, I put that rose in a bottle filled with water and placed it on my bedside table. That night as I slipped into my bed I heard a sob and found the rose crying. I looked at it with tender care and before long the rose was telling me its tales of woe. I leaned on my pillow and held it with loving touch as it told me how it had always known that I would come for it and had waited for me. I was too mesmerized with the fact that the flower was talking that I didn't have time to think much about what it was talking and the most unusual thing that was happening in my life.

The next morning as I reached my workplace, everybody commented on my looks- they said I looked gaunt and pale. I attributed that to the winter season not knowing any reason to think of and scoffed at them for noticing things about me( for the first time). At night, the rose told me yet some other tales. Many such nights passed- sometimes the rose would sing songs of unrequited love, sometimes it cried with longing for love's blessed hand to touch it and there were times when the rose even sang of our blessed togetherness.

In the workplace, the people's eyes nearly came out of their sockets seeing how sick and wan I had become. Only thing was my nights were engaged by the rose and its antics and my wakeful hours were spent re-living all the tales it told me about. One night, I felt too feeble to climb on my bed to cast my pillow aside so I could lean on it to make myself comfortable for yet another story from the rose. I don't know whether I was hallucinating, but I found the rose come out of the bottle and sit on my pillow. I closed my eyes and in my sleepy state I felt as if I was putting my head on somebody's lap. I heard the rose say, "Come! Come to me! Come with me! I always knew you would come with me!"

The Second spring

"Hi, it's me, do u want 2 hear a story tht cld bcome ur next book?" she typed the keys of her mobile fervently with no less sorrow to entertain her anymore. It was not the love for fame nor the means to become immortal, trapped in the words of her blossoming writer friend. It was simply a feeling of surrendering oneself ultimately to what fate had decided to make her swerve towards the next big U-turn her life was going to take. Isn't fate the mighty hand that pushes one, shoving till one trod on the path chosen by it? Well, who can fight that mighty hand which is keen to lead you like the first time mother who enjoys the first steps of her first born?

A heavy sigh expelled from her tired lips, which were now pursed together and her eyes followed suit. No tears flowed; tears were almost a cliché that eluded those eyes. Throughout her entire life she had believed that eyes are the windows of emotions but not anymore, her eyes had learnt better than to trust that phrase. She took a furtive glance at the one person for whom she had given her entire world away, he went on snoring unaware of the step that had been taken that would change their entire season of life.

Winter is a cold season and everything turns cold, even the love in one's heart freezes. Had it been summer she would definitely not have taken that drastic step. Summer for her was the season of bounty, well at least the starting of the bountiful season of the rich harvest that follows only after the showers of the summer season. If you compare human life with the different season, isn't it in the summer season one faces the thunderous adult life, that gradually takes one to fulfilled fruitful season. In the mellow autumn of ones life, fruitful parenthood, one sees the blessed nature of life. She was in her autumn season if you measure it by that scale but winter had followed sooner than she had expected. Spring had taken the farthest backseat and regeneration was yet to happen.

Slowly, she slipped outside, debating deep with the most intense feeling of rebuttal issued forth by her unsure heart. "Maybe, he'll not know that sms was from me. How would he know it's my number?" Even as she thought this thought, she became aware of her stupidity. Fourteen years had passed since their last conversation which was a rigid "I don't want to talk to you" type of conversation; at least she made it seem like that. Recently on her visit to one of her classmate, she had heard that he had published a book and was writing his second. Maybe it was some mighty hand that shoved her to save his number, well, whatever it was before she realized she had asked her friend whether she knew his number and she found herself punching his number on her cell, first gift of love from her husband.

They met; he wrote her story, published the book and it became an instant hit. In reality, he changed the course of her story by offering her the next path that lay hidden in the thick foliage of social norms. Who hasn't heart the saying, if winter is here can spring be far? Spring has blossomed yet again, along with the continuation of the love story which was left unfinished fourteen years ago.