Early days in Hyderabad..

I was born on September 3, 1986 in a small village called Nanguneri, a few kilometres off Tirunelveli. I was twenty days old, when my parents brought me to Hyderabad, where my father was working as a medium profile employee in Ramco Cements Limited. For thirteen years and seven months since then, Hyderabad was my hub. To be very frank, the days in Hyderabad were not so impressive that I can remember now, but here and there, there were incidents that linger in my mind.

My initial days in Hyderabad are like my finger nails. There’s nothing much to tell about them. They’re just part of my past. That is all. However, I had two friends, with whom I could be seen almost anytime of the day. Karan and Vamsi
Karan’s dad, Sunil Bhangay, was a player in the Hyderabad Ranji Trophy cricket team. He used to teach us lots of things about cricket, which was our craze at that time. We used to roam all over Begumpet, looking for small time cricket teams like ours, with whom we’d have bet matches. We won lot of such matches, and that took care of our pocket money most of the time.

We have a house in Unique Apartments, Brahmanwadi, Begumpet, Hyderabad. Karan and Vamsi came to the flat after we did. Karan and I were class mates, since kinder garten, till the time I left Hyderabad. Now Karan still lives in the same flat, while I’ve lost contacts with Vamsi.

Other than these two, I am able to recall the names of many people in my then friends circle – Anji the bully, Nandu, his brother Uday, Rithwick, his sister Neathy, Vinai and Vivek – the local twins, Shravan and Keerthi who are cousins, but don’t talk to each other because of a fight between their fathers ( I wonder if they’re still the same ), Pavan and above all, the senior among all these, Bhaskar. We also had Ram Prasad in the group, who died in accident two years before I left Hyderabad.

I remember a few names in my class-mates too – Vemana the scientist, Sourabh Dugar whose handwriting still holds the first place in me, Rajeev who draws like anything, Parul, K Chaitanya, M Cahitanya and CNV Chaitanya, Sreenivas, Rukmani, my benchmate, and Akhila, the only Tamilian other than me in the class.

I still remember among my teachers, Mrs Seema, who was my class teacher in the UKG, Rama Chari, who took science for us, Lavanya Madam, the greatest mathematician for me at that time, and above all, Chanda Madam, my family’s favourite headmistress, and Uma, the worst lady I’d ever met. I always dreaded Narayan sir, as he was the one who would punish us for whatever reason possible.

Now other than these names, I find it very difficult to recollect most of the incidents that happened in Hyderabad. Here and there there may be some, but as far as I am concerned, my life became meaningful, only after I set foot in Rajapalayam. The experiences in this town will remain in me till I leave this world. Those follow in the next posts.

To Start With...

There is one thing that fuels every single person’s life in this world. It has got different meanings, forms, scopes and perceptions. Yet, people fail to analyze its need, and fail to give it the right importance at the right place and time. What is this?

Expectations – the thing that steers every human being through one’s journey called life. Expectations are there everywhere. They are in every nook and corner of this planet. They manifest in every human being in every country, even in an animal, or a vehicle, or a computer – everywhere. Yet, it has got different names and forms depending upon where and what it is subject to.

Somewhere it is called desire, somewhere it’s called necessity, somewhere it’s called instinct, somewhere it’s a commitment, somewhere it’s a goal, somewhere an aspiration, ambition, aim, must, option, choice, obligation, service, help, hospitality, so on and so forth. On the whole, everything is some or the other manifestation of the thing called Expectation. It has transformed into a phenomenon that has geared itself up to take a firm place in everybody’s life, be it a child, a parent, a dog, a tiger, or Bill Gates or Bin Laden.

Now what exactly does expecting mean? We expect, when we desire, or want, or like, or seek, or go in search of, or go behind something, whatever be it. Perhaps, it could be the other way around. As kids, most of us would have gone behind chocolates, toys, cartoons or comics. As children, we would have run behind superman, spiderman, batman, or some or the other xxxman. These days, it is Jetix, Animax, Power Rangers, Rajnikanth, remote cars, cricket bats, playstations, etc. As teens, must of the guys go behind girls, girls go behind fashion, jewels, and these are just examples. In reality , this doesn’t have an end here. In future, we inevitably go behind one big important factor. Money. We go behind that, and the chase never ends. Till we go to the grave, something or the other gives us the chase – the run of our lives.

Nobody, no living organism is an exception to what I just said. There are people who call themselves monks and who claim that they’ve renounced everything and have no expectations in this mortal world. Even these people fall under the “Souls that expect” category, as these people long and desire for salvation. So, the moment you desire for something, you are into a serious expectation about it.

Everybody expects; obviously everybody should, in order to sustain in today’s fast paced world.

Now what has this got to do with our lives? When you expect something, there is a fifty-fifty possibility of it tasting the fruit. There are people who have converted their expectations into realities, and those people have made it to history textbooks of today, and students read them aloud.

But when expectations fail, or when they don’t fall into place, or when they don’t see the light of the day, you tend to feel horrible. You experience a sensation that the whole world is staring at you coldly. There, at that moment, you realize what not to expect in a particular situation in a particular time.

So, the compilations of your expectations and the results they meet with gives you the necessary beats and moulds to make what you are right now, or what you want to be in the future, or what you deserve to be.

Wherever you go, whatever you become, the tail called “Expectation” follows you loyally. Sometimes it makes you sit on a throne of pride and success, sometimes it drowns you into a sea of shame and anger.

But this can’t be the end. We have a lesson to learn from the outcome of our expectations. If you can co-relate your needs, desires, your current situation, prevailing circumstances, future prospects, and expect accordingly, you can make them into reality. All that is required, is a thorough self-analysis (to make your expectations practical), and a bit of positive attitude (to help you from failure).

To conclude with, this may not be the best way to start (a so called) autobiography, but what I have just told has got a fairly strong connection with my life till date, perhaps everybody’s life through the ages.