Desi Web 2.0

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colors from india

Check out some excellent photographs over here.

Yakeen

Tha mujhe yeh yakeen
hai mujhe jiski chahat
mujhe wahi dastaan milegi
har tamanna apne anjaam milegi
yakeenen mujhe bhi mohabat-e panah milegi

daur-e-jindagi ki kuch rahon se hi gujar
yakeen badal gaya
Sawalon ke patthar se aankhon ka sapna bikhar gaya
ab aalam yeh hai
ki mujhe yakeen toh hai
par yakeen par yakeen nahi

Light

Yesterday I was playing with poemmaker words at a friend's
place. I liked what I came up with, and here it is:

Here I am mortal
drunken vile
in thy lovely trifle
fair maiden
peasant said
perchance methinks
thy villainy will give
no drunkard a dream
but melancholy mercy
in this dire night

Bichadna

Here I am exaggerating a mild sadness felt at
leaving my old job, and people.

Janta hoon aaj ka din kal yaad ban jayega
Bichadne ke is dard ka kal namo-nishan na rah jayega
Phir bhi aisa lagta hai
Banne-Badalne ke is dard ka koi aadi nahin
ant nahin
Caravaan e jindagi hai yeh dard
Aur ek din mera naam
Bhi iska ek thahar ban jayega

FeatureD

There are a few hindi bloggers (growing ?) who actually
write in hindi. Checkout Chintan at Abhivyakta,
found via Desipundit.

Mercury Lingam

While searching for blogposts upon ujjain, I came across this piece of news:

The Siddha Ashram of Swami Nardanand Paramahansa have completed the construction of a 1500 kilogram Parad (Mercury) Shivalingam, which is the largest of its kind in the world . The Shivalingam and its temple are located at Siddha Ashram, Ujjain in central India.

It is believed that an opportunity to see, touch and worship this Parad Shivalingam is accredited to one's holy and good deeds done in the previous and present life.

Full article here.
Some google search, and I found that you can even buy a chotu version for personal usage. Here !
So you ask whats the freaking point. Well there is this :

How can mercury affect my health ?
The nervous system is very sensitive to all forms of mercury. Methylmercury and metallic mercury vapors are more harmful than other forms, because more mercury in these forms reaches the brain. Exposure to high levels of metallic, inorganic, or organic mercury can permanently damage the brain, kidneys, and developing fetus. Effects on brain functioning may result in irritability, shyness, tremors, changes in vision or hearing, and memory problems.
Short-term exposure to high levels of metallic mercury vapors may cause effects including lung damage, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, increases in blood pressure or heart rate, skin rashes, and eye irritation

More on it, here.
So when the world is working to reduce the dangers of mercury, we are installing a lingam, so devotees can pray, touch, kneel and heal.

Not Trivia

Word of the Day: Petrichor.
Or the scent of rain on dry earth or as they say in hindi
"pahli baarish ke baad mitti ki bhini bhini sugandh"
Also, where does fruit punch come from ? found via sepiamutiny

Song Select

Once in a while I surf youtube favorites. Here's a beautiful
song "Say It's Possible", composed and sung by Terra Naomi.

Karunamayi's Talk

Yesterday I went to attend karunamayi's evening program. The setting was very indian. A sort of sankeertan. It was held in a church, and the church had quite good acoustics. There were very few indians. Quite a lot of old people, a few young ones, and some little ones. The little ones were running around carefree. Some of the young women were quite beautiful. A young mother had come with matted locks, and a baby wrapped in her arms and a shawl like cloth. Some white women wore bindis, salwars, saarees. I am not accustomed to seeing that, and I felt saarees and salwars didn't look good on them, but they looked quite comfortable in that. Some men wore kurta-payjamas, white. There was a young guy on my adjacent bench, black hair, slender body. He sat eyes-closed. Mostly, the organizers wore a hushed silence, and beatific smiles on their faces.

It had just rained a while ago in boulder, and there was a lot of thunder; after a while rain had stopped, everything seemed fresh, and the roads were a little cooler, and when I biked along the creek, it had rushing waters. When she came, we all stood up, she greeted many on her way, walked to the dais, and sat quietly. It felt nice and cool when she walked in, and past by. There was an old monk with small hair, flowing beard, and a red robe. He met quite nicely with her. He sat two seats ahead of me.

We started out with a simple bhajan, listened to it, and maintained a long silence after the bhajan had finished. She was introduced by a person, who I thought travelled with her, and does much of the talking because he speaks english well. Then she started speaking. She speaks a little fast, but usually clear. She spoke about a lot of things, the seven chakras, the need for meditation, following whatever you do, blessing students and teachers all-over the world, world peace. I became filled with pride and chided myself, when she mentioned ujjain. She mentioned kshipra river, vikramaditya, kalidasa, and king poet bharathari. She said of bharathari, that he said to all the kings, his brothers "All this wealth, this gold, and much more, is nothing against the divine wisdom of a poet". She said kaliadasa's abhigyan shakuntalam has 54 german translations, and has inspired many western poets of 15th to 17th-18th century.

Her talk was interspersed with her singing, and a few 2-3 min silences after the singing. Mostly, I sat with my eyes closed, sometimes joining in, otherwise listening. We recited a few mantras, for ourselves, and giving peace to others. She talked a lot about the need to be sensitive to nature (mother nature as she says), and talked about glodal radiation (by which she meant global warming). Some of the things she said, I simply couldn't believe, and felt they were mostly stories. But her singing and voice quality, is very nice. And when a hundred people are tuning in, you can feel the vibrations inside your body. The woman sitting next to me sang quite well too. As I said, I mostly listened.

This one explanation I liked. She had started the talk with a description of saraswati. She said, saraswati is sara+swa+iti. Sara means the crux, swa means the self, and iti means thy. So saraswati, implies, the sara of thy self, that she said is the highest knowledge, nirvana, or mokhsa. From that comes all the knowledge, and hence we worship goddess saraswati, as the fountain mother of knowledge.

Before her talk ended, we were shown a small video of her charity works in india, and images from her world-tour. Seeing poverty and disablitiy in my face again and again, didn't feel nice. But then, those are real people I thought, and are being helped by her. So whats the harm if someone gets inspired to donate some money for them and her works, watching that.

In the end, most of us made an indian queue (which is a herd) towards the dais, and she put a chandan timki on each one of us telling each, my lovely child, children. The chandan timki (not sure if it was something else), had strong and soothing fragrance. Then some people including me stayed, she walked down from the dais, and sat on the floor, and talked about a few more things, and stressed upon the need to wakeup early in the morning, doing surya-namaskaram, meditation especially in the morning at 5 am.

Finally, she said come to the individual blessings tomorrow, and I will see your progress report, how many marks you got in science, how many in spirituality. We all stood up, as she walked past by. I moved a little back, others were rushing in to be in the frontline. Everyone stood with folded hands (in namaste), as she walked past by. I initially stood with crossed arms, I don't know why. May be reason made me defiant. I dislike bowing usually. But then my years of training came rushing in, and when she stopped in front of me, she looked blankly, or kindly, I don't know, but I did offer a small bow with arms still crossed, and then did do a namaste. Reflex happens in a split-second, you know :)

It was already past ten when I came out. Three hours. I wore my shoes, unlocked my bike, and drove on the empty roads. The night yesterday, was colder than usual because of the evening showers we had received. Biking in the night felt good, and I thought I will write about this experience. So there.

Update: Here are some photos from the program.

Garmi

The temperature racing to 100F, I remarked to a bong friend:
"Kafi garmi ho gayi na boulder main abhi ?"
He replied, "Yeh kuch nahi. Aap udhar india main jaoge na, toh french fries ban jaoge" !

Asha 5k

I am doing the Asha 5K walk, at highland ranch colorado, on Sunday, June 11, 2006. It's for supporting primary education of underprivileged children in India.

If you would like to register for the walk, click here .
If you would like to donate (via credit card), please visit here . (I have supported the pledge of shiva, who is a full time member of ashacolorado, and one of the organisers of this walk).

From their website

Hundred percent of the proceeds from the event will go towards supporting Asha projects in India. Asha locates and supports projects that help these underprivileged children go to school. In some places it takes the form starting new schools, in others supporting existing schools and/or after-school programs in the locality

For more information please visit here

Update: I miserably managed to not wakeup that morning, and hence skipped the event.
But I did click and contribute. So, click if you are interested.

Tapori Talk

If you understand hindi, and don't mind reading hinglish, click on,
this tapori talk by sayesha is hilarious !

Patan

एक वक़्त था, जब हम हवाओं का रुख बदल दिया करते थे
kismat का खेल देखिए
आज पत्ते भी gustahq हो चले हैं
सरसरा कर हमारे पतन का उपहास करते हैं

Family Warmth

Check out this cute Monkey Family pic. Did you spot the fourth one ?
via desipundit.

And while you are at it, check out this one too. That precedes getting
a family. Heh.

Sunny Day

I sing for the prairie
It's a sunny day
A few birds and a bee
Sing with me for the prairie
Listen my friend, to the soft rustle
Sings the the wind gently through the trees
Together we sing for the prairie
It's a sunny day
What is this song we sing
of words unknown ?
All I know
It has come to life
the day is alive
and it's a sunny day
Together we hum the chorus
the wind, the bird, the bee, and me
the day is alive
the day is alive
O prairie, it's a sunny day

Cloud Vagabond

I grew up with radio and vividh bharti. And so, I am familiar with hindi oldies, melodies.
Once in a while, I get reminded of them. Like today, when boulder sky is clouded grey, the earth is fresh with rain, and from my balcony I see half-hidden mountains, the valley shadowed white with low lurking clouds. It is a scenery which uplifts my spirit, makes me feel happy. And so, here's a song for the lurking cloud:

itna na mujhse pyaar badha
ke main ek badal awara
janam janam se hoon saath tere
hai naam mera jal ki dhara

which means

don't become so in love with me
that I am a cloud vagabond
since many lives I have with you been
that my name is stream of water

You can listen to the full song here (second last song, the one which says talat, is actually the duet talat and lata).
If you understand hindi, it has beautiful lyrics.
Enjoy.

Boulder Blooms

These days in boulder, trees are becoming green again, and summer warmth is all around. Except, once in a while weather throws tantrums, and becomes snowy, like today. Imagine, the temperature just the day before yesterday was in 70's, today is in 30ss. Here are some pics from pearl street mall, boulder:






Update: Welcome rhapsoder readers :)

Lion Sleeps Tonight

And oh, you can access it here

Ghrina

और कितनी बरबादियाँ हैं
ए इन्सान तेरी किस्मत मैं लिखीं
के अब भी तू कहता है
मेरी घृणा जाती नहीं