Four years.. wrapped up!

As the days of being Piled Higher and Deeper come to an end, I try to gulp down the lump in the throat with no success. Writing this makes me melancholic, and reminds me of that late October afternoon four years ago when I had arrived in this small German town and even smaller railway station with a bagful of dreams and butterflies in the stomach. Looking back, the town with an unusual pronunciation hadn't taken my breath away on first sight. But as they say, love is beyond first sights and red roses on valentine's day and rather is that feeling of "at home", I fell in love with her without even realising when. Yes we haven't always shared the perfect relationship. Sometimes she would be like the new lover, trying to impress with her sunny warm weather and charming happy faces all around. Sometimes she would be as dull and gloomy as an old couple watching T.V. on a Friday night. Sometimes she would all of a sudden shower on me thin light snowflakes and make me feel like a Disney princess, and at other times she would be as cold and distant as an angry spouse after a fight. However, in all these, she gave me infinite moments, moments that painted the most wonderful kaleidoscope on the canvas of my life. She gave me people who stood by me as I struggled through frequent academic and emotional turbulences and loved me in spite of my weirdness. And she taught me the true meanings of knowledge, compassion and tolerance. She is special therefore, very very special, because in the last four years, she felt like home.

So thank you Jena for loving me without conditions, for giving me my so many firsts, for accepting me as a part of GK that I'll forever be proud of, and for gifting me friends and memories of a lifetime. I'll miss you, more than I would have ever imagined. Auf Wiedersehen :(

iSpeak

Of all the things that I missed during the prolonged limbo, writing was the foremost. Oh, by writing I mean anything other than ECONOMICS, the last millions of years were only about that. The PhD grilled me like a raw steak on charcoal, extracting every ounce of energy and leaving me a walking dead! But, it also left me with a lifetime of experience, a hardback as proof of three and a half years of existential crisis, and in the end, time for what I love to do the most. Hence, I decided to forgive and forget, sit by the window on a rainy Sunday evening in the heart of the city that takes my breath away every single time I watch her from up above the world so high, and write.

If the prelude looks like I have something extraordinary to write about, clearly it is not the case. I wanted to write about the rains, that strangely makes me romantic and transports me to a wonderland where memories are served as welcome drinks, lunch and dinner (yes, I do relate everything to food, that's a genetic disorder). But as I start to write, I feel an array of dark clouds hovering around, mystifying the thoughts. On and off conversation with Ma distracts me, while at the same time fills me with a happiness that was missing in the past several months. We talk about life, love and experiences that have molded us, hopes and dreams, and destiny. She tells me stories of her childhood, her upbringing, when a teen-aged version of her met Baba and fell in love, and their journey ever since. She talks about her childhood crush, of friends she has long lost contact with, her school and college days, and I listen with a lump in the throat and the rain pouring incessantly outside. I have listened to her stories umpteenth times, but I still love to hear them. It makes me dreamy, and her too, as I continue the conversation with snippets of my own stories of a teen-aged version of me falling in love, of traveling around and making friends and memories for life, and of misjudgments and naiveté. I urge her to secure her stories in the pages of a diary and lock them there, as I would mine someday, only to open them on days like today. On days that turn out to be perfect, not for their fifty-shades-of-grey weather and intermittent activities, but because of rainbow-colored conversations and laughter that resonate across the room. No wonder, even after spending an enormous amount of time trying to write something in an organized way, I end up with nothing in particular. Only with a strange post that soothes :)