Roadside Barber

Road side barbers are very rare to see.If We spot them than we just pass them in our every day life.I was wondering how a new day starts for these road side barbers.Each and every day they have an hope in their eyes to earn more as compare to previous day.They used to stand in the shadow of a tree where they have fixed their mirror on the stem of tree, have a wooden chair and their apparatus used to cut hairs and shave.I don't know how much their hair cut costs but may be around 5-10 Rs.Every day they pray to god that at least they should get enough money so that their family can have a proper meal.

These days husband and wife works in a good firm so that they can have a good life for themselves and for their children but a barber and his wife works so that they can get a meal for their children and if possible than save it for the next day.Some times i think how they manage to survive if they don't have a single customer in a day.May be they had enough customer of their level and i am thinking like this as i didn't get chance to see any customer on their wooden chair.

Good thing is, at least they are doing some thing instead of begging.They have the courage to fight eevry single day to move ahead in their life.Taking hair cutting as a profession is good for those who have some amount of money in their pockets to setup a shop with a pair of chairs equipped with various creams and electrical gadgets but it is an obligation for such peoples by which they can earn their bread.

These days barbers have converted small shops to a full fledged saloon with an Air conditioner but a road side barber will never have such things,he will only have the courage to survive with his scissors and razors.

Vaishno Devi,a holy place or a place of Business

When i went to Vaishno Devi i asked myself that whether it is an holy place or a place of business, a place to pore in money in the name of holy goddess.Although Vaishno Devi shrine board provides lots of facilities to all devotees at various places.I got the business kind of feeling when i saw the facilities like battery operated auto rickshaws upto bhawan @100 Rs/ person and helicopter facilities from katra to the point Sanjichhat@ 1225 Rs/person which is just 2.25 kms away from bhawan.

When I stepped down at Katra,lots of people came and asked for Hotel room,all claiming cheap rooms,some claimed that they will charge for taking care of our luggage and we can take bath at their bathrooms and start our journey by giving an charge of Rs 100.Katra is a city which never sleeps and all the devotees keep moving across it on 24x7.

After taking a room and getting fresh we proceeded for taking Yatra Parchi which is an entry pass for beginning Yatra from Banganga check post.When we reached at Parchi counter we got shocked to see the long queue.A long queue of devotees waiting to get Yatra parchi so that they can begin their journey but to surprise Shrine board has closed the Parchi counter as they were not able to handle people at bhawan and they reported to have 50000 devotees at bhawan.They announced that due to over crowded ness counter will get open at next morning 5 am so that they can have control over the devotees.After hearing this i and my friend left for hotel and we planned to come back at around 3 am in the morning so that we can get Yatra parchi in the first slot.We returned to our hotel,slept and waked up at 2 am so that we can again reach at the counter at 3 am.When we were on our way to counter we saw many peoples sleeping at the road side,many people can not afford a room in a hotel,they were sleeping with their luggage with them.We were expecting that there will not be long queue as no one will come so early but we were wrong.We were at the same place in the queue where we left last evening.Peoples didn't left the queue and they were sleeping on the road itself.I saw the devotion towards holy goddess that people didn't bothered to leave for night.I some how managed to enter the line from front where people were waiting for door of counter to open.When door got opened at 5 am,people broke the queue and they were trying to enter the gate,the situation was so bad that security guards were doing lathi charge but still people were entering the gate by climbing on each other.I saw that one woman fell down due to rush and people were crossing her,some how one security guard came and took out that woman.I too flanged the queue and managed to get inside the gate.Internally i was thinking that i am doing cheating with the people who were standing in the queue from last day without catching any sleep and food but every one was doing that.I asked myself that "Is every thing fair to get an glimpse of holy goddess?".

After getting Yatra Parchi,we reached Banganga checkpost.Here we have to go through security check which involves the x ray examination of your luggage and checking of individual by security guards,Beyond this point the Yatra of Vaishno devi starts.We started climbing and took a bath in Banganga river at Banganga gath.Around 9:30 am we resumed our Yatra and kept climbing towards the Ardh kuwari which is in half the way to bhawan.There are lots of shops present on the roads which have drinking water,cold drinks and other things.Vaishno devi shrine board has also installed drinking water taps at various points from where devotees can refill their water bottles.We were climbing,taking breaks in between when we got exhausted as sun was shining along with cool breeze of air.We were reaching higher and higher by crossing mountains to mountains,watching natural beauty of hills in the shining sun light.Awesome,natural beauty.

After a walking of 6 kms we reached Ardh Kuwari at around 12:30 pm.There was so rush that we got the number of next day afternoon to enter the holy cave of Ardh kuwari so we skipped it and moved towards Bhawan. Lots of devotees were coming back from bhawan and lots of people were going towards the bhawan by enchanting Jai Mata Di all the way.There was a excitement in all of us, we all were so enthusiastic and energetic that we were not feeling tired.I saw some devotees who were not just walking like us.They just lie down on road completely and then get up and again lie down from the point where his hands were.My god, was the word which came out of my mouth when i saw them.How much devotion they had for Vaishno Mata.Some of them were walking through their knees.Vaishno mata gave them energy to do so.Around 4 pm we reached at Bhawan.There we took prashad and took a locker to put our luggage so that it can be safe.

There was a queue for final darshan,around 4:45 pm we were in the queue and after 15 minutes we were standing at the holy cave of Vaishno Maa.Queue was moving slowly and priests were not allowing any person to stand there.We got an chance to see the three goddess only for just 3-4 seconds.There was an different kind of feeling, my eyes got filled with tears when i saw Vaishno Maa, I don't know why.We forced to move from there and we left the premises,collected prashad and moved towards our locker to take our luggage.After putting some food in our tummies we moved for Bhairov nath temple as it is said, in order to complete the Vaishno Devi Yatra one should go to Bhairov nath temple otherwise Yatra will remain uncomplete.

After visiting Bhairov nath temple,we started to move downwards. around 8:15 pm.We were so tired that we were not able to walk but some how we managed to get Ardh Kuwari at around 10 pm.We had our dinner,took some rest and again started to move down.God our legs were not supporting us,after every 100 meters we were taking rest and thinking how we will manage to move down.Some how we reached Banganga check post at around 1 am and took an auto from there to our Hotel.When we reached our room,Dhammmm was the sound which i heard and than i lost control on myself and went into a deep sleep after complete 24 hours which included all the hush-hush for getting Yatra Parchi to our continuous Yatra.

Vaishno Devi,a holy place: where devotees are ready to do anything to get a single glimpse of mata.A place where Shrine board provides free medications,free dispenceries,free blankets and free accomodations to devotees.

Vaishno Devi, a Business place: where people earn money by carrying devotees on their back,on their horses and ponies,on palkies (palki is a kind of chair fitted over two bamboos which is carried by four persons to take an devotee to Bhawan).A place where Hotels charges are sky rocketing,where a cyber cafe charges 10 Rs for a print out and 30 Rs for half an hour surfing with an minimum amount of 3o Rs.

Firing Firing all the way

Firing Firing all the way, one has to accept that there is no other way...
Economy melt down,reduction in work,slashing of jobs these are the main and hot topics these days.Every where the common thing in IT industry is Cost cuttings and Firing of employees who are on bench.
Some are saving their necks and some are taking advantage of the term recession.Every body says Recession time is going on but most of the people don't know about recession and they are just taking advantage of it.Well i am not discussing all these things here.

I fired an 12 year old boy.Yes, but may be for his good.
Me and my flatmates appointed a maid for cleaning and sweeping our rooms so that our rooms look more nice and clean to others who come to our flat (I used to saw my room neat and clean before appointing the maid).Initially she used to come but as time passed she start sending her son for the same purpose.That boy is around 12 years old,he came regularly to our flat,sweeps our flat and went to some other place.Her mother was using him as her companion so that she can have more no of flats in her hand which results in good pay.
One day i asked that boy whether he goes to school or not,he said,he used to go school 2 years before and he has attended classes up to 4th,his father was not in a good state of health and family expenditure rose to recover his father's health,that's why he left school and helping her mother.A good emotional story,isn't it? I don't know whether he was lying or telling me the truth but i said to him that you must go school and study.This is not your work to sweep home,this is the time when you must study and make your and your family's future.He gave another excuse that he is not getting admission in any school due to two year break in his studies.
I told him that we don't want him to come for this work and if he continues to come than may be we will discontinue from you.I asked him to tell his mother to talk to me, i thought may be i will convince her mother to send him to a school but her mother gave another dozens of excuses to me.
I told him that he can bring his books on weekends and i will give him free tuition's but he never turned up.As i gave threat to discontinue from them,her mother started to come her flat for cleaning and sweeping and stopped him to come our home.I assumed that her mother got convinced and now she is not using him but my assumption came wrong when i came to know that her mother stopped him to come to our flat and started sending him to some other flat.She didn't wanted to lose her second hand.After some time i also came to know that, that maid have one more son and she is also using him for the same person.Their family is earning from the four hands.
I was not able to do anything in this but i decided that i will not use that boy again.Once i was seeing Shah Rukh Khan's interview on a show and there he said one thing:-

"If we are not able to stop the wrong things around us than at least we should not do the wrong things."
Its really sad to see such things that still childrens from lower class are not able to go school.We say that India is an fast growing and developing country but are we really growing and developing.

Earth Hour

Earth is asking for just one hour from us so that it can help us and we are not helping it.27th March the day when Earth hour is conducted at International level in which we had to minimize the use of lights just for one hour so that the heat produced by all the heat emitting devices across the earth can be reduced by some small amount so that we can reduce Global warming.
Global warming, seems not to be felt by us in our daily lives if we do not want to feel it.We are still using Air Conditioners all the time in our offices,home or Shopping Malls.If you want to know how much heat an AC emits than go in front of its condenser and you will feel a heavy hot breeze, hot up to the extent that if you are completely wet in your clothes than you can dry them by just standing in front of it for 20-25 minutes.

27 th March, time was approaching to 8:30 pm,suddenly power failure occurred in our area 5 minutes before the scheduled time.It was unbelievable that Electricity board was following the schedule of Earth hour or I should say they got a genuine reason to cut power so that it can be saved.Whatever it is, it helped those who don't have inverter at their home i.e. People who have inverters at their home were using it without caring to minimize the power consumption as mentioned for Earth hour.They don't care,they just can't miss their TV serials for one hour duration.But still Electricity board helped.Most of the area was in dark as just like as Black out.Hope we have saved some amount of heat.
Major example of Global warming,This year winter season closed after Holi and summer has to arrive but to surprise before summer, Monsoon arrived in North and its raining from past 2 days.Global warming is making changes in atmospheric cycles.

I think we all have to join hands for reducing Global warming.Every single person can make a difference by lowering the extra use of water,power and heat emitting devices.

Orkut and Friends

Surfing in midnight when no friends are online except those who are abroad seems boring especially when you are on the web from the past 3 hours,taking updates on each side and giving self updates.
Weekend is on and that's why I am still up and finding ways to kill time as i am not feeling sleepy.May be the thought of weekend is keeping me up so late.Enrique is on Windi Medi Player singing his most popular songs.Still surfing orkut and different websites,checking my official mail (i know no one is going to shoot mail at this time but i need to keep my lapi busy in something ;~)).
I observed one thing while surfing Orkut, i went through my friend list, i was just taking an idea who are residing in my friend list which makes an count of 191 and do i really know all of them? I was going through each profile and i found that each of my friend is happy and in good state of life.Some are enjoying,working outside India and some are rocking at India.
I was observing at each and every ones orkut portrait photo,most of them are smiling,some are showing there photography skills and some ressemble like film stars (OMG, when i was with them they never looked like a film star,what happens then.....).
When i look back in 2006,it was started,the time i and many other like me started orkuting,suddenly whole college was addicted to Orkut.There were many fights with lab administration people to unblock orkut as Orkut attained maximum no of hits and bandwidth of College internet.College authorities was wandering and talking about Orkut,they were not aware about Orkut.All the desktops assigned for accessing Internet was having just one website opened all the time.Orkut with less features gained so much popularity.
Time passed,we passed out from college,we became Engineers,we stepped in to Professional world with one thing in common,Orkut.Orkut provided us a medium or platform to stay in touch with our friends.As time passed Orkut get matured and launched many features with increasing privacy and security.
Well I am really happy to see updates from my friends on Orkut.I am really happy that my all friends are good and rocking.
Thanks Orkut.
Keep rocking Guys!!!

Search Of God.

We always go to temples,mosques,church and Gurudwara to offer our prayers to our almighty.We believe, temples and various other holy places are those where god resides or we can get a feeling to be at near or close to god.
We always pray to god for the happiness,success in our life.We ask him to bless us with all good things so that we can live a good life.I think,we are so selfish,we always ask god for only our self.Have we asked him for the good or happiness of others,If so than how many times we have asked him for others?
In normal life we generally talk with each other,we socialize at this society.We met various people and have our own perception for each and every body.This perception guides our mind to have a particular tone or style of talking when we meet different people.
For Ex:- If i am talking to my boss then my tone of talking will be very respective and i will be very humble to him on the other hand after completing conversation with boss if i met a person who is at same level on which i am,my way of talking and tone becomes different.I will behaving like a cool dude with my friends.
If we are talking to a person of opposite gender at that time also we are very different from our originality.If we encounter a person who is not of our level,who is like a rickshaw puller,bus driver etc we treat them as nobody is superior than us and we always talk to them in a way of giving them order.
What if one day we come across god?what we will do at that time?May be greet him very politely,respect fully from the core of heart because we are with god.May be we would be ready to do anything which god says at that time.We will follow to him like anything.Am i right here?
God says, I am everywhere,I am in every single thing from a partical of dust to every human heart.I am in every non living thing and i am in every living thing.But we forget these words and we have bounded god into the area of temples,mosque,church and other holy places.We can go thousand of miles away to see the birth place,foot prints or many others things which are related to god but we can't help those persons who really need help.We give a donation of Rs 100 in temple but we take our hand back to feed a small dirty children who comes to us asking for money.
Why we forget about god when we are scolding or abusing a person who is from lower level.Have you ever imagined that the person you are scolding,beating or abusing can be god (God can come in any form...isn't it)....yes he can be god who came to you, what will you do then after knowing he is god,ask that person to forgive you.... a second before you were beating him and a second later you are asking forgiveness.
Have you ever helped a person from lower class who needs help and have you ever came across the happiness on their face.I have experienced it,
One fine evening i was at road side eatery and i was waiting for my burger to come as i was very hungry at that time.When stall owner passed me my burger a small kid came to me and pulled my trouser.I looked at him and he was asking to me for some food.He was looking very hungry,i stopped myself and handed over my burger to him.He ate that burger and i saw a kind of happiness or a kind of satisfaction on face that comes after eating something especially when you were very hungry.I was feeling that what that kid was feeling after he took his first bite of burger,i feeled as that single bite going through my food pipe to stomach passing lungs (same observation when u ate something after a very long time).
This kind of feeling happiness is very different from the other things.I believe, i fed burger to god :~) that day who is in the form of a small boy.
My opinion is that we should greet every one in this society with a very warm and welcoming attitude.I know sometimes we face a rude behaviour from some but if we remain cool and warm then they will also correct their way of talking. (wo kehte he na,pyaar se sab thik kiya jaa sakta he).
We should greet everyone with a smile,Life is to smile.Keep a smile on your face.
Trust me just try to keep smile,be polite and warm to each and everyone,I am sure you feel that you came across god.

I am pasting some lines of a song "Banda re" from movie Raaz 2 as i believe there is truthness in them.

Mauko Kahaan Dhoondhe Re
BandeMain To Tere Paas Mein
Naa Teerath Mein Naa Moorat Mein
Naa Ekaant Niwaas Mein
Naa Mandir Mein Naa Masjid Mein
Naa Kabhi Kailaash Mein
Main To Tere Paas Mein Bande....
Main To Tere Paas Mein

Mirror and Mirror Images

As defined, A mirror is an object with one surface polished, which leads to reflection and another opaque.A mirror creates an exact copy of any object placed in front of it.
Above are the common definitions of a mirror, But mirrors show some thing more to a person.The difference is, the way of looking at the mirror.
Every morning when i go in front of mirror, i saw a person standing in front of me looking exactly as me,does all the things which i do but in a opposite manner.I know that this is my mirror image and it is opposite.Mirrors are made to do the opposite things which made the person inside the mirror totally different from us.
As we know that our mirror images do the things exactly opposite whatever we do.Just imagine, there is a different world inside mirror where all the things happens like our daily life.Whatever activities we do in a daily routine they just happens opposite in the mirror world.For example, If i am cursing anybody or scolding a person than my mirror image will be blessing that person or vice versa.
I think we have a similarity with mirrors.How?A plane glass is polished from one side so that it can act as an mirror.We see other side of the mirror not the back side of it. We as a person are also polished from one side and show our other side to outer world.Outer world will only see the other side of us but no one see the back of polished side which is completely different from the other side.No body knows what a person is in reality, we only knows a person according to the image which he is showing to the world.
Mirror images also asks you such questions which no body can ask you and nobody other than you can answer them.Although it is just a piece of glass but it means a lot.A mirror makes you realize what you are.It shows you as a confident person and it shows you as a defeated or dejected person.
Mirror is the thing in which a person can match his eyes with his own, it totally depends on us whether we have the courage to match our eyes with our mirror image or we try to avoid the eye contact.