It's the sun, stupid.

Am sitting far away from home.
How far?
About 11,500 km. Hmm.. about 15 hours of flying time.
Too far..

But yet, I feel as if I just turn around and speak something to the person sitting next to me in the bus, he would understand and respond to me in Hindi. As if this bus would drop me at the stop and I could just walk it to band-stand. As if at the next corner, I would see a chai wallah brewing tea and pouring it out in those small glasses. Why, I wonder?

It is the sun. The nearness to it. Actually, to be technically correct, it is the incline of the earth that now makes it just lean a bit closer to the ball of fire. Whatever it takes, the change is profound and long needed. As if the earth, asleep shrouded in a white blanket, is waking up.

It is so hard to even imagine that about just a month ago, I was in 4 layers of clothing, looking outside from the window of the same bus and nothing but bleak, forlorn, snow-laden trees. Cold getting to Colder.

But look at me now, dressed in a tee, I feel as if the winter is tale from the past. Long gone.Long forgotten.

Well, I know it is not home. The guy next to me wont reply in hindi. Band-stand and the chai shop are asleep. But yet, just a small tilt towards the sun and am already halfway across the world, imagining it here..Ah! the wonders of the sun. What power!!

Nuisance Value

What are these things that surround us? As I sit and write this, I see myself surrounded by so much............stuff.

How much of this is really useful NOW? How much of this is something I have kept because I "might" need it some day. There is a word for most of this stuff. Clutter.

It hides what is really needed. I have often spent hours searching for something I need and later found it hidden behind these inessential trivia. And I still spend so much time tidying it up, rearranging it, putting it in a neat order. Stuff I can really get along by without missing.

So, today I shall put them in a box. Give them. Leave them outside. I am going to create more space. So that I can see.

The good thing is that this applies also to my thoughts!

Contagious ..anytime!

First, watch this: 

What did you feel? 

Inspiring, yes! Simple, No.

A lot of this work is very conscious. Takes an enormous amount of balance and wisdom to not unduly influence and push the children towards work that we want them to do because it looks good. And also not to silence our own voices as educators.

It is not the stepping up and stepping back which is important. It is knowing when to.

Be inspired. Be prepared. Draw them out. Let them be..

Pitter Patter...

Rain. Growing up in Mumbai is about being one with it. Splashing in it, sometimes wading through it, fighting on when the windscreen wipers work furiously and still you cant see the road. It envelops you. You cannot remain untouched. I guess if you can live with it, you are halfway being a mumbaikar. If you can enjoy it, you might never leave.
How different the same rain is here. The clouds ready to burst, but they never really do - almost respecting people's desire to go on un-interrupted. As I wake up and see through this cocoon of semi-light, I feel the urge to open the windows, hear it fall, stretch my hand out. For a moment, forgetting that I am eight thousand miles from home. No, it isnt different - this rain. If it makes you feel the same way, how can it be. How can it be?

Is it just me or....

Life. Is it made up of moments or do "moments" make life? Why does time fly by sometimes? And sometimes, why doesn't a single moment come to pass? Are these just philosophical questions and a way to move away from living? Or do these questions help us come "alive"?
I guess, I don't know the answer. I guess, I never will. Maybe the answer doesn't exist. Or maybe, it keeps changing!
But still I wonder...