Do you remember those days?

We all come from somewhere. A small town, a village, a big city. So often we hear people talking about their hometowns. The good, the bad, and the special stories.

When I was younger, I never realized that people sometimes never live in the same place where they spend their whole childhood. So whenever my brother (who is around 8 years older than me) and I speak on phone, we often talk about our childhood and glory days at Amritsar.

Amritsar was a place where it seemed that everyone knows everyone. Even though no one from family, but friends, lives there now but I miss my old dusty hometown. I miss the bright light that revelled in every corner of the city, the savoury smells of the punjabi food, my cricket pals from school, the loud shouting street hawkers, the confusing traffic at railway crossings, the sight of dhoodwallahs (milk-sellers) on their old rusty bicycles, the fresh morning air and many many beautiful memories.

One of such memories my brother reminded me of a couple of weeks back was of the time when I was, I guess, in my early teens. Now that time stores some of the most treasured time of my childhood that I spent with my brother; time that would never come back again.

My brother reminded me of how our mother, despite her mighty power of love on both us, had labeled us in a way The Inglorious Snack-Hunters. When it came to snacks in the house (where ever they may be concealed, she feared us the most. We made sure that any snack, whatever it might be, be it a pack of Cookies to Haldiram Bhujia to Namkeen Dal to Cheeselings to any thinkable form of snack be searched, found, and assimilated same day and all proofs of such hunts be terminated. The proof termination was to keep our mother puzzling. If she would find out, then we always played the Blame Card! It was aces for us.

The only times that she used to be pissed off at her snack-hungry lads was when we put her in embarrassing tight spots. Actually, ours was a house where the flow of guests was always on the high. Our guests usually made surprise visits in the evenings. It was then when she used to find all the snacks cleverly missing from the vault. This situation in addition to the pressure of playing a hostess, sometimes, brought swift but predictable anger. But all her motherly anger magically disappeared when one of us gave her an earnest, dreamy look.

Interestingly, in all the odd situations that I mentioned, the only quick resolve used to be her placing money on my palm for a rapidfire snack purchase from the closest store. I used to run like a hare to fulfill what, to a boy in early teens, was the most interesting act of the errand--the money-spending act.

But did all this stop us from our future hunts—No. As they say, boys are boys.

With all these thoughts, I feel my childhood in my ‘hometown’ is clothed with some really joyful memories.

I hope I visit my hometown and ‘visit’ my childhood, some good day.

Mantric Gayatri

Many people in the world consider India as a land of spirituality. I reckon so. Some scholars even say that if you are born in India you inherit spirituality. Swami Vivekananda in his address at World Parliament of Religions in 1893 referred Hinduism in undivided India as the “mother of religions” with “the most ancient order of monks in the world”. I do not know if spirituality and religion go hand in hand forth I believe I have always been more of a spiritual person than a religious person. Now I know that many people may laugh and hate hearing that. I know.

Factually, I was born in a kashmiri pandit (hindu brahmin) family but was imparted spiritual lessons, which I think may or may not be religious. My spiritual education, what all little I tried to seek, comes mostly from my father, who had opportunities to study many religions and their philosophies under Fulbright and British Council Fellowship.

However, I am often confused by my apparent devoutness to any particular religion. It leaves in state of confusion and contradiction. But I am not an atheist. I love the concept of God and I love all HIS creations specially Nature. I love teachings of many religions from that of Hinduism to Buddhism to Christianity. And I do pray to God and whenever I pray, I pray with my whole heart. I often recite Gayatri Mantra in my prayers. But is Gayatri Mantra religious or spiritual? In my opinion, the philosophy of Gayatri Mantra is universal and not binded to any one particular religion.

In all my school days, we used to recite the Gayatri mantra every morning. But it is not long before when I sensed a strange affinity for Gayatri Mantra. I had just finished top in my third year in engineering, got campus placed in Wipro, followed by Samsung. It was a happy phase in my life. But little did I know that it would be followed by a period of turmoil. A period of great personal anguish and pain. I think the fall of 2005 has been the strangest period of my life. And in this period of sadness and despair, Gayatri Mantra injected in me an immense strength. It gave me power to defy odds. I could feel my spirit.

During this time, I vividly remember I was traveling with my father to Chandigarh from Amritsar one early morning and our driver played on one of the devotional hymn cassettes. As any other youngster, I never liked listening to a devotional song when cruise-traveling in car. I hated my driver for doing so. So with strong and quick objection, I asked him to immediately change the cassette but my father overruled. My gut rejection to the very idea of a devotional song playing in background made me feel spaced out and giddy for next few minutes. I rolled down my window to get some fresh air. But as time passed on, I started listening to the lyrics of this Gayatri Mantra based songs [ I do not know if I should call them 'Lyrics']. I started recalling the lessons from one of the discourse class in school where I had learnt the meaning of the Gayatri Mantra. I realized how beautiful the words were.

A basic translation of Gayatri Mantra, which is in Sanskrit, is as follows :

ॐ भूर्भुव: स्व: तत्सवितुर्वरेण्यं । भर्गो देवस्य धीमहि, धीयो यो न: प्रचोदयात् ।।

Oh God, the Protector, the basis of all life, Who is self-existent, Who is free from all pains and Whose contact frees the soul from all troubles, Who pervades the Universe and sustains all, the Creator and Energizer of the whole Universe, the Giver of happiness, Who is worthy of acceptance, the most excellent, Who is Pure and the Purifier of all, let us embrace that very God, so that He may direct our mental faculties in the right direction.

What I felt and experienced in those next few hours of travel left a deep impact. It was very then when I decided that if ever I had a daughter, I would name her Gayatri.

But I guess I didn't have to wait much long, so when my older brother had a baby daughter and asked me to suggest a name for her, I was quick to recommend Gayatri. So it is.

And till today when I am asked to think of an enchanting word and a devotional song, I think of Gayatri and this particular song.

Nalin Chakoo

‘Mistaken Identity’

I have been a victim of ‘mistaken identity’ [nationality wise] so often that I have lost the count now. The latest one happened on this Saturday Eve (9th January 2010). I decided to go to an Indian Restaurant, Authentic Indian Cuisine, with some close friends for my birthday treat. It was a warm evening because it had snowed in the afternoon. It usually gets little warmer after a snow fall and I felt this after my first experience with snow here at Seoul.

Authentic Indian Cuisine, the restaurant where we planned to take our dinner, has an Indian ambience. A majestic Taj Mahal painting on the front wall, lot of decorative Indian traditional vessels placed around, popular Bollywood songs playing in background, aroma, a shelf full of Indian spices among many other things built a sound theme. The place was throbbing with an Indian heart.

But in all this, the staff was oddly all Korean from the female counter manager, to the chefs (we could see chefs through an open glass wall separating the main restaurant space and kitchen), to the waiters. All were Korean. My Russian friend immediately flashed some of his newly learnt Korean to the lady manager and asked for a table (for five).

A chef (Korean national looking, short hair in white apron, above picture) came to take our order. I had never seen a chef taking an order before in a restaurant. Seeing this, I changed my opinion and thought that the restaurant’s way of sending a chef was a terrific way to connect to its customer. Above all, I felt it was better for us as now we could clearly mention, without the fear of the Chinese Whisper, the level of spices for our dishes.

As everybody started giving away order, yet again in Korean, to the chef, I suddenly realized that he was murmuring in Hindi. I exclaimed in excitement and said “Aap hindi jaantein hain?” [Do you know Hindi?]. The chef reciprocated with same excitement and asked me the same question.

It turned out that this chef was from Darjeeling (in India). Later, I told him that I was trying to speak to him in Hanguel (Korean Language) because I thought that he was a Korean national. He laughed and said that he had thought that I was a European.

Truly, Mistaken Identities.

The only thought that came to me after this was that INDIA is truly unique, diverse, and incredible.

-Nalin Chakoo