My every day Wonderland

After meetings that go better than expected
But worse than the manager's standard..
When a mail rests in my inbox awaiting a reply
That would result only in a midnight-damage-control session..
When the eyes start composing frame after frame of the coconut tree visible outside the window
Turning a blind eye to the overlapping charts in the dashboard report..
I walk to a corner and draw a magical pattern
A green hole in the shape of a word bubble opens up
"Did you respond to the client's doubt?", "Can you review this modified SQL query?", "Is the tracker tracking the daily tracker updated?"
I set up a barricade blocking these questions
And plunge into the hole, the hole of hope.

I wish everyone would get a chance to visit this world

This world where ghosts are lovable
This world where buffaloes are the most adored pets...
This is a place where ego evaporates in seconds but possessiveness persists for centuries to come
This is a place where conversations can be one-sided
Not because a partner is dominating
But because the understanding is so deep that an exchange is not necessary
Here, we blow up balloons to play with sleeping saints
And we ride behind baby bikers... Trrrrr....
Here, we worship Brain pickings and also a few nitpickings
We also fall in love with 'Aananda Yaazhai' and 'Ennaku piditha paadal...'
Rain is celebrated and so is Rumi
The Prophet is a Superstar as much as The Alchemist...
I wish everyone would get a chance to visit this world
This world where new words are birthed, and at times, poems
This world where a robot is transformed into a kid every day
Thanks to a guardian angel
A spirit who wipes away my pain and paints a widespread smile.

A proverb a day...

We tend to resurrect proverbs only when the days get difficult. Why don't we respect them even during the happy hours?

Freedom of Expression

Whenever I visit my maternal uncle's house, I make it a point to join my 13 year-old and 8 year-old cousins in finishing their homework, which they get to sadly, after cycling and cricket and carom board.
My 8 year old cousin starts making faces when she has to solve complex multiplication problems and at such times, I would want to tell her that life and society have a lot more in store than just multiplication. But I would stop myself, realizing I am not a news reporter releasing harsh realities of the world into every living room.
I would enjoy helping them out in all subjects but my happiest stretch would be when we got down to the English homework. I would go through the poems and short stories and envy all the English teachers. How fascinating would it be to recite a 'In the bazaars of Hyderabad' or narrate a 'The gift of the Magi' to a class filled with blossoming minds, and initiate a discussion about the thoughts birthed?!

In such a state of mind, I opened my 13 year-old cousin's English composition notebook. After 3 exercises of letter writing, I came upon an exercise of paragraph writing.
"In no less than 250 words, write a paragraph about your family. Use words such as which, whom, whose in your paragraph."
I could not control my excitement. I had never gotten to know what my cousin felt about my uncle and aunt. I had presumed that he was not yet mature enough to discuss about family. So, I blessed my cousin's school for gifting me with such an opportunity, and eagerly started reading his answer.
"My father is a doctor and he practices medicine at Bombay. My mother is a homemaker..."
I paused. I was confused. My uncle is an industrial worker and my aunt, a school teacher. I closed the note book to check the name on the label, wondering if my cousin had brought his classmate's notebook for reference. But the label showed my cousin's name. I returned to the 'paragraph writing' page and continued reading. The family described in the paragraph could not have been more different from my uncle's family.
"Why have you written this answer?" I asked my cousin. "My class teacher wrote it on the blackboard and we all copied it down in our notebooks", he replied. "But why?" I asked him. He threw me a confused look.
I apologized to my cousin for wrongly questioning him instead of the system.
I felt sad for my cousin's English teacher. Despite a golden chance to get an insight into a child's thoughts about his family, the teacher had opted to train the students to score well in the exams. Why spoil the delight of evaluating creative answers with the routine of just checking for known spelling mistakes and grammatical errors?

I wanted to be different from the teacher and so, I glanced through my cousin's English text book and stopped at a chapter titled "On being an Indian". I looked at the 'Questions' section after the chapter and one of the questions excited me.
"Do you feel happy or sad to be an Indian?"
I read it out loud to my cousin. Immediately, he replied, "I feel happy being an Indian because India is a country that expresses unity in diversity."
I could not help but smile. I told him that I did not want the answer given by his teacher but I wanted to know what he felt. He was silent. I encouraged him to just speak out his mind.
"I feel happy", he answered. "Why?" I asked. "Because my mother and father and sister live here" he replied.
"What if your mother and father and sister moved to Australia? Which country would you like then? India or Australia?" I asked him. Without a moment's hesitation, my cousin shouted, "Australia!"

I fell in love with his answer that shone bright in authenticity. But I also realized that my cousin's English teacher is great and selfless.
Maybe she is in the pursuit of safeguarding her class, by stopping her kids from doling out honest opinions and unpatriotic thoughts in this country at this time when they might cost a person his/her life.