First snow of the season

I woke up this morning to snow covered Leuven. I could feel the whiteness in spite of dark surroundings at 7 this morning. Surrounding houses and the church looked surreal, covered with layer of snow, almost reminding me of a scene from a fairy tale. The trees and bushes blossomed into snow-flowers and everything looked picture perfect.

I feel like a five year old every time I get to experience snow fall. Last December was my first encounter with the snow in Amsterdam and I could not hide my excitement. Thick layers of snow and walking through it carefully to go to school everyday was such a fun. We fstopped complaining about the cold. I spent hours together looking out of the window of my apartment, seeing the snow pouring down. Amsterdam had one of the harshest winters last year and the canals froze. We had snow till the end of March and people really got fed up with it but not us, myself and some of my classmates from countries who do not get to experience the snow. This morning took me back to that morning on 20th December last year when i was woken up from sleep with a loud thump on my door, Andrea yelling in excitement,'come out, it is snowing'. Within matter of few minutes all the girls were out of bed, bundled in coats and shoes and we were downstairs jumping into snow. The pictures were taken and excited phone calls were made back home to describe the magical experience of waking up to snow covered surroundings. I was with my six friends last year and today I stood all alone by my window absorbing this white beauty all around. I must confess I felt a bit lonely. I did not pick up the phone to call up my family, nor did I take any pictures. I just stood by the window and kept looking at it all without real reason. I did not know what to do with the snow, how to feel about it but that did not stop me from being part of it.

Nuria wanted to see the snow before heading home. Amsterdam had its first snow 3 days ago and hence her wish was fulfilled. I was happy for her. Last night on phone, she assured me that I would have my share of snow soon. I hoped that she would board the flight to San Salvador in the company of snow. She flew out this morning and as she was leaving, she left me behind with the first snow of the season.. my thoughts went out to Nuria and her long trip across the Atlantic to her home land. Have a safe trip my friend.

Last year, he came to Amsterdam in the middle of massive snow storm on 22nd December. The flights were delayed and the airport was in chaos. I kept looking out of the window helplessly, there was no sign of weather having mercy on us. I kept tracking his flight on my computer screen. The snow accompanied us every single day of his stay in Amsterdam and he was almost frozen to death thanks to not having proper warm clothes and shoes. We stayed indoors most of the time and watched the snow together. I will be lying if i say I did not think of him this morning while looking out of the window. The snow is still the same, the surroundings are beautiful but a lot has changed between us in this one year. I did not dare to call him in excitement of the first snow fall, in fact there was no real excitement this time with the snow, it was rather pensive and reflexive reception of it. I realized it is soon going to be 2 months of my arrival in Leuven. How am I feeling? Am I doing better? I do not know. I have a long walk ahead through the snow and the rain and the wind and cycle of seasons not just for one year but for a lifetime ahead. The snow will melt away and daffodils and tulips will bloom, summer will bathe me in sunshine and the life will continue. Will it make me feel better in some ways? I have no idea but all I can do is to wait and watch what lies ahead.

Lost in these thoughts, I lost track of time this morning... the snow covered ground, and the roofs of the houses, the dark night sky with the faint moon shining through it..I stood by the window cold and frozen by the first snow...

12 destinations on my journey of self healing.

Not so long ago, on 24th August 2010, my life took an unexpected turn. I chose the path without realizing once on that path, I would never be the same me, nor will I have my loved ones with me. The decision was mine, I am not denying my responsibility irrespective of the situations which were created around me. It took me a while to realize what I have lost for ever and there was no going back. It was wiser, many suggested to move on the new path without holding hopes or trying to go back as that door was closed for me permanently.

The days that followed could only be described in terms of guilt, pain, suffering, self doubt and anger towards myself for being so stupid, weak, irrational, immature and selfish (all these objectives were used by most of my friends back home) and I soon internalized these objectives so sincerely that they became my identity, i started describing myself in the same words without even questioning the underlying assumptions friends had made about me and my actions.

I had to rediscover who I am? I had to find ways to look at my own self in the mirror again. I had to regain my lost confidence and self esteem. I was reduced to nothing but a weak woman who could not take an important step in her life. My mother, brother and a handful of friends still stood rock solid by my side. They did not understand my actions completely and they also felt shocked and surprised but their main interest was in my well-being and they provided me with unconditional support and love. It is because of them, I could walk this far on my solitary path.

I had to get out of Mumbai after the aftermath in my personal life which affected 2 families in profound ways. The other family has shut itself off from me and my family, almost as if they have built strong walls around them and no means of communication could penetrate through them. But on the other side, the skype turned out to be a new lifeline. Friends took turns to call me so that i would not feel alone and isolated. When I was rapidly going downhill, my close friend from medical school invited me to spend a week with her in China. Even amidst my non ending tears and sleepless nights, her words worked magic on me and I actually started to think about visiting her in Guangzhou in southern China. People love to have you around when you are in your happy, chirpy best but not when you are feeling worthless and useless. Before realizing it, I had booked my ticket to China and my visa application was in. I was lucky to get the visa without any troubles which was another surprise for me. There I was in Guangzhou from 20th to 26th September at my friend's home. She allowed me to cry, she stood there just in case I needed her, she listened to my unclear words amidst sobs for hours together and she helped me look at my own life in a different light. All the courage I had hold on to till that moment fell apart in her house and I fell sick and she nursed me through my sickness while she was taking care of her two little ones, 5 and 2 years old. She cooked for me, she urged me to eat, she worried about my health and she allowed me to be a vulnerable woman within the safety walls of her home. She knew I was flying off to Belgium next week and she wanted me to cry my heart out in her arms (something I had to hide in front of my mother). She left a beautiful handwritten letter for me on my suitcase and she asked me to leave all my pain and fears in the southern China sea before flying home.

Then I was in Leuven from beginning of October, with my friends in Amsterdam just across the border. I made new friends here who helped me to be strong and to start living everyday life again. The course work forced me to think about things beyond my personal loss. on 24th October, I met five of my close friends from the Netherlands in Brussels. We spent a day together. They came only to keep me company and to make me feel better. The day went well but when some of them had to go back to Amsterdam, I broke into tears like a stupid child at Brussels station, uncontrollable sobs. My friend from El Salvador stayed back with me for few more days in leuven and that night I could again cry my heart out in her arms. I was trying hard to hold back my tears but they seemed non ending. She is a wonderful psychologist, she has seen me suffer without sleeping a wink, she just stayed awake by my side encouraging me to talk and to cry as much as I would like. She silently kept offering me tissue paper and holding my hand in assurance. Another month passed by and I must say I already started feeling a bit better.

She went back to Amsterdam but made sure that in November she will bring me to Amsterdam, where I feel really at home. It also coincided with her last days in Amsterdam before flying to San Salvador. I was counting days and I came back yesterday after spending 4 fascinating days in Amsterdam, meeting friends, biking around the city, going back to my school, eating and laughing. I did not cry this time, rather i felt as light as a feather without any intoxicants. I slept so good all three nights as if I never had trouble falling asleep. The trip was more than what I could have asked for. I met another great friend from Mumbai who was visiting Amsterdam for work. Met another of my close friend from Bangladesh whom I saw after 4 years. The olliebollen and the Christmas markets, I came alive after a long time. On my train ride from Leuven to Amsterdam, I had this interesting idea.

I am going to spend 24th day of every month in a new place, in a way marking the day. It started with Guangzhou, Brussels and then Amsterdam. Each of these days has helped me feel better in its own ways. Most importantly these days, the cities and the friends clearly told me that I am not alone, I still have a few special people by my side even when most of the others have turned their backs and have walked away from me. They gave me hope and they helped me smile again. I owe them big time. Next month I will be falling into silence in a meditation retreat and then from January on, my agenda is free to make new plans. I am curious where is life going to take me each month and I am open to travelling to places as long as I don't need visa and it is affordable. I mean I would love to hide amongst penguins on Antarctica but I cant afford it right now. I am going to write about these experiences and that will be my way of giving something back to the places and the people that have offered me so much in my life. Its my tribute to them.

Soon, I will be posting my Amsterdam experience, it is still fresh on my mind and in a way I feel I left a piece of my soul behind in this city. Not long ago, he had consoled me when I lost my one pearl earing in Amsterdam. His words were 'you loved your earing and you love the city of Amsterdam, so think of it as if you left your precious pearl earing for the city that you adore. it is your little gift to the city and that way you have left a part of you behind for the city to cherish'. My pearl earing is at the bottom of one of those canals by now but this time, I left my soul behind in this city....

'Let go'

I am reading a book 'The Tibetan way of Living and Dying' and it often talks about impermanence in life and power of letting go. It makes me reflect on my own life and I realize I have never been able to let go of things. Rather I almost get glued to them in some inseparable ways, be it people, places, experiences and feelings or for that matter things like dried leaves or old dried rose buds I have safely treasured in my books. I cant let go off anything and this manifests at its peak when it comes to worries. I can worry about anything in this world, I worry about my inability to sleep thinking of it as possible symptom of underlying depression, I worry about plant not growing well or rather dying and think it is my fault that I am incapable of taking care of a plant. I think I have always been this 'worrying' child. I remember one funny incidence from my childhood. I must be 5 or 6 and still not smart enough to understand beautifully synchronized mechanism in our throat that allows breathing and swallowing without mixing the two. So this five year old me one day refused to eat anything because i was afraid that I wont be able to breath while I am eating and that scared me of death. 15 years later in my physiology classes in medical school, I had a moment of realization that my worries about suffocating to death while eating were well thought of by the nature (god, for those who believe in our creation by god) and I also learned about those unfortunate patients who are at increased risk of suffocation to death where this natural mechanism fails.

What made me think of all this again. First, I am unreasonable when I have cold. I just cant deal with it as it makes me so uncomfortable but I personally feel, simple illness like cold should not affect my everyday life in any substantial ways. but in reality cold affects almost every aspect of my everyday functioning. To add to it, yesterday I tried to pack a bag for Amsterdam. I kept looking into my closet, into my bookshelf and kitchen closets and realized how much I have accumulated over and above what I had brought from home in last six weeks. They are piles of clothes, nicely folded and arranged, there are jackets and sweaters put up on hangers. Do I use all of them? No , not at all. I use the same clothes almost every week. Then why do I have so many clothes there? May be in case if I need them. What if it gets too cold and I need layers of sweaters and jackets? The fact is in Begijnhof, my apartment is so warm that I almost need no warm wear here but I am not going to be here for ever. In fact I am going to Nijmegen during cold gray months of winter and I dont even have a room to stay. The students from last year told us that the heating was so poor in many of those student apartments. There I go worrying again. I am without a roof and I know it is going to be cold and hence I need to keep all my warm clothes and also the shawls just in case there is a risk of freezing to death. So I looked at my wardrobe in despair but there was nothing that I could really throw away from it.

Then I looked at my summer clothes. The lovely dresses and skirts. Can I get rid of those things? They are not all new, some of them are 6 years old but I still fit in them. The problem these days is that the clothes dont get spoiled, thanks to the revolution in textile, detergent and washing machines industry. I cant throw away things unless they are not suitable for any more use by anyone, myself or the others. Hmmm, I should get rid of summer dresses but then that is not going to work. I am going to be in Italy from April to June and do I not want to flaunt my summer collection in one of the fashion meccas in the world? Well, lets not talk about my fashion quotient. It is terribly low, almost on the side of disaster but still I am not going to be bundled up in my long sleeved turtle neck shirts and layers of warm clothes in Italy. I need my clothes unless I am capable of buying new clothes for Italy. I dont think I can afford that. So even summer clothes are to stay and visit Nijmegen with me as there is no way they could be shipped to Padova before hand.

Let me take you to my kitchen. I call myself 'mistress of spices' just for the amount of spices that I have in stock with me. I love cooking Indian food and I do it everyday. So there is some utility of these spices unlike my clothes who sit in my closet like obedient students. But then, how much spice do I need to cook for myself over next 7 months? Not that much but then I have accumulated this wealth of spices over last whole year in Amsterdam. Every Indian friend who left Amsterdam, left their leftover spices in my safe custody and I was more than happy to receive those spices. I cant say no. So my accumulation of spices went sky rocketing and it took me a while to realize that it was impossible for me to use them all. I stopped accepting anymore spices but I could not find people who would like to have some of them rather than buying them in the market. Here I am with 4 glass bottles, 5 packets and few more plastic pets filled with different spices. And by now you know, I cant let go off them either. So, I have two bags of clothes and one bag of spices and cookware, the most important being my roti tawa and pressure cooker. I almost feel disabled without these few specialized utensils. But then there are little mugs and bowls, the mug which is the first thing every morning to touch my lips, I cant let him go... no, he starts my day with such a tender kiss. There are little candle stands and there are off course my potted plants. How can I leave them behind or throw them in one of those 'green garbage' bags. They have kept me company during my stay here, some of them have died and got sick, may be because they took on themselves all my troubles and worries and I am going to leave them behind with a cold heart.. no that is not going to happen. What about those roses, should I hang them upside down and dry them so that they can travel with me? And while all this was pounding in my head, the angel in Begijnhof brought me two plants with bulbs of purple hyacinths. I made her a deal that she would take them back when I leave on 17th and she kept hoping that they would bloom into flowers before I leave. Thank you angel.. I like this, I have a friendly ghost in Amsterdam and an angel in Begijnhof to keep me out of troubles...

So this is my story about getting attached to material belongings. Can you not guess how it must be with people I meet and friends I make. I can cry rivers of tear while saying goodbye to people, not always in public though. In public, I manage to put up a strong face, almost one of being in complete control of my emotions but beneath that is uncontrolled feeling of loss and pain and sobs. But very few people (even those who know me or believe they really know me) have any idea what I am at the core of my soul. Far from how I appear and how I get perceived. The book also talks about letting go off loved ones and relationships but how do I do it? Especially now, when I feel I am nothing without him while he is somewhere without wanting to say a word. How do I let go off him if he was never really with 'the unexpressed, unseen me'? How do I let go off him when I still hope to hear from him? How do I let go off him when almost a part of my existence got torn away from me and went with him as he drifted in the ocean of silence. Just like the tape on gift wrap paper sometimes takes away a big chunk of paper torn in ragged borders, ugly and painful and almost impossible to be healed? They taught us a surgical incison is easier to heal as it is planned incision with smooth borders taken along the line of natural lines of skin, fascia and underlying tissue. The problem with heartbreaks is that it is very rarely a surgical incision, they just tear open the tissue in most ragged ways and hence unlikely to heal to its normal self ever again. But if the heart muscles continue to pump blood even after scar tissue following heart attack, may be the woulds of heartbreak will also heal eventually.

Then come the lines from the poem Eternity by William Blake:

He who binds to himself a joy,
Does the winged life destroy;
He who kisses the joy as it flies,
Lives in Eternity's sunrise.

Looking for a partner..

They say if you really wish hard for something and believe that you have it already, the universal forces align themselves in such a way that your wish comes true... I am sure many of you know what I am talking about. The secret of positive thinking.

Here is my little wish. Trust me, though the title sounds really loaded, it is a little wish. I have found this beautiful 2 bedroom apartment near the central train station in Nijmegen. Comfortable, cozy home with all the facilities. I need a house-mate to share this house with me. I do not know any person in my social world who needs an apartment in Nijmegen. I hope that the university housing department will be able to find someone interested. I need to write to the landlady by 2row evening 5.30pm the Netherlands time. The apartment is no doubt worth renting and I am sure they have many people lined up in case we refuse.

Since I dont have any other option.. here is my wish to the universe. I really like this apartment and i can already see myself living there cheerfully through the dark and cold months of January and February. I need a person willing to share this apartment with me. I am quite a friendly person, but I also respect people's need of space and privacy. I am easy to get along with people and i am sensitive to people's cultural ideas and lifestyles. I can assure you that once in a while, you might also get to try wonderful home cooked Indian meals which is an added bonus. I really really hope that in less than 24 hours, I would hear that there is another person willing to share this apartment with me for the three months...

Remember, i need to write to the landlady by 5.30pm dutch time..

Reflection..

I am convinced that I have a major mind block. Whatever I learn or do should have some applicability in real world and that too in immediate future or it makes no sense to me and I loose my interest completely. Yesterday night while talking to the ghost and discussing one of the emails I received from a friend back home, I suddenly realized that this needs to change. I have to open my senses and soul to new insights and should not screen them on the criteria of usefulness or applicability before letting it sink in me.

The next realization was how much I have lost in terms of learning in last 31 years for this obsession of mine. It is no point taking account of all those losses but if i look at my recent time I have definitely lost some six weeks of great learning opportunity. I kept rejecting all those ideologies which made no sense to me as they felt alien in my country's context. I had convinced myself that I don't understand these theories and these philosophies and my mind wandered all around. I was always in the classroom but at the same time i was not there. One can imagine how frustrating it could be to sit somewhere where it makes no sense to you. I started feeling bored, lost and disinterested and I further moved away from the possibility of learning something new. What a vicious circle and I did not even realize it all this while.

I kept thinking about it as I went to bed last night. I agree lot has been lost but still I can prevent further losses. I have to make conscious efforts to open my mind and that is what I am going to do from today onwards. All the readers that I have thrown in the corner have already made it safely to my work table. I am not going to close the reader in first two paragraphs saying 'what the hell is this, I don't understand a word'. No, there wont be such a easy escape. I am going to sit with it till I can make slight gap in this tightly closed door between myself and the world of philosophy. I am going to befriend philosophy.May be there is a way to understand a philosophical writing or an argument, something that I do not know as if I don't have that pair of glasses to look at it. I remember how strange was the shift from epidemiology and bio statistics to social science research. But because I felt more at home with social science, it was effortless comfort and i never had to think about it. Now my initiation into philosophy and theology will definitely need some serious effort and I am going to do everything in my capacity to get little 'into' it.

I wondered for very long time if I have some sort of learning disability. May be learning disability is too strong and also a 'fashionable' word these days. I could say I have some different learning pattern. I could never master the art of taking notes. If I start making notes, I miss on lot of words that continue to fall on my ears and soon I have to give up taking notes. In my class here, my fellow classmates take such beautiful notes, their note taking styles could be a separate blog post with some beautiful pictures. I sit there listening to the teacher and I am good at it. The problem is not listening, the problem is what I find more interesting in my listening. For example, I am very good in picking up stories, I can repeat the stories that are told in the lecture exactly the way they were told. When these stories are narrated, my mind immediately starts visualizing those stories in three dimensions and that story becomes even more interesting. The people and the places come alive in front of my eyes as the words are entering into my ears. One could actually find me sitting in the class listening seriously with a faint smile on my face, smile comes from movie like visual inprint of the auditory inputs from the lecture which are unfolding in front of my eyes almost 'live'. So, I come home with bags full of stories but then if someone asks me what do I think about the argument in the class, I am lost. Ohhh no, I was suppose to pay attention to the argument and not the stories.. stories were just to get to the argument. I have missed the whole point. I dont know what the argument was, how was it supported and what was the critic of the argument? I feel so stupid and ashamed. I spent 6 hours there turning the told stories into visual stories and completely missed the point. I am not in a movie making class, I am trying to study ethical theories.... there I go hitting the bottom and feeling all the more stupid and jealous about all the philosophy and theology students around me who seem to have understood everything... I walk home with heavy feet and sad soul reminding myself ten times what a looser I am. May be this is why totto-chan was expelled out of the school at the age of five and I run the risk of meeting the same fate at the age of 31.

I need a teacher like totto-chan's new teacher. Someone who will guide me through the process of learning. I need the little letters in the mailbox like in Sophie's world, someone who will make me think in the right direction (and keep me away from making my own little films). I want to understand how to read and understand the theoretical argument and trust me I am a good student, so all these efforts wont go a waste. I seriously want to make friends with the theories and I am ready to make all the efforts needed. Is there any help I could get from this universe?

Celebration of life...

A beautiful gray lotus that I know about indirectly is celebrating her 97th birthday tomorrow in the North of this country. I have not met her, I do not even know her name. It doesn't matter really as what matters the most to me is this lived experience of 96 years on this planet, having raised a family, being quite healthy and celebrating her birthday with the extended generations of the family which now includes a great grand daughter who is less than 2 months old. I can only imagine how beautiful this family gathering will be. To me that seems like truly accomplished life but then it also makes me curious. How does this gray lotus reflects on her life? what does she think about it? What would be her words of advise for lost young women like me? Her life has almost spanned over last century. She must have changed her own self in order to adapt to this ever changing world around her. Looking back over those 96 years, these changes can be quite profound but she survived and she blossomed and here is now her moment of celebration. I wish you a wonderful birthday, Senorita. May you cross 100 in health and satisfaction.

I am always fascinated by the elderly people for their having lived the life successfully, surviving the storms and disasters and moving on. I feel I lack that perseverance, that zeal for life and the patience and acceptance that comes along. I always desire the things that I lack, so it is obvious why these days my predominant thoughts are about becoming a 'gray lotus' myself. I feel happy when I am surrounded by them in Begijnhof, I keep observing them, I keep smiling at them and I keep dreaming about becoming one of them. I know that old age is not all that romantic, even when there are clear shades of romanticism in how I perceive old age. I have never lived with an elderly grandparent to have close experience of old age and the pain and suffering that it might bring along for the elderly person and the family. I have one distant grandmother who is I guess in her late 70s but I hardly know anything about her. My mother's maternal grandmother died at the age of 87 in 1980 and I have heard so many stories about this woman and her innate strength and beauty. The story of women in my family, particularly on my mother's side are all about these strong women with virtually absent men.. it is almost a women's world and this great grandmother of mine leads our battalion. My mother feels that I would have been extremely close to this great grandmother if she was alive and she also sees a lot of her qualities in me. I have often thought about documenting stories of this wonderful woman as narrated by my mother and I am going to take up this project seriously on my return home. In fact she could be my starting point to a project about women's experience in marriage taking me to the beginning of 20th century.

Another such beautiful gray lotus who is 93 years old lives in Northern Thailand. She is the mother of my Thai friend, Nid. This accomplished mother of seven daughters is very liberal in her thoughts (we were impressed about her openness to relationships and her advice to her daughters) and she loves watching wrestling. We all burst into laughter when she explained that she likes wresting because she can see these 'well built' men fight hard with each other. I can only imagine this woman sitting in her living room in front of the television set biting her teeth while watching these wrestling men. I always feel that I should have been somehow there, as a 'fly on the wall' in this household, way back then, where a man and a woman raised seven daughters. As my friend describes it, it seems that their house had freed itself from standard stereotypical gender norms. Nid remembers her father taking active interest in cooking and household work. This gray lotus lost her husband some 35 years ago, she now lives in their ancestral property and a farm in Northern Thailand with her three daughters, grandchildren and extended family. She has eight dogs to keep her company. This woman was our biggest source of inspiration while we were studying in Amsterdam. Every time Nid called her on phone, her mother would ask her about the day she would graduate. Her next words always were, 'do not worry about me, I wont die till you graduate and come back home with your diploma'. We all knew we had to get our diplomas as this woman was waiting for that moment. Nid did go back home with her diploma and I am planning my trip to Thailand just to spend a few days with this gray lotus and I am going to take my mother along.

I picked up this leaf on my way home from the school this evening. It has a beautiful design with the clear but still merging boundaries of brown, yellow and the green. We have a saying in Marathi 'Pikali Paane, Hiravee Manne'. Old age is described as 'dried leaves but the green souls'. Here is my leaf.. drying, turning brown but still having a beautiful green border. what better symbol I could get to pay respect to these gray lotuses.. this post goes out to all those gray lotuses who have made such a difference to the lives of the others by just being there...

Happy birthday grandma up there in the north...

White roses and gray lotuses

This afternoon I received a bunch of beautiful white roses from a friend here in Leuven. It was indeed a surprise. I had to scratch my head to find a suitable vase or jar to keep those roses and that is when an empty juice bottle came in handy. I had bought some plants to keep me company in my early days in Leuven and unfortunately one has died, the other is alive but not very happy and the third one is actually fighting some strange sort of infection. I must say, I have not been taking good care of my little green angels and that hurts. I don't understand what is going wrong? Am I watering them too much? Are they not getting enough light? What could I do to make them feel better? Now the roses are sitting on my dining table and I smile every time I look at them.
My countdown in Leuven has already begun, I leave Leuven on 17th of December. By the time I started feeling truely 'settled' in Leuven, it was already time to look for a suitable accommodation for Nijmegen, my next academic destination. How excited I was to see the structure of this program arranged by three universities in three different countries. Now I realize how little thought I gave to this daunting task of uprooting myself from one place and moving to the next every three months. My way of exploring and experiencing any new place is to spend atleast an year so that I can see the entire cycle of seasons and changes in the environment and lives of people around. For this program, it is going to be autumn in Leuven, winter in Nijmegen and the spring in Paduva. I have to start winding up things here, sort out the belongings, plan goodbyes to my friends and contacts and I have about 5 weeks or little more to accomplish all this.
What I enjoy the most about my evenings in Leuven is the Tuesday evening at zen meditation when I am surrounded by gray lotuses and I absorb a lot of positive energy just by being around them. I am indebted to a friendly ghost in neighboring Netherlands for coining the term 'gray lotus' and letting me use it in my writings. The first gray lotus I met here has recovered beautifully after 2 weeks of illness and she bloomed so elegantly this evening, I could not help looking at her. I so hope that few years down the line, I will turn into a gray lotus and can pass on the same feeling to some young restless soul..
The movies and the books, the gray lotuses and cooking and off course my classes and discussions on reproductive health technologies make my day so action packed that I barely have time to mourn my losses. But being too busy to think about losses is not really having accepted the loss. I hope some day I will get there.. till then I am going to enjoy my days in Leuven, Nijmegen and Paduva..

Good night...

Dear Lisa

Dear Lisa,

I do not know who you are? What you do? Whether you exist in real world in real sense or not. But as I learned about you this evening through the lecture of Prof. Paige, I felt an instant connection with you. That is why I decided to write to you.

Lisa, this is what I understood about you. You were an undergrad student from the United States (one of the case studies in their larger research project trying to assess the impact of studying abroad). You went to Germany, Bolivia, Australia and Antarctica during your January term student exchange programs. I do not understand what that means, nor do I care. But I definitely got curious about this young woman who chooses 4 continents for her exchange programs and that includes Antarctica. I must tell you I have been dreaming about visiting Antarctica since I was 13, now I am 31 but I am far from Antarctica. So I am damn impressed and I could actually imagine you studying icebergs and the melting glaciers and polar ice caps as part of your little project on Global Warming. You changed your professional career from history major to Nursing and that was due to experience in Bolivia. You wanted to learn something with the help of which you could be of help to the others. What other field one could choose other than health care to reach out to people in any corner of the world. I understand your choice perfectly.

Then comes a beautiful postal stamp from Vietnam showing a penguin from Argentina I guess.. and next to that flashes the following line.

'I bike to school because I want penguins to live'. Lisa.

My heart went all out to you. I could imagine baffled faces of your parents and friends who must have said something like, 'she has gone nuts since those crazy exchange programs she has started doing. Who wants to bike to school, its so old fashioned and not so cool'. Your parents must have got concerned, many must have criticized you or made fun of you but there was our Lisa biking to school to save the penguins. It was not just a project on global warming to complete the credit requirements but you made changes in your life style to reduce global warming.

Lisa, I almost feel your pulse. For last 8 years, I have been struggling to find myself a place in my own society where I can be comfortable and still be accepted by the family and the friends. I feel such a misfit so many times and I try hard to fit into what I should have been as an 'Indian woman' if I would not have undertaken all that crazy traveling not only within India but also beyond. All the traveling changed so many things about who I am, and how I think, but my dear ones almost get shocked and disappointed every time they see me undergo another change. They complain that I am not the same me anymore and I take it as my fault that I am not the same me. I did try hard to adapt myself to my own home culture but I could not. I don't know how to explain this but it is like that Chinese saying 'you cant step in the same river twice'. I cant disown the change that these exposures have brought out in me. They are now very much part of who I am, my substance of being. But I still want to fit in my culture, I seek that approval from my society. I do not like it when I am almost always described as that weirdo who keeps studying crazy things and traveling to dangerous and strange places and then she comes home and has such stories about all the places that she has been that it seems like they are coming from her own imagination and not the reality. I have just a few friends left back home now that I feel lonely, almost isolated from what was once my community. I do have wonderful friends across the globe though but I think you will understand how it feels when you are alone in your own family and your own little community.

So all this while I thought that my restlessness and my ever 'traveling/wandering self' was my weakness. They say 'I am not settled or i am not keen on settling down. I am without a pivot, a grounding'. I started internalizing these judgments and interpretations. But today listening to your story, I felt may be that is not true. Probably what I have is a strength called Intercultural skills which could be built into intercultural competence. I never thought about myself in such a positive way. Its ok to accept myself the way I am even if it means being alone with less friends or being criticized by my society as long as I am happy with my choices. What else do I need? Finally I am at peace with myself and I must thank you for this.

I will always remember you 'lisa with her bike' every time I uproot myself from a place and start on a new journey of exploration, a new country, a new culture, a new continent and new myself being born in me. I am going to accept that change in me rather than fight it.

So.....where do I want to go next?

A girl by the window:

Not so long ago, Murali suggested a book to read. I was a second year medical student, struggling to find my place in the medical school system, feeling lost most of the time. The book was ‘Totto-Chan: The Little Girl at the Window’ by Tetsuko Kuroyanagi. Murali was one of those rare teachers who always told his students not to be afraid of being ‘weird’ or not fitting in the system. He himself as a faculty never made a good ‘Fit’ in the system. But for me, he was always an inspiration. His office was a place for me to find some peace and be comfortable with myself.

Totto-Chan is this little girl in Japan, someone who is quite a rebel for her age and gender. She was expelled from the school at the age of five and that explains a lot. The reasons for her expulsion were her ‘strange’ questions to the teachers that the teachers could not answer or felt that they need not be answered. One teacher complained that sitting in the classroom, she was talking to a little bird sitting on the window which disturbed the entire class. The girl really did not care about being expelled from the school, probably she did not even understand what it meant but her mother must have gone nuts. The story of Totto- Chan absorbs the reader completely. I think each one of us, at least in parts finds his or her own self in this little girl, those facets of our personality which we had to burry deep down somewhere in the name of growing ‘up’ and becoming mature person. Though they say it is a book for children, I feel, it is equally enlightening for the adults to understand a child’s world. I fell in love with Totto-Chan and her new teacher Mr. Kobayashi and a beautiful relation of friendship shared by this master and the pupil; the relationship that shaped the life of Totto-Chan and many ‘difficult’ students like her.

I have been blessed with many such teachers in every walk of my life. I was not typically labeled as a ‘trouble’ child but I was always very shy, low in self esteem and confidence, unable to speak in the class or make friends. My inability to make friends got better only in my mid-twenties. One might argue how can you be friends with your teacher? I understand the argument but really I can’t explain my relationship with these teachers. At some point in time, I stopped analyzing it and just was happy that I had them in my life. They stood by me in thick and thin times; they made me believe in my capacities. When I was too weak to take a step, they pushed me hard but they were right there by my side to keep me out of danger. I was protected in every sense. I would not have reached so far without these wonderful souls and their trust in me and all the encouragement they have provided me with over years.

Sitting here in my apartment in Begijnhof, I took a lot of pictures yesterday through the window which is right opposite my study table. It is a beautiful, large window and I was composing different frames with the sky, the clouds and the trees. I realized it is not only a window in physical sense, but it is also a window to my life which opens out to a larger world view. I was intrigued by this window and its meaning and function in my everyday life. The window that brings in sunlight, the window that lets the breeze in, the window which helps you see the changing colors of autumn, the window which gives you glimpse of a moonlit night. As long as I remember, my study table was always by the window and it always faces some trees. I have spent innumerable hours looking out of the window, watching the birds building nests or squirrels running around. In Mumbai, sitting by the window on a rainy day is an experience in itself and the way those water drops trickle down and form small streams on glass windows is a piece of art in its own ways. I have made multiple trips on Mumbai-Poona route by train during monsoons just to explore the green celebration throughout the mountain ranges of Sahyadri. All I needed to feel a high was a seat by the window in ordinary train compartment and a cup of coffee. Small pleasures of life! I am someone who always wants to get a window seat on a flight and my moment of happiness is watching the transition from the night into dawn on the horizon from the sky where you see the blue sky with the stars and the east slowly breaking out into orange red colors of dawn simultaneously, in one single frame. I stay awake just to experience that majestic play of the dark and light. Windows and faces popping out of the windows always have a story to tell and I am someone who is extremely intrigued by these stories. The only constraint is that I may not always have a chance to understand the story.

My window in Sawar looked over to a solitary tall tree, I always felt he was as lonely as I was but we both kept company to each other and we were happy in our new found comfort zone with each other. I fell asleep every night looking at the same tree and I woke up to see it standing patiently right there as if waiting for me to wake up. We had our silent ways of communication with each other. Looking at that tree, I always thought about the story of the last leaf, where the painter died after painting the last leaf on the wall in such a way to create an illusion that the plant was still alive with its last leaf on. It gave hope of life to this ailing girl on the other side of the window. Isn’t that a famous story? My window in Meer en Vaart, it not only gave a view from above (I was on the fourth floor, the highest level I have lived up till now), but it allowed me to enjoy a feast of colors in the sky every evening. I have hundreds of pictures of sky at the dusk in Amsterdam. My classroom in AMMA gave me a view of the canal and swans floating majestically and just a few blocks away were the other ‘famous’ windows of Amsterdam. Now my world is through this window of Begijnhof and the window gives me a reason to smile each day. She makes me feel like Totto-chan, she reminds me to be a Totto –Chan in my own ways, not being afraid and inhibited, a woman not afraid of dreaming and not giving up in her efforts to make those dreams a reality. A woman who accepts herself with all her strengths and weaknesses and a woman who is not concerned about what the world has to say about her. So this one is dedicated for Totto-Chan in me and my window to the world..