Off into silence retreat for 10 days

I have been silent for many days now but I am alive and kicking. It was first the exams then move to Holland, Catching up with friends in Amsterdam completely disrupted by the snow, a couple of bad falls on the slow, it was all my mistake, over excitement of the white snow covered land and not wearing proper shoes/boots.. but now I feel much better and in fact I am embarking on yet another adventure.. something that I have never done before and I feel this is the best way to say goodbye to 2010 and welcome the year ahead with new found self..

I leave in 30 minutes for a small place in the woods near Armersfort for 10 days meditation. No cel phones, no internet, disciplined life that starts from 4am and ends at 9.30. Turning the mind inwards and resolving all the conflicts. I do not know how I will be in this program but I am really inspired and curious to be part of this. This is going to be an experience of life time but I am not even allowed to have a pen and paper to make notes about the days. I have to fully experience this state of being and i may write about it later..

so to all my readers warm holiday greetings from the snow covered amsterdam.. see you all in the new year..

Chao

Action

December 13 – Action When it comes to aspirations, it’s not about ideas. It’s about making ideas happen. What’s your next step?

Exactly a year ago I started this blog in the memory of my father. The blog and writing has kept me great company throughout the year. I realize that sometimes writing has effects similar to therapy on me. I am feeling much better and in control even though there are issues that are still not addressed. I am looking forward to the life ahead and that is already an action and not just the idea or inspiration.

I received valuable feedback on my research proposal this morning. My proposal is well received and I feel motivated to go about it. My informal efforts around conducting the research might start on the new year's party. I have a couple of interviews lined up thanks to great friends in Amsterdam. The three months in Nijmegen are going to be crucial for my data collection but i am confident that with systematic planning, i will be able to manage the ongoing course work and conducting interviews. I plan to cut down the hours I spend on the internet, that aimless surfing which leads to nothing.. I have realized that if i do not have my mail box open while working, I work much better with less distractions. Otherwise, every time a new mail pops in, I tend to get distracted. A simple thing like not having some sites book marked has also helped. The social networking sites, some news sites, if i have to type in the web address, i found out, i do not feel that eager to do it. So 2day I have removed all such book marked pages that I really do not need to see. I am planning my days better. my list of things to do is now organized in groups of activities that can be carried out together and thus will be more efficient.

I want to be more outgoing, taking initiative to talk to people, to learn some networking skills. I understand that as long as i let the others speak, it is not all that bad to approach people. I am scared to start a conversation with people especially with those that i hardly know and even worse with those that I do not know. So i hang around only with people that I know and soon realize that I have nothing new to talk to them about. This new year's party at a friend's place, i aim to talk to at least 5 new people that I have never met before. In fact on 17th of this month, I am attending another party for opening of art exhibition by my painter friend. I might start with 2 or 3 people there itself. Someone, recently told me, if u do not speak up, no one is going to make efforts to read your mind. It is ok to approach people in a culturally appropriate way and either you would click with them in conversations or u wont but at least you would have made efforts rather than standing in a corner and feeling bored.

I plan to read a lot in coming months, my course related readers, readings for the thesis, and other interesting books and articles. It almost feels like a little adventure now to read an article looking for a central theme and making sure i got it right by confirming with the others. On my train ride from Leiden to Leuven yesterday, I read a nice article on ethical challenges in conducting research in non western contexts. The article was written in a very simple language and the reality described in there was almost similar to what we face back home, so it was easy to relate to it. For the first time, I also felt that I could write a similar article (not on the same topic) but in a similar simple language and building on my personal experience and that was an empowering feeling indeed. Reading and writing are the two areas that I am going to concentrate on in coming months.

Back to philosophical theories now, I have an exam on Wednesday and slowly there seem to be some threads of comfort between me, Levinas, Lacan and Gaita. But we have a long way to go to make meaningful bonds.

Body Integration

Body Integration This year, when did you feel the most integrated with your body? Did you have a moment where there wasn’t mind and body, but simply a cohesive YOU, alive and present?

This is definitely not an easy one. I never feel like one cohesive unit of body and mind. For me, these two are always running in opposite direction. hmmmm this reverb 10 is getting tougher each day.. is this the serious reflection we are expected to do as the year 2010 gives birth to the year ahead?

I can think of two moments in the entire year when I felt 'one'. The two situations are so unlike the other. One was when I had magic mushrooms and that effect lasted almost for an hour. Conflict-free oneness of the body and mind with the psychodelic effects of the mushrooms. The other one came on the beginning of zen meditation but it barely lasted for a minute or even less. It felt wonderful and it kept me motivated to keep practicing it. I must be honest though, I never had that feeling again. It felt as if it was a 'promotion' offer on that particular day to have me in, knowing very well that this is the only way I will continue my inward search... through Zen meditation

Ohhh no.. that is not true.. I had just this moment yesterday evening, biking towards the lake in a small country side village near Leiden. The evening was setting in, the birds were returning home, there were geese and the storks. They were flying in such a disciplined and organized structures, the atmosphere was serene and calm and I could hear the clutter of the wings of hundreds of birds flying above my head as I was biking though the small lanes of the countryside. The lake was beautiful, there was a little island in the middle with a little house on it. The house is aptly called 'oneness', it is a literal meaning of the original dutch name "eenzaamheid" but it meant, 'being alone' Now I can think of that tiny house on the island as 'oneness' in truest sense. Being one with the self, the island, the lake, the sky. Is this not what we are talking about. Being integrated, being one. There were no human beings around, the wind was bringing in the sound of the traffic from Leiden, there were 4 traditional windmills that we could see around us. On Saturdays, for touristic reasons, they allow the traditional windmills to work on the wind. For the first time, in my life, I had a closer view of the windmill, I could peep through the closed window, I could see the wheel pulling out water from the polder into the canals. What a beautiful mechanism, again being one, the wind and the water.. integrated keeping the water levels in control. We sat by the lake, I was all ears just listening to the beautiful music of waves of the lake. The wind and the water again.. wind producing waves and waves splashing to the shore.. creating this magnificent melody of life. Just like the wind and the water, my body and mind were one, even though it was for a short while.. we walked and walked and we talked.. our footsteps were enough to alert the birds and they took off together creating again a huge clutter of the wings against the wind.. another kind of music got created. The evening grew dark, the sky displayed beautiful colors and shapes.. the windmills created magical moments on the backdrop of horizon... there was oneness in every aspect of life there.. there was silence and the silence sometimes turned into music... for the souls who could appreciate it.

We could see little moon in the sky.. we biked home without the lights on our bike, depending on our senses just not to have a fall. We could not see much and our eyes and the body had to be one to bike home.. it was beautiful how our senses concentrate without a slightest distraction in such moments... we were home and the old 'grandfather's clock' struck six. The evening grew even darker and colder over delicious pumpkin soup and some more interesting conversations.. late into night when I went to bed, I had a window opening to the sky, through which i could see the stars making an entry on this huge stage of the sky.. I had never seen something like that before.. falling asleep with a blanket of clouds and stars.. i wish I had better eyesight as it was impossible to feel them without my glasses on. My body and mind at that moment, could not be one without the assistance of a pair of glasses.. the wind brought in the beats of music from nearby house.. the fluffy clouds were floating by and I kept trying to see the stars without my glasses on.. at some point, I surrendered to sleep... and turned into another beautiful experience of oneness of my body and mind..

Wisdom

December 10 – Wisdom. What was the wisest decision you made this year, and how did it play out?

This year has not been really an year of wisdom, in fact it was year of making mistakes after mistakes and finding myself in deep trouble. I could argue that I learned my lessons from each of those mistakes and then made a few other mistake so in a way i gathered a lot of wisdom but that is too simplistic way of looking at it.

I think the wisest decision I made was to take a pause and ask myself what do I really want to do with my life? The trouble was that this pause came at a very tricky moment in time but still it was essential. If I would not have taken that pause, my life story would have been completely different, it could also have been for good but I dont think I was ready for that goodness ahead in time. I had not understood the value of that goodness. I needed time to learn to respect and value what I have been given by the loved ones and by the life.

I stopped and i started reflecting on my life. I almost took a count of all those years, the things achieved, the failures and the success stories, the meaningful relationships formed and friends and family members who were left behind. For a while, I did nothing but allowed the reality around me to sink into me. It was essential to face the facts around me and about me. This confrontation with the self was needed. The restful moment was critical to see where I was heading and I felt I was heading towards total burn out. I have been neglecting those warning symptoms for way too long. I was training NGO staff on how to protect themselves against burn out. How could I not see it engulfing me slowly over years? Finally it hit me hard and I was turned into nothingness. I needed to set realistic goals and expectations for my life.

I did my SWOT analysis, I applied those self help techniques for my own life. I wrote my thoughts out like a mad woman, almost letting all the internal storms out on paper and I spent hours together looking at that mess that I had made of my life, in my efforts to overdo and over improvise everything. The most humbling realization was that I needed serious help to get out of the troubles and I accepted that I needed help. I found that help amongst my friends and family. I decided to take things slowly. I decided to make effort to relax. I decided to start walking again at slow but constant pace and that was the wisest thing I did. Last 11 weeks have been those little steps towards rediscovering my lost sense of self. Meditation, writing a blog, being in new place, making new friends and challenging myself with philosophical theories, it all had its own little effects. Slowly I have started getting little better sleep. My appetite for food and life is returning slowly. My attention span is improving and I feel I am able to take things in much lighter way than ever before. There are still moments that come in unannounced when i feel panicky, restless, helpless and lost but i accept those moments rather than fighting them back and I have learned that sometimes things unfold in their own course of time and they do get taken care of. That has been a valuable lesson indeed but totally worth it. I hope to continue my journey on this path and may be the year ahead will bring in new wisdom and new light.

Party

December 9 – Party Prompt: Party. What social gathering rocked your socks off in 2010? Describe the people, music, food, drink, clothes, shenanigans.

Of all the posts up till now, this one is the most difficult. I am not a party person at all. I stay as far away from parties as possible. Forget about the year 2010, I dont have example of one social gathering that I thoroughly enjoyed in all my adult life. Another insight into 'being me' for sure.

I tried hard to remember, any form of social gathering, may it be in my high school, amongst friends, in medical school, at work.. I have never been in a fun party. First of all I try and avoid going to the parties as I invariably end in a corner where I can hide myself. I feel very conscious of my lack of socializing skills. I do not know how to start talking with strangers and I think even bigger trouble is how to talk about something light, funny and casual. I have terrible sense of humour,most of the time I dont get the jokes at all. if there is a loud music in the party, it makes it even worse. I can barely hear others talking and that makes conversations harder. I have been caught yawning in some corner in parties on pictures by my friends. I can not dance, that is another difficulty. I am not at all confident and want to disappear somewhere or go invisible.My party discomforts are so well known in my social circle that these days I hardly get invites.

May be this should change in the year ahead. I want to experience this party life. I have had friends in Mumbai, who partied 5 nights a week. It is quite funny but I have never experienced night life in Mumbai even though I spent 23 years of my life in this city. It is time to catch up. I have not seen the night life of Amsterdam either. I am not a night person. I prefer to stay at home with a book or just have a friend or two over for dinner or drink and that is my idea of a nice evening. I need to explore this aspect of life before rejecting it completely. 2011 will be a big party time for me and it starts from the new year's eve. I will be with my very close friends in Amsterdam bringing in the new year..

Where is the party tonite?

Beautifully different

Think about what makes you different and what you do that lights people up. Reflect on all the things that make you different – you’ll find they’re what make you beautiful.

This morning when I read the prompt of the day, I smiled at myself. That was a very special and meaningful smile reminding me how badly I needed to reflect on my personality being different and learn to see and accept the beauty that lies hidden under those differences. Thank you for this prompt. Last few months, I have been extremely hard on myself for not being able to achieve an important transition of human life. Marriage. I felt I lacked something that was very important to be like all other girlfriends of mine, who are married and are raising children and balancing the professional and personal life so beautifully. I know their life is tough but I also want to have that family life and balance it with my work. I still want to experience the feeling of being with someone and raising a family with him. But when I grew cold feet at the most decisive moment, I nosedived into hopelessness, nothingness and self-doubt.

So starting with that, my first difference is that I am single at 31 because i did not feel confident to get married. In marriage context back home, the best description for me will be highly qualified, career oriented, self made over aged woman. I am ambitious, I know what I want in life. I have clear boundaries when and to what extent I can compromise but when I need to put my foot down and stand by what I believe even if it means that I might be left alone guarding my position. Power or money can not buy my loyalty. I am not afraid to raise my voice. I have strong opinions about most of the things but I am open to discuss and argue and I do change my opinion if one can convince me theirs is better argument than mine.

I am fiercely independent and I have been so since my childhood. I have accomplished many things that could be seen as a big milestones but with each step up, I find myself increasingly lonely and isolated. I am passionate about my work which has primarily been in Public Health. I have traveled to so many places for work against travel advisories and rules. I have survived curphews and social unrest in my work life in northeast of India but these challenges made me want to do it even more. I wanted to face it head on as I could not see how we can turn a blind eye to the suffering of our fellow beings. I dream of working in Afghanistan and as a school friend of mine once said, 'I sniff for dangerous places to be in and then I make sure I get to work there'.

I do not fuss about how I look, how I dress. I am not into elaborate romantic dates or fancy restaurants but one to one conversation about something thought provoking is enough for me to feel alive. I easily get bored in artificial environments. I cant put fake smile and pretend i am happy. My face reveals how I feel so easily that sometimes I get in deep trouble. I do not have champaign tastes. I am happy with simple vegetarian food and in fact fancy places make me a bit uncomfortable as I feel I am a misfit there.

I hate money being wasted under whatever justification, I cant stand double standards. I do not like people who use words without meaning even one single word out of it, whether on political level or personal level. I can talk passionately about many aspects of my work life about HIV, sexuality, female foeticide, inequality in access to health care and gender differences which are present all around me. I am not a radical activist but I do feel that sometimes activism is required to bring out a change.

I love travelling and when I travel I try and mingle with the local life. I absorb as much of the place and the people as I can. I have not been in one place for last eight years. The fact that I am constantly on move gives me a reason to live, explore and experience life. Idea of travelling to polar regions or Bolivian altiplano can literally infuse me with new energy for life. I am a crazy dreamer and I have made most of my dreams come true. The trouble is, ten more dreams are conceived in my mind as i fulfill one and there goes the gypsy all over again.

Wherever I go, I make wonderful friends in all age groups but I get along best with people much older to me. My friends are my biggest strengths and I go out of my ways to be with them in toughest times. As a friend, one would hardly expect me to be by their side in the happy moments, but I am always there when they are in the rough waters. My friends can totally depend on me. Their secrets are protected with all my might.

I am passionate about movies and I dream of being a movie maker someday and these dreams are endless. I want to be so many different things, be in so many different place in the same life that sometime my life tires out people around me. I try and organize every aspect of my life, I am a bit obsessed about doing everything perfectly and efficiently. I dont accept 'this is our culture/tradition' justification for everything that you dont want to change.

I value financial stability and good financial planning. I prefer honest and open communication rather than nodding head in agreement when you dont really believe in it. I find myself in a tricky situation, if people around me are reluctant to make certain difficult decisions or to take a crucial stand. I cant completely accept 'why care about tomorrow, lets fully live in today' approach to life. I beleive nothing comes your way just because you deserve it but you have to work towards it. That is when I got my second nick name.. 'control freak/ obsessive planner'. Well, if one can convince me that things will automatically fall in right place without you doing anything about it, I am curious to understand that point of view.

I have a brilliant smile, I think my smile can really light up the life around me. Trouble is I need to feel completely at peace and only then I can experience and express that dazzling smile. My friends who have experienced those moments will vouch for this. I have child like excitement and curiosity about life. I do not like any limits put on to me by the others or being restricted or treated differently just because i am a woman in both professional and personal life. I want to try different things even when there may not seem any immediate relevance and I want to learn all my life. These days I am called a 'professional student'.

These are my differences to which many got attracted over last few years but none could completely accept this 'beautifully different' me. In fact the same differences to which they got attracted in first place became my biggest faults later on. She is too strong, too independent, it is hard to live with someone like that. The question for me now is, do I want to give away these differences which actually make me who I am just so that someone will accept me (i hardly will be real me then) or I should remain 'beautifully different' even if it means being unattached most of the times. I hope there is a middle answer somewhere just like my hope that someday i will find a way to strike a balance between meaningful work and raising a healthy family.

Thats me 'beautifully different' sowing seeds to yet another dream.......

Community

Community. Where have you discovered community, online or otherwise, in 2010? What community would you like to join, create or more deeply connect with in 2011?

I transitioned through 3 real communities in the year 2010 and I think I will be again transitioning through 3 yet another communities in 2011. The year 2010 also showed me how virtual communities can outcast you when you make a mistake. This is how my story goes.

From January to August 2010, I was integral part of student community at University of Amsterdam. To define my community or probably what could be called a little family, it was my class at AMMA, the medical anthropology program that we were part of. 15 of us, 11 nationalities, 4 continents and many more subcultures within us and we were studying anthropology in one of the most ethnically diverse cities in the world, Amsterdam. If I remember correctly, I read that persons from 139 different nationalities live in this city. Life in this community was extremely comfortable, warm, accepting and friendly in spite of all the stress of student life.

August and September, I was back in India, amidst my family and about to merge with other family through matrimony. But when things did not go as planned, I was to experience what it means to threaten the norms of community and society and the the aftereffects of it. The same happened with the online community, like facebook. Suddenly there was a wave of 'block/remove' this person from friends list campaign and the members of 'our common' community shrunk in number almost overnight. One actually wonders, how social networking sites and online communities do have a powerful way of telling you 'you are not required in their life any more'. The friends suddenly cease to be your friends as if you never existed and it is just a click of mouse but can have same effect as being ostracized in real community life. I realized borders between the real and virtual communities are very unclear and same is the distinction between the communities you are born and raised within and communities that you create around you or become part of.

From October onwards, I am in this tiny student town in Belgium, surrounded by fellow classmates from diverse nationalities. This is my current community which has brought out some healing effect on my emotional wounds. How can I forget the community of 'Gray Lotuses' at my meditation center, now we also have some lotus buds in this community but all these guys made life so much livable. All the warmth and care they showed to me is beyond words and may be that is why it hurts so much that the next Tuesday will be my last day with these gray lotuses. Beginning of the new year, i will be transitioning into a new community in Nijmegen and then yet another transition in Padova.

Wonder what community means to me. It is a group of people where I feel comfortable and at peace. Where I can be who I am, express my joys and fears, sorrows and concerns. Where I could laugh with the others and I could also cry. Why is it that I find it easy to connect with people who are complete strangers to me but fail to do so within my inner circles of the family. Why i share my secrets and worries with friends who could be from absolutely different culture and outlook but not with a cousin or some aunt? Why I feel so isolated within my extended family but I am completely integrated into these transitory communities. I do not know the answer. May be it is about difference. Being with people with such diverse backgrounds allows me to fit with them in some strange ways. I do not have to be like the others as it is impossible to be like the others but you loose that privilege in your own socio-cultural setting. May be more stringent norms apply to you when you are in your home land and that is not the case when you are out of it. It probably is also easy to walk out of communities that you by choice became part of but may not be so for the communities in which you are born and raised.

I am also slowly becoming part of this new found 'blogger's community'. I read their blogs and smile as i see those recurring themes in the writing. It makes no difference where you are from and what you do but it seems all of us who are blogging, we feel this intense need to share our lives, thoughts, joys, worries and fears with some 'stranger' in this world wide web who actually might know you better just through your words. You start to pick up, their likes and dislikes and what makes them happy and what their struggles are. yet another form of community, quite scattered but still intricately connected to each other through those 'webs of significance'.

One thing is for sure, I was wrong when I thought I could be happy on my own without much social/communal backing. Over years I have understood, I need much more communal support to redefine myself and grow in the process but what is flexible here is the kind of community I need to be part of. The community which is open, accommodative, challenging, encouraging, stimulating at the same time giving me a strong sense of belonging. In short, it has to be a community that I choose to be part of and not one where I am expected to belong. I must say, I have been lucky to always have some sort of 'community' standing by my side even in worst of times and I am grateful for their support.

Make

December 6 – Make. What was the last thing you made? What materials did you use? Is there something you want to make, but you need to clear some time for it?

There are so many things that I want to make, I keep listing them down so that I dont forget but I hardly ever look at that list again. No object on that list got removed out because I did it. I am thinking hard, what was the last thing I made? I think I made nothing new in very long time. I have not cooked a new recipe, I have really not tried something new. Strange. ohhh there is one silly thing that I could write about. In my early days in Amsterdam, must be October 2009, I turned a little egg packaging box (those paper boxes in which eggs are sold in the supermarkets) into a box for my earrings. My creativity ended there. I could see a potential use in that particular packing and I used it to serve my purpose. I did not decorate it, paint it, put some little starts on it.. no , i did nothing. It was all about fulfilling a function, thats all.. no fun intended, no aesthetic sense involved. Will that be counted in 'making'? The other silly thing I did around the same time last year was to use a nice circular paper which I think came as a base for a cake that we bought for someone's birthday to write down my dreams and wish list. I wrote it all at one go on that little oily paper, I was just so happy with that paper and I pasted it above my study table. I still remember many of the things on that circular wish list.

I have a keen eye on seeing utility in things which generally get thrown away. Different shapes, colors and textures attach my attention. I love collecting little glass bottles in different shapes, initially it was the jam, pesto bottles, these days I am really getting fascinated by the different kind of bottles used by liquor industry. Just two days ago, I saw a bottle of 'Tatratea', a Slovakian liquor, this bottle without a neck was so beautiful. The other day at Magritte museum, I saw two painted wine bottles on display and I wondered if I could try something similar. It may not be as famous as those by Magritte but I can try it out.

I want to learn how to make beads using clay. One of my friends makes such beautiful pieces of jewelery using hand made beads.. some years ago, an american friend on her trip to Indonesia bought some lovely necklaces with colorful glass beads, very cheap and affordable but extremely beautiful and unique. It turned out that there is a woman's group in Indonesia who collect glass bottles of different colors, including wine bottles, melt it down and mix these different colored molten glass together to make those beads. I was so inspired to learn the technique. This afternoon, Leen gave me some children's candies. I forgot the dutch/Belgian name for it. The candies were little elongated, almost egg shaped but a bit flat.. but the color was perfect Turquoise. I did not want to eat them. I wanted to put a string through them and make a necklace from it and it would have looked perfect against Leen's skin tone.

I am fascinated with the idea that at some time in my life I am going to learn making mud pottery traditional way. I want to learn how to make lace, I think that inspiration comes from seeing stores here selling Belgian lace which is so expensive for my 'student' pocket. Same thing happens when I go to toy stores. The variety of toys and children's books, their touch and textures, the colours and sounds.. it is whole new world there that I want to have it all but I can barely afford any of it. My heart almost sinks to accept that I cant afford it and knowing fully well that I dont need these toys but how do children accept this hard reality. I feel toys and books should be available for children at an affordable price. but i know millions of children in this world do not have either of these. Some day I want to make these things available to all the children of this world. I dont know how I will do it but I will for sure.

I really want to develop my creative skills as I feel extremely satisfied if I can make something useful and beautiful using my senses and with magic touch of my fingers... the desire is there but i dont know the means.. there is some thinking that is needed here.

December 5: Let go

Just a few days ago, I think sometime in November, I had a blog post with the same title, explaining how I cant let go off anything.

The word for today is 'Let go' and I am going to write about what are the things that I am going to try and let go in days ahead.

First of all, I want to let go off all the limits and constraints I impose on myself.This is closely linked with my low self esteem most of the time. I doubt myself and my abilities to such an extent that I undermine my own potential simply because I dont believe I can do it. I want to change this facet of my personality.

I want to let go off my worries. I worry too much about everything and when one spends so much of conscious thinking time on worrying about things, one exhausts their energy for nothing. Sometimes I feel totally tired just because of constant worries in my head.

Then I want to let go off all my negative thoughts about myself and my life situation. I always see possible hurdles in every situation but hardly take count of what factors are on my side. If I think carefully, it is very clear that my advantages are more than difficulties. But generally my first reaction always is, 'it wont happen', 'I cant make it' and thoughts like those. I create blocks on my own path.

I try to control, plan and systematically organize every aspect of my life. Once upon a time, I believed it was my asset but now I have come to see it as a weakness. Now planning and organization has taken over my ability to relax to such an extent that I am on my toes even in most relaxed situation. I feel I should be 'fully prepared' for any unforeseen calamity. Most of the time, there is no such calamity but, i want to be ready to deal with, so I miss the fun of living that moment completely.

I want to set the standards of quality a bit lower than usual. I set such high goals and I am so critical of myself that i make it really hard for me to live everyday with a positive wibe. These are good qualities to have only when they are in moderation. But I am almost getting on the pathological side of it.

I want to let go off my obsession to do everything perfectly, to be always correct and nice and kind hearted. It is ok to fail once in a while, it is ok to make mistakes or to hurt people inadvertently. I want to learn to accept kindness and support others can offer me. I want to strike a balance between giving and receiving.

I want to let go off my fears, my constant walls of defense. I want to trust people and life again. I want to live naturally even if it means letting my vulnerability visible. Its ok not to be always strong and it is fine to depend on others for love, energy and motivation. I am tired of being a strong woman and I want to be just 'a woman'. I am not sure what exactly it means though to be a woman.

Wonder

The prompt for the day is 'Wonder'. How did you cultivate a sense of wonder in your life this year?

I wonder about so many things in life but most of the times, it remains at the level of curiosity and then I typically tell myself, 'stop being a child. you are suppose to behave like a grown up.' But no one has told me that adults cant wonder like a child. It is just something that I have imposed on myself because I want to be taken seriously as an adult by the larger society. I have been wondering for last whole week about what makes snow come down the way it does. May be child in this part of the world will give me all the scientific details about temperature, humidity, direction of wind, condensation and so on. I never had to study it when i was a child as snow is unheard of in Mumbai. Two days ago, I saw a father-daughter duo starting their day. Father probably going to work and on the way dropping the daughter to her school. There was thick 10 cms layer of snow and the girl had a little wooden sledge which was being pulled by the father. I wondered how would it feel for me to be on such (a bit bigger) sledge and being pulled by someone so that I could go to school. I did not dare to even talk this thought aloud but I kept staring at this father daughter duo as if I was seeing 8th wonder of the world. I loved listening the little girl laugh, and instruct her father to pull her sledge appropriately. She was the queen of the moment with her beautiful bunny ear winter cap. I wanted to be like her, happy, free, enjoying life and giggling hard. Yesterday on my way home from school, a friend showed me a shorter route home. There was a lovely snow covered slope and there were steps to climb down. The steps as expected were cleared of snow. I for sure wanted to slide down the snow covered hill even if it meant hardships for my bottom but the adult in me took over and I silently took the steps, followed my friend. I felt so miserable later having lost a wonderful chance. There was no one else but me and my friend, so no one would have laughed at me. Even if I would have got wet with that soft snow, I was anyways going home, I could have immediately changed into something warm. Why did I not follow my wish? I will try 2row.

On my way to school, the two large construction sites are active right now. They have those huge cranes for lifting and moving construction material. It has been my wish for years to be on that top end of the crane, not where the man operating it sits but the other end which has a hook hanging down. I always wonder how would the world look from that elevation. Two of my classmates know about this deep desire of mine and every time they see something where I could hang down from, they point it out to me.

Recently I have been wondering a lot about what it means to bake a bread. I eat such delicious variety of bread here and I have been following blogs which have so many recipes which require baking, I am aching to try out those 'herb dinner rolls'. I must confess that in India, we do not bake much so baking bread, cakes, cookies is like wonderland for me. I do not have a little oven here but I am hoping there will be one in Nijmegen and I have already convinced a friend who has some baking experience to be my mentor.

I have been making soap bubbles for many years now and I know how physics explains the rainbow colors on bubbles with laws of reflection and principle of surface tension but even today, the colorful soap bubbles fill my heart with so much happiness and excitement. Soap bubble solution goes with me everywhere, the bottle is right next to my computer.

I wonder what it means to be a painter. Let me tell you that I understand nothing in paintings, nor have I an eye or ability to appreciate paintings but I have a painter friend and I have many friends who love visiting painting exhibits. Every time I walk through the medical center here, I see both sides of the corridors adorned with beautiful paintings, some abstract, some which I can recognize as horse, an apple or a flower and so on. I have not seen a public hospital in my little experience in India which has hundreds of paintings in its corridors. I like the fact that these paintings give the hospital vitality and vibrancy unlike those disinfected white walls in hospitals I am used to. So I am going to spoil a couple of blank canvases and make some strokes of paint just to see if I have any potential to feel how it feels to be a painter.

There are more things I wish to try out but i am either afraid of it or I dont have means for it. For example, I really want to try and skate on ice but I am too afraid that I will fall and hurt myself. I want to jump with a parachute some day but that day still seems far into future. I wonder how the soft clay feels on your palms when one makes a pot on the traditional wheel. I wonder how those two little green leaves bring their heads above soil when the seed germinates or when the bud slowly blooms into a flower or when the leaves change color, fall off and then blossom again in the beginning of spring. I can spend hours together looking at the clouds floating through the sky and I imagine different shapes in them and an aeroplane going above my head equally makes me excited thinking about how does this big fat machine with all the people inside defy the law of gravity and manage to fly at 30000 feet and above. When the volcano in Iceland erupted this April, I wondered how it might feel to climb up a volcano crater or to float on the dead sea

I wonder how it feels to be standing on the north and south pole, all that ice, the glaciers, the northern lights, the penguins, the seals and other animals. I have planned to visit both these places in next 10 years. When I was a child and I did not really know the law of gravity, I used to feel that I would fall down into nothingness if I stand on the south pole as it was perceived as the bottom of the earth based on little replica of revolving globe of earth. Now I am completely ready to fall into nothingness from the south pole after having fallen into nothingness in spite of perfectly knowing how gravitational force keeps us all where we are in my non-polar life.

I wondered how one could eat in complete darkness and my friends in Amsterdam made my wish come true. We went for dinner at 'C Taste', a restaurant which serves you a three course meal in complete darkness. We struggled a bit initially but then realized once we accepted the darkness and made no efforts to see, other senses took over and we appreciated flavors and textures of food much better. Eating was not at all difficult but communicating with one another in the dark was hard as we could not understand how to communicate effectively without those non verbal clues. It was fun experience.

Last week in Amsterdam, I went for a show of 'Cirque du soleil'. It was an experience of intense stimulation of senses, the music, the light effects and off course watching the bodies in action. At some point, I could not decide what component of larger performance I should focus on. I wondered the human relationships amongst the circus actors. The kind of coordination, trust and confidence they needed with one another to put up a successful performance. One little mistake and a life is at risk. One may not have such confidence with each other even in families. How do then these people from different continents of the world, speaking different languages and sharing different beliefs coordinate with each other so perfectly to unfold such extra ordinary performance?

Every time I see little children sitting on those airport luggage trolleys I feel a bit jealous. I was not flying with my parents at that age so never had this chance. So many times, I decided to use a trolley from the supermarket that some one in my apartment had somehow hijacked but I never had courage to do so. This year in august, at a farm house of a friend, finally my wish came true and I had my little 'ahhhaaa' moment.

I also did some not so nice things in this year just to satisfy my wonder lust mind. I tried magical mushrooms to know what it really means when they say the colors come more alive, the sounds sound more musical and the shapes and forms dance around you. To be honest I did not believe these descriptions but now i can tell you it really works. The green looked greener and the clouds actually danced in front of my eyes to my own imaginary tunes. I loved that experience.

Finally I wonder, will there be a day when I will understand a philosophical theory? Hahahhaha this brings me back to reality after wandering in wonderland. I have to return to preparation of exam on this Monday.

'One word' December 1st

December 1 - One Word. Encapsulate the year 2010 in one word. Explain why you’re choosing that word. Now, imagine it’s one year from today, what would you like the word to be that captures 2011 for you?

My word for the year 2010 is fear. Yes that is the best word to describe how I spent the year in absolute fear of various kinds.

January: I was afraid to say goodbye to him after having spent lovely Christmas and new year together. The fear became more intense when there was a complete silence on his side for almost 10 days after returning to India. Somehow we regained our communication and I accepted his proposal on his birthday. I had accepted something that I was most afraid about, the prospects of getting married and he knew about it all along how scared I am to think of marriage but I felt confident that with him by my side, I will be able to overcome my fears.

February and March: I was afraid of my thesis and whether I will be able to do justice to what I was undertaking. I had fear that I wont feel as happy as I was in Amsterdam on returning to India. I could see I had changed significantly in mere few months and I was not sure how will I cope with again another transition in my life. I have been constantly on move since 2003 to various states within India and abroad. I do not really know what it means to settle done in one place and marriage somehow also implied settling down in one place. I was scared that I am going to be a terrible wife, someone focussed too much on her individuality and career and following her dreams.

April: I was determined to settle down so I started looking for jobs in India. No vacancy sounded interesting enough even to apply. But I needed a job urgently. I had a loan on my apartment back home and I had taken a year away from work to study. It practically meant I had no income but had financial responsibility. I am too independent a person, thought of being financially dependent even on my future husband was good enough reason to scare me.

May, June: I flew home to carry out field work for my thesis. To understand what it means to be married for elderly Indian women. How stupid I was to think that conducting research in this topic will make me feel more confident to get married. The stories I heard were mostly so painful that I started doubting whether I was doing a right thing to get married. I got another scholarship to study for 9 months in Europe and I could not say No to it. In fact that seemed like my lifeline not to be drowned in the family and societal expectations of being a married woman. Selfish woman was ready to come back and study immediately after marriage. My marriage was planned in August 2010 between the two programs. The families went over their heads in excitement planning the big 'traditional Indian wedding' in spite of my constant expressions of fears and not wanting such an elaborate wedding and preference for small very private affair. I was told that this is where the happiness of everyone lies and it was my duty to give the parents the happiness they deserve. I started chocking with suffocation, fears, nervousness but no one including my mother could see it all in the excitement that her daughter finally agreed to marry. I felt no one understood my fears, including him. They blamed it all on my research interviews and i withdrew myself into shell even more. I dreaded those 2 months back home when at one end I was listening to women telling their most private stories within marriage and the other end my family making big plans for my marriage in spite of seeing me feeling more and more lost, unhappy and in despair. I still did not have courage to take a stand and say no. I wanted to make everyone happy even if it meant I was terribly unhappy. Is this not what my women told me in those interviews? To make a marriage work, woman should have low expectations, should be ready for extreme compromises, should prioritize the family over the self and should demonstrate acceptance in every walk of life. I knew for sure I had none of these qualities but I was soon going to get married. I was the happiest on the evening when I flew out of Mumbai to Amsterdam. I so wanted to take refuge in my tiny apartment in meer en vaart where I could finally be myself.

July: It was time to write my thesis, I was listening to my audiotaped interviews and was analyzing the themes in it. All the courage I had put together all this while, fell apart and I went into a phase of deep depression. I could not work on my thesis anymore. I was scared I wont be able to complete my thesis and I wont graduate on time. I have never failed in my academic life uptill now but this time I was sure this is what I was destined to get into. I hoped he would understand my situation and help me come out of this black hole but it felt as if he moved further away. Our communication became less and less frequent and very impersonal. All i got to hear about is the progress of the wedding arrangements. I knew I was completely alone and no one really understood me. I spent sleepless nights weeks after weeks, fearing that I was failing not only in my studies but also in personal life. Was I not suppose to feel very excited and happy about getting married? Why was i feeling so skeptical and disillusioned even before getting married? All my fears of failing in marriage engulfed me further and pushed me down into the black hole. Nuria was the only one I could talk to but we all were struggling with our thesis work. I felt he was changed completely and may be he felt the same too. Where was the energetic, happy, strong woman he fell in love with? Here was a woman who was beyond recognition, depressed, bitten, negative, scared, unsure with her self-esteem gone to the dogs. But we still were going to get married.

August: My brother flew in to be with me on my graduation. He saw me in real terrible state, almost on the verge of breakdown and he was the first one to realize I needed help. He took over the responsibility of caring for me, cooked for me, stopped me from writing for few days completely. Meanwhile he read all my interviews and he at once knew what was happening inside my head. He could feel my fear as a tender boil in the ear. He told me it was ok to fail in my thesis and to not get married and assured me that he would stand by my decision if I decide not to get married. He kept his word all through months ahead. It was with the support of my teachers, him and Nuria, I managed to complete my thesis and I graduated on time. I left Amsterdam the very next day of graduation with a heavy heart and I was to be married in exactly a week ahead. That week was most difficult time of my life. I could sense the widened distance between the two of us but he insisted it was my illusion. What followed ahead was my biggest failure in personal life. I could not get married and the decision though taken mutually to not get married the next day came in very late, a day before marriage. What I did not understand then was that my relationship had also met premature death with that decision. He systematically cut all the channels of communication and our relationship got suspended in a strange ending. I faced immense criticism from every one around. I was called stupid, irrational, selfish, timid. I fell apart once again, this time the downfall was even stronger as I had very weak support system. I kept asking myself what made me act the way I acted? Where I went wrong? I blamed myself for my failed relationship. I begged him and his family for forgiveness. I was a terrible infection in his life now and his family and friends almost quarantined me from entering into their world again. I do take all the responsibility of what happened, I accept that I caused them pain and suffering but was I totally at fault?

September through December: Everyday I battle with my fears, fear of loneliness, fear that I will never be able to find my self again, I will never be able to trust anyone again, i will never have a meaningful relationship. Fear that I will never have resolution on this issue, i will never have a single word of communication from him. Fear of going back to Mumbai, India. Fear of being considered a looser, a woman who could not get married. Fear is the word that I live by every single day, fear in different forms. Sometimes I dont even understand what is it exactly that I am afraid of.

So my word for the year 2011 is 'trust'. I need to trust myself again and trust the world around. I need to trust my future and that I will soon find my own self. I will regain my energy and the confidence and i will accept myself with all my strengths and weaknesses. I will find reasons to smile and to laugh. I will make new friends, i will explore new places and be open to range of experiences life has potential to offer me. I trust that there would be a day when I wont break into tears and there would be a night when I will fall asleep like a baby without being afraid and feeling guilty. I hope to bloom again as a person and make meaningful change in my life project. 2011 will be my transition from world of intense of fear to one with the trust, hope and abundance.

Reverb 10 December 2nd Writing

What comes in my way to writing every day? Can I change it?

Hmmmm, I think the first thing that comes in my way is being simply lazy. I can talk for hours together and describe vividly simplest of a thing but ask me to write and I am sure half of my thoughts will never see the day light. They just disappear at the back of my mind.

It gets even worse when I have to write academically. I hate it, that is the word. The reason I hate it is probably to do with the fact that I have almost convinced myself that I do not have ability to write academically. Those scholarly articles and long convoluted sentences studded with words that I have never heard. I have this trouble for many years now, most of my teachers have given up on me and even my bosses highly disapproved that quality in me. Here, in Leuven we were told the mantra of surviving academic world, 'publish or perish'. By that account I am already perished, I have never published anything of serious nature in my life. Will this blog be considered a serious writing effort? I do not know.

My second limitation in writing is that it is more like a story telling, describing great details which may be completely irrelevant. Recently I discussed my narrative style rather than the argument based or critical writing with my ghost. I aspire to be a teacher someday and we both worry that this way I will never make it there. May be I should change my profession in time rather than feeling disappointed having failed to realize my dream of being in academia.

Writing I think needs to be developed like a skill. One needs to be patient and persistent. One has to work hard on getting it right. I lack that patience. None of my assignments get read once more the moment I feel I am done enough to pass the exam. Just yesterday we worked on my messy references and i made a point that I should pay attention to it. In a way it is interesting that yesterday we were discussing about writing and the theme on Reverb 10 for yesterday was the same.

Last I think is that I get distracted with so many things that are going on simultaneously in my head. I am writing a paper and then suddenly I remember I wanted to read something else or had to run some errands. Because writing is not the best of my comfort zone, sometimes it feels as if I am looking for an excuse to run away from it. I probably need to take out strict time slot for writing and not allow myself to get away from it.

I can hardly do anything about the 7 years of my academic and professional life that are almost perished for lack of publications but the point now is what I can do to change the situation. I think I am in the right place, I have necessary assistance just across the border and i have enough reasons to feel inspired. I will soon be writing my thesis on ethical reasoning on 'Dying out of free will'. I have my another thesis just sitting there idle about women's experiences in long term marriages in India and I hope to turn it into a little book. That is my first little goal. I have all the assistance needed to realize this goal, all I need is taking the first step forward. I am determined to have a career in Academia (in spite of my innate fears of failing miserably at it) but i would try and fail better at it. I am going to read more inorder to understand how others write and even while reading I am going to make conscious effort to understand the central argument and how was it supported or refuted? I read things like stories again giving attention to descriptions which are probably just to support the argument and in the process i completely miss the argument. Thus I need to learn how to read correctly and systematically to get better at writing.

What else I could do to write better? I dont know. May be I will get more ideas for the same through the blogs of others. I am looking forward to it.

Moment

I am not quite sure I understand how it works but I signed up for an initiative 'reverb10'. It seemed like an interesting idea to help me reflect on the year passed and the year ahead of me rather than just feeling sad, gloomy and helpless.

A friend yesterday asked me to be an active agent for change in my life rather than playing the victim. Here is my first step towards that new found agency in my life.

So today I am suppose to describe a moment when I felt completely alive in the year 2010. It is hard task. I can write atleast 10 moments in the year with all the details of smells, textures and sounds of feeling like a complete looser and hopeless, selfish creature but really cant think of one moment when I felt alive. But why am I insisting that feeling alive only has to be understood when you feel positively alive? Why it cant be a moment when you felt most alive thanks to feeling intensely miserable, in pain and helpless? Is this not equally important dimension of feeling alive? Something to reflect on but let me think about a moment of positively feeling alive.

It has to be that solo bike ride at night from Bijltjespad along Prins Hendrikade to Rambrantpleine on 25th November. I was in Amsterdam visiting friends. Just the fact that I was surrounded by my friends gave me so much relief in those 4 magical days. The Christmas lights went up that evening at Dam square and there was a small music concert. My friend, Nuria had made sure that I will have my old bike to move around in Amsterdam during those 4 days. This bike, named 'Sally' has become my metonymic connection with Amsterdam. This was the bike that made me feel independent, free and autonomous in that one year. I had multiple falls but she always protected me and soon my bike became my means to feel light like a bird and to glide through those biking lanes in the city, the commonest commute was from meer en vaart (my apartment) to school which was near the city center. We preferred the path which goes through Vondel park and I started my day taking the same route. The park was beautiful as usual, very familiar and hence comforting, soothing and healing. I never had a fall in this park. Thanks to broad lanes for bikers and pedestrians. I have seen this park change its form from autumn, to winter to spring. I think right now this park must be covered in snow. That was the first moment I felt alive after many many months and the entire day ahead brought out more such moments.

Though I had biked in Amsterdam for a year, I think it was always restricted to certain paths. For example, I never biked from my school to station or from Dam square to beyond Amstel towards Hermitage. Amsterdam in my mind came to an abrupt end along the same lines. The city ended where I stopped biking. Strange, isnt it? But I realized it during this trip. Suddenly I understood how close Hermitage museum is from the waterloopliene and how easy and fast it is to bike to centraal station from my school. So from Dam square, I biked to Bijltjespad without having ever done it before and without having looked at biking directions on google map. All I had was an sms describing how to get there from the bus stop along the way. From the station, I started along Prins Hendrikade, I crossed the path that I once took with my ghost to go to the central library, then came my old student apartment where I stayed for a month in the summer of 2008, further on my left was the Chinese restaurant almost floating on the water, many old ships lined up (I had found a ship that had gone to India), then was NEMO the science museum with its characteristic architecture. That is where my previous familiarity ended. I had never ventured beyond that big folding bridge on the amstel. I remembered having read about the fears of the sailors when they believed that the earth is flat and not round and hence the ship would fall into nothingness at the edge of this flat earth. I cant get all the right details of this discovery of round earth and the sailors, a figure I used to draw of a little ship and the globe of earth when i was 6 years old for a school assignment. It was funny to stretch beyond my 'flat' idea of Amsterdam coming to an abrupt end. On that absolutely traffic less path, I biked further, turned to the left and crossed the Amstel that was flowing peacefully giving me company. I did make it to my friend's apartment, someone whom I saw after 4 years. We are very close friends and we remained in touch through these four years via internet but seeing her again was indeed a beautiful moment. First thing I noticed while giving her a hug was that she was wearing my old brown sweater, the same sweater that i wore almost every day at home in Amsterdam last year. We girls have been literally carrying bits and pieces of each other in our current life. Nid's belongings are all around us. Me and Nuria have so many things of each other and that of Nid's. Just holding Nid's back pack in my hand, I felt I was actually feeling her presence. Now I saw Nasima carrying my life in Amsterdam through that brown sweater. I hope that this sweater will keep her warm and give her happiness and energy which i got all across the year in this city. I had never noticed that I am taller than her. she surprised me with the fact that she cooked dinner for us. I never saw her as someone who would take interest in cooking. We had so much to talk about that we could not understand where to start. So at some point, we decided to remain silent and just feel the presence of each other. A lot has changed in our lives both personally and professionally but being in love and having lost it is one common theme that connects us strongly. We both are at different levels on our path to recovery and healing. We both are again at a crucial point in our life projects and we have to soon make very pertinent decisions. Through her window, I could see the Amstel and there she sat by the window smoking cigarette and I instantly went back to that huge football ground in Sawar, Bangladesh where the two of us used to walk and discuss and share our hearts out to each other.

I had to leave her soon as few other friends were waiting for me at the Christmas Market in Rambrantpleine. Mayank the philosopher, an indian friend whom I met in Amsterdam and Nuria. We were the three buddies and we wanted to meet up again for a drink in Amsterdam. This was our only chance as Nuria was soon leaving Amsterdam. It was good to see him again and it was even better to listen to this composed man and his perspective from a man's point of view about recent disaster in my personal life. The gluhwein and the Bailey's. The place was warm but smelled a bit funny must be all that wine. Mayank was most bothered by it. The wine was so strong in its aroma that we had to struggle to drink it, the fumes would straight hit the brain through nose before the drink could make it to the mouth. We talked and we drank. We girls were faster than Mayank, I think he did not like it that much. Then came a round of Baileys and he refused to believe that it was a liquor. He kept saying that it was flavored cold coffee. Nuria kept insisting that it is alive as it grows. The sweet while liquid would appear to rise in its level as the ice melted. especially in the end when only thing that remained behind was the ice cubes with little baileys, we kept sipping to its last fraction laughing that the liquor keeps growing. For nuria, most food items are alive. The poories and rotis from India are alive because they puff and make a noise. The mustard and cumin seeds in hot oil are alive because they pop and try to jump out of the pan. So this 'its alive' syndrome is very peculiar to our trio and dates back to our adventures of cross-cultural cooking in the kitchen of Meer en Vaart. Mayank used to make lovely Indian tea with ginger (boiled with lot of milk and sugar) and fry some potato wedges to treat the two of us. He said he has stopped making those as he wants it to remain a treat between the three of us and not to relish it alone. I like that idea. If the three of us ever meet again, Mayank will make the tea and wedges for us again. What will we (myself and Nuria) make for that occasion? Mayank could make it to the last tram and we girls set out with our bikes to go home.

Was I drunk? No not really, i was in complete control but was feeling much relaxed, warm and happy. Nuria led the path. I was biking silently behind her, along the path that we often took back to home from school, hitting the Rijksmuseum, along the overtoom towards Surinaampleine. I fell silent but the silence was comforting. I kept looking around for all those familiar buildings and shops as if I had woken up from a long standing coma. I was back in my familiar world. Nuria asked if I was ok and I answered 'I am at perfect peace'. The cold did not bother us as our souls were warm with friendship, acceptance, care and concern for one another and trust that the future will be brighter even if it feels so gloomy right now. The Ethiopian restaurants, the marktplaas, the little rehabilitation medical center, the big gymnasium, the little cafe were I met Sally for the first time, the circle around surinaampleine where the trees got dressed in lovely pink flowers in the summer and there we were at home. It was almost 1am. We both were tired but we had immense satisfaction of having had a wonderful day together in our favorite city and having also accomplished most of the things in our list of things to do. The moon was shining bright and the night was beautiful. I was so content and relaxed, had not felt like that for long time. I knew at that very moment that Amsterdam is where I want to be. This is where I feel at home and this is the city which makes me feel comforted and protected.

So my moment of feeling alive is being in Amsterdam with my closest friends.

The snow, the Christmas season and the memories

I know I am not suppose to feel like this. I should take control of my life and move on, accept things with smiling face, keep the lessons learned with me and be open to life ahead. I do try hard to do it sometimes consciously, sometimes without it. But there are days when things fall apart, all the courage gathered disappears and I feel like a complete failure. I want to hide myself, i want to cry, i want to disappear.

I woke up to snow, everything around me is pure white and beautiful. I enjoy the snow and the cold but something is different this time, there is a hue of sadness to it now, the snow actually freezes my soul. The happiness that I try to feel, seems out of place and there is this invisible burden on that smile that I have to bring out with great effort and determination. My apartment is warm, there are warm people around me but I feel cold, frozen, numb within. I took out that parrot green sweater this morning, bright, happy color. Is green not my favorite color lately? Yes it is but not this particular shade for sure. I look like a parrot. It is pure alpaca wool and it was brought to me all the way from Bolivia. I never could use it in India, it is too warm, but probably it is perfect for the days ahead here. I touched its wool and the memories came flashing by, very hard to put a lid on it. what went wrong there? Would this wool succeed in warming up my soul?

I carried on my day with great energy. we were in Brussels, with all my classmates and some of the teachers. Lovely group, snow was coming down beautifully. Magritte museum, the magic, illusion and metamorphosis were the three key concepts we were asked to take away with us. I loved those clouds and the windows.. now I know where the inspiration to photograph windows came from. It must have been my visit to the same museum on 24th October with friends. Today, I was also surrounded by friends but still felt so lonely. it was still snowing outside straight onto us.

The central city plaza, the old city hall and that majestic Christmas tree, the nativity and the people all around bundled up in warm clothes enjoying the snow. There was little sound and light show projected on the building of city hall... i remember how excited I was last year walking through the Christmas market in Bremen and then in Amsterdam and today I almost wanted to run away from it all. I think I had underestimated the effect of Christmas on me, I realized it today. I felt so out of place, the guilt, pain, self-blame it all came back... will I survive this festive season without falling apart? How drastically things have changed in a year's time. Does he ever think of it? The snow, the cold and the Christmas, how am I going to face these each year? Will I get used to it? I dont know but I am scared. The feeling of loneliness overwhelms, almost engulfs me and so is the feeling of loss. I wanted to be happy 2day, i tried but all I had to actually try was to control my tears. I decided to walk home, I wanted to be alone so that tears need not be hidden. I had to walk through snow covered paths and snow is still coming down....