Took this picture in the train on my way to Trivandrum a couple of weeks ago.
i'll be 61 next week. i realised that i have always been a very weak person physically mentally and emotionally. This is because i hardly had any bad experiences worth mentioning in my life, and not a joy ride eeder. i never went after it. Took life as it came to me and made no attempt to shape it. My life is a shapeless ugly and weak building.
Its not the moments of joy, which are very few, but it is the bad experiences which give you the strength, and bad experiences make you a strong person. Every time you have a bad experience you add a strong pillar to your building, to your life. Its your desire to shape your building as beautiful as possible, using beautiful building blocks, but it doesn't happen. Very few good looking building blocks, rest are rough and not so good looking.
That is life.
The building is kept alive by those who love you trust you. .
its easy for me give you a hollow wish for the new year and that is what you want to hear. i can only wish you all the courage and strength to deal with any situation that comes your way and
wish you the ability to let go.
just let go and Look ahead.
that's a strange wish.
oh well .... i am a clown
Love you all.
59 comments:
Thank you so much rauf-ji for the wishes, indeed we want all of those things in our life, if not for anything else but just to make it as a life.
Wishing you a happy new year
- Alok
happy new year :D
Bless you Rauf and happy birthday next week, young man! Your New Year wishes are hollow like a musical instrument, full of resonance.
ThaT was a sweet post... it is so true-
with every mistake
we grow stronger
we learn some more!!!
happy new year!!
And when is ur bday btw? dont know the date....:) advance wishesss
take care n hope to see u more this coming year!!
I agree with what Vincent wrote, about hollowness. I am a bit stunned by it actually, combined with what you wrote. There is music here - quiet, the kind that makes me close my eyes and see the view from a mountain. You are still climbing, Abi. Little Kuttangi just started climbing. But you both have very fresh eyes.
Thank you for this post.
Uncle very nice new year wish! you are very special to us. the speciality in you is because of what you took out of life and how you lived ur life so far! so, frankly, ur building might be old but you are yound at heart and wise at mind! which is what makes all the difference :D...appy new year to you 2009, 2010, 2011...and all the years!!! may be till 2099..so later don tell me i dint wish you appy new year :D
Wishing you a wonderful 2009 Rauf, May it have all that you want and much happiness.
Blessings my friend
Such a beautiful child, such a beautiful message. You have grasped the reality of life we must look only forward for behind are cast only the shadows of our walk. Deepest wishes for endurance and continued strength to you.
that is a lovely child....and u are ery true that its the ad experiences which make us better people..but soetimes...too much pain can cause the most hardy person to crumble....
Great blog, Poms - As usual, Short, sweet with strong undercurrents of poignant thoughts.. First things first - Brilliant photo, captured the right essence of her curious look.. almost like peering out at the world, wondering what lies yonder. Little does she know, that it's not a wonderful place out there.. sprinkled with violence, hatred, warfare with an extra dollop of fear, paranoia and isolated societies.. and yeah, the hint of sad melancholy in your words does not go amiss.. Hope this year shows us a brighter shade of the colours of life.. Miss you Poms. Hugs.
Arshi
Thank you for your wise words!
HAPPY NEW YEAR!
What a young guy you are! For me, I prefer a life of ease and time to do what brings me bliss and joy! I agree what you said about our strengths being developed by adversity, and I've had enough of that to last me several lifetimes. Just raising four sons gave me a lot of that.
I'm all for the joy now! Wish you must joy and bliss this coming year.
We have one life ALOK, when we are here things happen as we live, very little is in our control, most of the things that happen in our lives are beyond our control. We have to face them whether we like it or not. The End is always tragic. No escape. We can't think of the tragic end and stop living. Religion offers some solace, they sell dreams and hopes of a life beyond.
Thank you VISHESH, wish you all the imagination and the knowledge in the world and the ability to grasp it.
Thank you VINCENT, Words can give you comfort but not for long. When you see things going wrong. you can only hope for a better tomorrow, it comes. The world stands on hope. Better tomorrow comes or not we have to live. some break under pressure, some have the courage to face it. i wish courage and strength to all.
Hi AAARTI, Hope things are going fine. Your building should look good and hope it gets better as you grow older. parents shape it to a certain level then you are on your own. You have the brains and courage to deal with any situation Aarti, its your job to guide others and help them to shape their buildings. This is a bit complex. You want a certain shape and they want something else.
8th is the day Aarti. Met Mala Chinna yesterday. Anything new for the new year ?
RUTH, i sound a bit pessimistic in my post. There are no dreams. i offer none. Life is a burden we have to carry on our shoulders. we make it light with our attitude, hopes, desires and wishes. some realistic some not.
We see the glitter of celebrities, we wish to be like them. Are they happy ? How are their buildings ? Wealth comforts, they have everything. Michel Jackson thinks that he would shape his life better changing his faith. it will not work Ruth.
All religions guarantee a happy end, eternal life, if you follow them. it doesn't work either. If one of them works and all six or seven billion people of this world would follow that path.
Rauf Uncleeee!! Happy New Year!
And the kid is so pretty! And your photography is great too!
If I ever had to learn photography properly, can I come to you to learn it?
NEERU, My attitude towards life cannot be called wise. i am expected to make my life better for tomorrow, i had no such desire. Tomorrow did not exist for me. i make no plans. This is not the right approach. You have to do your best to shape your life and make your life interesting.
Except for losing things with alarming regularity, i have no bad experiences, This became a joke as i continued to be reckless and careless.
Hope you are enjoying your studies, please wear a cap outdoors.
Thank you BILL, Hope the New year is better than the old one.
Dear PAULINE, We have to let go. even letting go takes a great deal of courage. i just wish every one the same. Hollow words of comfort don't work when we face reality. The impact of grief is far greater when we pray and hope for miracles to happen and they don't. Moments of joy don't last. What is left are memories which should not pull us down. Memories are nothing but experiences pleasant and rough. they don't fade away easily, it takes time. We move on. Time waits for no one.
Life is precious SHOOTING STAR, but its not sweet, though we would like to believe it to be so. A simple life is made complex with our desires, expectations, hopes and dreams. They let us down time and again. Hopes and dreams make our life worth living if they are realistic. Its the unrealistic hopes and dreams that cause much pain. Sometimes pain is to much to bear as you rightly said, the unfortunate ones crumble. i wish, we all wish strength and courage to them.
EEEEEEEE BOO, SWEET PUTPUTAS, Little girl is curious to know what lies ahead. Expecting something exciting and pleasant to come. Yes the world is not a pleasant place as we hope to be and it never was. Good never prevailed over evil. We want to believe and we are made to believe that it did. The very fact that we have countless religions and beliefs proves that its not working. We have divisions within divisions under a single faith because none is convincing. Why do we divide ? People give up one faith and embrace a different one in the hope that their life would be smooth, easy and peaceful. It doesn't work. Believe me Boo, if the followers of one faith are found to be peaceful and prosperous, that would be only faith in the world. Every one in this world would gladly embrace such a faith. We humans brought the misery upon ourselves by dividing ourselves by race and religion. what is left of the world is chaos, pain suffering misery and bloodshed. Is this the original design ?
yes sweet Boo, i sound melancholic for the lack of understanding we see every day. We have been hoping and praying for thousands of years. it ain't working.
love and hugs Boo. please take care. me miss you toos sweet.
Hope you are enjoying your break SONIA, Hope to see you back soon. happy New year to you and your family.
You are the lucky one SANDY,
but all are not as lucky as you are, unfortunately. We all hope for a better future.
Thank you for your wish Sandy.
Happy New year to you too.
EEEEEEEEE SINDHU BITIYA, Sure, i can make you a master of goofs. i hardly do anything sensible. When you coming Chennai ?
Please call 98407 68067 ;
044 -2858 6985
Good to see your smiley on this depressing post.
please come Sindhu bitiya.
Dear Rauf,
Your words touched me deep. Happy New Year to you and your family. I'm sure that your Life Building is strong and beautiful.
Claudia W.
Dear CLAUDIA, please tell me what are we doing here ? Why we are here and why we have to endure such pain and misery ?
i do not know Nia, i have never even seen her picture, but it hurts so much to think of her that i need some hollow words of comfort and unrealistic hopes. what has she done to deserve such a fate ? She is just a child. its just bad luck. No one can imagine the pain and suffering of the parents and those who know Nia. it hurts so much to see my friends in pain, How can i look for moments of joy ? people losing jobs, falling victims to greed of few evil people causing misery and suffering of the innocent. The whole picture is so meaningless. But this is cruelty of living. This is life. i cannot lie, i refuse to give my friends unrealistic hopes Claudia. We have come here and we have to face it. i can only wish strength and courage to Nia's parents and her friends. Believe me Claudia, i did not like writing this post. But i had to do it.
Rauf, bad experiences do not make you grow. It is how you REACT to them that makes you learn.
I will wish you a Happy New Year anyway!
wishing you a wonderful new year!
JUDY, what you say is quite true, i said bad experiences make you stronger. Like you said, its the attitude towards bad experiences makes you learn. wrong attitude can pull a person down into eternal depression. i treated rough experiences as joke and forgot quickly but i refused to learn too, kept repeating the same blunders. That was my folly.
Thank you KUTTANGI Wish you the same
Your picture of this little innocent has a wishful almost cautious glance of what is to come...questioning and uncertainty... It is the perfect representation of this coming year.. I think most thinking people feel just as this young child right now.. ...
I will tell you that I am not a Christmas person.. it does not make me happy... every year I fear it when it approaches... even now at this moment I wish we could cancel all future Christmases... I am the kind of person that would rather keep a gift wrapped... or not receive a gift at all.. therefore these days that everyone calls Holidays.. I think they are something very difficult that I must force myself through...
and I have had my share of bad experiences and they don't make me stronger like they like to say... but make me sadder... and make me work much harder... so many times I wanted to give up but the sun comes out and saves me... at that moment.. then it gets dark again...
sometimes I wish I could close my ears and pretend not to hear...but that is the thing that makes me even sadder still... the ignorance of many and the inability of people to wake up, and stop being sheep.. I don't mean to put down sheep as a creature as I love sheep...I love their wool too.. but not people acting like sheep...
I came across this quote by Nietzsche..."The surest way to corrupt a youth is to instruct him to hold in higher esteem those who think alike than those who think differently"... Being as well read as you are, you have probably read this many years ago. but I am sending it anyway, 'cause I believe it is true...
Don't ever stop your original thoughts.. I value them... you make sense... I'm glad you are here to listen to ... and to speak to...
I know that song "the Tears of a clown"... I use to sing it... I understand it... I still sing it...
and the year will come minute by minute.. no stopping it and it doesn't need a wish.. It does need strength just as you said...
Take care, no matter what day it is.
What happens to the building of people who are not loved nor trusted?
its easy for me give you a friggin hollow wish for the new year and that is what you want to hear. i can only wish you all the courage and strength to deal with any situation that comes your way and
wish you the ability to let go.
just let go and Look ahead.
that's a strange wish.
oh well .... i am a clown
Love you all.
he he he eeeee ....
"God dont make lonely girls-the wall flowers-bringingdown the horse raufee"
eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee haw ahaw hawee ... clowns are very good acrobats and dance damn friggin good .... above all try making a tiny small girl who has not been to a zoo ! ...
being a monkey is so sweet aaaah ...aaaaajhhisdfi ....reueop@46124769289erhhh*****97077(*#!@)(UUIH%%*68IOLHKIOB[ON..,001347!@#$%#|||++__))(*&&^%$#!!@#$%^&^*
one thing i yet to understand is .... please pls watch richirich and homer simpson on TV to know the history that ya monkeeeey been wanting t o kno ...
ok ok ...
cheers !
Dear GWEN, i have friends who depend on me, pour their problems, look for my guidance, they do not know how weak i am. i never had any tight or trying situation in my life to deal with, all my life i have been dealing with the problems of my friends. i have no first hand experience myself.
In India it is difficult to stay away from religion Gwen. People pull you in and you have to participate whether you like it or not. There are religious festivals nearly every other day. i go to Temples and Churches with my friends. i am a non believer like you, but religious people are surrounding me with all their love and affection. Sometimes i speak out but most of the time i keep quiet and join them.
i have read Nietzsche long time ago but don't remember this quote. thank you Gwen. i can't afford to be too different either. if not for myself, i have to think for my friends and come up with ideas to help them,sometimes leads to unpleasantness but i haven't lost a friend so far due to my harsh and blunt remarks.
i haven't heard 'tears of a clown' i'll try to get it.
Wish you all the best for the new year Gwen
EEEEEEE LAETITIA, good to see you back.
i see many people without friends, their problem is not love, they simply don't trust. If you don't trust you don't have friends. simple. They crumble. Some call mere acquaintances as friends. i see lot of people who still do not know what a friend is.
How you doin Laetitia ? Happy new year to you.
ANONYMOUS, i have adopted a monkey's approach to life and death. i am still trying to figure out human behaviour.
i am afraid i am not intelligent enough to understand your comment
i wish you the same, strength and courage to deal with any situation.
Rauf, Religion is still very prevalent here too...all surrounding.. even in our tiny community of 350.. there are 4 churches... and I can see 3 of them from my perch on the rock... almost everybody is involved in it.... It makes me wonder.. I think most participate on a level that they don't even understand.. maybe from a type of unknowing brainwashing... Because they believe it gives them comfort of some kind... it is sort of like the media... persuading people by saying things loud, repeatedly and emphatically ... it is not good for people to put all their hopes in things like this.. I wish I could understand why...
Rauf......
Strangers that we are,
Yet we are binded with,
Words of wisdon in blog
Here i greet you and meet
A friend Foe or an enemy!
Happy 61st Birthday, dear Rauf!
Don't know when it is exactly, just know that it's this week :-)
You are one of the very few people I am grateful I met throught this marvelous new medium that is the internet. Don't know a lot about you but I really admire the intelligence, sensitivity, humour, humbleness, wisdom and knowledge that your posts and comments denote. Not to mention your wonderful, top-notch photographs, which always leave me mesmerized.
May your enjoy many more birthdays in good health, good company and good humour.
May you feel at peace with yourself, if not with this crazy World we live in, through your life.
Happy New Year old bean.
and let's be careful out there eh?
Oh, good to see you back in your blog, Rauf! I have missed your photo updates.
May your New Year bring you healthiness - which we all need to get through the rough spots. Your building looks rather nice to me, because it is YOUR home - and where you are I know I have a friend. I am working to content myself with my own "home" life-building and find as much positive as I can within its boundaries. As they say - when life hands you lemons, make lemonade.
Wasn't she aware of your camera ? When I try to click kids that age, they come, snatch my camera and instead try to click a photo of mine. :(
Thanks for these wishes. We need them. And you too. :-)
oh i am so glad my family is expanding and i am smiling.
Dear sister GWEN, i was away for three days, sorry for the delay in response.
Here at home the love and affection of my sisters has made me a spoiled and arrogant brat. You and Ruth are making me one too. As dear CLAUDIA says in the comment above, we all should be grateful to the medium of internet that we met each other and have become one large family. We need not have similar views, it is the diversity which contributes to better understanding. i feel spiritually rich Gwen.
Religion has a role to play in our lives. i am contradicting myself Gwen. We, in fact, have evolved to believe in God and we are programmed to have faith in the supernatural which went out of hand. Future would be more chaotic as belief would grow stronger and stronger causing more and more divisions within divisions, resulting in more bloodshed. This is clearly a wrong turn of the process of evolution. We were not programmed to kill each other. Evolution has taken wrong turns in the past and it has rectified itself, giant reptiles for instance. Rectification takes millions of years and the human race may not last that long. Four Churches in a community of 350 is a clear indication of our extinction. A tiny community cannot stand under one roof and agree with each other.
This is not healthy diversity Gwen.
This is lack of clear understanding as you have rightly pointed out.
We can just hope the fog disappears and clarity of thought descends on all of us.
This is what you are going to hear.
No ! my mind is clear, i hope the clarity of thought descends on YOU
Aha ! So MY mind is cluttered and your mind is clear ? Who says that ?
No Gwen, we humans have serious problems. Evolving to believe in God is not working.
i wish i could welcome you to a pleasant post SAPNA, strictly speaking, it is wisdom and intelligence which has destroyed and divided our world in to different religions and races. So i am very allergic to wisdom and intelligence.
Welcome to 'Daylight Again' Sapna, i have to warn you that views expressed in this blog may hurt your sentiments.
i am a foe from a distance.
Happy New year
oh DEAR CLAUDIA, You make me feel so rich. Welcome to the family. We learn from each other Claudia. More from your side actually.
A friend of mine goes on a pilgrimage every year after observing some rituals for a month. i asked him if these rituals have made him a better person than last year. He didn't answer. i can say with pride that your blog and a few others have made me a better person and less arrogant. i have to be very grateful for that Claudia.
My love to you, your husband Ana and Clara and not forgetting Rose.
Happy New year.
oh its today CLAUDIA, 8th, thank you for your wishes. Other chaps who were born today are Stephen Hawkins, don't like him much, actually i don't know why i don't like him.
Russel Wallace born Jan 8th( i like him a lot, he was not given due credit for the theory of natural selection. Though he and Darwin exchanged notes of each other's work.) others are Elvis, David Bowie and Shirley Bassey.
EEEEEEE Hi PREACHER, my brother, where art thou ?
aah 1 i wish a less violent 2009 Preacher. hope things are fine, my love to Jax and Caz.
oh yes make lemonade SEW, thats the way. i am fine when i accept that the road is bad and i walk carefully. i make my life miserable when i keep cursing that i have to walk on a bad road.
hope you have fixed the door Sew.
Happy New year.
Happy New Year CUCKOO JI, i don't know, i am fine with kids, its the grown ups that don't understand me. there is hardly anything in me to understand Cuckoo ji. You understand a cat or a dog. i am no more than that. But we get more and more complex as we grow up. Children have no problems. Hope you had a wonderful beginning of the year 2009.
such a great thought.. and so harsh but so real... just look at her eyes so pretty full of dreams... that innocence would be lost soon... kills me from within that there are still kids like these but i cant do much about it.. as u said helping a kid isnt easy ... i wish there is some way...
Oh What a sweet baby. Like a bowl of freshly churned butter!
A lot of wisdom always from you. You are one of the wisest people I have met.
Thank you for the wishes, that is all one needs, courage and strength to shape one's life.
DARSHANA, kaisi ho ? i think you are referring to the next post. anyway This and the next are connected in some way. Its all about wishing. This is about how we want to hear hollow words of comfort which don't work and the next is about wishing. How wishes erupt our of our hearts. How we sincerely and genuinely wish for our loved ones. There is a contradiction here. Wishes don't work too. But nothing stops us from wishing and hoping for the best for our loved ones.
MYSTIC ROSE, No wisdom here. What i write is plain fact which we refuse to accept and understand. What can you do when people want to be misled ? Nobody wants to hear the truth. Truth is never pleasant. People want to hear lies. Lies are sweet to hear.
Nice post Rauf, as usely very good pictures, and your words make sense too.
Take care.
Thank you ASHI, Hope you are doing fine, please convey my regards to Bodil
“I, a stranger and afraid In a world I never made.”
- Alfred Edward Housman
happy birthday rauf ...
rauffff .... my season 2 ... has started on my wildpic blog !
yippppeeeee !
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