How To Kill Hope? - A Letter To A Dear Friend!

Life is indeed strange. Just a few months back, I did not know this person, but once we started talking, I realized that I know her as well or probably better than she knows herself. So, like we do very often, we were having this extremely interesting night conversation about relationships and hope. How the two are interlinked. We fondly call these talks of ours “Therapy”!!! And during the course of this heart to heart convo, there I was, thrown this question at me. “So tell me, how can I kill hope?” ………………… this sentence was followed by a prolonged silence from me, which is quite unusual and strange for a non stop chatterbox that I am. “Yes, go on, tell me, How to kill hope?”

There are some questions that make you think, and then, there are some that don’t let you sleep! This one was definitely the latter kinds. I told her, “This is so cool, thanks for giving me a topic I can think on, and blog about. I will reply to your question through my article.” And here I am, writing this piece, despite being devoid of sleep due to this lingering thought and a suspected rat in my room since yesterday!

How to kill hope?

By definition, “Hope is a belief in a positive outcome related to events and circumstances in one's life.” Hope is the feeling that, what is wanted can be had or that events will turn out for the best. So, in essence, hope is nothing but a glorified hypothesis.

Hope was personified in Greek mythology as Elpis. When Pandora opened Pandora's Box, she let out all the evils except one: hope. Apparently, the Greeks considered hope to be as dangerous as all the world's evils. But without hope to accompany all their troubles, humanity was filled with despair. It was a great relief when Pandora revisited her box and let out hope as well. It may be worthy to note that in the story, hope is represented as weakly leaving the box, but is in effect far more potent than any of the major evils.

So, if you put hope in context to human relationships, especially the ones that haven’t gone terribly right, what is the effect? Human relationships are inherently weird. At least I believe so. When we think we know all the answers, life comes and changes all the questions.

All our young lives we search for someone to love. Someone who makes us complete. We choose partners and change partners. We dance to a song of heartbreak and hope... all the while wondering if somewhere, somehow, there's someone perfect... who might be searching for us. And in this pursuit of finding that ONE made for us, we let our heart weep every now and then. That’s when we feel the need to cling onto hope, catch hold of the last straw, and make ourselves believe that Yes, What I had, was indeed the ONE… let me do everything I can to save it. We disguise hope, and keep giving it to ourselves in its falsest form, knowing fully well that we are just catering to our subconscious, just because we don’t feel like letting it go, just yet.

Change is never easy. You fight to hold on. You fight to let go. We forget that If we have to emphasize or defend the importance of something, then it probably isn't that important in the first place. I guess sometimes the ground can shift between your feet. Sometimes your footing slips. You stumble. And sometimes you grab what's close to you and hold on as tight as you can by calling it hope.
Over the course of our average lifetime we meet a lot of people. Some of them
stick with us through thick and thin. Some weave their way through our life
and disappear forever. But once in a while someone comes along who earns a
permanent place in our hearts. We just don’t realize that we should wait for that one to find us rather than clinging onto false hopes we’ve gifted ourselves about the one who never deserved us in the first place.

Growing up and out of relationships is never easy. You hold on to things that were. You wonder what's to come. But I think, subconsciously, we know it is time to let go of what has been, and look ahead to what would be. Other days. New days. Days to come. The thing is, we don't have to hate each other for getting over. We just have to forgive ourselves... for moving on, just because that’s the right thing to do. In essence, you don’t really need to “Kill Hope”. Just place hope where it deserves to be placed. On those better things, beautiful people, memorable times, prepare for the magic called life that is just waiting to unfold!! And yea, do it with a smile, she’ll feel welcomed!! :-)

25 Random Things About Me...

I put this up on facebook, because I was tagged in this silly game where one needs to mention 25 things about themselves.... I'm sharing this here too....


1) I’m doing this not for putting these things up here or letting the world know about myself, but for the sheer pleasure of self discovery!!!

2) I’m an emotional fool, I love people and things very easily, I get attached to them too soon, but I CANNOT express how I feel about them…

3) I really respect women a lot… Mom, aunt, grandma and few of my best friends…. Basically all the people I’ve been closest to are women!!

4) I think my school days were the best times of my life, I wish I could go back to school…

5)I think leadership is all about converting people’s potential into performance… I think I am a good leader…

6)An ideal start to my day is spending an hour uninterrupted on the pot with my three newspapers Times of India, Economic Times & DNA :-)

7) I think, having bought my mom a fully automatic LG washing machine from my savings is my biggest achievement till date.

8) I love talking to people on the phone, especially in the night, somewhere down the line I picked up this habit and now I feel restless and at times & don’t get sound sleep without talking on the phone.

9) A walk at the Marine Drive sea face is my biggest stress buster..

10) I am a hopeless romantic. I love SRK. I am a HUGEEE fan of Yash Chopra movies. I dream of walking at the sea face on a windy monsoon evening, hand in hand with my wife and my daughter in a pram!!

11) I guess the biggest achievement for any man is to find a loving partner who cares for him and with whom he can spend the rest of his life happily.

12) I am quite a people’s person, I know for sure that whatever I’ll do for a living, will have something to do with people, be it HR or Law or something random… I really don’t know.

13) I really think, All men are what they think women really are, and all women are what men have always wanted to be!

14) I am extremely spiritually inclined, I believe in God, I feel that truthful a prayer does get answered. I am also an eternal optimist.

15) I love my music. I really like devotional music. Indian folk, ghazals, smooth romantic classics, Indian classical music and sufi music really stirs my soul. I have an uncanny liking towards all songs having the word “Rabba / Rab” in the lyrics.

16) I love ice creams, Im especially crazy about raspberry duet & go mad about choco nut.

17) My favourite beverage would be an ice cream soda or an apple juice.

18) I’ve cried in a lot of movies… I still remember Khamoshi & Black!!!

19) I’m sure that the happiest day of my life would be the day I become a father!... (Oh I so identify with Steve Martin in Father of the bride!!)

20) I think the best of the TV shows are all now sadly off air, Dekh Bhai Dekh, Zaban Sambhalke, Wonder Years…… wish they showed all these again instead of stupid reality shows!!

21) If I ever had to propose to a girl, I’d do it by singing, Ronan Keating’s “It’s amazing how you, can speak right to my heart….”

22) Some of my most favourite possessions are my books, I love reading them, I truly get inspired by them. My mood, thoughts and actions are influenced by what I read.

23) My favourite pastime besides, teaching, reading, writing, blogging, sea face walking and talking on the phone is to sing to myself, either in the bathroom or in my balcony. I also dream of being a bestselling author someday!!

24) I am a keen follower of Indian politics and nurture a secret ambition of being a mainstream politician one day. I also think I’d make a rather good one!!

25) I love myself, I loved myself even more when I was a kid. I think I was the cutest kid ever, I also modeled for Femina when I was three, I still have the clipping.

26) I love defying rules. What the hell, I’ll put down a 26th point too. I am at times very insecure, I feel I have no friends and I am extremely lonely. I sit at home and sulk sometimes on weekends. In short I just need to be told that ...I’m loved :-)

Wangdu's Wisdom...

Dear World,

Now, this was a deliberate beginning to my letter. Not “Hey ssup” or “Wazzaaa” or “Howdy” like 98.37% of other people my age would have begun. I preferred to begin with the traditional salutation, not because my 4th grade English teacher taught me that is how it should be done, but out of my own sheer preference for the way I felt all the readers of this letter should be addressed.

Anyway, I just want to share with you my views on this really nice movie I saw lately. I also learn that it has gone on to become the highest grossing bollywood movie of all time cashing in 2.4 Billion Rupees or USD 51 Million and counting. Right since the time I saw “3i” or “3 Idiots”, there have been these thoughts in my mind about the true message that the movie conveys. Actually, not really what the movie conveys, rather what should I actually be making of it. What’s my takeaway? Is being Chatur, foolishness? Can all of us really be Phunsukh Wangdu? How really does the youth of this country think? Do we think at all?

The movie is a beautiful take on defying convention, on the art of friendship, on heeding to your heart’s call, on prioritization in life, on prioritizing life over escapist measures like a suicide. The movie is a brilliantly non preachy take on the pressures faced by the youth in India. But it also states that this pressure is self created. It suggests some rather cheesy, but outrageously workable methods of crisis management. It also makes a much deserved mockery of our educational systems which propagate the herd mentality, discourage out of the box thinking, I wonder if they really want us to think at all or just blindly follow. Imagine even the dean of the college looking up the thick encyclopedias for the meanings to the terms “Farhanitrate” and “Prerajulization”!!!!!!

It also peeps into the heart of aspirational India. An India which is not shining, neither is it incredible, bur still savors an ambition of social upward mobility and considers the dysfunctional education system a catalyst in its pursuit. The movie wonderfully pampers a rebel. It encourages change. It seeks to incubate innovation. It shatters the premise of social conformity to the systems and conventions. And while doing all of this, it also teaches us a thing or two about the sheer non materialistic nature of true love.

Having said all this, my most important takeaway from the movie still remains the fact that the movie appreciates “being different”. All through my growing up years, I’ve never been able to confine myself to one set of ideas, people, behaviours or interests. I love being MYSELF. And most of our youth today, as I see it, is trying to FIT IN to the social definitions of what’s COOL… rather than creating a niche for themselves and taking real pride in who they are! It is more important to people of my age to think, act and behave according to what everyone else thinks will be cool.

We want to do things, not because we like doing them, but because if we did them, our friends would think a certain way about us. We are too concerned in trying to please almost everyone apart from ourselves. We use social networking to connect with hundreds of our friends, but I think our generation has miserably failed in connecting with themselves. Anything “different” is usually questioned, looked down upon and sometimes even humiliated rather than being appreciated for its talent and interests.

Imagine telling your friends that you hate the concept of partying on Saturday Night and would rather enjoy an Indian classical music recital by Kishori Amonkar. Imagine you don’t want to go out drinking and dancing away on X - Mas eve but you wish to spend the day with the kids at the orphanage or go for the midnight mass at the Church. Imagine the reaction of your friends when you’d tell them that you’re going hiking to welcome the New Year or attend a poetry reading of the works of Kabir on 31st night rather than welcoming the New Year with a hangover. I’m sure each one of us can gauge the response our peers are likely to throw at us.

For me the greatest takeaway was the confidence that Rancho had, to reclaim his identity as Phunsukh Wangdu and make it sought after enough for a Silicon Valley dude to come to India chasing him all the way upto Ladakh. The bright spot of the movie really is the confidence with which Wangdu signs the “Declaration of Defeat” fully knowing that he’s the real winner. 3i tells you to pursue your passions, so that success will eventually have to follow you. (Khud hi ko kar buland itna… ke har taqdeer se pehle… khuda bande se khud pooche, bataa, teri raza kya hai?) It gives you the courage to be the schoolteacher Wangdu, rather than being “Chatur” a man in a mad rush to pursue material pleasures of a well paid job and the luxuries of life. Untill we realise these things… “All is well”!!!

Best regards,

Himanshu Kapadia

Till Death Do Us Part....

The Prelude:

While going through some of my research on social issues in India, I came across this report on Domestic Violence. Violence against women is a serious problem in India. Overall, one-third of women age 15-49 have experienced physical violence and about 1 in 10 have experienced sexual violence. In total, 35 percent have experienced physical or sexual violence.This figure translates into millions of women who have suffered, and continue to suffer, at the hands of husbands and other family members. The frustration had to be vented, so here it goes....


The Poem:

“SMACK” came the first one, and she fell to the floor,
Heeding to her instincts, she got up and ran to shut the door.

Her advances were curtailed, and “BANG” came another one,
She tried hard to escape, but was gripped tightly by her bun.

Now the scene got murkier, and the beast lost his fuse,
Unzipping his pants, he removed his belt and put it to its next best use.

It went on for half an hour more, while the hooligan was in his trance,
The helpless lady was beaten up sore, sanity had no real chance.

A loss in a silly game of cards compounded by a heavy desi dose,
The frustration had to manifest itself, so the usual victim it chose.

Beaten, gagged and ravaged she was, forced to perform the pleasure act,
Oh what sadistic pleasure it could’ve been, it was a one sided pact.

He kicked the food and had his drink, till he lay unconscious on the bed,
Irony had her last laugh, she was still breathing besides him, her soul, long dead.

The Indian ways of life and the feminine strife are miraculously strange,
They see hell each living day with a smile, and shed a tear sometimes for a change.

It’s a wedding gift they say with pride, our husband’s a God, its close to our heart,
We’ve promised to bear with them, come what may, till death do us part!