A place of mixed emotions!!

Have traveled to a lot of places from mighty mountains to beautiful beaches and always enjoyed them. A weekend getaway or month long vacation, they all bring a feeling of happiness and rejuvenation, but my last escapade was completely different from all the other travels throughout the world and I couldn’t resist penning it down for everyone to enjoy.

I think there is only one place in India which gave me of not two or three emotions at the end but a bag full of them from feeling patriotic and the fight of Azadi to devotion towards all mighty, from sleeping with a stomach full of yummy food to engaging in some retail therapy with all the traditional fashion of two different countries. And the best was all this was felt by me within two days a one single place and not making you guys rack more of your brains with what that special place is, let me put you all to ease by putting down just 8 alphabets and those are AMRITSAR.

The Golden City with people full of love and laughter was my destination for one of the weekends a few months back while spending a few days at the capital city. This city has a huge presence in the Indian History and every Indian wishes to feel it once in their lifetime and I certainly checked it of my list.

I’m not a very Desh Bhakt (all the die hard patriotic people please excuse me for it :P) but Amritsar made me feel about my roots and culture and wherever we are today being free and able to talk and do what we want was because of the people who sacrificed their lives at this place. One road which connect two countries who used to be together now are separated by two gates which are created by ourselves. The cement and tar are the same, the road is plain and straight helping people move then why do we have to be in tension with them. The Wagha Border made me realize how proud I can be of my nation and the enthusiasm our soldiers create among us at that place is commendable. Just a few steps and you can see a complete different scenario and I’m really intrigued to explore that one day.

Pain and anger was I felt develop when I visited one of the biggest piece of our history , the Jallianwala Bagh. It made me weep looking at the bullet holes in the walls and the well where thousands of people jumped to save themselves. It made me feel that what happened so many years back should be commemorated and talked and given importance every year. An year old baby to a 70 old grandmother not a single person was given mercy and that moment I felt angry that the people who did this shouldn’t be forgiven even now for the deed. Yes people come to rule and destroy but such a manslaughter is heart piercing.

But to calm all the feelings evoked by the two place before was the Golden Temple. I always laughed and questioned people who said that when they went to some place they felt the quite and peace, because frankly I had never felt that until this time. Sri Harmandir Sahid commonly known as the The Golden Temple is one place I can truly say that would make you feel good and bring a bit of peace to your mind and soul. This place brought the emotions of being in touch with the God. There are so many people to help you through out it feels good but at the same time it made me feel I should also be devoting some time here and provide some sort of service to the visitors. I felt that doing bhajans for hours for chanting mantras will never bring close to the almighty but just providing water to people at that place would certainly do that. The calmness and serenity that place hold even though there might be atleast 50,000 people at a time it a complete bliss and you feel you are connected to God throughout your journey their. I would really say that if you ever want to just visit one place to connect with God , this would be the right one!

Let’s get a bit more perky now with the fun things I felt. If you have read my bio you would know I just live to eat and shop and what better place in the country than this place. I’m personally not a big fan of Parathas, but let me tell you the parathas near the Golden Temple or Lawrence Road are simply amazing. Every meal my heart and stomach both felt happy with the food. The super sized Lassi which I could never finish to the mouth watering Kulchas (P.S. I’m feeling hungry right now while telling you all :P) everything will give you a foodgasm! The people who serve you are always so happy and smiling you feel at home and they are always ready to help you and that extra serving just goes somewhere and you don’t even realize it. So if you feel happy when you eat then this is for you to visit.

A girl can never have enough shoes and that’s what I abide to. This place has so much of culture to two different countries you tend to pamper yourself with some retail therapy. The juttis and mojaris in vibrant colors from pinks to oranges with ghungru to phundas everything fascinated me and to tell you I was feeling like Carrie Bradshaw buying the Manolos or Choos. The small shops have the Desi Punjabi Juttiya also the Pakistani traditonal footwear with all the bling and dazzel and let me tell you it will be a very hard time to pick and choose and after trying about 20 pairs I ended up buying 5 of them. This is not the end of the spree, the place is visited by designers and fashionistas from all over the world for the colorful handiwork called Fulkari. The floaral thread works are hard to miss and when I entered the shops to buy, it made me feela full Punjabi kuddi in those patiala salwar and floral kurtas. Girls if you love to shop till you drop this place should be on your list!!

This is what I wanted to share with the world where just a small place can make you feel everything a human can feel in a lifetime at a time and whether you are an Indian or Foreigner this should be always on your travel list!!

Where do WE go from here ???

The day you are born is the Happiest day in everyone’s life you are related to even though you wouldn’t understand a thing and would keep on staring all around because entering the BIG BAD world is really scary !!

The first few years are full of fun, no tension about studying or working, just EAT & SLEEP because that’s what you will be missing in the years ahead of doing NOTHING. The life goes on and you have to go to Kindergarten and learn the ABC’s and 123’s to become a doctor or an engineer in life. They say kindergarten is the place to make your knowledge base so that you can become a successful person in life, but isn’t it a place just to come pass some time and find what the world just consists of. It’s the first place where you meet people of your age and make first actual connect with humans who have not been related to.

We move from that homely place to a bigger place where we spend a major chunk of our life , THE SCHOOL !! Parents tell us to behave in the interview, warn us to keep our clothes tidy and tell that we should answer to the PRINCIPAL in the most polite way. But isn’t that place supposed to be where you can talk yourself out and be yourself, find out what you like and dislike, make friends for life and find your first crush and experiment on your love life. Every year passing in school teaches us to be a certain person and the pressure to become someone increases with it  as well. Parents want you to excel at studies , teachers want you to submit the assignments on time and Principal wants you to go out and win name for the school but no one ever asked you what you want to do, where you want to be or who you want to be. Everything is just put up on you and you have to live by those RULES even if you hate them !!

Graduating from high school but more burden than anything else in life, the decision made at this juncture is considered what you will become in future. From granddad to the youngest cousin everyone will ask you and give you advice in what you should become, they will never ask what you want to become and love. At this moment whatever you do or wan to do is considered wrong but every elder surrounding you and they think it’s just the adrenalin rush talking and not your brain and all the decisions you make are wrong.

Since you want to make everyone happy you take up something which you don’t like but are not even sad to take on and give a try to plan to graduate in that field. We slog for 3 or 4 years liking those subjects so that you can make something out of yourself which the world would consider respectable. In this journey even if you don’t like what you are studying the friends you make ,lectures you bunk, concern seat romances in theater or long hours spent in the coffee shops are what make this journey a bit more easy and happy. Sometimes these moments actually make you take a step and break free from what you are doing and follow your heart but sometimes even those attempts fail.

The final phase is where the studying still continues because you are expected to get a post graduation because a normal degree would not get you a good job or a good life partner. It does not bring a good name to the family. We slog again and get ourselves enrolled for more studies whether it’s a MBA or MS. The 2 years we are taught how to be a leader or  manager and handle various situations of the Big Bad Corporate World. I don’t think anything learned here is actually applied by all everywhere. We give up on our dreams again and the aim is to get the best paying job and pass with flying colors even though the job may just involve entering information like a machine in excel sheets and nothing else.

You get a job and next agenda is “BACCHA SHADDI KAR LO” !! The favorite line of everyone again. Don’t you think its time to enjoy and do what you love for sometime. The whole life we cannot be puppets and be handled by someone else. So where do we go from here ???

I have been through the same phase like this and questioned myself the same. What do I do and where do I go from here and just be myself. The answer what I could find was don’t think what the world says but just follow your heart. What if you don’t have a high paying six figure job like your friends or a boy/girlfriend’s shoulder to cry on when something goes wrong. Just break free from all the rules and go out and live your life. Nearly 24 years you have spent in living how others wanted you to, now’s the time do actually do what you like. Help save the planet or start making pots and selling them online..since the whole world is going online. Meet new people and save some money to travel. Explore new places and culture and could be you may find your soul mate and not marry the one you are asked to by others. This is what I have been doing and I thin this is what will take me ahead from where I’m standing currently.

PS: This is just my first step in doing something which I like, so please excuse with the style of writing or and other thoughts which might not be in sync with your thinking style !! 😛