Kochah

While browsing through various social causes on a community site, I came across one called “Kochah”. Kochah is one of the many projects by Farhad Darya; a US based singer and composer, born and brought up in Afghanistan. The project has been launched with an intention to draw the society as well as the governments’ attention, towards orphans and working street children of Afghanistan; who have always suffered. The objective is to reshape the destiny of vulnerable children of Afghanistan, especially the street and under age working ones; who have been a constant victim of more than two decades of war, social and cultural strife in Afghanistan.

The most noticeable thing about this cause is the picture used by its creator, which is of a young Afghani Muslim boy. The boy seems to be crying with his right hand pointing at someone, mouth open as if he is bawling, eyes red with tears and his soul deeply wounded; surrounded by a horde of people standing helplessly behind him. What deeply touched me about this picture is the child’s eye.

Eyes, I have always felt, narrate a story of their own. They have this unique ability to speak about what one is feeling. The intensity might be visible initially and ephemerally; the overall story still being obstinately exhibited. We might be melancholy, jubilant, irate, gloomy or even ecstatic at times; all being evident by close observation of ones eyes.

I could indeed sense a lot of sorrow and also despair in those eyes; which for that particular moment made me think what we have become. How ferociously brutal have we become, with the advancement of technology; which ideally should have been used for the protection as well as development of mankind; is worth pondering over. We need to reevaluate ourselves and actually empathise with these children; it’s perhaps then that we might understand the consequences of our wrong-doings. They not only loose their family or their house but also their youth, because of a war; and adolescence, I believe, is a beautiful phase of every individual’s life; once lost then nothing but a forlorn look is to be found. We need to restore the blissfulness in those eyes or else…. all is lost.

In search of an answer

Loneliness is a strange feeling. There are times when one might have all the material things at ones disposal and still might not be happy. There is this one thing missing which for some odd reason is of acute importance; and at that particular time perhaps the only possible solution for ones problem. Ever imagined why we need someone in our life to make us feel better. Why couldn’t we be self-sufficient and not need anyone.

It is extremely painful to get up every morning pretending in front of others and the mirror that one is absolutely fine. Going off to work smiling when all one wants to do is perhaps be in a pensive mood and not laugh at our boss’s fatuous joke or a colleagues frivolous gossip. Coming back home, hoping that one could get some rest; while all one gets is a horribly long night sans sleep. Life at that particular time becomes a strenuous exercise; not worth performing. Why are we foolish enough to think about a particular person’s well being when the person in question is hardly interested? Why do we even bother to care when the other person thinks that it’s smothering her? Why can’t we just forget about it, live our own life and not bother? Is it really tough to do so? Yes, initially it is, but there comes a time when this whole ordeal becomes excruciatingly arduous. When it becomes unbearably difficult to carry on and we get so fed up with the situation that all we want to do is snap out, somehow.

This is the precise moment when we need to put our foot down and crush this feeling inside. Kill it somehow and stop it from flourishing any further. Do we need a cold heart to do so? Yes we do. Do we need to be inexorable? Yes we do. Do we need to be emotionally unresponsive? Yes we do…. And so we shall; and so we will. There is more to life than just a relationship.

Love, is like magic. But magic is... just an illusion

Why is it so difficult for people to fall in love? Almost everyone, from a child to an adult has a ready definition of love; none digressing too far from one another. If I were to be asked about love, I would perhaps, enumerate thousand wonderful words in the praise of it. Well, there isn’t anyone who would forthrightly deny all the beautiful things said about this strong feeling. Yet, come to think of it, people find it extremely difficult to fall in love. Even if we do, then after a while it’s almost impossible to take the relationship forward. Of course there are quite some lucky souls amongst us who fall in love; and fortunately end up with that very person.

Whenever we think that we might want to fall in love, we, the so-called “homo sapiens” try and rationalise. We want to speculate the current gains and the future losses that might arise from the relationship. I wouldn’t say that being rationale is not good; but to the last thread of it, wherein there is practically no scope for trial; this truly does amaze me. One thing that we perhaps do not realise is that we as an individual are extremely short-sighted; irrespective of us being endowed with greater brain power, as compared to our predecessors. All our assumptions are based on our past happenings or at the max on the things that we hear from people around us. We always ask others what they can give; but never do we try and think what we can give in return for so many things that we want. Compromise is another big question. “Why the hell should I compromise on the things that I want to do.” Never really thinking; that perhaps the other person might also be compromising on a lot of things to make me happy. Compatibility is something that we so rightly want and that too from ‘our’ perspective. The best part is that whenever we come across someone who thinks alike, we are the first to point out that, “Man, you only think about yourself.”

Phew, so much of analysis; and yet we can’t understand that all it takes, is to follow our intuition. We simply need to lower our guards and for one instance get into the flow of things. Yes, we might fall and get hurt in the process; but if we do succeed then there’s nothing like it. We need to believe that some things are meant to happen even if they appear seemingly pointless. But this I guess, is too much to ask for; because sorry to say, we do not work so. Loving someone is definitely not the most important criteria as there are other things that have to be thought about, which are momentous and of grave importance. So what if there is a lot of reason that the other person can see. Well, I don’t see any compatibility; and that’s all that matters because I think rationally. I have analysed everything and I think that there is no scope for us; so what’s the point in trying. On the other hand, the fool all so smitten perennially tries to show how much he loves; fighting a loosing battle.
Ah! Alas, he has lost; it’s the win of head over heart and all he can say is…
“If music be the food of love, play on,
Give me excess of it; that surfeiting,
The appetite may sicken, and so die.”