Atoms

We were just a collection of atoms,
who came together for a brief period,
and then fell apart. 🙂

Tweeting: @thebrokenspecss

Pursuit

If you live in India or have ever traveled to India in the second decade of 21st century, you would have found a lot of places having fancy street foods, specially, in the metropolitan cities like, New Delhi, Mumbai and Bengaluru.

If you exclude the posh areas of New Delhi and NCR(National Capital Region), and then walk on a very normal street/roads which connects welfare housing societies, you are likely to easily spot the following roadside options like, Ice-Cream tricycles, Open roof stalls of Sugarcane Juice, roasted corn and maybe the push-truck(thela) tickiwala(also called, Chaatwala).

An addition to this group is the roadside “Gol-Gappe”(also called PaniPuri). Now, what’s PaniPuri? It consists of a round, hollow puri, fried crisp and filled with a mixture of flavored water (known as imli pani), tamarind chutney, chili, chaat masala, potato, onion or chickpeas. The complete setup on which Gol-Gappe, Pani and other spices are placed is very easy to carry and move, and also can be quickly placed anywhere and can start selling it back. Now you are thinking, why I am writing about all this stuff? Here’s why.

Every evening when I am traveling back home from work, in the last part of the transit I have to make a 20 minutes walk to get to my apartment. In these 20 minutes, starting from getting down from the auto, finding the Panwari(guy who sells Paan, which is made up of betel leaf with areca nut) and cigarettes(which is sold more than the paan these days), interestingly, his wife also sits during late hours to keep the business up. Some 200 steps ahead, I find the Ice-Cream tricycles from Vadilal, Kwality Walls, Creambell and newly famous Havmor, which is expensive to my pocket. 😛

After 5 minutes, I find a little boy selling Gol-Gappe at the corner of the right turn of the road. I walk towards him, and ask for the rates. He replies, “4 pieces for 10 bucks”. I said, “Can I have it?”, he offers me a dona(which is a paper bowl). The Panipuri tasted amazing!! 😀

Yesterday evening, I left early from work and while getting back home, I met the boy again. He is 3/4 of my height, considering I am not tall, so he looks short. He should be around 10-12 years of age. I asked him, “What’s your name?”. He replies with a smile, “Vansh Gupta”. I asked him if he goes to school, he replies “Yes, I go to school”. With a thought on how he gets time to study, I asked “When you study or do your homework?”, he says “during night, after having dinner”.

I asked him if I can take his picture which I will share on internet with my writing. He shakes his head with a smile. 🙂 I said “Okay, can I take picture of your setup?” And he says “Yes” this time. I also checked with him, “So, where are you from and who else are you in your family?”, to which he replies, “I am Mirzapur(in Uttar Pradesh), and here I have my father and brother who also sell Gol-Gappe, whereas my mother lives in hometown(Mirzapur)”.

He has friends of same age. They also sell Gol-Gappe. One is Rajkumar and another is Komal. I have ate Panipuri from them too. 🙂 Komal is the smart one, like a leader among these boys. I think he likes momos because I have found him eating momos a couple of times. Whereas, Vansh is the good-looking one. But they all are very simple and happy going boys. 🙂

At the age of 12, helping family to earn enough so as to get one time meal is really unbelievably appreciable. Just think about the sacrifices they have been making, like missing their mother, not playing outside in evening so that they help their father and surely not able to spend enough time to learn and study so that in future they don’t need to sell Panipuri.

The least you can offer is a Smile 🙂 to them, do not see them as someone lesser than you and just be good and motivate everyone around you. Life is not easy for everyone.

Tweeting: @thebrokenspecss

Advertisement

Deprive

Deprive.. a woman
of water
for too long

and

she will stop
believing in rivers. 😐 😦

Tweeting: @thebrokenspecss

Gaza ~ An open air prison

“The Rocket may be above us,
but they have forgotten that
Allah is above them” 😥

~ A Palestinian Child.

We don’t need to be a Muslim to stand up for Gaza, we just need to be Human. #BeKind #Dua #PrayforGaza

Tweeting: @thebrokenspecss

Stranded

And..

In the blink of an eye,
everything that meant anything to Him,

was gone.. 😦

Tweeting: @thebrokenspecss

Inarticulate

He loved her in silence..
Maybe, because he was scared of

Rejection in vocal. 😐

Tweeting: @thebrokenspecss

Equivocation

I read her blog, again and again.
This time with a little more attention.

I read the lines.
I read in-between the lines.

And then I realized,
that
the tears she talks about,
are not the tears of joy. 😮

Tweeting: @thebrokenspecss

Dear Daddy

Hi 🙂

I hope you are doing great at your end and having an awesome holiday season. 🙂  The year 2015 is about to bid adieu, time to thank for everything it gave us. So, before you get ready with your resolutions for year 2016 and plan out the party for New Year’s eve, I would like to share something similar to what I shared starting this year (Post: Slap Her!).

Recently, I came across a video which depicts how the society and its culture encourages violence against women.
In the five minute video, a unborn baby girl tells her father about all of the harassment and abuse she will suffer at the hands of men during her lifetime.

I won’t go into details and would like to share this video asking you to just give your valuable 5 minutes.

Warning: It’s about boys.

“One thing always leads to another. So please stop it before it gets the chance to begin.”

Tweeting: @thebrokenspecss

“For those I love, I will Sacrifice”

A story behind a Soldier’s Tattoo.

For those I love I will Sacrifice... captured in a photo on the side of a wounded warrior, as he is being medicated. One of the soldier after his retirement when being asked  “what you regret most?” replied “I only regret that I have but one life to lose for my country.”

There is a lack of public recognition of the tremendous life changing impact that is incurred by an individual who has been wounded in combat. After suffering this catastrophic event individuals are left struggling to put back the pieces of their lives. They are physically scarred and subconscious about their wounded and often disfigured state, leading them often to avoid going out in public. They try to avoid the scrutiny that is directed towards those forced to wear excessive medical devices, carry massive scars, or showing the loss of one or multiple limbs. All of this is compounded by their inability to wear any kind of regular clothing. Many times People immediately think that an individual has been injured in an automobile accident or some other grievous incident and fail to recognize that this is what the Cost of Freedom looks like; a sacrifice they made for all the country people.

I believe that a man is the strongest soldier for daring to die.