Wednesday, 31 December 2014

The P Café

Posted by abezayprose on 13:15:00 with No comments
Today, in the evening time when I got a phone call from a friend. She sounded exasperated and demanded to meet me ASAP. I was bewildered by such a demand as we both weren’t so much intimate in each other’s social circle and anxiously rushed to New Baneswor Chowk, where she was addressed to be. I barely spoke with her before and this was the first time she had called me. There was a sort of awkward feeling as I was proceeding towards her. I remember when I met her first few months back, maybe in January; she was happily married and was with her husband then. I met them at the tax office, her husband was starting a pharmaceutical trading company and I had assisted them for the same. After that, 9 months later I met her again, this time at one of my client’s office. I was there for an audit assignment and she was for a job interview. We both had to wait for a while and we both got into a conversation after a mutual smile.
“I think I have seen you somewhere?” She said amused.
“I think the same. Do you have any idea, where?” I answered in a question. I actually had known where.
“No idea, sorry. I just cannot recall it.” She said.
“Are you in business?” I asked.
“No. For a job interview.” She replied smirking.
I would have ended the conversation there, but I saw something strange in her that day. When I had seen her hitherto, she had so much poise in her looks, glowing with ecstasy. Now I could see woe. She looked miserable. And what astonished me the most was the wife of a newly registered trader, about whom I had read and talked a lot recently, his being one of the successful player in the Nepali biz world in a very short period, searching for a job.
“I am sorry ma’m, but I do certainly recognize you. What makes me unsure of the fact is that, why would the wife of a business tycoon search for a job in a company like this?” I asked.
“Maybe the business tycoon is no more her husband”, she said smiling.
I could say no more. I was shocked and that was clearly reflected in my pale-turning face. I apologized with my deep sympathies. She just smiled and asked if I could help her find a decent high paying job. We shared phone numbers and I assured her that I will remember her if I came across anything as such.
It was a queer encounter for sure. I wished her good luck for the interview before we separated.
I hadn’t seen her after that day. And today this jolting phone call, after about a month of crossing each other. I was hysterical to know what’s coming next. Anyway I had settled to make the meeting as discrete as possible.
I met her at the New Baneswor crossroads. She was an elegant young women, perfect physique with proper dressing sense. She was wearing a light blue suit that suited her very well. There was dark shades below her eyes, maybe she was skipping sleeping a lot recently. It was loud and noisy and by her body language I perceived that this was going to take some time. There was an awkwardness in looks of our both and we mutually veiled it. She apologized for a sudden call, thanked me for coming and assured that it was something important for her. I was thinking the same thing, “It better be good!” She proposed to have a small chat and appraised an underground café near the spot. I had already ventured this lot, so anything coming up was sure to be ok for me. She escorted me to this place, just about 100m from the crossroads. “P Café”, it was written on the board. I was surprised to see the place quite occupied, despite of its basement location and deafening noise of the generator. It was not even lighted properly. We settled in a table at the leftest corner. The seat was not visible from any part of the café and no one could hear what we say. I was feeling like being in a top secret meeting of a national concern, like in classic Hollywood movies.
“I am really sorry and thankful for you. It was really awkward for me to call you, but I don’t know anyone else in the city with whom I can talk and they would listen me. But this is not the only reason for my affording to contact you. It was actually a co-incidence that I saw your post in the Osho’s group. I got the feeling that you will fathom my plight.” She looked me with chastity as she started the conversation.
The dim light was adding shades to aberration in her air, making her more alluring. I resolved to not see in her face directly as I found myself staring and it was sure to create more awkwardness. We agreed on coffee and ordered the same.
“Is it something about your husband?” I asked.
“No, I don’t want to talk about that crock.” She had a desolate look. “He called me a berserk. Can you imagine that? I left everything for him. I trusted him, challenged all for him and he turned out to be a phony. How could I stay with him?” “He may earn a lot from his illicit business, he may be successful destroying lives, but he will someday face the annihilation for sure. He will have a long list of sins to regret.” She looked preordained.
“Illicit business? Destroying lives? I don’t understand.” It got intense the very beginning.
“Do you want to know how he grew so rich so soon? He smuggled charlies and cokes in the shadow of his pharmaceutical trade. He has contacts and they allow and assist him in this, those crooks! He can do anything for money. He destroyed his own wife’s life. He said that he loved me over everything and the traded me for money?” She started sobbing. I gave her a tissue, I didn’t know how I should console her. Her husband was an icon for me as well, I admired him for taking Nepali business trend to a new height and knowing the truth kind of devastated my belief. I was thrilled to hear what she went through. I could see her fighting through pain. She was weak, pretending to be strong. I felt pity for her.
The coffee came.
“Did you get the job that day?” I asked her, after the waiter left.
“No, I didn’t get that job. I had a nervous breakdown and I abused the interviewer.”
“What? You did What? Why would you do that? What did he say?” I was shocked hearing her. I couldn’t hold laughing and she joined. It was the first time I saw her laughing in the evening. Then suddenly her smile fade away and she had a terror in her eye. This mysteriously changing emotions were making me amused and scared.
“That’s why I called you today to listen me. There are some secrets, I have suppressed them inside me all this long. This is eating me and I can hold any longer.” I became more attentive. “I see things, unnatural things and I feel them.” She continued.
Her phone started to ring. She asked for an excuse and picked the call. I couldn’t transcribe what the person on the other side was saying but I could distinguish, it was a male voice. She assured him that she shall lock all the doors at the very moment and hung up. She then looked inside her bag and fetched a device, looked like a tablet, and kept in the table. She then inserted a USB cable attached with a device I had never seen such device before. As soon as the cable was connected a virtual keyboard appeared of blue rays and the table was now the keyboard. She clicked some buttons and it was done. She unplugged her USB and kept the tablet inside her bag. She then looked above at me.
“I guess you need to be somewhere to lock something up”, I reminded.
“No, I did it just now,” She winked. “Actually I got a job of lock women.”
“What’s a lock women? Never heard of such thing”, I was annoyed by all the confusions.
“Because that’s a word created by me”, she glowed. “Actually I open the locks in the doors and gates of different institutions in the morning and close at the evening. There are 7 institutions. That’s my job.”
“Why would they hire a person for just locking and unlocking doors?” My mind shouted that this is insane. “And they use computerized locks in the gates?”
“No, they are all physical locks! I have made them accessible through my computer so that I can do that from anywhere.” I could see no pride as she said this in her eyes. “If you want to know how I did that, it’s actually very easy. I inserted a chip in the lock that converted the mechanical lock into an electronic device that can be controlled from my computer.”
“That’s fancy! Where do you get such chips?” I grinned.
“It’s not available in the market, I made it,” She exclaimed.
“Wow! I didn’t know you are a software engineer.”
“The problem is I am not. I didn’t know even a “C” about a computer. Never studied a formal class before.”
“Then how did you do it? Where did you learn?” I couldn’t resist.
“I saw the procedure to make the chip in my dream.” She said. She actually said that. And that was the most unbelievable thing I ever heard in my life. I reacted the same.
“You’re joking, right?” I asked controlling my laughter.
“I wish I was?” She looked serious and valiant. I still couldn’t believe that.
“How?” I could just manage to say that.
“I was telling you the same. I see and feel unnatural things.”
“Unnatural things? Like what? Since when?” I wished in my heart that this was not real, she was just kidding. I never believed in such things. And now she was saying that it happens to her. Seeing her at that moment I had no other options to agree what she was saying. I asked her to go on. This was not science, it was related to inner mind, psychology and maybe spirituality. I read and followed spiritual Gurus like Osho, Kabir, Sai. I looked for answers and got quite satisfactory answers from them. That’s why I followed them. Apart from those, I never thought really about spirituality. It was just a medium for motivation and self-realization. I had read a similar case in a book of Osho’s, where an illiterate women could speak languages she never learnt or heard and give lectures on scientific theories. When asked to her she said that it comes automatically to her. I had laughed at that women when I read that, but now I was feeling sorry for her.
“It started after some months of me getting married. I am this because of my husband. I don’t want to remember his face in my life. He destroyed my life.” There was rage in her face. “He drugged me. I didn’t know at all about that. He used to mix it in my food. He used to inject me when I was asleep. I later learnt about it. I started to hallucinate. I saw things that didn’t exist. I started to observe everything very minutely. I used to hear the cries of dead children. I saw dead people, the spirits used to come to me. I was so scared. I could not sleep at night and that made me even sicker. He made me crazy and left me saying that I was crazy. Can you believe that?”
I couldn’t believe her confession. How can a person be so cruel? I was enraged. My temper was high and I was feeling hot inside. My eyes were turning red. He was the most disgusting and hateful person in my life and I just wished I didn’t meet him anywhere because I would do something insane if I met him anywhere.
“He tried to send me to the rehab and also to the mental care, I escaped somehow. But I knew I needed cure.” She continued. “I then joined Osho. All I am today, able to sit in front of you and communicate socially, the total credit goes to Vagwan Osho.” I never admired Osho more than that day.
“I called you here because I saw your post in the Osho’s group and also your name in the tapoban visitors. I worked there as a sevika of the Acharya and also volunteered for other chores. It really helped me. All those spiritual awakening lectures and soul purifying meditations are divine.  Which meditation did you try? How many sessions did you attend?”
I was in trouble. I was not that much in Osho, as people thought. I had not attended even a single session and didn’t know a single meditation. I had seen some videos in YouTube and read some book. I knew that was not enough to talk Osho with her. So, I confessed the truth. She smiled and suggested me give it a try. I could clearly see the lines of disappointment in her face. And that made me nervous. So, I thought of changing the topic.
“How can you invent such things out of your dream? I can’t remember what I saw in my dream any day! And I read that we can see only what we know in our dreams.”
“I thought the same. But Acharya explained it to me. He told me about the states of mind. The conscious mind, that enslaves us, makes us believe that we know only those things that our conscious mind knows. That is what we have gathered with the help of our senses. And there is this unconscious mind. Though called unconscious it has the knowledge of everything. A common human can ever get into his this part of mind. People like Buddha can only access this knowledge. That’s why Buddha knew the truth about everything in the world just sitting under a tree. In actual there is nothing in the universe that we are not aware about. The search is never on the outside, everything is inside us. We just need to focus on ourselves. But everyone cannot be Buddha. Acharya showed me another way for enlightenment. He told me that there is a bridge between these two minds, the sub-conscious. It acts as the mediator and gives us the option which part of the mind we want to use. The dreams, alternate personalities, reflexes are all due to this sub-conscious mind.”
“So, how can we divert our sub-conscious mind from our conscious to unconscious?” I wanted to know more. I was getting into it and I found it logical.
“It is through meditation.” She replied. “There are various meditation techniques.”
“I still don’t understand how you can invent such chips by dreaming about it.” I was curious.
“Acharya told me that whatever we think about so deep, we dream about the same. It should reach the sub-conscious, which was the precondition. The sub-conscious extracts either from the unconscious or conscious mind, so it depends on your choice of mind what you want to see. And about remembering the dream, there are a lot of meditation technique. The easiest way I learned is the lucid dreaming. Have you heard about that?”
I certainly had heard a lot about that. I even tried it once or twice but could not ever succeed.
“Acharya told me that it is a very dangerous technique and never to try it. And I request you not to take this all things so seriously, I mean I don’t want you to try these out yourselves. You can take sessions in Tapoban though.”
“Can you read mind?” I shouted, because the idea of trying all she said once by myself was revolving in my mind. I was now quite assured that she can do almost anything.
“A little,” She said grinning, and became quite. “You know why I abused the interviewer that day? Because I could read his mind. He was a pathetic person and he had sick mind frame.”
“So your ability cost you a job. Can you rely on that?” I questioned.
“Then I could, now I cannot. Then I was just out of the sessions and I wasn’t totally cured. Now I have slowly removed all such things. Or I thought so. But I feel scared again now a days. It started to feel strange and then strange nightmares. I cannot sleep at night. It’s not ghostly feeling I am sure. Its loneliness, I feel scared that I will not be able to make to make any friends.”
“Well you already made one, I guess.” I smirked.
“Thank you for coming for me today and listening to me. It’s such a relief to open with someone. I was so scared to share it with anyone but I was dying keeping it inside me. I had so lot so say but all that’s gone now.”
“I loved hearing all these. You completely changed my dimension of thought. I should thank you for showing me a totally different universe of thought. And in future at any time, you want to talk about anything, you can count on me.”
She smiled. I smiled back. She had a strange light in her eyes. I hadn’t seen that in any person before. She was looking straight at me, not saying anything. I was feeling uncomfortable and scared. I pretended to look at my watch and removed my eyes.
“It’s probably getting late,” She said. “I had a good time. I hope to see you soon.”
At that moment all my mind could wish was getting out of there as soon as possible. I bid her goodbye and we separated.
I couldn’t forget her words, neither her eyes and they haunted me the whole evening. At night I decided to try lucid dreaming technique. I woke up and wrote this all. I think it worked, I can remember all the minute detail as I write. But as I finished writing, I feel that I wrote all this in dream. I am scared that this meeting was all hallucination of my mind. My mind is suggesting that I have no such friend and this is all an illusion.
I couldn’t remain in such a quandary so the first thing I did next day was going to the place where the café is located. To my relief there is a basement café with the name “P Café” but my mind still doesn’t believe that the event is real.

Wednesday, 17 December 2014

Dream Catcher

Posted by abezayprose on 09:44:00 with 1 comment
This is my story. Nothing so special, thrilling or sensational. But it certainly is worth sharing. This is the reality of lots of other young people all over the world. Wherever a person may live, whatever the person eats or speaks, people are similar in lots of ways in terms of emotions, empathy and remorse. So, my story represents lots of other emotionally baked people.
Life was majestic, happy-to-go lucky. I was jaunty and adamant without being pretentious. I guessed lots of others dreamed of being me. I had all lock stock and barrel; gorgeous I was, good in studies, benevolent family, I was kind of “the father’s daughter”, and above all I never lost smile in my face, maybe no reason to lose. I had super-eminent friends and they were with me ubiquitously. All galas were attended together and people even commented us that when we were together we were like a radio talk show, no matter if the audience is grasping what we were saying, we were always chattering. But it wasn't just limited to our being together, thanks to Facebook and mobile phones no hearsay was missed. If you wonder what was that we talked about so lot I would say, you will think it mostly as nonsense, but for us it used to be the most important matters to know. The talks were mostly about clothes, other girls, little scams and secrets, controversies of movie stars to classmates, like we talk about almost everything that came in our head. We talked about boys, very cautious of being a new scam, talked about our crushes, about boys we met, blind dates though very rare, our perception about them, their hair style to their talking style, caring, yes almost everything. Apart from gossips I had my friends for shopping, market visits and in every celebrations. I was really happy with my friends, being with them was marvelous but I had an avidity inside me of having someone more closer, a person out of the ordinary who shall treat me special, like the only girl in the world. I would secretly wish for it when I used to watch movies, or see couples in malls, restaurants and I longed more when I saw my mom and dad so much into each other, when they understood each other emotionally and expressively. I had few relationships in the past but they were all kind of farces and parodies and surely didn't last.  I wanted someone for me and this feeling was eating me up. I unconsciously started to look around, guys from my school, friend’s friends and even checked out some profiles in Facebook, some quite stood out in my measure of expectation. I just checked those guys out, I had no guts to approach, being a girl, a beautiful girl, there was this thing called girl’s attitude that prevented me from such attempts and allowed only to leave hints.
I was in quandary the whole time and suppressed the feeling until the day a boy from school, Ankit proposed me up. He looked pretty good, and had passed my expectation measure, so there was nothing to think of. But there was again this decree of girl’s attitude and I was supposed to ask for some time to think about it and I did the same. Though I had a dismay about him changing his mind. Maybe in greed of love, I had lowered my self-esteem real low. I talked with my friends about that event. I was excited to see their reaction but only made me disappointed. They all knew him and started foul invective towards him. He was the most negative personality for them, they reveled gossips about his getting dumped by his ex for being a jerk and also claimed that he was interested in me only to show his ex that we can get better. They clearly asserted that he was just trying to use me up. If it was about anyone else I would readily have believed them but in this case I was already so much into his influence that everything they said about him was only blah blah blah in my ears. I even started hating them for disliking him. I started to think about him even more and started to be with him. I joined him everywhere he wanted me to be. Firstly I restrained but later it was not so big fuss. We were seen together in all places and he alone replaced all my other companions. He listened to all my jabbers and girly talks, and always supported me even if I was against the universal truth. He promised to be with me in all delights or despairs. He was my true friend and best friend and my love of life in no time. I wanted him to propose me again but he didn't. I started to post love quotes and desires in the Facebook wall. He liked and commented in all but I still didn't get what I wanted. Maybe I was throwing hints but even I didn't know what I was doing really, it just felt so good. Then came the Valentine’s Day. There used to be a special party in the lakeside club, I always wanted to go there, but it was late night party and being single and going there with girlfriends would be embarrassing, so I had just ignored it all long, but this time I was asked by the special person of my life and there was nothing to stop me this time. I was sure it was going to be the best day of my life, and yes, it was. He proposed me in front of everyone in the proposal session, yes lots of other boys did propose their companions as well but it was the best thing ever happened to me and there was no reason for denial. I was formally his girlfriend.
The party ended late night and he walked me home, holding my hands and kissed me goodbye. Everything was as I wanted. He was like an angel for me. I was so happy until I found my dad waiting me inside. I froze with fear. He inquired about my whereabouts and my recent strange behaviors and also my low grades that I had not realized till now. I had no answers but wasn't guilty as well, I was with someone I wanted to be, so I lied and got my excuses. My dad wasn't satisfied, I saw it in his face. How stupid I was, giving pain to my beloved to live a fantasy. But I was ready to sacrifice anything for this fantasy. My friends still urged me to stay away from him. My parents suggested me to concentrate on my studies then in baloney. But I stared loathing them more and convinced myself that they were just jealous. Phone calls, texting, chatting and regular meeting bonded us even more. I opened even more with him. I told him what my friends thought about me. I also wanted him to tell about past relationships but he just dodged saying that he had no any past relationships and I was the first and shall be the only one. I was assured he loved me truly and all my friends were just liars. Slowly from private texts and conversations our relationship started to evolve on Facebook walls and got public. There was a thrill and satisfaction of claiming him mine in public. We were the cutest couple in the town, everyone commented so. But I was also scared that my parents may take some actions against our relationship if they know about it, so I tried to convince him to stop the exhibition of our relationship but he was like showing everyone that he got the cutest girl in the town, he said the same to me, why to hide if there’s love. It further increased my confidence towards him, still I was scared. And it happened what I was scared of. Dad asked me about Ankit. The talk raised after I denied a proposed family trip giving a stupid study reason and Ankit posted a picture of us in my room the same day. Dad, mom and brother returned half way home. I again got excused with a lie. Dad looked really stressed, maybe I made some harsh comments, but I was so much into Ankit and I was drifting away from all others. He tried convincing me, even scolded and threatened to lock me inside if I didn’t stop this drama. I apologized with my dad, I promised I would stop all and focus on my studies; I was lying again and certainly everything continued and even more. My grades declined more steeply and my dad stopped talking with me. I saw everyone in the family was stressed but I didn’t see why, as I was doing the right thing. My once happy and loving family was now turning gloomy, I felt sad about that, but I couldn’t sacrifice the love of my life. I even started to think about leaving my dad’s house. Things worsen even more, I ignored my parent’s dissatisfaction and all my friends showed cold shoulders towards me. But for me none of these matters, I had him by my side.
And after six months of us being together despites of all sorts of restraints that I thought only made our love stronger, something happened that shook me and the inner foundation of my love, like an earthquake shakes the earth, a really strong one. I spotted him with his so called ex. I couldn’t go to them directly, that would create a scene that I didn’t want so I decided to ask him about that in the evening conversation. I wasn’t mad because I saw him with a girl, I was mad because he had lied me that he was going for a trek to Gandruk with his friends. I texted him in the evening for answers but he alleged that I was mistaken him with someone else because he was on the trek. I knew I had seen him, but I had no choice to believe and forgive him. But it was just the beginning. He started pretending to be busy and was unable to find time for me. He started to ignore my phone calls and texts. Our college was over so I couldn’t meet him as he said he was busy with his entrance preparations and language classes. One day I planned for a surprise visit to his home but only got jolted to know that he had lied me that he told his parents about us. He wasn’t home either and his parents were worried too. They told me about the girl who visits him a lot, they didn’t like her either. I clearly knew they were talking about his ex who probably was reinstated as present.
I felt miserable and lonely. There was gloominess and melancholy all around me. I was feeling this after so long. I realized my fantasy was over and I had no idea how I would face my parents and friends. I dumped them all for him and now it was my turn to get dumped. This feeling made me scared and I got more desperate. I didn’t believe the truth, I still hoped what I discovered to be false. I tried calling him and texting him and finally got a reply. “How I dared going his home?” I could feel the rage. It burnt me like hell. Finally he said, he can’t be with me anymore. I being so irritating, crossing my limits and breaching his space wasn’t the one he wanted, and he felt suffocation even when he thought about me. The roof fell over my head. I got broken into pieces. It was a disbelief how some phrases can hurt so much. I was enraged. I wanted to hurt him with the pain I was feeling. I wanted to cut him in pieces, shoot him with hundreds of bullets, I just wanted to get rid of that jerk. But I was wounded. Tears fell off my cheeks. I cried and cried. I saw nothing ahead. It was all over, it was all over now. And forever. It was all dark, maybe I fainted. Everything was null and dark and in the darkness I saw a light. There was a glowing photo frame with a picture of me about 5 years old playing in my dad’s lap. I felt sad for him and every other person I loved for what I did. I felt guilty for my deed. On a race of being a dream catcher I had lost the hold on reality and now I was empty handed as I woke up.