A Letter

Recently got a letter from my school principal, K. P. Ghimire. Very melancholic letter...He reminded me of our past days, how I was an intregal part of the school establishement, how he got into the circle of creating a examplary Boarding school system and how he regarded me his best students ever, even after so many years. He sold the school. It is sad. He worded it different, he said he transfered the ownership to a reputed, capitalistic school group in Nepal called NIST. If that still made me sad, I don't think, wording it different made it easier for him. He had his life's investment on it, not just money. He also told me about financial losses, and how he did not do anything for profit but for social, educational sophistication in modern Nepal. I am not very business minded but I could feel his pain. I understand how deeply ambitious he was, how hard he tried, how he did not leave any stone unturned. I don't want him to think that its was a failure. I wish not to call it a failure. The school has produced many brilliant students, have heard that most of them are doing well.

He wants me to send him my hand written Nepali letter. He wants to know my comment about it. So sweet of him, he was only of my many beloved teachers, who thought I could be an interesting creative writer. We had few minor confrontations, but he is a good human, who ask about his student, who cared to write to a student out of thousands he taught, and whom he could have easily forgetton. He always said hand-written letters are the best.

I sure remember how we were teased that the school's name "Panchakumari Boarding" and it was not an "only girls" school. What is in the name anyway? I have seen many criminals named Jesus. It was an ironly, alright.

When I remember him, I think of his hard work, dedication and his big ambition to make that school system a legendary one. He writes- we can't get anything sooner and anything more than what has alreday been written in fate. Oh God!! I am a big believer. True- not all good works get success, not all dedications bring fortune, not all Karma brings fruits. It is the system. It is very sad, very unfair. I don't agree with this system but I guess that is God's way.

Man can fall in love with anything, even with soulless things, sometimes, memories and dreams. It is all good. No harm in that. It creates a senstive human-super human. Insesntive, loveless people are just like old, broken chairs abandoned in Highways. Loves brings the best in us. Love brings senstivity, peace, creativity, sprituality, energy and a quest for living. When I will go back and not find my childhood school, my heart will ache. Life goes on, people are born, they die, new people will be born. Memories will deepen in the innermost core of any sensitive person, anywhere he goes in the existance. I hope things go better for him. I have to write a Nepali letter, after a long time, and even as stuborn, and overly confident as I am with my abilities in Nepali language, I feel hesitatation to write to a teacher, who taught me the basics of nepali literature.

I will pray; God will bless him in his future quest.

18th July, 2011

Irving

Playing Life

Sunday and I am at work. My grandmother's voice rings in my ears. I see her everyday in my dreams. I wish I could be like her.She is childish, very original and always innocent.She does not recognize money bills. Like a blind person, she touches and feels the money.Infact, the money never had any value to her.She just wanted to keep money. she never had to use it however; she was always provided.

I remember her wanting some jewelries and my fathers and aunts would take her to jewelry shop and buy some gold. She would be happy but her happiness would only last for a week.She would get bored. "Repetition creates boredom" she said. She wants something different, a neckless this time, or a ring. But the same story would be repeated next week. But everyone in our family respected that. They enjoyed it. The playfulness of childish innocent behaviors are the best. They are the original human nature. I liked how she played her game.

I always wonder how my grandmother keep her childish innocence to this day, never really affected by outside world. Very happy within, she had very abstract spirituality in her, not caring about human perfection, not caring about how immature she looks.Here I am too worried about future, selfishly, foolishly, and indecisively running here and there for carnal issues. I feel like a pendulum in space- somewhat of "jack of all , master of none"- trying for human perfection, looking for love, prosperity, good life among people. I really don't know what that means. When weekend finally arrives, a bunch of Nepalese people living in next apartment block drink, and yell and use profanity and sleep around. Weekend is theirs "sleeping around" time. Few girls wear glasses bigger than their face, wear clothes shorter than panties and post million pictures in facebook... That is their definition of happiness and great American life. Few friends made enough money putting tape in their shoes and stealing money from grocery stores where they worked. They want green card now, as if their quest will be fulfilled by that."Wow I am fully Americanized, Thanks God" one of facebook friend posts in her wall. She is kissing another girl, beer in one had,  cigarette in another and the clothes she is wearing makes it look like she is homeless, or just came out of jungle age. Nepalese people have Americanized themselves a little bit differently. And my cousin made me laugh whole Saturday when he said-- "Oh mercy! American people also get old". We were in tax office, waiting in a line. An old guy, who was also deaf was standing behind us. That old guy was wearing a pant, and did not have a belt on him. So with a safety pin he had held it together on his waists. Wrinkles in his pants... Poor old man... his wife called his hundred times, before he finally saw her and went to her... holding his pants with one hand, cane in other. My Cousin got his Buddha instinct, I guess. I felt pity but I knew about oldness already. If people knew about old age and death, it could have helped. My grandfather said: "if people feel for a year, the same feeling they feel when they come back from a funeral, world would be dramatically changed. There will be no wars, poverty, temptations, selfishness, greed, crime, sufferings, jealousy... no evil at all. All worldly desire would end. This world would turned to a heaven. "

I really don't know what Americanizing means. Money, green card, women, cars, houses and all the materialistic attraction means just temptation. That is not my way. But you got to  have the minimum required. Man can live without food for 10-15 days, but shall we not eat because eating is just wasting? Man can go without water for a week probably, shall we not drink when we are thirsty??. The intensity of our quest define us who we are. Now if I have to explain my grandmother about Americanizing, I don't think I can do justice. On top of that, I don't think she will want to know. I doubt about the fairness of treatment of fate, people get in this world. I can't do nothing but witness. All my writings are nothing but a phenomenon, a low product of ignorance, dissatisfaction of the world, disagreement with God but compliance, kind of foolishness- like a Hindu going to a temple and shaking a rock in there or striking his head against it and asking ---- WHY GOD WHY WHY? I don't think God lives there. By the way,  I told this to so called Nepalese society members who are collecting dollars, trying to build a temple that God does not live there but Nepalese politicians can be as stiff as a cat. They are as stiff as Saddam Hussein or Gadaffi. Until the end, they will stand. Many of American friends ask me why Nepalese are so brave. I answer them-because they are foolish, as simple as that. They don't know the definition of braveness. They go whole heatedly, brainwashed- in wars, in politics, in America... I mean wherever they go, they go without surrendering, without knowing what they are doing. Pure Neplalism will never be changed.

But if facebook makes them mini-celebrities and if they are happy in their findings, why do I bother. People preaching me about Nationality, Religion, value of a green card, green money, are still hopeless, while I am happy about something else they always ignored. I don't care about things they long even in their dreams. I long for something else. Salvation, pure joy, a bliss that can't be disturbed for eternity. Green things are for them... I just hope that God does not show me Red Card prematurely, like they did to Zidane. That is what I fear because world is not always fair. I have no big dreams, no desire to become rich, no houses to built, no history to write. When I die here, its finished here but not everywhere. Something never dies. Somewhere it will ever be present. Till I am here, I try my best. I will keep counting, I rejoice on what I have and I am slowly preparing myself for ultra violet card not just red, if there is any such thing. I will put my own case to God. I will speak for myself. If I am assured that Jesus, dying on the cross had already put my case in progress, I am speechlessly honored everyday. This is how I play life.