Grazie St.Patrick's...Thanks for the Trip.

“Sach hai ki dil toh dukha hai...

Humne magar socha hai...

Dil ko hai gham kyun, aankh hai nam kyun?

Hona hi tha jo hua hai..

Uss baat ko...jaane bhi do...

Jiska nishaan...

Kal ho naa ho.”


My favourite lines from one of my favourite songs...

A short ode to my alma mater, St. Patrick's:

I don't remember the start particularly well... all I remember was that I cried more than all my classmates put together...'Maa ki yaad bahut aati thi', probably.

Come to think of it, I hated going to school, and despised everything it stood for.

13 years down the line, things have changed. And how!!!
My school is my 'everything' now... and the journey I've had, is something which is indelibly etched in my heart and soul. The journey is not about an epic that had been set in motion 13 unforgettable years ago, but it is about the unforgettable moments we've had along the way. Those were the ones that made life so beautiful...So, it has become all the more painful to let go. It has become hard to wake up on weekdays when the sordid reality hits me like a train - no more pseudo-traffic duty, no more getting "Heyy"-ed by Mr.Victor, no more bunking LNG's classes, no more hooliganism in the canteen... I could go on. And on. And on. Like that car in the Amaron Batteries’ ad.

And I can’t start talking about the comradeship amongst all of us Patricians, and all those bittersweet memories we share. Sounds clichéd, I know, but this is an indisputable fact. If I even begin on that topic, several tomes will be filled up, and I’d still want to write some more! And yes, its all over. ‘Picture abhi baaki nahin hai mere dost! Ab toh zindagi ke theatre mein sirf andhera hai…Jisme main khud ko, aur apne doston ko dhoondhta hoon…’

In hindsight, I really consider myself extremely lucky because I had something with me that made saying 'goodbye' so, so painful.

The memory of our last two days at school shall forever remain our memory, like the dazzle of the Sun after a hazy fog...You just couldn't have written a script for this.

We always want perfect endings. 'Happys Endings'(a la OSO). But now we've learnt the hard way that some poems don't rhyme and some stories don't have a clear beginning, middle and end.

We don't know what life has in store for us - for life is about not knowing, about having to change constantly, taking the moment and making the best of it, without being aware of what lies in store...

Weak, weak, weak. That's what you are thinking now. The guy whose blog you are so painstakingly looking up is a complete wimp. He can't bear losing his school! What stuff is he made of?

Actually, saying all this and feeling all this doesn't show me as a weakling. In fact it goes on to show how strong I actually am. Because giving up does not mean I'm weak. It means that I am strong enough to let go.

Grazie, St. Patrick's.

Thanks for the trip.