My blog is essentially Me. No, by that I do not intend to portray a narcissist image. What I meant is the person that I am, people, circumstances and events who have made me, moulded me, sharpened my wits and defined my thoughts, is deeply reflected in my blog. In this blog, I am going to share some of my personal and professional experiences, and some experiences borrowed from family and friends. So before I begin talking about my blog, I would like to give a succinct account about myself.
I am Indian. I am also Bengali. By birth and by behaviour. I was born in Shillong, affectionately referred to as the Scotland of East. My entire school life was spent in Shillong. Both my parents are professors and as such in the close knit community life of Shillong, I have always been surrounded by academicians. Wherefrom stems my profound love for reading and writing. At the time of writing this blog, I may as well state the obvious. I am presently happily unemployed, although my joys will be short-lived (hopefully!). I am on a self-imposed sabbatical (no, there is no pay or research grant involved, although you could throw in home food as an excellent compensation). And I am making use of this time to pen down all the memorable and not so memorable moments in my life.
I did my bachelors from Chennai, my second homeJ. I also worked for a year and a half in Chennai. All the more reason for me to be attached to Chennai. Chennai has been a potpourri of emotions, experience and events for me. The five and a half years I spent here have come to be defining years in my life. I would have said struggling years, but I reserve that for later years. Chennai has been my first metropolitan familiarity, my home away from home, the place where I lost my mind (my balance too a couple of times), my sanity, my sense of humour and miraculously got it all back, unscathed.
So basically, all my stories are about life from in and around Shillong and Chennai through my eyes. As and when I get to travel to other places, I will include anecdotes from those places too. Why am I blogging about it? Primarily because the people I am going to mention in these stories, and the stories themselves have made all the difference in my life. The events may seem very commonplace to you, dear readers. But is it not these very everyday incidents that make up a lifetime of memories and something which we fondly look back to, just because it makes us smile? Another reason for this blog. We are living in a very fast evolving age, where every inch in our lives is being replaced, modified, hauled and claimed by an electronic facade. And I am no exception, a statement made evident by the fact that I am typing the draft for my blog. There may come a time when our next generation would not even know certain traditions, customs and rituals that define the typicality of our cultural communities. It may happen with my own children. Google could be a very reliable source for them to trace their lunacy to their ancestral idiosyncrasies. However, I would prefer that they rather hear it from me first. And if my memory fails me then, (or if I am busy making money to buy them PSPs), this blog will serve the purposeJ.
I named this blog thus because of my mother. She is a professor in Geography and she loves travelling. When I was quite small, she got me a set of books titled “People and Places”. It was a collection on all the continents and countries of the world, the economies, the people, the culture, communications and trade, etc. It was an extremely colourful set of books and even though I did not often feel like reading them (Geography was not really one of my favourite subjects!), I would see through the pages which had pictures of the people from all nations in their traditional attire. So “Of People, Places and Time” will be my very own, much personalized compilation of, well, of people and places.
One disclaimer: All things mentioned here are not completely accurate. The stories are based on my personal experience and on things I’ve heard from my friends. Not all of it may be true. Exactly at which point I have moved from fact to fiction will be hard to tell, even for me. Given the ardent storyteller that I am, I have really not made a very clear distinction between truth and fabrication. I write solely for the joy of writing and with a hope that someday somewhere reading my works might make someone really happy and momentarily bring out the child in them.
While writing, I have also taken a generous dig at every possible kind of community. My apologies if any of you are offended. I bear you no ill will. In doing so, I have only tried to bring out the lighter side of every ritual and sacrament. All I wanted was to tickle your ribsJ. For certain narratives, I have also made some sketches where snapshots were not available. I have tried, to the best of my ability, to make precise illustrations. In case of the palpable flaws, I beg your pardon again for the inaccuracies and request you to bear with my love for dabbling with colours.
And finally, the people of the “People, Places and Time”J without whom this blog would not come to be at all. My mother. My sister Sanghamitra and brother Sagneek. My school teachers. And a few exceptional people who deserve to be mentioned here. Charunethran, my buddy, classmate, benchmate, colleague, partner in crime, partner in canteen and someone who taught me, among several other invaluable things, to never compromise. Baishalee, my childhood companion, my best friend, a gem of a person and someone who always pushed the envelope so others could shed their inhibitions. Lakshmi, from whom all Gujarati tales have been imported, but most importantly, someone from whom I have learnt how important it is to follow your dreams. And finally Bhuvan, my pillar of strength who taught me no adversity can be big enough to break us down.
To them I attribute my most important asset. My sense of humour. Without which, it is absolutely impossible to have survivedJ.
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