In context of this little story Iron is 'self', Wood is 'wish'.

A ship was sailing in sea. A tempest tore apart the ship. A piece of ship which had iron and wood fell on waves. Iron was heavy than water, wood was lighter than water. Iron could sink to bottoms of sea but it being attached to wood both kept sailing. Shore was in sight. Wood was trying hard to swim to shore. For once Iron felt happy that it had wood with it for rescue, but wood was unhappy. If only wood was alone it could have reached shore quite soon. Wood was cursing iron and was considering it a liability. 'Hey Iron, if only you were not tied to me I could have reached shore quite soon.' Iron had nothing to say. It was somehow getting dragged with wood. Both were unable to get apart. Shore was quite near. Both were almost there. Suddenly a cleaning ship appeared. Cleaning ship is 'fate' here. It was cleaning the garbage of sea. The piece of iron & wood was picked by it. 'You Iron, it took me time to swim to shore only because of you, I'd've'een free of all bondages if I was on shore.' Iron replied, 'Wood, you were attached to me, thats why we kept floating. If I was alone I'd've settled peacefully on sea bottom. How you can say who harmed whom?' It was hard to separate both of them. That piece was put in furnace. Wood burned and turned to ashes, Iron melt and was given shape of a nail. That nail was fitted at another place. Till memory could last Iron kept thinking 'Only if we could have reached shore, life could have been so different, alas!!' Wood has no meaning without Iron, Iron is incomplete without wood. Wood finishes in time, Iron keeps lamenting till memory last. Its the story of life which keeps repeating itself. Search for completeness in this incomplete world keeps on going.

My jaw is not opening fully, I am hearing some rings in ears and head is strained with a little ache. But I am glad I saved a little white dog :). This morning when I left out for office in a cheerful mood suddenly a little cute dog came out of nowhere before my motorbike. I was at a slow speed, but it seems the fall was inevitable. Now blame it on broken road, on the car that was passing by, on the burger which I ate last month or on the fact that why I bought a bike at all. I was in a cheerful mood and so much cheerful that a perfect fall was planned for me. The bike fell as flat as the man who gets the chance to sleep after 72 hours and I was flying in air like a low flying kite. What a perfect fall it was!! I was lying upside down on road in half a moment with head held high, but not for long :( my chin struck ground and my head, ears, jaw all were so much co-operative that they absorbed much of the force in them. Now they all together are making merry. Chin is looking like a dented bonnet (thanks for not shaving for 1 week, its not much noticeable), jaw is refusing to open fully and letting me eat little from left side only, ears are sounding musical and head is experimenting with ache lines from its southern to northern frontiers. Good teamwork. A perfect example of co-dependency and co-existence :)) I am thankful to the car which passed by just 2 seconds ago and thankful to all those absent big trucks which keep running on that road.


New experiences come in life and I had never fallen like that before. Sometimes there are new, unexpected ways of falling. Every fall is followed by a rise. I also rose up, partly because I had to give way to coming traffic and partly because it does not look graceful to lay back on road like that, hey man go lay back on your bed, not here on road :-)). Falling like that is not such a great idea and I'll try to fall in a more careful manner if I ever have to fall again. People fall in love, some people fall from their values, some fall from other's eyes, some fall for temptations, others for money or power and here I fall from a humble bike on a humble road, how unimportant. The falls should have more significance.


I had got a new insurance policy in last quarter and cover note was still not delivered to me. I dug up that document from them today. Some sales people 'll promise moon to you while making sales and afterwards leave you in wilderness of Planet WPT156, which has still to be discovered in 24th century, huh. It's a posthumous!! benefit policy only and I don't want it to give any benefit at least for next 70 years. I don't know who is going to inherit this earth, but it's a good thing to leave something behind for those whom you care for and those who depend on you.

I am sitting here in this moment. Trying to meditate. We can meditate on anything. We can meditate on time. We can mediate on vast expanse of universe. With my limited mind and awareness I can experience mixed effects of past and present. I was same 'me' in the beginning, even before I developed the capacity to think and react it was same 'me.' This 'me' has been through many stages in this life. Happiness, joy, sorrow, sadness, bliss, relaxation, tension, meanness, selflessness, serenity all are known to this 'me.' This 'me' was born with me and have spent most time in my company. It can get bore with me but can not run away from me. I see you, I like you, I love you and this 'me' goes to you for sometime. After sometime either you cannot keep this 'me' or this 'me' comes back to me on its own. This 'me' is my vehicle to higher stages of consciousness. It gets influences from past, understands a few things of present and does not know anything about future. Its knowledge of future is in form of hopes and fears. It certainly does not want to loose any good thing in the same way it does not want to get any bad thing. This play of hopes and fears keeps this 'me' moving like a pendulum. Hopes increases and go down, fears increases and go down. With hopes fears are attached and fears become bearable with hopes. This pendulum of hopes and fears becomes an obstacle to realization of peace which delves in us. May be someday I'll be able to tell myself 'I have no hopes because I do not want anything and I have no fears either because I am not afraid of loosing anything.' Peace will start manifesting itself when this pendulum 'll stop its momentum. I am sitting here. Wishing the pendulum to go highest in regions of hopes so that it never gets a chance to travel in regions of fears. I still have a long way to go. This pendulum can take a while to find a resting place.

Some little events get our attention and make us think of things beyond them. I found a baby mouse at home and safely left is outside. Very next day another mouse was trapped which looked like mother of that mouse, very tiny one. I took the trap on scooter and left with it to release it safely away from homes. I stopped at dark road and opened door of trap with foot. After keeping it open for about 1 minute I picked trap up and came back home. Presto!!!! What I see when I took a look at trap, the mouse is still in!! Normally mouses run away from trap in less than 5 seconds of opening. This mouse was loving its captivity. I again went out and this time stopped at well lighted part of road. Opened door of trap, the mouse won't go away. Then I picked the trap and put it upside down. Seemingly mouse was clutching to trap and unwilling to get free!! I shaked the trap and it feel down and ran for cover. Life has so many incidents which attract our attention and this incident attracted mine. The mouse walked into trap out of its own free will. It was lured by a piece of bread, temptations are quite powerful. Later it developed love with trap, like some hostages develop love for their abductor. This mouse psychology applies to life on man on this earth. We involve ourselves in this world out of temptations and then we find it hard to go away. Incidents in life keep us telling that its the time to rise above our dwarf interests and do something to justify our life on this earth. Many of us understand this and act accordingly, others who fail to understand just get a shake out of this trap.

Life is a big magnet for all of us. Our preferences keep on changing but we always try to do our best in all circumstances. Of course trying to do our best is good but many a times we carry ourselves away with actions rather than their desired outcomes. First we want to do something, then after some time we start thinking of its validity and device a number of tests for it. During this phase the objectives for which we started our actions becomes oblivious. If we believe spiritual assumptions completely than every human being start life with good intentions. Our karmas bind us in this material world. At the very start, even before start, when humans are in womb they have capacity to think and understand. At that time the life form which still has to come on this earth determines to do all good things while on this earth and make best use of life which the creator is going to give him. But we all know what happens after that. Veil of maya drags us to our basic nature and very few can rise above it after much efforts. All things become relevant to contexts. At a time when my right arm aches my healthy left arm can't comfort me, all my attention and sense of pain 'll be diverted towards aching arm. When we want to attain something we do all out efforts for it and after attainment either we cherish it or slowly we start loosing interest in attained things. I am so much wonderful, I have got all things life can offer, I can get anything at my wish, if I wish for something I can have it. Slowly we develop the tendency of collection and become habitual winners. We collect things, people, feelings, emotions and let them litter away in some dark corner of our house, our consciousness and feel it right to look for them only if some need arises!! Many times we are lucky enough to find them again or either the efforts to attain them again start or we do start believing that they are not needed anymore as they have become useless.

Why push factor becomes dominant so much at times? A thing which can be achieved is not worth keeping!! Aim for the impossible and when it becomes possible find another impossible. There can be many factors responsible to it. When we are all out to attain something we put our all efforts for that and let our ego go down for sometime. After attainment no immediate objective remains so the efforts are not needed and ego also comes back. Then we start feeling need for other things. We need to keep ourselves busy, life should not be constrained to one thing only and I have far more important things to do. A mirage looks attractive, even if someone finds a nectar how much satisfaction can be achieved from it? There is a limit to everything and nectar 'll loose its attraction soon. When the peak point of longing is achieved a wish to get relaxation also follows.

Continuity can bore. When same things keep continuing for much time it becomes like a chore. Machines are better at performing chores than humans. I cant keep on doing same things again and again dear, its too boring :).

A bike ride with my father. I was sitting on fuel tank in front!!

I am away from office for two days now. I was thinking that I have got addicted to usual office routine, communications, computers, internet etc., but no withdrawls symptoms here :). Its a good thing. Today is Friday but more relaxed that Sunday as I have nothing to do but to wait till evening for something. Children are clapping and wishing Happy B'day to one of their 'collegue :)' Place is National Rail Museum, New Delhi. A nice place for rail enthusiats. Vintage engines and coaches dating back to early 1800s are displayed here. A special rail coach which was made for Prince of England (who later became King Edward VII) in 1875 is still in a very good condition. Life like statues of prince and his orderly are displayed in the coach. Possibly world's smallest steam engine is displayed here.

Mono rail on one rail line with support of a wheel on other side to run on ground or pavement made specially for it is still functional. It has sitting capacity for 8 and runs only on Sundays and one ride costs Indian Rupees 20 (US$ 0.50).

There is another toy train with 5 coaches and provision of 40 seats in train. Today's ordinary buses have seating capacity of 52 seats and trains can accomodate more than thousand!!! Quite a lot of progress mankind has made :) But these are vintage machines and quite valuable. I did not think that I'll need camera on this small travel, I really miss taking pics here :(. A small joy ride in this toy train costs Indian Rupees 10 (US$ 0.25) and it takes a round of periphery of museum in about 5 minutes. This joy train runs on a about two feet wide track with enough speed to match normal pace of human running. What makes toy train run? The same old engine? But no steam here. I asked the driver and wow .. its engine of TATA 407, a commercial vehicle popular in India. Plateform of Toy train is good and a book shop of National Book Trust India is made on plateform in a vintage rail coach. Bookshop .. hmmm it was there and I had to buy a book and another was bought because salesman did not have change for currency :)).

There are another 25-30 vintage trains displayed in the museum here. A number of trains are still functional or may be all of them can be functional as they are on tracks and maintained in shining condition.

Yesterday I travelled in Metro Rail in New Delhi which is comparable with modern world's best trains for city commuters. Its nice to get experience of both old and ultra modern trains in same city. Hopefully I'll make another visit to this city soon, which earlier I used to shun beacuse of its crowd, crazy traffic and pollution. Things are improving here now and the change is visible.

Indian Railways has perphaps world's largest rail network and of course its world's biggest employer, employing more than 10 million people!!! From a deficit organisation it has become one of government's best milking cow in less than 3 years, thanks to present Railway Minister.

Disclaimer - This profile may sound quite boring and unconventional. No professional presentation, business manner or to the point information is guaranteed. Simple plain things are told in unnecessary boring lengths. Anybody can read this profile at his/her own risk. No claim shall be entertained for any kind of side effects resulting out of reading this profile. You have to be patience enough to fish out traditional information from this profile. Name - Quite often I think about myself. I was given a name when I came into this world. It was winter and foggy and I made my way into this world. I gave out a cry announcing my arrival and all nears & dears were happy at my arrival, without knowing about the purpose of this new life form thrown on this earth. Always wondering about my existence I never knew why I am here, perhaps my consciousness would have been better if it was a comet, a distant star, a supernova, black hole, planet, galaxy or anything. There are more than 6 billion people on this earth similar to me. My consciousness is always eager to know about the bond of life. The life in all is same, then why can’t I feel the feelings of others, why can’t I think their thoughts, why can’t I just pass on as ‘You.’ Looking at faces and wondering what a vast world is behind every face. My inner world is so large that I can’t travel this completely, always finding new things in myself. What a surprise there are more than 6 billion inner worlds on this earth and whoever possesses it don’t know it completely. Many things come together, billions of cells, countless feelings, innumerable thoughts, numerous breath, heart beats pumping gallons and gallons of blood to every corner of body; flesh, blood, bones, skin, hair and we call the complete entity by a particular name. We have a tendency of sticking labels on everything. The easiest way to know about somebody is giving it a name. My memory is fading away now and I don’t remember what happened at the time of my birth. But I can easily assume a lot of things about my birth events. Parents, all uncles, aunts, grandma was happy. Somebody should have the satisfaction and honor of giving a name to the new life form. All were making proposals and calling me by different names. Nobody cared to ask me if I like a name or not. Perhaps I was asked about names and I cared not to respond to anybody. Then somebody came forward with a seemingly unique name. The brain chemicals producing idealic electricity which influence thoughts suggested my name. Everybody agreed on that name and I found a new name in this new incarnation. Hello dear, I am Mahesh. Everybody knows me by this name and I am supposed to get the impression that their knowledge is correct. Age - A lot of water has passed in rivers of world since I took birth and same water keeps coming again and again. The passage of time in comparison to our body is known as age. How much time per day, 24 hours! How many days per year, 365! The measures of times are different elsewhere. Even in solar system, times are different. 100 years on earth may seem like fluttering of eyelids in some other part of the universe and one minute of earth may seem like ages in still some other part. I wonder what my age is. My body lives on earth and my consciousness keeps roaming everywhere - in all time dimensions. When it comes back I find yet another year is passing away. I have witnessed year after year passing with same lucidity as the clouds pass over the roof my house. Before I know, one cloud gives place to other cloud and the calendar changes. Time is speeding away like clouds. Time seems to have lost its relevance, existence is more important. I existed before this and I will exist after this. Time can’t eliminate my existence; it will just change its expression. Existence knows no age and bodies get old. This time I am 33 now. Sex - Consciousness changes sex in different incarnations or it’s always the same? Some people undergo sex changing operations. What effect it has on their consciousness. Sometimes consciousness lives in opposite body. Men behave live women or women are manlier than men. Most men can contest the idea that they can be women in some other incarnation; the idea would sound less manly. While some may think that they can be anything in another incarnation. Of course I am a man and I have strong belief that in my stone incarnation I was a male stone. Education - I am illiterate. I lack 99.99% knowledge of this world. I don’t have even a little fraction of wisdom of this world. I know only a few languages, rest unknown to me. I still lack the pinch of intelligence which I am expected to have. Though I finished my schooling and college normally, yet I find myself nowhere. The more I know the less it becomes. I graduated as Bachelor of Arts. It’s called B.A. in short. B-Bachelor, which I am still :), A-Arts and believe me no art is involved in it. No pottery, no poetry, no sculpture, no culture. My graduation subjects were cold Economics, nostalgic History and shrewd Political Science, along with 2 languages which are never enough for true expression. Education was always a good affair with me, seldom giving enough time to studies and always getting enough marks. At college professors would take me as their friend and considered me wise for some odd reasons best unknown to me. It was not a matter of objection if after calling my attendance for a lecture I would run away from class by jumping like a frog on floor to avoid sights. I always got most marks in subjects of whose classes I bunked most. It was like a hero affair at college, the best part of my life. Schooling was also good. One thing common throughout is that I was considered a wise person, don’t know why, I rarely did anything to establish that point :). I am still getting educated, life is the best classroom and time is the best teacher. I am still running out of classes and teachers are still friendly with me. Taking the last sip from my cup of tea, I wish life to be same - Tasty, fragrant, hot, getting cool only when I give it time, sometimes getting spilled and giving a feeling of too much only when I take third cup in a row. Skills - Mirror mirror on the wall, who is the most skillful of all. Always trying to get skillful at anything which passed my way and always bunking those skills like my classrooms. A jack of so many trades that even the learned things seems oblivious. Music, martial arts, sports, astrology, palmistry, occults, spirituality, the list goes on. Presently working in a business. I can write but not for long times and not much. Writing a few pages is enough for me. I can sing sometimes, though I don’t sing in bathroom now. If anybody doesn’t like me singing (which I rarely do, so no need to worry ;) ) I recommend cotton swabs, they shall clean the ears and block the sound. I can talk and on rare occasions can talk for hours on relevant or irrelevant topics. I can make layouts for newspapers, magazines, books. Lately I was writing, composing, getting printed, helping in binding, distributing my magazine single handedly. So I have got skills of a printer, publisher and journalist as well :). Hmm.. Life is flowing, everybody has his own flow and nice to be alive on this wonderful earth. May be I ‘ll add more to my profile later….

 

India can be very a good destination for comfortable living at a low cost. If you are in Europe or USA, have a minimum fixed income and want to resettle elsewhere then India is for you. Even US$ 500 per month is more than enough and if you are skilled in managing the personal budget you can save more than half of $500. Let's take a look at monthly budget for individual and 2 persons.

MONTHLY COSTS :

• Rented independent room set : Rupees 5000 (US$ 120)
• Good grocery : Rupees 1000 (US$ 25)
• Fresh fruit, fruit juice, vegetables & dry fruit : Rupees 1500 (US$ 36)
• Meat & Fish (if you are non-vegetarian) : Rupees 1000 (US$ 25)
• If you use alcohol, average whisky bottle : Rupees 250 (US$ 6)
• Beer Bottle : Rupees 50 (US$ 1.2)
• A pack of 20 smokes : Rupees 50 (US $ 1.2)
• Broadband internet connection and telephone : Rupees 500 (US$ 12)
• Cable TV Connection with 100+ channels : Rupees 300 (US$ 8)
• Domestic helper, who'll cook, clean, wash : Rupees 3000 (US$ 75)
• If you want to keep a car monthly fuel cost : Rupees 1500 (US$ 36)

TOTAL AROUND US$ 330

(For 2 persons living together this should be around US $ 400)

Take note that you can have room for as low as Rupees 1000 (US$25) per month and can opt to do all your housework yourself and save Rupees 3000 (US$ 75) reducing the cost of living.

EFFECTIVE MONTHLY LIVING COST CAN BE AROUND : US $ 230

 

But it is recommended not to save 100 bucks as this will have effect on quality of life.

ONE TIME SET UP COSTS :

• Double Bed with mattress : Rupees 10000 (US$ 245)
• One Steel Cupboard with dressing : Rupees 5500 (US$ 135)
• Work table, centre table and 4 chairs : Rupees 3500 (US$ 85)
• TV Set : Rupees 6000 (US$ 146)
• DVD Player : Rupees 3000 (US$ 73)
• Cooking gas double cylinder connection : Rupees 2000 (US$50)
• Gas Stove : Rupees 2000 (US$ 50)
• Mobile set and connection for one year : Rupees 1500 (US$ 36)
• Health Insurance for one year : Rupees 5000 (US$ 120)
• Used car in good condition : Rupees 100000 (US$ 2400)
• New Gear Less 2-Wheeler : Rupees 35000 (US$ 850)

 

ONE TIME SET UP COST US $ 4200

 

It is recommended not to keep your personal vehicle in India as it can be tough to drive in Indian traffic. It is always safe to use public transport which is available easily.

TOTAL ONE TIME COST WITHOUT A PERSONAL VEHICLE : US$ 950

For short distances a 2-wheeler can be bought, which can be used easily in Indian weather conditions.

Life in India is good. If the hypes which media creates from time to time are ignored (it has to because media lives and thrives on sensation) then values here are peaceful, secular, adjustable, harmonious and spiritual. Of course a travel guide to India telling about does's and don'ts must be studied in advance.

 

It did not intend to learn swimming, the liquid was too hot to try anything like that, there might be some objective otherwise life is too precious to be lost in such a way. They were sitting on our eyes, nose, face, entering our ears and giving a good chase to our hands. Cleaning and more cleaning would not help and a spray of safe insecticide was almost inevitable. The insecticide must be safe, we want to get rid of them not ourselves. I am sure it was either drunk on over dose of insecticide or it chose to raise its voice against its use. The reason can be any but it spoiled my cup of tea, the housefly took a dive into it and lay motionless. The tea was tasty, I had already taken a sip and housefly might have been lured by its aroma and fragrance. Nobody taught housefly to look before leaping and it thought of consuming all tea itself which turned out to be nobody's share. How can a housefly drink my tea? I should better pick it up, squeeze my tea out of it and continue with sips. The tea was enough hot to kill any bacteria which might have been left by housefly in it, the stopping factor was fear of insecticide on its being. Though insecticides have become a part of our food chain but still it's a good idea to desert the cup of tea in memory of housefly killed by insecticide and a hot cup of tea. Besides I would not like to struggle with giddy feelings after consuming the same.

This incident happened on Saturday at office and I don't think I'll need to attend a meeting of housefly association to give an explanation of why I permitted that housefly to jump into my cup of tea. Life is precious in all forms. Human life is dominant on this planet at this time. The usefulness of all other life forms is determined in accordance with their advantages or disadvantages for humans. The houseflies and mosquitoes are most annoying for humans. They make us clap, dance and move. These species are super abundant than us and it's a blessing for us that they have less intellectual development and don't have any voting rights. I love you world but I find it hard to love a housefly trying to enter my nose and it's harder to love mosquito singing its tunes in my ear while I am trying to sleep at night. It's still harder to love a phone call while I am trying to drift into dreamland. Last night while I was almost slept a lady called and asked me why I had called her!!! I never called and still was accused of giving her miscall. A fight back would have been a good option but that would have spoiled my sleep. ‘If you need to talk then better call not miscall.' I was told this and felt fairly reprimanded. Only my mother can talk like that with me. I am going to take up this matter with Phone Company today.

Are you depressed? Confused about purpose of life and your own existence? As a kid I used to have bouts of depression for days. Meditation and chants were helpful but not a cure. Being fed up of these cycles I decided to have a final fight with myself. Fighting with self!! Why not? If we can live in harmony with self, we also have a full right to fight ourselves as well. I gripped myself from neck and asked, "What's your problem man?" I got no answer. "Then why are you bothering me? Don't mess up with me." As the self was confused so it had no answer. If you are also bothered like that, I am sure you also won't get any answer. You will get answer? But Dear! You will be answering your questions yourself; the answers won't be coming from your self. We think about things and circumstances, ponder over them necessarily or unnecessarily and feel bothered. When I asked my self why it was bothering me it did not answer. I assumed that I was acting sternly and it was too scared to respond. It's also part of my existence and requires same attention as is given to ego! Instead of gripping from neck, it was better to hold its hand while strolling and give it comfy feelings. Talking with self can be of much help. Later I realized that it is not self which bothers, instead we bothers ourselves and involve the self in it. The solve I found for problems was fairly simple. First of all I accepted the fact that ‘I am pure, undiluted, have no wrong intentions, knowingly or unknowingly not doing anything which goes against spirit of life. At second stage I realized my existence in present moment. What is present is real, past is gone, future is hopes or fears. What I am doing or thinking in present is important for me. If something wrong was done to me or by me in past then only its effects can be tackled in present, nobody can go to past and undo what has been done. If I am thinking of future then the way goes from present. Present conduct shall mould the future to a great extent. Best way to get away from negative feelings and emotions is to involve ourselves without getting involved. It comes by practice and is beneficial for our health; be it physical, mental, emotional or spiritual.