She Loves Him... She Loves Him Not!

April 7, 2017

As usual on this warm Friday afternoon Manas should be getting excited about the weekly night out with his fun-loving roommates. But he looks acutely sorrowful. He is in a bus, heading towards his village. In half an hour he will be in his ancestral house which he has left nine months ago to pursue his bachelor's degree at Hansraj College in Delhi. He was not in a mood to inform the rest of the gang about this sudden change in the plan. He left the college campus during the lunch break. Never before had Manas bunked any class. At 1 p.m. there was a Physics period wherein Prof. Dr. Anwesh Bose talked about Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle. For many weeks Manas had been eagerly waiting for this lecture. This is one of his most favourite topics. He feels this scientific principle has got some sort of mystical perspective on reality. But today an excruciating confusion in his young life has overshadowed his curiosity about the discoveries of the quantum world.

Manas has skipped his lunch. Sitting in the last window seat on the left he is apparently staring at the rapidly moving landscape. A while ago the gentleman sitting beside him had introduced himself as a journalist and tried to strike up an insightful conversation about India's bid for a permanent seat in the UN Security Council. He did not even bother to look at the journalist and when the word 'permanent' fell on his ears Manas scoffed curtly. The bewildered gentleman had no idea what was going on in this young chap's mind.

The very first thing Manas does every time he visits his village is meeting his childhood friend Chinmay. But not this time! At about 4 o'clock he gets down at the bus stop in his village and goes straight to his house though Chinu's house is just two hundred metre away. He finds only his mother at home, hugs her tightly and a little longer this time. Taking his favourite cup of coffee from her he goes to the terrace. Aroma of hot coffee and the serene evening sky soothe his bruised feelings, but not completely. Suddenly he takes his bike and rides to the nearby lake.

Source: pixabay.com

In the evening the slightly tapering eastern end of this huge lake becomes lonely. Manas reaches there and after a short walk sits under the mammoth banyan tree. His grandmother says it is almost two hundred years old. By now he is mentally exhausted; all day he has been thinking deeply about Kalpana and nothing else. He first met her on the first day at the college nine months ago and it was love at first sight. She is in the first year of her B.A. degree.

On some days Kalpana talks to Manas for a very long time, but on few other days she remains aloof! Since the last evening she hasn't picked his calls; he has called her seven times. During the lunch break Sarita told him that a while ago Kalpana drove off in a Mercedes-Benz with a handsome guy. Sarita is Kalpana's classmate and a common friend.

"Does Kalpana love me?", one more time this inevitable and disturbing question pops up in his mind. He spontaneously closes his eyes, tears roll down his cheeks and he heaves. At that very moment something magical happens - he feels as if the soul of the banyan tree was speaking to him. And it says -

Dear Manas,

You know what, the answer lies hidden in your question! It's simple, yet it has a profound meaning. With a calm and clear focus you need to listen to your heart. Remember, without attention you would definitely miss this wonderful conversation.

The question has appeared in your thoughts - this itself is a significant sign that Love hasn't yet ushered in its magic in your life. You need to wait for its blessings with patience. It could be Kalpana or somebody else.

As of now it is not there, otherwise you would not have asked this question. When one receives love they feel, beyond any doubt, that it is happening in their whole existence - thoughts, feelings, actions, reactions, social interactions, everything! The same life with the same circumstances feels like heaven. Her eyes start speaking much more than the words. Love has the immense capacity to bring in a better world, without any extra resource.

"Love is like the wind. You can't see it, but you can feel it."

But my friend, you should not get disappointed. Your question has one more important sign. And that is - your heart is now open to embrace this wonderful experience, otherwise you would not have asked this question. So have patience! You should never try to push it.

The Famous Dussehra Festival of Cuttack

Mahishasura, the buffalo-hybrid demon, defeated the Devas (deities of the Hindu pantheon) after pleasing Lord Brahma by his austerity. To re-establish dharma (righteousness) Goddess Durga appeared and slayed that mighty asura (demon). To commemorate this divine victory the Hindu festival of Dussehra (also spelled Dashahara) is celebrated grandly in the Indian state of Odisha.

Durga Puja at Choudhury Bazar | Source: Wikimedia

Cuttack's Dashahara festival is the most famous one in Odisha. It's celebrated for ten days in the month of Ashvin (7th month of the Hindu lunisolar calendar).

Ghata Puja | Source: Pinterest

The current form of Dashahara has a Bengali influence though this Sharadiya Durga Puja was initiated by King Suratha of Chaitya dynasty in 300 BCE. A Banerjee family started this community festival in 1510 at Binod Bihari. The family came to Cuttack with Sri Chaitanya Dev. For four years it was observed in the form of Ghata Puja - the traditional Odia way of Sharadiya Durga Puja. In 1514 the family introduced the worship of the clay idol of Maa Durga to this 506-year-old festival.

Love: A Source of Weakness or Strength?

In an unwisely and non-philosophical manner if we try to say what is life, then it would be a plain unthoughtful one-line definition, i.e. -

Life is a list of events.

So from life or so to say from this list of events we derive experiences. Some experiences are pleasant, some are otherwise and few are even frustrating. As children we live everyday afresh. We don't carry the burden of our past judgments. But as we grow we tend to search for a pattern in apparently similar experiences. Eventually, in the lab, located between our ears, we manufacture a personal list of DOs and DON'Ts.

Carefully observe all the social interactions happening around you. You can notice that a lack of trust pervades our modern society. You would realize that a continuous psychological world war is being fought in every society. So to protect ourselves in this warfare we build walls furtively. Thus everyone mentally turns into an island - disconnected from each other - while living among hundreds of fellow beings. Though invisible we feel the strong presence of this wall in almost all social interactions. In due course this defense mechanism becomes strong and impenetrable. Because of this self-imposed loneliness we incline towards comfort rather than adventure.

Why not adventure?

Because it's full of uncertainties and uncertainties are nothing but the inconceivable dangers lurking at every corner of the unknown path. That's what the limited adult mind loves to believe in.

And what kind of comfort?

Well, this is the comfort of predictability which we discover in a mechanical life wherein a year in nothing but the same day repeated 365 times. Sadly, this gives us only a false sense of security. Hence it would not be incorrect if I say that almost all the people grow only biologically.

But when love happens...

You notice that a tiny yet prominent window has appeared in that formidable huge wall and you hear the enchanting call of the uncharted terrain. Some sort of other-worldly happiness replaces the feelings of fear and separation in your heart. Your lonely soul finds its long-lost soulmate and hence it no longer likes to be confined by the man-made walls. You want to grow as tall as the sky and as wide as the oceans; you want to embrace your beloved. You don't want to construct any wall, any barrier between you both.

This new sense of freedom - freedom from your DOs and DON'Ts - comes as a complete surprise and thus makes you feel vulnerable for the first time. So you mistakenly conclude that love gets you into such weak conditions.

If love were the source of weakness...

Source: Pinterest

Rose, who belonged to an affluent family, would have gone in the first lifeboat leaving Jack in the sinking Titanic. And Jack would have struggled for his own safety rather than caring for Rose.

Ranjha would not have the courage to follow the fakir's advice to find love and solace. And Heer would not have left that excruciating forced marriage to reunite with him.

Source: Pinterest

Mastani would never have travelled to Pune to meet her beloved, leaving her royal life in Bundelkhand. And Peshwa Bajirao would have hesitated to accept her publicly.

Instead they all found supreme strength in love; so does everyone.

Love is the ultimate strength, my friend!

Strange is the World of Facebook

A Friend Request on FB

As usual I chose Ola Share on that day to reach my office. It's cheaper and doesn't take much longer. Thankfully it arrived on time. One co-passenger was already in the cab. I said the OTP to the driver. Then it started following a winding route for the third pickup. After few minutes as I opened my Kindle Paperwhite I requested the driver to reduce the loud volume of the song he was playing. It was a peppy Tamil chartbuster, but I was more interested in reading 'Khullam Khulla' - the autobiography of Rishi Kapoor. My only co-passenger, who was sitting in the front seat, didn't object to the change.

When we arrived at his address this guy with the unruly hair and untidy attire entered the cab and sat next to me in the rear seat. Without wasting even a minute he got himself busy on his cell phone. I continued with the autobiography - In those good old days RK Studio was brimming and glittering with film stars and parties at Raj Kapoor's residence were the talk of the town.

During a brief pause a quick glance at my second co-passenger let me know that he was glued to WhatsApp. He talked in Hindi when his phone rang. After that short conversation on the phone he went back to the chatting screen. I resumed my reading. When the cab halted for some time I looked around and realized that it was stuck in the traffic on Taramani Road. I wondered why the driver didn't take the left turn to Thiruvalluvar Salai from New Colony Road as that route was shorter and expressed my concern to him. I didn't want to waste my time on the way; nobody wants to. But in an unhurried tone my second co-passenger said, "This route is also okay."

"Lekin Thiruvalluvar Salai se hum jaldi pahanch sakte the" (We could have reached earlier through Thiruvalluvar Salai), I responded to his peculiar comment in Hindi. Then silence and my frustration prevailed. His drop was scheduled earlier than mine. Just a little while before we reached Ascendas IT Park, his destination, he unexpectedly inquired, "Where are you going?"

I replied, "Ramanujan IT City." And turned my head again towards my Kindle.

His abrupt curiosity didn't abate. Further he asked, "Which company do you work for?"

"CTS, and you?"

"iNautix." And immediately he added, "To... phir de do apna phone number." (Then... tell me your phone number.)

My focus was primarily on the book during this sudden and uninteresting inquiry. So inadvertently I gave him my phone number and name! I just wanted to get rid of that unwelcome inquisitiveness. To my surprise I received a friend request on Facebook in less than five minutes. For sure that didn't feel like a friendly chat; it was more like an investigation. Though he had got ample of time during the ride he didn't care to strike a conversation. Then what made him want to be my friend? Why was he so desperate? Doesn't he have genuine friends? These spontaneous questions popped up in my mind.

I do agree that before the friendship every friend was a stranger in the beginning, but it's also true that this kind of inept approaches don't lead to friendship. Interestingly such people are not as rare as it seems. This weird chap reminds me of a co-worker I had come across in 2014. He joined the same client's office, but for a different project. In his first week in the office he came to my desk and introduced himself. He left after we exchanged pleasantries. And in the evening his friend request appeared on Facebook! I accepted it as we both were working for the same organization. But surprisingly he never talked to me after that day even though we worked in the same building for one year.

Here, in this blog post, I would like to emphasize on this growing but least-discussed socio-psychological phenomenon. Simply the total number of "friends" on Facebook gives them a high, I guess. Or maybe they consider themselves more influential, and hence more powerful, than those mere common people who have very less number of "friends" on FB. The actual social interactions don't intrigue them at all. Then in such conditions do they cope up with their trauma when someone unfriends them?! Does that virtual world successfully replace the social support system whenever they feel sad, depressed?!

I strongly feel that Social Networking Sites have a proper space in our lives, but definitely they can't be the substitutes for our real beautiful society.

How to Remember the Value of π Easily

The mind-boggling ratio of a circle's circumference to its diameter is called π (Pi). Being an irrational mathematical entity it doesn't reveal itself in fraction. Its decimal representation neither ends nor does it repeat a permanent pattern! It's an enigma. It has captivated the human intelligence for millennia.

In layman's terms pi is a never-ending number - This incomprehensible phenomenon has bothered not only the mathematicians, but also the lawmakers perhaps. On 18 Jan 1897 the state legislature of Indiana had proposed a bill (House Bill No. 246) to legally define the value of pi as 3.2! This incredible story originated from the pet obsession of a physician (living in Solitude, IN) with the age-old geometrical problem called 'Squaring the Circle'. Surprisingly that notorious bill was passed by the House unanimously (Ayes: 67, Noes:0), but it got postponed indefinitely in the Senate on 12 Feb 1897 due to the intervention of Professor C. A. Waldo of Purdue University. This bill is popularly known as the 'Indiana Pi Bill'.

With the rapid development in computer hardware and software, in this 21st century, the zeal to discover the maximum number of digits in the value of pi has touched new height. The current world record stands at 22.459 trillion decimal places!

This Wikimedia link shows the chronology of human endeavor to discover more approximate value of pi.

In 1981 an Indian could memorize and recite more than 31,000 digits of pi. A Japanese recited 40,000 digits in 1989 and broke that record. By reciting 67,890 digits a Chinese holds the current Guinness World Record.

To achieve such impossible feats these champions used an ancient method called the 'Method of Loci'. In Latin loci means places. This technique is also known as the 'Memory Journey', 'Memory Palace', 'Mind Palace'.

To follow the 'Method of Loci' you have to visualize a familiar place. Then you have to roam that location mentally and drop the chunks of the digits at various spots. To recall the complete sequence of digits you have to repeat that exact route!

To remember lesser number of digits there is an easier technique. It's a style of writing called Pilish wherein you form such a sentence that the numbers of letters of those words coincide with the digits of pi. Some examples of such sentences are -

• How I wish I could recollect pi easily today! (= 3.14159265)
• May I have a large container of coffee beans? (= 3.14159265)
• May I have a large container of coffee, cream and sugar? (= 3.1415926535)
• How I need a drink, alcoholic in nature, after the tough chapters involving quantum mechanics! (= 3.14159265358979)
• How I need a drink, alcoholic in nature, after the heavy lectures involving quantum mechanics! (= 3.14159265358979)

There is a book written in this style; its title 'Not A Wake' is also in Pilish! This book has 10 sections and each section contains 1000 consecutive digits of pi.

Source: Amazon

Piku and Piem are two other methods for this purpose.

How to Kill the Corrupt Politicians

So the situation is grave!

Well... there are two methods to kill a corrupt politician.

Method #1 - Bullet

Its performance and accuracy have improved tremendously, but there are some grievous disadvantages of this method, i.e. -

• Using this method you no longer remain a law-abiding citizen. You become a criminal, an assassin.
• There are many corrupt politicians. It's impossible for you to kill all of them by this method.
• A corrupt politician never neglects their personal security, so it's difficult to succeed in this method.

Method #2 - Ballot

This is a much better method as it has many advantages, i.e. -

• You don't have to become a criminal to implement this method.
• You make the corrupt politicians suffer till death by not letting them retain their political power.
• You confer the power on a suitable politician and thus you kill two birds with one stone!
• It allows the law to take its course.
• This method also allows a glimmer of hope that the corrupt politicians might realize their mistakes and become good human beings.

So obviously the latter method is highly recommended.

Google India has published a beautiful video (shared below) which would definitely encourage you to opt for the 2nd method. In this video a gentleman, from Kalpa in Himachal Pradesh, shares his amazing experience of using the power of ballot.

Shyam Saran Negi, born in 1917, is a retired schoolteacher. He is the first voter of independent India.

How to Express Love without Saying 'I Love You'

But my friend, why would you not say it? You must grab this divine opportunity. Such occasions are rare! There is nothing to be worried about. Don't hesitate. Go ahead and cast the spell. I assure you - it would be a life-changing moment for you.

Essentially there is no substitute for 'I love you'. That's why it's magical.

However, as you want to postpone this moment, for any justified reason of yours, let me tell you the other two effective ways to reveal your feeling for that special someone. Disappointed? Probably you are, because I told that there are only two alternate routes. Moreover, I must tell you, these two ways are NOT as powerful as uttering that sacred sentence. Anyway, here you go.

Note: I've kept the perspective of the scenarios gender-neutral for the benefit of all my readers.

Scenario #1 - Say It Symbolically

• It's a beautiful Friday evening.
• You both have come to attend the literary festival held every year in your city.
• It was an easy day in the office.
• You know each other for some weeks. You both have joined the project on the same day.
• Like you she/he also loves the novels written by Paulo Coelho.
• In the literary festival today's topic is - Love Story!
• The panelists make the discussion intriguing.
• After this one-hour literary romance you both decide to take a stroll to the beach.
• You walk for few hundred metres and reach the lighthouse located at the southern end of the beach.
• This part of the beach is lonely now.
• In this amazing autumn evening you talk about your hobbies, likes, dislikes and then about the novels you have read.
• After a while your conversation veers to topics like life, ambitions, challenges, hope and optimism.
• At that very moment you show your utmost optimism and sincere feeling for her/him by holding a red rose out to her/him. (You have got this beautiful red rose from a flower stall located at the eastern corner of the festival ground when she/he was busy in checking the books at the nearby stalls.)
• And you say just one sentence, "This is for you!" while the numerous waves are playing the soft background music.

Source: WallpaperCave.com

Scenario #2 - It's Beyond Words!

• On a weekday you both have come to a lesser-known beautiful lake, far away from the concrete jungle and the maddening crowd.
• You know each other for years.
• After trekking for hours and talking about all the things under the sun you reach the northern bank of the lake.
• You both are almost exhausted, yet there is a certain feeling of relief - relief from the day-to-day chores of city life, relief from the rat race in the corporate world and also relief from the vigilance of the society.
• You walk carefully on the rocky bank for few feet and sit on a huge flat stone. You can feel the soothing warmth of the stone.
• Your special someone follows you and sits closely on your left.
• Now the sun is about to hide behind the hills and the western sky looks like a colourful canvas.
• The atmosphere is getting cooler. Birds are returning to their nests.
• By now there is nothing left to talk about, but you both are comfortable with this absolute silence in your minds.
• Your faces are glowing by the last rays of the day.
• At this rare moment your left hand reaches out for her/his right hand and you say, "I have searched for the right words... Searched for years! But haven't found that yet. Let me know when you hear the echo of my unspoken words in this silence - far away from the noise of our society."

Source: Pinterest

Has Your Love Life Become Boring?

Dear Friend,

You need to revisit your conclusion. Love never makes life boring! It's the ultimate happiness a human being can experience. It may lead someone to the level of intoxication and hence the person may become disenchanted with or disinterested in other worldly affairs, but it never takes a person towards that unpleasant condition called Boredom.

Many people mistake attraction and infatuation for love. Infatuation doesn't last; it stays with you just as a beautiful memory. We can call this as a nice short film. One would fall in love if the attraction becomes intense in a healthy way. But when the intensity gets misguided it manifests obsession. An obsessive person gets impatient, ill-tempered and aggressive. Sometimes it turns into frustration and extreme mental fatigue.

If a love story culminates in marriage and the day-to-day interactions become monotonous, mechanical, repetitive and completely predictable then boredom creeps into the relationship. In such cases the couple can break the deadly pattern by venturing out of the dull routine. The most prominent ways to do so are -

1. Travel to beautiful places (at least once in every quarter)
2. Watch romantic movies together
3. Read love stories
4. Explore new hobbies
5. Spend quality time at home

Thus they can create wonderful and unique memories. In short they have to rekindle their passion and reinvent the surprise factor (pleasant though) in the relationship.

3 Words as Magical as 'I Love You'

"Love you too!"

Very few mortals are fortunate enough to receive these three magical words after expressing their deep-felt love for that special someone. Nothing else can match the charm of 'I love you', the sacred sentence. You need to muster all your strength to utter the three words - I, Love and You - together.

Rest your logical and analytical mind for a while, slowly and softly close your eyes. Wait... wait... wait! Please do this only after reading my post completely. Okay? Ha... ha... ha. Then slowly take a deep breath and try to visualize this -

• You are with your special someone in a beautiful hill station. It's the month of June - the end of summer.
• In a pleasantly sunny afternoon you are driving towards a hilltop. Your special someone is sitting next to you.
• At a curve on the lonely road you pull over unexpectedly, both of you come out of the car and go to the edge of the curve.
• You see that down at the bottom the calm blue water of a beautiful lake stretches in all directions towards the other surrounding hills. Around that blue waterbody you can see green patches of land and tall straight eucalyptus trees.
• You both appreciate this spectacular beauty and share the joy.
• Meanwhile far away, on the other side of this huge lake, dark clouds have arrived at those blue hills with great speed. Now you can feel the cool breeze coming from there.
• You hold your special someone's right hand softly and pronounce, "I love you!"
• As you raise your gaze to see the facial response your heart skips a beat.
• For few seconds you both look at each other without saying anything!
• As the profoundness of that sentence sinks in a smile slowly appears on that special face. That smile becomes brighter and you hear the rarest sentence in this world, "Love you too!"
• At the very next moment it starts pouring down as a sign of divine blessing and you hug each other spontaneously and tightly as if you both were waiting for this love since time immemorial.

Note: I've tried my best to keep the perspective of the narration gender-neutral so that all my readers can visualize it easily. Hope I've succeeded!

Confused - Not Sure if You are in Love?

You must have heard this song from the Hindi movie 'Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham'.

Song: Suraj hua maddham...

In this song it's surprisingly clear that even the King of Romance is confused! So don't worry! This initial confusion is quite natural. Love brings a tremendous transformation in life. And that too suddenly! The thought process becomes blurred as an inexperienced heart gets inundated with strong feelings and a plethora of inner voices. Love shatters all the predefined limits of your individuality and expands the feeling of oneness. Hence while falling in love everybody encounters the fear of losing themselves - it feels almost suicidal. This causes the anxiety in the initial stage.

Falling in love can be considered as the second birth in a deeper sense. You can't see any change in the material plane, but you strongly feel that now you are a new you. Isn't that baffling? That inner contradiction torments you as your existence is about to break out of the cocoon and fly to higher realms as a beautiful and wise butterfly.

Since the advent of love in your life you have realized that modern physicists are absolutely correct when they claim that time is relative. When she/he is with you, you wish that the time should stop there forever! In her/his presence hours seem like fleeting seconds, whereas her/his absence kills you - days feel like months and weeks like years!

Slowly your rigid personal definitions of 'I' and 'Mine' lose ground and her/his smile gains prominence in your thoughts, day and night. Her/his religion, her/his caste, her/his nationality don't bother you; things like social identities and social status have become irrelevant. Your continuous urge to express yourself has found out that these human languages are insufficient and inefficient. But when your eyes meet hers/his they speak volumes fluently.

You become filled with so much love that everybody who meets you feels awesome! All of a sudden every bit of this world feels wonderful, every second gets you the joy of a lifetime and you start hearing the subtle music in your heartbeats.

If all this is happening then you are truly in love! Many (not all) Hindi movies have polluted the meaning of love. Please refrain from that version! You must be wondering why I haven't covered the bitterness which people go through when they fall in love. My friend, that bitterness comes into the picture only when you impose your expectations and/or restrictions on her/him. Remember this!

Who is a Soulmate?

Disclaimer: I'm not a spiritual master. Hence I don't have the knowledge (in its true sense) about soulmates.

Nevertheless recently what I've read about this concept in the book called 'The Laws of the Spirit World' makes sense; at least I feel so. Khorshed Bhavnagri, the author, could contact her two deceased sons - Vispi and Ratoo - after those two brothers had a fatal car accident. Using the Automatic Writing method those two departed souls dictated all the contents of this book to their beloved mother.

Source: Amazon

Popular Misconception

Somehow the concept of 'Soulmates' has got distorted. Many people think that a soulmate is someone who is naturally and absolutely compatible with them, someone with whom they would have an always-smooth romantic affair and someone who they can marry and live happily ever after. This notion feels so good, but it isn't the truth.

Source: Pinterest

The Truth about Soulmates

God created souls in groups. The souls who belong to the same group were created at the same time. Hence essentially no soul is alone in this world. As per this book they are called Group Souls. They take birth together, life after life, and help each other pay off the karma and grow spiritually. Group Souls are popularly known as Soulmates. Not just your girlfriend/boyfriend or your spouse, your parents, your siblings and your relatives could also be your soulmates. Even you may find a soulmate in a platonic relationship.

What is Karma?

Karma is the consequence of a soul's thoughts, words and actions. It's the inevitable effect of a cause or a combination of causes. Negative karma is like a debt which you owe to somebody and positive karma is like a blessing.

Palm Springs, CA: A Desert City to See Sand, Snow & Marilyn Monroe

My captivated eyes were slowly moving across the pages in the second chapter of ‘The Pilgrimage’ on my Kindle Paperwhite while on I-10 the Greyhound bus, along with us, was advancing towards Palm Springs in California. We had left the bus station in L.A. almost two hours ago. In ‘Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port’, the second chapter of this magical travelogue, the ace storyteller Paulo Coelho was walking across the Spanish Pyrenees. He was on his life-changing spiritual journey to Santiago de Compostela. Here, in the bus, my wife had rested her head on my right shoulder as she was sleeping. Whether it’s a train, a bus, a taxi or a flight I have lost the window seat permanently to her after our marriage.

My wife tossed and adjusted her head again on my shoulder. Breaking the flow of the tale I looked outside the window – On both the sides of the freeway hundreds of wind mills were welcoming us by waving their long white hands. I wish I could stop the bus, look at the tall white giants for some time and feel the grandeur of this San Gorgonio Pass Wind Farm. This was a scene wherein the nature and a man-made creation were not in confrontation with each other! My mind, which usually engages itself with numerous thoughts, was completely at rest while watching this serene view. Slowly my eyelids felt heavier and I dozed off.

Suddenly I woke up to the loud call, “Passengers! We’ve reached Palm Springs.” The driver repeated the announcement of arrival to ensure that he was audible to all the passengers in the bus. Despite feeling sleepy I raised my eyes wide open and to her dismay jolted my wife out of her slumber. Grabbing our backpacks quickly we got down to a tiny Amtrak train station. Out of bewilderment I looked around – No human habitation was visible; the barren desert was occupied by the wind mills only!

Maybe this is not our destination, I thought.

Passengers, who had disembarked, were waiting for their baggage. Getting in the bus hurriedly I asked the driver, “Is this Palm Springs?”

“Yes.”

“Then… where is the city?!”

“This bus won’t enter the city. This is the nearest stop.”

Without saying anything further, after this disheartening confirmation, I got down and just looked at my wife wearily. I could read many questions on her face – Which place is it? How far is Palm Springs from here? How will we reach there? But these questions remained unexpressed. She knew that I didn’t have the answers.

A car came to pick an old lady and two youngsters who got down at this unstaffed train station along with us.

Lucky are they!

My travel plan is an utter failure even after so much deliberation! Now how can we leave this lonely place before nightfall and find an accommodation? – Thinking so I felt completely drained of my excitement for the trip.

My wife, who was standing silently all this while, noticed that a family of four was trying to find something in the pamphlets stuck on the bulletin board and asked me to check if the phone number of a taxi is available there.

I wasn’t hopeful, so I shook my head in denial and didn’t move.

She decided to go and check on her own. She came back with a smiling face and a telephone number. I too smiled and heaved a sigh of relief while dialing that phone number. The taxi driver said that it would take around 25 minutes for him to reach to our rescue.

It was around 5 o’clock in the evening and the winter sun had already set behind Mount San Jacinto. The dim radiance of the dusk was receding from the San Gorgonio Pass. Ten minutes ago the family near the bulletin board had left in a taxi; so also the security personnel five minutes after them.

Platform of Amtrak Train Station in Palm Springs, CA

Only we two were present at the unstaffed train station situated in the middle of the vast desert. There was complete silence, even the whooshing of the few cars travelling on the I-10 didn’t reach us. Slowly the wind started blowing with the usual chill of a January evening. But it was not strong enough to move the blades of all the wind mills. Putting my hands in the front pockets of my jeans I walked to the parking lot.

In front of me, behind the tall wind mills and the bushes scattered across the white sands, was there the huge Mount San Jacinto spreading almost across the western horizon with its snowclad peaks touching the dark blue sky. It felt as if the mountain was sending the cold wind down to the valley.

Mount San Jacinto & San Gorgonio Pass Wind Farm

Spontaneously I felt a mystical closeness with this mountain. My heart was in sync with the vibration of this Grand Design!

I wish this moment lasted for eternity!

Yes, there are no accidents in the Universe! I was destined to witness this fascinating moment. Such surprises make a journey memorable.

Few hundred meters away at the turn in the Palm Springs Station Rd. a yellow cab appeared and veered towards us. We picked our baggage, said a heartfelt ‘Thank you’ to the driver and got inside the warm cozy vehicle.

Downtown Palm Springs, CA

We were heading towards the hotel via East Vista Chino, the road adjacent to the Palm Springs International Airport. As a curious traveller I was looking at both the sides through the windows. California Palm trees, also called Desert Fan Palm, were planted on the edges of North Palm Canyon Dr. at equal distances. This desert city had showcased many tall things so far – tall wind mills, tall mountains and tall palm trees! Yet I was completely awestruck to see the 26-foot-tall Marilyn Monroe at the intersection of Palm Canyon Dr. and Tahquitz Canyon Way.

'Forever Marilyn' in Palm Springs, CA

The next day we visited her again. Its sheer size represents her larger-than-life persona! This giant statue, designed by Seward Johnson and aptly named as Forever Marilyn, is a striking tribute to her iconic subway grate scene in the 1955 film ‘The Seven Year Itch’.