I AM A CHILD, ONCE AGAIN..

I am sitting in the Surgery ICU, posted here as a part of my internship rotation. I have a lot of work to do but my work arrives in intervals. So, I am free for 5 minutes and then again, I get called by a nurse or a resident doctor for some work for 10 minutes. The cycle keeps repeating although irregularly.

In the 5 minutes that I am free, I read a page or two of a book that I am carrying. So, its Ruskin Bond some days and Paulo Coelho on other days. And for those 5 minutes, Ruskin Bond takes me to the pristine forests of Himalayas and Paulo Coelho takes me on a walk in one of the lesser known streets of Rio. I came back again to Surgery ICU, Shree Krishna Hospital, Karamsad, Anand, Gujarat, India in a matter of nanoseconds as soon as my ears hear the words, “Intern Bhai!”. Sorry, Mr. Einstein, you were wrong. My Mind travels faster than the light!

I am disturbed once again as I get a news notification on my mobile (I always keep the news notification ON, you know, so that I can be the first one to write a status update on that!!) But this time the news notification brings to me some unexpected joie de vivre; a sense of déjà vu- the familiarity of what was once a habit, now a nostalgic memory, coming alive!! Yes, against all odds, Rafael Nadal has won the semifinals against Grigor Dimitrov in an exciting 5 setter. I could not watch a single serve, a single forehand and yet in my mind I know how Rafael must have played- the benefits of having followed his game for more than a decade now. I ve cuttings from the newspaper when Nadal won his 7^th French Open title and have pinned it in my hostel room. “NADAL IN 7^TH HEAVEN”, reads the headlines of TIMES SPORTS page 14, 12^th June 2012. It was an iconic victory which confirmed the status of Rafael Nadal as the conqueror of Clay as he overtook Bjorn Borg’s record of 6 French Open titles.  

When it came to sports, I have always supported the second best, because best was always considered divine. You cannot support or follow a divinity, you can just worship him. And so as much as I loved watching Roger Federer play that majestic single handed backhand, or Sachin Tendulkar score that booming straight drive to Glenn McGrath, I some how found it hard to make them heroes. They were legends already even before I had started to watch the respective sports. So, it was in late 2003 when I started to follow cricket with passion and it was also the time when India discovered its 2^nd best batsman- Rahul Dravid, a man I have come to admire, love and follow through all these years, because he was a man, a human, a mere mortal, flawed and not divine.

It was a similar experience of watching a young, handsome, long haired guy wearing a sleeveless shirt and sending down grunting forehands against the divine Roger Federer which made me a Rafael Nadal fan.

But on Sunday as I will sit to watch Roger Federer vs Rafael Nadal in the Australian Open finals (they are playing in a grandslam final after 6 or 7 years gap!), I am not really sure who is the 2^nd best and that’s why I am at odds to select a player I have to root for. Both are coming after injuries and bad form. Both were written off by the Sanjay Manjarekars and Geoffrey Boycotts of Tennis world. But they are back, just like Yuvraj Singh and MS Dhoni did last week versus England when they turned the clocks back and produced a special.

When Rafael and Roger play on Sunday, I am sure they will be dishing us a special too, each moment will be savored by the tennis loving fans irrespective of whoever wins because the biggest prize will not go to the players but to the audience.

Well, can there be a bigger prize than getting ourselves 10 years younger? Science has faltered to deceive when it comes to reversing age, but sports still has that beauty and that is why we watch sports and read Ruskin Bond’s books, we become a child again; a child bubbling with enthusiasm, fervor and hope- things that can sometimes get defeated as we grow up.

Let us for once, not turn the match into Rafa vs Roger, for that would be disrespecting the legends who made our growing up days beautiful. 
Irrespective of the result, I just hope they play a long match. Because longer they play, longer I will be a child on Sunday. 

Thank You, Roger Federer!

Thank You, Rafael Nadal! 

THANK YOU, 2017!

-      Devashish Palkar

JUST ANOTHER NOBODY

"JUST ANOTHER NOBODY!"
AN OPEN LETTER TO
Respected BSF Jawan Tez Bahadur Yadav,

Good morning, sir..
I am sure you must be experiencing mixed emotions this morning. You must be wondering how a simple video appeal where you are seen highlighting the dark secrets of the Indian army, especially the poor quality of food the jawans have to endure during their duty in some of the most inhuman weather conditions.
I salute the determination with which you guys still work under such extreme conditions. But I pity your condition. I almost ridicule it. Because I am a hypocrite. I am an Indian. I am an Indian hypocrite. (That's a deadly combination. )

Today, in this 21st century while we are madly following the standards and infrastructure established in the west, one thing which we should have followed but are dearly missing is the openness to receive criticism- and I am not talking about the Kejriwalian idea of criticism where Modi is responsible for everything right from corruption to constipation! May be it is here where our flaws lie- in differentiating between a true critic and a cry baby!!

But, a critic is often misunderstood for a cry baby by men in higher authority and so you will either be expelled from the army by some men in power too blind to appreciate their flaws or you will be totally disregarded and labelled a lunatic.

We are a nation of hypocrites. We are inert. We are corrupt becaue we are vulnerable. We are vulnerable because we are corrupt.

Here is what I predict will happen to you-
1. You will get a severe bashing from your seniors.
2. You will be labelled a lunatic.
3. You will be transferred to a place where there is no internet coverage and your voice will be subdued.
4. At best there will be a 'surprise' (pre planned) inspection and the authorities will make sure that at the time of inspection everything is in place and in perfect order.
5. You will be alienated by some of your own men who wouldn't want to associate themselves because their job security matters to them and that is justified too.
6. You will be made an example of and the authorities will make sure that nobody will become another Tez Bahadur.
7. The viral video will be forgotten over the course of next few weeks or will be taken down or you will be forced to take it down citing that your video could potentially be a risk to India's security. And you will once again become just another nobody.

But to me you matter. You matter to not just India but to humanity.
Becaue you are an unreasonable man.
As George Bernard Shaw said,

"The reasonable man adapts himself to the world: the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man."

Here's ending it with an optimism that your step will help improve things over the course of a longer run.
I know it is a very utopian wish but nothing ever moves until it is pushed. You have given it a push. You have done your bit. Be proud.

 "The world suffers a lot. Not because the violence of bad people. But because of the silence of the good people."
-Napoléon Bonaparte

~Devashish Palkar,
"Just another nobody" (with some personal experience of how things work!!)
#IndianArmy

REDEFINING SUCCESS

As I begin to write this, the question that is being asked is whether Aamir Khan's Dangal will break PK's box office record or not? Around the same time 2 years back the question that was being asked was whether PK will eventually break the box office record of Dhoom 3? 

A year before that the question was whether Dhoom 3 will break PK's record? 

Do you notice the pattern between these questions? Yes, Aamir Khan playing the lead role is a definite no brainer! But the important thing to notice is that each of Aamir Khan's new movie gets compared with his own previous movie. I repeat. 

His own previous movie! 

By the time you actually read this article, Dangal might have actually broken PK's record!

With Dangal, Aamir has not only established himself as one of the most reliable actors of this industry but has actually redefined how we measure success or rather how we compare success. 

With his new movie, I feel Aamir Khan has reached the pinnacle of his acting career. 

It won't surprise me if I cut and paste the same line for Aamir Khan the next year and the next... 

It is a bit like Virat Kohli who has become such a great cricketer and his records are so mind numbing that we are forced to compare Virat Kohli with only Virat Kohli just like we used to compare Mahendra Singh Dhoni as a finisher with Mahendra Singh Dhoni, the finisher we know through his records over time. 

For any professional performer, the highest point of his career is achieved when he starts becoming a 'misaal', a rallying point about the highest achievement in his field. The only competition a professional then has is with himself.  It is at once the most gratifying and yet a very vulnerable prospect to be in. You are expected to deliver every time you make the next move. Some players like Sachin Tendulkar and Virat Kohli and some film stars like Aamir Khan excel when they are put in such a position. 

However this might not always happen. We all know the story of a 17 year old kid who slammed a 37 ball hundred in 1996 tried replicating it in each of his next innings. (He played 400 ODIs by the way) But he could never again emulate the same amount of success that he did when he first batted. We know this kid by the name Shahid Afridi and he too is a 'misal', a rallying point when it comes to talking about 'inconsistency'. 

Perhaps it is a natural human tendency to expect more, "Yeh Dil always Mange More!" The burden of expectations is what separate a successful professional and excellent professional. With the work which Aamir Khan and Virat Kohli are producing right now in their respective careers, it appears that they are not chasing success but rather in pursuit of Excellence, as one of Aamir's famous character, Phunsuk Wangdu says in 3 Idiots. 

And perhaps the dream and goal of every individual and every Institute is to reach a level where comparison with the contemporaries ceases to exist but the comparison becomes one with their previous work. 

In trying to beat their own records, these individuals have widened the horizon of human excellence and as we know the beauty of Horizon is that a new one appears every time we go past the existing one. 

I leave you here with a question - What should be our goal to become successful to stay successful? 

Can our each next step be better than the previous one? Can our each new day be more productive than the previous one? Can each new moment of your life be more valuable than your previous one? 

Can our each new Year be better that the last? 

If we actually make this possible then I believe we shall have lived the most productive versions of our life. 

As Robin Sharma wrote in one of his books, "At the end of my life I don't want to be like a glittering lamp which gets extinguished with the oil still inside. I want to be like a flame, burning the brightest till its alive and leaving behind no unsued oil." 

I write this to you at a time when I know many of the new year resolutions thay we took a week back have vanished. 

But starting today, we still have more than 350 days to make this year the best year of our life yet. 

With all sincerity I pray to the universe to make us all monomaniacally focused 

on making 2017 our best year yet. 

Let us approach every decision that we make in this new year with the timing and confidence of Virat Kohli and the perfection of Aamir Khan.

Happy 2017.

~ Devashish Palkar