Playing parts

Ever got the feeling that you are this intsy-winsty spider in a huge web of life? Maybe it’s all about studying Engineering. I still have no idea what we “engineer”, most of the time we are learning useless stuff by-heart. A friend of mine used all the skills she had learned in her four year course of engineering and got placed in two of the top companies that come recruiting to our colleges. Everyone envied her for a while. The companies were so good that she had a tough time choosing which one to go with. In a casual chat with me, she said “You know what, all that we learn in these four years takes you only as far as getting you placed in a good company, or else helping you clear a entrance tests for further education. You will not really use what you learned in college. What you actually use is the training that the company gives you when you finally join them.” So all the four years are needed only to make sure you understand the 1 month of training?? Accepted, that the industry is ever evolving and they cannot possibly keep updating our syllabus, but then why the stress on completing journals and all the stupid file work? Files and journals give you 5 marks, attending 75% of the lectures gives you another 1 mark, 80% 2 marks and so on till above 95% gives you 5 marks. It is so pathetic, the way we are bribed to do something that doesn’t make sense all for the sake of discipline and keeping traditions. So this is one place where i feel I’m just playing my part..doing stuff just because I’m meant to..without asking why.

Another place where that happens is whenever I visit Mumbai. Just the sheer numbers astound you. The massive amount of crowds, the traffic, the pace of their life. I’m dazed me every time I see it. Everyone has something on their minds, everyone has somewhere to go, some job to do. Sometimes I feel even the speed with which people walk about on the streets is faster. Like in the movies when the camera suddenly zooms out of a scene…you suddenly get the bigger picture, suddenly you and your little complicated life are miniscule, infinitesimally small, negligible. I knowI’ve been saying that living in Goa had made me more capable of enjoying the small things in life. But ironically living in Mumbai teaches you some lessons too. The poverty, the competition, the striving to make ends meet that you see makes you value what you’ve got. And you start feeling like you are just one link in this fantastic maze.

Another time is when I’m traveling at night. When I’m traveling by bus or train and I can see the distant light of households passing by, I always try to imagine whats happening in each home. What food is being cooked, who all are sitting at the table to eat it, whether they are watching TV serials. This too makes me think about how each individual is playing their part.,doing what they have to do…not because they always wanted to do it, but because it’s a part of the maze..part of what you have to do to give your share back to the world, to get what you want back from it.