Ghost Stories!!!

Everyone likes ghost stories. Here is my attempt at penning true life incidents. Each of the below mentioned incidents did happen and are 100% true. They were narrated to me by my office colleagues when we took a break from crunching numbers. I would like to thank SK, V and A for sharing these stories with me. They are spooky, seem unreal and all of them entertaining in a goose-bumpy kind of way. So dear reader get ready to be spooked. Enjoy!!

Calcutta haunting!

SK 's father was in the army, so SK spent his formative years travelling all over the country thanks to his father's numerous postings. The incident I am about to narrate took place at the army quarters in Calcutta.

SK's father had to report at 4.30 a.m. every morning for training. Their next door neighbour whom we shall call C, was also required to report for the said training, but had trouble waking up early in the morning so he requested SK's father to knock at the door when he was leaving. SK's father agreed and it was all set.

Next day morning as was the ritual SK's mom walked SK's father to the door. SK's father stepped out and turned to go to C's house, when all of a sudden, they were surprised to see C dressed in parade uniform walking away towards the ground. To say the least SK's father was a littled miffed that C did not have the courtesy to wait up and say hello, but he let it pass and soon forgot about it.

Later in the day C's wife stepped out to water the plants. She and SK's mom chatted for a while and thats when C's wife asked why SK's father did not knock before leaving, she went on to say that C missed the training again today as he to could not wake up. SK's mom was flabbergasted, she told her that both SK's father and she has seen C in full army uniform leave the house and walk towards the parade grounds. To which C's wife said C was still in bed having taken the day off work! Now both SK's mom and C's wife were spooked and they inquired with some old residents if anyone else had such sightings in the past. That was when they were told that that road was haunted by the ghost of an armyman!!!

Ghost Samaritan!

This one took place in rural Maharastra, Konkan to be precise. V's family has an ancestral bungalow in Konkan and spent occasional vacations there. A few years ago when they were on one such vacation V's elder sister fell ill and needed some medicines that were not available at the village. V's father set out to get the medicines. It was raining pretty heavily and V's aunt warned him that the last bus for the village left at 6.30 from the city and if he missed the bus, he would have to walk home.

As luck would have it V's father missed the bus and cursing his luck he started the long lonely trek home. The rain was now pouring pretty heavily and rain water was cascading off his raincoat and joining the river that had formed where earlier in the day had been a kaccha road. He must have walked for half an hour or so when he felt like someone/ something was walking behind him. He stopped, looked around and called out but there was no one,so he shrugged it off and continued walking thinking that it was just his raincoat and gumboots that were making the sound and cursed his overactive imagination. But the feeling of being watch just would not go. After a while he became aware that the sounds came from up ahead and not from behind as he earlier thought. It sounded like grass being cut by a sickle... slick, slick, slick... He walked faster towards the sound and soon ahead in the gloom he saw a faint light...some distance away was a bullock cart.

He called out to the occupant and the bullock cart came to a halt. The person driving the cart offered V's dad a lift and introduced himself as Dhanghar. He said he lived in the same village and knew V's family. V's dad had moved to the city a few decades ago and barely knew people there anymore and was glad for a ride back home. They covered the remaining part of the journey chit-chatting about the village and happennings. Before they knew it they arrived at the village, Dhanghar dropped V's dad at the gate and left. On arriving at the house, V's dad narrated how he missed the bus and was trudging along alone when luckily he chanced upon Dhanghar who dropped him home. V's aunt who was listening silently so far, quielty asked whether he was sure it was Dhanghar who had dropped him. When V's father replied in the affirmative she dropped the bomb...Dhanghar had died three years ago!!!

Study Night Fright!

When A was in school she and her best friend D, would study together as it was good excuse to stay over at each others homes, be pampered by the moms (who supplied food and drink for the hardworking twosome), listen to music and exchange the latest gossip. During one such study night at A's place, sometime after mid-night D said that she would like to use the bathroom. Being scared to go alone she coaxed A to go with her. The bathroom was outside the study to the right and opposite it was a balcony that overlooked huge mango trees. The branches of these trees were so close that A claims she could pluck mangoes straight off the tree. So there A was stood outside the bathroom door waiting for D to come out. She began looking around and happened to look in the direction of the balcony. There sat on the branches of the mango tree was a man with these huge red eyes staring at her. She screamed loudly, on hearing her screams D rushed out and looked in the direction A was pointing, she too saw the apparition. By then, A's parents also arrived at the scene, when they looked out there was no one on the tree...the man had dissapeared!!!

The status quo has changed!!!

Dil to Pagal hai was on TV today, it is one of my favourite movies...Nisha is the character that I like most and I believe it is one of Karisma Kapoor’s best performances. The hero’s best friend, the one who loves him to distraction but knows she can only be his best friend. Your heart bleeds for her, you feel her pain, her helplessness as she watches her friend fall for someone else.

Very poignant few lines from the song Chand ne kuch kaha...from the same movie...

Jis pe hum mar mite, usko pata bhi nahin
Kya gila hum kare, voh bewafa bhi nahin
Humne jo sun liya usne kaha bhi nahin
Ae dil zara sochkar, Pyar kar, o ho ho pyar kar

How many times in life do we come at crossroads where we have to let go. They say,

If you love something, let it go
If it comes back it is yours
If it does not, it never was...

Why is letting go the hardest thing??

Is it because we feel that no one will be able to fill the vacuum??...But Nature abhors a vacuum, doesn’t it??

Atleast that is what the film said, Nisha meets Ajay in the end... the vacuum left by Rahul is filled by Ajay... the film ends with hope...

As a rule we resist change, the reigning feeling is don’t rock the boat... We don’t want any change in the status quo... but at times a change in status quo is just what the doctor recommended. My favourite quote is “The status quo has changed” from the movie National Treasure... it is in our hands how we make sure the status quo changes in our favour!!!

Leaving you with the below quote from Voltaire,

Each player must accept the cards life deals him or her. But once they are in hand, he or she alone must decide how to play the cards in order to win the game.

Walk in the clouds

Well, at least the escalator is going up, my career is going nowhere, Rohan has left me and here I am at the mall with a maxed out credit card with payday two weeks away. I have absolutely no clue what I am doing here as I simply don’t have the dough for a spot of Retail Therapy.

I reach the top and who's that?? ... Oh God, it’s Rohan, my ex-boyfriend. I backtrack, miss a step and roll all the way to the bottom.

The next thing I remember is a feeling of weightlessness, a soothing calm as if nothing mattered. I am walking on clouds towards a bright light. As I near it, I hear Rohan’s voice calling me.

Surprised, I look down where I see the scene at the mall; there I am or rather my body is at the bottom of the escalator with Rohan holding it in his arms and crying.

As I start walking towards him, a chariot with angels emerges from somewhere in the bright light and approaches me. I suddenly don’t want to leave Rohan and start running, but the chariot draws alongside me and I feel myself being lifted by the angels. I plead with them to release me, but they refuse to listen and continue towards the bright light ... away from Rohan ... I struggle to free myself...

That’s when I woke up; struggling with the sheets and realised it is a brand new day with no mistakes!!!

This is a story I have written for the "Ascension" short fiction contest after Vin threatened me with dire consequences if I did not participate :P

If you haven't participated yet, then rush your entries. Contest closes on 14th of this month...looking forward to read your entries :)

Disillusionment and faith

A few facts were brought to my notice that I never in my wildest imagination could think possible...


9/11 terror attacks conspiracy theory - I even checked this out on the internet...there is a movie , over 2 hours long, called Zeitgeist, which gives a very convincing account of the so called 9/11 conspiracy theory. I have not yet seen the movie but have been told it is compelling - This film have some amazing footage of the crash sites - both at the Pentagon and of united 93 - on which there does not appear to be any evidence of a plane being involved in the crashes.

This fuels speculations... this is not a place to discuss this complicated issue... but I am disillusioned, what state would do such an act to its own people...With the terror attacks in Mumbai, tongues are wagging that some forces in India tried to do some thing akin to the terror attacks in US for their own ulterior motives...this had left me disillusioned all of Wednesday...I kept pondering on the issues all day with a spillover of the same into Thursday...I kept thinking what is the point of writing about it when everything is a conspiracy!!!...I had decided not to write anything on this issue going forth...when it dawned on me that tongues wag...they have in the past,they are wagging now and they always will in the future too...It is not in our control to stop them...what is in our power is to ignore them and follow our purpose...I can think of two stories that my mother told me when I was little, they are very relevant to this scenario...let me recount them for your benefit...

Once upon a time a colony of frogs lived in a large well, as it happened one summer was exceptionally hot and the water in the well began to dry and the frogs decided to leave the well and look for an alterntive place to live. They began climbing to the top of the well, no matter what they did they began slipping back to the well because of the slimy walls...some of them managed to climb out but others began losing hope after numerous failed attempts and quit and consigned themselves to a slow death. Finally a time came when all the frogs except one gave up. The lone frog kept trying, inspite of his fellow frogs telling him to quit, the more they told him to quit the harder he tried to get to the top, finally after one tremendous burst of energy, he made it to the top!!!...when someone asked the frog why he continued to climb up when all were advising him to stop... it dawned on the astonished group that the frog was deaf...when he saw the people talking to him asking him to stop he thought they were actually encouraging him to keep climbing and thus was able to make it to the top!!!!

The second story....
Once a farmers donkey fell into a deep well, the well did not have any water and the farmer did not have money to hire people to pull the donkey out. So, he decided to bury the donkey alive by filling up the well with mud. He called the villagers and asked them to help him to fill the well. The work began, at first the donkey cried piteously when he realised what the farmer and villagers were doing. But then it became quite, and the farmer was surprised to see that as more the mud was thrown on top of the donkey, the donkey calmly shook it off his back and climbed on top of the collected mud...thus climbing higher towards the rim of the well and freedom....finally the well was filled in and the donkey joyously jumped out and walked free...

The reason why I have narrated the two stories in to jut make a point that just as the frog in the story did not listen to the naysayers we must not listen to negative influences and believe in ourselves and rise in life like the donkey, using the dirt or whatever is thrown at us in a positive way...

A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step...so my fellow Indians...step forward...let us begin our journey towards a better India...

Rumours

This is in response to Sawan's blog on the Financial crisis...lemme narrate two stories that I read long time ago but seem really relavant in times like this..I dont remember the exact words but have tried to capture the gist...since they are pretty lengthy I decided to convert it into a post...here goes ...

1) Once there was a bank in a village the owner was much liked and all that...one day the owner was talking to his wife and the maid happened to overhear some bits and pieces of the conversation...the wife was a spend thrift and the man was telling her to curb her habit or he would have to declare himself bankrupt..The maid heard the words "I will have to declare myself bankrupt!"... without thinking or trying to find out the context in which these words were spoken she panicked...and told the milkman who happened to be at the back door that the bank was going to close as the owner was declaring himself bankrupt...the milkman told the baker... the baker in turn told the vegetable vendor...the vegetable vendor told the butcher... as such the news spread and all the villagers arrived at the bank to withdraw their savings...as the banks usually do not hold all their money in liquid cash... there was a shortage and people panicked and there was a perfect riot with much damage to the banks property...as noone was willing to listen to reason... the owner was left with no option but to liquidate all the holdings to pay off the villagers...thus a silly rumour led to the demise of a perfectly healthy bank...

2) The second story is set in the time of the great depression of 1929...there was small town which was reeling under the pressure of the depression...one day a stranger came to the fur trader and ordered a Mink coat...Even in todays world a mink coat is an absolute luxury...the fur trader was over the moon and began thinking finally he would be able to buy his wife the jewellery she has been wanting for a while...the fur trader went to the jeweller and placed an order for a nice piece of jewellery...the jeweller inturn wanted to buy some nice furniture and hence went to the carpenter...this set the cycle of trade in motion...soon the town was bustling with activity...it no longer resembled the place where there was depodency all around but seemed to be thriving and prosperous economy...a few days later another stranger came to the fur trader and showed him a picture and asked him whether he had seen the man in the picture...the fur trader replied in the affirmative and was naturally inquisitive and asked why he was looking for this man ... to which the stanger replied that the man in the picture was mad and had run away from the facility a few days ago...but since the madman first came to town and placed an order for the mink coat... the town had been transformed and the fur trader himself had brisk business and would not suffer if noone now came to collect the mink coat... thus the madman help pull the town out of the depression :)... hope you enjoyed reading these two short stories