PUSH AND PULL

New Year’s Eve was a learning experience. We got together to meet our old university professor. Vincent and Terence arrived late, thinking it was fashionable to do so. Little did we know that we had passed the age of fashion and renaissance was around the corner. Baharul Islam, our eternal ‘flower power’ sensation, was as usual punctual. He swore using words like ‘fart face’ and ‘botox smiley bastards’, we laughed as usual. Anyway, don’t let me drift.

So there we were, early afternoon, with the splendid sunlight glowing along the gaps which escaped the lovely woods at some corner in DSE. Hope tangled like a spring, time wouldn’t freeze but it sure felt fantastic when we saw the combination of the smoke coming out of our cigarettes through vivid sunlight. The moment was excellent because it was an amalgamation of geography, history, culture, language, fashion and art. You will know what I’m talking about if you have also spent many useless afternoons at DSE doing absolutely ‘nothing’ (which seemed so important back then).

Like I said, our conversations range from ‘Mussolini’ to ‘Diesel’, ‘Coffee’ to ‘Flintstones’, ‘Feminism’ to ‘Pocket Billiards’, so on. You get the idea. That day was pretty significant because we were, like usual, discussing about the new Viagra in Agra.

Baharul said that he sacrificed his MBA seat last year so that he could purchase stocks of ‘Axe’ and he cried that no woman came jumping on him like the advertisements show. Vincent and Terence had complications (NON-MATERNITY RELATED).

While we kept whining about life, our professor said he’d get some tea and walked off towards the famous JP Tea stall. We insisted we’d get it but he also insisted, and you can imagine who insisted better. Anyway, our professor returned with a large pot of tea and an assortment of cups- porcelain, plastic, glass, crystal, some plain looking, some expensive, some exquisite. Then he asked us to help ourselves with some hot tea.


When the three of us had a cup of tea in hand, our professor said-

“If you noticed, all the nice looking, expensive cups were taken up, leaving behind the plain and cheap ones. While it is normal for you to want only the best for yourselves, that is the source of your problems and stress.

What all of you really wanted was the ‘tea’, not the cup, but you consciously went for the best cups and were eying each other’s cups.

Now if life is ‘tea’; then the jobs, money and position in society are the cups. They are just tools to hold and contain life, but the quality of life does not change. Sometimes, by concentrating on the cup, we fail to enjoy the ‘tea’.

Anyway, don’t think much. Enjoy the tea.”


HAPPY 2008.



Disclaimer- The ‘Tea & Cup’ example is from some source (Internet). Used only for adverse affect. However, the humour and core of this piece is fucking brilliantly original. Many thanks.