Life 360

If you read my previous post and saw the video in there you would have found the Background score pretty intruging. Its in ... yes Bengali :) . The song is called "Praan" by Garry Schyman (vocals by Palbasha Siddique). It was inspired by Rabindranath Tagore's poem which goes like so ..

The poet describes an epiphany in which he sees all of existence, from the natural world around him to the entire history of humanity, dancing with the same blood - the same stream of life. Pretty darn profound huh .. ! somehow makes you think .. shouldnt we all be feeling that stream of life ?

If you think about it its such a simple question. Yet for the past 15 mins I haven't been able to come up with a credible enough answer to that question. So I guess that ain't such a simple question after all. Well to be able to answer that question you need a pre requisite, - enter a 'Plan' which is what I never have had .. and I mean ever ! Is that bad ? well in a way thats is bad coz I don't have something to aim towards. Like some invisible goal I should reach before I leave this place on earth. Then again I live for the moment or atleast I think I do. No long term plan means that I am adaptable enough to any change that life will throw at me (and there is the superstition that plans never work for me anyway), which brings us back to the core of the post ' what the hell do I wanna get outta my life ?'

Isn't that an amazing picture and I kid you not it isn't photoshoped or had any digital mimicry done on it. Its a real place that exists called Salar de Uyuni (or Salar de Tunupa) in the western part of Bolivia in South America. It is the world's largest salt flat kinda like the salt flats of Utah but much much bigger. The effect you see is caused by a few inches of water that stagnates over the flats when it gets some rain during the year. The water remains still as the place experiences very little wind or breeze for that matter turning it into a gigantic mirror creating that magnificent effect, where the havens meet earth so seamlessly. Its when you see pictures like these that make you want to know more about that place go see it for yourself and experience the awe. Cruising along on a jeep at 40 miles per hr and feeling as though you were on a ship sailing the high seas, now wouldn't that be cool.

I caught the travel bug also coz of 2 people who i grew close to at my previous job at Symbian. First of whom is a quirky South African Indian guy Jiten Rama. We became friends at the 4 week 'boot camp' training that Symbian put us through. The fellow is a real inspiration coz hes one of the nut cases who got up one morning and suddenly realized that hell what the frak am I doing, I need to see more of this world than stay here cozy in my cool job, driving around in my nice sports car and sweet talking my lovely girl friend. So what does he do he quits hes job, sells his car (which by the way he still cribs about), says adios to the girl and comes to UK - coz it has easy access to all the European countries he has always wanted to go see. Hes been at it ever since he got here, slowly but surely checking off atleast one country a month ! hats off to ya buut (buut is Afrikaans for 'bro'). I need to be doing that one of these days .. only difference being that i don't have a job, a car nor a gurl but atleast I am already in Uk :D.

The other person is one of the most humble, knowledgeable and thoughtful people I have met is Mr John Moore. I used to sit right next to him at work and we used to share stories. Hes a pretty old fella about my dads age and has been a person I could aspire to be, not only for his sense of humor and helpful nature (god knows how many times hes solved stuff when I was stuck with at work .. thanks John) but most of all for his passion for traveling around the world and meeting and experiencing distant and different cultures. The cool part is that his wife seems to share his passion too so every 4 to 6 months they are off to another distant part of the planet. While I was with Symbian he made a trip to Transylvania (think Count Dracula) in Romania in the summer and Timbuktu (which I till then thought was a fictional city :|) which is in the western African country Mali for Christmas. He has been all over Asia as well and you wouldn't believe how much he loves Indian food. Hes been to more places in India than I have been to and I call myself an Indian. It still makes me smile when I think of the time I asked him if he had ever been to Mumbai and he enthusiastically told me all the stories about his visit back in the 80's and how he stayed at this really great hotel which was pretty cheap to stay at over looking the Gateway of India. If you haven't figured it out he was talking about the Taj Mahal Hotel and Tower :D.

But this video below is what really got me thinking



Its a 4 and a half minute video so it might take a bit to load but trust me its worth it (and it starts off in amchi mumbai ) and if your lazy to wait for it to load then heres a lill clip from the video.That video makes me think damn that guy must have had an excellent time doing that. He is Matt Harding ,a 31 year old former video game designer from Connecticut, who used to think that making video games is all he ever wanted to do. He soon realized that theres much more to life than just that and there might be a ton of stuff that he might be missing out on. So as many of the wacky people out there he quit his job and set out on a journey of exploration and he recorded it all in his own funny little way and according to his website www.wherethehellismatt.com hes been at it for quite a while now. Hes not only having a lot of fun doing something thats pretty neat but also bringing smiles to a lot of people around the world at the same time .. :D. Check out his website for some more of his fun videos and a 3 part lecture by him about his adventures.

so it all still makes me think .. what DO I want to be doing with my life ? So people reading this gimmie some comments to help me answer this burning question of mine .. what do you what to be doing with ur life ?