If only………..

Courtesy: hdwallpapers.in

From every slit of a small angle 

I watch you, with others mingle

Only to find you like a cute little girl

Stunning, striking and lovable

If only, you know this fable 

My life would be blessed and more stable 

When I could not see your face

I feel like going mad for days 

And when you ignore at your pace

I hate my life in many ways

If only you remain near and pays 

For what I missed, I would be happy for always 

When I come close and near

In your eyes, I find fright and fire of fear

Not because you are with me dear

Because of the room that is so clear

If only others pretend not to dare

Our presence can be something we can bear

Romance is what they are

The age always has no bar

Race and region’s effect is also very far

Nothing strong possess the courage to mar

If only things happened before at par

We wouldn’t face any kind of this war

"Being deeply loved by someone gives you strength while loving someone deeply gives you courage" Lao Tzu 

The Fortune of the Misfortune

If the grain of the misfortune is already sown in the field of our name, it is destined to grow one day with the click of the clock. Escapism is the rarest breed that one can afford to buy with the currency of our luck.

It was Sunday, the seventh of October, twenty-twelve. A piece of day in the calendar of my stay here that printed a seal of misfortune in the pages of my life, lived and to be lived.

The short-circuiting melted my one-year-old LCD which to date fed me with the songs of the current global affairs. To my utter despair, half of the used-to-be magnificent screen mirrored to be the best worst electronics I have ever seen.

The cruel hands of the inferno had an extraordinary length of courage that it grabbed one of my friends scanning machines into a roasted ball of carbon. The flame had danced with the contemporary steps over the carpeted floor of my room, thereby ignoring the presence of few minute electronics. Their fate was ruined with the wind of its strength that it completely lost its genetic shape and size.

And fortunately, as its song of the smoke danced out of the door of my curtained window, it accidentally pulled the trigger of hairs inside the nasal chambers of the people around.

These pollens of smell ought to be the synonymy of pheromone that pushed the neighbours into a single file to the direction of my house like a congress of ants. At that moment, the closeness of a bunch of ladies became the furthest strength to strangulate the fuming flame inside my room, since their timid hearts were engulfed by the tentacles of fear and panic.

But with the life of their cry, it towed the crowd of archers who became the heroes in the fire battlefield. The fibre of their muscles was put into an acid test that they assassinated the flames like an infuriated Brutus killing Julie Caesar. Their might echoed the famous Marcus Brutus’s line: It is not that I “loved Caesar less,” but that I “loved Rome more” as in the process of putting the fire off, it involved making my windows nude, breaking the door and soaking my entire bedroom. 

After I reached the scene, I lost some hours to knit the wool of my courage to believe what has really happened. Thank God, I gave a huge sigh of cry that it only injured me and saved the life and hard-earned property of fellow mates. Keep aside casting the casualties, the fire ignored to impair the rest of anything other than mine. It sent me a thrill of message that fortune comes at the cost of misfortunes as well.

[Actually, the article was supposed to be posted on 7th October 2012 but failed. I was not able to log into my blog]

The Census RIMPOCHHE

The Precious Naming Ritual

In Bhutan, we take naming very seriously. We do not name someone on a whim. If possible, we queue up to get our newborn’s name from a revered Rimpoche. After all, Rimpoche literally means "the precious one," and their blessings make sure we do not end up with something absurd.

Well, that was the plan, my dad and mom had, at least.

Like every other Bhutanese baby, I was presented before a lineup of wise Rimpoche, and after much spiritual calculation, I was bestowed with the name Damchu Wangchuk. 

My parents beamed with pride, and my name made its way from census records to school admission cards, and from there to becoming a full-fledged identity in my village.

It was all smooth sailing... until it was not.

A Name in a Constant Motion 

Fast forward to 1997, I sat for my Primary School Certificate Examination (PSCE) with the same name I received from my birth. But by the time I joined Nangkor Junior High School, something strange happened.

My name had magically morphed into Damchoe Wangdue.

Did I change it? No. Did my parents? They did not. 

Did the school system casually or mistakenly decide that my name was due for an upgrade? Apparently, yes.

And that was just the beginning.

2 years later, when I appeared for the Lower Secondary School Certificate Examination (LSSCE), my name had once again undergone an unsolicited transformation 🤯. Now, I was officially Damcho Wangdi.

At this point, even I started accepting my identity crisis. Whatever name they gave me, I simply rented it for a while before the next inevitable change.

tenor.com

The Census Rimpoche 🙏

 In 2001, I was gearing up for the Bhutan Certificate of Secondary Education (BCSE). It was a big deal. My batch was the first to sit for this prestigious exam after Bhutan parted ways with the Indian School Certificate Examination (ICSE).

Before the exam, we were notified to submit our Citizenship Identity Card (CID) to confirm our names. I took leave from school and travelled home to collect my CID that I obtained recently. 

My plan was to get the document and return to the school without any drama. But, I was wrong.

Upon reaching home, I discovered that my name had once again undergone its evolutionary cycle. This time, my name had reached its final, least glamorous form: Dumcho Wangdi.

Yes, you read that right. Dumcho.

It sounded plain, awkward, and terribly uncomfortable to pronounce. It was as if someone had taken my name, chopped off a few letters, and put it back together with zero concern for phonetic dignity.

Burning with rage, I turned to my poor parents and demanded an explanation. 

"How did this happen? Who did this?"

Turns out, it was all thanks to a Census Rimpoche, a highly qualified gentleman from the census office, who had generously decided that my name needed a little renovation. The man had gone around my village collecting information from around 70 households, and somewhere along the way, he decided to play a game of scrabble with my name 😠.

The Public Humiliation Ceremony

With my new name, I returned to school and submitted my CID. The next day, our class teacher walked in with a sheet of paper and began reading out our final, officially confirmed names.

I already knew what was coming. I could feel the disaster before it happened.

As soon as my teacher reached my name, he did not even attempt to maintain his composure. Instead, he roared with laughter. My classmates soon joined in, and the classroom erupted into a chaotic mockery fest.

Then, to add salt to my wounds, some eerie friends from the backbenches decided to helpfully announce, "That sounds like a dog’s name!"

And that was it. My self-esteem packed its bags and left the building.

From that day on, I started detesting my own name. Every time I had to write it, spell it, or worse, say it out loud, I felt the weight of the mockery that came with it. My classmates never let me live it down. Some even kept the joke going for weeks.

And all thanks to our dear Census Rimpoche, who turned my name into an unofficial canine brand. 😡

The Philosophical Acceptance? 

Now, after decades of reluctant acceptance, I finally made peace with my name.

I take solace in Shakespeare’s words from Romeo and Juliet:

"What's in a name? That which we call a rose, by any other name would smell as sweet."

Sure, Shakespeare, but try telling that to someone who got stuck with an accidental dog name 🐕.

In the grand scheme of things, names are just labels. They have no strength or weakness, no scent or colour, no power to differentiate rich from poor. But when you have spent your whole life getting used to one, and it suddenly gets switched up, it is like hearing a song off-key. It sounds awkward, funny, and utterly ridiculous.

To this day, the one thing I still dislike about my name is that I always have to stand next to someone and spell it out letter by letter. Otherwise, I pay the price for their negligence. Because honestly, unless it is our name, we always take other people’s names for granted.

Funny but True

If names were currency, mine would have gone through an unstable stock market crash. From Damchu Wangchuk to Dumcho Wangdi, I have lived multiple identities without ever asking for one.

The evolutionary board of my name 

What is THIS?

I feel like I am lying on a carpet of a dream,

But, it isn’t a dream, I hear others talk and scream

To say I am induced with a drug to be crazy

I find myself stable, not so lazy

Then, what is this? 

Your absence from my sight is an injurious pain 

That numbs the usual tune of my brain 

When you are next to me my dear,

I find meaning in being so close and near

So, what is this?

I envy you for being with others

The eyes of my heart get clouded and it bothers

Although our line of living is separate and clear

Yet my heart beats with pain without any fear

And I wonder, what is this? 

Sometimes, I don’t want you with me here 

As I fear you would say you don’t want to hear 

I know the path of our closeness is so rough 

Yet I want to tread on without fear, as it is not enough 

That makes me think, what is this?

When you are just out of the house

Wearing that elegant blue blouse

Over the slim body and take a walk

I want to join your cold hand openly and talk

And let people watch, what is this? 

Every single bead of our moment 

Is archived in my heart that I really can’t 

Erase to start something new and make ours lost 

For such kind will never happen at any cost 

It’s special for me to reflect what is this?

To describe you, the words don’t have the capacity

The lyricist would fail to compose on their own ability

As charming as you are, so is your closeness  

Which I miss and enjoy, so shall I confess

But I know you may think, what is this? 

People may make fun and as abnormal, you may find 

Because it might or not have occurred to you of such kind

To me, it doesn’t make me surprised and wonder

As your absence rather makes my heart grow fonder 

Please don’t say “Are u crazy”, and shout what is this?

Although destiny has pushed us to a separate room

When met before, our relations have failed to bloom

Yet with the destiny’s pity hand and heart

We will craft our relation into one best form of an art

And let destiny itself wonder, WHAT IS THIS?