Sushmita Sen about "Compassion"

 Sushmita Sen once gave a speech after receiving an award. Loved her words so documenting here:

Oh this is overwhelming! very overwhelming! 

Thankyou A & B for that very wonderful introduction.

Thankyou so much C & D for this wonderful honor. This award represents more than what I do or What 'we' do and represents more of who we are. I think Identifying that, to acknowledge ones true calling in life is a very powerful thing. "Kuchh logo ko poori zindagi lag jati hai". 

And I think that "compassionate" the term you used - it exists in everyone. Every single human being I have met, has it. Some realize it faster, others take a little longer to come to it.

Nothing in my life, ladies and gentlemen, has been an act of charity. I say this with my hand on my heart. I don't believe in it. I only know that there is a responsibility that you are born with, when you are born a human being and that has to do with connecting on a level with another human being, be that a girl child, a boy child, a human being and I am very privileged that I got a platform in my life so early on to have such an abundant life masha allah that I have looked back at it and said "the more I do is less"..

Congratulations, ladies, the ones that have won tonight, the ones that have won in their lives, the courage to stand and be who they truly are ! and to make a difference in the process to other lives as well. To share this platform with you truly makes me taller than I am tonight and it is fantastic !!

Finally, thankyou God, thankyou my mom and my dad ! my wonderful friends, my beautiful daughters ! But truly it is powerful to be a woman, even greater to be a human being !

Thankyou very much for this ! I am indeed in your debt.

Pearls

Dad's one of the hobbies is writing. Here's is a casual reveiw he wrote on the video collages I made. The blessings at the end for Sehaj, brought tears to my eyes, dont know why :

ਨਿਰਮਾਤਾ ਨਿਰਦੇਸ਼ਕ  ( ਮਨਿੰਦਰ ) ਦੀਆਂ ਇਸ  ਹਫਤੇ  ਵਿਚ   ਦੋ  ਮੂਵੀਜ਼  release  ਹੋਈਆਂ  ਹਨ | ਪਹਿਲੀ  ਫਿਲਮ  (ਸਾਗਾਂ  ਮਹਿੰਦੀ  ) ਵਿਚ  ਹੈਰੋਇਨ  ਨੂੰ  ਆਪਣੇ  ਵਿਵਾਹ  ਲਈ  ਤਿਆਰ  ਹੁੰਦੇ  ਵਿਖਾਇਆ  ਗਯਾ  ਹੈ | ਖ਼ਬਰ  ਹੈ  ਕੇ  ਉਸ  ਦੀ  ਮੈਰਿਜ  ਹੋ  ਗਈ  ਹੈ  ਤੇ  ਮੀਆਂ  (Suneel) ਬੀਵੀ  (Jupinder) ਦੋਨੋ  ਖੁਸ਼  ਹਨ | ਮਨਿੰਦਰ  ਦੀ  ਦੂਸਰੀ  ਫਿਲਮ  (Sehaj's Birthday ) ਵਿਚ  ਦੋਨਾਂ  ਨੇ  ਆਪਣਾ  ਰੋਲ  ਬਹੁਤ ਵੱਧੀਆ ਨਿਭਾਇਆ  ਹੈ | ਰਬ  ਜੋੜੀ  ਸਲਾਮਤ  ਰੱਖੇ |

ਨਿਰਮਾਤਾ  ਨਿਰਦੇਸ਼ਕ  ( ਮਨਿੰਦਰ  ) ਨੇ  ਮੂਵੀ  (Sehaj's Birthday ) ਵੀ  ਮੇਹਨਤ  ਨਾਲ  ਬਣਾਈ  ਹੈ | ਫਿਲਮ  ਦਰਸ਼ਕਾਂ  ਨੂੰ  ਪਸੰਦ  ਆਈ  ਹੈ | Cinema house full ਚਲ ਰਹੇ  ਹਨ | ਵੈਸੇ  ਨਿਰਮਾਤਾ  ਨਿਰਦੇਸ਼ਕ  ਪਰਿਵਾਰਿਕ  ਫ਼ਿਲਮ  ਬਣਾਉਣ   ਵਿਚ  ਮਾਹਿਰ  ਹੈ | ਉਹ  2009 ਵਿਚ  ਵੀ  ਆਪਣੀ  ਸਿਸਟਰ (ਜੁਪਿੰਦਰ ) ਦੇ  ਸਹਿਯੋਗ  ਨਾਲ  ਆਪਣੇ  ਪੇਰੇਂਟਸ  ਦੀ  25th marriage anniversary ਤੇ  ਪਰਿਵਾਰਿਕ  ਫਿਲਮ  ਬਣਾ  ਕੇ  ਦਰਸ਼ਕਾਂ  ਦੀ  ਵਾਹ  ਵਾਹ  ਖੱਟ  ਚੁਕਾ  ਹੈ |

"Sehaj's Birthday " ਫਿਲਮ  ਦੇ  ਸਭ  ਕਲਾਕਾਰ  ਅਪਨੋ  ਆਪਣਾ  ਰੋਲ  ਨਿਭਾਉਣ  ਵਿਚ  ਕਾਮਯਾਬ  ਹੋਏ  ਹਨ | ਪਰ  ਫਿਲਮ  ਦੇ  ਹੀਰੋ  (ਸਹਿਜ ) ਨੇ  ਨਿੱਕੀ  ਉਮਰ  ਵਿਚ  ਕਮਾਲ  ਦੀ ਐਕਟਿੰਗ  ਕਰ  ਕੇ  ਦਰਸ਼ਕਾਂ  ਦੇ  ਦਿਲਾਂ  ਵਿਚ  ਜਗ੍ਹਾ  ਬਣਾ  ਲਈ  ਹੈ |

ਨਿਰਮਾਤਾ  ਨਿਰਦੇਸ਼ਕ  ਨੂੰ  ਫਿਲਮ  ਦੀ  ਕਾਮਯਾਬੀ  ਲਈ   ਮੁਬਾਰਕਾਂ | ਫਿਲਮ  ਦੇ  ਹੀਰੋ (ਸਹਿਜ ) ਨੂੰ  ਵੀ  ਵਧਾਈਆਂ | ਰੱਬ  ਅੱਗੇ  ਅਰਦਾਸ  ਕਿ  ਉਸ  ਨੂੰ  ਜ਼ਿੰਦਗੀ  ਵਿਚ  ਵੱਧੀਆ  ਕਿਸਮ  ਦੇ  ਰੋਲ  ਕਰਨ  ਨੂੰ  ਮਿਲਣ  ਤੇ  ਉਹ  ਹਰ  ਰੋਲ  ਨੂੰ  ਕਾਮਯਾਬੀ  ਨਾਲ  ਨਿਭਾਏ |

ज़िंदगी चल मुस्कुराने की वजह ढूँढ़ते हैं। तुम हमें ढूंढो हम तुम्हे ढूँढ़ते हैं।

Yesterday I stumbled on a beautiful quotation on Facebook and I want to make it the title of the next writing: ज़िंदगी चल मुस्कुराने की वजह ढूँढ़ते हैं। तुम हमें ढूंढो हम तुम्हे ढूँढ़ते हैं।

Trail of thoughts

In general, our understanding evolves as we pass through new events in life and meet new people and situations and try to think about those. I feel like I have a trail of evolution of my thoughts which was often left unexpressed in words. But I still remember I had different thinking and I see the transition in my consciousness. Here I put down the trail in sequence of its evolution:

[Before Aug/Sept 2013] - Everything should be perfect.

[Start of Dec 2013] - Humans have imperfection and you cant hate them because they have those.  I am talking about those limitations people have but they cant overcome those anymore. It is ok to be imperfect. If they are your near ones, gel with them accepting their imperfections and finding a way to deal with those. Yet, if you dont see a hope and if you have the possibility to do away with them, no one would stop you !

Will keep writing here to document the trail.

[Oct 2021] - Humans have imperfection but also follow different patterns and have different quirks and habits. Some of these quirks or habits may be annoying to you and may even be unhealthy or needing-improvement in general. You would try to work alongside of those things without pushing them to change but you may not be successful. Then you will try to change them which may cause conflicts because not everyone can take criticism in positive way, no matter what is at stake. You will end up hating at times, questioning yourself and clueless how to deal with the whole situation - should you be working on relationship now that got wounded because you tried to change or should you put efforts to improve your tolerance level. Oh and doing away with someone may not be an easy option for several reasons. 

Another thing I discovered since Dec 2013 is a lot of areas where I can improve and progress. Identified imperfections. I am wondering how did 7 years pass without updating this post.

Kerala - Through my eyes...

Just to preserve this write-up, posting it on my blog now. This is about my Kerala visit 24 Oct 2009 to 31 Oct 2009

 Kerala - God's Own Country

"Through My Eyes..."

DAY 1 (FORT COCHI - The Fairy Land)
DAY 2 (FORT COCHI - The Fairy Land)
DAY 3 (FORT COCHI - "Teapot" and going to KOTTAYAM )
DAY 4 (KOTTAYAM Conference and local market cruise)
DAY 5 (KOMARAKOM - Bird Sactuary and Backwaters and going to Munnar)
DAY 6 (Munnar - Tata Tea Museum, Eravikulam National Park, Waterfalls)
DAY 7 and Departure (Veena Vadan show and coming back)

"God's own country" as they call it and I saw it, Kerala is realy a state where one can feel the sipiritual pleasure in its natural beauty and cultural heritage. Fort Cochi is like a fairy land I have fallen in love with. It is a small town with impressions left by Dutch, jewish, Portugese people and so a blend of all these culture, architecture and religious aspects which makes it such a darling. It is so peaceful with rich heritage and historical places, away from the hustle bustle of the modern world and located facing the Arabian Sea on one of the Islands in cochin. Let me tell you that Cochin is name given to collection of Islands: main ones being Willingdon Island, Fort cochi, Bolghatty Island, Ernakulam (the main commercial City), Vypeen Island. Malayalam is the native language. Rarely anyone knows Hindi and English they understand more than Hindi. However, Malayalam is the primary language everyone speaks and understands and writes. So I was like did not know how to read did not know how to write ..  a dumb expression. But English helped a lot ! In Fort cochi, I did not face any problem. It is a tourist place. Lots of foreigner tourists.

My plane took off from Delhi at 9:15 and reached Nedambussery (30 Kms from Ernakulam on the same Island) at around 1:30 PM. The first glimpse of Kerala which I caught from the sky was small water bodies curled around bunch of coconut trees.. ! It was same that I had been imagining all the way long during my journey.

Well, I was welcomed by a group of Keralite men wearing traditional dress "Mundu" (kind of dhoti they wear, off white in color with yellow thick strip on the border), bare chested and with big drums (kind of dhols) in hand and they were beating dhols in a fast rythem, then they were dancing along in there own way. Ladies wearing off-white saris with same yellow border, Jasmine flowers in their hair and a plate containing jasmine and marigold flowers with small oil lamps were standing in a line. Actualy they were there to welcome a tourist group which came along in the same plane as mine. So I was also feeling like being welcomed by them. Well, it was a nice start.

I went directly to fort cochi which was like 45 Kms away from the airport. The first day I saw only dance performances.. Kathakali...  and three forms of BharatNatyam - Kuchipudi, Mohiniattam, and third one I dont remember the name. I wonder how beautifuly they have preserved their culture. Kathakali is a bit difficult to understand because it is not a dance as such.. it is a kind of drama performed in the form of dance. There are defined actions, eye movements for showing conversation between characters. Only ppl who can understand these actions can know what is going on the stage. Well, to us, they first showed the make-up application, then they told what story they are going to play,. It was about Hindu Mythical character Arjuna who was a "bhagat" of Shivji and wanted pasupatastra from him. Parvatiji insisted Shivji to teach him a lesson as she felt that he boasted about his archery skills and bravery too much. Shivji goes to Arjuna in jungle in the avtar of a hunter. They would have a litle fight over there. But then Shivji becomes serious and Parvatiji had to stop him from hurting Arjuna. so story was something like that. They have defined characters universaly in Kathakali and each character has a special kind of make up which would be same all over the world at all times. It was a nice performance. Then came Bharatnatyam. Personally I liked bharatnatyam more than Kathakali.

Well, then I met a Malasian girl there who was a Mechanical Engineer and was on vacation. We had dinner together and she told me about the places she had already visted by now.

The next day, I managed to get out of my room around 8:45 AM. The best way to explore Fort Cochi is a leisurely walk along the peaceful streets with a camera handy. Starting with the huge chinese fishing nets, I saw on the Fort cochi beach fishermen working hard to get fish from the sea, a number of boats made up of lagoons, fishing nets here and there, lot of fishermen wearing "mundu" on the sea side. That day my breakfast was different kind of "vadas", samosa stuffed with something that gave taste of Sambar.. and tea. Oh it was so nice. I am otherwise not fond of south indian food that is cooked here.. Dosa, idly, Uthpam.. and ironical to my expectations, these were not the dominating dishes there. In my stay of 6-7 days,  I ate Kerala fish curry [ate with hand :)], Arabian food (shavoi chicken and thouge... watever the exact names were, lots of different kindd vadas, poori, banana pakodas, steamed banana, Kerala rice, puttu (something made up of wheat) etc etc.. O yes and I also tried Prawn sandwich there. No no it was not yuck !! the taste was exactly as that of fish but it was only a realization that OH I AM EATING PRAWNS.. it was a mixture of excitement of trying a new sea food and a resistive feeling of eating something non-veg out of the list of whateve I had eaten till that day. Well, this dinner I had with a Keralite guy who met me near Santa Cruz Basilica church and was enjoying his day alone on the weekend. It was sunday that  day. On that day, I saw portugese museum.. (it contained all the royal items that they use in the catholic religious processions in church.. all that I read in Angels and Demons novel I had completed few days before my trip)., I saw Cochin's Bishop's house also, saminary. clicked photographs with Father of church., Saw Santa cruz Basilica, st Francis Church, Vasco's house. Vasco da Gama actualy passed away in Fort Cochi and was burried there. His body was then taken back to his home town but church stands there. Then they have very beautiful buildings, houses made up in dutch architecture.. a royal kindd feeling you get while roaming in those peaceful streets. Names were K.B. Jacob road, Peter Celli Street, Princess Street.. and so on.. ! Then there were beautiful cafes, restaurants, Eating places which all had artistic ambience inside and fecad. My favourite one being "TeaPot"... oh it was such a cute tea cafe.. with theme teapot. Teapots and Teapots everywhere... Neat and clean, antique tea pots decorating the small room like a Tea-Heaven (as i call it). Teapots hanging from roof, Tables that of tea-export boxes, it was so wonderful ! There lied some books about Tea.. and then even the wall clock was no ordinary ! Instead of digits, there were 'T' 'T' 'T' 'T'.... :)

Overall, I liked the unique and royal touch in the decoration of all buildings exterior and interior both. It was unusual and gave a special feeling of a standard.

I dont have much time to write in more detail.. so I would end briefly explaining my trip. I went ti Mattenchery Palace Museum, Jewish Synogogue.. everything was wonderful ! I will send the link to you when i will upload my photos... Then moved to kottayam. one day spent completely in conference. My presenation went well. I met a guy there who was nice and we ate together there in an Arabian restaurant, so tasted arabian chicken dishes.

Next day, I went to Komarakom, did backwater tour, saw bird sanctuary (with less birds than reptiles, becoz season of birds would start in mid november)... and then finally went to Munnar, a hill station approx 4 hrs journey from Kottayam ( and kottayam was at around 2 hrs journey from Fort cochi). I spent a day in Munnar.. Saw Tea Plantation, clicked photos with tea plucker ladies, saw Demo of how Tea is made and a documentry on History of Tea business in India.. all this i saw at Tata Tea Museum, Munnar. Then saw Eravikulam National Park (abt 13 kms far from Munnar) which shelters many animals including a special endangered species of Goats called "Neelgiri Tahr". Also saw some waterfalls there. Ate vadas, steamed bananas, banana pakoda, samosa (tasted like sambhar) kindd snacks which I liked. In munnar, I felt like there should be somebody very dear to ur heart accompanying you ;) such a romantic place it was ! There were lots of spice shops, Ayurvedic shops, I bought a bottle containing some Aurvedic "jadi-bootyian" in which I would mix oil and then keep it for a week or so and then will apply it on my hair regularly. My hair are loosing health actually ! Well, then there were banana chips, Junck fruits, etc. etc. Everything so nice !

I forgot to tell you that Kottayam claims to have 100% literacy rate. The first book was published there. Rubber farming is done in kottayam. Not only kottayam but whole Kerala is the most educated state among all the states of India. There are no rickshaw Pullars .. the reason they give is that everyone is educated and they dont allow human pulling another human. people live their lives independanty. Everyone works there. I actualy saw women working at all the places there. At a petroleum pump, there were women workers. There are beggars but very less in number.

Oh yes, a very interesting incident that I want to share with all of you .. At one point i had to catch a bus from From fort cochi to Alua. But all the buses read malayalam. so, when i got irritated asking people abt bus to alua on every bus's arrival, what I did.. I asked driver of a bus to write "Alua" for me in malayalam. He did that and I was then matching the so-called "text" with similar text on the buses. I burst into laugh when I realized what was I doing !! :) Well, these kind of incidents I really enjoy !

After Munnar, I came to Fort cochi back as I love that place now. Saw Instrumental show "Veena Vadan" which was as usual spiritualy enjoyable. That was my last day and Last night in Fort cochi. Next day, means I came back to Delhi.

I am now catching up with the routine work but still my consciousness is roaming somewhere in those peaceful and colorful memories of that beautiful town Fort Kochi. It was realy like some fairy town.. so neat and clean..  all people so polite and the cultural part.. simply awesome !!

Hey, the place is worth visiting ! Must go to "TeaPot" if u go there !! :)

Rooh khali si Hai..

Aisi hi Kuchh dastaaN hmari bhi hai
Dil bhara sa hai.. nazar khali si hai
Zamana kehta hai Gharoor achha nhi..
Hum se poochho rooh khali si Hai.
(Self)

Information About The Dalai Lama of Tibet