The Crow Says

The way the crows gather from all over the city into a single stream
of dark mass just before the sunset is a sight to be seen and
experienced in Vancouver city. While I have to dig deep inside myself
to face a group of people called the twelve tribes. http://www.twelvetribes.com/

Unshaven faces with their woman following them in faces untouched by
makeup, they almost remind me of my days in in Assam filled with
people teeming with life. They become quite attractive in contrast to
the world around them where everybody is trying to be different. Check
print shirts and dark pants with leather shoes and woman with long
hair and skirts. They all look the same, in fact like we do in India
where fashion is not a way of life but a way to blend into other
people. The simplicity and structured family makes them interesting
for me but not something out of common.

While they are really unique to environment here. They simplicity is
something which is unheard of here while their structure family system
without any conditions is huge affair by western standards. Nobody has
ever heard of a group having no individual bank account but a single
family account. And sell it well too, present themselves through their
publicity material in extreme odd places where they will find people
who are at crossroads or self doubt to recruit.

Desi Soap Opera or My Dream Life

Prof. Kuthiala proclaimed Human communication is 'sharing of
Experience'. Seven years later I recall my masters degree teaching in
the most unlikely place. Today I had to go and give the final edit of
the punjabi soap opera to the director, after pulling a all nighter I
realised I wouldn't be able to make it back to my desi Hippy
restaurant on the drive at 2pm. Total failure to recall the fact that
my shift now began two hours early made me over commit. So I had to
cancel the director's appointment and head straight for the restaurant
few hours before.
So here I am listening to the local punjabi radio waiting for my shift
while I set up laptop editing suite on one of the tables editing soap
opera while I sip my deadly chai. The place could be easily identified
as backpackers joint in some sleepy town in the himalayas. May be it
is the reason of the cult following this place has and more so why I
fit in as bridge between the shy punjabi lady who owns the place and
the memory stricken westerners trying to relive their backpack trip in
India.
Picture this, sitting on one of the tables, joking with the auntie in
punjabi as I edit an episode, right outside the windows is the trendy
commercial drive bustling with trendy Vancouver artist Diaspora in
hippest part of the city called Commercial drive. The inside is the
chaos of India which I am addicted and proud of while outside is the
mundane and predictable life of the first world.
All I can state to my Prof. you were right I am living it right now,
trying to document every passing moment and ending with bag full of
rich experience. Thank you my family each one of you are somewhere
responsible for initiating me in this uncommon path.

Uncommon Nation

In time we will discuss in public how today's life swings between odds
or Uncommon. Most of us would agree how we wish to be different and
connect to other wish to differ.
In today's post modern world of the Common where everything is getting
homoginised. A symptom of our present economic condition none the less
prevalent life style of humanity of 21st century. Hence the generation
of deviants who find undisputed pleasure at getting attracted to
another who has deviated.

Most commonly noticed among backpackers who travel for cheap within a
large group of people belonging to their travelling nation to a
boardroom meeting where two subtle prints of the tie fabric as
momentary exchange of glances of acceptance. There lies my imaginative
nation of Uncommon nation. A space within the face of encroachment of
public space in our society. More and more people realising that they
truly differ from others are becoming more receptive of each other.
Efforts of such amounts upto creating a space which inn time will a
nation within a nation.

Somewhere within this lies our inert nature to be huge mass of
diversity or just to be part of team and yet be ourselves. How much we
decide to differ and where do we draw the lines? When can we say
connecting as a differing with physical appearance and being racist
could be separated in morality? Why do the answer seemed to be lying
in the line in-between the line of Common and Uncommon? Is it just a
mere battle between similar experiences?