Kabhi Kabhi Ittefaak Se

Not always but sometimes i just feel like taking off...off on to the beautiful roads...no fixed destination, no purpose but just aimlessly go...

Yeah i want to be The Vagabond that R L Stevenson talks about...

Give to me the life I love,
Let the lave go by me,
Give the jolly heaven above
And the byway nigh me.
Bed in the bush with stars to see,
Bread I dip in the river -
There's the life for a man like me,
There's the life for ever.

Let the blow fall soon or late,
Let what will be o'er me;
Give the face of earth around
And the road before me.
Wealth I seek not, hope nor love,
Nor a friend to know me;
All I seek, the heaven above
And the road below me.

Or let autumn fall on me
Where afield I linger,
Silencing the bird on tree,
Biting the blue finger.
White as meal the frosty field -
Warm the fireside haven -
Not to autumn will I yield,
Not to winter even!

Let the blow fall soon or late,
Let what will be o'er me;
Give the face of earth around,
And the road before me.
Wealth I ask not, hope nor love,
Nor a friend to know me;
All I ask, the heaven above
And the road below me. 

Robert Louis Stevenson

As for that title, well i have borrowed it from a Bollywood song from a film and it means, ' Sometimes just by chance'.
The song opens like this...

''aate jaate khoobsoorat aawaaraa sadkon pe
kabhee kabhee ittefaak se, kitanay anjaan log mil jaatey hain 
un mein se kuchh log bhool jaatey hain, kuchh yaad reh jaatey hain... 

Travelling in the train once i had met rather seen a sophisticated lady once. She did not speak much and i had just watched her dainty moves the entire journey. Later did a blog. i still remember her face...although my blog turned out to be more about not her but what i did after i saw her and watched her...here's the link just in case one needs to know how it went after i had had my chance meeting and the aftermath of that...
http://shivanidiwani64.blogspot.in/2010/09/thank-you-sister-bhojeya.html

And although translating a song or poetry is quite difficult i am trying what can be best dubbed not a translation but transliteration so here it goes...the song and the meaning in English...

Aatey Jatey Khoobsoorat Aawaara Sadkon pe
Like a vagabond as i come and go on the beautiful road
Kabhee Kabhee Ittefaak Se
Sometimes it's just by chance
Kitanay Anjaan Log Mil Jaatay Hain
So many strangers we come to meet
Un mein Se Kuch Log Bhool Jaatey Hain
Some of these people we forget
Kuch Yaad Reh Jaatey Hain
But some linger around as memories

Okay in my transliteration i have chosen for the time being to call the road beautiful because sometimes roaming around on empty roads feels beautiful. That grey unending bordered by greens if there are any looks pretty and offers respite from much stress that can be attributed to the hassles of living in a congested concrete jungle and one sometimes feels like taking off to somewhere, even if it means a long walk on an empty road. But then you never know when something on that walk of yours might catch your fancy and it might stay with you forever...could be a rock, a dried up tree, some clouds in the vicinity or even some people...

i roamed like a vagabond on the beautiful roads one day and had a few chance meetings too. Some that i remember are here...i see them as i had seen them that day and this is one good thing about roaming alone with a camera in your hand.

And the best part of it all is that memories is that unlike the song i have to make no extra effort to sent any plea of some sort to those i remember. The song from which the title of my blog is taken continues till it ends and midway there is a plea to someone who is remembered.

It was also  ittefaak se ( by chance) that i came upon this video. Because it was very relevant to what i had to say and before i said it i decided to bring it from it's home page and embed it here. The home page says, 

Plants of Life ( plants are people & people are plants)


https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/748694792/plants-of-life-plants-are-people-and-people-are-pl

So when i took off on the road all by myself one day i had a ittefaak se meeting with these people. And of course i believe that Plants are People too

i remember them fondly and who knows they might remember me too. After all there were Homo sapiens coming and going and surely these who have stayed in my memory will remember one among the entire that came and went. One sapien who kept fussing over them. Giving them the well deserved time and attention. Noticing their limbs, foliage, texture and their entire being. Surely they would remember ... for i believe plants have feelings too, and my years of tending to them and talking to them reaffirms that faith that they respond toward not only light, air and water but feelings too.
Long ago when that story of Dushyant and Shakuntala was told as a story by Ma to me i remember her telling me how the vines and creepers in that vana (forest) would respond to her touch and reach out for her to offer her their fragrant laden blossoms which she came to pick for sage Kanva Rishi her foster father's worship. Then as an infant i believed in awe like i believed in magic and fairies but today i believe more because of my daily practice in what i see and what my logical reasoning mind tells me. It just takes me a couple of days to be away from my green loved ones and their desolate forlorn appearance gives it all. My logical reasoning mind tells me that they were having their photosynthesis alright but they sure did miss me and all my daily yapping and fussing even if it were for just two days.
i know elephants of all the species have a sharp memory and i haven't come across any programme on TVchannels or readings of any sort that can prove my theory about plants having memories but then it's a nice thought and i would like to keep it that way.  

Saritaea magnifica or Arrabidaea magnifica - Glow Vine, Purple Funnel Vine

Iris domestica earlier known as Belamcanda chinensis- Blackberry lily, Leopard lily

Unknown...looked like flowering ASPARAGUS to me but i wouldn't be sure

The next beautiful bewitched me because there was a decent fragrance of something like food also around her. And at first i hadn't noticed her because she was closest to the road and from the other side to where i was first standing to be with others i hadn't noticed her at first. It was only when i got ready to go when my eyes Ittefaak sey fell upon her. Had to postpone my going for a bit as i went all around her. Crawled on my knees so that i could see her eye to eye and then right into her gullet. It was then i sensed the origin of the food fragrance...faint and good...like coconut...

OMG...what colours...and those radiating lines...and where the lines seemed to meet the emergence of the  curled tender stamen holding the anthers...OMG !! she looked delectable too...like whipped butter spread carelessly her petals overflowing the top of a round vessel...and the shape of her body very seductive...no wonder then the common name CHALICE...Haaah!!

Solandra grandiflora- Chalice vine

When i stood up i looked at the beautiful flower and the bud and ittefaak sey it being there by the lilac pole perhaps had not only enhanced it's beauty but also made it stand out as quite a stunner. She is remaining thus as the most beautiful liana ( climbing vine) that i have ever seen by the lilac pole.

 Her cousin i keep seeing regularly ie Datura metel aka Devil's trumpet or Indian Thorn Apple... Lord Shiva's favorite. But she who looks like a Chalice Cup continues to remain a sweet, smelling like coconut, a beautiful Memory. Needless to say then that i hope and wish for an accidental meeting with her again someday. 

In the beginning of my blog i called the road...the empty road beautiful because that could be one interpretation of the song and my feeling of aawargi meaning vagrancy felt refreshing and much more beautiful than any scenic place could provide me. Although when i took off i was on a very scenic spot. But that needn't be the case. An empty road might just as well do.

 Thus what i'm trying to say is that being a vagabond could be beautiful too and one could reach that reckless freedom from inhibition and worry of mind, lacking restraint or control in which one feels that supreme kind of leisure. So in the song the road could be beautiful or being a vagabond could feel wonderfully refreshing and beautiful too. It could be interpreted as one chooses it to be. This feeling of wantoness has been best penned in the words by the famous poet Mohsin Naqvi and later rendered beautifully as the most popular ghazal by Mr Ghulam Ali 

                                      ''  Ye dil ye paagal dil mera, kyun bujh gayaa awaargi
                                          is dasht mein ek sheher tha, woh kya hua aawaargi..''

'' Mohsin Sa'ab realizes the Carefree State of Mind in these opening lines. He says, "I do not understand what is wrong with my heart, with what I am feeling. Its totally crazy and out of this world! Until recently there was so much chaos within me( "is dasht mein ek sheher tha", meaning, the chaos within the heart compared to the hustle bustle of a City), but where is that today? Today what I feel is only "Aawargi" ! ''

http://wordsalsofeel.blogspot.in/2011/03/aawaargi-yeh-dil-to-pagal-dil-mera.html

The title of the blog from a Bollywood movie song of the 1970's film ' Anurodh' meaning ' Request' in which the hero of the movie, a popular singer is reminiscing the chance meeting he has with people and is emphasizing the fact that although some of these people get erased from memory some seem to stay forever. He is particular about one. In the movie clip he is seen singing, " Aaatey Jaatey Khoobsoorat Aawara Sadkon Pe, Kabhee Kabhee Ittefaque Sey...", on the radio and is lyrically lamenting his chance meeting with someone he can't seem to forget. Need i divulge then that the someone happens to be a lady...and he goes on to recollect how he found a kerchief, her kerchief which now is in his possession as a token of that meeting...

Apart from lamenting he is also making a plea to the kerchief owner, the beautiful lady he saw when he roamed like a vagabond on the beautiful road or perhaps was roaming in his beautiful wantoness  to come and take the silk kerchief from him which he is cocksure was left by the lady for him. As the song progresses in the movie there are scenes from his recollections of a wet monsoon night and a beautiful girl all drenched and the two look into two happening. She then leaving in a hurry not without dropping her kerchief behind and he drenched yes but enchanted more is seen picking up a silk kerchief with one hand and holding his umbrella with the other.
Also now when he is singing on the radio in the studio his mystery lady who he is sort of serenading is sure listening to it all grasping every bit of all that love transmitting through the radio, resting in the comfort of her plush bedroom first and then as she moves with the transistor in her hand to the living room later.

Okay since i has used the lines of a song as the title of my blog i felt the need to give this explanation for those who would not be able to fathom why or how i got my title from.

Apart from that blissful giving sleepless nights romance there are other important lines in the song that can be applied to a whole gamut of experiences that we have by chance including just dreams and romance. The concluding para of the song talks about dreams too. There are certain long nights when sleep eludes us and then if by chance ittefaak sey  we do fall asleep we get certain dreams but isn't it strange that there are some dreams we always remember but some feels like we never had them at all.
The song has ittefaak sey used as a refrain for the romance and is thus linked to romantic relationship that was brewing there and i could not use that...i had the walking on the road and meeting the beauties just by chance in mind so the words that immediately hit me were the words from that particular song. Nothing else seemed to fit the title of my blog so decided to use it. Take the romance aspect out of the song and apply the rest of the song to other facts of life and it fits to the T to everything else as well and not just the title of my blog.

i am a great talker...and plants, trees, birds, insects, creatures that have caught my fancy even those that have bitten me, well, i can talk forever about them but after having written and my writing having layers as is usual like this one in which first i have spoken about my a) wanting to be a vagabond sometimes and why, then,
                                                                           b) plants being people and having feelings too ,
choosing an appropriate title becomes one onerous task for me. Each time and every time and then finally i do what had come to my mind first and post my blog. Although words in my blogs create a riot/ ruckus of sorts and i am puzzled if this title was appropriate or the other one...the one which almost sounded like a refrain in the blog...ufff...it is mind boggling and sometimes a finished blog just sits as a draft waiting to be published like this one has been sitting in the draft box for three days now because i was not too sure or too happy with the title. Its not that i'm too pleased with my post either but the title is the one that keeps me in the loop the most. i keep going round and round all and about...and finally sheer frustration leads me to sigh and press Publish.
i wonder if this happens with other bloggers too...would help to know if only they could stop by and let me know...