It was a great day when you were born. I can still
remember the moment when I first saw you as a tiny baby, and how you took my breath
away. I loved you then, and I love you now. Thank you for being with us. And I
thank god for that.
And
as we celebrate your birthday, we also celebrate the anniversary of you
arriving in the world and making it a better, happier place for us. The 12th
of December is always an auspicious day for us. Now, though we are far, you are
always inside me. I cry out with happiness when I hear your voices in my dream
and cry out when I talk with you. You are always here. I pray for you. I miss
you, my dear baby.
Wednesday, December 12, 2012
Happy Birth Day Pema Tashi
Wednesday, December 5, 2012
My Son
My son Pema
Is a
bouncing boy
He calls
himself Rama
And makes
Him as a toy.
His full
name is Pema Tashi
He likes
being called different names as Dorji
He makes the fuss of not naming him Yeshi
Better his
father's last name Dorji.
I tell him
his name is just a name
Don’t make
on it such a nonsense flame
It’s not
where you came
But you can
make good fame.
His only aim
is to be a truck driver
And many a
trucks he brings and breaks
To be thrown
down in the nearby river
He questions
me, 'Is the real truck that much weak?'
He calls me
Tom and himself Jerry
He calls me Eon
and himself Ben Ten
We bet for
the team was in a hurry
And he
smacks me till I got beaten.
We are like
Kenchosum, we are three;
My wife and
I do everything for his happiness
For he is
the only fruit in the tree
Let him be anyone
for the human goodness.
Friday, November 16, 2012
Nothing
He has
nothing today
Nothing
exactly
And nothing
more
And
nothingness enshrouds him
And nothing is
worthwhile
Nothing
There is
nothing as such;
The sound of
rustling
And nothing
more
Mute, deaf,
dumb and numbed, nothing
Not even a
palpitation
Nothing
There is
nothing in life
He is gone
today
Leaving the
life
Hopes,
dreams and wishes all death
Nothingness
is all he has
Nothing
Nothing will
last to the end
It’s as
empty
as useless as
A smile a
minute ago
Shifts into
tears
Nothing
The world is nothing to him;
Cannot hold, cannot play, cannot
secure
It’s all nothing
As he is nothing
And everything has become nothing
All and nothingness is all that’s alive
And triumphs over something
Nothing is what his life has become
now
His dreams lying cold and dead on the
ground.
Tuesday, November 13, 2012
Who DOESN’T Try?
Time
to time we get demoralized by people who are born with a silver spoon in their
mouth and have everything from birth. From time to time we get demoralized by people
who have achieved success to their great height without doing much. From time to
time we get demoralized by people who have lots of capabilities to do
everything but are left in the dust. From time to
time we get demoralized by people who have lots of love but are betrayed by the
same love. Everything is unequal and George Orwell’s
‘Animal Farm’ book rightly says, “All animals are equal, but some are more
equal than others.”
Anyways,
life is not all about comparison. I am
not so. I look for a place or path where I can have enough space to stay or
walk on. That is it. A plate of rice is enough for me.
Life
will change, I thought when I was a boy, but as I realize now, it is just the
beginning of overcoming trials and tribulations of life.
I cared so very much about the fruits,
not about how a tree is nurtured and taken care of, and when I jump to get the fruits
from an un-nurtured tree, the qualities of fruits are very dreadfully small.
Life is trying
and trying and even more trying, not axing the dreams. It’s trying. I tried to
do many things in my life but most of all failed and over again. I tried to
work hard to reach the target I had thought but my work hung in the vacuum of
nowhere; anyone hardly recognized my toils or was it an unreachable fate in my
life. I tried to write but it faltered devastatingly. I am ever trying, I was
hurt but I move on but the bad parts shape me into a better person as I continue
to move in life. I tried liking my job but others didn’t like it the way I did
work; without knowing anything, it was a fagging also. I tried to fulfill my parent's
expectations but it’s putting me off to the future. They were the ones to fulfill
my expectations. I tried to mask happiness but the internal force was more
powerful, I am a victim of it. I tried very many alternatives to bring my life
to my satisfaction, but every trying is as useless as not trying at all. The
more I try, the more I have worries that anguish my problems further. The more
problems I encounter the more solutions I try to find. But the solutions are far
hidden behind the mountains.
God forbid me not,
from not trying; I will keep on trying… I say this because when everything
fails, in the end, one hope keeps me kicking; knowing that I have my family to
embrace me and show me that there is still love around me. So I will keep on
trying. I am not an escapee. I can’t give up easily…BUT what can I try now?
Anyways, hope keeps waking up.
Anyways, hope keeps waking up.
And this story keeps
me there is something in life; the artificially-kind of real that we need to
display to live our lives forth. Here is a story: A man bought 12 flowers. 11 real and 1 fake. He said, "I will love
you until the last flower dies."
And this is the irony of life; to fake and live or to live and fake.
Saturday, November 3, 2012
Bad Luck
Now and then, bad luck can shame you
And make you gloomy;
The hurt in the heart bemuses and
frustrates
Everything you carry out will be of
desperation,
The other lot will have some criticism,
Everywhere; some bending and
harassment,
Face pulls down and
Mouth shut!
All over, your act will be defective.
Everywhere you wrong;
And infects others!
The grave is your place-
Whatever you attain or find
Turns out to be meaningless
All endeavors turn to nothing
One way or other, your people hurt
you,
They go off beam,
Splitting the same smash-up.
Why do these come about erratically?
To stick with for a week or two
Every walk you walk,
Every talk you talk
Will diffuse your face
Nothing counts.
All gone astray to be dishonored;
Those push down your days
You bear wary.
When bad luck comes slithering
You’re in the chasm of omission
Nobody heeds
And nobody you can take care.
At this time, you think and think
But of all wrongs
Nothing hit!
Your world turns sinister
You cringe your mind - thick
And think
But your hurts multiply in the heart,
The thing that never will imagine
beyond,
At this point, you must be more
cautious and conscious.
Thursday, October 25, 2012
A Noiseless, Patient Spider
A Noiseless, Patient Spider
-Walt Whitman
A
noiseless, patient spider,
I mark’d where on a little promontory it stood isolated,
Mark’d how to explore the vacant vast surrounding,
It launch’d forth filament, filament, filament out of itself,
Ever unreeling them, ever tirelessly speeding them.
I mark’d where on a little promontory it stood isolated,
Mark’d how to explore the vacant vast surrounding,
It launch’d forth filament, filament, filament out of itself,
Ever unreeling them, ever tirelessly speeding them.
And
you, O my soul, where you stand,
Surrounded, detached, in measureless oceans of space,
Ceaselessly musing, venturing, throwing, seeking the spheres to connect them,
Till the bridge you will need be form’d, till the ductile anchor hold,
Till the gossamer thread you fling catch somewhere, O my soul.
Surrounded, detached, in measureless oceans of space,
Ceaselessly musing, venturing, throwing, seeking the spheres to connect them,
Till the bridge you will need be form’d, till the ductile anchor hold,
Till the gossamer thread you fling catch somewhere, O my soul.
The above poem is one of my favorite poems. The poem is
short but it has multi-faceted meanings. The poem describes a spider, which is noiseless,
patient, and isolated (bother less) and it works on its web. It’s doing the most
uncertain part of hard work: trying to shoot out lots of little filaments ceaselessly,
patiently and tirelessly, and trying to get one of them to stick to something. We too ceaselessly muse, venture, and seek all
of our lives to achieve the height of enlightenment; trying to find the meaning
of life, but we get obstructed, tired, bogged down and bothered so much by the world
that surrounds us. We must learn all kinds of super-perseverance from this creepy
creature.
This poem is not only about a spider; Whitman
tells us that spider is a metaphor for the human soul, which also explores and
tries to connect. Whitman describes the vulnerability of the soul in this
vast realm of existence. He tries to find ways to accommodate the soul and find
a place for it amongst the rest of the soul-filled world, hence the bit about
venturing, seeking, and connecting in this measureless ocean of space. With the
use of lots of imagery and figure of speech (metaphor), it portrays a deeper human
emotion.
The poem is about hard work, exploration,
spirituality and the man and the natural world.
Friday, October 19, 2012
Dzongkha Lopens
One of the weird kinds of people that we encounter in our life is our Dzongkha Lopens. They have a typical way of misbehaving and dealing with people. And they tease girls like
anything! And happy would be if female Dzongkha lopens behave such to boys. But I tell you, they are timidly naughty too. Though looked at as the upholder of good ethics and
discipliners in the school, they themselves are utterly breakers of all these.
Their disorderliness and unruliness are the order of the day. They seem to be
acting very strict; smack or beat students but they are not really so; I say
this now with regret (I would have climbed on their heads if I had known in my
school days). Their personalities can be the worst of any humankind sometimes. They
sometimes think they are the only people around.
I was disciplined by so
many of my Dzongkha Lopens. One Lopen in Pemagatshel Jr. School was known as
Lopen Goenpo Lhudrup (nicknamed), cause he used to tell us the story of Goenpo
Lhudrup every time. The story interested us so much so that we felt almost
sleepy in the class. Lopen Goenpo Lhudrup had a habit of drinking and coming to
the class. He, in his drunken, sleepy state used to ask us to pluck his beard
from his face. The smell of alcohol made us depleted in the class. We were not as stupid as Goenpo Lhudrup had thought;
some of us took out the sharpest pins from our Lhagay and pierced on Lopen’s chin. The Lopen stood up grunting. Tiny
blood oozed from his face. Stunned, he would go.
For that whole year, the
Lopen didn’t ask the class to pluck his hair from his face.
Lopens, especially
Dzongkah Lopens are heavy drinker. Lopen X in Darla MSS (name withheld) revolves
his life around drinks and women. Lopens are usually not good womanizers but
indisputably good in drinking. They don’t have a patient to pour sweet talks
and wait; they just jump into conclusion with many contacts on forbidden parts
of the body. But this Mr. X, once he drinks, he becomes wild. There is no word as
shame in his dictionary. He speaks around in whatever he likes. He moves around
carefree. He dances on the stage -less stage. He becomes one and he thinks he
dominates the world. Such is the height of his sense.
One day, I asked him why
he was so desperate that made him behave like dog. The response Mr.X gave was
even worse than a dog’s barking. It was somewhat like a cat’s meowing. “Don’t just
catch rats.” He said. I guessed what he really meant to say, it would certainly
mean that one should do everything in life. The cat must not sleep hush near the
fire and wait for rats. The cat must behave like a mouse, like a bird, move around
the holes. That was absolutely true. Mr. X was right.
With the change of time,
our Lopens have changed a great deal. Lopens, who are supposedly responsible
and are exponents of Dzongkha language, have become fans of the English language. The
twists of their mouths and producing different accents make English more popular
in school than Dzongkha. I have seen Mr. X communicating and making fun of his English accent right from the morning with colleagues. In this way, Dzongkha is
forgotten by our own Dzongkha Lopens. I remember Lopens translating almost
everything in English to make his lesson understand better, and it seems like
giving more importance to English.
Our Dzongkha Development
Commission (DDC) has done nothing to upgrade Dzongkha. English enthusiast Dzongkha Lopens will one day speak Dzonglish - a mixture of Dzongkha and English. DDC
must promote Dzongkha learning through fun ways. It should let loose of its fixed
phonologies, words, grammar, etc, and make it easier like English. Our Dzongkha
Lopens are sometimes tough on silly little mistakes. It demotivates learners so
much. Mr. X has only one particular word for maize as ‘Gayza,’ limiting
vocabulary. Why not ‘a:shome?’
Note: The
above article is the memories and observation of the author and doesn’t intend
to hurt anyone implicitly or explicitly, especially some of our dedicate
Lopens.
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