SPIRIT OF BEING A PUNJABI !

Finally I got something that reflects my heart about being a Punjabi.
FRIENDS: Never ask for food.
PUNJABI FRIENDS: Always bring the food.

 
FRIENDS: Will say 'hello'.
PUNJABI FRIENDS: Will give you a big hug and a kiss and say " Oh Behen***, kithe si tu ? ".

FRIENDS: Call your parents Mr. and Mrs.
PUNJABI FRIENDS: Call your parents Mom and Dad .

FRIENDS: Have never seen you cry.
PUNJABI FRIENDS: Cry with you.

FRIENDS: Will eat at your dinner table and leave.
PUNJABI FRIENDS: Will spend hours there, talking, laughing, and just being together.

FRIENDS: Know a few things about you. 
PUNJABI FRIENDS: Could write a book with direct quotes from you.

FRIENDS: Will leave you behind if that's what the crowd is doing.
PUNJABI FRIENDS: Will kick the whole crowds that left you...

FRIENDS: Would knock on your door.
PUNJABI FRIENDS: Walk right in and say, 'I'm home! Daaru - shaaru nikal yaar "'

 
FRIENDS: will visit you in jail
PUNJABI FRIENDS: will spend the night in jail with you!!

FRIENDS: will visit you in the hospital when you're sick
PUNJABI FRIENDS: will cut your grass and clean your house then come spend the night with you in the hospital.

FRIENDS: have you on speed dial
PUNJABI FRIENDS: have your number memorized

FRIENDS: Are for a while.
PUNJABI FRIENDS: Are for life.

HAPINESS- ELUSIVE FEELINGS...

Seeking happiness remains to be the basic purpose in our life. All our activities are directed towards achieving happiness. Yet happiness continues to elude us. Why ! We glibly talk about happiness being state of mind but fail to understand its true meanings. Happiness is a product of love. We love our children, parents, life partner other relations and friends. We love our belongings and have longing for these. In all these relations and possessions we are guided by our basic purpose of fulfillment of our desires. We keep chasing our desires to no end. This love for our relations and belongings is reciprocal. We have expectations in return for our love. In our offerings too we seek much bigger returns. Even alms giving is guided by our desire to be thanked in return. When these expectations are not fulfilled we feel disappointed and sad. Jealousy, a product of ego is another cause of our unhappiness.


So, in order to achieve eternal happiness we need to understand eternal love. The love that is not reciprocal. It is one way act, without any expectations in return. It is a different plane altogether from reciprocal love which is based on give and take. “Sarbat da bhala” (Well being of all) enunciated by Sri Guru Nanak Dev Ji is out of eternal love for all. Love for all, even of those who may not like us or have gone astray from right path, that we call criminals. Love without discrimination. Eternal love has no scope for hatred. Instead we feel sorry for those who suffer for having lost their true bearings, (Na ko bairi nahen begana sagal sang ham ko ban aai). Compassion replaces hatred. It is total surrender to Him, that is called 'Bhagti” Once we are one with Him we achieve eternal happiness, the bliss. Till than the true happiness will continue to elude us.




Lt Col HS Cheema

Do you have to time to Live life?.....

My daughter

(1995)

Brother's daughter, His son, My son and My daughter

Must try this after a drink

Everywhere I see - I see depression, tension and people spiralling down in the lives, not living -- just marking their days -- passing time, wishing that the day goes by - waiting eagerly for the next day and when that arrives not knowing what to do with it. What has gone wrong? I see that the divorce has become everyday affair. Was materially being more comfortable meant to give us more problems? Or was it to solve our everyday problems? The satisfaction is just not there -- in our work, in play, in family, in children, in friends..... where do we head from here? Have we become our own slaves, slaves to a desires, slaves to time, slaves to our work? How do we break the rigmarole of daily routine and live our lives?

Sorry -- that's a sentence with too many question marks. But I do know about to put it across any other way. I was slipping through my album and saw the photographs of my daughter -- just born in my hands -- today I have discussions with her as we are good friends. I realised that time has flown by. I do not regret any moment of my life because I have tried to live it to the maximum - living within the self constraints of morals. And this is what I teach my children also -- I tell them whenever the times are bad to not wish them away -- because the time that goes by never comes back. I tried to explain to them live life whether it is good and bad or ugly to the fullest. Enjoy every moment that you live. In all this I have tried to throw in the salt of their responsibilities to the nature, society and each other. I am sure and pray that they will be good citizens of tomorrow.

I wanted to ask - what does ' living life' mean? Does it have a separate meaning for me and for others? are now trying to press an early retirement from this uniform -- make some neat money and spend the time I like doing the most. Nature, photography, reading, music, movies and of course donating to the poor FIIs.

hell -- too much time daydreaming -- let me get back to work.

And then there were those days.....

Those were the days I would fondly remember throughout my life. Sitting in the nights staring in the freezing skys and wishing sometimes that we remain in those beautiful surroundings through out our lives and at other times wishing that we run back homes from being isolated and sitting there. Now it all seems like our college days. What days were those. We had powerful telescopes to see the activity at the enemy posts and I thought -- why can't I click some photographs of moon through it? It took me so long to finally get the photographs -- first there were problems to align the camera lens and the telescope. Then was the problem to keep the camera steady with so much of zoom. The light was so less that I could not increase the exposure speed beyond a certain setting. After so many trials and misses -- finally got some good shots. Three by night and two by day to be precise. Hope you like the shots.

Some more flowers.......

Thanks for such encouraging words. I am now going to bore you to death with my collection of photographs of flowers. Just by the way -- the photograph of the first flower in the last post is barely a few milimeters across. The flowers bloomed on moss on the stones.

Insignificant life.... or .... is it?

Sorry for such along time since my last update.

Okay today I would like to talk about something that I noticed -- once again when I was on my post in the Northern tip of our country. It was summer time and the entire place was lush green with so many colours floating in the sea of green. One of those days when I had nothing particular to do when I was sitting on the grass after a gruelling patrol that had lasted the entire night -- I noticed a very small fluorescent flower. I noticed that the flower had been tramped upon so many times but it refused to smile. Infact the flower was so small that I really would not have noticed it had I not been sitting down and looking closely.

I wondered -- there in front of me were thousands of colours that were floating in front of my eyes and I never had time in my routine to sit down and admire these small wonders. I was also sure that once my tour of duty that would last for 2years in that place -- I would never on my own climb a mountain for 11 hours to admire flowers. I then stared to photograph the flowers of the valley. In all I counted 100+ varieties and a total of 190+ colours (probably varients of the same types) I tried to photograph and keep a tally/record but unfortunately as was destined probably, one of my memory card (I am talking of a time when I had to save for two months to buy 128mb mem card) gave up. I hunted for some software to retrieve the photographs - but was unfortunate. I am now posting a few of those photographs. Hope you like them.