Читать книгу A Family break up after 37 years of marriage - El Kay Mawkin - Страница 2

Year 2000-2006- happy days

We were living happily in our small two bedroom flat at Rail Vihar, sector 56, in Gurgaon .

These were Railway employees' quarters built by Indian railway workers organisation.

A peaceful and well planned society for railway employees .There were more than 150 families staying in the society .There were four bedroom,three bedroom and two bedroom or even a single bed room units there .Flats were mostly three storeyed , with a lot of open spaces and a community centre within the society ,

My elder sister was working at Railway audits and got this flat on loan but she never stayed here .She had moved into another flat at DLF Phase-II,, Gurgaon and offered me to move into the vacant flat ,since I had no job in hand and my children were still studying .

Hesitatingly and with a lot of concern in our minds , with no job in hand , I had moved alone and sent my family on a forced vacation to my wife’s parents at Ambala cantt .I was hoping that I shall get an assignment or a job and would shift to a better place at south Delhi with my family ,where we had stayed for almost ten years ,after having shifted from Chandigarh .

Having worked with well known American Multinational companies and some big Indian Corporate houses ,I was jobless for various reasons for the past two years ,which is another long story of how bosses kill their subordinates careers .

It would need another book like this to write about the most obedient servants to the management as CEOs in Corporates and kill their subordinates careers .

But it didn't happen and we had to stay put and wait for better times .

Our hesitation for moving this far in Gurgaon was because of the house being far away from the main roads ,with no conveyance facilities or shopping facilities nearby during year 2000.

I used to commute to my office,nearly 40 kms every day by my car but my son had a tough time going and coming back from his school at south Delhi , in an autorickshaw filled with labourers and servants .

My daughter had to take a bus from the main highway , where I would drop her by my car and then she used to catch a bus .But while coming back from her college , she had to walk down from the highway and stay at my elder sister’s place at DLF -II , till I picked her up in the evening while coming back from my office and brought her home .

Things improved slowly and I got a job ,first as a consultant and then as a regular employee with an upcoming healthcare organisation and we started staying in this flat ,when gurgaon was still coming up in the year 2000.

( I remain grateful to my highly placed mentor who helped me get the assignment )

Gurgaon was quite deserted those days and even a cab driver would fear coming this far till sector 56 ,at night .

Shepherds from Rajasthan would often come here in winters with their flock of sheep and build their temporary huts on the large tract of vacant land ,just behind our flat .

It reminded me of Aryans having moved from Mediterranean to India almost 2500 years ago, since there was no fodder for their cattle back home in winters .

Whenever it rained ,I enjoyed sitting in my small balcony to watch rains on the open landscape

.

It has all disappeared since then , over the years and a number of buildings have come up on the vacant land .

We had our parental property at Ambala cantt, where my younger sister , a divorcee from 1987 , but employed as a lecturer at a local college ,stayed with her school going daughter .

She was fortunate having stayed with my old parents, looking after them financially and they supported her and her daughter till their demise in 1997 .

My younger sister was teaching mathematics as a lecturer at a local college and go by small two wheeler called Luna and then by her scooty ( a clutch free two Wheeler) to her college , nearly 20 kms away from our home and taking private tuitions in the evening at home or correcting mark sheets of her students .

After our parents death , we decided to sell this house so that my younger sister could construct her own house near to her college at Ambala City and I could use the money to pay up the loan that my elder sister had taken for our Rail Vihar flat .

We took some money to buy a motorcycle for our son so that he could be mobile ,while I was away to my office daily .

A very peaceful sharing of proceeds from selling our parental,property happened among three of siblings .

My wife always felt that the entire proceeds should have come to me as a son

But I was absolutely clear in my mind that the proceeds had to be divided in three equal parts .

Delhi has been built and rebuilt over the last 1300 years starting with old Delhi during Mughal period ,Tughlakabad made by Mohammed Tughlak and Mehrauli as well as Qutab minar constructed by Slave Dynasty in the year 1298 and then Britishers building New Delhi towards southern side as Lutyens Bungalows and Viceroy house which is now Rashtrapati Bhawan , where India's Prseident stays

A large flow of people from all over the country , extended the Delhi metro boundaries on all fronts towards eastern Delhi as Trans Yamuna or Noida and Greater Noida and towards west of Delhi as Nrayana ,Shalimar Bagh ,Azad pur and going towards Sonepat in Haryana .

Population has been on the increase and people shift from smaller towns from all over the country to Delhi for better job opportunities and better life styles with good infrastructure around . With Haryana border and UP( Uttar Pradesh ) border as well as Rajasthan border on its three sides ,Delhi has now become Delhi- NCR Viz, National Capital region .

After shifting from Chandigarh,we all along stayed at south Delhi for our children’s better education facilities and good infrastructure here ,compared to other parts of Delhi .

Off and on we stayed at Bangalore,Chennai and Mumbai for short periods of time and feeling well settled in a Company leased waccommodation at south Delhi .

Owning one's own flat was to become difficult with escalating costs every year .It wasn't easy to take bank loans even those days , compared to the present times .

Gurgaon was a small village and new Gurgaon was now developed by a real estate builder known as DLF .They built DLF in phases and developed modern glass office buildings ,attracting a lot of multinationals to shift their offices here .Independent bungalows of different sizes and small flats were built for public . Railway and Defence also built flats for their employees at Gurgaon .

Hospitals came up slowly and later on big supermarkets choked the roads of Gurgaon .

Young Boys and girls now had some place to go to and chat at a coffee shop .

Previously they had to go to Gautam Budhha park to get privacy where police would always disturbed them.

Comparatively , Mumbai has huge beaches , where these young ones go and sit in privacy , but not in Northern India .

Over the years, Gurgaon has grown as a modern township of India with a lot of multinational companies and their employees shifting here .I always felt that it was a part of a mad rat race going in a certain direction and finally choking it completely .Like all other major cities in India ,we have acute water shortage in summers and electricity supply is like a vagrant boy who keeps running away from his home .

Commuting from Gurgaon to Delhi or Delhi to Gurgaon has become quite painful process for employees in the morning and towards the evening hours .

Smart builders have built society flats with power generators and underground water tanks , so that residents have 24x7 electricity , water supply and security guards , above all .

There came a time in my career when , I had no job and could not pay the high rentals at Delhi , despite my best efforts .I ate up all my savings during these years , when my ex colleagues were taking easier loans and moving into their own houses and here I was hunting for a job .

We stayed in this small but cosy flat for six years and still recount the good times we had at Rail Vihar, till 2006 .

I got a good job as a General Manager at a local leading healthcare company and was entitled to buy a big branded car but decided to go in for two smaller cars ,one for myself and the other for my family to use when I was away to my office .Although my wife drives car but my son used it more often .

My daughter had passed out her masters in Mathematics from Delhi University .

She was a bright student all through her academic studies .

A highly systematic and responsible child , who never let us bother, as parents , about her studies .

She was an introvert child from the beginning and very responsible for even small things in her daily life .A teacher at her play school used to call her Little lady and she was exactly a like little lady from her childhood days .

Children have their little brains and hearts and whatever they hear or see in the family, gets registered in their mind very fast . My daughter never said anything but kept a lot of her pains in her tiny heart , which I was to learn much later after our separation .

Parents should be careful in the language they use , while fighting with each other or in various arguments, since children may not say anything but keep registering these small incidents in their hearts life long .

This shapes them as adults when they grow up .

There is a serious dichotomy in India on the shift of children from their schools to college levels .

We put our children in the best of English schools, but once they have to shift to colleges ,there is always a mad rush of percentages and parents have to run from college to college to get their child admitted in a reasonably good institution .

It marks a big difference from well organised schools to completely disorganised college atmospheres in India .

From my own past experience , I realised that if a child does graduation or post graduation in a particular subject and doesn't wish to go in for Research or teaching ,one has to face difficult time settling down .There are many roads open to a child leading to confusion till he or she gains clarity about her own self .

We always felt proud that our children were different from the general lot .Well behaved, very respectful to their elders and trying to find their own niche areas to succeed ,rather than running in the ever growing mad rat race outside .

My daughter was always fond of reading good books of English literature .She composed very good poems from her early age .

Teachers at her college won't teach well and most of the students used to go to an outside tutor who was running parallel college classes in mathematics, just opposite their college .He taught the students like a strict school master and he was never short of students wanting to learn mathematics from him .

After her graduation, She cleared GRE exam for applying to US universities for doing her PhD .

Fortunately,she got admission at Rutgers university in USA but was tied closely with her own classmate who was a shade better than my daughter .University offered her PhD but on payment basis and I could not afford to spend Rs 13 lakh per annum those days and she continued with her masters in Mathematics at the south campus of Delhi University .

There were a few students in her class and their professor always sponsored a student from her batch every year for Houston In USA for doing PhD .

The teacher never chose my daughter , since she was a shy and introvert student and an extrovert ,more ebullient student was chosen ,who was a close friend of my daughter , from north east ,quite fair and an active girl ,The teacher was impressed with her and selected her to be sent to Houston to do her PhD .

My daughter did try to apply again after her masters for going to USA but wasn't successful this time .

This made my daughter quite sad and more introvert and she lost all interest in pursuing mathematics .She could have gone for her PhD at Delhi Unibersity or followed some other course in her life .

Here I had a realisation but much later in my life .

I didn't perform the role of a good friend to my daughter , by boosting her self esteem , which was going down in her abysmally low .

My son had passed out his class XII exam with a great difficulty .He had no love for tight schedule of school and college education , which bored him to hell .

I did help him to clear his class X exams , when I was jobless and he passed out with flying colours .

But after we shifted to Gurgaon and I got busy with my own job,he started slipping again in his studies .

We put him in a local school at Gurgaon and I helped him with his compartment examination in Physics , so that he cleared his final class XII Board examination .

A bright young boy ,who was interested in astronomy and so many other fields of learning in life, but sitting tight and cramming the subjects were not his cup of tea .

As a father I was often worried about my son’s education .( But consoled myself that even Einstein and our great Guru Rabindranath Tagore also hated going to their schools , but both of them became nobel laureates in their own fields,later on in their lives . )

As parents , we wanted our son to do graduation, even by a long distance education which would help him in his life all through , anywhere in the world .

But ,despite my taking leave from my office to teach him ,it just didn't work .

Destiny had something else in store for him and he was to become a successful professional musician in his life later on ,

He was struggling to find his way out of the mad race ,after finishing his class XII exam .

He started pursuing music, by learning acoustic guitar by himself or with the help of a computer and singing at a local restaurant.He used to sing at the small balcony outside our flat or go upstairs on the rooftop to sing freely and loudly .

As a father ,I started feeling that he needed a better vocal training and we got him a South Korean teacher ,an opera singer and a conductor . This teacher taught him for almost for two years and after that he left for South Korea,He did a good work on my son’s voice and I did see visible improvements in my son's voice control .

He had borrowed a good baritone voice from me and his grandfather but didn't posses the range of higher notes which myself and my father had .

His teacher used to be a conductor in city minstrels( -a choir group who would sing Christian hymns on Easter or on other events and the choir consisting of volunteers of all age groups ) and my son became a part of this choir .

As parents we always attended his shows at the local church or at an auditorium ,

For western music , there were hardly any institutions for learning Western music , one could learn at Delhi School of Music or practicing on one's own .

He did join a newly opened school of music by Rai foundation at Delhi and my son had his own motorcycle to travel now .But this music school closed down after a few months .

My son learnt music with the help of his computer and his own patience and passion for music .

I always wished I had known earlier that my son wanted to pursue western music and I would have got him a good teacher early on in his student days .

As children my son and my daughter used to learn Indian classical music with a private tutor , after their school .My daughter completed her diploma for three years but my son left it in between .

Later on I realised his interests lied more towards learning musical instruments especially in western music .

Music has always been a part and parcel of our family genealogy .My father had a good deep baritone voice and he used to sing for pleasure .I used to sing Light music on stage till my university days but we never thought of making it our profession .

Entertainment industry had started coming up in India during 2000's ,opening several avenues for young performers .Parents had also changed their old mindset about entertainment industry .

My son got admission in Berklee college of music at Boston in USA but annual fees was Rs 20 lakh per annum .This college was quite renowned ,not only in America but the world over for Contemporary western music and many other areas of western music .

Now the value of my flat had gone up and I decided to sell my flat to send my son by paying his first year fees.

The entire graduation course was for five years .

My friends from USA used to tell me that I needed to pay only once for my son’s ‘first semester and the rest my son would generate himself .

This did not happen since my son was not allowed to work at the college part time or outside for two years of his study course .

Me and my wife completed 25 years of our marriage in this house and celebrated our silver wedding anniversary with our close relatives and friends .We did a Havan by Arya samaj priest who was to do this Havan for our family on all our future wedding anniversaries for many years till he died in 2016 and as a family we also separated in 2016 .

We got together with our close relatives at our home ,pushing furniture aside and kept a steel Havan kund in the middle of the hall and a fire was lighted with the help of special woods and Havan Samagri .Arya samaj Havan basically thanks god for one's health ,Nostrils ,knees and eyes , water and Fire ,the two most essential elements of our life .

In India, we have many religious groups and sub groups .Major ones are Sanatan Dharma which has many temples with a lot of idols inside for doing prayers .

Sikhs have their own temples called Gurudwaras .

Muslims always pray in the mosques .

With the coming of Britishers, India , now , had a lot of Catholic , Protestant and other sect churches in India .

Arya samaj was developed by swamy Dayanand Saraswati during 1800’s to rid Hindus of superstitions and idol worship and focused on our ancient Vedas . Arya Samaj usually performs Havana to cleanse the air within a home and pray to Fire by chanting Sanskrit mantras .

Similarly Brahmo samaj was developed in eastern India to get rid of superstitions and idol worship among Hindus .

The land of India is full of gurus ( teachers ) of al shades and hues with a large following by poor people .Many of such gurus have exploited their followers and are lodged in jails for raping young girls .

A lot of foreigners get attracted to them quite often .

Beatle group and Steve jobs were some who came to India in search of peace .

When Muslims came to India,a lot of poor people became Muslims fin order to avoid taxes .

When Britishers came to India ,these poor people became Christians to gain acceptability in an otherwise caste ridden society of India, which looked down upon the lower castes like cobblers ,carpenters and sweepers .

Most of them had adopted Buddhism to gain acceptance to the social circles in India .

My mother in law developed breast cancer at her home at Ambala during 2005 .

We brought her to Delhi and showed her to the best of doctors but her cancer had spread badly on her breast .

We ran around to get her radiotherapy treatment but unfortunately ,she had a terrible fall and fractured her hips .

We consulted orthoPaedic surgeons but she expired .

We performed all her last rites at our flat during January 2006 and sold our flat in March 2006 to send our son to USA .

My father in law tried to counsel his daughter as well as me to not to sell our only flat , since we were growing old .

We had taken a loan for a new flat and I had a good job going ,so we never bothered about his concerns .

Little did we know , that things would change drastically very soon and we would have to stay in a rented property and always thought of a wise counsel given by my father in law .