Editorial

True, my friend XYZ’s Uncle’s Cousin was put on lifelong medication after he got a medical checkup done, but it wasn’t the medical checkup that gave him hypertension. He was perhaps living with this risky disease for several years before it was diagnosed and God know what could have happened had the person not gone for a medical checkup. But ignoring a doctor’s advise is as common to us as ignoring that scary label on a cigarette packet or the common sense that too much alcohol is bad for our health.

So we go on living in a denial of the fact that at any points in our adult life, our body isn’t getting any younger. And that we need to take care of it. If we have missed the bus to preventive care, we absolutely need to take curative measures, to make sure that we are able to live a life we want to and travel to all those exotic places on our must-visit lists.

More than 20 Ghumakkars braved it. Tridev Sir and Silentsoul played the role of Sutradhars and helped us introduce each other. Apart from Sushant who came all the way from Saharanpur, the spirit of whom we salute from the bottom of our hearts, Naresh Sehgal joined us all the way from Ambala. As people started to gather, it was difficult to grasp so much warmth in that little a space. I would let the attendees talk more via ‘Comments’ section of this post. For me, it was an overwhelming experience. We didn’t talk a lot but somehow it feels that the connect and bond has suddenly grown much stronger. The first meet was a beginning and I do hope that it carries on, in smaller or bigger way, in different seasons, in various setups and in various cities and tahsheels and mohallas. It need not be bound by the fact that whether someone is writing on Ghumakkar.com or not, but by the sheer heady spirit of traveling. I would take this opportunity yet again to mention that traveling builds tolerance and tolerance builds peace.

This is an age-old problem human beings are trying to resolve. We are on an unending quest to have it all. But the truth is that we always have to make hard choices, we have to give up things. And especially if it is for following your passion, not everyone will appreciate your stand. It takes a true braveheart to go against the flow, and there are several sacrifices one has to make.

I have talked about my love for winters quite a lot. And it is no secret that I hate summers. But this post isn’t about how bad summers are. No, sir! It is in fact about the little blessings of summers, and when I think about it, it wasn’t so difficult to come up with the list. I only had to ask myself “what is it about summers that I don’t detest?”, and the answers poured like a soothing monsoon upon the sun-dried earth.

Summers are here and with them the sweltering, all-melting heat, especially if you are living in the plains in Northern India and the coastal regions. When in school, we at least had the satisfaction of being able to chill at home during the blissfully long summer vacations. Of course there was the much-hated holiday homework. But even that failed to dampen our spirits. I managed to keep the homework blues away by the ever-useful tool, procratination. I kept on putting off the homework to the next day and in most cases ended up tackling the humungous monster in the last two days of holiday. And the fun didn’t end there. During those last two days, while I slept on time, my mom and my elder sister ended up burning the midnight oil to complete MY holiday homework. I wonder why I never got a whack for this.