Dream Compromised?? - Part I

I was reading the alchemist today, nearly 2 years after I had first read it. When I reached the part where the King of Salem is addressing Santiago, it struck me that I had probably missed the real meaning of those words, when I had first read it. It was a wonderful story back then, but now those words seem to trouble me. Hope they will not haunt me in time to come. Did I just believe in the greatest lie in the world that - at a certain point in our lives, we lose control of what's happening to us, and our lives become controlled by fate.

It's been more than a month since I wrote crossroads. Then I was leaving for a journey which I thought would lead me to the unknown. But fate or my decisions, I don't know which, have led me back to my home for now. A lot has happened in this period. There is so much to tell and to write about. I just haven't had the time to sit in front of the computer and write, and even when I have tried, I didn't know where to start. Maybe I should start from the start.

So, on 16th May 2008, I set out for Trivandrum along with the other three people from delhi - Ashish, Leena and Monika. The 3 days in the train kinda passed well, and it was fun. We even made up a hindi movie version of the O'Henry story - The Last Leaf. And me and Ashish almost missed the train twice too. And not to forget that since we only had 3 seats, me and ashish had to squeeze into one at night. But overall it was kinda good. On the morning of the 18th, I also got news from home that my grandfather (my mother's father) had passed away. I decided not to tell anyone, and its sounds weird, but I didnt really feel anything. Maybe I should have felt sad and all, but I just didnt, maybe I am quite a selfish person. Anyway, so we arrived at trivandrum on the 18th, and reached the hotel - Hotel Prasanth. Me and Ashish got the room on 5th floor, while the girls got the room on the 2nd floor. So, by evening all the people for the training had arrived. We first met the first floorers - Arun, Kapil and Viral. And then the guys from our floor, the mumbai guys - Vinit, Vinayak and Mihir. I felt really awkward after exiting from that room. Actually they seemed to fit the image of mumbai guys I had formed, namely - tough, cool and unfriendly people. I was beginning to fear that I had landed at the wrong spot, and I didn't belong there. I even tried sending a SOS to Avi, but her mobile was off. So finally she had changed her number to avoid me, cos I had really creeped her. Well thats what I thought atleast.

We were told the bus would leave for office at 7.30am next morning. Though I woke up at 5am, and outside the window, a neon sign, which I couldn't read without my glasses, was flashing on and off. It kinda reminded me of the "LOVELESS" sign in FF7. Me and ashish thought that everyone wud come down by 8 atleast. So we took our time, and I was watching a very nice movie in the morning - Wide Awake. So at 7.45 we go down, and to our shock, everyone is seated in the bus, waiting for us to come! We got an idea of things to come. There were 21 of us chartered accountants for this training. Most of the people were from mumbai. So, we arrived at a really big and good looking bulding. TCS Technopark! We were led to a classroom of sorts, and then the whole ILP thing started.

In days to come, people of all kinds visited us and bored us with their lectures. There were very cute faces in the faculty as well. And some very nice people too. But most of them were boring. So, if ur gonna ask me what the training was all abt then that would be a really difficult thing to do. And to chronologically set about all the things that happened would be a very tedious things to do. So, maybe I could narrate some of the key flashpoints that happened there in my subsequent posts. And then we would lead to the final question of what the title actually means.

Me is really tired to write. I better sleep.