I was deep into this photograph posted in the Orkut profile of my dear pal of +2 days. There was nothing awesome in it. Nor was it a treat to watch for a common viewer. But this photograph of the recently built house in his village had enough to strike my stream of consciousness, resulting in a brief comment in his Orkut profile and subsequently share those thoughts with one of my fellow colleagues.For me, the newly built house painted white having a Tulsi chaura and a Hero Honda motor bike in the front and the old mud-house in the side, has a story close to many of our hearts. It makes me a thinking man's picture. How a man (read his retired school-teacher father) toils all his life to bring up his kids, his family, runs breathlessly for a lease of life and then gradutes (by fortune) to build a house at a time when he has little to cherish...most of our families have a similar story to tell...it pains me...because we are, as if, destined to take all difficulties in our stride, we are designed not to be different and not take up and pursue challenges at the right stage of life. But one thing satisfies me despite the gloom all around. That this is honest money. And that's why the honest always stands alone. Standing Along is not that easy.
The photograph attracts me because I also share a similar dream, the DNA of which has been transmitted from our parents for whom it has remained a life-time desire. Our oriental culture never allows us to think about money at a time when we decide our career. You take up your career before you tend to know what you like and what not. (May be things are changing gradually.) Material pleasure is a bad connotation even today. But we forget one thing that religion is never practised in an empty stomach.
Alas, we still live in a world of hegemony.
I still remember the words of an Army officer who advised me to read Rich Dad, Poor Dad and thus understand the legitimacy of wealth creation as in the Western society and know the importance of finding a career ensuring a life full of wealth. He was my copassenger in train in which I was travelling to Hyderabad to study Communication. Later, I purchased that book from Koti Market in Hyderabad but I had never read it once, quite in sync with the symbolic relation between me and wealth creation.
At times, in forlorn, I try to remember the interaction between me and the Army officer.
