Friday, March 5, 2010

Time Travel

This post has been published by me as a part of the Blog-a-Ton 8; the eighth edition of the online marathon of Bloggers; where we decide and we write. To be part of the next edition, visit and start following Blog-a-Ton.

Very soon she entered into a state of trance.


"What do you see?"


"I see myself standing in the queue. My feet burning in that heat." She stopped. She looked tired.


"I am fully drenched. My saree is soaked in water and it is weighing me down", she said.


"What kind of a queue is that?"


"I am waiting to fill the two pots with water. I have to hurry. My children must be hungry. He will not give them food. I have to go. But I cant go without the water. And there is a long queue. I feel dizzy. No, I cant feel weak. I have to be strong. For my children. I must wait for my turn."


She spoke hurriedly but her sentences were short. She looked uneasy. Her last 3-4 sentences came almost like a whisper.


"Tell me more. What will you do when you go home? Who all are there at your home?"


"Sulekha and Ram, my two children. And he will also be there. Sitting in the room, drinking. I must hurry. Or else he will beat me up. He will beat the children too."


"Why does he beat you?"


"Because I dont give him the money." She looked worried. And then she started talking again, "If I do, then he will drink more. There will be no food for us then. My children will go hungry."


"Why don't you leave him then?"


"No, I cannot do that. I have no one in this world. I will not have a place to live. Where will my children live."


"How old are you? How old are your children?"


"I am 17. Sulekha is 5 and Ram is 3."


She was again silent. I asked her to go ahead and progress in that lifetime.


"My husband died. We are going to burn his body. My children dont want that. They want to throw his body in that big field outside our village. The birds will eat him. But I cant tell them that the villagers will not let that happen."


"What will happen after that?, I aksed her.


She was silent. I could see tears coming from the corner of her eyes.


I grew worried. I wanted to take her out of this trance but I was still curious what will happen to her. I had to know. She was my patient. And I had hypnotised her at my own risk. I had no clue as to which lifetime had she traversed into. I quitely waited for her to speak. But she did not. She was sobbing. I didnt know what to do. She had agreed to be hypnotised. But none of knew that she would go back in time to one of the lifetimes that she had already lived.


I decided to take her out of this state but then suddenly she spoke, "I don't know what will happen to my children. I am scared."


"Why are you scared? You will go back to them after the funeral."


"No, I will not. I will be burnt with his dead body."


"But why?"


"Sati," she said meekly.

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68 comments:

  1. touching story...

    A nice and innovative perspective to time travel... Its the mind that travels!

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  2. you built it up well with a dramatic end

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  3. WOW!!
    Seems like u are a die hard fan of Raaz Pichhle janam Ka...:)
    Kya hua Chandni ko??
    Waise its a nice story.
    Giving a msg in a different way.
    Harassment, child marriage, fear, sati all covered in one short post.
    Kudos!!

    CHeers

    Nuts

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  4. M coming to delhi chanz!
    Hope u pic me up this tym...:)
    Have a GD PI scheduled at sum lodhi road...
    :)

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  5. @ Saurabh : Feels good when u said it was a touching story.. :)

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  6. and yaa.. abt the GD PI.. which company is it..??

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  7. @ Nipun : No I am not a fan of that show.. Havent seen it even once.. But yeah, the question of past life is still there in my mind.. I just cant take it out.. :P

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  8. :( oh sad ending. But liked the way you interpreted time travel. SAti is such a horrible tradition!!!

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  9. Nice story man.
    Imagine man, this sati system actually prevailed in our society. Although now they don't burn a woman after the husband's death, but still the life of rural women isn't easy.

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  10. good writing buddy :)
    touchy one :)
    have a great day ..

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  11. Oh, I love this :) So touching. Reminds me of Brian Weiss a little...but evokes more emotion.

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  12. @ evanescentthoughts : Thanks a lot..

    And i read your post too.. it was good..

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  13. @ Shivani : I know.. Its quite sad. Imagine the poor woman married off at an early age, living with a drunkard husband n two children.. And she gets tied down by Sati..

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  14. @ Golden Vulture : Thanks yaa.. wat abt u.. u not written one..??

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  15. @ Wicked : yeah, I know.. And since I am such a big fan of hypothesis and past lives, this story was definitely expected from me..

    do u really think there was more emotion..?? :)

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  16. great writing... and nice interpretation of 'time travel'. :)

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  17. @ Mehak : thanks a lot sweety..

    I loved your post too..

    btw thanks for following my blog.. :)

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  18. that was really touching... that was a nice way of portraying what women in India go through in our country... keep it coming... and all the best for BAT8

    Cheers!
    Tavish
    Blog: Sensible Bakwas

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  19. Its a sister college of XLRI.
    XIMB bhabhaneshwar..:)

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  20. @ Tavish : :) Thanks.. Good luck to u too..

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  21. @ Nipun : Oh man.. That means u must have got an excellent score in XAT.. i got 85 and didnt get a call from even one :(

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  22. no need to tell u
    that u hv again done a fabulous job

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  23. GRRRRR. Thank god they got rid of Sati. Just makes me so angry that women had to that.. even if it is the past.

    Wonderful. thanks for reminding us all of the world that used to be. And once again, it's nice to use the past tense with this one.

    All the luck for batom.

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  24. Wow! What a beautiful and touching story!

    The end was the best part of this, and it even made me teary-eyed! I must say, you have a very good ability to keep the reader engrossed in your writing! Very powerful and dramatic!

    Keep it up, buddy!

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  25. @ Saro : I swear. Thank god, we werent born in that era.. Sometimes I get upset when I think about the consequences if I had been born then..

    Thanks.. All he best to u too..

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  26. @ Parth : Really..?? U really thought it was touching..??

    U know, it feels just too good when somebody likes what u write.. Really, it does.. :)

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  27. Touching. And beautifully written! :) All the best for BATOM!

    PS: http://bit.ly/aliensandme

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  28. Heylo,

    You wrote it nice and simple. Especially, the starting narration is a class. I read it but I still feel like- yeh dil maange more..Anyway, overall it was nice and smooth. I liked it. Good luck for the BATOM!!
    Love & Peace
    Viv

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  29. @ The virgin Author : thanks a lot.. I read your post too.. It was kinda funny.. :)

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  30. @ Vivek : Thanks a ton.. I read your post too... East India company..lol.. All the best to u too.. :)

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  31. a very touching story. Good job!

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  32. neatly done.. good work! :)
    the emotions flowed well, though I thought the start was a bit abrupt here! :)

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  33. Nice nice nice......though sati isn't as prevalent now, graver injustices are still ramapant in our country

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  34. liked it, it was a very good read.

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  35. and all the credit goes to me.. kudos to @ease.

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  36. nicely written. The full horror of sati brought out nicely. The dialogue was really, gripping leading on your curiosity.

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  37. ... i was wondering if the Sati tradition actually started as a practice by widowed women willingly committing the act and in the process became 'godess' because of that... and this later became a tradition with women down the timeline thought it would make them and their families respected in the society... however like all other traditions this also lost its's underlying theme and became a forced act... rather an abuse...

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  38. Those stupid practices sucked big time, didn't they? I'm glad it gone for good.
    It was a nice story. :)

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  39. @ Leo.. Well yaa.. I did that deliberately.. Earlier, i started it differently but I didnt the way it sounded.. So i changed it and made it take off abruptly.

    Thanks anyways.. :)

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  40. @ Mural : Thats true.. There is always something which eats up our society.. I dont think we'll ever live a life free of these boundations. Not that the life would be exciing without these cultures..

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  41. @ease : Ya right.. Why not.. :|

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  42. @ Harsha : Thanks a lot.. :)

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  43. @ The Fool : Thanks :) I am glad that it came out to be a gripping story.. :)

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  44. @ Nethra : Yeah.. Thankfully, they no longer exist.

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  45. @ Atul : Well, as far as I know, Sati was perhaps done voluntarily when women jumped into the husband's pyre. They thought that it was no point living when their love had died. But for cases like the one I talked about, the women didnt have a choice.

    Whatever it is, it really was a sour practice..

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  46. nice post hitting the bulls eye.....
    The narration is good .....
    great take on the evil practice....
    happy womans day

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  47. @ Mahesh : Thanks for saying that.. It gives me a lot of confidence.. :)

    N I Thank u for the wishes..

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  48. Burning issue.

    but controlled up to an extent.


    but still miles to go.

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  49. @ Makk : I know.. Though it is not prevelant these days but I am not really sure about the rural areas.

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  50. Oh..Thats so cold. its hard to believe such things did exist in ur society..One must be worst than an animal to allow such thing..

    Good story...well written

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  51. @ Dilontherocks : Yeah.. Sometimes you feel sad when you realise that your ancestors were the ones who followed these traditions..

    Thanks btw.. :)

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  52. wow..its simply superb yaar !! I loved the flow and at end , it really touched me ..wonderfully written !

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  53. @ Blogger : Thanks a ton.. :)

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  54. Good One...
    All the best for BATOM

    Yours Frendly,
    Saravana Kumar M

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  55. @ Saravan : Thanks a lot.. n best of luck to u too..

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  56. Beautiful! Didn't really expect that ending. "Sati" - just that one word gave a tremendous ending to the story.
    A very neat story with strong emotions.
    All the best for BATOM!
    Cheerios!

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  57. @ Karthik : Heeeeeee... glad that you liked it.. thanks a ton.. :)

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  58. That was a stunning story indeed!

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  59. Better late than never! Glad I did not miss reading this one! One of the many blind practices in the pages of History - Sati system. Though people claim it is over, it is still dormant in some rural areas of India! It sucks big time! Good you have thrown light on the issue! Nice attempt! Good luck with BATOM!

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