Kuenza's Diary

--> The Life’s Battle I I married when I was 15. I was out of my house in two months after my marriage. Dorji hailed from the snow clad high mountains from the north. Then, people from those mountains traded with the people from the lower valleys. That was barter system then. And there was no hard currency. Money was very hard to earn. I worked day and night in the field with my sister and her husband. When she soon gave birth to a naughty baby boy, my life became even harder. And when one day, Dorji proposed after much eyeing and silent passes we had shared, I thought my prayers had been answered. Dorji had been in our locality for around a month by then. He camped along with his fellow-men in the paddy field that winter in 1920. We lost our father when I was 10. My mother and my sister disowned me after marrying Dorji. He was called ‘Bothpa.’ And my folks considered them of a lower race. This had nothing to do with me in liking him. So when they gave me a choice, I ...

I was to write on it a long time back. But I just checked this back today (February 20, 2009) and I find that all I ever wrote was the sentence, “Today I reached home late and I found…). I never got to finish that sentence. I don’t know what urgent work came up or what mugged my thoughts. But I remember what I wanted to write. Every evening I reached home, I saw an apple on my bedside table. This touched me so much that I wanted to cry. This went on for many days. Karma wasn’t home. It was just my mother, my nephew, my niece and me at home. Since I had to walk home from town, I reached home a little late. And every evening I got home, there was an apple. How can you not help but be so flatly bitten by such kindness? It must be an act of all mothers but by God, it is hard for me to take it as natural and not feel touched. She could have taken the apple herself. But she kept the best for me. The big, red, nice apple. And I think I did cry. I was consumed in the apprecia...

I am very much sane. I am very much alive. But there are moments when I feel so darn close to death, so darn close to madness. I find myself sitting with no particular thought. I find myself wondering on things I can’t figure. Right now, I’m listening to the songs by Norah Jones which in some ways calm my mind. But that also arouses some sad feelings. Oh man, this mind! It is ridiculous—how it can hop from one thing to another and not know what it really wants. Is it true that we create our own fate? I find it difficult to believe though I often say it when I want to console myself into believing that great things can happen as it has happened to some lucky person. But I think that it isn’t really true because if it were, I’m sure there will be no unfairness or the minimum inequality. Lilac wrote about the unfairness in life—about some people being so rich while some have to work so darn hard and still not have enough in life. If we didn’t have a belief of the past karma working...

I don’t know what reality is and what is not. I’m sure most go through such moments—where they are not sure of what really happened and if it really happened. I’m dancing in this moment right now and it is driving me crazy in a way. I’m trying to think of whether something really happened. I try to concentrate and pick the details of it but I am unable to do it because it just vanishes off before I can see the picture. I know something really happened but why? Why am I not able to see it clearly in my mind now? In a way I am happy but I find myself trying to figure it out and I am not able to catch it. That is how it drives me crazy. I must have been crazy then when the moment started. It is not something I would be happy to remember but I still wonder why I am so least bothered about what happened. It is unexpected of me. I never thought I could just say, that is the way of life and it happened, so what? I think as we grow up, our reasoning power and the way we see life changes into s...

I got the shock of my life this morning to read a mail from my friend. I thought friendship lasts. I thought it does not need any basis to build on. And though some call it normal, it is hard to believe that it crumbles just like it has a solid nature of breaking. Do you believe there is something like saying goodbye to a friendship? I thought it lasts, just like the sun, the moon, the stars or whatever everlasting thing there is. I thought friendship just builds without needing any basis for it to stand on Sometime, I wonder if something like luck doesn't go along with me. Neither does good fortune. You know, I have always been content with little things that give beauty in life. I thought they gave me more meaning than any other material things did. I thought I lived happy because of the meanings I saw in life, in friendship, in smiles and in the people I knew. But now, I wonder if there is death in everything. It will be hard for me to believe all these, but I guess that is how ...