Hi! I am your long lost friend from Assissi Convent School, Noida. I am really sorry for not being able to keep in touch with you, once, you left the city. It was very hard to stay in touch at that time, as there were no e-mails and cell-phones and going to the post office was too much of an ordeal. After that, I left that school and studied humanities in senior secondary from Cambridge School as I wanted to study Psychology. I made new friends there, and forgot about you. Though it has been so long since the last time I spoke to you, but I have very fond memories of you in my heart. You have a special significance in my life as we grew up together, and I spent a significant time of my adolescence with you. You had great influence in my transition from being a little girl to being a woman. That was the time when we had just learnt about sex, and we thought that we had learnt everything we had to know about life. We use to giggle at “non-veg jokes” relentlessly, no matter how stupid they were. We thought that watching Baywatch, Friends and knowing about bands like Backstreet Boys, Boyzone and other boy bands made us “cool”, and definitely cooler than rest of our classmates. Thinking about it now, makes me feel that we were really lame. After the whole boy band phase, I developed a taste for rock music and did not want to listen to any other genre of music for a while. But I think music was what brought us together we had long discussions about Boney M & ABBA, The Eagles, The Beatles etc. Remember, that was the time when the movie-Titanic had just released, and both of us had fights over who’s man is Leonardo Di Caprio, we use to the titanic song-‘My heart will go on’-by Celine Dion. We bought a couple of more albums of Celine Dion, that was the time of ‘cassettes’ and ‘Planet-M’, now it seems like it was so long ago. I graduated from Celine Dion to Bryan Adam & MLTR, to Linkin Park, to Guns N Roses & Iron Maiden during graduation. Honestly, I use to listen to a lot of pop music under covers as well, like Enrique, Dido, Alanis, and love ballads, but did not talk about it too much as that was not the coolest music to listen to on campus.Then I started listening to Pink Floyd, Dire Straits & Nirvana, to Led Zepplin, Radiohead, Deep Purple, Jimmi Hendrix, Pearl Jam, The Doors, WHO and the Rolling Stones. Well other than rock, I love techno, country music, fusion and Indian film music, started developing a taste for Blues and Indian Classical, but have not been able to develop a taste for Jazz yet. But music was that one constant companion in my life, and is something I really love.
As you know, I was really passionate about dancing and learnt bits pieces of Oddissi, Bharatnatyam and Kathak. But I stopped learning classical dance as the burden of studies increased in higher classes in school, during the boards. I have always been more into cultural activities as opposed to academics. I have been actively involved in dancing, singing, elocution activities, dramatics and writing. I was the editor of school magazines and journals in school. After school, I pursued my graduation in Psychology(hons) from Kamala Nehru College, Delhi University. While I was in college I was a part of the Western Music Society and participated in many inter college competitions. During this period, I started participating in social services as a volunteer. I worked on the issue of Child Sexual Abuse with an NGO called Rahi Foundation as a peer educator in my college. Awareness campaigns, and fund raising programs were organized in the college by a team of peer educators and I played a lead role in that. While carrying out such activities I realized I was interested in social work and good at social work related activities. So after my graduation, I applied for a Masters in Social Work in Tata Institute of Social Sciences, as there was stiff competition I really wasn’t expecting a call, but to my surprise I got through, and this was a turning moment in my life. As you know, I had a very protected life at home, which was rather easy. For pursuing my masters I had to leave Delhi and come to Bombay. For the first time I was staying away from my family but I was very happy about that, as I was yearning for freedom. There was a lot practical on the field job that I had to do along with theory, social work meant interacting with people from different classes of the society, so I stayed in villages and worked in slums as well. I really enjoyed working with children, so I worked with HIV positive children in Naz Foundation. I worked with street children in railways stations in Delhi and Mumbai. I worked with CRY and Larsen & Toubro as a part of field work and internships. My attitudes towards life and people changed little by little. I was no longer the college girl from the upper middle class society thinking about how to look better, and other materialistic aspects of life. Along with that I picked up other habits like drinking and partying as well. I made a lot of friends in the new city, and staying in the hostel was a lot of fun as there were people of my age. After I finished my masters I got a job in National AIDS Control Organization(NACO), Delhi-through campus placement, and I had to return back to Delhi. Though it was a comfortable and respectful job, and I was earning quite well, I was not really satisfied. I felt that my talents were not getting utilized in the job, and I was doing mere office work, not working on the field and interacting with people. I thought I was settled in life and was not interested in studying further, unless compulsory. There was one thought that was consistently playing in the back of my mind which is the idea of convergence between media and social work. I realized how social issues were completely under represented or unrepresented in the media. I felt films were a strong medium of conveying messages to a large audience, and would be very useful in depicting social issues. This was something that I had started realizing more and more each day after my experience with people on the field. This thought led me to apply for a course in social communication in Sophia Polytechnic in Mumbai. So now I am back to Mumbai, pursuing this course. The course is very hectic and my schedule is jam packed, I don’t get time to meet my friends, everyday I am working on some assignment or the other, but since I am interested in this, I don’t mind and have no regrets. I hope to become a documentary film maker or a journalist by the end of the course, lets see what the future has enstored for me.
Well this was my story, and I am looking forward to know about what is happening in your life. I am wondering what life brought forward in your journey. You were always a meritorious student, and interested in becoming an IAS officer. So I want to know if your plans changed or are you close to your dream now? As a kid you were really cute, and I think you must have grown up into a really attractive lady, and a real heart breaker to many. So please send me some of your pictures, and give me an update about your life.
With Love,
Antara
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