Becoming a Big Fish !!!
Evening time on Saturday’s are generally good ones to watch movies and I could not help but remain hooked to two movies.
The first movie I watched was “ I am David”. The story was of the life of a boy who left the concentration camp filled with brutal memories of war and death and how he learns to smile one day. While watching this movie it reminded me of the other day when me and my friend Akhilesh were walking down the Norwich street, we met up with an old lady, she appeared lost, not sure where her next destination would be, her eyes greeted us with curiosity and we could not help her much but exchange a casual “Good Morning, How are you?” in the most cheerful tone. It did cost us nothing, but she felt a bit more relaxed and shared a smiling glance at us. Anne Holm in his 1963 written novel has similarly portraited David’s life. David grew up in the concentration camps seeing deaths as the most obvious sights everyday, this made him have the most unsual eyes which any painter finds tough to depict and explain!
How many a times we come across such interesting expressions in our regular journey by tube ? I know , we live by our own worries and curse our destiny for our miseries, only perhaps if we could know the more deeper sorrows hidden in the many Davids around us, the eyes we look at but could not comprehend what it means, it could be the eyes of agony or pain or of confusion and mistrust……there might a hidden language telling us a story !!!
The next movie I watched was “Big Fish”. It depicts the picture of a story telling father Edward Bloom who tells the most simplest of stories of his life with unusual fantasies and creativity which his son , Will, never believes.The movie is a store-house of simple philosophies of life with the message of helping everyone and leaving your footprint in someone else’s life with sheer determination and honest effort. While watching this movie I could not help thinking of 3 years back when one my mentor Sir Aravind Srinivas, asked me , “What would you like to be ? A Big Fish in a small pond or A small fish in a sea and growing up to a Big Fish one day” Well, I chose the later , It was not that the transition was a smooth one, I am spending lot of my times making mistakes , but every mistakes only teaches me one new secret which might help me becoming a Big Fish one day. Looking around me I find today lot of my friends are constantly lost in conflict whether they would stay in the Small Pond and live like a Big Fish, or get lost in the challenges of the sea and struggle everyday to become a Big Fish someday. I know there is nothing like a perfect answer to solve this dilemma, all I hope that we keep recognizing the effort the Big Fish has made in a small pond and helping all the small fishes, in whatever way we can, to become a Big Fish in the sea one day. Who knows!!! someday you may become a Big Fish in the sea in this process!!!
