Happy New Year

It's another brand new year. Watching the massive crowd on the Baga beach in Goa go mad at the stroke of midnight with the sky lit up with fireworks and the thumping beats from the shack close by, I was thinking what is it that we are celebrating? Beginning of the Earth's 2009th revolution (after the birth of Christ) around the Sun can't be worth all this hysteria.

Were we celebrating the fact that so many of us dared to come out in spite of all the security threats and warnings, the fact that we did not let the fears bog down our spirit? It didn't feel like that was the prevalent emotion.

There were people hugging, kissing, holding hands, or simply smiling at each other. Wishing each other a happy new year. Were they celebrating the fact that they were together, sharing this moment with someone? To be frank, a few years from now, you might not be able to recognize the person who probably means the world to you right now. Don't we all know deep down that this togetherness is fleeting?

I think there is only one thing we celebrate through all our festivals - hope. The hope that things will get better from here on. For me, for you, for the world. It amazes me how the existence of the human race is based on just this faith, that everything will be alright, that things will work out. And yet we have survived.

Here's to the hope of a better tomorrow.