Reminiscing 2019 – The Unintended Year-End Post

Those Suppressed Emotions

It’s already the end of December!

This year too has passed off in the blink of an eye and as always I really can’t fathom where all the time went.

There’s something significantly different about the year end this time. The melancholic way in which the year is drawing to an end is not something I can ignore. The incomprehensible sadness and heaviness I feel in my heart weighs me down. Sometimes to the extent that I feel ill-equipped to handle it in a way that would keep my sanity in place.

I am just an ordinary citizen of the country and matters of politics has never affected my peace of mind. However, all the things that has been happening around the Citizenship Amendment Bill (CAB) has been a different story altogether. I never thought this would impact me personally so much. Belonging to the community – a Hindu Bengali from the NE – that has been in the eye of the storm, this has directly affected me.

The events and happenings of so many years that I had chosen to forget came back with a bang. The feeling of being a stranger in your own home is impossible to comprehend unless you are in it. Growing up amid curfews and bandhs, living in apprehension and fear, facing discrimination and humiliation are not things one would like to remember. I would rather recall the green hills, the whispering pines, the freezing cold, the incessant rains, the warm wooden homes, the myriad coloured orchids, the chattering birds, the gorgeous butterflies, the cascading waterfalls, the gurgling streams, and every other beautiful thing of the place I call home. And when things had just started looking up in the past 6-7 years, there came another blow.

My grandparents and parents lived a life of apology and shame, being reduced to refugees in their own country after having lost all their wealth and property to partition. They silently suffered for no fault of theirs and accepted their fate without complaining. Historical wrong doings for satiating political gains has left an entire community of people suffering for generations. As a 3rd generation of that community, I thought I had left all that behind, so what that I still struggle to settle down to a comfortable life and that feeling of belonging nowhere comes in to haunt me now and then.

Is Shillong my home? Oh yes, it is. I am born and brought up there and no other place I can call home, my favourite place on earth………BUT………

My heart bleeds and I can explain my feelings to no one – nobody is ready to listen. I am the outsider, the encroacher.

Well, I don’t intend to be negative in my year-end post. At the same time, I have never felt this emotional in my entire life.

Note: I was writing my usual year-end post but emotions took the better of me and I landed up writing something else. My year-end post will follow.

Author: neelstoria

Traveling, Gardening, Trekking, Hiking, Storytelling, Writing, Nature, Outdoors, Yoga, DIY

18 thoughts on “Reminiscing 2019 – The Unintended Year-End Post”

  1. Here again is a place where WordPress needs something other than “like.” No, I cannot understand what you are going through, but I can sympathize. Young people in the U.S. have several times deplored the divisiveness occurring here as the “worst ever.” But it is not. Were I being negative, I would point out the humans seem to have an unlimited capacity to harm. But today I watched a television program showing humans also seem to have an unlimited capacity to love. Personally, I look back to 1968 as my worst year, a year of rioting, assassination, and polarization that divided so many people here — and looking back, I take comfort in the words of the sages: “This too will pass.”

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    1. Ralie, first of all my sincere thank you for a reading my post – a post that that you do not connect to at all and would not understand. That means a lot to me. I absolutely believe what you say “humans also seem to have an unlimited capacity to love”, we always experience heart warming experiences in our own lives.

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  2. I being on the same boat as you are, completely understand the emotions behind your ” out of the genre” post and can only hope and pray for peace and harmony to return! When a group or community is lead by short sighted, ill informed bunch of people, when the so called intellectuals and so called educated seniors of the society, are silent and offer passive support to the mob incited by vested interest, there’s little hope left though!

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    1. Totally get your sentiments and understand where you are coming from. For me, I feel extremely sad that nobody knows our real truth as we have always chosen to remain silent. Worst, only just a very few people listen. Others are too busy giving gyan.

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    1. All I know is I have never been so upset about any political event before. I feel torn between the love for my home versus the reality of who I am. If I support one, I betray the other. For now, I just wish people of my country to know my story. The story that i had left behind and made peace with.

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  5. Your post had been sitting in my inbox for the last 2 0r 3 days, feeling I would definitely read it as I always enjoy your travelogues. But this one is different, touched my heart, feeling the same sentiments as you are, and encouraged that there are people in India like you, with rational and sensitive minds to feel the plight of those who have become homeless in their homes.”Nobody leaves home unless home is a mouth of shark”. Hope the new year brings some civility in the racist’s minds of governing politicians who hate and discriminate fellow human beings of different religious background.

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    1. Thank you for reading Promod ji. It feels good when people like you understand what some of us have gone through, especially more when you are not directly connected with it. I had no intention of writing all this, it just happened. So overcome by emotions I was. Thank you once again for showing empathy and compassion.

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  6. This is a sad time for many. The CAB, now CAA, has touched so many people. In fact, as I was reading a tweet, this is the first time since the fight for independence that the political and personal have come together for so many people. As to the NE, in general, things were indeed looking up over the last few years, with the threat of extremist activities gradually decreasing. But this CAA will rake up old issues, and increase problems in the long run instead of solving them.

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  7. Pingback: Reminiscing 2019 – The Actual Year-End Post – Seasons of Life!

  8. It’s never easy to speak or write about the things that we are going through and so I am encouraged by your ability to share such a touching message. I cannot relate one bit but we certainly go through challenges of our own. Thank you for your post and I wish you the best and a future of happiness.

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    1. I am feeling so touched that you read my post even though you could not relate to it. And, even left behind a message. Most people would not bother. Thank you so much! It’s the empathy that people like you show that gives so much hope making the world a much better place. Thank you once again 🙂

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