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A Small Guide to Journaling by Eintsein

This building was designed way back in 1868 and completed in 1876, when Lord Lytton was the Governor general of British India. It was made to sort all the mails coming into Bengal. It is called Old Telegraph Office, commonly known as the Dead Letter Office.

If a letter cannot be sent to someone because of an error in the address, if the recipient has passed away or any other reason, then the letter gets stored here.

It is located at the corner of Dalhousie Square East and Dalhousie Square South. It’s a 120-feet-tall bell tower, oddly without a clock and built in a very classic colonial-era British style of architecture.

Earlier the letters used to be burnt and articles were auctioned after being kept for a year. Nowadays the letters are shred and the articles are auctioned after getting permission from the postal authorities.

Picture taken in 1878

I’ve passed by this building a fair number of times. Fo a long time I wasn’t aware of the history or purpose of this building. However the visuals never failed to fascinate me. Despite orchestrating one of the darkest phases of Indian history, the British did leave behind some impressive works of architecture. Looking at the building feels like looking at a page in a history book. Even more so, after learning it’s purpose, the morgue of the unsent letters.

I find this concept so incredible, even though all the letters aren’t stored. I wish the old letters were kept. The history books document the great wars, pacts, treaties and such, but this building could have become a museum of very personal bits of history. Not of great men and women but of the ordinary people. Snippets from everyday. Snapshots of life.

This is how it looks now. Click for full image.

( DO NOT REPOST )

आतुरे व्यसने प्राप्ते दुर्भिक्षे शत्रु संकटे।

राजद्वारे श्वशाने च यस्तिष्ठति स वान्धवः।।

The real friend is the one who stays in the court and in the crematorium when he is sick, in trouble, in famine, when he is endangered by the enemy.

विवादो धनसम्बन्धो याचनं चातिभाषणम्।

आदानामग्रतः स्थानं मैत्रीभङ्गस्य हेतवः।।

Quarrels, financial relations, taking loans, incessant chatting and desire for unwanted competitions are the reasons for destroyed friendships.

आढ् यतो वापि दरिद्रो वा दुःखित सुखितोऽपिवा ।

निर्दोषश्च सदोषश्च व्यस्यः परमा गतिः ॥

Rich or poor, grieving or joyful, innocent or bastard; A friend is the biggest supporter of the man.

चन्दनं शीतलं लोके ,चन्दनादपि चन्द्रमाः |

चन्द्रचन्दनयोर्मध्ये शीतला साधुसंगतिः ||

Chandan (sandalwood) has the most cooling properties in this world; The moon, however, is more cooler than chandan. In actuality, it is the company of good friends that is the most soothing.

महाजनस्य संसर्गः कस्य नोन्नतिकारकः।

पद्मपत्रस्थितं वारि धत्ते मुक्ताफलश्रियम्॥

Just like a drop of water that falls on a lotus gains the status of a pearl, company of good friends elevates the value of a person.

आपत्काले तु संप्राप्ते यन्मित्रं मित्रमेव तत् |

वृद्धिकाले तु संप्राप्ते दुर्जनोSपि सुहृद्भवेत् ||

A friend in need is a friend indeed. Even an evil person can befriend anyone during prosperous times but it takes a real friend to honor the friendship during difficult times.

सर्वथा सुकरं मित्रं दुष्करं परिपालनम् l

अनित्यत्वात्तु चित्तानां मतिरल्पेऽपि भिद्यते ll

It's pretty easy to earn friendships but difficult to keep them. The human mind is transient and even some petty conflicts can be the reason to end the friendships.

न सुहृद्यो विपन्नार्था दिनमभ्युपपद्यते।

स बन्धुर्योअपनीतेषु सहाय्यायोपकल्पते॥

A good friend helps a friend in fatality and brings back the friend on the right path (if he has strayed away from the path of goodness).

गुणवान् व परजनः स्वजनो निर्गुणोऽपि वा।

निर्गुणः स्वजनः श्रेयान् यः परः पर एव सः॥

If I lived my life devoting to love, that service was not true because I ache. If I lived my life inflicting pain, there is no one here to remind me of it other than my regrets. I'm not a victim because things just happen and I only feel them nearby. I'm not a destroyer because I am no where to be found. It is a lonely dissolving of self, a loss of responsibility, a loss of fingerprints. All is lost in the name of learning, that is it's reward.

First I let go of cultural identity, religion, and family. Then i evolved to completely lose grip of who I am . I tasted it, god. With you, I learned how to taste it. To fill the future with dreams. to fill the present with footsteps. The pitter patter of the world beckoning you closer.. the cold air gripping you tighter, reminding you that this winter is happening to you. You are here, I promise. You are here and I don't want to lose you. What will happen if this dissolution continues? Is this en route to depersonalization? People do what people do, they do everything except wait. Nature progresses, except wind. My nothingness is like wind, wind, the sound of the void. the only part of me that doesn't change. Soon I'll become nothing except a memory. The way we forget what faces tell us. The way we forget the roots of someones hands. I ask my mother to tell me a story and close my eyes listening to her reach into the earliest memory of home. My family will have someone else to look up to. My love will outgrow me and live on in the caricature of your dreams coming to life. I know you are capable of impossibility, I know anything is possible with you. My love for the world, for the mysteries it has to offer, is another insect for the mysteries' collection. My love for the world is going to live in the anger and kindness I'm able to conjure. My grief will outlive me, it will swallow me and perhaps be the only lasting memory of mine on earth. I am so proud of my nothingness and the shelter it offered. and I am so devestated by it. When I was something, it amounted to a loss of Something. When I'm nothing, what happens? I sleep, tread into deeper sleep. there I can live in dreams. It counts if it happens in dreams, right? if my effort enfolds in dreams