Enough of investor meetings and board meetings and shuttling between New York City and Washington DC. Now is the personal time for me and my dog to relax…

“Abhi unke hasney ke
Din hain, woh has lein
Abhi mere ronay ke
Din hain, main ro loo
Magar ek din unko
Rona parega
Ke jis din bhi meri
Mayiaat uthegi ”

Roughly translated…

Now is the time for her to laugh
Let her laugh
Now is the time for me to cry
So, let me cry
But there will come day
When even she will have to cry
And that will be the day
When my funeral will be brought by

“dard ho dil mein to dawaa keejay
dil hi jab dard ho to kya keejay

hum ko fariyaad karni aati hai 
aap suntay nahi to kya keejay”

Roughly translated…

“If there is pain in your heart, you can take medicine for it
But when heart is itself pained, what can you do?

Sure, I am perfectly capable of complaining too
But when you are not listening anyways, what can I do?”

“Main nazar se pee raha hoo
Ye samaa badal na jaay
Na jhukaao tum nigaahein
Kahin raat dhal na jaay
….
Mujhey phoonkay se pehlay,
Mera dil nikaal lainaa
Ye kisee kee hai amaanat
Mere saath jal na jaay.”

Roughly translated… (improvements welcome)

“I am drinking in the beauty of your eyes,
Let this moment not change ever
Don’t even lower your eyes
For the night may melt away
…
Before you all cremate me
Make sure to take my heart out
It actually belongs to somebody else
Ensure it does not burn away with me”

“Aap gairon ki baat karte hain
Humne to apne bhi aazmaein hain
Log kaaton se bach kar chalte hain
Humne to phoolon se zakhm khaayen hain
Mohabbat mein akeli jaan pe
Kay Kya aazab aayein
Kabhi kaanto mein main soya
Kabhi phoolon me khwab aayein”

Roughly translated (improvements always welcome)

“You keep complaining about strangers
I have tried acquaintances too
People stay clear of the thorns
But I have been hurt by the flower itself
Love has, to this lonely heart
Brought troubles of so many sorts
That sometimes I have slept among thorns
And sometimes I have dreamt of flowers”

Wrapping up a hectic week with some winding down with Abida Parveen. There are very few singers I have heard that can scale as many octaves as she can….

Here she sings…

Yaar Ko Humne Ja-ba-ja Dekha
Kahin Zahir Kahin Chupa Dekha
Kahin Momkin Hoa Kahin Wajib
Kahin Fani Kahin Baqa Dekha

Going by somebody else’s translation (as always improvements welcome)…

I saw my beloved in all I saw,
At times revealed, hidden at times.
At times a possibility, at times an imperative,
At times ephemeral, at times eternal…

Also, I am not very sure of the poet but it probably was Hazrat Shah Niaz.

The couplet was written by Agha Bismil but was used by Nusrat in his qawwali “Ankh Uthi Mohabbat Ne Angrai Lee” written by Purnam Allahabadi

“Mehfil mein baar baar unhi par nazar gayee
Humne bachayee lakh magar phir udhar gayee
Unki nigahon mein koi jadoo zaroor tha
Jis par pari usi ke jigar tak utar gayee”

In the gathering, my eyes kept drifting towards her
I controlled myself a thousand times; still they went back to her
There was some eternal magic in her gaze
Whoever it fell upon, he lost his heart and everything else

This evening, while I was practising tabla, Sharmila came into the music room and as we talked, she casually mentioned about Amjad Sabri. Being somebody who avoids news de jure (no TV, no newspaper for me), I did not realize that Amjad Sabri had been murdered in Pakistan a couple of days back.

For those who are not aware, Amjad came from a musical family that went back four centuries in undivided India!! His father and uncle are my first recollection of Sabri Qawwalies. Their family sang devotional songs in the Sufi style. Sufism is one of the mystic strains of Islam that is liberal in nature (e.g. A lot of Sufi music is in praise of alcohol).

Appparently, he was gunned down by Taliban who professes a very conservative militant version of Islam day before yesterday in Karachi in Pakistan – where his family lived after the dividing of India. The world makes a lot less sense to me now. What can anybody have anything against music?

This evening, I spent hours practising tabla with Amjad Sabri songs (you should be able to see him if you zoom in to the iPad)

It was a hectic week with three subsequent mornings starting at 3:45 am to catch 6 am flights. This evening’s choice of singer was Munni Begum. She was actually born in a village – not too far from where I come. Born a Bengali muslim called “Nadira”, her family had moved to Bangladesh and then Pakistan. I understand she lives in US now.

“Kis ko khabar thi sanwli badal
Bin barse urh jate hain
Sawan aya lekin
Apni qismat mein barsaat nahin
Toot gaya jab dil to phir
Sanson ka naghma kya maani”

Who knew the dark clouds
Would fly away without raining
The rainy reason was here
But it did not rain for me
When the heart is broken
Music has no meaning..

(Somebody should translate the “sanson ka naghma” part better – literally it is the song of our breath? )

“Hum jeet na sake woh aisi shart laganey lagey
Hamari aankhon ko apni aankhon se ladaney lagey
Jeet jaate, par palak humne jhukali
Kyon ki unki palkon se aansoo jo aane lagey”

Tranlsated,
She started making bets that I couldn’t possibly win
As she locked her eyes upon my eyes
I could still have won, but I relented and looked down
Because I saw the tears roll down her eyes”