NORBU WANGDI

When I was little, I did not like reading… at all. I only read when I was forced to read one. My reading habit only developed after I reached high school. Many of my friends and teachers in high school were ardent readers and shared keen interest for books. Wherever I went I saw people carrying books in their hands – in assembly, in multipurpose hall, in dining hall, at balcony, at school garden, and, at rare occasions, I would see a guy carrying a book in his hand coming out from toilet. In his defense, I think he was making most out of his time by multitasking two businesses at a time. And I respect that. The whole setting was different. Everything was big, beautiful and… old: students, teachers, buildings and books. The only new thing here was ‘us’ – new students from lower secondary schools. We were left spellbound by the whole experience around us, and the environment we were in. Eventually it did fade away – the spell – as we also became part of the school, like many student...

At 9 am this morning, I opened my notebook and logged into my facebook account. As usual, I scrolled my facebook wall to check if there are any important news and updates. After reading few headlines, I stumbled on an article that caught my attention. It was about how we are increasingly getting too attached to our mobile devices. It was titled ‘We Are Hopelessly Hooked.’ I spent few minutes reading this article and found it very interesting, and decided to share it with my friend, who shares same interest. Before I even shared this article, I found myself reading another interesting article. Minutes later another article. And another. And again another article. I kept clicking links after links and reading every single one of them until I realized that I have not shared my first article to my friend. This has happened to me several times and I thought it was just normal to be distracted for few minutes or even hours. At least, I thought, I was reading something useful and educational...

I have never been a big fan of Writing, and for that reason, I’m always scared of putting words on paper or screen. To make matter worse, when I read my friend's writings I can’t help but compare it with my own writing style. Most of their writings, I feel, are creatively written. Their writings are concise, and easy to READ. Some say,  ‘Easy reading is damn hard writing’, but when I read my friend’s writings, I feel writing comes easy to them – maybe, a natural gift or talent. Writing is an effortless task, my friends would say, but never did I understand that statement. Writing has always been a major challenge to me. It is complicated, difficult and extremely laborious. I would type words on screen, try to form meaningful sentences, and create beautiful paragraphs, but when I re-read again, I always feel it lacks something; maybe a spontaneity, a uniqueness, or even, if I may, a Magic – or something more. Because of this void or lacking, I eventually delete my file an...