Journey started with Alchemist mindset
It was November winters of 2017 and i had my semi-final exams were going on. I was in 7th standard. I was weak in English since i came from rural background. Even uttering a full english sentence was like a nightmare for me. I had never thought that i would be in a world of english shakespeare all around. Seeing them speaking eloquently always pushed me to learn from them. My seniors became my motivation , frankly speaking even my classmates and my juniors who were absolutely way better than me in engish speaking.
I used to see them holding and reading books other than school textbooks. I was the kind of child who was brilliant in academics ,i had good hand writing including could solve english grammar questions with fastest pace in my class, but the only haunt of my school life used to stuck me down at english speaking.
As my parents admitted me in an english medium school considering it to be a school which transforms sons and daughters of low income families into the finest persons of the world. The subject teachers used to ask questions and if by chance i could get pointed by him, i would stammer and used to feel like the most humiliated person of the earth for that entire class period . It went on the same way until , as i told you when it all came by chance , destiny, coincidence or whatever you can think, it sometimes happens with all of us but rarely we catch hold of it.
I had lot of friends including those of shakespeare too because i used to teach them mathematics or could solve maths questions fairly well. One of my friend, Gourav was reading it . I had never seen that book earlier ,neither it had course number written on it to distinguish on front cover.
I approached him and said hey buddy , what is this you are reading?, what is in it that you are so engrossed in it, so concentrated as if you are watching a movie all alone. The sharp reply i could get was ,"I am reading a novel". I got bit confused . I had never heard of this word. He explained me it is a story book. Then there was a sudden relief listening story book. I requested Gourav to lend it to me once he finishes it.
I had been always curious , whatever the matter it may be and this time too, a curiosity was pushing me to find out what the matter is there with these so called novels or storybooks. He handed it over to me , after lunch break saying , he had taken it from library and need to return it by day after tomorrow. Gaurav had already finished it and i was like, what is the story, tell me and he was like "read it yourself , and you will like it , a great story". His words in combination with his facial expressions had a magic on my brain. I wanted to read it no matter what comes. The feeling was like, somebody had offered me a gold chain for free.
Although i got that novel from Gaurav to read, but i was thinking it will take around 10 to 20 days to finish that enormous book, consisting around 300+ pages. Yes you are right, only this used to be the thought in 7th class , i used to measure difficulty of a book by its size, but this was not the case with The Alchemist until i read its first 50 pages.
The first look of that novel THE ALCHEMIST by PAULO COELHO can never tell what it holds , but it holds the maximum of the wisdom, as i can recount. See the front cover look of this awesome book :-
The bell rang , we packed our school bags and went home. I had in my mind juggling various thoughts, what will be there in that long story and why such a long story be an interesting one. Reaching home , i could remember , changed dress with the pace of light , ate food , didn't talk much to my mother except the usual talk of school and homework. Next what began was the ultimate and the most successful decision of my life i think i took.
Took that novel out, leaving my homework and everything else aside. I had my semi-final english exam the next day, but what all i could recall that i had taken a book today from my friend which is said a novel and it is a long story book and i didn't know what is the story inside.
Looked carefully at the front cover and i could sense nothing from it. Barely the two pyramids can hold what kind of story, i was confused but excessively curious now. Even the name of the author was new to me Paulo Coelho, I had never heard of it nor read it anywhere . But no matter what, i wanted to dive in it.
My first question was alchemist? Alchemist?
Took my English-Hindi dictionary out and searched its meaning which stands for "A person who transforms things for the better". Felt good reading that simple sentence.
And here the journey began, i was not even neglecting the introductory pages consisting publisher , ISBN , prologue ,read about author, and finally saw writen "Part one".
A sense of joy followed. I began reading it , it was a story of a teenage boy named Santiago who was a shepherd and fell in love with a merchant's daughter who was gorgeous and took our little hero's heart out for her. Our hero Santiago was poor so he couldn't ask for her hand from her rich father. So this boy Santiago went in search for a treasure. His love was deep so was his will to find the treasure.
His journey went with lot of upheavels , had to sell his 40 sheep to accumulate money to travel. He used to take his sheep nearby his village up to an old and deserted building where he used to spent his night with his sheep. Once selling his sheep , he found a men who gave him two stones , one each for good nd bad omen. The complete journey had various ups and downs followed by decisions with the help of omen stones. It was like i was getting submerged into the life of Santiago that i even forgot that i had been reading it from last 2 hours.
I was finding something new in it , i had never done, it was a new experience. I wanted to continue with the story to know more and more and more about it. I wanted to know the climax of this journey, whether Santiago find the treasure or not in the end.
Santiago had to travel to Arab following his omens, did small job at a local merchant shop there cleaning his items in the shop. Days and weeks went, things seemed stopped for him, but he later found a person visiting the merchant's shop who gives him hint to follow his treasure journey. It went on and on and in this mean time, i was feeling like i am travelling with Santiago, helping and watching him finding the new routes for the journey.
Sometimes in this novel feels like you are watching it all happening from the above with surveillance camera specially focussed on our hero ,except the characters can't see you watching them and listening to their conversations.
I was completely engrossed in the novel , forgetting the life odds of my life , even my own english exam the next day. Took a break to drink water and this thought overpowered me , to study for exam but no matter what, i wanted to continue and i continued.
It was 9 pm and i was halfway in the novel. I again delved into The Alchemist. Seeing Santiago struggles and adventure , i could very well relate it to my own life. Santiago's efforts were energizing me to push myself , and i think this novel story had a great impact in my own life too.
And that's the reason i think made me to read more and more books and novels and made me a smart person. I very well remember how i evaded my parents including my angry father saying them i am studying for my english exam and it is a english textbook.
My parents were in shock or in excitement, i don't know that even to this day, but that night was lengthy, I was waking up till 2 am in the morning, not doing some serious studies but fulfilling my curiousity to find the climax of this story. Yes , i was reading my first novel and that too for so long. As it was my first novel and had some issues with my English including in vocabulary and comprehension, so i took long time understanding it all, but i feel great whatever it was because i have overcome my these problems . We grow when we learn and it suits everyone until you are some super human with Einstein like abilities and with Shakespeare like brain, handling language with utmost capabilities.
But i still believes , no one is a born genius, they are not made but they become with their own hardwork, passion and determination. Luck do exists but merely depending on luck will take you nowhere. Those were like kind of thoughts generating in my mind while i was about to finish this long journey of Santiago . I understood one thing clearly, treasure lies on the other edge of the river where the river offers difficulties and challenges in various forms. It is our choice , Omen stones it were in the Santiago life but it is our life's most calculated risks which works as omen here .
YES, indeed , it was one of the most adventurous, curious novel i had ever read. It showed me path or i should say it was a good omen for me, i not only passed my English exam but got decent score without studying literature. I had read those literature poems and stories which i could easily recollect but i was facing problems with words and comprehension which improved upon huge task for my brain after continuous reading for more than 10 hours straight.
The book was blessing for me, since then i understood reading enlarges our view and the thought at this time is suitable to tell that "A LEADER IS A READER". I never looked back , i wanted to improve upon my english and it worked. I started living with the characters of my books and new spectrums started coming in my life.
What i learnt from THE ALCHEMIST is way huge to tell by specifically mentioning, it made me an avid reader and showed me a new way of life. Up to my 10th standard i started participating and winning in debates and declamations. Once , i was like who couldn't complete a single sentence in english became a popular speaker of the school. I was becoming like someone who had done Phd. in book reading. My interest broadened from novels to books and view points enlarged.
My next novel adventure was Chetan bhagat's revolution 2020 , about which i discuss in my another blogpost. But before that let me tell you what happened with Santiago in the end . It is exciting to tell you that our little hero Santiago , found the treasure in the end.
But where exactly was the treasure?, again unexpectedly it was at the same place where this Shepherd boy Santiago used to sleep in the night along with his sheep. Exciting it is isn't it?
Yes, it was very unexpected. I would have told you whole lot of summary of this novel but the exact fun can never be distributed with any piece of writing until you read it yourself. Do give it a read and you will appreciate yourself after reading it and if you have read it already, you may try adventure of reading it again like i used to do sometimes with my books and novels.
And this way my journey started of reading. I didn't leave a single stone unturned. My life changed and yours too can be changed with reading.
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