"You're So Much Like Patrick Raj"

For those of you who don't know, dass currently works as a Learning Support Assistant at a training provider for 16-18 year olds. Yes, for those of you who have asked me 1000 times now, I go to work in my normal dastaar (my mah-oosive dhumalla) and my cynderblocks I like to call my Kare, and yes no one says anything at all about it - if anything they love it. I get questions about my Dhumalla all the time.


Yesterday a student came up to me and said "Raj, you're so much like Patrick".

I started thinking to myself "Is this because I'm lazy? Is this because I live under a rock (most of the time)? Is it because I have a very weird obsession with Spongebob?"

As I asked him why he said that the student replied "Because you're so relaxed and you look so calm all of time".

Dhan Guroo Nanak Dev Sahib Jee. A great majority of my co-workers, I have to say, get stressed unusually quickly and just look like they have no sukh (peace) within them. When Sache Paatsaah blesses me with Amritvela, that is when I am most at peace and it lasts the whole day - and you need it when work with 16-18 year olds.

Another great vadaaee (blessing) that I get is when listening to Keertan on the way to work, even if it is a 10 minute journey. However as I am being made to travel further I get to listen to more Keertan! On some days I use to listen to the radio in the car before going to work, but somedays I couldn't change it or turn it off (I didn't have a very good stereo). Sometimes they use to play "modern" songs. These stick like soot to your brain and last for the whole day. It is very difficult to concentrate on anything else when you have a silly tune going on in your head all of the time.

Sometimes I use to be lucky enough to listen to a few Hindi songs on the TV that my dad would listen to whilst I would tie my Dastaar in the mornings. My God I would not wish that amount of pain upon anyone. They are the hardest to get out of your head!
But everytime I listen to Keertan sung with Pyaar by the Sangat collectively, it gives you an amount of Sukh I can not even begin to describe. Keertan is such a big daat we have been blessed with that even other people can tell when it has made an impact on you.

My humble advice: Listen to Keertan before you begin your day! You'll never know who it might have an effect on.