The First Time I Ever Cried After Reading A Book!

I never thought a book or a movie could make me cry. Sure, I had read books that moved me and had me pondering about it for a very long time; but tears? I had always been a hard, not so emotional person when it came to stories. But one book proved me wrong. I still remember, when I had turned to the last page of the book, my hands were trembling, and my vision was blurry, and I could feel a lump in my throat.

That book was Anne Frank's Diary.

I have always been fascinated by stories about World War, or the Holocaust. I have a passion for history and usually find these topics really intriguing. But, I had always read facts, and data. Everything that I had read was just in numbers. The fatalities, the innocent lives vanished away was just written in numbers and long forgotten. I wanted to know how the world felt through the eyes of a commoner living in those times.

That wasn't enough to feed my book-loving soul. I had always wanted to know these stories from the perspective of a survivor; from a perspective of someone who had actually seen these moments pass through his/her eyes. I had wanted to know the emotional side of these wars and how it had left an ever-lasting impact in the souls of these witnesses. 

That was when I found out about Anne Frank. For those of you who do not know who she was, she was a thirteen year old victim of the Holocaust from the year 1941-45.She wrote in her diary about her experiences during the time of these atrocities and mass genocide, when she and her family went into hiding from the Nazis into the Secret Annex, located in Netherlands today. She was however, detained and taken to a concentration camp where she died at a young age of 15.

Well, in her diary entries, she has described her daily life during those torturous times in such an intricate and a nuanced way, I felt as if I had travelled back into time and was living those moments myself. She poured in all her feelings into her diary. It was as if I was living with her in the Secret Annex. Using letters of black and white, she painted the most vivid and colourful images in my head. 

But her writing style wasn't something that broke me down into tears. It was her soul that made me fall in love with her and her diary entries. That was what made me cry.

She was someone who managed to light a spark of fire even in the darkest of the times. It was her hope, her resilience and her optimistic soul that made me cry.

"Look at how a single candle can both defy and define darkness."

I still remember, that I read this book in a train when I was holidaying in Japan. I read one of the most beautiful quotes ever written. In that, she said:

"Dead people receive more flowers than living ones because regret is stronger than gratitude." 

This line made me ponder about life and death. I sat there, looking outside the window, just thinking about her, praying for her happiness even in heaven. I was stunned, and emotionally shaken after reading that line. That was indeed so true! The suffering that she had gone through had made her a stronger person, had made her think about life in such a beautiful way and perceive it in a way no one else could.

That moment, I cried. I cried, thinking about how the world had lost such a beautiful, innocent young mind. I cried, thinking about what all she might have gone through in the concentration camp. I cried, thinking about she was hardly two years elder to me when she died. I felt as if she was someone I already knew! I thought about what would have happened if she was alive today. 

Right then, I prayed, and I thanked God for whatever I had. I was safe, unlike her and her family. I indeed felt miserable for her. It was her story, her viewpoint that had made me realize that what a precious thing it was to live! To breathe, and to enjoy life was something many people like her could not afford. Right at that moment, I saw the view of Mount Fuji passing through my view across the window. While the rest of my family was busy taking pictures, I sat there, smiling at the view, thinking about how lucky I was to get to see this surreal view and to enjoy the fruits of life. I looked at the mountain cap engulfed with snow with the rest of the mountain dark and barren. I felt like her words were just like the cold, snowy, breathtaking mountain cap, but deep down, her mind was dark and desolate, trying to look for a ray of hope in those dark, murky times.

When later, after completing the book, I researched more about her, I came to know that she died at the mere age of 15, I broke down. I felt like my heart was shattered into a million pieces. I felt like I had just lost a very dear friend. I hugged that book and thanked Anne for telling me what gratitude really was. She taught me how make the most out of life and to be happy, not matter what the situation is. She taught me to accept the beauty around me and be thankful for whatever I have!

Signing off,

Khanak Saboo ✨ 

"We all live with the objective of being happy, our lives are all different and yet the same"-

Anne Frank