Pachauri and Patil

Nature magazine’s “newsmaker of the year 2007” is an Indian. No not the Indian with a different passport or an Indian who lives abroad and holds its values dear to his heart- but one who breathes the same dusty air and who is enraged by the traffic every morning as each of his compatriots. Rajendra Pachauri, the economist who runs the India based energy and resources institute TERI and who as the chairperson of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has shared this year’s Nobel peace prize. The interviewer asked him if he “felt hopeless” when he voiced his frustration about the (Indian) system that is “hopeless at looking beyond the immediate interests of the individual”. His reply will not fail to move anyone who holds India dear – “No. Not at all. I just feel that we need to work harder and harder”.

Contrast this to this year’s biggest let down – our own beloved “woman” president (to most of us uninitiated Indians, wasn’t this touted as her biggest qualification for the post?). She was featured too only this time in the editorial of Indian express- regarding her love for her kith and kin : 9 “family” members are taking an “official trip” with her down to the Andaman. They had to cut 60 trees in this regard to make way for a helipad as the family to too big/lazy/whatever-you-can-think-of to take a 40 km road trip. Hail Pratibha!

If you ask me, I still feel hopeful- that this generation of presidents and prime ministers will all vanish and give rise to those that would fill us with hope for the future. If you want to call wishful thinking, who knows, santa might well be on his way!

Here’s to a joyous Christmas 2007 and to hope in the hopelessness.

Soap Bubbles

Where have I been? Sometimes I wonder (shall we say dream, wish for, desperately crave,...feel free to add to the list) if there are hundreds of you wondering along these lines. Well to begin with, I have been away from this part of the world for sometime now but thats no excuse is it?- unless the place I have run off to is in the middle of the amazon? And then, I have been bogged by work and more work and more of it. And then, my family was here and I was taking them to the Night safari, the underwater world and the bird park (sigh!) and the works and showing off this city almost as if I made it myself (if you think its sad, I will forgive you this time).

More closer to the truth is that I have been looking at myself for sometime now. I mean not in terms of how I look and what the dreaded decade of the thrities has added to my girth but more in terms of where I was headed and where I am. Ages ago, a freind of mine told me she hates to get old and I laughed at her. How much of laughter can I muster today at such a thought is what actually brought me to a halt. Looking back, its amazing how I even managed to be here- not exactly a success story which can be featured in a sunday newspaper but coming from where I do, its hard to believe that someone/something didnt propel me here. At the same time, I look at what I have and I think, is this all? Is this is what I was after? What comes with this? What meaning is this supposed to give to my life?

Taking Umbrage

Taxi drivers in the city I live in deserve special mention as prospective Zen masters. They utter a sentence and lo and behold you are bound to experience a satori moment. That is if you are in the right path to enlightenment, must I add? Yesterday, I met a rather patronizing one -common in this part of the world where India shining still means glitzy Bollywood wear-, the kind who will say Vanakkam and expect you to be grateful for learning ‘your’ language (how many times I have tried explaining to them that not all Indians speak Tamil?!). The kind who advise me to move out of “the horribly expensive city area into a suburban HDB flat” so that when I go back to India, I’ll be “as rich as a princess” with the money I make here. (Make no mistake- this is not their xenophobia, just a way of saying you are fortunate to be here but make sure you go back). So this guy who apparently was a regular reader of a local newspaper, had a few well informed opinions; women still “die of dowry “in India, to be born as a woman in India is a curse, Indian food is “too spicy”, Indian men always hold hands when they walk and here comes the satori statement - Indian women do not work (this when I was on my way to work on a gloomy Monday morning)

Actually the story runs beyond the cab driver obviously. Some colorful whirling spirals later, comes this moment in which we decided to give in to the charms of Pradeep Sarkar’s camera team (what gorgeous views of the Banaras!) and set out to watch Laaga Chunari Mein Daag. The first ten minutes were very engaging despite the pathetic lyrics (humto aise hain?!)- What with the Ganges forming an almost lyrical backdrop to the setting (a family mansion which invokes more jealousy than pity), lovely ethnic wear sported by Rani and Konkana and the clichéd but inviting treats of Banaras (paan and kachodis...smack.)! What followed was a combination of Karan Johar’s wishful thinking, Sooraj Barjatya’s saccharine scenes and Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s mind-numbing pseudo-profound situations. I know I was supposed to talk about taxi driver-induced zen and not vent my love for these glorious filmmakers. The film was as clichéd as any but the anger it generated was catalyzed by a zen master into a satori moment.

Yes, I have heard this one before- that no matter what statement you make about India, you will most likely be right. And you well might be right Mr. Pradeep Sarkar that in today’s India, there are poverty ridden “family” girls who transform overnight into uber expensive escorts. But to come up with a fairy tale wherein Shivshankar’s pride is redeemed by his son-in-laws and not his daughters is repulsive. Aren’t those days are long gone? On one hand, we have a national campaign trying to create awareness of daughters being equal to sons in the most remote and rural parts of India and on the other, we have monsters right in the midst of our “urban” class who propagate ideas contrary to that. So who can blame well-informed readers of newspapers in other countries? This thought...if this thought doesn’t call for Zenness, it calls for us going berserk. Punct.

Sethusamudram Project

I loved the whole Sethusamduram yarn woven with purely original anecdotes (" Lord Rama never strikes an emotional chord in the south"- certainly not true Sir, unless there is only one state in South India which, of course would be oh-so-convenient but sadly, is not the case) complete with the proverbial proof of the Indian political pudding, the cherry on which has to be none other than the Dravidian atheist CM's grandiloquence: "From which engineering college did Rama graduate?".

I was in stitches when I read the feminist’s view of Rama (yes, growing up in Andhra with a communist of a mom, I did read the legendary “Ramayanam visha vriksham by the Ranganayakamma) and the way his disservice was being touted as the justification for building the canal. It would shame the Bush gang if they knew how creatively one can build a case with unadulterated opinions and still be called intellectual (as opposed to being ridiculed for "Bushisms").

Oh and did I say I totally loved the “intellectual” (read the classic apologists who start a piece with a disclaimer that is along the lines of “let me put this upfront, I am a Hindu but only by birth, I don’t give a damn to religious sentiments as long as it is not about Baabri Masjid and oh the 9/11 too”) Hindus’ take on the sethusamudram?-It is not about religion, it is about progress/national security and some such brain waves?

Rather neglected in this cornucopia of emotions and intellect is the logic of using survey details from the 1970's in planning this project. But that’s for experts in Navigation technology to debate on. Equally neglected is the impact this project will have on the environment. As a biologist, as much as I feel compelled to add my slant to the story, I realize I have only one thing to say - it is a lie when anyone tells you that projects of this magnitude will not negatively and irreversibly affect the environment. The rest as we Indians (yes Sir, even the southies) say …Raam jaane.

I do want to write about how an educated person can be perfectly normal (not me perhaps but I assure you, a lot of people I know are normal) and still call oneself a Hindu (Muslim, Christian, Jew) among the myriad other identities that one takes on in the course of life. I do want to say that I will not be coerced into being apologetic about my faith. I do want to say that we should start seeing issues in the multi-dimensional manner that is demanded of life and stop slotting things into "communal" and "everything else". To say that I believe in Rama is not blasphemy as is to say that I don’t, for that matter.

Having said that, one question teases my mind since the beginning of this episode. Would our intellectual pundits and the pseudo-intellectual politicians dare say that they do not believe in Mohammed and hence scrap the Muslim personal law that allows polygamy among Muslims in India? If we as a nation cannot profess to have the courage to rise against religion in the name of justice and equality, what gives us the right to rise against religion in the name of progress?

Yes, I know- writing this means I am well on my way to being honored as the next saffron queen (since when did the queen of spices become Hindu, did you ever wonder?). I am also well on my way as being labeled anti-Muslim, anti-progress, anti-whatever. We can argue endlessly about how the hindutva fanatics react to the sethusamudram project, how religion should not come in the way of progress, how this project would cause environmental havoc. But certainly, not all that happens in the name of progress is good.

I think it is time to pause and think if causing a national debate in the name of religion/faith is worth the fuel that would be saved by destroying the bridge. It is time to think if Hindus do deserve respect for their faith at least as much as those who belong to another religion. After all, an overwhelming majority in this democratic country are Hindus. Can our secularism afford to be a-religious only in the case of Hinduism?

Kaagaz Ke Phool

I finally got to watch a movie that I have heard so much about-Guru Dutt's Kagaz Ke Phool. I have been meaning to watch this for a long time now but it used to be tough to find these kind of movies on DVDs outside of India (not anymore, I am glad to say!). I also owe this passive reluctance to watch it to my perpetual fear of being dissappointed: Waqt ne kiya is one of my favorite songs and I wasn't too keen on knowing the real story behind those lines ( I had created my own over time).

To write about a masterpiece is obviously daunting but then, I guess that's what classics are about. In them, each can find, his/her own truth. And what might touch me, neednt always be the same as someone else. The movie is a deeply disturbing, haunting story of a person who happens to be a director. With as many nuances and unsolved complexities and (yet) as poignantly beautiful as life itself. It starts off like a dream- literally- with an old guy in a movie studio reminiscing about the success and glory he had tasted in that very studio. The beauty of those early scenes is that it perfectly captures nostalgia. I cannot at the moment think of another scene in a movie where I experienced that sense of loss mingled an equal measure of deja-vu. Its almost like those now-lost openings of fairy tales, the kind that my grandmother used to tell us. Which starts with "anaganaga oka roju.." (once upon a time is a poor translation of this phrase). Only, the story is no fairy tale in the classic sense. There is no triumph of good over evil. In fact, there is no definition of good and evil. What a contrast to "mein tera khoon pee jaaonga" or "mere paas maa hain"?!

The protagonist Suresh Sinha (Guru Dutt) is a once-famous director, who strove to be true to himself and to his calling so much so that he does not fear to refuse the top heroine's request for make up ("only a beautyspot and some lipstick"!). It was amusing to see Guru Dutt's views of heriones in those days and I suspect, he would be equally baffled by today's crop. Despite his astounding success as a director, his personal life is a disaster. Seperated from his wife Veena and his daughter Pammi largely owing to the wife's anglicised family's views on "those cinema people", he is alone in his success and yearns in vain to find meaning in his life. He meets a self-taught, independent-yet-traditional chemist Shanti (Waheeda Rehman) in a storm, offers her his coat and promptly forgets about her. It was when she comes searching for him (and possibly a job thorugh him) to his studio in Bombay that he sees her through his lens and is instantly convinced that hers is the face he is in search of- innocent, free of dramatics and make up. Guru Dutt's deep devotion to the natural is evident in many a touching scenes between him and Wahida Rehman (especially in the scene where she sits in his car with freshly washed hair- after having being taunted by him for her new hair style). In my opinion, this quest for what is natural had also left him dissolusioned in life.

The focus slowly shifts to the character of Shanti played by the stunning Wahida Rehman. One of the strengths of Kaagaz Ke Phool is that each of the characters of this movie are so real and consistent. There is no trace of frivolousness (not including scenes with Johhny Walker et al) yet the scenes are not as heavy as those "artsy" movies from a country that shall not be named here.

I was very pleasantly surprised by the way my favorite song was introduced (I'd ofcourse watched the famed picturisation of this song many times before). Shanti makes it clear that she is in love with Suresh while Suresh, knowing that he cannot take this path, altough it was the very meaning of life that he was in search of, does not acknowledge her love. It was then that these lines that breathe into the pain of unrequited love, a lonesome hope, have been rendered almost in a spiritual vein by Geeta Dutt.

"Jaayenge kaha Soojhta nahin,
Chal pade magar Raasta nahin,
Kya talaash hain Kuch pata nahin,
Bun rahe hain dil Khwab dam ba dam"

(Whither are we bound, we do not know. We have started on this journey but where is the path? What is this quest, I know not. Our hearts weave dreams in every breath : This is my attempt at the gist. I dont dare to call this a translation)

In one way, one cannot imagine another couple more suited for each other. But irony of juxtaposing these two characters cannot be lost on anyone. Both Suresh and Shanti are loners, independent, artistic with similar views and above all whose hearts resonate with each other. And yet, while Shanti's character is that of someone who can find peace in her "half-happiness" as she calls it, Suresh on the other hand choses to see pathos in her adoration for him and his feelings for her. Some of the scenes that I found were really telling of her character - when Pammi (Suresh's teenage daughter) hears of her father's relationship with her and asks her for a promise to stay away from her father, Shanti quielty agrees. She defies the producer and the contract that she has signed and leaves the place. But when she learns that he has all but lost everything in his life, she returns. For his sake alone. Hers is a love that warms the heart. Sadly, for all their resonance, his is a love that doesnt feel at home in warmth (entirely my take on the movie, I must add).

Her departure coupled with a court ruling that his daughter will remain with his wife set him on a path of no return. He loses focus and the same crowds that treated him as God throw furniture at him. What follows is what has been summarised in these immortal lines by Sri Sri:

"Nippulu cherugutu ningiki nenu egirinappudu
Nibidascharyam to veeru
Netturu chimmutu nelaku ne raalinappudu
Nirdakshyanamga veere.."

(When I fly to the skies spewing fires of success, they look on in awe
When I fall to the earth spilling my blood, it is they, who look on callously)

He dies in the deserted film studio in the directors's chair, a loney and forgotten man. Paper flowers do not wither - they just become useless and lie strewn after the festivities of life. Is that what was behind his title? Does anyone know?

To think that this movie was made in 1959! The finesse with which it was made, the direction, the acting, the cinematography, the editing (and I could go on)...a full forty eight years later, I find it hard to think of parallels. It is a masterpiece by the maestro. That is all that I have to say. And to those who find this film depressing :

"Zindagi ko kareeb se dekhon Iska chehara tumhe rula dega" (from an album called Face to Face by Jagjit Singh)

If you take a closer look at life, its face shall move you to tears

Chalam - premalekha

Chalam has remained in my memory as one of the greatest writers ever (that I have read, I must add) who has explored the concept of love both carnal and discarnate in the same breath. Below is my abecedarian attempt at translating one of his emotive love letters.

(p.s: you have guessed it right. Thats why - "premalekhalu"!)

For you and me,

No, I cannot alter this itinerary of my relentless mind's odyssey of the unknown. Not even for your sake. Even as I try to loosen your grasp, you reign over my thoughts in a baffling gait, your timeless tunes lure me through a myriad dreams. I can neither find you nor lose hope -what am I but a vagrant, an eremite of love? I run hiter-thither seeking you in words that are lost to history.

My hope: Your voice that rings in my ears since time immemorial. The touch of your tresses in the distant realms of my dreams. A gently whispered promise of union on the other shore of time. Delusion or madness, my love?

I have no peace, no comfort, no joy. The very thought that perhaps there is no "you", that perhaps through these fathomless ravines of time- I have been in quest of myself, is harrowing. Tired in this quest for you, my vision has turned inward and my heart calls itself by your name. These stars in a moonless sky and the eight corners of mortal space all mock alike- my infatuation with the beauty of a mirage.

Your smile is the light that enlightens the yogi.

How can I reach for it? I, who seek thee in this world?

Pulau Ubin: Singapore of the yore

A week ago, to escape the mad crowds of the long weekend, we decided to finally visit the famed "Singapore of the yore". It is a mere ten minute ferry ride from Changi point but as you step into this island you realise how true that is!

You do have to get out of the three or so enthusiastic vendors who will try to make you hire a cycle though - one of them was so desperate- he even called V a "bollywood hero" in his desperate attempt to make us stop in his shop. Actually we were surprised how no one seemed to consider taking a walk in this place- Bicycles are a must by the looks of it. But then, we lived long enough in Singapore to know we needn't follow them! And were we glad to take this trek?

Here's what we found in one of the nooks- imagine living here!! What would I not do to live here?

Along the way, we saw a few villagers collecting coconuts and smoking them-so this is where the "Thai" tender coconuts come from then? Where ever they are from, I just love fragrant coconut water. So we stopped at a "hut" selling them and had a taste of heaven. As we walked into the woods, the remnants of urban life disappeared- no more pucca roads- it was mud paths strewn with potholes, dried leaves and broken twigs. V had a good laugh at the expense of my nostalgia for potholes. Walking in the woods really did bring me back to my treasured days in Vizag- those trips to Simhachalam, Srikakulam, Vizayanagaram (more about them some other time).

While walking we came across quite a few people on their bicycles, pardon me for being what I am but to me it looked like they were doing just cycling and nothing else. I mean how can you not break into a smile when you are in such a place? When the wind brings in whiffs of unbelievably sensuous smells- the tembusu, frangipani and a million other smells that lift your spirits and take you into a different world? Quite a few were carrying mobile radios blasting music and I can safely say that none of them cared for the smells and the sounds of the forest. And a lot more were walking around with a two-ton equipment to photograph the sights. I guess it was my "hormone-high" time of the month which brought tears to my eyes. Or perhaps it is this thought that man no longer takes pleasure in nature as it is. I know people from all over the world just love this region. But all this hullabaloo about hiking/ trekking/ diving/ para sailing/ kayaking...what ever .."ing" makes me wonder whether we can ever stop for a minute and enjoy what is around us without having to "do" anything to fill our time (and yes, that does explain my next-to-zero-social-life).

As we neared the Check Jawa area, the wind turned balmy and I swear I could smell salt in the air..and all of a sudden what do we see-what else but a baby monitor lizard. It gave us a 'what-the hell-are you-doing-here-man' look (think Eddie Murphy) before disappearing. It was there that we saw two Singaporean kids playing with their father and for once, just playing- no buckets, spades and all the rest of the mandatory beach paraphernalia! It is always this way with me- my cynical side gets a kick in the butt as soon as I take recourse to cynicism (almost instantaneously), I get to see the other side (which I absolutely need to reaffirm my faith in life, may I add?). So thank who-ever-you-are-up-here.

For those of you folks who are reading this and haven't been yet to this place, I'll add that check jawa is amazing- with thousands of crabs (what hues!), barnacles, mollusks and mangroves and to top them all, eagles and hornbills(!). There is also an (swaying) observatory tower which is a great vantage point for bird watching-if you don't mind having to put up with the flights landing at a furious pace (reminding us we are ever so close to civilisation). So what are you waiting for? Shoot Orchard road and take this trip to Pulau Ubin and then tell me if you don't fall in love with Singapore.

(Reminder: for those of you who haven't figured out yet, my views can be slightly biased!)

More slices of the paradise :

Babbles in the name of poetry

Until we meet again

If that brief rendezvous with you
Were all I would know of life,
How gladly would I give up these listless
years of existence!
to have a glimpse of that once, just once
again
Each day dawning into a new one,
It feels like I live in history
Moving onto future..and yet knowing
Tomorrows wont have much to yield
Except memories of yesterday
Why should this circle of time ensnare me?
Me,
who has been immortalized by your touch?
I have transcended the boundaries of
this world
With the strength of your breath flowing
into my being
Love, my love,
will u not help me live this life
Until we meet again?

Loneliness

And once again,
I stand alone;
All hope of quenching this
Ever-increasing thirst in this desert
gone
For my dreams,
like puffs of rainclouds,
Have drifted past my wait;
And my own eyes have been dried
By the smouldering flames
Of my burning anguished heart.

(my poems on www.poetry.com!)

Of faith and Chettinad curry

Last night was interesting if that doesn't sound cliched. We decided to go for the spicy chettinad curry in Little India before V leaves for Dubai. The place is so full on Mondays! -but we did manage to get a table. Soon we saw a motley bunch enter- one was a Ang Mo (that's the local term for gora) the second was Indian and three were distinctly African-looking. Four of them sat down at a table next to us and there was one who had no place to sit- so we offered our table. He seemed quite friendly and in no time started talking about why he was here (to attend a training in "leadership"), where he was from (Solomon Islands!) and how much he was tempted to buy for his kids from here.

When he spoke, it was like going back in time- I mean seriously when was the last time you had a middle aged-person speak of peace and serenity and the happiness his kids bring with no reference to job/career/travel for twenty serious minutes? I was thoroughly enjoying his simplicity and his child like enthusiasm about the "organisation" and cleanliness of Singapore. A few minutes before he had sat down at our table, there was an Indian who, while waiting for a place in the restaurant, dragged a chair from our table and sat with his back facing us and the moment a place was announced by the waiter, jumped to get it (and I swear I am not exaggerating) without so much as a smile at us. I was just thinking about how drab and dull we Indian expats have become here- so jaded that even smiling doesn't come easy. And as an answer to my thoughts, comes this islander who is all smiles!

But why would life be called a paheli if that was the story? Even as the gentleman was relishing the chettinad spices, his Ang mo friend (I was so tempted to ask him if his name was Obelisk- get the picture?) turned to me and asked me if I would like to go to heaven or hell. And in an instant- it all fell into place- "leadership training"....evangelism! Too amused to stop, I replied- "heaven of course" to which he said that the only way I could do that was to invite Jesus into my heart.
I said "but I do have Jesus in my heart".
"Are you hindu?"
"yes"
"This is the problem with you hindus- you have so many Gods that Jesus is another of those"
"And whats wrong with that?"
"Jesus has to be invited with an open heart"
"How would thinking of Jesus as another form of God be called closed?"
"We have met for a purpose- Jesus has sent his message to you through me- you can make a choice of heaven or hell now"

We had to leave for the fear of missing V's flight but I wish I could have stayed on and spoken to the Ang mo. I wish to understand how it is civilized to call me "you hindus" and to brush aside my faith as if the only thing that mattered in the world is that I (and everyone else) believe in what he believed in. I wish to understand how any intelligent person believes that there is but one truth? That there is but one colour in this world? If it is so, what is day and what is night? Can we say that the sun is there- can we say that it is not there? Are both not true? And yet both not true?

I am born into this faith which respects all religious beliefs because fundamentally, no religion can be in conflict with the universal quest of man- his search for himself and for the ultimate answers to his existence. I fail to understand why someone has to constantly re-affirm his own faith by way of making another person "convert" to his faith. I wish this stops- can we not be at peace with each one's beliefs?

When I was thinking of this episode this morning, I remembered that the gentleman from Solomon Island was quiet through all our conversation. When we were leaving, he said- " I am so glad I met you both and hope you will look me up in Solomon Island". No evangelism here- just humane-ness. That thought made me smile with relief. There are still people in this world who have perspective-Thank God (in whichever form!)

Empty Thoughts of a Stranded Traveller

There was a huge hullaboo about the release of the last of the Harry porter series by the richest author on earth (and she writes childrens fantasies that are lapped up by one and all- what does that tell us about our collective mental state I wonder) and this morning in WHS smith, they were selling the same book with a 30% discount!(not even a bloody week since it was released- so what about all those poor souls who have pre-ordered it?)What is it with thse cult books? Da vinci code and harry porter and the lord of the rings and so on..? For that matter what made people go mad over the beatles in the 60's (women swooning and all)? Are we in one way trying to replace all our unused collective admiration for "the imperial" (but come on the UK still does have its royal family intact) in these kind of cult worships I wonder.
At the airport this afternoon, I am positive that I saw the book atleast in one in three people's hands. Did they buy it because it is on "sale"?

Climate Change Anyone?

I had an interesting conversation with the cab driver who drove me from Liverpool to Manchester airport today. He refuses to belive in climate change because "if the scientists are divided in their opinions about it, one better think twice about taking in that concept". Its another thing that I kept trying to explain to him that we scientists are no superhumans and we are not infalliable but I dont think he got that!

Today's report on the BBC had shown how life has come to a stand still in the midlands thanks to the wettest season in recorded history in the UK. Unsurpisingly, most flights to Heathrow were cancelled from Manchester leaving hundreds of us stranded in the airport with no flights out for the next couple days or so and incessent rain expected. And thanks to the 'very supportive' BA staff who had no suggestions to offer for alternative accommodation arrangements ("sorry we cant help you"), we had to find our way to some decent place for the night. No idea if the flight that I am put on (from Manchester via Abudhabi reaching my place just twenty four hours behind schedule (thats a blessing given that passengers behind me had to wait until Monday to catch their flight to Hongkong)) will even take off on time tomorrow.

Talk about climate change again and I will really kick you!

Guru and the Truth

I read a blog on the film Guru the other day. While the blog was very well written, and while its true that ManiRatnam has proved himself time and again to be a pretentious filmmaker, I think that the idea of that film was not about capitilism alone. On a superficial level, yes this is about making money-loads of it- in as unscrupulous manner as you can imagine.

Did you watch the film chocolate? In a tiny Frech village where people are always told that to indulge oneself is "sin" and to hold back one's desires in light of the imperceivable "nobility" is indeed the greatest virtue. In this film as well as in Guru, I think the underlying idea is the triumph of the human spirit - over desire, over circumstance, over what we have passively come to accept as our "destiny". In doing what needs to be done- not being held back by preconceived notions of "good" and "bad". Being free means one gets rid of these preconceived notions. It might be true that the reason why we as a people did decide that somethings are good and some not is that perhaps collectively at some time point in history we must have seen some wisdom in that. But to allow those notions to become the guiding truth of our lives, is to lose the awareness that each one's truth is but his own.

It is this recognition that made a Copernicus, a Newton, an Aristotle. It is this awareness that brought us independence in 1947 ahead of majority of the "colonies". It is this indeed that made the nation of immigrants become "the greatest nation" in present times. If we can see this attempt of Maniratnam in this light, I think this is one of his most sincere attempts at film making. This film certainly rivals Iruvar as one of the finest flims made by him.

King's new clothes?

This weekend, I watched yet another of those French movies...! Whats with the French? For that matter, what is with these egalitarian "artists" European or otherwise? To top it, I also ended up watching a bit of our home grown egalitarian's "modern" interpretation of a woman' identity (gaja gamini).

It all started last evening, when along with a middle-eastern colleague of mine, I visited a "modern art" gallery in Liverpool. There were four floors to this gallery and by the time we reached the third and had seen rows of unbelievably mediocre art, we decided we were not polished enough to "comprehend" the message/beauty behind damaged books and twisted wire. There were a couple of old timers who gave us the "looks"-(I am not sure but I think they meant - these ignorant asians!). Sorry grandpa-I happen to believe in personal experience of beauty. Whether it is beauty perceived by my eyes or other senses (music, movies, books, food and more importantly, wine?!). I for one cannot understand how knowing your wine makes it more pleasant to your palette. Poetry that has to be broken down into prose and explained in detail to be understood is such a waste of effort. It is like this- you feel the rhythm and those words or you dont. No I dont mean to sound like an egalitarian here! But come on, if people really like caviar or have it because it is associated with being “posh” is anyone’s guess. Now I am digressing.

After this modern art experience, we walked down the docks and were discussing the concept of exclusivity and why it has been such a big hit through ages- through races and perhaps through civilizations. What makes us crave to belong but only to those “exclusive” class (it depends on your level- intellectual, rich, classy- you name it)? Why do we run away from our normal instincts?

This afternoon, I watched the French movie tell no one with some colleague again. As it is French you’d expect naked men and loads of scenes with a single frame that goes on forever. If you look at the story line- it was a simple murder mystery. Should I love the movie for making it seem something incredibly more superior to a thriller? Should I hate it for making a fool of me? I mean come on, the wife of a doctor is manhandled by a super rich pedophile whom she had been counseling and she kills him in self defense. Whats funny is that it takes 8 years for her father (who orchestrated her escape and who planted another body at the crime scene and made it look like she was murdered) to tell the bereaved husband (who never stopped loving her) that she is alive!! Before you presume anything, no - this is not a magic realism film! Go figure out for yourselves. I have only one more line to add. Enough of pretense. Art (even movies) has to touch you. If it leaves you the moment you walk out of the scene, to me, its not art.

Pseudo patriotism

A couple of weeks ago, I had a little debate with a young friend of mine. My fireflies...

I have been thinking after our little debate the other evening about the attitude that seems to be the norm nowadays with young, educated and bright Indians - indifference mingled with cynicism, coupled with a "what's India got to do with me anyway" stance- altogether a pronounced disenchantment with the cause of the very nation whose identity is yet so young. While the statement that "India will never make it" built on intellectual platitudes is obviously a pained reaction to the economic, social and political state that our country is in right now (how well I know this reaction! How many times in the past have I argued on these very lines!), I think its high time that we think through something before we put forward our views. That brings me to the very crux of the argument as I saw it that night- Pseudo-patriotism as you call it (by the way this term denotes those swayam sevaks who call themselves true Indian nationalists on the basis of being Hindus). Wonder what patriotism really is in the first place. If we can define that perhaps we might even agree on what aspect of loving one's land, its culture, its people, the struggles it is coming to terms with and the ways and means through which it is trying to come to terms with those can be termed "pseudo". Don't get me wrong- as I see it there is no need to defend anyone's position neither yours nor mine (and no I am not at all angry, that's not the reason I didn't reply back to your sms). But having come a full circle through almost similar kind of rather extremist/pessimist views, I can say that I do understand the drive to argue for the sake of an argument.

Having said that, over the years, I have also learned to argue for nothing that I have not completely processed in my thought thoroughly and when I see someone young (as I once was) going through the same struggle, I feel its up to me to try stop you and ask you to look within yourself and resolve the issues within first before you form an opinion. As you grow up, you will realize often that quoting someone is less important than having realized that truth for oneself from within. If you had been into the whole debate-elocution routines in your college, I am sure you do realize that laughing anyone's opinion off is not the point of a debate. Nor is condemning. What we humans try through every means of communication is to get the other party to see what you mean and where you come from when you mean that. And certainly not to try change the other party into your photocopy.

When we try to coin a new term, what we really are trying is to fit things into a "box". You know terms like "pseudo-patriotism"- it shows we try to understand the other person's point of view, cannot really come to terms with it, think its source might be shallow and hence fit into the box of "pseudo". And lo and behold, I am superior to you because I cant think like you and if you can think like this, it has to be that you are either wrong/shallow. We will come back to the conformist attitude later. But the presumption in your statement about me living abroad for 10 years and hence being a pseudo-patriot is that one's relationship to his roots is directly proportional to the actual physical distance between him and those. In other words if, one becomes a patriot by passively staying in the country and a pseudo-patriot by searching for ones individual goals in a setting larger than one's country. There are a lot of things mixed up obviously here.

Do you realize that most of us "middle class people" in India are already uprooted from our indigenous cultures? My parents moved from their village to the state capital, started their own life there and were as distant in terms of the time taken to reach this place from Hyderabad as the time needed for me to get to Hyderabad from Europe (yes 10 hours). And yet the tradition I fall back on is that of Andhra and not telengana. By tradition I mean the lilt in my language, the festivals we celebrate, the literature I derive pleasure from, the values and principles we rely on, the food we eat, the customs we hold on to, in short, the way of life I inherited. From my personal experience therefore, the distance physical or empirical between your roots and you do not determine how much you adhere to or rely on them. The choice of course has to be a conscious one. How many in India turn to "western" value system, principles and way of life? What would you make of them? True upholders of the Indian way of life?

You also spoke about the "Mittals" versus "Rockefellers". I do understand what you mean by the "cheap Indian mentality" that you describe whereby according to you we Indians dont really bother about others and all that matters is our comfort (which by the way is not unique to Indians). But you should know that idealism and realism do not co-exist in an argument (they might in real life!). The US is not a great place to live in because of Rockefellers and for every one of those Rockefellers and Bill Gates there are at least a hundred millionaires who would much rather splurge on their cats and dogs than think of the starving millions in the other side of the globe. Yes the world would be a better place if they all behaved humanely but then there is no world if there is no conflict. Yes and about our economic debacles, do you realize that Mittal didn't earn his money in India? And that it was not easy for a tata or a birla to make his millions? That Kirloskars had been out beaten by Toyota although they started off in the same way purely owing to the half baked communistic ideals that were woven into the fabric of our policies? But turn it around- in 1991 after our gold was pledged (remember how close were to going bankrupt?), we learnt our lessons and see where we are in 2006. If you try understanding the history and where we come from, you will begin to see where we are headed too.

Sorry for the digression but lets come back to what you feel I don't know and hence have a rosy picture of things in India. For this you need to understand one thing though – the India that I'd left had no "India shining" label attached to it. All the glamour that it could conjure up was national geographic photographs of starving women who could be killed as and when men wanted to, naked sadhus and snake charmers. It is this India that I cherished- it is this very same India that within a few years was to be projected as one of the most influential economies of the coming years. It is this India that I always believed will reach its potential- the hard way, but reach it will. Sadly, it is this India that had fallen under a spell of pre-independence era indifference and apathy and now after 60 years of independence, we are still arguing with the younger generation about why they shouldn't give up hope. This despite baffling figures – economically, politically and socially, we did made huge strides in these sixty years. Show me one country in the whole world with as many different languages, religions, cultures and traditions (save a single period of emergency), could democratically continue on a path to progress?

The lament your generation has is that this is too slow. But the path we chose long ago is a path that is the toughest. And yet would any of us bear to look at the alternative? Can you imagine in other words to be in a nondemocratic society? If one were to look carefully at the nearest metaphor to the alternative (think of a country), our values are self evident – it is rooted in the improvement of human situation above economic realities. But lets first think about progress-what is progress? Is it related to our GDP? Our economic growth? Our political stability? Infrastructure? Progress is striving for perfection. The economic figures alone wont do it. Why then do Japanese have one of the highest rates of suicides in this world?

A cure-all for poverty, subjugation, lack of resources and in general human misery doesn't exist. As you said, education might help alleviate some problems- to be specific it can create awareness of individual rights and responsibilities in a population but education as a "box" to fit in all problems sadly doesn't exist. Do you know the literacy rate in the U.S is 97% what is its current unemployment rate? What is its crime rate? When we start thinking that our path is wrong, we have to evaluate first the parameters by which is seems wrong and only the second step should be try find alternatives and solutions. But as I keep saying, your generation is quite happy judging the path rather than evaluating it. Perhaps this is the paradox after all, that after 60 years of independence, we still remain largely in apathy to current situation.

All I wanted to say is that intelligent Indians such as you should not fall into the trap of cynical apathy. After all, it is the easiest stance to take. Never fail to ask yourself the question first before you judge anything- policy, situation, morals, values- anything at all. And it is indeed from within that you will find answers to what is the definition of patriotism. And last but not the least, never fail to argue. The one thing I cant stand in people is inability to accept the fervor of an argument. Life without debate is not worth it.

Minuguru Purugulu (Fireflies)

Fireflies dont live forever like the rest of us. But do you think that the similarity ends there between them and most of us? Their ephemeral lives seem so pointless - but dont they make the darkest of nights seem like you never want it to end? Have you ever seen a field full of them on a new moon night? My thoughts aspire to be fireflies. Ephemeral, pointless even perhaps, but all that matters is the beauty of their existance. You wont miss them when they are not around but once you have seen them, you cant imagine a new moon night without praying that they bring the starfilled sky into rice fields once again. oh well, I do hope so atleast.
Talking of thoughts, one thing that struck me when I created this account is that there might be atleast a score of people in this world who did set up their blog this very moment and that makes me ask this of myself -Why do we want to preserve our thoughts (for isnt that what we try to do in communication by any means- this propapgation of our thought)? Is this similar to the "selfish gene" that does nothing but preserves itself forever? Or this really a way to connect? Connect to what? I mean if by mere communication of ideas would fill the gaps and connect people why did we for centuries fight? Why do problems arise and never cease between people, cultures, countries, races?