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?