one year on

It has been a year since the ghastly and unbelievable images jumped through our tv screens and gripped our minds and hearts with disbelief and horror. One year on, have we really learnt a lesson? I don't think so...

The same problems plague us, the hatred, ignorance, apathy... i could just go on. And there are still scores of people with an educated facade and medieval mind living amidst us. We still have goons all out to squeeze out the last drop of liberty, compassion and creativity from the society in the name of morality, religion, nation, race, cast and what not. Perhaps its just me and my pessimism thats speaking, but a look at the news portals makes me depressed (not to forget the rediff articles comments section - makes my blood boil at times) ... i mean is this the world that i would want to have a child in? What is the point of procreating if this is what my child would have to face and deal with eventually? I know very doomsday like... but thats how i feel at times.

It has been, is and will be... forever... like an eternal love story, only nothing is good about this... religion, money, morals, power, corruption. I dont think there is an end to any of this. No wonder i lost track of the religion part of me along the way, when i saw how mind-numbing and blinding religion can be and that in most cases religion has nothing to do with spirituality or being as good a human as you can be. It evetually becomes, my religion and your religion and the eternal struggle to prove our point...

On a brighter note, I am reading "Eat, Pray Love". I like it; the sound, the self-deprecating humour. I like the casual tone and pace as well. And some of the thoughts of the author on religon are familiar. Having said that, i would also say, unlike the author, i dont really know if i believe in "God"... i wish i did; it would make things easier for me and its an infinitely attractive thought given the kind of security it brings along (and i am a sucker for the warm feeling of being secure - not always in the physical sense, but yeah i guess that too). But i really dont know if i do; barring the instances when i have fervently prayed a few thousand feet above ground at the mere hint of an air-turbulance or when i am shit-scared that i have some life-threatening ailment (you can blame it on the upbringing :)). And like i said i am a sucker for security and the thought that theres someome watching out there and things will be alright is very comforting... i really wish there is God out there. The truth however is that I sit on the fence and i wish there is some sign that would make me tumble over to the spiritual side of the fence ( are you listening God? :)).

There are other things that i am not sure about. Like... destiny. I have a feeling that things happen because they are destined. Or perhaps everything that happens is chance; nothing is predetermined as a dear friend had told me (he is an athiest ;-)). But i am not sure that i am ready to believe that; how is it then that some of the things predicted in my life have come true, if not for destiny or a predetermined way of things to be? If so, is this really connected to some force that controls my life? And if so, is that force God? If so then, where does it leave Karma? Or if i go on another tangent, where does that leave the expanding universe? Yes i think of that too... There are plenty of things that are hazy in my mind and belief system. What is not hazy is that i am really sure of one thing, that i certianly am not blinded by religion; i have my own set of values they ARE my religion and if and when i ever have a child, i will try my best to not impose any religion on him/ her... my child will be free to choose whatever s/he believes in. I guess the only thing i would try to brainwash into their little heads is, what goes around, comes around; so be aware of your actions and intentions coz they might come back to bite you in the ass when you least expect :)

Okay, so enough of the rant and back to some more blanked out staring at the computer screen :p

Ciao! ( That reminds me, and i quote from the book "Eat pray love", i did not know this but the book says, the word "ciao" is an abbreviation of a phrase used by medieval Venetians as an intimate salutation: Sono il suo schiavo! Meaning "I am your slave!")

So... Ciao once again ;-)

My Bamboo plant - green again

I am all snuggled up in my bed... on a workday. Thanks to a throat infection that payed me a visit and had me all drowsy and headached in its wake. Antibiotics were of immense help in mamothifying (am sure there's no such word... but eh, you get the point) the drowsy weak and zombied feeling.

Anyway, i am all snuggled up, but cant doze off just yet coz theres some work to do. The weather is not helping either, what with the sky pouring its heart out. Thanks to this 'pink of my health' condition that i am in, i am forced to ponder on something... theres some guilt thing going on here as well. Guilt since this particular aspect of my nature has driven my near and dear ones up the wall many times and the seeds of which were sown long long back when i was this oiled-hair-in-two-neat-braids school girl who read about terms such as cancer and who now thinks all the cancers known to the human race have either attacked or about to attack her.

So out of this immense feeling of guilt and exasperation with myself, i admit that i am, am afraid, a closet hypochondriac... anything that can go wrong with anyones health might have happened to me or can happen to me and the people i love... and so i google and google and google some more for knowledge and information; some of it is truly enlightening, some of it scares me and confuses me and so i google some more... enough to know about diseases more than some of the docs i have visited :P my father would have said, see now you know why i wanted you to be a doc! Alas...

On a different note, I like this, this working from home arrangement, it gives me enough freedom and time to do other things... when you are in office, you are tied to the office space even when theres not much work. I am so tempted to stop going to office and work from home from now on! :P

And theres some teeny weeny happy feeling sparkling somewhere in the midst of headaching misery. I was so disappointed to see the bamboo plant in my garden turn absolutely brown in the 10 days we were away from home... its soooo good to see the green appear again! my bamboo plant looks beautiful, fresh and green again... wish human body was like that. As a child i used to wonder how fantastic it would be to be able to shed tails like the lizard. You know if your arm was in pain or injured, just shed the arm and grow a new one! Human beings are disadvantaged it seems. We probably did not pick up some of these miraculous gifts that nature has gifted others in the name of evolution and survival.

I shall bid a good bye and make some tea... its still grey and raining outside. Have a fab weekend !

Wish i could weave the words

I just finished reading "The inheritance of loss"... a bit overwhelmed; the heart and mind are abuzz with thoughts and visuals from the book . I have often envied this gift in people; the gift of weaving words so effortlessly... something that i so want to possess and which evades me. You know words which have a life of their own, they breathe, conjure images in your mind so vivid, you would feel you are in the midst of all that is unfolding between your eyes, in your mind.

Its as if good writers are good psychiatrists as well... how they would effortlessly read the human mind and its sea of thoughts, emotions and contradictions and then they would pick and choose the right ones and string them up together to create such beautiful and compelling stories. With words that are so damn powerful; unashamed, violent, ugly, brutally truthful, ripping the ugly face of nature and humankind open with all its innards out, shorn of all skin and cover, weak, decieving.... creating images of immense beauty, nature, sensitivity, kindness, love, hate and passion that can build and destroy lives and countries... i could almost hear the frogs croaking, the gurgle of the Teesta and maybe the flutter of the butterfly wings patched yellow and orange for a fleeting second.... or maybe i am just a very visual person... I even think in images most of the time while normally one would think in a particular language.

I have been part of the mountain life, but it was so long back that there are no immediate and vivid memories left... except for some. Everytime i go back home, i revisit the tiny black and white pictures from my childhood to keep the memories from fading away... yet some of the words mentioned in the book sound familiar and i felt a connection; teesta, kalimpong, baku, lepcha... I think my ma-in-law and my parents will have a stronger connect with the book since a significant part of their lives were spent in Darjeeling, tea-gardens and the northeast...

Anyway, tomorrow is another day and i am glad i am back to my reading rituals :)) a short break and then the faint fragrance of the bookshop that i so love awaits me...

g'nite!

And i screwed up the comments thing for the nth time... finally abandoned haloscan and came back home to blogger comments and in the bargain lost all my previous comments :(