To you, the fair star of Elegance

It is amazing, even today, just how much time and effort it took to befriend you, and I still don't know if we ever succeeded! It is not without rejection that you finally started accepting our food. You were irregular, but my father was persistent, to the point of stalking you, and his effort paid off when you became regular with your food timings at our window.
I cannot say if you ever truly became attached to us. You hated the human touch, that's for sure. You would not forgive us even if it was an accidental touch.
When you were operated once at IDA (for sterilization) I particularly remember my father's astonishment when he visited you at the IDA center, on finding a label on your cage that read 'Aggressive'. IDA has numerous cats, impossible to count, and it was very amusing for us to note that you alone had been termed aggressive! I imagine you must have put up a tough show or fight - something rebellious to invite the label :)

I remember all your fights with crows. They would come near you, and you would hiss back at them with hatred. I have no idea why they kept coming near you. Maybe they liked irritating you, like I did too at times :)
You gave us Kumari. She is such a well-behaved thing! I do not like that you never posed for photographs. It has always been a challenge. I think I won though, when I managed to get a shot of your eye.

As you grew older, you became more accustomed to my mother's company. Although you once attacked her for no reason, when she tried to place a cup of milk at the window. But later, you would not run away when she came near you, and that is the friendliest you got to any human being.
Your last days were very bad, and my family is truly sorry we could not help you. Your eye infection set in a few months ago, and it progressively worsened. My father spoke to multiple vets, we (unsuccessfully) tried mixing drugs in your food, I wrote to a few seeking help/counsel about your condition.
Your last day will be unforgettable in our lives. I wish there was a way to explain to you that we called IDA only to help you. You were sleeping in the bush when they fired the tranquillizer at you. Nobody imagined you would react so violently to it - scrambling up the wall in panic. Oh, I will never forget the feeling of panic and fear I experienced at that moment - my heart was bleeding for you. I am so, so sorry we put you through all the pain. We were only trying to help. I hope you forgive us. Please, please forgive us.
My mother misses you the most. My father regrets calling IDA, given that you were getting old. But we really hated the state of your eyes and your discomfort.

I will end this here by telling you how much I have admired your nature - your adamance in never letting us near, your abstinence from any form or expression of love, forever trying to set an example for other cats, in your own, original way.

Media Bans Required.

Uppercase letters must be used carefully. Dialog typed in uppercase represents shouting. So what does "TIMES NOW" mean, eh ? It's too loud, firstly. Much like Arnab Goswami himself.
That reminds me. Amazing dialogue he once had with some politician:

Arnab: Sir, what is your opinion on this subject?
Politician: See, Rajdeep, what I am -
Arnab: It's ARNAB, sir !
Politician: I'm coming to that, Rajdeep! ...

Recommended bans for the media:
1) News channels should refrain from using bright red font colors, font sizes greater than 12, uppercase letters and embarrassing animations that RUN across the screen (courtesy: India TV).
2) They should be banned from slapping stupid marquees at the viewers, and making text of size 48 RUNNNNN all over the screen.
3) All journalists should be banned from shouting continuously and unstoppably.
4) India TV alone should be banned for the following:
- Regularly spotting UFOs and alien spacecraft that are missed by NASA and ISRO
- Doing shows on ghosts that haunt students if they study late at night
- Doing special-shows on aliens and investigating if aliens can survive on cow's milk. Indulging in stupid animations of a poor cow dropping from the top of the screen and spiralling all over the screen.
- Having journalists report from other planets.
5) Headlines Today for competing with Zoom TV instead of NDTV or CNN-IBN, and for excessive coverage of the Indian wrestler Khali The Great
6) All news channels should be banned from indulging in any single piece of news for over 5 times a day, or for over 1 hour - whichever is lesser.

Flu blue

(Typed at the clinic this morning)

Today's my 4th day of flu symptoms, and I'm at the clinic right now. There are 21 people at any given time here. All of them are either sneezing, coughing or sniffing. So much for the H1N1 scares. People have become stupider than ever.

While I was initially of the opinion that the media was educating the masses, I am now heartily ashamed of subscribing to such views.

There are only 3 things I gathered from the news, all of which pertains to hygiene:

1) Use a tissue/ handkerchief constantly while sneezing/coughing

2) Wash your hands regularly (this is the most over-told and naturally, the most neglected piece of advise)

3) Avoiding crowded areas : for those who are ILL.

As I sit here in the clinic, taking an off from work thanks to some flu I imported from Hyderabad, typing this,

there is a small 3-month baby to my right, cocooned in tons of towels, and to my left, a woman who coughs almost once in 10 seconds. (Why can't the baby's mom understand kids are the most vulnerable to any infection ?) I have now told the cougher-woman that she must use something to cover herself while she coughs. I am shocked at how she does n't understand. How is it that people are so quick to fear and panic, but unforgivably reckless and shameless when it comes to some basic caution, care and hygiene??? Horrible. I feel helpless.I have asked my mother to stay outside of the perimeter of this clinic. Anyone healthy is sure to fall ill with people so terribly careless.

The ill just HAVE to be careful. That's the only way we can prevent any epidemic. It is absolutely selfish of these people to go about sneezing and coughing all over the place, not caring about passing it on to others.

On Friday morning, I travelled to Hyderabad without a mask, emboldened by the fact that noone in the flight or around me showed any flu symptoms. Last night however, I chose to travel with my nose and mouth covered up, that others around me felt safer even if I coughed.

It is ridiculous how quick people are to think I've caught the great big flu.

Caution should be our lesson. Not panic. Not fear.

Every single article on the H1N1 has failed in its purpose, if people cannot draw the right lessons and inferences from them.

Quick Updates

In chronological order:

• Faced my first big huge failure in my work-life last week, when I failed an important exam. It was the first time I was seeing the words "FAIL" on a report card, and I cannot describe what it feels like. All I know is it still hurts, and will continue to prick my conscience and lighten my sleep until I clear it on my second attempt.
• The same day brought me news of qualifying into the finals of a contest at my workplace. This required my team to travel and stay at Hyderabad from Friday through Monday. This contest will is somewhat like the show The Apprentice, where a team is required to analyze a case study and present solutions. This is a 6-week contest, and we will have to be at Hyderabad until we get eliminated from further rounds.

Lost my credit and debit cards and all the cash I had at a mall in Hyderabad on Saturday. I have no idea how the week could have been any worse. Hunted for 2 hours thereafter and made a hundred calls to freeze my account. I'm grateful to my teammates for my survival thereafter.

• .. I'm ill. My very second day at Hyderabad, and I've been ill for the 4th day now. The timing is awful, for people react very bad at this moment. Almost as if you could not have any other flu in the world. I don't know myself, nor does the doctor I saw today. We can only pray it's nothing troublesome. Today was also my first day off work since I joined, thanks to the rules at all offices that require you to stay at home if you have any symptoms or the appearance (read: my red eyes , sniffs and cough) and likelihood of causing panic at work.
• Got my 8th semester results an hour ago, and I have passed with distinction.

All this in just the past 6 days..

Hosseini, A Mighty Heart and Beyond

{..continued..}

I'm posting this from a different city, and a good 4 days after I posted part-1. The primary motivation remains the same: the sheer power of his writings.
There is however an additional impetus, in the same direction, in the form of A Mighty Heart which I happened to watch on HBO yesterday. The movie captures the sequence of events that describe the kidnapping and subsequent murder of Daniel Pearl, the journalist of the Wall Street Journal. The whole episode was so gruesome, mysteriously factless and haunting that I still remember seeing it over the pages of TOI years ago.
In a nutshell, here's what happens:
Daniel Pearl tries to meet religious leaders and is misguided into an appointment with a leader Gilani, who, (as investigations reveal much later) had never granted him one, which means Pearl had been tricked and trapped by some unknown parties.
Mariane Pearl (played by Angelina Jolie in the movie), wife of Daniel, who delivers a baby merely three months after Daniel was beheaded, an unbelieaveably calm girl of mixed race, describes Pearl as a man who was Jewish by birth, as one who'd never advertise his religion, but as one never denying it if confronted. This, she believes, could've made him more vulnerable in the eyes of his captors.
The investigation is so complex and confusing, (with suspects having multiple identities, missing links in the communication chain leading from Daniel Pearl to the leader Gilani) that the viewer realizes how terribly messy the whole situation in Pakistan really is. All men dress alike. Terrorists, policemen, investigators, common men, religious clerics. Everyone. So frikkin confusing. For you, me, the US, and anyone else interested/bold enough to try distinguishing between the lot. They all wear clothes characteristically Muslim.

No offense meant, but in one single sentence, here's my point:

Religious leaders must never be allowed to govern a nation or even as much as a valley in it.

The Swat Valley "peace" deal is a shocker. The Pak Government's attempts to distinguish between the Good Taliban (as they call it) from the Bad Taliban are such a pathetic eyewash that it is absurd, shocking, unfair and insane all at the same time.
When we talk of religion in such terms, I sometimes seriously wonder if we have completely forgotten the aspect of GOD in a religion. The close association of every religion with Him, the former merely being an illuminating path to attain the latter. Because the moment one remembers this, a number of questions arise.
Has any religion ever described norms for governing a large populace? Does any religion have anything remotely resembling (in principle or otherwise) a constitution that describes rights of an individual - social, economic, civil ? Does it identify the definitive rights of man as equality, libert,y fraternity, social justice and the most fundamental of them all - freedom? Does any religion even so much as treat all its followers on an equal footing - does it ever prescribe or define equality of all men in the eyes of God? On the contrary, every religion has some form or the other of sub-division: sub-sects, sub-castes, types, forms etc etc etc. The list is endless. My objective here is not to criticize religion, but to try, identify and understand its goal.
The purpose of religion was never to equalize men. It was (and still is, I trust) to teach us the best way to attain, understand and feel God. Although it does prescribe morality, ethics and a general heuristic model of acceptable behaviour at the most - these are never enforceable and binding upon anyone. This is exactly why religion is purely a matter of choice - because it tests one's own understanding of its teachings, which frankly might be quite complex for some and very simple(and beautiful) for some others. In short - every follower of a particular religion X will never understand it(and hence abide by its teachings) to the same extent. And that is why it can never be law. It has never been understood to the same level by all men.
Unlike a nicely put down constitution whose first declaration is that all men are equal in its eyes.

Be it in India or in Pakistan, religion can never be law. It is a non-enforceable guide that attempts to teach us something very complex : God. And we, the citizens of a nation, will learn it differentially - as a function of our ability/willingness to understand and appreciate them.

Muslim clerics cannot and must never try to rule a place. Their tools, they must not forget, are God, religion and faith. Which are not exactly what is required of an administrative Government. Radical Islamic groups can better utilize their energies in uplifting the people, in bettering their current standards of living and rescuing them from their impoverished states, which I am confident is a much, much more challenging task than what they pursue at the moment.

A thousand Splendid Suns

Completed 4 years of engineering! Took my last exam last week. (Where on earth did the 4 years go?? Seems like just yesterday that I joined! )
This post is not about my life in these 4 years though. Wanted to post something on that subject, but I've consistently put off the idea.
I cannot put off this motivation though. After Jonathan Livingston Seagull (which strongly reminded me of The Alchemist, by the way), I finally began to read A Thousand Splendid Suns, a birthday gift I received almost a year ago.

Khaled Hosseini. He must feel like God. Having control over the emotions of total strangers. Having such power over his readers - their emotions, their feelings, thoughts. He is a powerful writer, for I have not been moved by anyone's writings in a very long time. (The last book that gave me a sleepless night was Night by Elie Weasel, because of the descriptions of the Holocaust, and the horrific concentration camps at Auschwitz.)

A thousand Splendid Suns has a lot in common with the Kite Runner.
1) For one, both stories are set in similar backgrounds: the story ranges through the periods of the the Soviet Union controlled Kabul, followed by the period during which factions including the Hazaras, Uzbeks, Pashtuns and Tijeks killed each other, and finally the fall of Afghanistan into the Taliban's Sharia' laws.
2) The second striking resemblance is the contrast of characters in Mariam-Laila and Hassan-Amir. Mariam and Hassan are both illiterate, very strong, steady, unfailingly patient, never faltering in duties assigned to them, religiously working for thankless chores and ungrateful people. Both sacrifice their lives in ways that the other pair (Laila-Amir respectively) can never forget. Laila and Amir are similar because of their educated background and their role in seeking redemption: in the way they each visit the dead's place or seek to remain connected with the lives of their beloved.
3) The third common factor is Hosseini's formula. His recipe. The first half of the stories hurt the reader in ways that will pain the reader most cruelly ( he most certainly hurt me badly enough for me to hate each book at varying points of time). In Hassan's pain, I could feel my own. In all the brutality Mariam faced, I was being burned with her. I could feel every blow dealt to her with Rasheed's belt. The second half of each story heals the wound. In the most beautiful, unforgettable manner.
4) The fourth common factor: outstanding conclusions. The last pages are worth reading a thousand times over.
5) Hosseini's love of the number thousand. "For you, a thousand times over." The most unforgettable dialogue of The Kite Runner. And the Farsi poetry lines on how 'one cannot count the thousand moons on the roof or the thousand splendid suns behind the wall'.
6) Finally, Hosseini has flooded his stories with beautiful Farsi. Words like koshteep(handsome), tarakosh (thank you), the suffix of jo/jan/agha, 'zendagi megzara'(life goes on) and so many more I cannot forget in a very long time.
7) The plight of Afghan refugees brought out in both books which nobody who reads his work can fail to notice. He has conveyed to us how war leads only to destruction - of a magnitude and scale that can scarcely be estimated with accuracy, let alone be reconstructed or rebuilt. He has highlighted to the world how difficult and important the task of rebuilding Afghanistan really is.
8) Hosseini's USP remains the same- his ability to create characters that are so powerfully convincing, that he can etch them permanently to our memories alongside those of the story itself, that the first thing we will think of when we remember his works are the characters themselves, however insignificant they may be. Be they that of Giti, Hasina, Tariq, Aziza, Rahim Khan or Asif - each one has a totally distinct characteristic nature and behaviour pattern.

{ .. to be continued.. }

UNHOLY.

I absolutely hate everything about Holi. The drunkenness, the public nuisance. None of it is funny.

I am angrier than I've been in months right now. My building &#!*#$#*^ have lit up the hugest ever fire I've seen in my life at this moment. The flames reach up almost to the second floor. (they're mid-way between the first and the second floors.) They are shouting gleefully like hooligans or tribals. I am not being allowed to go out of my home by my family. I'm too shaken up to even take photographs or a video this time.

I had blogged about this previously. : http://silverwhines.blogspot.com/2009/01/what-waste-of-education.html . Only, this time, their excuse is Holi.

Something needs to be done. I'm not able to figure out what. The frustration and anger are killing. I will greatly appreciate it if anyone can suggest anything with regards to what I can do.
I'm FURIOUS. Please... give me some idea...