If - 2022

If you can keep your riches when all about you

    Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,

If you can enrich your coffers when all opposition doubts you,

    But make more riches from them too;

If you can lie and not be tired from lying,

    Lying endlessly, blatantly, and don’t deal with the truth,

Or being loved, don’t give way to loving,

    And yet always look good, never talk wisely;

If your friends can dream and make you the one to deliver;

    If you never think, and never make sense your aim;

If you can meet with Hate and Bigotry

    And treat those masters as your claim to fame;

If you can smear the truth that others have spoken

    And twist it further for your group of fools,

Or watch things others have given up their life for, broken,

    And stoop and stoop even further to break it in full;

If you can take the entire rich of the nation

    And risk it on just two of your chums,

And lose every wealth of the great nation

    And never breathe a word about the loss;

If you can force every established institution

    To serve you long after their semblance is gone,

And still, hold on when there is nothing left

    For the nation, except your greed that says “Hold on!”

If you can talk to crowds and make them lose their virtue,

    And walk with oligarchs and stoop to their legs to touch,

If neither courts nor patriots can hurt you,

    If all crooks count with you, but not one sane soul;

If you can fill the four long years

    With every second’s loot in the urn,

Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,

    And—which is more—you’ll be a Bhakt, my son!

Photo of the Lily pond from the gardens of Claude Monet.

Footnote: Unconditional apologies to Mr. Monet and Mr. Kipling.

Hope is a four letter word!

 Hope is a four-letter word!

 

How many

Lives have been lost

People have been ruined

Kingdoms compromised

Clinging on to this chimera!

 

Hope

Is a tool used by despots and dictators

To lull a gullible population

Into temporary submission

And eternal captivation.

 

Hope

Is that anesthetic to

Lull the sting of the needle

Gradually drowning you into an

Endless state of comatose

 

Hope

Is that four-letter word

Cleverly orchestrated by

Governments and systems

To capture your soul.

 

Hope

Is that intoxicant that you imbibe

To dull the throb of a stab

A make-believe that convinces you

That the knife is administered for your own good.

 

Hope

Is that mirage that

Is dexterously created

To fool you to keep running

Long after your soul is dead.

 

Hope

Is that wonderful double speak

To convince you that

We fight for peace

We suffer to enjoy

We trade our today for a better tomorrow

We sacrifice a few for the good of the many

Not realizing that the few are the real good

And the many are the ones that need to be exposed.

 

Hope

Is that parlor trick

That pulls an

Imaginary rabbit out of a

Non-existing hat

Convincing you that

The rabbit is real sweet

And you played your part

In liberating it from the devil of a hat.

 

Hope

Is that illusion that makes you believe that

A is not A

Logic is insane

Hate is good

History is wrong

Legal is greater than moral

The herd is greater than the individual

 

Hope, once a beacon of light

Has been reduced to a Lucifer’s toy!

 

So, when you tell me

Do not be a cynic

Do not give up

The horizon is near

The future is bright

Do not lose hope

Yada yada yada

Thank you very much

To me, it is just another four-letter word!

 

 

 

 Image Courtesy: Wikipedia.

 

 

 

Your Skin color is your passport

 The war in Ukraine has exposed the hypocrisies of the world like never before. Before anyone starts jumping on me as Pro-Russia, let me clarify that I am proud to be in Poland today as they had opened their borders to the fleeing Ukrainians. As did the Czech Republic and Romania, the two other countries I have lived in in the last 14 years. 

Commendable indeed. 

The world is excited about the unity we had demonstrated, condemning Russia, imposing crippling sanctions, and even taking unprecedented steps of arming Ukraine. I am for all of them. Let the world stand united in the face of oppression and not play to appease the aggressor with the hope that a concession made now will avert a bigger conflict. In fact, it is precisely a concession made to an aggressor that leads to greater miseries. If one does not forget history, Hitler, Chamberlain, and Czechoslovakia will remind them of what I am talking about.

While all this is good, let us not forget the double standards that are now blatantly put out on display.

        •        No one condemned China when it crushed Hong Kong 

        •        No one condemned China when it invaded Indian territory of Arunachal Pradesh

            o     I can’t blame others as even the Indian Government did not acknowledge the invasion

        •        No one boycotted China’s Winter Olympics even though the atrocities on Uyghur are common knowledge to everyone who can read.

        • No one is going to condemn China when it will soon invade Taiwan. (The man is taking notes on what is happening on the Ukraine fiasco)

        • No one is remembering that Poland, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Romania closed their borders when refugees were pouring in from Afghanistan and Syria.

        • We choose to ignore the RW targeting blacks and Asians at the border, humiliating them, harassing them, even physically assaulting them which resulted in at least one being admitted to the hospital.

        • We allow the FIFA WC 2022 to take place in Qatar after all the evidence of human rights violations.

        • We are ok with F1 in Saudi Arabia in spite of the regime’s association with the killing of Khashoggi.

        • No one raises (or raised) an eyebrow at the persistent state-sponsored Islamophobia across many nations, India topping the list.

        • Taliban is allowed to strangle Afghanistan again once the USA was bored with spending more time there, placing their own collaborators on the Taliban altar as a sacrifice. 

        • The devastation in Syria hardly makes it to the news.

The majority of the people are still good. I firmly believe this. The problem with such good people is that they choose to be optimists. They would see the greater good and choose to ignore the sporadic evil as an exception. This is where they err. The sporadic, unchecked, unchallenged evils accumulate and become the norm over a period of time. This is why,

        • 700 killed in a Mogadishu bombing does not even make it to the front page while 5 killed in France is trending. 

        • Uyghur incarceration is not news anywhere.

        • Lynching of Muslims is considered not worth highlighting.

        • Racism in all its subtle forms is tolerated.

        • Hatemongers are allowed to roam free.

        • Targeted state-sanctioned killing is digested as evil too difficult to fight.

        • Caste oppression is considered integral to society.

As if ingrained prejudices and selective dispensation of justice is not lethal enough, we have a new tool to ratchet the misery to a higher level. Fake news. All of a sudden, people have stopped taking the trouble to research and read. All their education comes from their Facebook feed and/or WhatsApp forwards. Unless we all make an effort to form our own opinions after a pragmatic approach to a given problem, superficial gestures and shallow understandings shall prevail.

Let no Ukrainian suffer in the current meaningless (is there another kind?) war. In the process of ensuring that, if we can also ensure

        • Let no Uyghur suffer

        • Let no African suffer

        • Let no Muslim suffer

        • Let no women suffer

        • Let no downtrodden suffer

        • Let no Afghan suffer

        • Let no …..

        • ……

        • ……

That would be a comprehensive victory!

I am closing this with the powerful message from Periyar, a most misunderstood, often vilified, individual from my homeland.

 The title is from my daughter. When she mentioned it in one of our family chats, this simple sentence captured so much, I felt the need to expand its full meaning. 

Books read in 2021

 Hello, a happy 2022 to everyone.

Continuing the habit, here is a list of books I read in 2021.

1.    The English Patient (Fiction) by Michael Ondaatje; Was a disappointment. There is consistency in the last 3 years, as the first book continues to fail to impress. I do not understand all the acclaim the book had gathered. Probably I am too dumb to appreciate this book. Am taking nothing away from the author. We did not click, that’s all.

a.    Started on 3^rd January and Finished on 20^th January

b.    Recommended by Self

2.    People, A-Z drabbles for every occasion (Fiction) by Natasha Ramarathnam; The foreword says drabbles is a story of 100 words, not about 100, not nearly 100 but exactly 100. Trying to write a story in exactly 100 words will be a task. And then you raise the bar by saying I will to 26 by running through the alphabet. Like solving a Rubik’s cube blindfolded. A wonderful task. And that each story is a gem by itself.  I am likely to be biased as I know the author well. But my reviews are usually honest. A breeze of a read. A relief after the previous one which was incredibly slow at times.

a.    Started on 21st January and finished on 21st January

b.    Recommended by the author (How often does one get to say it)

3.    How not to be wrong – the power of mathematical thinking (Non-Fiction) by Jordan Ellenberg; A wonderful book with interesting anecdotes, case studies, and a writing style that is so easy to relate to. Some basic grasp of mathematics is needed, but most possess that. A compelling topic and an easy read. Would strongly recommend this to anyone. Statements like “Linear regression to social science is like a screwdriver to home repair” and “Torture the data till it confesses” are so effortlessly written. At least two or three birthdays are taken care of from the gift point of view.

a.    Started on 22^nd January and finished on 14^th Feb

b.    Recommended by Bill Gates

4.    Buddy and papayi – The true story of an Indie pup and his best friend (Non-Fiction - Biography) by Lalita Pulavarti; What a fantastic book. Tugged at my heart and then ripped it open. Felt personal at so many levels. I can write a 10 000-word review about what this book meant to me but enough is to say that this is BEAUTIFUL. Will surely feature in my top 10 list and maybe this should not have a number. It is above such trivialities.

a.    Started and finished on 14^th Feb

b.    Recommended and gifted by Savitha

5.    Gandhi – The years that changed the world 1914-1948 (Non-Fiction) by Ramachandra Guha; At 930-pages (without notes), it was never meant to be a quick read. But it was a pleasure to read this one. This is one of those books that requires two bookmarks. One for the reading part and one for the notes section. Mr. Guha surely is a fine biographer of Gandhi. He is not a blind devotee to extol everything done by Gandhi as right. He has questioned him often throughout the book. So much new information (at least for me) – Gandhi’s son married Rajaji’s daughter, one of his sons wanted to marry a Muslim that was discouraged by Gandhi, his son converted to a Muslim, his “affair” with Sarladevi Chaudharani, his secretary Mahadev Desai, the Nehru-Patel friction, Jinnah, Ambedkar tussle. A great book. One statement stays with me “Assumption of superiority by any person over any other is a sin”!!!!

a.    Started on 15^th Feb and finished on 6^th April.

b.    Recommended by Ujval

6.    When I hit you (Fiction) by Dr. Meena Kandsamy; “Love is not blind, it just looks in the wrong places”. The last chapters that address the questions “Why did she not walk away” were the best. To preempt what the readers might think and answer them, and not leave it open-ended with the author’s license to addressing the matter is amazing. That she used Tamil in many places makes a closer connection, as it is my first language too. An essential read to men more than women. And if someone concludes abuse only means physical abuse, think again. To me, the message is that a woman must leave a marriage when abuse creeps in, in whichever form! A searing work, and as relevant as <insert most topical issue>.

a.    Started on 6^th April and finished on 10^th April

b.    Recommended by The Guardian

7.    Say Nothing – A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland (Non-Fiction) by Patrick Radden Keefe; History is a delicate matter. When events as recent as 50 years ago can be so unclear and left to multiple interpretations, what hopes do we have on the veracity of the history or how the future generation would read our times as. With spin doctors manipulating contemporary events and doctor existing narratives, it sure looks scary. Back to the book; A lovely well-researched book on the Troubles, reads like crime fiction, with an abduction in the first chapter and the (potential) killer revealed on the last page. Strongly recommended.

a.    Started on 10^th April and finished on 22^nd May.

b.    Recommended by The Guardian

8.    Rules of civility (Fiction) by Amor Towles; What a gem of a book. Quotes galore. Mr. Towles has a grip on writing superlative stuff. “If we only fell in love with people who were perfect for us, he said, then there wouldn’t be so much fuss about love in the first place” – this reminded me of his quote about fate in his second book, the gentleman in Moscow. His command over the language is something extraordinary, comparable to that of Julian Barnes among his contemporaries.

a.    Started on 24^th April and finished on 22^nd May (due to testing positive for Covid, which robbed 15 days of reading time)

b.    Recommended by self

9.    The name of the rose (Fiction) by Umberto Eco; This book probably took the longest time I had ever taken to finish one book. There were multiple reasons. First was my shuttling between two cities for almost 6 months on a daily basis, and then spending another 3 months living in two cities, the workweek in one and the weekend in the other. Secondly, the book was SLOW. The writing style had aged and it is not easy to stay comfortable with the style. And lastly, there were too many theological arguments and debates. But on the whole, his wit and his capacity to weave a stunning story remain intact. Out of the blue pops a statement that clears what scores of pages can’t. His postscript was hilarious. A typical Eco albeit a trying one.

a.    Started on 23^rd May and finished on 3^rd December

b.    Recommended by self.

10. Cold Blood (Fiction) by Robert Bryndza; A birthday gift. I was stuck on the rose for so long, I needed to have a sense of having finished reading something. The book is crap. As expected.

a.    Started on 19^th September and finished on 23^rd September

b.    Gifted by Iveta

11. Kim Jiyoung, born 1982 (Fiction) by Cho Nam-Joo; “If you must read one book this year, let this be the one” has been reduced to a cliché but applies well to this book. What a lovely beautiful book. The last two pages knock off any breath still left inside. One of the most beautiful books I have read in my life. I thought South Koreans can only make weird films and TV series and write even weirder books (a la The Vegetarian) but this one changed that opinion. A GEM.

a.    Started on 4^th December and finished on 5^th December

b.    Recommended by Akshaya

12. The lost decade (2008-2018) (Non-Fiction) by Puja Mehra; A book that a person like me can understand is a sure recommendation. If the policy paralysis destroyed the economy in UPA2 then the speedy implementation of unprepared policies implemented without preparation spelled the doom in Modi’s years. Can you get any simpler than this? And then this line – If Mr. Singh’s government ignored the advice then the Modi government removed the advisers. I learned a lot about Pranab Mukherjee through this book. A great impartial look at just the economy without yielding to the temptation of blaming one over the other.

a.    Started on 5^th December and finished on 23^rd December

b.    Recommended by Ujval

13. Interpreter of maladies (Fiction) by Jhumpa Lahiri; Bit of an anticlimax. The eponymous story and Mrs. Sen’s were brilliant. The remaining 7 stories were just about ok. Describing daily activities, looking for nuances and terrific observations capturing most of the gestures and the activities were all spot on.

a.    Started on 24^th December and finished on 27^th December

b.    Recommended by self

Grief

 A close friend of mine recently lost his mother. He is 66 and his mother was almost 90. 

How does one begin to understand grief? 

Am sure that 10 out of 10 people who called him had said something along these lines, “it is sad, but at the same time isn’t she the lucky one to have passed away so peacefully and quickly? She died the way she wanted to” etc., etc.

Left with no other options I am sure he also consoled himself by echoing the same sentiments. What are the options in front of him?

Could he have her forever?

Could he live forever?

How long is long enough?

How soon is sudden?

Is there a good death?

How does one evaluate the inevitable?

If one has to die someday, how does one evaluate the death?

If someone died without having experienced life or lived to the full potential, do we grieve that death more?

How do we know that death at an old age is a relief?

One relentless march of time is accentuated by a drop in the volume of conversations. We end up speaking less and less with people who are close to us. We strike up interesting conversations with strangers who bring in fresh ideas and fresh perspectives and predictably that stranger also becomes a “stranger” after a while. Is it any surprise that the ones closest to us also end up being a stranger over a period of time?

Does proximity lead to a state of taking it for granted? Can only death make the realization complete?

How do we know that a 90+ had lived one’s life to its full potential and had no ambitions, desires, aspirations, or goals left? How many times have we spoken to them in our life to understand what they need?

We are consumed by our daily lives and convince ourselves that we have provided them all that they need – from our point of view!

We can’t be blamed – we have our lives and the lives of our children.

Have not philosophers and thinkers driven the point home that life moves on and does not linger in the past?

But, is there a present or a future without a past?

Do we know for certain that the 90+ had no regrets when her life ended?

Did she get the apology she deserved?

Did she get the acknowledgment she earned?

Did she get a listener when she wanted to talk?

How often she had to talk when she wanted solitude?

How many compromises did she make, long after they should have been unnecessary?

Did she get to do all that she wanted?

Did she still need someone’s permission to proceed to do certain things?

Did anyone ever ask her what her ambitions were?

Or were people easily convinced when she answered “I need nothing”?

Let us move to the grieving side.

Can a son or a daughter ever accept a parent’s death?

Reconcile, yes.

Learn to live without their presence, yes.

Understand the inevitability, yes.

It is a game one does not win.

Like Richard Bach said, “Is your mission on earth complete? If you are still alive, the answer is no”.

A bit fatalistic. But sadly, true.

One can run through a wide vocabulary and find many verbs to define the state of mind.

Accept – surely NO.

Years after the death, memories will still haunt them.

Isn’t that what memories are meant for?

You won’t be able to discard the physical belongings.

The chair will remain forever empty and unoccupied.

You will not be able to throw the chair away.

Not yet.

Not so soon.

You will not know what to tell your dad.

Whatever you say will be hollow.

You will still say it.

He knows it is hollow too. He will still listen.

The two of you will play this charade for a while.

And then the conversations that suddenly sprang to life, because someone died, will also die, gradually, one sentence less at a time, till it meanders to a painful halt.

Not because you have nothing to say, but because whatever you say is not going to compensate for the loss.

Not for him. Not for you.

Each tragedy is unique. There is no standard operating manual on how to deal with it. Each one finds a way to deal with it, come out of it, and braces oneself for the next, and the next, and the next, till one day you are the next tragedy.

Let the son grieve; on his own terms.

He will call you if he finds you worthy.

Wait for that call. Do not force it on him.

What can you offer?

Other than empty words and readymade phrases.

You can never offer him what he needs.

His mother.

No Woman No Cry!

           

             -         Hear all through your life phrases like “It is not for you”, “You can’t do this”, “Who do you think you are”

-         Resign to the fact that you will be judged

o   Constantly and continuously, for no fault of yours.

-         The dress you wear defines your character

-         Footsteps behind you make you nervous

-         Bleed every month for 3 to 5 days for 35 years of your life and not breathe a word about the inconvenience

o   Face discrimination within the family and society for associated taboos due to the above mentioned biological fact

o   Suffer the cramps and the pains due to the same

-         Listen frequently that honor and family prestige is placed on your genitals

-         See another person of the same competency (or lower)  draw a different (higher) salary just because of “gender”

-         Carry another life inside you, nurture it, give birth

-         Feed the child – not from a cup, not from a supermarket shopping – by and from yourself

-         Cook three meals a day, almost every day of the year, for 75% of your adult life

o   And listen to comments about the poor quality of the food

-         Get used to not finding a decent restroom while on the road

-         Acknowledge that sexual intercourse will be wielded as a weapon

-         Accommodate and tolerate patriarchy in all its vile versions

-         When people share household chores and call it “helping” you, learn to accept it.

o   And demonstrate that you are grateful for the same

o   Announce and highlight in every social gathering such “noble” acts

-         Get ready to be told by your children that you know nothing

o   Or less than the father.

o   Or the uncles.

o   Or even the neighbors.

-         Even after understanding all such ignominies, treat your daughter different from your son!

The next time when a man finds the urge to do some mansplaining or enters a discussion on women by women uninvited or feels the urge to lecture women about women,  it shall be a good idea to go through this list once.

Bob Marley needed to repeat 8 times “Everything's gonna be all right” in his song asking a woman not to cry.

Trust men to interpret that seminal song to mean “if there is no woman there is no crying in this world”.

🤦

 

 

Pic Credit - Pinterest.