For some months now I've been having the urge to visit the Hindu Scriptures and I find it to be a very revealing exercise. I admit it contains certain parts that could explain the tragedies of the Indian sub-continent, perhaps caused by a lopsided reading by certain privileged sections of the society.
Let me cite an instance.
If you happen to have the patience and perseverence to check it out, I invite you to scan through the Book Three (3), Discourse Sixteen (XVI) Verse 9 of Srimad Bhagvata Purana.
(I quote verbatim from 'Srimad Bhagvata Mahapurana' Part-1 Rendered into English by C.L. Goswami, M.A., Shastri) Published by The Gita Press, Gorakhpur.)
Here the Lord says:
"The power of my Yogamaya (wonderful divine energy) is infinite and unobstructed, and the water in My feet have been washed (viz. the holy Ganga) quickly sanctifies all the three worlds along with Lord Shiva (who bears on His head). Yet even I bear on My crown the holy dust of the Brahmana's feet! Who would not, under the circustances, bear with them?"
Verse 10 Says:
"The Brahmanas, the cows (that yield materials for sacrificial offerings) and defenceless creatures are My own bodies. The vulture-like messengers of Yama, the god of punishment appointed by Me, who are furious serpents, angrily tear with their bills those who look upon these (My bodies) as distinct from Me, their faculty of judgment having been impaired by that sin."
Verse 11 says:
"On the other hand, they captivate My heart, who with a gladdened heart and with their lotus face enlivened by a nectar-like smile respect the Brahmanas - even though they utter harsh words - looking upon them as My own selves, and pacify them by praising them by loving words even as a son would appease an angry father or as I am pacifying you."
Now whoever of a sane and balanced mind reads verses like these would obviously conclude, and very rightly too, that these words have been concocted by the upper classes to keep the lower classes in slavery. It seems so obviously biased. In fact, Brahmins have been terribly guilty of using the scriptures very selectively for their own advantages. Perhaps even today, not many from the lower classes know Sanskrit, to help them figure out things for themselves. Why! Even I, who is supposed to have studied Sanskrit as a second language till the undergraduate level, remain so grossly ignorant of the language that I cannot make out the meaning of one simple sentence, and frankly I don't know the Sanskrit word for chicken. The language being so esoteric, and in a way inaccessible, people just don't have the opportunity to read the scriptures and find out for themselves.
Brahmins who use the opportunity to use the above verses 9, 10 an 11 of Book 3, Discourse 16, will do well to pause, yes! pause and carefully read the Verse 8, which is mentioned well ahead which says:
Verse 8:
" I do not enjoy the oblations offered by the sacrificer in a sacrifice through the sacrificial fire, which is one of my own mouths, with the same relish as I eat the delicacies overflowing with ghee through the mouth of the Brahmana....."
This seems to again be getting dangerous and nasty, but hold on!
"...who having dedicated the consequences of his actions to Me, is ever satisfied (with his lot) and relishes every morsel he takes."
The words that are italicised are the catch. Do we have Brahmins who are really satisfied with their lot? Do we have Brahmins who truly surrender all their actions to God and are truly not desirous of the fruits? I know from terrible personal experience that the majority would nurse a rather bad grouse if you under tip them! And what about the motives of the so-called sacrificial fires? Once upon a time they were supposed to be done for the good of a tribe or a cow-pen (which is supposed to actually be what is referred to by Gotra). In the present day context, it should be done for the good of the world; or if not that, at least for the good of a nation. But you have Brahmins these days doing these for personal and totally selfish ends.
If such brahmins happen to invite a brahmin like me with the delusion that feeding me as a 'brahmin' is better than conducting a homa, you will only succeed in making me fat!! And worse you won't get any results whatsoever. Rather it's likely that your homa would be confounded. Incidentally, I'm a brahmin, I'm fat, and I frequent homas in Bangalore. Call me to one if you can and oblige.
Sunday, December 5, 2010
Friday, October 22, 2010
Just can't understand God's methods!
I've passed 58 years on earth and am yet to understand why God does certain things. I fully sympathise and understand the consternation of Carol Leifer. She is the one who famously asked:
Here's something I've never understood; how come men have nipples? What's the point?
Yeah! That's right! What in the world is the point of God endowing men with nipples? What are they supposed to do with them? And in God's universe there are many such surreptitious designs which makes us wonder "What was His real motive?"
Again, for instance, someone quite astute remarked "If God really wanted Adam and Eve to live happily forever in the garden of Eden, I mean if He were really serious, why did He surreptitiously endow them with reproductive organs?"
Quite true! Why did He do things like that? And imitating God, Man too has resorted to such illogical whims and fancies. Take for instance the silent 'G' in many English words. Some man has very perceptively observed:
That man didn't have much to do,
Who put the 'g' in gnat and gnu !
And why do we have illogical designs like the centipede or the tapeworm? And if God wanted peace on Earth, why did He give different teachings at different parts of the Earth? What are we supposed to do with the various religions of the Earth, some of which conflict head-on with others?
Here's something I've never understood; how come men have nipples? What's the point?
Yeah! That's right! What in the world is the point of God endowing men with nipples? What are they supposed to do with them? And in God's universe there are many such surreptitious designs which makes us wonder "What was His real motive?"
Again, for instance, someone quite astute remarked "If God really wanted Adam and Eve to live happily forever in the garden of Eden, I mean if He were really serious, why did He surreptitiously endow them with reproductive organs?"
Quite true! Why did He do things like that? And imitating God, Man too has resorted to such illogical whims and fancies. Take for instance the silent 'G' in many English words. Some man has very perceptively observed:
That man didn't have much to do,
Who put the 'g' in gnat and gnu !
And why do we have illogical designs like the centipede or the tapeworm? And if God wanted peace on Earth, why did He give different teachings at different parts of the Earth? What are we supposed to do with the various religions of the Earth, some of which conflict head-on with others?
Sunday, October 17, 2010
The Bullfight Delicacy !
The fire-breathing, dynamic and spirited head-honcho of a leading multinational, a woman of urban Indian descent, during one of her business trips to Spain chanced to visit an upscale restaurant attached to a Bullfighting arena. Having witnessed a blood-curdling bullfight in the afternoon, she repaired to her room for rest, and later in the evening, returned to the restaurant attached to the sport venue.
She ordered the Chef’s Special and was not at all disappointed when she was served a pair of meat-balls in an exquisite sauce which was truly delicious. She made up her mind to revisit the place for dinner the next evening after her business meetings that were scheduled for the whole of the next day.
Next evening she returned and spiritedly ordered for the dish she had ordered the previous evening. But to her disappointment, the fare doled out was emaciated in comparison.
She summoned the Chef and gave a severe haranguing that left the latter totally breathless.
“But Senorita…”, the Chef attempted to explain, but was mercilessly cut-down by the no-nonsense woman.
“I want none of your explanations! You tempt your customers the first day only to…”
“But Senorita, let me explain!”
“Enough of your lame explanations! You brand Asians cheats, but you too resort to the same trickery…”, she was spewing forth, as she sliced the meat balls and devoured them with a knife and fork while simultaneously berating the Chef.
“But Senorita, if you only listen to my explanations…”
Just as she finished gulping down the last morsel of the frugal fare, she said “Not only was that too frugal, it was also insipid in comparison. So what’s your excuse?”
“Senorita! But the bull does not always lose!!”
Moral: Listen to what others have to say.
She ordered the Chef’s Special and was not at all disappointed when she was served a pair of meat-balls in an exquisite sauce which was truly delicious. She made up her mind to revisit the place for dinner the next evening after her business meetings that were scheduled for the whole of the next day.
Next evening she returned and spiritedly ordered for the dish she had ordered the previous evening. But to her disappointment, the fare doled out was emaciated in comparison.
She summoned the Chef and gave a severe haranguing that left the latter totally breathless.
“But Senorita…”, the Chef attempted to explain, but was mercilessly cut-down by the no-nonsense woman.
“I want none of your explanations! You tempt your customers the first day only to…”
“But Senorita, let me explain!”
“Enough of your lame explanations! You brand Asians cheats, but you too resort to the same trickery…”, she was spewing forth, as she sliced the meat balls and devoured them with a knife and fork while simultaneously berating the Chef.
“But Senorita, if you only listen to my explanations…”
Just as she finished gulping down the last morsel of the frugal fare, she said “Not only was that too frugal, it was also insipid in comparison. So what’s your excuse?”
“Senorita! But the bull does not always lose!!”
Moral: Listen to what others have to say.
The Tragic Tale of Alfred Sams
Mr. Alfred Sams had very humble beginnings and the same circumstances continued throughout his life. He was a very talented chef whose dishes were remarkably delicious and had an appealing quaintness and were served with a peculiar aesthetic arrangement that was truly captivating. He had led a fairly respectable life, but for a short prison term that was kept a well guarded secret.
While not particularly ambitious for his own self, he was rather ambitious for his son, who also was fortunate to inherit some of his father’s talent. Alfred Sams was rather insistent that his son receive the best education and at the risk of personal suffering, he admitted his son to one of the more expensive schools in England. He wanted to ensure that his son got a good education.
The son, however, though he followed his father’s advice for a few years, quickly wearied of the drab education that he was receiving, and one day, without heeding his father’s advice, quit school.
“Dad! I’d rather use my talents and capacity for hard work to succeed, instead of following a useless academic pursuit”, he told his father.
His father patiently picked up the tale. “Son! I’m sure you are aware of my culinary skills. When I was your age, there was a recruitment test for a Royal Chef at the Buckingham Palace. Many talented chefs from all over Britain applied for the job. We all had to prepare a set of dishes that were to be personally tasted by the Queen.”
The son became curious.
“And when the dishes were prepared and set before the Queen, she found the set of dishes I had prepared to be the most impressive.”
“And I was separately summoned by the Queen, who heartily appreciated my cooking. ‘Now I want to see your testimonials’, she told me plainly”
“And Son!... If I only had the benefit of a good education I would have been the Royal Chef at the Buckingham Palace instead of having to serve a prison sentence!”
While not particularly ambitious for his own self, he was rather ambitious for his son, who also was fortunate to inherit some of his father’s talent. Alfred Sams was rather insistent that his son receive the best education and at the risk of personal suffering, he admitted his son to one of the more expensive schools in England. He wanted to ensure that his son got a good education.
The son, however, though he followed his father’s advice for a few years, quickly wearied of the drab education that he was receiving, and one day, without heeding his father’s advice, quit school.
“Dad! I’d rather use my talents and capacity for hard work to succeed, instead of following a useless academic pursuit”, he told his father.
His father patiently picked up the tale. “Son! I’m sure you are aware of my culinary skills. When I was your age, there was a recruitment test for a Royal Chef at the Buckingham Palace. Many talented chefs from all over Britain applied for the job. We all had to prepare a set of dishes that were to be personally tasted by the Queen.”
The son became curious.
“And when the dishes were prepared and set before the Queen, she found the set of dishes I had prepared to be the most impressive.”
“And I was separately summoned by the Queen, who heartily appreciated my cooking. ‘Now I want to see your testimonials’, she told me plainly”
“And Son!... If I only had the benefit of a good education I would have been the Royal Chef at the Buckingham Palace instead of having to serve a prison sentence!”
Sunday, October 10, 2010
Re-examining my Atheism
As a child, between the ages of 8 and 14 or 15, I was a blind believer and was not too passionate about my beliefs. With the sort of inattention that springs from not being passionate, I was rather careless with 'the data that was given to me'. Actually I have a tendency to say 'the data that I handled', thereby seeming to imply that the data was unimportant and impersonal, and to be dealt with in whatever way one wishes. So being a lukewarm believer, my prayers were perhaps lukewarm too, and they never seemed to yield any results. Now instead of having a good look at the basic data, I developed profound doubts about the usefulness of the methods - that of theism and a belief in prayers. The reading that I did too - the type of books that were popular in the late 1960s, 70s and 80s also fostered my atheism. As an impressionable youth of 25 years (Yes! I was still impressionable at 25 and am still impressionable now at 58) I fancied the arguments of Bertrand Russell and the passionate texts of Albert Camus and the others. Marxism was the popoular political theory among the youth and in fact, every aspect of my social life led me to a 'revalluation of values'.
This attitude resulted in more severe problems for my happiness and well-being. Instead of quickly re-evaluating the subsequent method and changing track soon, I found myself too committed and hamstrung. I braved rather severe emotional storms of various kinds both in my personal and professional lives. I'd do anything but abandon the chosen method. When things got horribly bad and I had suffered sufficiently, a series of spiritual and mystical experiences came my way which I can only call Grace! I call it so because it pulled me up from the deepest pits of despondency and a dependence on others, to the bright and airy lands of hope, gratitude and genuine caring. Whereas earlier I was so dependent on others to affirm my opinion of myself, I began to breathe the freedom of an independent spirit.
The same process made me quite pliant and is still busy doing so. From an obsessive and compulsive dolt, I am being transformed into a person who has a greater degree of acceptance and into one who is willing to work in whatever limiting framework of circumstances I am placed in each day. Even my relationships with others are changing in a fundamental way. Earlier I had a very poor self-image, and as a consequence would 'project attitudes and values' that would endear me to others around me. Many of these ideas wouldn't spring from the depth of my being, but I had mastered the art of mouthing ideas that would appear intellectually 'more appealing'. I knew I was becoming an intellectual, but what I didn't realise was that I was being a 'fake'. I do have to admit that there were quite a few genuine relatioships - that with my wife, with my friend Mathew, with my colleague Karthik and with my boss Sundaram who genuinely cared for me. I also treasured the relationship with my teacher Narayanan for his out and out honesty and forthrightness. I found I could interact with him in a totally honest way. But it is only grace that is pushing me along even further to transform me from a person who would not change even in decades, to respond to altered circumstances in a period of half-a-day if not within minutes. I owe a great deal of thanks to Shirdi Sai Baba for all of this. And I tell Him that it is quite painful, and yet so rewarding!
This attitude resulted in more severe problems for my happiness and well-being. Instead of quickly re-evaluating the subsequent method and changing track soon, I found myself too committed and hamstrung. I braved rather severe emotional storms of various kinds both in my personal and professional lives. I'd do anything but abandon the chosen method. When things got horribly bad and I had suffered sufficiently, a series of spiritual and mystical experiences came my way which I can only call Grace! I call it so because it pulled me up from the deepest pits of despondency and a dependence on others, to the bright and airy lands of hope, gratitude and genuine caring. Whereas earlier I was so dependent on others to affirm my opinion of myself, I began to breathe the freedom of an independent spirit.
The same process made me quite pliant and is still busy doing so. From an obsessive and compulsive dolt, I am being transformed into a person who has a greater degree of acceptance and into one who is willing to work in whatever limiting framework of circumstances I am placed in each day. Even my relationships with others are changing in a fundamental way. Earlier I had a very poor self-image, and as a consequence would 'project attitudes and values' that would endear me to others around me. Many of these ideas wouldn't spring from the depth of my being, but I had mastered the art of mouthing ideas that would appear intellectually 'more appealing'. I knew I was becoming an intellectual, but what I didn't realise was that I was being a 'fake'. I do have to admit that there were quite a few genuine relatioships - that with my wife, with my friend Mathew, with my colleague Karthik and with my boss Sundaram who genuinely cared for me. I also treasured the relationship with my teacher Narayanan for his out and out honesty and forthrightness. I found I could interact with him in a totally honest way. But it is only grace that is pushing me along even further to transform me from a person who would not change even in decades, to respond to altered circumstances in a period of half-a-day if not within minutes. I owe a great deal of thanks to Shirdi Sai Baba for all of this. And I tell Him that it is quite painful, and yet so rewarding!
Friday, October 8, 2010
The Indefatiguable Woman !
I like the word 'balse' (pronounced bal say) which some erudite and astute dictionaries list it to mean 'minor error'. So I would say that one of the major balse of humanity is that it has always considered women as the 'weaker sex'. Many years back, Vandana Shiva, a prominent environmental activist, in one of her articles had noted that women fail to get the required appreciation because they do 'too much work involving too many skills so that their production tends not to be recdorded as work'
Take my own wife. She wakes up by 4:00 a.m. and puts in the requisite spiritual work by meditating for roughly an hour. Later she warms the milk and gets her physical exercise by going to a hata yoga school where she is active from 6:00 a.m. to 7:45 a.m. On returning home by 8:00 a.m. she immediately gets busy cooking. She has to rinse the vessels the maid-servant has washed, cut the vegetables, cook the rice, make sambar and subzi and then to ensure that I keep my fitness discourages me from eating rice and prepares fluffy chappathis. The rice is essentially for my father and my wife. Later she clears the dining table and tidies the kitchen. She gets to read the newspaper for the day only by 10:00 a.m. and then showers and meticulously does her prayers and other rituals with quite intense devotion. It is only by around 11:30 a.m. that she gets to eat her first meal of the day, as it is a practice in our house to have a brunch. My wife doesn't spend too much time cleaning up the house because her body structure has not endowed her with too much stamina like some specially gifted ladies do. By the time she is done with the above tasks it is usually 11:45 a.m. and she is quite exhausted. She rests briefly, waiting for the second and final visit of the maid-servant. She is generally around supervising the work of the maid servant and after she is done, she would prefer to go to her room upstairs and rest, but she has to wait for my father to arrive after his morning stroll. So it happens that only around 12:45 or 1:00 p.m., after my father returns, that she gets time for relaxation.
Other housewives spend quite a lot of time cleaning up the whole house too. They dust the furniture, wipe window panes and sills, curtain pelmets and so on. Many families that have children have to ensure that the kids breakfast is done and their lunch boxes are packed by 7:30 a.m. Mothers ensure that their wards school bags are laden with the right text books for the day and their homework is in order. In many houses, women cook a second meal in the evenings.
If the woman happens to be working in an office, I shudder to visualise how at all they are capable of handling their jobs after all this. Where do women get their strength? Who calls women the weaker sex? And we now have some stupid and inconsiderate commission equating the status of a housewife with those of beggars!
Meanwhile I am busy meditating and also engaged with thinking about world problems and my spiritual advancement right from around 5:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. when my wife joins me upstairs. At other times I am acquiring the requisite intellectual skills and polishing my writing abilities.
A wonderful TED Talk on the wonderful ways in which women are moving up in the social scale can be enjoyed by clicking on the link below (GIVE A MINUTE FOR THE PROGRAM TO LOAD !):
http://www.ted.com/talks/hanna_rosin_new_data_on_the_rise_of_women.html
Take my own wife. She wakes up by 4:00 a.m. and puts in the requisite spiritual work by meditating for roughly an hour. Later she warms the milk and gets her physical exercise by going to a hata yoga school where she is active from 6:00 a.m. to 7:45 a.m. On returning home by 8:00 a.m. she immediately gets busy cooking. She has to rinse the vessels the maid-servant has washed, cut the vegetables, cook the rice, make sambar and subzi and then to ensure that I keep my fitness discourages me from eating rice and prepares fluffy chappathis. The rice is essentially for my father and my wife. Later she clears the dining table and tidies the kitchen. She gets to read the newspaper for the day only by 10:00 a.m. and then showers and meticulously does her prayers and other rituals with quite intense devotion. It is only by around 11:30 a.m. that she gets to eat her first meal of the day, as it is a practice in our house to have a brunch. My wife doesn't spend too much time cleaning up the house because her body structure has not endowed her with too much stamina like some specially gifted ladies do. By the time she is done with the above tasks it is usually 11:45 a.m. and she is quite exhausted. She rests briefly, waiting for the second and final visit of the maid-servant. She is generally around supervising the work of the maid servant and after she is done, she would prefer to go to her room upstairs and rest, but she has to wait for my father to arrive after his morning stroll. So it happens that only around 12:45 or 1:00 p.m., after my father returns, that she gets time for relaxation.
Other housewives spend quite a lot of time cleaning up the whole house too. They dust the furniture, wipe window panes and sills, curtain pelmets and so on. Many families that have children have to ensure that the kids breakfast is done and their lunch boxes are packed by 7:30 a.m. Mothers ensure that their wards school bags are laden with the right text books for the day and their homework is in order. In many houses, women cook a second meal in the evenings.
If the woman happens to be working in an office, I shudder to visualise how at all they are capable of handling their jobs after all this. Where do women get their strength? Who calls women the weaker sex? And we now have some stupid and inconsiderate commission equating the status of a housewife with those of beggars!
Meanwhile I am busy meditating and also engaged with thinking about world problems and my spiritual advancement right from around 5:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. when my wife joins me upstairs. At other times I am acquiring the requisite intellectual skills and polishing my writing abilities.
A wonderful TED Talk on the wonderful ways in which women are moving up in the social scale can be enjoyed by clicking on the link below (GIVE A MINUTE FOR THE PROGRAM TO LOAD !):
http://www.ted.com/talks/hanna_rosin_new_data_on_the_rise_of_women.html
XXX
Thursday, October 7, 2010
My horrible Math Skills - 3
In continuation of the last few posts, I give the Mind bender problem that figured in today's (29th September 2010) Bangalore Times. I got the solution so fast that I almost chose not to verify the answer given. The problem is as follows:
A total of 15 delegates from Africa, Asia, America and Europe meet at an international conference. Each continent sends a different number of delegates and each is represented by at least one delegate. America and Asia send a total of 6 delegates. Asia and Europe send a total of 7 delegates. Which continent has sent 4 delegates?
When I saw the problem, my mind seemed to simultaneously consider America, Asia and Europe. And when I saw the numbers 6, 7 and 4, my mind automatically zeroed in on the number 4 and by lateral thinking I assigned the number 4 to Asia as it was the common continent in the two data. Then I just happened to try whether it would work if by the ensuing obviously logical deduction that America sends 2 and Europe sends 3. So if Asia=4, America=2 and Europe=3, evidently Africa must be 6. It seemed so simple!
Then when I looked at the answer, this is what I see:
How complicated the whole thing seems! Yes, the answer is infallible. But just to be doubly sure you are right and have eliminated all the other logical possibilities, is it worth the amount of trouble? But people scarcely seem to take the trouble when it concerns the problems of life. Take my friend for instance who readily betrays without a trace of fear. In fact after reading the above answer, I felt worried whether I had not considered any of the other logical possibilities. Then I felt how foolish of me! - When I've got the right answer.
A total of 15 delegates from Africa, Asia, America and Europe meet at an international conference. Each continent sends a different number of delegates and each is represented by at least one delegate. America and Asia send a total of 6 delegates. Asia and Europe send a total of 7 delegates. Which continent has sent 4 delegates?
When I saw the problem, my mind seemed to simultaneously consider America, Asia and Europe. And when I saw the numbers 6, 7 and 4, my mind automatically zeroed in on the number 4 and by lateral thinking I assigned the number 4 to Asia as it was the common continent in the two data. Then I just happened to try whether it would work if by the ensuing obviously logical deduction that America sends 2 and Europe sends 3. So if Asia=4, America=2 and Europe=3, evidently Africa must be 6. It seemed so simple!
Then when I looked at the answer, this is what I see:
How many delegates are from Asia? Since they make a total of 6 with those from America which has at least sent 1, they can be 1, 2, 3, 4 or 5. Three would be impossible since it would yield an equal number of delegates from America. 1 would yield 5 from America, 6 from Europe and hence 3 from Africa. This would be impossible, for one continent has sent 4 delegates. Two would yield 4 from America, 5 from Europe and 4 from Africa, which is impossible because Asia and America would have the same number.
How complicated the whole thing seems! Yes, the answer is infallible. But just to be doubly sure you are right and have eliminated all the other logical possibilities, is it worth the amount of trouble? But people scarcely seem to take the trouble when it concerns the problems of life. Take my friend for instance who readily betrays without a trace of fear. In fact after reading the above answer, I felt worried whether I had not considered any of the other logical possibilities. Then I felt how foolish of me! - When I've got the right answer.
Now I realize that most of the lateral thinking is divinely inspired. I wonder whether if one sets out to cultivate lateral thinking by reading books and practicing from them, one would really be successful!
Could my dismal failure in mathematics be a divine gift? Sadhguru Jaggi Vasudev talks about cooking and child rearing. He says that a commercial establishment in Coimbatore tested several formulations in various percentages of rice and urad dal and pounded rice in an effort to get delectably soft idlis when cooked. He rightly says that it sounds stupid. His grandmother prepared soft, fluffy idlis every time she tried them out and all through her life. She simply seemed to know! He says that Man knows these things if only he would trust his intuition. It is only when you logically try to deduce an answer and by analysis, proceeding carefully step by step that these problems arise. You don't seem to know anything at all.
Jaggi also talks about an experience he had in the west. He came upon a book on child rearing and as he kept browsing through he saw among other stupid and irrelevant inanities, a direction to hopeful mothers that when a baby is 3 months old, the mother has to kiss the baby a specified number of times (say 45) in a day. So as he says, if from morning to evening she has been busy and decides to go by the book, she will have to kiss the baby 45 times between 6nd 7 p.m. Before the advent of the ulta-modern age, mothers seemed to know when a baby needed a kiss and not deserved a kiss!
To conclude I put forth two common quotes:
Reason takes you from point A to point B. Imagination takes you everywhere !
I don't know why but I give another quote that rings similarly:
Good girls go to heaven! Bad girls go everywhere !
My horrid Math Skills - 2
Earlier I wrote to write about my inherent weakness in solving mindbender problems of the mathematical type. For some reason I never seem to get the inspiration to arrive at the solution. Others say that there is no such nonsense such as inspiration. It is your own inherent capacity - you either have it or you don't. Hence it happens that armed with this world view they see a successful person essentially as a talented person in his own right who doesn't have to owe thanks to anyone. No need of gratitude; no such things like providence and hence no such Provider.
Hence it has come about that some people are venerated beyond their dreams and aspirations, and othyers are condemned beyond their wildest nightmares. So you find a Bill Gates and you also find an Anand Jon - the Indian male model sentenced to 60 years of incarceration for an unfortunate sexcapade in the USA.
Such an obvious disparity strikes an impressionable mind. Even as a kid of 12, I wanted to be a world-famous cricketer like Sachin Tendulkar with as much glory as he is getting. As I grew into a college-going teenager, I wanted to be handsome and sought after by girls like Cary Grant and Gregory Peck. As I grew up and matured further, I wanjted to be a talented writer like Jorge Luis Borges. For some reason unknown to me, I wasn't too keen on wealth and did not fancy much getting rich. With these tendencies, when I fell in love, I became so deeply and helplessly attached that, when the universe chose to deny me the woman I loved, I fell headlong into deeper and deeper depression and had to face great shame and humiliation. For years I felt life was not worth living.
It was precisely for these reasons that, in the earlier days children, when they attained 8 years of age used to be sent to a good teacher who was an ardent devotee of a Guru who would ensure to prevent such desires from cropping up in the minds of young kids.
And then began a series of events that was to give me an understanding of the way the universe works. I became a mystic of sorts. (Came across a good definition of Mystic - a person who wants to know how the universe works, but is too lazy to study physics !) I came to acquire a degree of peace. I suspend judgment, and in a feeble hypocritical attempt to retain some humility, I just call it Grace.
Now I have come to believe in inspiration and this will be discussed in the next post.
Hence it has come about that some people are venerated beyond their dreams and aspirations, and othyers are condemned beyond their wildest nightmares. So you find a Bill Gates and you also find an Anand Jon - the Indian male model sentenced to 60 years of incarceration for an unfortunate sexcapade in the USA.
Such an obvious disparity strikes an impressionable mind. Even as a kid of 12, I wanted to be a world-famous cricketer like Sachin Tendulkar with as much glory as he is getting. As I grew into a college-going teenager, I wanted to be handsome and sought after by girls like Cary Grant and Gregory Peck. As I grew up and matured further, I wanjted to be a talented writer like Jorge Luis Borges. For some reason unknown to me, I wasn't too keen on wealth and did not fancy much getting rich. With these tendencies, when I fell in love, I became so deeply and helplessly attached that, when the universe chose to deny me the woman I loved, I fell headlong into deeper and deeper depression and had to face great shame and humiliation. For years I felt life was not worth living.
It was precisely for these reasons that, in the earlier days children, when they attained 8 years of age used to be sent to a good teacher who was an ardent devotee of a Guru who would ensure to prevent such desires from cropping up in the minds of young kids.
And then began a series of events that was to give me an understanding of the way the universe works. I became a mystic of sorts. (Came across a good definition of Mystic - a person who wants to know how the universe works, but is too lazy to study physics !) I came to acquire a degree of peace. I suspend judgment, and in a feeble hypocritical attempt to retain some humility, I just call it Grace.
Now I have come to believe in inspiration and this will be discussed in the next post.
Where does the leap of reason spring from?
I am singularly weak in mathematics. For some reason the type of intelligence that is needed to be adept at mathematics has eluded me totally till now. When I sometimes see some math puzzles and the solutions that are given to them, I am amazed at the 'leap of reason' at certain crucial steps, and to my limited understanding, such leaps of reason are simply divine! I am amazed how one could think of a step like that? Even more astounding to me is, how on earth could one conceive of a problem like that! Take the 'Mindbender' Puzzle that figured in the Bangalore Times section of The Times of India today (28th September 2010):
My brother Julian is a little simple. I recently asked him to buy some ribbon for my daughter's pretty pink bonnet. He went to the haberdashery shop for the required length and accidentally interchanged the feet and inches. When I measured the resulting ribbon, I only had 5/8th of the length I required. How much ribbon did I originally ask for?
I thought of trying my hand at the problem - specially now that I had a 'partial understanding of the way the world works', so I started off this way:
I decided to see the solution. Here it is :
1st Step: Label what I asked for as A feet and B inches. (Now who could think of that?)
2nd Step: So I had to ask for (12xA + B) but asked (12xB + A) (o.k. This is simple)
3rd Step:Which means that :
(5/8)x(12xA + B) = (12xB +A) (o.k. This is also quite easy)
4th Step: Simplifying the above equation gives :
A in feet = (91/52) x B (This too is simple)
5th Step: As B is the number of inches, it can only be between 1 and 12 and must give A as a whole number of Feet
6th Step: Which means that B is a number such that it should give 13 in the denominator as 91 is only divisible by 13 to give 7.
( In my understanding these 2 steps are an 'inspired' leap of reason)
7th Step: And the number which cancels 52 to give 13 in the denominator is 4 .
8th Step: So we have the Answer that B is 4 and A is 7.
SO I HAD ASKED MY BROTHER TO GET ME 7 FEET 4 INCHES OF RIBBON AND HE BOUGHT 4 FEET 7 INCHES (A clear exposition helps).
If I were given such a problem in my high school examination, after my feebly attempted steps, I would have lapsed into a reverie - 'How old is the daughter? Is she sexy? Could she be of a friendly type or would she be moody? Is there a chance that she has a bobbed hair? O.K., if I meet her you know what I'll tell her? I'll tell her that...' and so on I would go along for a whole quarter of an hour before realizing I was in an examination and had to get on with the other questions.
Which explains why I got just 35% marks, which is just the marks required to pass the examination, evidently given by a sympathetic examiner to ensure that I pass, maybe responding to a directive from the state government, to ensure that a particular percentage of students pass the examination to bring a good name to the government that it is doing well in the field of education.
xxx
My brother Julian is a little simple. I recently asked him to buy some ribbon for my daughter's pretty pink bonnet. He went to the haberdashery shop for the required length and accidentally interchanged the feet and inches. When I measured the resulting ribbon, I only had 5/8th of the length I required. How much ribbon did I originally ask for?
I thought of trying my hand at the problem - specially now that I had a 'partial understanding of the way the world works', so I started off this way:
1st Step : Since he got 5/8th of the length, that implies he lost 1 - 5/8 = 3/8 of the length.
2nd Step: What number when multiplied by 1/12 (since 1 feet = 12 inches) causes a loss of 3/8 ?
3rd Step: So if the number is 'p' then (p)*(1/12) = 3/8
or p/12 = 3/8
or p = 36/8 or 4.5
So is the answer 4 feet plus 0.5 feet or 4 feet and 6 inches?
Let us check:
Is 4 feet six inches 5/8ths the length of 6 feet 4 inches?
4 feet 6 inches is 54 inches and 6 feet 4 inches is 76 inches
So what is 54/78 ?
That is 9/13 and not equal to 5/8
Since I did not get the correct answer I QUIT !
or p/12 = 3/8
or p = 36/8 or 4.5
So is the answer 4 feet plus 0.5 feet or 4 feet and 6 inches?
Let us check:
Is 4 feet six inches 5/8ths the length of 6 feet 4 inches?
4 feet 6 inches is 54 inches and 6 feet 4 inches is 76 inches
So what is 54/78 ?
That is 9/13 and not equal to 5/8
Since I did not get the correct answer I QUIT !
I decided to see the solution. Here it is :
1st Step: Label what I asked for as A feet and B inches. (Now who could think of that?)
2nd Step: So I had to ask for (12xA + B) but asked (12xB + A) (o.k. This is simple)
3rd Step:Which means that :
(5/8)x(12xA + B) = (12xB +A) (o.k. This is also quite easy)
4th Step: Simplifying the above equation gives :
A in feet = (91/52) x B (This too is simple)
5th Step: As B is the number of inches, it can only be between 1 and 12 and must give A as a whole number of Feet
6th Step: Which means that B is a number such that it should give 13 in the denominator as 91 is only divisible by 13 to give 7.
( In my understanding these 2 steps are an 'inspired' leap of reason)
7th Step: And the number which cancels 52 to give 13 in the denominator is 4 .
8th Step: So we have the Answer that B is 4 and A is 7.
SO I HAD ASKED MY BROTHER TO GET ME 7 FEET 4 INCHES OF RIBBON AND HE BOUGHT 4 FEET 7 INCHES (A clear exposition helps).
If I were given such a problem in my high school examination, after my feebly attempted steps, I would have lapsed into a reverie - 'How old is the daughter? Is she sexy? Could she be of a friendly type or would she be moody? Is there a chance that she has a bobbed hair? O.K., if I meet her you know what I'll tell her? I'll tell her that...' and so on I would go along for a whole quarter of an hour before realizing I was in an examination and had to get on with the other questions.
Which explains why I got just 35% marks, which is just the marks required to pass the examination, evidently given by a sympathetic examiner to ensure that I pass, maybe responding to a directive from the state government, to ensure that a particular percentage of students pass the examination to bring a good name to the government that it is doing well in the field of education.
xxx
Sunday, September 26, 2010
This Post - Only For Shirdi Sai Baba Followers
In times of intense crises when crucial decisions about the course of life one has to take confront Sai Baba followers they frequently fall back on a few peculiar practices : 1. There exists a book of 100 or 200 answers. So Baba followers pray intensely asking him to 'RESPOND' to the crucial question they are about to ask, and after an intense prayer they open at random a page of the Answer Book and read the answer that the book gives which is purportedly Sai Baba's ANSWER to the question.
So you may have an anxious girl asking Baba whether to say 'Yes' to a particular groom proposal, or you may have a financial speculator asking whether to invest in a particular share and so on. These days with technological advances, computers have entered this activity where the program generates a random number and a suitable response is displayed. The programs on the net advise you to take this business very seriously and pray with intense faith and further the questioner is asked to accept the answer with tremendous faith and refrain from asking the question again.
So it was that I too like a fool once took part in this exercise. It so happened that in Sai Satcharita which is the sacred book of Sai Baba followers, everyone is advised not to abandon his own Guru however more famous or attractive another Guru may appear. I had this injunction firmly implanted in my mind. One day it so happened that while browsing through the collection of books at a bookshop my eyes fell on a book by Sadguru Jaggi Vasudev entitled 'Essential Wisdom from a Spiritual Master'. Somehow the style and contents of the book appealed to me and I bought the book. On going home and reading through the book I came across three jokes:
1. Once a businessman boarded a flight and found himself sitting next to an elegant woman wearing the largest, most stunning diamond ring he had ever seen. Awestruck he exclaimed, "Wow! That's a beautiful ring you have there!" The woman replied "Yes, this is the Schoreder diamond. It is beautiful, but it comes with a terrible curse." "What curse?" asked the businessman. "Mr. Schroeder", answered the woman.
2. Once a hypnotist bombastically said he would take everybody in the hall together into a 'let go' state of hypnosis all at once. "I want you each to keep your eye on this antique watch. It's a very special watch. It has been in my family for six generations," he said. He slowly began to swing the watch gently back and forth, while quietly chanting "Watch the watch! Watch the watch! Watch the watch..." The crowd became mesmerized as the watch swayed back and forth, back and forth, light gleaming off its polished surface. Suddenly it slipped and fell from the hypnotist's fingers and fell to the floor, breaking in a hundred pieces.
"Shit !!" said the hypnotist.
It took three weeks to clean up the theatre!
3. A man sat in a train traveling from Bristol to London, with a young boy of four years. Halfway through the trip another man with two big suitcases got on the train and sat next to him. The first man said "Those two suitcases look just like mine; are you a salesman too?" "No," the other man replied, "I'm on my way to the airport, I'm flying to Greece." Then he asked, "So what are you selling, anyway?" "Condoms," the first man replied. Shocked, the other man said, "Condoms? And you're taking your son with you while you sell condoms?" "Oh, this is not my son; it is a complaint from Bristol."
Now, I'm fairly well read too. And I have come across many witty jokes. However this was the first time I came across these jokes. Now a spiritual guru who shares jokes like these while talking about spirituality I found very, very attractive. The style and the content of the books besides various other jokes too made me fall for his teachings.
Now I had been advised by Sai Baba never to abandon your Guru. Further you are repeatedly warned in Sai Satcharita that if you disobey the Guru you may end up severely repenting the act. So I was in a quandary. I wanted Baba's permission to go to Jaggi Vasudev.
I hence came on the internet to the site that purportedly provides Sai Baba's RESPONSES to your questions and gingerly typed:
"Have you appointed Sadhguru Jaggi Vasudev to be my Guru?" and pressed the Enter Key.
The response on the computer was:
"YOU HAVE TO SUFFER ONLY FOR THREE MONTHS MORE. REMEMBER SHRI SAI. EVERYTHING WILL BE ALRIGHT.
With a response like this I lost my guts. I dared not disobey Baba. I read thro' the book but scrupulously avoided enrolling for the yoga programs of Jaggi Vasudev. As months dragged on, I found the urge to be associated with Jaggi become stronger and stronger." Finally, despite my own will, I found myself undergoing the Inner Engineering Course and even going on a Mount Kailash Yatra with them. From the past two days I'm being troubled in my mind whether to continue the yogic practices I learned from Jaggi Vasudev or not.
Today I chose to look into Sai Baba's crucial response to my question. I found that Sai Baba had responded indeed but not answered my question!
Suppose you ask a man "Do you think it will rain today?" and he replies "Two plus two equals four." HE HAS ONLY RESPONDED TO THE QUESTION BUT HE HAS NOT ANSWERED IT! The response may even be factually true but it is certainly not the answer! So on reconsidering the computer response and using my commonsense I choose to continue with the yogic practices. After all what might happen? I may get punished a little, but Baba is not a hangman!!
This entry is to highlight the futility of such practices that Baba followers like me foolishly follow.
This is supposed to be the way in which the famous oracle at Delphi responded too! Once upon a time, a powerful king - King Croesus of Lydia planned to wage a war on another powerful kingdom, the king of Persia in order to annex it. He was a little unsure and nervous of the result so he approached the Delphic oracle and asked whether it was wise for him to wage a war on the other king. "If Croesus went to war with Cyrus, he would destroy a powerful kingdom!" was the response of the oracle. Hence with a new found confidence and strong courage the king proceeded boldly to wage a war. However to his dismay he was thoroughly routed and his kingdom was destroyed. Afterward, his life being spared, Croesus wrote a bitterly complaining letter to the Oracle. His letter was answered by the priests at Delphi, who claimed that the Oracle had been right In going to war Croesus had destroyed a powerful kingdom indeed - his own!
So you may have an anxious girl asking Baba whether to say 'Yes' to a particular groom proposal, or you may have a financial speculator asking whether to invest in a particular share and so on. These days with technological advances, computers have entered this activity where the program generates a random number and a suitable response is displayed. The programs on the net advise you to take this business very seriously and pray with intense faith and further the questioner is asked to accept the answer with tremendous faith and refrain from asking the question again.
So it was that I too like a fool once took part in this exercise. It so happened that in Sai Satcharita which is the sacred book of Sai Baba followers, everyone is advised not to abandon his own Guru however more famous or attractive another Guru may appear. I had this injunction firmly implanted in my mind. One day it so happened that while browsing through the collection of books at a bookshop my eyes fell on a book by Sadguru Jaggi Vasudev entitled 'Essential Wisdom from a Spiritual Master'. Somehow the style and contents of the book appealed to me and I bought the book. On going home and reading through the book I came across three jokes:
1. Once a businessman boarded a flight and found himself sitting next to an elegant woman wearing the largest, most stunning diamond ring he had ever seen. Awestruck he exclaimed, "Wow! That's a beautiful ring you have there!" The woman replied "Yes, this is the Schoreder diamond. It is beautiful, but it comes with a terrible curse." "What curse?" asked the businessman. "Mr. Schroeder", answered the woman.
2. Once a hypnotist bombastically said he would take everybody in the hall together into a 'let go' state of hypnosis all at once. "I want you each to keep your eye on this antique watch. It's a very special watch. It has been in my family for six generations," he said. He slowly began to swing the watch gently back and forth, while quietly chanting "Watch the watch! Watch the watch! Watch the watch..." The crowd became mesmerized as the watch swayed back and forth, back and forth, light gleaming off its polished surface. Suddenly it slipped and fell from the hypnotist's fingers and fell to the floor, breaking in a hundred pieces.
"Shit !!" said the hypnotist.
It took three weeks to clean up the theatre!
3. A man sat in a train traveling from Bristol to London, with a young boy of four years. Halfway through the trip another man with two big suitcases got on the train and sat next to him. The first man said "Those two suitcases look just like mine; are you a salesman too?" "No," the other man replied, "I'm on my way to the airport, I'm flying to Greece." Then he asked, "So what are you selling, anyway?" "Condoms," the first man replied. Shocked, the other man said, "Condoms? And you're taking your son with you while you sell condoms?" "Oh, this is not my son; it is a complaint from Bristol."
Now, I'm fairly well read too. And I have come across many witty jokes. However this was the first time I came across these jokes. Now a spiritual guru who shares jokes like these while talking about spirituality I found very, very attractive. The style and the content of the books besides various other jokes too made me fall for his teachings.
Now I had been advised by Sai Baba never to abandon your Guru. Further you are repeatedly warned in Sai Satcharita that if you disobey the Guru you may end up severely repenting the act. So I was in a quandary. I wanted Baba's permission to go to Jaggi Vasudev.
I hence came on the internet to the site that purportedly provides Sai Baba's RESPONSES to your questions and gingerly typed:
"Have you appointed Sadhguru Jaggi Vasudev to be my Guru?" and pressed the Enter Key.
The response on the computer was:
"YOU HAVE TO SUFFER ONLY FOR THREE MONTHS MORE. REMEMBER SHRI SAI. EVERYTHING WILL BE ALRIGHT.
With a response like this I lost my guts. I dared not disobey Baba. I read thro' the book but scrupulously avoided enrolling for the yoga programs of Jaggi Vasudev. As months dragged on, I found the urge to be associated with Jaggi become stronger and stronger." Finally, despite my own will, I found myself undergoing the Inner Engineering Course and even going on a Mount Kailash Yatra with them. From the past two days I'm being troubled in my mind whether to continue the yogic practices I learned from Jaggi Vasudev or not.
Today I chose to look into Sai Baba's crucial response to my question. I found that Sai Baba had responded indeed but not answered my question!
Suppose you ask a man "Do you think it will rain today?" and he replies "Two plus two equals four." HE HAS ONLY RESPONDED TO THE QUESTION BUT HE HAS NOT ANSWERED IT! The response may even be factually true but it is certainly not the answer! So on reconsidering the computer response and using my commonsense I choose to continue with the yogic practices. After all what might happen? I may get punished a little, but Baba is not a hangman!!
This entry is to highlight the futility of such practices that Baba followers like me foolishly follow.
This is supposed to be the way in which the famous oracle at Delphi responded too! Once upon a time, a powerful king - King Croesus of Lydia planned to wage a war on another powerful kingdom, the king of Persia in order to annex it. He was a little unsure and nervous of the result so he approached the Delphic oracle and asked whether it was wise for him to wage a war on the other king. "If Croesus went to war with Cyrus, he would destroy a powerful kingdom!" was the response of the oracle. Hence with a new found confidence and strong courage the king proceeded boldly to wage a war. However to his dismay he was thoroughly routed and his kingdom was destroyed. Afterward, his life being spared, Croesus wrote a bitterly complaining letter to the Oracle. His letter was answered by the priests at Delphi, who claimed that the Oracle had been right In going to war Croesus had destroyed a powerful kingdom indeed - his own!
The Freebies of Partial Enlightenment !
Yeah! It is interesting to talk about the 'freebies' one gets on the path of enlightenment. There is only one hitch - you cannot claim any of the credit either to knowledge or to the intelligence of the piece of writing, or to the style of language or anything. Yet it is yours.
Now there is another aspect. That of remarkable coincidences. On the route to partial enlightenment one is often struck with remarkable coincidences that can leave one dumbfounded. These coincidences can make you conclude that a thought of yours, or again a particular action of yours caused a cloudburst in Bangalore resulting in some tragic deaths and so on. This can turn out to be scary for you tend to assume responsibility for all sorts of tragedies and human suffering. Then again, like it happened to me today, I wanted the telephone number of a former colleague of mine (Mr. Bhasker) since I was interested in getting some articles that I had penned and given to him for his consideration many years ago. The trouble was I didn't have his telephone number. So I rang up another colleague with whom I am in closer touch (Karthik) to fetch the number of Bhasker. So when I rang up Karthik, he told me that he wanted to in fact ring me up just to enquire how I was. Then again, on getting the name of Bhasker and ringing him up, he told me that he too was thinking about me and was intent on ringing me up or contacting me as he was perchance attracted to information on Mount Kailash which I had visited recently, as he had suddenly come up on the name of a certain Sadhu Sundar Singh and CHRISTIAN HERMIT IN A MOUNTAIN CAVE - THE MAHARISHI OF KAILASH. Mr Bhasker asked me to consult the Internet by searching on 'Sadhu Sundar Singh'.
So it accidentally happened that I got the information that Sadhu Sundar Singh was born a Sikh at Rampur, Punjab in 1889. He converted to Christianity in 1903 after he had a vision of Jesus Christ while he was intent on attempting suicide. He first visited Tibet in 1908 before entering a Christian Divinity College in 1909. Abandoned his preacher's life in 1911 and again became a 'Christian sadhu'. And from Wikipedia I get the following: "That first year, 1912, he returned with an extraordinary account of finding a three-hundred-year old Christian hermit in a mountain cave-the Maharishi of Kailas, with whom he spent some weeks in deep fellowship."
For many years I've been strongly feeling (thinking?) that God is either not Muslim (Allah), Christian or Jewish (Jehovah), Hindu (Shiva, Vishnu, etc.) or Zoroastrian or is all of these. I tend to credit myself with having a rather secular and liberal viewpoint and in being broadminded. But could what I'm feeling and thinking be due to a reason outside me? Like being exposed to information about Sadhu Sundar Singh and such things for instance. In fact most of my readings that I came across by chance were such that it promoted a secular nature. Of course, it is also true that I had an inherent preference for such a bent of writings. But then, is it only the environment in which I was raised that is responsible or are there other factors that have not been given due importance. Why do you find a one year old (or maybe a two year old) child having strong preferences - some don't like curds, some have an inherent dislike for certain vegetables. So if by some outside chance I have a character that can be called 'liberal', 'good', 'progressive' how much credit must I appropriate to myself.
If such happenstances help to make this blog interesting am I to take the full credit?
Now there is another aspect. That of remarkable coincidences. On the route to partial enlightenment one is often struck with remarkable coincidences that can leave one dumbfounded. These coincidences can make you conclude that a thought of yours, or again a particular action of yours caused a cloudburst in Bangalore resulting in some tragic deaths and so on. This can turn out to be scary for you tend to assume responsibility for all sorts of tragedies and human suffering. Then again, like it happened to me today, I wanted the telephone number of a former colleague of mine (Mr. Bhasker) since I was interested in getting some articles that I had penned and given to him for his consideration many years ago. The trouble was I didn't have his telephone number. So I rang up another colleague with whom I am in closer touch (Karthik) to fetch the number of Bhasker. So when I rang up Karthik, he told me that he wanted to in fact ring me up just to enquire how I was. Then again, on getting the name of Bhasker and ringing him up, he told me that he too was thinking about me and was intent on ringing me up or contacting me as he was perchance attracted to information on Mount Kailash which I had visited recently, as he had suddenly come up on the name of a certain Sadhu Sundar Singh and CHRISTIAN HERMIT IN A MOUNTAIN CAVE - THE MAHARISHI OF KAILASH. Mr Bhasker asked me to consult the Internet by searching on 'Sadhu Sundar Singh'.
So it accidentally happened that I got the information that Sadhu Sundar Singh was born a Sikh at Rampur, Punjab in 1889. He converted to Christianity in 1903 after he had a vision of Jesus Christ while he was intent on attempting suicide. He first visited Tibet in 1908 before entering a Christian Divinity College in 1909. Abandoned his preacher's life in 1911 and again became a 'Christian sadhu'. And from Wikipedia I get the following: "That first year, 1912, he returned with an extraordinary account of finding a three-hundred-year old Christian hermit in a mountain cave-the Maharishi of Kailas, with whom he spent some weeks in deep fellowship."
For many years I've been strongly feeling (thinking?) that God is either not Muslim (Allah), Christian or Jewish (Jehovah), Hindu (Shiva, Vishnu, etc.) or Zoroastrian or is all of these. I tend to credit myself with having a rather secular and liberal viewpoint and in being broadminded. But could what I'm feeling and thinking be due to a reason outside me? Like being exposed to information about Sadhu Sundar Singh and such things for instance. In fact most of my readings that I came across by chance were such that it promoted a secular nature. Of course, it is also true that I had an inherent preference for such a bent of writings. But then, is it only the environment in which I was raised that is responsible or are there other factors that have not been given due importance. Why do you find a one year old (or maybe a two year old) child having strong preferences - some don't like curds, some have an inherent dislike for certain vegetables. So if by some outside chance I have a character that can be called 'liberal', 'good', 'progressive' how much credit must I appropriate to myself.
If such happenstances help to make this blog interesting am I to take the full credit?
Thursday, September 23, 2010
At the Jayanagar 5th Block gardens.
It is just around 7:00 a.m.on 23rd Sept. 2010 as I start writing this article. Today I just decided to enjoy the crispness and the freshness of the dawn. I didn't care too much about exercising and just wanted to enjoy the chirping of birds and look at flowers and the pale green leaves of the hedges in the beautiful garden behind my house.
I ambled across to the park around 6:00 a.m. and watched the day break in gradually. It was my wish to see a clear blue sky, but it was moderately cloudy and it was unlikely that I would see the sun come up. But then there is a beauty of its own in a cloudy morning. I noticed a lot of dragonflies flitting about in the air. For a moment I saw that these were just flitting about randomly in a sort of Brownian motion. For a while I felt like wondering what they could really be up to! They were definitely not seeking the nectar of flowers because they were not hovering around flowers but were rather flitting about in mid air with nothing live in the vicinity. Then I wondered what, in fact, were they seeking. Is it worth a study?
(Today (April 16th 2013) I learnt that dragonflies are carnivorous and it clarified why they were not around flowers seeking nectar. Perhaps it is worth a study !)
At that moment I stopped myself. Mankind has collected enough and more of such knowledge. I myself have remarked about the wondrous touch-me-nots. I envy the primitive man who perhaps watched their leaves fold in salutation to God even as a man touched them. There was magic in creation. Now the scientific Man knows that the leaves fold-up as water is expelled from one part of the leaf to another. The magic has been removed from creation! We now have information, but how sad! How dry that information makes this world of ours. So for whatever reason those pretty dragonflies flit around I decide to just enjoy that magical moment.
And there was another magical moment too this morning at the garden. After I spent over three-quarters of an hour just enjoying nature, a young man and a young woman came and sat down on one of the other seats some distance away. They seemed to be doing some warming-up exercises, and after some minutes of watching them it became clear that the woman was leading the man in these exercises. As I kept watching out of curiosity I found the woman giving the orders rather firmly but soon the tenderness behind the sternness became obvious. After some more minutes of watching as the couple began practicing the chanting of the OM sounds, it became apparent that the man had an obvious health problem as he could not keep his voice at the required modulation. As I continued to watch with greater intensity I came to realize that the man had a slight degree of retardation. The man apparently looked older than the woman.
I just surmised, seeing the man's obvious handicap, that the couple must be a brother and sister and that the concerned woman was helping her brother cope with life. I felt like congratulating the woman, but being of a reticent type, I just felt hesitant to approach the couple. After many minutes of dilly-dallying I found the urge to talk to the couple building up within me. Finally I went over and said:
"Excuse me! Are you a brother and sister?"
"No! We are husband and wife!", the woman replied.
On further questioning she told me that they were quite distant relatives and that she had married him to help him out in life. My thoughts went back to my own nature at the same age - around 25 yrs. How I had intensely desired a pretty woman for her beauty and saw the contrast with this young lass. The woman's name I found out was Leela and the husband's name was Karthik, they perhaps live on the 11th Main, Jayanagar 4th Block.
I ambled across to the park around 6:00 a.m. and watched the day break in gradually. It was my wish to see a clear blue sky, but it was moderately cloudy and it was unlikely that I would see the sun come up. But then there is a beauty of its own in a cloudy morning. I noticed a lot of dragonflies flitting about in the air. For a moment I saw that these were just flitting about randomly in a sort of Brownian motion. For a while I felt like wondering what they could really be up to! They were definitely not seeking the nectar of flowers because they were not hovering around flowers but were rather flitting about in mid air with nothing live in the vicinity. Then I wondered what, in fact, were they seeking. Is it worth a study?
(Today (April 16th 2013) I learnt that dragonflies are carnivorous and it clarified why they were not around flowers seeking nectar. Perhaps it is worth a study !)
At that moment I stopped myself. Mankind has collected enough and more of such knowledge. I myself have remarked about the wondrous touch-me-nots. I envy the primitive man who perhaps watched their leaves fold in salutation to God even as a man touched them. There was magic in creation. Now the scientific Man knows that the leaves fold-up as water is expelled from one part of the leaf to another. The magic has been removed from creation! We now have information, but how sad! How dry that information makes this world of ours. So for whatever reason those pretty dragonflies flit around I decide to just enjoy that magical moment.
And there was another magical moment too this morning at the garden. After I spent over three-quarters of an hour just enjoying nature, a young man and a young woman came and sat down on one of the other seats some distance away. They seemed to be doing some warming-up exercises, and after some minutes of watching them it became clear that the woman was leading the man in these exercises. As I kept watching out of curiosity I found the woman giving the orders rather firmly but soon the tenderness behind the sternness became obvious. After some more minutes of watching as the couple began practicing the chanting of the OM sounds, it became apparent that the man had an obvious health problem as he could not keep his voice at the required modulation. As I continued to watch with greater intensity I came to realize that the man had a slight degree of retardation. The man apparently looked older than the woman.
I just surmised, seeing the man's obvious handicap, that the couple must be a brother and sister and that the concerned woman was helping her brother cope with life. I felt like congratulating the woman, but being of a reticent type, I just felt hesitant to approach the couple. After many minutes of dilly-dallying I found the urge to talk to the couple building up within me. Finally I went over and said:
"Excuse me! Are you a brother and sister?"
"No! We are husband and wife!", the woman replied.
On further questioning she told me that they were quite distant relatives and that she had married him to help him out in life. My thoughts went back to my own nature at the same age - around 25 yrs. How I had intensely desired a pretty woman for her beauty and saw the contrast with this young lass. The woman's name I found out was Leela and the husband's name was Karthik, they perhaps live on the 11th Main, Jayanagar 4th Block.
Postscript: I'm adding this on 24th Sept. because I chanced to see a question in Yahoo! Answers which was worded "What is beauty to a blind man?" Ms. Leela of the above episode looked homely to my eyes, but if I were blind would I have found Leela extremely beautiful?
Monday, September 20, 2010
My Teacher
I have a Teacher whose contribution to my well-being I am yet to fully appreciate. But I seem to get a rough idea of how it could be. Suppose you are about to make a 3000 mile long journey. You are sitting in a craft as a pilot and have just taken off. Suppose a person comes over and makes a slight three degree shift to the right, in the direction in which the craft was headed almost at the very beginning of the journey. Suppose you just accepted that direction shift without much knowledge about where it would lead. And then suppose as time flowed on, and after a considerable distance has been covered, the landscape around you was getting more and more pleasant and you become more and more sure that you are traveling in the right direction and the destination is up yonder. You may never guess the importance of the small change of direction at the very beginning of the journey! You may have initially been heading towards a desert!
My Teacher asked me to seek knowledge from my Guru. In accordance with those directions I prayed for knowledge. I feel I was thence blessed with a degree of self-awareness that my Teacher didn't seem to possess. My Teacher had blessed me with a certain set of procedure for my spiritual uplift, but I surmise (I stress that I only surmise) she didn't quite know the logical purpose or the reasons why the procedures worked. It apparently appears so to my perception. However the Guru's directions to me clarified the purpose of the procedure to me (I add that it could be only one of the purposes among several others that I do not know).
And in accordance with the innate human tendencies I had mentioned in my previous blog entry, I sort of judged my Teacher for a lack of self-awareness that I seemed to perceive in her. This after my Teacher only had directed me as to what to ask my Guru for !! I do feel quite contrite now but I do keep my fingers crossed that I do not make a grave error by being ungrateful.
One of the main steps that spirituality advises is a set of procedure to still your mind. The more restless and rapidly flitting your mind is, the greater is the danger you are supposed to be in. So before anything else, the Teachers try to still your mind and to achieve this you may be advised a Mantra to suit your personality or even advised to watch your breathing. The mind - body - breath interconnection has been given a great degree of importance in Yoga and if one is really open, one can get to experience how watching your breathing and thence regulating it can bring a degree of stability to a troubled mind.
The advice that is frequently given in India to respect your teachers is to forewarn you about the tremendous value that lies in the teachings that you are to get and the extent to which they can change your life.
xxx
My Teacher asked me to seek knowledge from my Guru. In accordance with those directions I prayed for knowledge. I feel I was thence blessed with a degree of self-awareness that my Teacher didn't seem to possess. My Teacher had blessed me with a certain set of procedure for my spiritual uplift, but I surmise (I stress that I only surmise) she didn't quite know the logical purpose or the reasons why the procedures worked. It apparently appears so to my perception. However the Guru's directions to me clarified the purpose of the procedure to me (I add that it could be only one of the purposes among several others that I do not know).
And in accordance with the innate human tendencies I had mentioned in my previous blog entry, I sort of judged my Teacher for a lack of self-awareness that I seemed to perceive in her. This after my Teacher only had directed me as to what to ask my Guru for !! I do feel quite contrite now but I do keep my fingers crossed that I do not make a grave error by being ungrateful.
One of the main steps that spirituality advises is a set of procedure to still your mind. The more restless and rapidly flitting your mind is, the greater is the danger you are supposed to be in. So before anything else, the Teachers try to still your mind and to achieve this you may be advised a Mantra to suit your personality or even advised to watch your breathing. The mind - body - breath interconnection has been given a great degree of importance in Yoga and if one is really open, one can get to experience how watching your breathing and thence regulating it can bring a degree of stability to a troubled mind.
The advice that is frequently given in India to respect your teachers is to forewarn you about the tremendous value that lies in the teachings that you are to get and the extent to which they can change your life.
xxx
Thursday, September 9, 2010
Mt. Kailash - Manasarovar - Pretty pictures !
Dusk at Manasarovar. The planet Venus is seen shining bright.
An artistic Tibetan Building at Changan village near Millarepa cave.
Ramesh Perumal on a Chinese bike near Paryang.
Mountain adjoining Mt. Kailash.
Farewell to Car drivers before our return to Nepal.
Perilous road prone to landslide on our way to Kodari.
A meandering river in Tibet.
Another river landscape.
Tibetan girls in modern attire.
Some Tibetan women - both traditional and modern.
Ramesh and his Tibetan porter.
Mahesh Acharya (L) and Balamurugan at the gardens of Hotel Shanker.
Mt. Kailash - Manasarovar Sojourn - 10
The last aspect of the Kailash - Manasarovar Sojourn consisted of a three kilometer trek up a streamlet issuing forth from Mount Kailash. The path is a mildly steep gradient that commences with a grassy surface but soon transforms after a short while to a valley strewn with granitic and basic igneous boulders that makes the trek a little difficult. As one ascends, you chance to see the grandeur of the valley around Dirapuk and the Tibetan village at a distance. Mt. Kailash looms large over the valley as we approach closer and closer. After a considerable ascent, the troop leader Swami Prabodha together with his associates performed with intense devotion a holy offering to Shiva in the vicinity of Kailash. Swami Prabodha led the whole group in various chants and mantras. It certainly was a very solemn occasion marked by total surrender to the power of the Divine.
After the adoration and worship of the divinity, some of us made a further climb along the valley up to a point where Dilli's altimeter gave a reading of 5250 m (17,325 ft). At that point I collected a rock fragment that seemed to resemble the rock of Kailash parvat. I also collected a bottle of the holy water of the streamlet issuing from one of the glaciers of Kailash. After a round of silent meditation we headed back downwards towards the Dirapuk hotel. I would like to mention that Sadhguru Jaggi Vasudev speaks that the rocks of the Kailash Parvat are of a metoritic composition. But to my perception and even in various photographs of the North Face of the Kailash Parvat I seem to see the presence of distinct sedimentary layering. While to my eyes the rock appeared to be a layered ferruginous chert, I cannot deny that the boulders in the stream that we traversed were mostly granitic, with a few resembling mafic igneous rocks. But I did collect a fragment of a ferruginous chert cobble, which to my perception formed the upper layers of the Kailash Parvat. In my assessment it didn't resemble a meteoritic rock.
(Top) The hotel at Dirapuk in the distance. The village settlement is seen on the opposite hill slope.
Left (3 km trek upwards toward Mt. Kailash)
The rest of the day after returning to the camp was spent in light-hearted banter and relaxation. Thus the final aspect of the Mt. Kailash - Manasarovar Sojourn drew to a close.
After the adoration and worship of the divinity, some of us made a further climb along the valley up to a point where Dilli's altimeter gave a reading of 5250 m (17,325 ft). At that point I collected a rock fragment that seemed to resemble the rock of Kailash parvat. I also collected a bottle of the holy water of the streamlet issuing from one of the glaciers of Kailash. After a round of silent meditation we headed back downwards towards the Dirapuk hotel. I would like to mention that Sadhguru Jaggi Vasudev speaks that the rocks of the Kailash Parvat are of a metoritic composition. But to my perception and even in various photographs of the North Face of the Kailash Parvat I seem to see the presence of distinct sedimentary layering. While to my eyes the rock appeared to be a layered ferruginous chert, I cannot deny that the boulders in the stream that we traversed were mostly granitic, with a few resembling mafic igneous rocks. But I did collect a fragment of a ferruginous chert cobble, which to my perception formed the upper layers of the Kailash Parvat. In my assessment it didn't resemble a meteoritic rock.
Left (3 km trek upwards toward Mt. Kailash)
The rest of the day after returning to the camp was spent in light-hearted banter and relaxation. Thus the final aspect of the Mt. Kailash - Manasarovar Sojourn drew to a close.
Mt. Kailash - Manasarovar Sojourn - 6
It was quite late by the time we left Saga on our way to our next destination at Paryang situated at a distance of 235 km from Saga. We could leave only by 10:00 a.m. local time. This route is quite treacherous and we had to pass sites where the roads were actively under construction, and the prevalent rock types (purple, green and carbonaceous shales and in variegated colours) yield a rather clayey mud that forms a thick gooey slush through which the cars have to negotiate. One of the cars lost direction and missed the path and came down a precariously steep slope that left the occupants of the vehicle quite rattled.
(Photo below: Highway where we were stranded by the authorities)
Along this muddy and bumpy route that rattles your bones, you find that the authorities block large tracts of the path and force the convoy over the rough countryside. It may even happen that the road authorities may deny permission to move ahead and forcing you to spend hours on end stranded in the middle of nowhere. This is precisely what happened to our convoy around 11:45 a.m. or 12:00 p.m. when we were halted by the authorities who vaguely said that they may condescend to give us permission to travel further by 2:00 p.m. or failing which we would be permitted to move ahead only after 10:00 p.m. in the night. This was rather disconcerting and the leader of the team decided that in such an event we would move directly to Manansarovar without stopping at Paryang. Such a scheme of things would really be exhausting and we kept our fingers crossed that matters would not come to such a head. In the meantime we decided to put the time to the best possible use and finished our lunch as we waited. Luckily, the authorities cleared our passage by 2:00 p.m. and we headed on our way to Paryang.
Enroute we saw some wonderful arcuate sand dunes of quite large sizes that appeared very attractive in the golden glow of the late evening sun.
For the first time after several hundreds of kilometers we saw a petrol filling station with filthy stinking toilets. It was the only gas station that I saw on the entire route.
After a drive of another hour or so we reached the village of Paryang at around 8:00 p.m. The hotel there is a very threadbare one with four beds to a room of rather small size. The toilets are in a miserable condition which forced many of our group members to go out in the open. We were warned about the dogs around here as they are reputed to feed on corpses of humans that are abandoned in the open air when they die. So we were advised to be wary about the dogs here which created an additional problem of going out to the toilet in the open air. Later in the evening we had a satsang and around dinner time, the B3 Group which had left for Manasarovar around August 16th came to Paryang on their return trip to Katmandu.
In my effort to get some information on the difficulty of the Shershong - Dirapuk trek I was surprised to find every single man and woman advising me to take a pony for the journey. Not one person assured me that I could make it on my own steam. This was bad because the pony costs 1200 Yuan (Rs 9000) and I did not have that kind of money on me. Further, I viewed the trek as a challenge to my physical capabilities and I had undertaken to do it on foot as a religious observance and vow of some sort. After dinner we rested for the night.
(Photo Left: Hotel at Paryang)
Late evening Views of Paryang Village at an altitude of 15000 feet in the Tibetan Plateau
(Photo below: Highway where we were stranded by the authorities)
Along this muddy and bumpy route that rattles your bones, you find that the authorities block large tracts of the path and force the convoy over the rough countryside. It may even happen that the road authorities may deny permission to move ahead and forcing you to spend hours on end stranded in the middle of nowhere. This is precisely what happened to our convoy around 11:45 a.m. or 12:00 p.m. when we were halted by the authorities who vaguely said that they may condescend to give us permission to travel further by 2:00 p.m. or failing which we would be permitted to move ahead only after 10:00 p.m. in the night. This was rather disconcerting and the leader of the team decided that in such an event we would move directly to Manansarovar without stopping at Paryang. Such a scheme of things would really be exhausting and we kept our fingers crossed that matters would not come to such a head. In the meantime we decided to put the time to the best possible use and finished our lunch as we waited. Luckily, the authorities cleared our passage by 2:00 p.m. and we headed on our way to Paryang.
Enroute we saw some wonderful arcuate sand dunes of quite large sizes that appeared very attractive in the golden glow of the late evening sun.
 |
| Arcuate Sand dunes |
 |
| Sand dunes |
For the first time after several hundreds of kilometers we saw a petrol filling station with filthy stinking toilets. It was the only gas station that I saw on the entire route.
After a drive of another hour or so we reached the village of Paryang at around 8:00 p.m. The hotel there is a very threadbare one with four beds to a room of rather small size. The toilets are in a miserable condition which forced many of our group members to go out in the open. We were warned about the dogs around here as they are reputed to feed on corpses of humans that are abandoned in the open air when they die. So we were advised to be wary about the dogs here which created an additional problem of going out to the toilet in the open air. Later in the evening we had a satsang and around dinner time, the B3 Group which had left for Manasarovar around August 16th came to Paryang on their return trip to Katmandu.
(Photo Left: Hotel at Paryang)
Late evening Views of Paryang Village at an altitude of 15000 feet in the Tibetan Plateau
Wednesday, September 8, 2010
Mt. Kailash - Manasarovar Sojourn - 1
For over 35 years, ever since I happened to trek vast parts of Arunachal Pradesh in 1975 and subsequently trekked parts of Kumaon Himalaya, I had heard of the Lake Manasarovar - a large turquoise and emerald coloured body of freshwater occurring at dizzy heights of roughly 15,000 feet in the Tibetan Plateau, and I had nursed a dream of being able to visit the place. Back then, the Chinese were still wary of granting permission to outsiders to visit these places. Perhaps it was only in the early 1980s that Indian pilgrims were granted visas in limited numbers to visit Lake Manasarovar Mount Kailash
During the past ten years I had constantly heard of private tour operators from Nepal Katmandu Mount Kailash Coimbatore Mt. Kailash Bangalore Delhi Delhi Katmandu Nepal
A bus transported the group from the airport to a fairly comfortable three star hotel called ‘Hotel Shanker’. I was allotted a twin-sharing room with a fellow traveler fromBangalore
A bus transported the group from the airport to a fairly comfortable three star hotel called ‘Hotel Shanker’. I was allotted a twin-sharing room with a fellow traveler from
Right: Split-level room - a rather inconvenient arrangement. The entrance is seen on the top.
During our stay at Katmandu Pashpathinath Temple
We later visited the Stupa at Boudhnath which has 13 steps and a lotus shaped structureon the top. At the very top of the Stupa there is supposed to be a chimney-like conduit, down which kings and royals are supposed to have cast down precious jewels and money. As a consequence, these stupas are supposed to contain a lot of wealth within them. At the outer periphery of the stupa are fixed several cylindrical wheels with Buddhist prayers engraved on them, which devotees set in rotatory motion as they repeatedly circumambulate the stupa.
The Boudhnath Stupa is surrounded by several shops marketing antiques, art, music CDs and clothes. A small Tibetan Buddhist monastery also is seen where Tibetan monks were chanting sacred mantras. We also visited an art gallery where artisans were painting very intricate paintings on specially treated canvasses made from cotton and wax and rubbed with a polished rock and using carefully selected vegetable and mineral dyes. These paintings, called 'Thanka Paintings' largely depict stories from the life of Buddha and include elaborate detail and are very skillfully executed.(See below)
Later in the afternoon we visited the Dakshin Kali temple about 50 to 60 km from Katmandu
Right : Dakshin Kali Temple
Tuesday, August 17, 2010
INTERPRETATION OF DREAMS
Interpretation of Dreams
Perhaps Sigmund Freud is somewhat overrated. Or is he? I'd assume from my later experience of people that people's dreams are more likely to be Freudian if they have read Freud or know somethings about his theories. People innocent of Freudian structures just dream and that's it.
Like this friend of mine once had a dream. He dreamt that some archaeological digging was being done in 'Ayodhya in Greenland' (sic) and that his son picked up a beautiful vase and went running. My friend is supposed to have shouted to his son 'Don't break it!!'
If I were to add that I had visited Greenland in 1982, perhaps that would clue everyone to believe that the dream was somehow related to me. Freud famously links objects like 'vase' to symbolically represent women for obvious reasons and that his son picked up the vase should leave no doubt as to who that woman is. What about breaking the vase? Evidently it has to do with violating the woman. But my friend is no ignoramus of geography and why did he come to dream of Ayodhya in Greenland. Obviously in his mind, for some reason, he links up a scoundrel like me to the likes of Sri Rama. But what would I have to do with his wife?
It might be useful to draw attention to the fact that I had borrowed Rs20,000/- on my personal guarantee of paying up the money to help another friend who had a penchant for charitable deeds. This other friend was seeking to finance someone who was in financial trouble. So I took it upon myself to borrow the amount from this guy on my personal guarantee. Another fact is that at the same time all of us had seen a very nice French film 'Vincent, Francois, Paul & others' by Claude Sautet. Yves Montaud - one of the main character is portrayed in a very sympathetic light who deals with his estranged wife in a very straight and cordial manner and even seeks her financial help. Having been influenced by the film and my trifling act of helping a friend in a monetary way, perhaps he unconsciously came to mistakenly associate my character with Sri Rama !!! Try as I did to draw his attention to all the complexities of his dream by saying to him several times that it was a favourite film of mine, he never took the hint.
He is supposed to have had another dream. In that he dreamt that he was sitting in a bus traveling to Belgaum, but some time during the journey he fell asleep. However when he woke up he found that he was in Tel Aviv, and in the dream he is supposed to have asked a girl as to which place that was. The girl told him somewhat crossly "Can't you see with your eyes. Its Tel Aviv". And when he looked around he found buildings with chandeliers and the works. When I asked him why in one dream he considered Greenland and in another Tel Aviv, he told me that Greenland was extreme north and Tel Aviv was more west than Belgaum.
As I can see he tends to exaggerate in his dreams. For one thing, my friend is a little too thrifty, so he exaggerates his weakness to call himself a Jew (Tel Aviv, Israel, Jew, Shakespeare etc). Likewise he grossly exaggerates my so-called large heartedness with Sri Rama. Ayodhya which is to the north of Bangalore is exaggerated to be in Greenland, which is even further north. And Belgaum which is to the west of Bangalore is exaggerated to Tel Aviv which is likewise further west.
Such are the dreams of the sophisticated. How do the simple ones dream? A junior colleague of mine always told me that he never ever dreams. He had told me so over a period of one or two years of talking to me. One day he came to me and said "Sir! Today I had a clear dream that was strongly registered in my mind! I dreamt that Shiridi Sai Baba came and told me 'Bete! Neenu illivarigu ninagoskara badukidiya! Inna mele bere avarigoskara baduku'" Except for the first word that is in Hindi (meaning Son!)the dream was essentially in Kannada and means "Son! Till now you have lived for yourself! From now on live for others!"
My wife too reports that a majority of her dreams are either about temples, or gods, or Sai Baba (her guru). Wonder what Freud's take on this would be!
Perhaps Sigmund Freud is somewhat overrated. Or is he? I'd assume from my later experience of people that people's dreams are more likely to be Freudian if they have read Freud or know somethings about his theories. People innocent of Freudian structures just dream and that's it.
Like this friend of mine once had a dream. He dreamt that some archaeological digging was being done in 'Ayodhya in Greenland' (sic) and that his son picked up a beautiful vase and went running. My friend is supposed to have shouted to his son 'Don't break it!!'
If I were to add that I had visited Greenland in 1982, perhaps that would clue everyone to believe that the dream was somehow related to me. Freud famously links objects like 'vase' to symbolically represent women for obvious reasons and that his son picked up the vase should leave no doubt as to who that woman is. What about breaking the vase? Evidently it has to do with violating the woman. But my friend is no ignoramus of geography and why did he come to dream of Ayodhya in Greenland. Obviously in his mind, for some reason, he links up a scoundrel like me to the likes of Sri Rama. But what would I have to do with his wife?
It might be useful to draw attention to the fact that I had borrowed Rs20,000/- on my personal guarantee of paying up the money to help another friend who had a penchant for charitable deeds. This other friend was seeking to finance someone who was in financial trouble. So I took it upon myself to borrow the amount from this guy on my personal guarantee. Another fact is that at the same time all of us had seen a very nice French film 'Vincent, Francois, Paul & others' by Claude Sautet. Yves Montaud - one of the main character is portrayed in a very sympathetic light who deals with his estranged wife in a very straight and cordial manner and even seeks her financial help. Having been influenced by the film and my trifling act of helping a friend in a monetary way, perhaps he unconsciously came to mistakenly associate my character with Sri Rama !!! Try as I did to draw his attention to all the complexities of his dream by saying to him several times that it was a favourite film of mine, he never took the hint.
He is supposed to have had another dream. In that he dreamt that he was sitting in a bus traveling to Belgaum, but some time during the journey he fell asleep. However when he woke up he found that he was in Tel Aviv, and in the dream he is supposed to have asked a girl as to which place that was. The girl told him somewhat crossly "Can't you see with your eyes. Its Tel Aviv". And when he looked around he found buildings with chandeliers and the works. When I asked him why in one dream he considered Greenland and in another Tel Aviv, he told me that Greenland was extreme north and Tel Aviv was more west than Belgaum.
As I can see he tends to exaggerate in his dreams. For one thing, my friend is a little too thrifty, so he exaggerates his weakness to call himself a Jew (Tel Aviv, Israel, Jew, Shakespeare etc). Likewise he grossly exaggerates my so-called large heartedness with Sri Rama. Ayodhya which is to the north of Bangalore is exaggerated to be in Greenland, which is even further north. And Belgaum which is to the west of Bangalore is exaggerated to Tel Aviv which is likewise further west.
Such are the dreams of the sophisticated. How do the simple ones dream? A junior colleague of mine always told me that he never ever dreams. He had told me so over a period of one or two years of talking to me. One day he came to me and said "Sir! Today I had a clear dream that was strongly registered in my mind! I dreamt that Shiridi Sai Baba came and told me 'Bete! Neenu illivarigu ninagoskara badukidiya! Inna mele bere avarigoskara baduku'" Except for the first word that is in Hindi (meaning Son!)the dream was essentially in Kannada and means "Son! Till now you have lived for yourself! From now on live for others!"
My wife too reports that a majority of her dreams are either about temples, or gods, or Sai Baba (her guru). Wonder what Freud's take on this would be!
Thursday, July 29, 2010
Viva Ms. Ungleesh !
Ms. Ungleesh
This story is about the days when sex determination of fetuses by ultra-sound scanning was rampant in India and was not yet outlawed.
It was very common in North India, especially in the smaller mofussil towns, for families to use the services of ultrasound scanning centres to determine the sex of their unborn child. A female child would cause untold anxiety to wedded couples as it would mean that they had to make intense preparations for saving up substantial amounts of money and wealth to pay as dowry to get their daughters wedded. Male babies caused no such anxieties and were considered the harbingers of wealth and prosperity, besides being assured agents to lead its parents to heaven and salvation after their deaths – something which only male children could do.
In such circumstances female fetuses were rampantly aborted all over the Indian subcontinent leading to a rather unhealthy and precarious male:female sex ratios that finally led the Indian Government to ban the usage of sex determination of unborn babies.
It was under such circumstances that Ms. Ungleesh was born. Although the name, to those who are familiar with Hindu names, strongly suggests a male gender, it is actually the name of a girl. A rather uncommon name though! But how she came to be named so is a story of extraordinary and surprising awareness for a fetus within the womb of an anxious mother.
It is said that when the mother went to an ultrasound clinic for scanning, and while she was being scanned in the abdomen, the fetus had positioned its hand with its finger projecting strategically in such a position that the doctor had no doubts whatsoever that the fetus was indeed a male. The photograph of the scan was also provided and the doctor confidently showed the proud parents the evidences of the baby being a boy. The parents returned home mighty pleased with themselves and pleased with the good fortune that had blessed them with a future boy. Being devotees of Shiva they had decided to select a name that would reflect the potencies of Shiva.
When the delivery actually did happen, it turned out to everybody’s surprise that the child was in fact a baby girl. The parents were shocked beyond their wildest expectations. How had the doctor been misled? On a careful scrutiny of the images they did realize that the fetus had fooled all of them by a clever use of a finger. Astounded by the remarkable awareness even when in the womb, they had no doubt that it was one of the potencies of Shiva that in fact had manifested as the baby girl. And the proud parents named the baby after the crucial feature of the baby’s body that had protected the child and evidently with the grace of Shiva. Hence the girl came to be given the name Ungleesh (Ungli – finger) – a seemingly masculine name for the charade she had played in great awareness despite being just a fetus in a womb.
This story is about the days when sex determination of fetuses by ultra-sound scanning was rampant in India and was not yet outlawed.
It was very common in North India, especially in the smaller mofussil towns, for families to use the services of ultrasound scanning centres to determine the sex of their unborn child. A female child would cause untold anxiety to wedded couples as it would mean that they had to make intense preparations for saving up substantial amounts of money and wealth to pay as dowry to get their daughters wedded. Male babies caused no such anxieties and were considered the harbingers of wealth and prosperity, besides being assured agents to lead its parents to heaven and salvation after their deaths – something which only male children could do.
In such circumstances female fetuses were rampantly aborted all over the Indian subcontinent leading to a rather unhealthy and precarious male:female sex ratios that finally led the Indian Government to ban the usage of sex determination of unborn babies.
It was under such circumstances that Ms. Ungleesh was born. Although the name, to those who are familiar with Hindu names, strongly suggests a male gender, it is actually the name of a girl. A rather uncommon name though! But how she came to be named so is a story of extraordinary and surprising awareness for a fetus within the womb of an anxious mother.
It is said that when the mother went to an ultrasound clinic for scanning, and while she was being scanned in the abdomen, the fetus had positioned its hand with its finger projecting strategically in such a position that the doctor had no doubts whatsoever that the fetus was indeed a male. The photograph of the scan was also provided and the doctor confidently showed the proud parents the evidences of the baby being a boy. The parents returned home mighty pleased with themselves and pleased with the good fortune that had blessed them with a future boy. Being devotees of Shiva they had decided to select a name that would reflect the potencies of Shiva.
When the delivery actually did happen, it turned out to everybody’s surprise that the child was in fact a baby girl. The parents were shocked beyond their wildest expectations. How had the doctor been misled? On a careful scrutiny of the images they did realize that the fetus had fooled all of them by a clever use of a finger. Astounded by the remarkable awareness even when in the womb, they had no doubt that it was one of the potencies of Shiva that in fact had manifested as the baby girl. And the proud parents named the baby after the crucial feature of the baby’s body that had protected the child and evidently with the grace of Shiva. Hence the girl came to be given the name Ungleesh (Ungli – finger) – a seemingly masculine name for the charade she had played in great awareness despite being just a fetus in a womb.
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