The detached state of mind

Rare is the being that can achieve,
a detached state of mind,
sharper than the razor's edge,
this strength of a different kind.
-Saurabh

This one of my favorite :). After explaining to Arjun that he must do his duty in the battlefield, Lord Krishna tells him how one must do one's task, treating all alike -pleasure or pain, Profit or ruin, victory or defeat:. This is true detachment :).

A Perfect World

Bhrama's great creation,
his dream his timeless song,
he built for your elation ...
{To be continued}

Our Deepest Fear: Marianne Williamson

Read and be aware :) -

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.”

A hunter alone in his cave

The time has come for the Hunter,
To sit and contemplate,
Upon this turn of events,
And upon his fate.

If he can still this moment,
his being will comprehend,
the power that is in him,
that even fate will bend.

My enemy my brother

Today I saw the unity,
between myself and him.
Between he who I conquered,
who thought I conquered him.

You are but me my brother,
my flesh, my breath, my bone.
my victory is not my victory,
your defeat is not your own.

This is the story of a fisherman, who engaged in a battle with a huge fish. He did not need the fish to feed his family, he got engaged in a power struggle from which he could not withdraw. His pride and need to prove his strength held him back. After many hours of hauling and struggling, he realized that he had won. His heart filled with empathy for the fish, and he felt the pain a creature feels when it gives up its life and freedom. He wanted to let his brother the fish go, but by now, his battle had become the subject of lore. People gathered around him cheering, shouting waiting for the monster's end.

They did not have the spiritual insight the fisherman had, but he did not have the moral courage to let his brother go. So he pulled him in ... and understood there there is no glory in the victory that breaks one's own heart.

P.S. I have not found the right heading for the poem, if you have a suggestion, do leave me a comment.

Give them all to me :)

Inspired by a discourse delivered by Sri Sri Ravishankar.

If you have feelings of Anger and grief,
Give them all to me :).
If you have memories of sadness and pain,
Give them all to me :).

You were born to be living free,
go find your destiny :).
And if there are things that hold you back,
Give them all to me :).

I will take care of all of them,
they, will not bother me :).
For I have found within myself,
The power to be free :).
-Saurabh

Inner Calm

My little prayer:

Souls are hurting around me lord,

Let me be their ocean,

Let my calm heal their wounds,

and still the inner commotion.

-Saurabh

Karma from Rabindranath Tagore

"Living one's own life in truth is living the life of all the world, then the unquiet atmosphere of the outward struggle clears up and the power of spontaneous creation finds its way through the centre of all things"

--- Rabindranath Tagore

they all said the same thing.
and all they said was one thing,
Make correct choices, in this moment,
And your life will unfold as it should
Beautiful, abundant, intense, fulfilling :)

I am going to post the Seven Spiritual Laws of success (Deepak Chopra soon). I was thinking of getting permission from them before publishing, but got lost on their site :). Will contact and post (if they are ok with it).

Religion is the path to truth

Religion is the path to truth,
Not the path to power :).
This is what I understood,
In the last half hour :).
-Saurabh

Inspired by a research paper on Islam by Dr. Asghar Ali Engineer, Institute of Islamic Studies,Mumbai

http://awareness-2009.blogspot.com/2009/03/centrality-of-jihad-in-post-quranic.html

Hanuman I become

Continuing on my theme of lord Hanuman being an aspect of ourselves, I wrote this little poem,

To thee O lofty Hanuman,
I give a wakeup call
to thine incredible power,
I pray with all my all.



Today I need your courage,
To see that you are in me,
I need thine strength to live my legend,
My lord - understand me.



As ye gazed upon great Lanka,
I gaze upon my ask,
as thee grappled with tumult,
my tumult I unmask.



In this mirror of karma,
I see all that I lack,
I see forgotten powers,
Of Pavan bring them back.



This is indeed my purpose,
The journey I had dreamed,
Drunk with pride and idealism,
This is what I screamed.



My arrogance is gone my lord,
And my virtue is strong,
I want to live a life of dharma,
I want to sing the timeless song.



This is but another shore,
among the shores to come,
and as my doubt I relinquish,
Hanuman I become.


Hanuman brave, hanuman strong,
Hanuman the invincible one,
With every step and every breath,
Hanuman I become.

Saurabh

Why my lord, did you let it happen

My views about the mis-interpretation of religion.

sad I am today my lord,
thou name has been embellished,
Sad I am today my lord,
Thy glory has been sullied.



Thy words and thy lessons
were hijacked by these bigots,
they mixed them with their lust for power,
your virtue they forgot.


Why did it happen o my lord,
to you, to Jesus, to Allah?
Why did they get away with this,
Asks this confused fella ..


Hey! at least it rhymes :)
Saurabh

The Hanuman within

This is not the story of a mythical god, It is the story of all of us.

Doubt is the privilege of the greatest. If you feel doubt or question yourself, your judgment, your abilities, your position, your right to do do something ... and so on, you can be sure of one thing, you are at the same shore as Lord Hanuman was when he had to leap to Lanka.



As the story goes, when the Vanar sena (Army) found that Sita was in Lanka, they were faced with the task of crossing the sea. Jambvand asked all of them to think of ways, some said, they would jump 10 kosas (or some other unit), others 100, others half way to Lanka, but Hanuman, the blessed on, the all powerful sat quietly on a rock, looking onto the sea. Because he had forgotten his own power.

Jambwand then reminded him of who he was and all that he was capable of doing. Remembering his powers, Hanuman easily leaped to Lanka.


But here is the deeper interpretation. Hanuman is not a mythical monkey god, he is that aspect of us all, which makes us invincible. He is the symbol of remembrance for us all to know that the loftiest ones too have experienced doubt and that they have made peace with it.


We often feel doubt and doubt leads to fear. In such times, we have to remember that this doubt is in our lives to awaken those latent powers. And all we have to do is remember them. This I believe is the essence of Hanuman. To really worship him, one has to worship one's own inner self and free it from the doubts that stand in the way of one's duty.

Note: Many people have misused Hanuman's name for a variety of purposes, this is the fate of all beings great, their kind words and immense influence are used to perpetrate the very injustice they stood against :(

And then the Magic began

Like a symphony, starting with a single instrument,
it turned into the serenade of the whole orchestra


My state of mind and a few muses about the things that happen around me :).

A savage among savages, A saint among saints

An savage among savages, A saint among saints,

A beast among animals, a sculptor among paints

brave among the bravehearts, unusual among quaints,

by his company becomes a man - a savage or a saint.

Nowthen :), looks like this poetry thing is kickin off inside me ... the scene is of a meeting where we all forgot what we were really trying to do and got involved in turf wars and power struggles. There was no trust and no support and too much resistance from everyone ... and inspite of my knowing this, I too became the animal among animals.

I thank the lord all mighty,

for this chance to consider and to reflect,

upon all that has happened,

and what might happen next,

to ask if the time has come

for me to myself eject,

to give up this path that wants everything

my heart wants to reject

this is not the dream we dreamed,

not our values, not our tenet,

I must finish the work I started

But look out for the next?

Saurabh
...now that is a real poem ... :)

Where does the power come from?

So where does the power come from?
To see the race to its end?

- From within :).

The Wild, Wild Stallion

I see him in the distance, the wild, wild stallion,

Powerful, sleek, shining with rage and anger,

kicking, fighting, biting with all its life,

As the cowboy tries to break his spirit.

Photo courtesy AANHCP - Clinic in a Box(http://www.hoofwalkernaturaltrim.com/Home_Page.html)

He is not for the faint of heart
he is the stead of the mighty heart,
the man of steel and capability
who can hold down his stead and equal its rage
So when a cowboy fails to ride the horse,
And blames the horse for his own weakness,

http://www.flickr.com/photos/fredholley/2382488139/Thanks to Fred Holley

Who should I blame I ask myself?

The wild horse and his wildness,

Or the cow-boy for his tameness?

None, I say, To each his own I say,

Let the spirited cowboy find his spirited stead,

Let the meek horse find a meek match,

They are all right in their own place

The horse and the man and the man and the horse

But this is the poem for horses that run free,

Let them run free I say,

Let them forever be the symbols

Of the freedom for which we all yearn

Saurabh
Quite a poet
I am turning out to be

Btw, I was having a conversation with a friend recently and mentioned
If it don't rhyme,
It ain't a poem :).
~Me

Hope my friend is a worthy friend

I sat today, thinking the end had come,
That the whole exercise had been pointless
Questioing myself - do I take things too seriously?
Do I care too much ... and through that care harm others?
Do I understand other people's points of view
Or am I so obsessed with my own goodness, that I become callous?

But today as I sat, in inaction,
Trying not to judge or intervene,
I saw a shimmer of hope,
Everything worked out by itself
If only I could actually submit to the flow of life
The experiences I want will flow through me

but today is a day to celebrate,
I saw the shimmer of hope :),

Saurabh
P.S. This is not a poem :) ... its just the effect of too much Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan and Rahat Indoori.

Bollywood

who needs weapons? We can win the world over by our culture - bollywood is but one example - I muse.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/29278667/

Pramod Mutalik and Valentines Day

Something I wrote up in response to some friends who were concerned about Pramod Mutalik's obsession with some day ...

Hello,

I have a different take on this issue.

Pramod Mutalik's insecurity lies in the fact that the symbolism associated with Valentine’s day is alien to him. The word 'Valentines' comes from the west. The imagery includes 'red roses', 'heart shapes' and the sweets include 'chocolate'. None of which are familiar to him. If you actually take the other 80% of India into account, you will notice that this imagery is alien to them also. To them, this imagery is alien or ‘western’.

Do take into account that India has been invaded for the last 5000 years. People like Pramod Mutalik (and all of us) have born the brunt of these invasions. These invasions were violent. And though India has become a free country, the images of past violence persist - even if we do not realize it.


On the other hand, Valentines day or lets call is a 'celebration of love day' is perfect for Indian Culture. If you count the number of synonyms an Indian language like Hindi has for 'love' - prem, preet, ishq, pyaar, mahobbat ... etc etc ... you will find more references than English at least. Honestly, I could not think of any synonym except 'amore' - but isn't that French?

Now think about Indian imagery of love. Radha - Krisha, Shiv - Parvati, Ram - Sita and Jodha -Akbar. To me, it is much more real (graphic) than anything anyone will find in any western imagery. Let’s go further, into our places of worship and observer the Shiv ling or the Temples of Konark and into books like the Kamasutra (written by a celibate btw). All of these clearly indicate that ancient Indian society was mature enough to look beyond the physical expression of love.

When these temples were discovered by western individuals, and I include anything west of Punjab, including England, they were not prepared for such imagery. They could not associate it with the divine because their own imagery was so starkly different. So they went shame-shame and belittled another culture - just because they did not understand it. Now since were the rulers, their view dominated and 'we the people' bought into that collective shame we still associate with Indian culture.

If you see Pramod Mutalik's actions in this light, does it seem like he is still serving the cultural slavery that his colonial masters imposed on him? Does it appear that he has bought so deeply their idea of correctness that he has forgotten his own roots? So is he the perpetrator or the victim? Does he even realize that he is insulting Indian culture (especially that which he calls Hindu? with his actions? Does he even know where his thoughts come from?

But there is a larger question here – the question of inclusion:

There are people among us who understand both the west and the east. We like to celebrate Valentine’s Day, but also want to celebrate Holi and Diwali. So the question is - what choice are we going to make about the people who don’t associate with the west? To sent them ‘chaddis’? Or through protest marches – blaming people like Pramod Mutalik for something he clearly does not understand?

Or are we going to build the bridge of understanding? It is simpler than it sounds J. Instead of holding protest marches, we just have to give Valentine’s Day an Indian Flavor (Desi Tadka). I am sure St Valentines will not mind. This might mean we call it by another name or include images that are more culturally relevant in India. So we join the world in a celebration of love but we do it in an inclusive way.

If we succeed in building such a bridge, Pramod Mutalik will not exist. Moreover, we might become more accepting and understanding of Valentine’s Day itself. The choice is indeed ours J


And if we want to take direct action, let us make sure that Pramod Mutalik receives the most valentines cards in the country, albeit, in images that he associates with – radha-shyam, Shankar-Parvati, Ram-Sita … and so oneJ. In my humble opinion, this will do more than anything. He cannot insult such cards. But the underlying emotion has to be one of love and not of hate or fear.

Saurabh

The law of Karma

Recently, someone passed me the name of a person who talks about reincarnation. I listened to a 1 hour lecture delivered by him and then another on the same subject by someone else. Both these people were psycotherapists from the west btw. My interpretation of their conclusion was this -

We are all here in this life because we have to learn some lessons - the lesson of compassion, of truth, of love and so on. And until we learn these lessons, we will keep returning back to the 'earthly' form. I think this is what the Bhagwad gita also says. It says that everything is the outcome of karma - our deeds and our choices (Act Maketh joy and voe - Light of Asia). If not from this life, then perhaps from another life. There is no coincidence and there is no luck.

Everything is perfect and it is so because we needs to be, in order for us to learn the highest lessons and walk that path, which the world considers difficult, but the path that is inevitable - for all of us. We can avoid it for as many lives as we want, but until we take this path of purity, we will keep coming back here and keep facing circumstances and different forms of sorrow that give us the opportunities to learn these .

So for instance he said that if one has been a 'nazi' in one birth, then this person will face the same kind of persecution in another birth. It form might be different, but the nature of the sorrow could be the same. Meaning that if I take someone's life in this birth, maybe someone close to me in this or the next life might face the same fate. so I do not suffer directly but I suffer because of the same cause.

In another instance, if I think my spouse is a nag, it is because I have nagged someone or have contributed in some way to someone else's being nagged and I have to learn to love and forgive the nagger or I will keep running into them - ed eternity :).

Now there is no proof of this and I cannot certify its accuracy but it resonates very strongly with me.

The only true law in this world is the law of karma

It cannot be bent.

It will not be broken.

Obama for America

I am happy that Obama is in the office. I fear greatly for him. I hope he is able to do the good he promised without compromising the ideals he appears to stand for.

It is unusual for someone who walks the straight line to walk in a twisted world. I think such a being must possess tremendous inner power, but more than that tremendous moral strength and courage.

Does he have it? Is is fair to expect any man to have it? Do ideals and capability converge in one being? Is luck on his side?

Many unanswered questions, and the audacity of hope.

karma - prayer

Pray not! the Darkness will not brighten!

AskNought from the Silence, for it cannot speak!

Vex not your mournful minds with pious pains!

Ah! Brothers, Sisters! seek

Nought from the helpless gods by gift and hymn,

Nor bribe with blood, nor feed with fruit and cakes;

Within yourselves deliverance must be sought;

Each man his prison makes.

Each hath such lordship as the loftiest ones;

Nay, for with Powers above, around, below,

As with all flesh and whatsoever lives,

Act maketh joy and woe.

The Middle Path - the right amount of work

here is a beautiful poem that resonates with me. It has something to do with how much one can achieve at a time.
I think it is a must-read for those driven,
even by the lust to do good to heed

looks like the Light of Asia is stirring the strings of the poet within :). How is that for poetic expression?

http://www.buddhabihar.com/renunciation.html

"Fair goes the dancing when the Sitar is tuned,
Tune us the Sitar neither low nor high,
And we will dance away the hearts of men.

The string overstretched breaks, the music dies,
The string overslack is dumb and the music dies,
Tune us the Sitar neither low nor high."

The balance ... how does one achieve it? Is it even possible to measure everything? How does one know when one has bitten off too much ... before it is too late ofcourse :).

well well well ... would u believe it, I am not the first to ask that question :). here is Buddha's response:

The foolish ofttimes teach the wise:
I strain too much this string of life, belike,
Meaning to make such music as shall save.
Mine eyes are dim now that they see the truth,
My strength is waned now that my need is most;
Would that I had such help as man must have,
For I shall die, whose life was all men's hope.

amazzzziiinnngggg :).

Buddha's Awakening

I found this in Light of Asia, a book about Gautam Buddha, written by Edwin Arnold (one of my favorite poets). one of the places to find the book is here http://www.buddhanet.net/pdf_file/lightasia.pdf
The prince's father has kept him in a prison of bliss. He is with his new wife Yashodhara and is ... honeymooning ... if I got it right. The palace is beyond all expressions of beauty and the king wants to keep Gautam away from all forms of grief. I just liked it very much and thought Id paste it here:

But Prince Siddartha heard the Devas play,
And to his ears they sang such words as these: -

We are the voices of the wandering wind,
Which moan for rest and rest can never find;
Lo! as the wind is so is mortal life,
A moan, a sigh, a sob, a storm, a strife.

Wherefore and whence we are ye cannot know,
Nor where life springs nor whither life doth go;
We are as ye are, ghosts from the inane,
What pleasure have we of our changeful pain?


What pleasure hast thou of thy changeless bliss?
Nay, if love lasted, there were joy in this;
but life's way is the wind's way, all these things
Are but brief voices breathed on shifting strings.

O Maya's son! because we roam the earth
Moan we upon these strings; we make no mirth,
So many woes we see in many lands,
So many streaming eyes and wringing hands.

Yet mock we while we wail, for, could they know,
This life they cling to is but empty show;
'Twere all as well to bid a cloud to stand,
Or hold a running river with the hand.


But thou that art to save, thine hour is nigh!
The sad world waileth in its misery,
The blind world stumbleth on its round of pain;
Rise, Maya's child! wake! slumber not again!

We are the voices of the wandering wind
Wander thou, too, O Prince, thy rest to find;
Leave love for love of lovers, for woe's sake
Quit state for sorrow, and deliverance make.

So sigh we, passing o'er the silver strings,
To thee who know'st not yet of earthly things;
So say we; mocking, as we pass away,
These lovely shadows wherewith thou dost play.

A new metaphor for 'killing 2 birds with the same stone'

I like to say "Planting 2 seeds with the same seed" ... how is that for environmental friendliness :)?

Satyam Scam

Doom is the destination of wanton greed I guess. And it is possible to make money in an honest way, especially in the IT industry ... at least for the next 50 or so years. Its unfortunate that people make these rash decisions. My feeling is that they do this out of fear .. and mostly because they find themselves in charge of power that they are not capable of handling. Therefore, to prove that they are more powerful than they really are, they end up doing brave (stupid) things ... and when stupid things dont pan out as originally expected, they commit crimes to cover their hides. At any rate, I hope this is a sobering experience and people of greater moral strength take over from the people who are running Satyam as of now.

We were always standing with open arms

This is just something that came to my mind as I thought about India's relations with Pakistan. Arundhatti Roy has written a very powerful article in which she talks about this embrace of hate that India and Pakistan have with each other.

I still remember reading about Sardar Patel that he was the only person besides Gandhiji who could have prevented the partition and that when he too realized that it was inevitable, he was tasked with breaking the news to Gandhiji.

I suppose wanting the past to change is futile. What we have to do now is move on and ahead. Without underestimating the phenominal emotional burdens that both peoples carry, I wish there was a way to start the healing. Our healing is tied to each other. One cannot heal without the other.

As an Indian, I do not know what I can do. I feel like I have stood with open arms but no brother came to them. Yet I guess for those of us who believe there there can be a future in which our enimities will be forgotten and we might join forces to uplift the poverty, hunger and uneducation that plagues both nations, the only alternative is to keep our arms open and hope that some day ... those voices in Pakistan that support peace will become stronger than those voices that do not.

Basera-e-Tabessum

This is such a beautiful project and video :)
Project: http://www.ashanet.org/siliconvalley/sac/projects.html

Video: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=5359167312113100190&hl=en

This is not us: Yeh hum nahin: Lyrics english

A song worth listening to. I could not find the lyrics anywhere, so wrote them down (at least the english versions.
http://in.youtube.com/watch?v=s6P9qP_Rpxw

Terrorism is murder,

Murder is haram.

Countless innocents are being

murdered by terrorists

claiming to fight in the name of

Islam

{Newspaper clipping: Terrorists are criminals not Muslim activists}

{Bomb kills two newborn babies and mother}

The story that is being spread in our name is a lie

These stamps of death on our foreheads are

signs of strangers

The name by which you know us

We are not that

The eye with which you look at us

This is not us ... not us (times )

With the nightfall, one has lost one's way

We are scared of the dark

so much that we are burning our own home

What is this rising all around us?

The stories that are being spread in our names are lies

This is not us ... not us ( 6 times)

The name by which you know us

we are not that

The eye with which you see us

we are not that

This is not us ... not us ( 6 times)

We have lost on the way

the lesson of living together

Now we are even scared of each other

They are others, whose faces are on your hands

Your pain is like the ocean

but our wounds run deep also

This is not us (12 times )

The Urgency of Now

This is the moment in which we have to act. If there is a one good bone in my body. If there is one good thought. If there is one good reason to make the world a better place, then this is the moment for me to act. There are a thousand ways to make a difference. Why to we wait?

Me

Gandhiji's quotes

It always amazes me to think how deep, profound and positive an impact one man can have on a nation ... as indeed the world :)!. What would we be if people like him had not awoken the conscience of the world?

A coward is incapable of exhibiting love; it is the prerogative of the brave.

First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.

A nation's culture resides in the hearts and in the soul of its people.

Mohandas Gandhi

Only you can uproot the terror menace

The roots of war and conflict are in us. There are afflictions in us to be recognised, embraced, and transformed: anger, hatred, discrimination, prid
TOI Guest Editor Thich Nhat Hanh. (TOI Photo)e and despair. It is important to look deeply into their roots, to understand them and learn how to transform them.
We need to listen to our own suffering and the suffering of our family, community, and nation. We should be able to help each other to recognise that suffering is present in each of us and we have lived in a way that has allowed it to grow.
The Earth is ailing, our society is ailing, and there is so much despair and violence. Peace negotiations will be successful if both parties to the conflict have mutual understanding and know how to use deep listening and loving speech. And this kind of training should start at the earliest levels of education. This is peace education and it is the way out of war and violence.
Each of us has to make the commitment not to water the seeds of violence, hate, discrimination and despair that are in us, as well as in our relationships. We should help each other to heal in the context of our personal relationships before we can expect to help heal humanity and the Earth. Healing is possible with each breath, each step, each thought, each word and the simple act of smiling to someone.
Our daily lives are so busy. In fact, throughout our lifetime we will spend months, if not years, waiting; waiting in line, waiting at red lights and waiting in traffic jams. We become so stressed and tense always wanting to be somewhere else.
We always think that happiness, peace and joy are something to attain later. When we practice engaged Buddhism we see that every moment of our daily life is a chance to practice meditation. As we wait in line, or sit in our car at a red light, nothing prevents us from bringing our attention to our in-breath and out-breath, relaxing and smiling.
True happiness is available for us now. We cannot often choose our circumstances, but we can choose how to respond to them: that is our real freedom. When our telephone rings, why not close our eyes and breathe in and out a few times before answering- taking a mini break- and then begin to speak. Our speech will be lovelier and we will really be able to hear what the other person wishes to communicate.
Many of us, particularly in the developing world, believe that as we acquire more wealth we will have more happiness. In fact we never are satisfied by this kind of pursuit. When we practice stopping, looking deeply and dwelling in the present moment, we begin to touch the wonders of life that are available wherever we are: the green leaves, the sunshine and the smile of a child.
Rather than searching outside of ourselves, we can find happiness in developing understanding and compassion. To focus on the Gross National Product, or our buying power, as a measure of our success and happiness as a society and nation is not enough. We must also focus on developing our level of understanding and compassion. True happiness should be the foundation of our policies on production, consumption and development.
We need to develop our capacity to look with the eyes of interbeing. Everything relies on everything else to manifest. If other species cannot survive, humans cannot survive either. Therefore, protecting the environment is protecting ourselves.
We are not only our body and spirit; we are also our environment. Our environment is the consequence of our collective action (karma). Living more simply, developing understanding and love, taking care of our environment, committing together to sustainable development, this is to follow the path of awakening.
Burning fossil fuels and clearing forests in the quest to supply our means of transportation, as well as our consumption of meat and dairy products, are the main causes of global warming. According to a United Nations study published in 2007, one solution is to reduce the production of meat by 50 percent, and drive cars that run on cleaner fuel and only when truly necessary. Many Hindus and Buddhists do not eat meat, or limit their intake. Reducing or completely giving up meat and alcohol consumption is not too difficult to do.
People who are really awake to the gravity of our situation should take action immediately. We can practice one car-free-day or one motorcycle-free-day every week. We can drive more environmentally-friendly cars. We can bike to our workplace or to school. We can enjoy delicious vegan or vegetarian food. There are many things we can do right away to save the planet. Our civilisation will self-destruct if we do not wake up in time to our real situation.
India is a richly spiritual country that has offered so much to the world. Let us all do our best, regardless of our tradition, to put these beautiful teachings into practice in the here and the now, to heal our cities, our nation, our mother Earth. In this way, the living wisdom of our spiritual traditions becomes a gift which can offer concrete tools to help us transform the real situation of our world today.

'Terrorists are victims who create more victims'

Pasting the other 2 articles from Thich Nhat Hanh from the Times of India after Katinka's comment. Just wanted to expand the number of people who see his messages. I felt really calm after reading his words ... was just not able to find rest after the recent violent incidents in India. There is hope. There is hope if those who believe in peace wake up and act - through non violent means otherwise more victims will turn into terrorists.



Today's TOI carried a whole bunch of articles by Thich Nhat Hanh which are simply wonderful to read. As many of you are aware - there have been many terrorism related violence in different parts of India. Thay's articles really came in time. It is good to read these in a standard newspaper.Here is the first oneThanks, friend


'Terrorists are victims who create more victims'

Midway through the news meeting on Wednesday, the grim news came in: Agartala had been rocked by serial blasts. All eyes immediately turned to Venera
TOI Guest Editor Thich Nhat Hanh. (TOI Photo)ble Thich Nhat Hanh, the Guest Editor for our special Peace Edition. As journalists, what should we do on a day like this?
The Zen master, who has rebuilt bombed villages, set up schools and medical centres, resettled homeless families and for a lifetime advocated tirelessly the principles of non-violence and compassionate action, pondered for a while.
When he spoke, it was with great clarity, ''Report in a way that invites readers to take a look at why such things continue to happen and that they have their roots in anger, fear, hate and wrong perceptions. Prevent anger from becoming a collective energy. The only antidote for anger and violence is compassion. Terrorists are also victims, who create other victims of misunderstanding.''
This, remember, is the monk — now 82 years old — credited with a big role in turning American public opinion against the war in Vietnam — for which Martin Luther King Jr had nominated him for the Nobel Peace Prize in 1967. And so, his words are not to be dismissed lightly.
''Every reader has seeds of fear, anger, violence and despair, and also seeds of hope, compassion, love and forgiveness,'' said Thich Nhat Hahn, affectionately called Thay.
''As journalists, you must not water the wrong seeds. The stories should touch the seeds of hope. As journalists, you have the job of selectively watering the right seeds. You must attempt to tell the truth and yet not water the seeds of hate. It's not what's in the story, but how you tell it that's important.''
But how should the State deal with terror? Thay's answer: ''We should invite those who believe they are victims of discrimination and injustice to speak about it. We should initiate sessions of deep listening and invite deeply spiritual people, who don't have to be famous, to attend these. We must televise these sessions nationally. I am sure you will see a dramatic drop in the level of violence. A war on terror cannot succeed, because you cannot bomb perceptions. The only solution is dialogue.''
He cited the example of an experiment by his own group of monks at Plum village, south of France, in 2006. ''We asked people to write letters to terrorists and more than 40 letters came in. Some claimed, 'I am the terrorist because I am also violent and there is suffering in me as well'. We need to get together. When we address suspicion and anger as a collective, when we talk informally about suffering, then we can find answers. If we reduce the violence in us, and change, then we change others around us because then we are connected to them.''
Talking about world peace, the monk said, ''Political leaders meet at peace summits but no lasting solutions to the world's problems are found. Therefore, political leaders, before they get down to talking at summits, should practice sitting, walking, talking informally with each other and practice techniques to calm themselves. Only then can talks lead to positive results.''
The history of Vietnam in the last century was fraught with violence. Thay has himself seen war from close quarters. Naturally, the question came up: Does he believe non-violence can help find solutions in today's complex world?
Thay's reply was surprisingly pragmatic. ''Non-violence can never be absolute. However, you can make aggressive action less violent. In war, the generals must try and avoid the death of innocents. Even soldiers can show compassion. The first step towards nonviolence is to be calm and compassionate yourself.''
Questions on wars and conflicts led to the next logical query. How can humanity relate with each other when it is divided within confines of national or ethnic or racial identities?
That brought the Buddhist teacher into his element, propounding on one of Buddhism's basic tenets of 'non-self'. The problem, he said, arises when one's self is set against another's self. Once we realize that self is made of non-self, then the issue of identity gets settled.
''Man is made of non-me elements. I am made of so many non-me elements — my parents, the food I eat, the education I received, animals, vegetables. Take away all the 'non-me', and there is no 'me' left. Buddhism is made of non-Buddhist elements. A Christian is made of non-Christian elements and a Muslim is made of non-Muslim elements,'' said Thay. Once we realise that we are all interconnected, we will begin caring for all other things.
That's why, Thay says, we need to learn from suffering. Because only after we have understood the nature of suffering can we understand true happiness. ''Happiness and safety can't be individual matters. If you have peace on your side, only then can you promote peace in the world. Individual happiness is impossible, as is individual suffering. Because we are not one but a collective.''
And what about the financial crisis that is causing many to suffer? The answer, says Thay, is related to greed and fear. ''As journalists, you must help people so that they don't become victims of greed and fear. If the aim is happiness, then you must be prepared to give up riches and fame and power, all of which are transitory.''
Can the modern economy — fuelled by conspicuous consumption — co-exist with a monk's lifestyle? After all, if everyone stopped consumption, industries would shut down and unemployment would rise. So should individuals, in their pursuit of 'selfish' happiness, create unhappiness for others?
''Many of us have started believing in happiness from consumption. But happiness is largely a problem of the mind. You don't have to run into the future, you have enough conditions to be happy right here and now. But in our search for more conditions to be happy, we sacrifice the present. The remedy for us is to go home to the present moment. Don't get stuck with the past or get sucked into the future. So many wonders of life are with you. Development is like a wild horse that we are riding, over which we have lost control,'' responded Thay.
But then, isn't it much simpler for a monk to talk about not consuming than for people who have to deal with the world on the world's terms? Can regular people with regular lives follow his teachings?
According to Thay, ''The meditative practice is for everyone, monks and non-monks, the young and the less young. The conditions for reaching out for Buddha-hood are there for everyone. We are just caught up in our worries and projects. The kingdom of God is available for you. But are you available for the kingdom?''
We couldn't resist asking: what were his feelings when the Taliban destroyed the Bamiyan Buddhas? His reply: ''There was no anger. We have a tendency to punish whoever has dared to make us suffer. We seek relief by making the other person suffer. If we see whoever is hurt as a victim, then a neuro pathway will open in our brain and we will forgive the person and reduce his suffering, which in turn will help us to suffer less. All this is not based on speculation but on the basis what we have done, in our group sessions.

Thich Nhat Hanh

Got this from a friend;
Hi folks,Here is another article by Thich Nhat Hanh that appeared in the Times OfIndia. Of course it discusses things in the context of terrorism. But a lotof what he writes below is equally applicable to us in our own daily lives.I hope you enjoy and learn from this article.

You can use a knife to kill or you can use it to chop vegetables1 Oct 2008, 1941 hrs IST
An Israeli soldier asks about the use of force during a question and answersession with Thich Nhat Hanh on November 29th, 2001.
Thich Nhat Hanh, guest editor of The Times of India
Question: I am from the Israeli-Palestinian group. I want to ask aboutforce. I was, and still am, in the Israeli army. At times we need to useforce to prevent an act that will cause suffering, and that force causessuffering to another person. My question is, can force be used?
Thây: If you have understanding and compassion in yourself, then what wecall force, what we call military force, may help to prevent something, toachieve something.
But that shouldn't prevent us from seeing that there are other kinds offorce that may be even more powerful. We don't know how to recognize andmake use of them so we always have cause to resort to military force. Thespiritual force is also very powerful. The spiritual, the social, theeducational - they are all forces, and much safer to use. Because we havenot been trained to use these forces, we only think of using military force.
Suppose there are two people, both of them full of anger, misunderstanding,and hatred. How can these two people talk to each other, even if they arenegotiating for peace? That is the main problem: you cannot bring peopletogether to sit around a table and discuss peace if there is no peace insideof them. You have to first help them to calm down and begin to see clearlythat we, as well as the other people, suffer. We should have compassion forourselves as well as for them and their children. This is possible. As humanbeings we have suffered. And we have the capacity to understand thesuffering of other people.
The spiritual and educational dimensions can be very powerful, and we shoulduse them as instruments, as tools for peace. Suppose you live in a quarterwhere dozens of Palestinians live peacefully with Israelis. You don't haveany problems. You share the same environment, you can go shopping in thesame place, you can ride on the same bus - you enjoy. You don't see yourdifferences as obstacles, but as enriching.
You are an Israeli and she is a Palestinian and you meet each other in themarketplace and you smile to each other. How beautiful, how wonderful. Youhelp her and she helps you. That image should be seen by other Palestiniansand Israelis. If you are a writer you can bring that image to many peopleoutside of your group. If you are a filmmaker, why don't you offer the imageof peaceful coexistence to the world? You can televise it to demonstratethat it is possible for Palestinians and Israelis to live peacefully andhappily together. That is the work of education. There are a lot of peoplein the mass media who are ready to help you to bring that image, thatmessage to the world. That is very powerful - more powerful than a bomb, arocket, or a gun, and that makes people believe that peace is possible. Whydon't you invite a few Palestinians and Israelis who have not been in such asafe place, to show them that, "Well, you see, there is no problem livingtogether."
If you have enough energy of understanding and peace inside of you, thenthis kind of educational work can be very powerful, and you won't have tothink of the army and of guns anymore. If the army knows how to practice, itwill know how to act in such a way as to not cause harm. The army can rescuepeople; the army can guarantee peace and order. It is like a knife. You canuse a knife to kill or you can use a knife to chop vegetables. It ispossible for soldiers to practice non-violence and understanding. We don'texclude them from our practice, from our Sangha. We don't say, "You are asoldier, you cannot come into our meditation hall." In fact, you need tocome into the meditation hall in order to know how to better use the army.
So, please don't limit your question to such a limited area. Make yourquestion broad - embrace the whole situation, because everything is linkedto everything else.
There are many things we can do today to extend our understanding,compassion, and peace, because every bit of it is useful, is gold. When youtake a step, if you can enjoy that step, if your step can bring you morestability and freedom, then you are serving the world. It is with that kindof peace and stability that you can serve. If you don't have the qualitiesof stability, peace, and freedom inside of you, then no matter what you do,you cannot help the world. It is not about "doing" something, it's about"being" peace, "being" hope, "being" solid. Every action will come out ofthat, because peace, stability, and freedom always seek a way to expressthemselves in action.
That is the spiritual dimension of our reality. We need that spiritualdimension to rescue us so that we don't think only in terms of militaryforce as a means to solve the problem and uproot terrorism. How can youuproot terrorism with military force? The military doesn't know whereterrorism is. They cannot locate terrorism - it is in the heart. The moremilitary force you use, the more terrorists you create, in your own countryand in other countries as well.
The basic issue is our practice of peace, our practice of looking deeply.First of all, we need to allow ourselves to calm down. Without tranquilityand serenity, our emotions, our anger, and our despair will not go away. Andwe will not be able to look and see the nature of reality. Calming down,becoming serene is the first step of meditation. The second step is to lookdeeply, to understand. Out of understanding comes compassion. And from thisfoundation of understanding and compassion you will be able to see what youcan do and what you should refrain from doing. That is spoken in terms ofmeditation. In that respect, everyone has to practice meditation - thepoliticians, the military, the businessman. All of us have to practicecalming down and looking deeply. You have our support.
Follow-up Question: We have to pray and work for a whole lifetime to purifyourselves of anger and to cultivate compassion for those who try and succeedin hurting us and causing suffering. There is not a lifetime in PlumVillage; there are two weeks. There is a whole lifetime in Israel tomeditate. But during that time there are situations in which I see someonewho is committing an act of force, and the only way I can stop him isthrough force, not through education or meditation, because those areprocesses that take a long, long time.
We do not always have the time to have compassion for that person. At timesthe act of force that will stop that person from killing, hurting, orwounding so many people is done through anger or hatred and withoutcompassion. But I feel that even though I am still not pure, it is an actthat I have to do because I have to protect my people. If a terrorist walksinto a restaurant with a bomb on him and I can stop him, the military canstop him, but only by killing him; I don't have time to have compassion. Itcould be an act of hate and anger to shoot him, but it will stop him fromblowing up that restaurant with women and children and people who are mypeople.
Thây: Of course it is very difficult to not get angry when they are killingyour wife, your husband, or your children. It is very difficult to not getangry. That person is acting out of anger, and we are retaliating also outof anger. So there is not much difference between the two of us. That is thefirst element.
The second element is: why do we have to wait until the situation presentsitself to us as an emergency before we act, dealing only with the immediatecircumstance? Of course you have to act rapidly in such an emergencysituation. But what if we are not in an emergency situation? We can wait foran emergency situation to arise or we can do something in order to preventsuch a thing from happening. Our tendency is to not do anything until theworst happens. While we have the time, we do not know how to use that timeto practice peace and prevent war. We just allow ourselves to be indulged inforgetfulness and sense pleasures. We do not do the things that have thepower to prevent such emergency situations from happening.
The third element is that when things like this happen, it is because thereis a deep-seated cause, not only in the present moment but also in the past.This is, because that is. Nothing happens like that without a cause. Youkill me, I kill you. But the fact that you are killing me and I am killingyou back has its roots in the past and will have an effect on the future.Our children will say, "You killed my grandfather, now I have to kill you."That can go on for a long time. When you get angry, when you have so muchhatred towards the person who has made you suffer, and you use all kinds ofmeans to destroy him, you are acting out of anger just like he is. And angeris not the only cause. There are also misunderstandings, wrong perceptionsabout each other, and people who urge us to kill the other side becauseotherwise we will not be safe. There are many causes.
In the past our fathers and our grandfathers may not have been very mindfuland may have said things, may have done things that have sown seeds of war.And their grandfathers also said things and did things, planting seeds ofwar. And now our generation has a choice. Do we want to do better than ourgrandfathers or do we want to repeat exactly what they did? That is thelegacy we will leave for our children and grandchildren.
Of course in a situation of great emergency you have to do everything youcan to prevent killing. And yet, there are ways to do it that will causeless harm. If you have some compassion and understanding, the way you do itcan be very different. Bring the dimension of the human heart into it; helpthe military strategists to have a human heart. It's the least we can do. Dowe teach the military to conduct a military operation with a human heart? Isthat a reality in the army, in military schools? They teach us how to killas many people as possible and as quickly as possible, but they do not teachus how to kill someone with compassion.
In one of his past lives, it seems that the Buddha was a passenger on a boatthat was overtaken by pirates, and he killed one of them while trying toprotect the people on the boat. But that is an earlier life of the Buddha.If the true Buddha were there he may have had other means; he may have hadenough wisdom to find a better way so that the life of the pirate could havebeen spared. Because life after life, the Buddha made progress. You are theafterlife of your grandfather; you must have learned something over the pastthree generations. If you don't have more compassion and understanding thanhe did, then you have not properly continued on after your grandfather.Because with compassion and understanding we can do better, we can causeless harm and create more peace.
We cannot expect to achieve 100 percent peace right away - our degree ofunderstanding and love is not yet deep enough. But in every situation,urgent or not, the elements of understanding and compassion can play a role.When a gangster is trying to beat and kill, of course you have to lock himup so he will not cause more harm. But you can lock him up angrily, with alot of hate, or you can lock him up with compassion and with the idea thatwe should do something to help him.
In that case, prison becomes a place to love and to help. You have to teachthe prison guards how to look at the prisoners with compassionate eyes.Teach them how to treat the prisoners with tenderness so they will sufferless in prison, so we can better help them. Do we train them to look atprisoners with eyes of compassion? A prisoner has killed; a prisoner hasdestroyed. Maybe he was raised in such a way that killing and destructionwere natural for him, and so he is a victim of society, of his education. Ifas a prison guard, you look and see in that way, then you will havecompassion, understanding, and you will treat your prisoner with moregentleness. That helps him and that helps you. Help him to become a betterperson, and help yourself to be happy by helping people in difficulty. Thatis the principle.
We should not focus only on short-term action. Again, we have to look withthe eyes of the Buddha. We must train ourselves to look at things with abroad perspective and not just concentrate on the immediacy of the problem.Our lives are for that, and the lives of our children will be for that,because we are a continuation of each other. We build synagogues and mosquesin order to have a place to sit down and do that - to look deeply, so thatour actions will not only be motivated by desire, greed, or anger. We have achance to sit in the mosque or synagogue for a long time, and in that timeour compassion and understanding should grow. And then out there we willknow how to act in a better way, for the cause of peace.
As a soldier you can be compassionate. You can be loving and your gun can behelpful. At times you may not have to use your gun. It is like a knife thatis used to cut vegetables. You can be a Bodhisattva as a soldier or as acommander-in-chief of the army. The question is whether you haveunderstanding and compassion in your heart. That is the question.

Some laughter

Dark humor from Suresh Albela. He actually quotes Atal Behari Vajpayee:

Jheel par badal barasta hai hamare desh mein,
Khet pani ko tarasta hai hamare desh mein,
Pagalon or deevanoon ko shor kar ,
Kaun hasta hai hamarae desh mein

And yet, perhaps it is time for the pagaloon and deevanoon (mad men and dreamers?) to wake up and start working for the land. Perhaps it is indeed time. To the paagals and deevanas who love mother India, this entry is dedicated to you :). Tomorrow is another day.

Krishnamurti Talk on Education

This is a beautiful talk that I recommend for Teachers. He discusses concentration and also talks about how young people can find their direction in their livs

Part 1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oSqzkGyxpmc
Part 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W9g0J0IdkIQ
Part 3: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ZU9IyDYzdg
Part 4: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d4ADeEd-CZc
Part 5: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jyv7Ye2F5aQ

:)! And he also has many lectures that talk about going beyond violence. I will post them soon.

Islam

Some months ago, I was listening to a conversation between people of different religions in India when I came across a beautiful quote by a (seemingly) Hindu person. Here it is as best I remember it. I agree with him and wish we all had the same attitude.
He said “Islam is not a criminal that has to justify itself to every person. It is one of the greatest religions of the world”.

Who will account for the ethnic cleansing in Kashmir?

I recently read an article by Arundhatti Roy about the recent protests in Kashmir about the allocation of lands to the amaranth trust. I do not have an opinion on the allocation of the land itself. At best, I think there was no need to rock the boat unnecessarily. There are greater issues at stake.
I remember going to Srinagar in the 1990ies. And as we drove in an Army convoy, we could see one beautiful house, a second beautiful house and then a burnt house. And then we would see another beautiful house, a second beautiful house and then a burnt house … and the pattern left a deep impression on my mind. All of these houses belonged to people of a particular community. These people have now been ethnically cleansed from Kashmir and are now living in refugee camps.
The first question I have for these people is who will account for the ethnic cleansing? What right had anyone to drive these people out of their homes?

A letter to the perpetrators of the Delhi Blasts

Dear Terrorists,
You think you have brought glory to your movement by taking 22 innocent lives. You think the news coverage you got is your success. You think you might succeed in dividing our people again. You think in some way your actions have touched India.

Let me tell you this. India is more than the lives you have claimed. India is more than its government. It is more than its petty politicians. It is more than the police you have taunted. It is more than the news channels whose attention is more valuable to you than your own mission. It is more than a country, more than a set of religions, more than the ocean that takes its name. It is more than its history, its misery and the billion people that inhabit it.

India is an idea that burns steadily in the minds of a billion souls. Your bombs may claim our bodies, but they cannot touch this idea.

You sent taunting emails to news channels. Now hear my challenge to you: Do whatever you can. Use your most powerful weapons and your dirtiest tricks and every power and resource you have. I dare you to touch this idea. I dare you to look into my mind and see how I revere this idea and then I dare you to make one change … just one change to this idea. Not a complete change, not a reversal, not a complete conversion, just one change. I dare you to make just one change and you will know that you are powerless. Your actions are meaningless. Deep down -you already know it.

You have one hope: – renounce violence and surrender to peace and love.

tp://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/7614280.stm

Bill Watterson's address

The whole text is here :- http://www.tetongravity.com/forums/showthread.php?t=84619

the part that touched me most is paste below. It was really wonderful to see such depth and meaning in the author of Calvin and Hobbes :D. they have become dearer to me still

Saurabh

Creating a life that reflects your values and satisfies your soul is a rare achievement. In a culture that relentlessly promotes avarice and excess as the good life, a person happy doing his own work is usually considered an eccentric, if not a subversive. Ambition is only understood if it's to rise to the top of some imaginary ladder of success. Someone who takes an undemanding job because it affords him the time to pursue other interests and activities is considered a flake. A person who abandons a career in order to stay home and raise children is considered not to be living up to his potential-as if a job title and salary are the sole measure of human worth.You'll be told in a hundred ways, some subtle and some not, to keep climbing, and never be satisfied with where you are, who you are, and what you're doing. There are a million ways to sell yourself out, and I guarantee you'll hear about them.

An inspiring story.

This story really touched my heart. I got it in a forward and decided that I had to keep it safe. 'God has always been planning things for me' Naga Naresh Karutura has just passed out of IIT Madras in Computer Science and has joined Google in Bangalore.You may ask, what's so special about this 21-year-old when there are hundreds of students passing out from various IITs and joining big companies like Google? Naresh is special. His parents are illiterate. He has no legs and moves around in his powered wheel chair. (In fact, when I could not locate his lab, he told me over the mobile phone, 'I will come and pick you up'. And in no time, he was there to guide me)Ever smiling, optimistic and full of spirit; that is Naresh. He says, "God has always been planning things for me. That is why I feel I am lucky."

Read why Naresh feels he is lucky.Childhood in a villageI spent the first seven years of my life in Teeparru, a small village in Andhra Pradesh, on the banks of the river Godavari. My father Prasad was a lorry driver and my mother Kumari, a house wife. Though they were illiterate, my parents instilled in me and my elder sister (Sirisha) the importance of studying.Looking back, one thing that surprises me now is the way my father taught me when I was in the 1st and 2nd standards. My father would ask me questions from the text book, and I would answer them. At that time, I didn't know he could not read or write but to make me happy, he helped me in my studies!Another memory that doesn't go away is the floods in the village and how I was carried on top of a buffalo by my uncle. I also remember plucking fruits from a tree that was full of thorns.I used to be very naughty, running around and playing all the time with my friends. I used to get a lot of scolding for disturbing the elders who slept in the afternoon. The moment they started scolding, I would run away to the fields! I also remember finishing my school work fast in class and sleeping on the teacher's lap! January 11, 1993, the fateful day when we had the sankranti holidays, my mother took my sister and me to a nearby village for a family function. From there we were to go with our grandmother to our native place. But my grandmother did not come there. As there were no buses that day, my mother took a lift in my father's friend's lorry. As there were many people in the lorry, he made me sit next to him, close to the door.It was my fault; I fiddled with the door latch and it opened wide throwing me out. As I fell, my legs got cut by the iron rods protruding from the lorry. Nothing happened to me except scratches on my legs.The accident had happened just in front of a big private hospital but they refused to treat me saying it was an accident case. Then a police constable who was passing by took us to a government hospital.First I underwent an operation as my small intestine got twisted. The doctors also bandaged my legs. I was there for a week. When the doctors found that gangrene had developed and it had reached up to my knees, they asked my father to take me to a district hospital. There, the doctors scolded my parents a lot for neglecting the wounds and allowing the gangrene to develop. But what could my ignorant parents do? In no time, both my legs were amputated up to the hips.I remember waking up and asking my mother, where are my legs? I also remember that my mother cried when I asked the question.

I was in the hospital for three months. I don't think my life changed dramatically after I lost both my legs. Because all at home were doting on me, I was enjoying all the attention rather than pitying myself. I was happy that I got a lot of fruits and biscuits. 'I never wallowed in self-pity' The day I reached my village, my house was flooded with curious people; all of them wanted to know how a boy without legs looked. But I was not bothered; I was happy to see so many of them coming to see me, especially my friends! All my friends saw to it that I was part of all the games they played; they carried me everywhere.

I believe in God! I believe in destiny! I feel he plans everything for you. If not for the accident, we would not have moved from the village to Tanuku, a town. There I joined a missionary school, and my father built a house next to the school. Till the tenth standard, I studied in that school. If I had continued in Teeparu, I may not have studied after the 10th. I may have started working as a farmer or someone like that after my studies. I am sure God had other plans for me.

When the school was about to reopen, my parents moved from Teeparu to Tanuku, a town, and admitted both of us in a Missionary school. They decided to put my sister also in the same class though she is two years older. They thought she could take care of me if both of us were in the same class. My sister never complained. She would be there for everything. Many of my friends used to tell me, you are so lucky to have such a loving sister. There are many who do not care for their siblings.She carried me in the school for a few years and after a while, my friends took over the task. When I got the tricycle, my sister used to push me around in the school.

Everyone treated me like a normal kid. I was a happy boy and competed with others to be on top and the others also looked at me as a competitor. I was inspired by two people when in school; my Maths teacher Pramod Lal who encouraged me to participate in various local talent tests, and a brilliant boy called Chowdhary, who was my senior. When I came to know that he had joined Gowtham Junior College to prepare for IIT-JEE, it became my dream too. I was stood first in 10th standard, scoring 542/600. Because I topped in the state exams, Gowtham Junior College waived the fee for me. Pramod Sir's recommendation also helped. The fee was around Rs 50,000 per year, which my parents could never have afforded.

Moving to a residential school was a big change for me because till then my life centred around home and school and I had my parents and sister to take care of all my needs. It was the first time that I was interacting with society. It took one year for me to adjust to the new life. There, my inspiration was a boy called K K S Bhaskar who was in the top 10 in IIT-JEE exams. He used to come to our school to encourage us. Though my parents didn't know anything about Gowtham Junior School or IIT, they always saw to it that I was encouraged in whatever I wanted to do. If the results were good, they would praise me to the skies and if bad, they would try to see something good in that. They did not want me to feel bad. They are such wonderful supportive parents.

Though my overall rank in the IIT-JEE was not that great (992), I was 4th in the physically handicapped category. So, I joined IIT, Madras to study Computer Science. Here, my role model was Karthik who was also my senior in school. I looked up to him during my years at IIT- Madras. He had asked for attached bathrooms for those with special needs before I came here itself. So, when I came here, the room had an attached bath. He used to help me and guide me a lot when I was here.I evolved as a person in these four years, both academically and personally. It has been a great experience studying here. The people I was interacting with were so brilliant that I felt privileged to sit with them in the class. Just by speaking to my lab mates, I gained a lot. 'There are more good people in society than bad ones' is inadequate to express my gratitude to Prof Pandurangan and all my lab mates; all were simply great. I was sent to Boston along with four others for our internship by Prof Pandurangan. It was a great experience.

I did not want to pursue PhD as I wanted my parents to take rest now. Morgan Stanley selected me first but I preferred Google because I wanted to work in pure computer science, algorithms and game theory. I am lucky as I get help from total strangers without me asking for it. Once after my second year at IIT, I was travelling with some friends in a train for a conference. We met a kind gentleman called Sundar in the train, and he has been taking care of my hostel fees from then on.I have to mention about the Jaipur foot. I had Jaipur foot when I was in 3rd standard. After two years, I stopped using them. As I had almost no stems on my legs, it was very tough to tie them to the body. I found walking with Jaipur foot very, very slow. Sitting also was a problem. I found my tricycle faster because I am one guy who wants to do things faster. One great thing about the hospital is, they don't think their role ends by just fixing the Jaipur foot; they arrange for livelihood for all. They asked me what help I needed from them. I told them at that time, if I got into an IIT, I needed financial help from them. So, from the day I joined IIT, Madras, my fees were taken care of by them. So, my education at the IIT was never a burden on my parents and they could take care of my sister's Nursing studies. Surprise awaited me at IIT. After my first year, when I went home, two things happened here at the Institute without my knowledge. I got a letter from my department that they had arranged a lift and ramps at the department for me. It also said that if I came a bit early and checked whether it met with my requirements, it would be good. Second surprise was, the Dean, Prof Idichandy and the Students General Secretary, Prasad had located a place that sold powered wheel chairs. The cost was Rs 55,000. What they did was, they did not buy the wheel chair; they gave me the money so that the wheel chair belonged to me and not the institute. My life changed after that. I felt free and independent. That's why I say I am lucky. God has planned things for me and takes care of me at every step.

The world is full of good people. I also feel if you are motivated and show some initiative, people around you will always help you. I also feel there are more good people in society than bad ones. I want all those who read this to feel that if Naresh can achieve something in life, you can too.

A Note about the Chinese

I spent this afternoon with a group of people - Barbecuing in a park. Everyone in the group, except me was Chinese or of Chinese origin. Strangely, if I had removed these people and been with a group of people of Indian origin, I do not think the behavior or my experience in the group would have been any different.

There was the same composition - one tough guy, one person everyone picked on. two girls who kept whispering to each other. one couple and us boys - playing Frisbee and water fighting.

Why is there such a comfort in the company of the Chinese? My humble conclusion is that irrespective of where we come from and what languages we speak, we are deep inside the same - human, people, individuals. Getting along in life.

My hope is that through these picnics, friendships will grow first between individuals and then between nations.

Saurabh

ISRO's achievements

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/7374714.stm

The opening line of the article says it all:-

Less well known is that in a nation where more than 300 million people live on less than $1 a day, it is also a real force to reckon with when it comes to top class rocket and satellite technology

We are indeed a nation of paradoxes. I am positive though that out achievements will pull us out of our darkness and not the other way round. :)

Cheers!

Desh Tarakki Kar Raha Hai

Yes I know I am the 5% of Indians who have this privilege but I have to say I was impressed. I booked a plane ticket online and wanted to know what I needed to carry to the Airport with me. The airline had sent me an SMS with a PNR number and also followed up with e-mail. I wanted to know whether I had to take a printout of the e-mail with me to the airport so I called their customer care. They said I only need to carry the PNR number and a valid ID.

When I contrast this to the good old days when we had to go to the Indian Airlines counter. Stand for a long time and then fill out a tedious paper form only to wait for a delayed flight I feel like we have come a long way.

If these services could be extended down to the remain 95% of my brothers and sisters why would we not be the golden bird "Sone Ki Chidia" again :).

Thought I should write the good news too :).

Hyderabad's traffic

Anyone who has been to hamara Hyderabada knows that our traffic is hell. We leave home dreading the evils of road rage, jumping traffic lights and people popping out of nowhere. We obviously care little for the pedestrians who we would happily trample underfoot.

I write because today I saw an exception to the rule. At the Manikonda crossing, there is a zebra crossing that no one has seen. But if we look carefully, we realize that it really exists. Today I saw a car actually stop to let a pedestrian pass.

Cheers to Hyderabada ... more such car walas and we will have the best traffic in the world.
Me

Read and Be Afraid

I am pasting here, the editorial written by Tehelka.com's editor-in-chief Tarun Tejpal.
http://tehelka.com/story_main35.asp?filename=Ne031107Tarunspiece.asp

The ugliness and brutality of the whole carnege has never failed to hit me hard enough. The Tehelka coverage made me stop many times over to breath and to think and to delibrately stop lest the force knock me over.

I think it is important for these stories to be told. And for all of us to read them. We may not be able to understand what drives men to such brutalilty. We may not be able to understand what justification one man can give for burning another in cold blood or for raping women and killing children. But we must be aware that such things happen. We must force ourselves to face this uglyness if ever we are to purge it. May god be with the the victims. We the people of this country have let you down. I will try to do at least the little I can to prevent this from happening again.


Read. And Be Afraid
TARUN J TEJPAL
IN AUSCHWITZ the exposed-brick barracks sit in neat rows, in a calm so deep it must necessarily rise out of death. The tidy paths cut each other at right angles, and the trees are stately and still. The sweet boxy buildings could be town houses, or school blocks, or military quarters. Or killing factories that smoothly sucked in human beings, separated them from their clothes, their hair, their gold teeth, their reading glasses and their children, and then processed them in a furnace. The electrified barbed wire fences that run in straight lines held up by concrete pillars could have kept out unwanted intruders, or kept in helpless innocents. The Nazis believed in the differences in men, and believed in the extermination of these differences. The imagination can never fully get around the horror of Auschwitz — and adjoining Birkenau — where in less than three years the Nazis gassed and incinerated nearly one-and-a-half million men, women and children, many no more than a few years old. In a world full of memorials to our creativity and genius, this is a memorial to the darkness that ever lurks in the heart of men.As you walk through those surreally peaceful double-storey blocks, you will invariably find yourself tailed or led by a crocodile of teenagers — scrubbed shining, brightly attired, speaking in hushed voices — winding their way through a byway of history to which they — and each one of us — are deeply connected. Round the year, ceaselessly, the Jews ship out their children from all over the world to show them the beast that resides in us all. By their own long suffering they understand that the battle of life against death is the battle of memory against forgetting. That to not look the beast in the face is to have the beast on your back all the time. There is nowhere in India that you can take your daughter if you wish to level her with the beast of Partition, the beast of the 1984 Sikh riots, the beast of a hundred communal and caste massacres, or the beast of Gujarat 2002. Because we do not remember, we repeat; because we do not look the evil in the eye, it dogs us all the time.There is nowhere in India that we enshrine our cruelty so that we can look at it and be dismayed and be afraid.Well, read this special issue of TEHELKA and be dismayed and be afraid. Ashish Khetan’s extraordinary six-month investigation — one of the finest in the history of Indian journalism — peels off all kinds of masks, and shows us the beast in us. For five years since the carnage, we have heard charges and counter-charges. We have heard the victims, the government, the police, the judiciary, and the civil rights groups. Now for the first time hear the story of the killings from the men who did it. Put to rest your doubts about the foetus that was pulled out from its womb; about the systematic slicing of Ehsan Jafri’s limbs and torso; of the raping and chopping and burning of women and children; of law officers who turned on the victims; of the collusion of the police and the government.
Read it and be afraid.One problem is we live in an age of spiralling hype and sensation.An age of cheap spectacle in which the indulgences of sports and cinema can be so easily deemed landmark and historic. An age in which words like chilling, appalling, inhuman, outrageous, have all lost their charge. We are all desensitised viewers set upon by a turbofuelled media. Image is chasing image at such blistering speed that we dare not hold on to anything — lest we burst. This issue of TEHELKA, perhaps, can be a kind of litmus test. Read the following pages and see if you rediscover the meaning of some words — barbaric for one; for another, heartbreaking. Read it and see if you can still be made afraid.

What indeed should a free man do?

This poem is my followup on my 2 earlier articles: Mr India's Dilemma and Gulal in which I explored a volunteers thoughts about their participation in Asha. This poem describes the volunteer's conclusion. It is inspired by Mahatma Gandhi's quote: "You must be the change you wish to see in the world"

It does not start with conquering the world,
It does not start with working for one's country,
It does not start with volunteering for one's community,
It does not start with working for one's family.

These pieces fall into place automatically,
They will bask in the glory of the most important task,
They will stand like bricks, one upon the other,
First the family, then the community, then the country, then the world.

The real work starts with me,
It starts with self purification,
It starts with adding strength to my character,
It starts with self development

When one's will is strong and vision clear,
Everything else will fall into place,
Like planets bask in the sun's glory,
And nations bask in the glory of good men (and women)

My deeds will touch my kin and friends,
My actions will guide their actions,
All talk of intent is useless,
All intentions of upliftment are vain

The only downtrodden one lifts is oneself,
The downtrodden of the world rise in one's wake,
The only man I pity is me,
When I am strong, my people will strenghten.

The greatest service a man can do
Is to cease to cause worry to others,
When one is secure in the eyes of the world,
Then alone can one inspire

With purity of purpose,
And selfless motives,
With the conquest of weakness,
Must this journey begin ...

~Saurabh
(A budding poet I should say ;)

A salutation to women's hockey and their 2002 statement

I recently saw Chak De India, a movie based on the stunning 2002 commonwealth games victory that the Indian women's Field Hockey team achieved. I liked the movie because it made a strong case for secularism and gender equality in India.

However, I wrote this blog at 2:00 am, to make a small tribute to feminism and to the achievement of a few sportswomen in India.

Here is a profile of the players of 2002:
Suraj Lata Devi
Preetam Rani
Seeta Gussain
Manjinder Kaur
Jyoti Sunita Kullu
Mamata Kharab
Sanggai Chanu
Suman Bala
Saba Karim
Tingongleima
Helen Mary
Amandeep Kaur
Sumarai Tete
Masira Surin
Adeline Kerketta
Kaanti Baa

Gulal

Gulal is a dry color used in Holi – the Indian festival of color. It is usually Red, Yellow, Purple, Green, Orange and of many other colors. The story goes like this … Mika was a passionate friend of India and discovered Asha while seeking volunteer opportunities. Soon after the new volunteer orientation, she found herself lending a hand to the perpetually swamped chapter coordinators, project stewards and other teams. She attended workshops, sold Chai (tea) and as the story continues … found her feet.
One day she pondered, “So we call ourselves ‘Asha for Education’ … but don’t we do much more than education? We supported the Bhopal gas victim’s campaign, organized talks to educate ourselves and to raise public awareness. We supported the ‘Right to Information’ and discussed the ‘Right to Education’ bill. We also support fellowships, learning networks and god knows what else. “
All good work … but where is the common ground? Can so many small initiatives really get us somewhere big? Wouldn’t we have greater impact if listed out our three most important priorities and focused our collective efforts on them? Why are we here? Why are we doing what we are doing? What is the direction of our endeavors?
The next day was Holi, the Indian festival of color. Mika was out in an open field and had filled her fists with Gulal. On an impulse, she looked towards the clear blue sky, and hurled the Gulal towards it. The grains of color took the shape of a red apparition or a cloud … and in it she saw - Asha’s structure. This was not a pyramidal structure like that of a conventional organization.
Mika realized that the paradigms that apply to conventional organizations - such as central themes, core competencies and strategy did not necessarily apply to this … ‘what-do-you-call-this-type-of-organization’. In this cloud of red dust, each grain was its own master and took its own decisions. It defined its own path and responded independently to the forces that acted upon it.
“If I push my hands into the air“, she thought “to which grain will I give direction?” Which grain can prepare the strategy? Why will the others follow? How much time would it take to build consensus? We took 6 months to take a stand on ‘Right to Education’ bill. How long would 66 chapters take to take the stand? What about change and flexibility? What if we developed a strategy – in x months … and then realized that we got it wrong? Would we do then? What about exceptions? What if our core strategy did not include a fight against indentured prostitution – but we go the opportunities to do so? Would we turn them down?
Mika was thoughtful– on one hand she saw the value of a direction and on the other she saw what she had to compromise to pursue it. “There has to be a middle path between the two” she thought. She then read Asha’s mission “To catalyze socio-economic change in India through education of underprivileged children.” But realized that the freedom to interpret the statement is hers alone; that the path to the pursuit of this mission is hers to choose;
Mika has not figured it all out. She realizes that the commitment to a direction is important but, she wants to focus on crafting her own mission and direction, for Asha’s direction is no more than the direction of its volunteers taken together.

Mr. India's Dilemma
The head hunters at NASA Seattle were looking for candidates to head their quality assurance department when they came across Mr. India. His experience with Mogambo's missiles blew them away and they made him an offer he could not resist. So with Sridevi and the kids in tow, Mr. India moved to Seattle. He started shopping at Indian stores, reading mails on Indian lists and thinking about what he could do for India.
Though he was no stranger to India's problems: religious strife, female feticide, bureaucracy, et al; its contrast with his new frame of reference, hit him with unparalleled force. So one day, as he stood in his balcony, watching the sun set and the moon rise, he tore open his shirt(superman style), and declared, that he, Mr India, with his dads formulas, and superhero powers would bring about India's redemption.
But what should he do? AIDS is endemic, farmers are dying, 50 million kids are out of school, militant movements are thriving, criminals are ruling the country. Kicking Mogambo's 'but' - is not enough!. His head reeling and heart thumping he ran inside the house and asked Sridevi "What must a superhero do?". Sridevi, looked up from the DVD screen, and said "Instead ask yourself … what must a free man do?"
What indeed must a free man do ... ?
His quest for answers, took him to a talk organized by Asha Seattle. It was called 'Right to Information(RTI) - a Talk by Arvind Kajriwal - Magsaysay award winner for emergent leadership in 2006'. His eyes opened a little. For the first time, he understood the fundamental relationship between the flow of information and a just and equitable society. Encouraged, he attended an IAS officer's talk, and learned that all politicians are not evil. Many roads turn out badly simply because we don’t have the expertise to build them right. At Ms. Jayashree Janardhan's workshop, he learned that a tribal child does not learn from a book that depicts an average home with a TV and a Fridge, because the book does not relate to its culture.
In activist Suma Josson's film he saw an objective analysis of the Green revolution (I am still not convinced it is 100% true) that mainstream media just does not undertake. He saw that multinationals used local deities as brand ambassadors for their products. He saw that as mono-cropping destroys India's genetic diversity, some people are quietly filing patents to claim ownership of well adapted local varieties. He saw how one-season seeds destroy traditional models of sustainability which prescribe the reuse of seeds season after season. He saw that expensive fertilizers reduced soil-productivity in the long run and that a gene resistant to American Bollworm does not fight desi Kidas (other local worms).
Talk after talk, discussion after discussion, over and over again, he forced himself to confront that bitter truth: 'We the people' don’t understand our own problems…
But Mr. India realized that he could not apply America's solutions as is to India's problems. When his friend, the CEO of a company decided to spend Lakhs of rupees on doing up the walls of a poor school, he told the friend that nutritious food is more important than pretty walls. When another friend decided to construct new schools, he told the friend that a worthier challenge was to improve the quality of the existing 900,000 schools. And though Mr. India has not arrived, he has avoided doing more harm than good, which, unfortunately, is exactly what zealous superheroes end up doing - despite good intentions.
But that’s Mr. India. Let’s talk about me. I am no Mr. India ... I have work! Kids! Boss! Spouse! traffic ! ... you name it, I’ve got it. I don’t have the time to attend talks ... and anyway, I pay them Asha folks some cash every year, to remind myself that I remember.
True, but far away from Seattle, between the Arabian Sea and the Bay of Bengal, is a potpourri of races, languages, religions and customs. A place where paradoxes of poverty, riches, renunciation, ambition, hope, dreams and despondency exist together. Some call this mass of land a country. I call it an Ideal … an ideal called India.
This great ideal does not need your charity. Hell No!! There are more billionaires in Mumbai than there are in New York. What it needs is your awakening. It needs you to recognize that freedoms are expensive that privileges are loan. It needs you to wake up ... and do something!
Note: I a male protagonist for convenience only.