wannabeing

Change is the only constant in the changing world. We change around us, and within us. Without change, there would be no concept of consciousness. In short, we pretty much know what change is.

So there is no point talking about it. I want to explore another word – growth – because A. it’s an everyday currency and B. it’s tricky, especially since it’s liable to be confused with wannabeing.

So how does a wannabe know that he is just wannabeing and not growing? Well, a wannabe wouldn’t care in the first place. Others have no confusion anyway. How does it matter then! Leave it.

The Taste of Sweet

Sweet has two tastes, at least. It tastes one way to those who get to eat it.  And it tastes quite differently to those who don’t get to eat it. It might have another taste for those who are fed or overfed against their wishes, and we can talk about aftertaste etc. but let’s not get too technical about it.

The question is – which taste is the right taste of sweet? And who can describe it – one who got to eat it or one who didn’t? Or both?

The taste of one sweet might be different from the taste of another sweet. But the taste of sweetlessness doesn’t change; sweetlessness tastes the same no matter what the sweet is. The taste of want and unfulfillment is the same.

The question comes back – could the taste of unfulfilled desire (to eat sweet) be one of the valid tastes (of sweet)?

Alas! One knows the price; other knows the value.

99C

By the time I understand, it changes. No matter how much I try to catch up, I find myself lagging. I don't ever arrive, and I don't even give up and relax. I keep shifting from one position of stupidity to another. 

I am in dark. I know that I don't know enough. At the same time, I also feel that I know much more than I would like to. I would rather not know things that I know, for they are painful and useless. I was supposed to be stupid, I turned myself into a cynic.

But I cannot go back. Time takes no U-turns. It pokes me from behind and pushes me forward. I have to keep running, hoping for some magic or miracle. After all, beyond a point, you cannot heat water; it turns into stream and flies away. Away from your cruel contraptions.

Halal

Arabia, about 1500 years back. Mohammed and his followers were in do-or-die conflict with rest of the population. 

The war, as usual, was being fought at every level, in every corner, including the market. This is what this post is about. This post is about economic terrorism.

Near about 99% population would have been non-vegetarian in the deserts of Arabia in the times of Mohammed. And food and animal farming would have been one of the predominant sectors of the economy. 

Given that, if one managed to capture the supply side of the food industry, the production of meat, he would pretty much capture the economy by the scruff of its neck. 

The question was how to effect this economic coup. How do you make your people take the war to their home and hearth, without being ugly naked about it? Let's devise a strategy that sounds convincing; let's Allah reveal something technical this time.

And lo! you have halal, which means that the animal will be slaughtered only in the name of Muslim God by chanting Allah-o-Akbar, implying that only Ummah would control the production of meat and dominate the food industry. Halal is a certificate not just to stamp food or even its means of production but the people who could produce it - what's allowed (or halal) to be consumed could only be produced by those who are allowed to perform the necessary ritual. Others could shut their shop and go home.

In other words, halal is nothing but an economic sanction on non-Muslims in order to establish a monopoly in food market. It means nothing else! Rest is smokescreen. It was genius of an innovation, evil but effective. Combine this with jizya (tax for protection), and you wreak a veritable holocaust on kuffar or dhimmis, without spilling a single drop of blood.

The only question now is - how important is understanding halal today in the globalized economy? Well, I would rather you reach your own conclusion. But when one steps into a Nepalese restaurant in downtown San Francisco and reads "We Serve Halal Meat Only", one cannot help but wonder.

Media

BREAKING NEWS:

Israeli Jew militants bombed a Berlin shopping mall. 42 dead, more than 100 critically injured. 

A Japanese school-bus driver opened gunfire, shouting "Buddha is Great", killing more than 50 school-kids in downtown Chicago.

Recent beheadings of kidnapped British cricketers - Hindu group "Tat Twam Asi" owns responsibility. 

CONCLUSION:

Speak after me - terror has no religion. Islam has nothing to do with terror.

Breaking Up

Somewhere on Planet Earth. Sometime.

Primal Dark Night. Bright Stars. Sporadic swoosh of Cold Dry Wind. Silence.

Bang! I hear door of the world being slammed on my face. I turn back and walk away. I walk away and turn back. I pause. I reflect. I stand out, outside the periphery, under the starry umbrella, gazing at the world, which looks like a gigantic space station - a huge spread of negative space with lighted airplane windows clustered and scattered. Perhaps I am dreaming. The whole world seems alien to me.

Today, we break up. I stand out, alone.

I am pronounced guilty in the hearing. I am not even hearing.  I am wondering if I could care any less.

This is the first day of my remaining years. Yes, that matters, that alone. There is darkness and no signposts, just a star in the sky, that alone. 

Parole (or Prison Break)

I died

Yesterday

Or day before

I don’t remember

I lied

In leisure

Life oozed out

In moody slowness

Red, it was

The color of pain

The color of anxiety

The color of bondage

Silky smoke
Spiraling poetry
Like solemn tunes

For last communion

Ordinary Gandhi

Your surname is Gandhi. Can you, dear reader, relate to this situation? Can you even imagine?

Let's look at the crux of it - you have all the wealth of this world, and power. And everything else, in excess. You cannot have more, though you can do as much as you want. Will you work? What will you do? What would be your motivation?

Don't read any further before answering these questions.

Consider yourself lucky, dear reader, that you don't have to answer the Sphinx/Yaksha. For you, these questions are optional. You went ahead to read further.

At this point, let me take back my words. You don't have everything, let alone in excess. The Sakya prince was not a moron to have left his kingdom if princes have everything.

Coming to think of it, princes are often deprived of the most common, but most vital, things in life. They have company even if they want solitude, but do they have friends? Can they trust their friends? Can you have friends without trust? Can they loose themselves to simple pleasures without getting themselves high? Who is not an addict, by the way?

Ditto for love. Can he have simple joy of being loved, admired and accepted? How does he make sure if she loves him? All of them swear they do. Pause for a moment. This is not an ordinary loss. This is massive! Is that why he runs away to faraway lands to find some semblance of love, just like his father did? Does that make him a philanderer? 

Could you be any different? 

I think that there are two type of people - anonymous and celebrity; and as a rule of thumb each side needs much more imagination and sympathy than they usually have to make any sensible comment about the other.

The man in question, in my opinion, is not perfect. Far from it. But none of us is. He is an ordinary man stuck in an extraordinary situation, like a deer in the headlights. He should just run away, to find his love, and his motivation. But how many of us do, just because we should? We keep hanging around; so does he.

Coexistence

Doctor: Your report has arrived. You have cancer.

Patient: Not sure if I wanted to know, though I had suspected something like that.

Doctor: We might have to go for surgery.

Patient: That will be costly, isn’t?

Doctor: Less costly than all other options, or the only other option.

Patient: Sure we cannot coexist - cancer and I? I believe in coexistence.

Doctor: Cancer doesn’t.

Patient: May be my cancer is different.
Doctor: God bless you.

Corporate Mockroach

One mockroach

Catching up with another

In a frantic mockroach race

Of directionless dissatisfaction

Ever busy

Going nowhere

Running on treadmill
Burning damp with perspiration

Make in India

And here arrives
Another life

Another soul

Another little pit

This little pit would grow

Into a sea of desire

A cornucopia of dearth

A million wants

His hunger

Slaughterhouses

His needs (or greed)

Draughts, traffic, and inflation

Forgotten in chaos
Or procrastinated in haste
A million orphaned wants
Lie cold on the compromise way

But what this fuss is all about?

Multiply - Matrix needs cells
Wars need voters, if not heroes
Just be useful to somebody

The Prophet of Desert

There is no god
That's not My own
That doesn't speak My words
Prostrate on My only begotten god

The past was distortion

The future will be blasphemy

Let the infidel clock tick away to glory

I break the nib that sentenced your destiny

Submit to Me
The way I approve
Defeat, and enjoy the defeated
Slay, but ritually, as per My law

I circumcise, I shroud

I herd My flock in line

Having sermoned unsolicited 

I take no questions, only offense

Have faith in me, since

My faithful eggs break not

And if they did, they had no faith
Mashallah! Heads you lose tails I win

Interview

Your CV

Your paper self

Your better half

Lying on the table

Will you be able to

Match your metaphor

With convincing conviction

That’s the question

But why fret, why despair

Rest assured, my friend

If you are not juicy

Someone is not hungry

And it helps to remember

No matter what happens

You will be misjudged
One way or the other

Perfume

August evening

Rain beating against the roof

In monophonic monotony

Of meditative noise

Widowed Monsoon

Clouds dangle heavily

From a teary canopy

Of far-spreading melancholy

Out in the cold

Steaming cup of coffee

Gazing into nothingness

Hearing echoes of imagination

All of a sudden

Out of nowhere

A gust of wind flies by

Leaving a smell behind

Like a thunderbolt

In primitive darkness

Revealing you
In my arms, almost

Cricket World Cup - A Thought

Yuvraj Singh, match of the tournament of 2011 cricket world cup, was diagnosed with cancer soon after his team won the cup.

Where does he go for his medication? Why does he have to go abroad? He should have found the treatment in his own country, one would expect. "India" (with a sizable non-Indian support staff) was the world champion, right? World champions should be good enough, if not the best, in basic things like healthcare, right?

Your children are not educated, even those who have degrees. Your boys are effete and your girls are molested and half your working population stands in queue of foreign embassies for work permits, of any type, of any where, as if you are not a country but a hellhole everybody wants to get out of. And you are not ashamed of all that! You are ashamed of a loss in a cricket match!

Perhaps our sense of pride and shame need to be restored to sanity.

Last week, one of our media channels - Times Now - tried to trend #ShameInSydney on Twitter, hoping to ride on the wave of sentiments similar to what they would have observed in neighboring Pakistan few days back. Thankfully, the TRP ploy backfired and what actually trended was #ShameOnTimesNow.

I was pleasantly surprised by the way twitterati in large refused to go down to the level media had decided for them. However, many creeps couldn't resist mud-slinging at a Bollywood celebrity to taunt her boyfriend - their star player - leaving a very bad taste in mouth. 

The fans should be more critical of their own performances as all of us play our own sports in our own arena. We must cheer our teams, but I don't see any glory in winning through someone else's hard work. This "Lagaan" must go. A Bangladesh or Pakistan or even India can not defeat England just by defeating them in a cricket match. We must realize that we have been thoroughly defeated in all the games that really matter. And it's hightime we lifted our game.

Let's not overload a sport; let's not outsource our aspirations to 11 men. 

The Lost Key

No one knew how old the village was. Few believed it lived since the beginning. Others differed, but not very much.

The villagers were simple people. They had enough, and perhaps they could have more, but they aspired to want less. When they prayed, they prayed for all. They believed, yet they would urge their young to seek; and the seeker was one who had questions. Sparingly they spoke, and intently they listened. Often they would go to faraway places where nothing was heard except the murmurings of Divine. Once they come back, they would pen down what they had heard.

And their experience would become part of their age-old repository of knowledge that sustained them for eons. They had a veritable treasure - their lore and myths were layered and lyrical, their epics were as vast as the oceans, and their philosophy had depth unfathomed. The books cultivated them, and they preserved their books, in a place securely locked by a key others knew nothing about. Only the villagers had the key; only they had access to the treasure.

In beginning of when the time started to rot, came from the West the barbarians, crossing the river, those who knew neither music nor sculpture. Blinded by the certainty of their faith, they had no eye for subtlety and symbolism. Apart from them, no one expected them, and no one was ready for them. What followed was a chaos unseen by any, and by the time it subsided, the world had changed for ever. 

The village is still there, though it looks very different. Poor villagers, who now speak a strange tongue with considerable difficulty, know that the treasure is still there, but can only peep from outside, for they have lost the key.

For Raif*

He insulted by making a disrespecting movie. He was killed. You said, "you asked for it; why did you make that disrespecting movie at first place"? 

He insulted by drawing a disrespecting cartoon. He was killed. You said, "you asked for it; why did you draw that disrespecting cartoon at first place"? 

He insulted by writing a disrespecting book. He was killed. You said, "you asked for it; why did you write that disrespecting book at first place"? 

He insulted by writing a disrespecting post on his blog. He was killed. You said, "you asked for it; why did you write that disrespecting post on your blog at first place"? 

He insulted by uttering a disrespecting word. He was killed. You said, "you asked for it; why did you utter that disrespecting word at first place"? 

He insulted by making a disrespecting gesture. He was killed. You said, "you asked for it; why did you make that disrespecting gesture at first place"? 

He insulted by raising a disrespecting head. He was killed. You said, "you asked for it; why did you raise your disrespecting head at first place"?

He insulted by asking a disrespecting question. He was killed. You said, "you asked for it; why did you ask that disrespecting question at first place"? 

He insulted by being. He was killed. You said, "you asked for it; why did you BE at first place"?      

This is not a mere point of view. And this is not a mere rhetoric. To BE anything but "submissive without doubt" (in other words Muslim) has been seen as disrespecting in their theology, as well as in their History. Book a ticket to Iran or Saudi Arabia to have first hand experience. There is no IS or Boko Haram there. If you are scared, that's exactly the point.

Here is the fact - there is no minority left in any country ruled by Sharia, forget about fancy things like democracy and human rights. Even in countries like Bangladesh, which owes its very existence to India, non-Muslim Hindus have been systematically eliminated by Muslim Hindus**. Day in and day out, the infidel crawls in dhimmitude, precisely as prescribed by Sharia. Did these non-Muslim Hindus draw cartoons too? Or were they killed just for their being infidels***?

It is this fact alone that is making the ongoing self-flagellation on cartoon controversy a farce. This is high-time we started to see beyond the smokescreens of propaganda, political correctness, and platitudes. In the age of internet, ignorance is a cardinal sin. Wake up, and switch on the light. Face the Truth.

*Raif Badawi - a blogger who insulted by writing a disrespecting post on his blog. Punishment by Sharia court - 1000 lashes and 10 years in prison. Today he received first installment of 50 lashes.

The whole edifice of this death cult stands on Fear (mostly among Muslims) and Ignorance (mostly among non-Muslims). Raif frightens because he defies Fear. Raif is a hero as a man and a superhero as a symbol. We owe him (and people like him) our freedom.

**Hindu - a Persian word, denoting those who live beyond the Sindhu (Indus) river. It doesn't mean anything else.

***Sounds outlandish? Read Quran. Refer to Quran 9:5 to start.

Issued in Public Interest

When a fanatic M kills you, instead of going berserk your family should be thankful to the millions of moderate Ms out there who didn't kill you so far, and saved you so far from the eternal fire of hell, where you are destined to be (as per their faith). The dhimmi heads ought to bow before the life-saving Inaction of the great, the compassionate, the merciful. Do the math; look at the positive; and have your rotting body removed before the accusing stink starts to upset the precious sensitivities around. 

Politics is the art of possible. Gandhi and his acolytes were bunch of rabble-rousing goons who routinely over-reacted to the sporadic excesses by few wayward Brits and ignored millions of others who believed in sunbathing and Wodehouse. He too chose to ignore the majority Christian Inaction and looked only at the actions of the fringe.

For that matter, did anyone care to count how many Nazis were NOT burning Jews? Is it not unfair to badmouth millions of innocent Nazis and their prophet Hitler* because of a handful few misguided Nazis? And who knows for sure - Jews might have provoked these boys in their vulnerable moments.. Don't forget - it is under the leadership of the prophet the lost race became such a huge power in such a short span of time. Is it not a divine miracle? 

Ah! If only the prophet had won the war! He would've relegated the reigning Last, his predecessor who he reportedly revered, to the second last. His word would've been hailed as the last word. If only! 

This is a call to enter this growing faith (practiced primarily by the left-liberal atheists) worshiping the holy trinity of the Arab-medium Allah as the creator, Moderate Muslim (and Spiderman) as the preserver, and the Offended-Victim (or Reluctant Fundamentalist) as the destroyer. This is the ONLY way to go. With my right hand firmly supported by the Holy Mein Kamph, I am speaking the truth, the only truth, and nothing but the truth.

*my faith! any problem?

Quiz - if one was to make a movie called "The First Holocaust', based on the events of History, who do you think the villain would be?

Restroom

As I was looking for the medicine I wanted, a salesgirl passed by me. She took a few steps before turning and asking - 

- Sir, can I help?

- Yes, thank you. I am looking for Benadryl.

- There it is, to the rightmost in the 3rd row from top. 

Before I could look in that direction, a voice coming from the other side pulled my attention.

- Why everyone is ignoring me! I am diabetic, and I need to go to the restroom. It has already been fifteen minutes. I can't wait any longer. Can I see the manager?

She was about 70 years old, may be more, with some contraption wrapped around her right leg. With that big a body, life must have been too heavy for her to drag. Moreover, she had a cart to push around, carrying around her belongings, perhaps all her belongings in it. In the cold world out, she was homeless. Her dignity was still there on her face, probably misplaced and certainly wounded. It seemed to me that she had seen better days.

- What's the matter with these guys? They come to our country and get everything. And see how they treat an old citizen! We open our doors for them, and they deny us a restroom! 

Since the salesgirl had left muttering something on her phone, she was talking to me now. She needed to be heard; and she needed to hear someone else.

I didn't know what to do. I looked down. 

- I have used this restroom before. I clean it before leaving, sometimes before using. But they make me suffer. They have no mercy, these guys. I wish someone pees in the aisle. Being a female I cannot do that. But I wish someone did. That would serve them well. 

I wanted to help her but I couldn't. After all I was not the manager. Or perhaps I could. I could have requested the salesgirl to help her. Or I could have helped her with few pennies to pay in public toilet. But nothing occurred to me then. I had been surprised by the situation. 

Moreover, I had my own issues to deal with. I had not found the medicine I wanted. It was late and I had to decide between buying a different Benadryl or waiting for the next day. Right at that moment, I was expected to do the right thing by many people, and I was going to disappoint all of them.

- May be our senator should see this. May be he should see how they treat us. May be he should get the immigration rules changed to filter out people like these.

I took whatever Benadryl there was and rushed towards the cash counter. I had a long list but I was not sure I wanted to buy anything from that store. I stood in the queue, waiting for my turn. There were many counters, but I didn't see a single soul.

My turn came, and the automatons did what they had been programmed to do. 

-  What else one can expect from you! The place you come from is well known to torture people. Now you come here to torture us. What else one can expect from you! 

She emptied herself, but left without relief. The door of restroom remained closed. All of us were helpless. None could open it. 

On Rafi

Man is destined to be consumed - by flames or by worms. There is no escape, even in the safe lockers of pyramids. Ironically enough, these mummies don't remind us of immortality. On the contrary, they show that even high-and-mighty are brought down to dust by the ticking clock. 

You too have been claimed by the ticking clock, and consumed by worms. However, thanks to that magic wand of science, a part of you is alive and singing. Like the pyramids, your work, which is love made audible*, will last. What makes you immortal is not a clever trick of alchemy but a touch of divinity, for you were gifted, you were blessed. And blessed are those who can feel you in their heart, who can witness your gift. 

No matter what the experts make us believe, more often than not the best works of art don't put you in discomfort. For me, the best works of art lift you, hold you, embrace you, and comfort you. That's what your voice did to many of us, Md Rafi. You gave us comfort in countless nights of loneliness and longing. You still do. And you will, forever. 

And so you'll live, forever.

*"Work is love made visible". - Khalil Gibran

"The purpose of life is to find your gift. The meaning of life is to give it away". - Picasso