Everything that is a matrix

I was reading an answer on Quora today about how people with religion are happier than the ones without. It was at first sight, an answer that was more anecdotal and less data driven. But it did talk about religion from the pov of an atheist.

It brings me to mind snippet of a conversation that I had with my dad years ago. He told me how atheism was depressing and god gave you a sense of belonging. Well, I have been pretty much atheistic for 2.5 years now and it has been a journey so to speak.

The answer spoke about how man is a social animal, and religion gives a sense of social structure and belonging. My sister and I have wondered about this sense of belonging, knowing your place in the world, a sense of identity etc,  that religion gave us, but which seems to be missing in our lives ever since we gave up on religion.

But here’s the thing. Religion was the matrix that we lived in. Everything wasn’t hunky dory, we believed that a supreme power was watching over us and making sure that our lives were good, or at least without too much suffering. All of this, is a lie. There comes a day when someone shows us the red pill and the blue pill. In this case the pills were always there in front of us albeit without a Morpheus. In my case, I chose the red pill once and came back to the matrix. I was simply not ready. To take the world on my own. But the next time I was offered a choice, I chose the red pill and this time I went all the way down the rabbit hole. I saw the truth, or rather the lies that I had been covering myself with.

Here’s the funny thing about the bliss that comes with ignorance. It is blissful only as long as you are ignorant of your ignorance. Once you are aware of your ignorance, it is not blissful anymore. Not that life is blissful now. It is not an easy thing to throw away something that defined you, that you defined yourself with all your life. It starts a painful journey of self discovery and it’s not one that a lot of people want to take. Mind you, I don’t think there is anything wrong with it. We all choose what helps us sleep at night. But having been an atheist, I cannot go back to praying. The act doesn’t come with the relief anymore. My mind recognizes it for the empty act that it is. I have to confess, I miss it. Atheism has made my life more difficult. But so has choosing to study, to leave my home country, and to leave the comforts of my home and travel. But all these things make me stronger. I hope for atheism too, to make me stronger everyday.

Trees and woods – Judge Karnan

I am sure that by now every single person knows about Judge Karnan’s controversial judgement. We have read enough jokes and snides on Facebook and Twitter. A number of guys have taken this opportunity to declare their ‘marriage’ with the likes of Sunny Leone and several others. Thanks to a sensationalistic title from The Hindu, the real point of the judgement is lost.

It was disappointing to see The Hindu’s fall in standards to that of TOI’s. At least most of the people who read TOI, know what they are getting into. But, you don’t expect a stunt like this from the Hindu. It is disheartening because that particular title in my opinion, is majorly responsible for all this furore. When you see any sub-standard newspaper printing something sensational, people take that with a pinch of salt. But, when it is the Hindu, people assume that it must be true, because it is The Hindu. I am from Chennai and I have grown up with this newspaper. I have defended it to outsiders who have called it boring. A small part of me died that day.

The Hindu, however, is not the only party to be blamed. The majority of the blame lies with all those people who posted witty and funny statuses and tweets. It was disheartening to see that people did not even bother reading the article fully. When I saw all that, it made me wonder whether any one had even bothered reading the actual judgement. You can read it here.

They say that the law is open to interpretation. So, no matter what the words spoken by the Judge in the media were, the judgement is clear enough. It does not say that anyone and everyone who has pre-marital sex is married. It merely talks about retribution for those men who have wronged women. If a man and a woman consummate their relationship and then decide to part ways mutually, the Court is not going to come after them calling them husband and wife. If however, if the man leaves the woman after promising her marriage, the woman now has a legal avenue to right the wrong. Personally, I felt heartened to see this kind of a progressive judgement from our courts. When the country is reeling from all the wrongdoings perpetrated to women, this judgement is a feather in the cap.

Anyone with half an intelligence could have bothered to read the judgement to see what it really was saying before posting tweets and status messages. This landmark judgement could help so many women who have been wronged for centuries. If every one of them had understood this judgement for what it was, they could have spread awareness by posting the judgement instead of inane remarks on their statuses. There are so many of us who personally know women who have been wronged by men on false premises. Rather than making a joke out of something like this, let us see it for what it really us and do our bit for the women in our society. The next time you rant about the politicians of our country, look inside and ask yourself whether you are a responsible citizen. Most of us were in our teens when we signed up for Facebook and Twitter. We are older and so it is up to us to be responsible too. The absence of accountability on social networking does not mean that we can abuse our fundamental right of speech.

Vote for heaven

“Mumbai cha Raja. Vote for Ganpat from Fort as the best Ganesh. Send in your sms now”.

Doesn’t make sense? Yeah it took me a few blinks too to actually believe that what I was seeing was true and not something cooked up by some drunkard. Once when I was climbing the seven hills of Tirupati and saw all the shops lining the footpath, I was convinced that religion was commercialized enough; until I saw this. How can someone, anyone come up with something like this? Think about it. How are you supposed to vote for the best God? Not even different Gods, the same God from different places in the same city. I am a religious person myself, which is why it irks me to no end when I see people use religion and faith to just make money. Say I do vote for the Ganpat from this temple, what do I get? A passport to heaven from this idol? So what about the other idols in other places? Would they be angry with me for not voting for them?

Correct me if I am wrong, but I have always believed that God does not punish you unless you have erred grievously and harmed someone else in the process. When I see something like this I want to hide my face in embarrassment. No wonder my atheist friends give me a hard time about religion and believing in God. It is people like this (read morons who do not know where to stop) who give people like me (believers) a bad name.

P.S: While I hate to say this I am very sure that a few hundred idiots at least, would have voted for some Ganpat or the other. People, if you want to go to heaven or do God’s work, then donate a few bucks or your old clothes to a nearby orphanage. Whether you go to heaven or not, you would certainly put a smile on a few faces and yours too if you think about it.

Boulevard of broken dreams

Disclaimer! This post has nothing to do with the Green day song.

This post is about the wonderful walk that I took on the roads of Mumbai. Mumbai has everything that an Indian metropolitan has; dirty roads, vehicles to and from all directions, people everywhere, animals running along. You get the picture. However, what makes Mumbai unique is the speed of the life here. Don’t mistake me. By speed I don’t mean to say that you will find vehicles whizzing at the speed of sound. Far from that in fact. Traffic in Mumbai is crawling at its best and frozen at its worst. A friend of mine in fact calls Mumbai one of the slowest cities he has ever been to. The speed I am talking about is the sense of frenzy and hurry that you get just by looking at the people. Everyone is in a hurry to get somewhere. People are either rushing to work, or dropping their kids, delivering newspapers or something. Every railway station and bus stop is filled with people waiting to go somewhere. Every auto rickshaw is filled. It makes you wonder whether this city ever rests or sleeps.

Even a casual walk turns into a battle to get somewhere. People behind you are pushing you to walk faster and there are people walking towards you so fast that you cannot help jumping out of the way. For some, this might sound scary, but this life rejuvenates me like no other. In a way it reminds me of my life in Berlin, albeit a dirty and more populated Berlin.

Mumbai is full of weird things, but the weirdest of them all is the battle between the climate and the weather where the climate always wins. It does not matter if there is a thunderstorm with buckets of rains from the heavens pouring down on everyone. Mumbai is hot and humid; always. You can walk in a torrential downpour and still manage to sweat profusely. At least in Chennai, when it rains the climate gives in and blesses people with a respite from the sun. But here in Mumbai, short of carrying an A/C I don’t think there is any relief.

The most amazing thing about Mumbai is its spirit. When you look at the people who make this city what it is, you can’t help being swept over by it. When you see the ‘chai wala’ diligently getting up at 4 in the morning to go about his business and when you see the ice cream vendor opening his shop at sharp 5 in the evening, you see resilience. You see women rushing to their work and making friends with their fellow companions in the trains, you see pride. The feminist in you is proud. And the human even more.

After all, that is what this post is all about; a salute to one of the greatest cities I’ve ever seen.

 

P.S: Sorry my friend, I don’t agree with you about PUNE being faster than Mumbai!! 😀

End of the C and L

India against Corruption! The entire country has been chanting this for the past few months. The long suppressed middle class took to the streets to fight it out. No matter where they went, one would see protesters wearing the famous ‘Anna’ cap and screaming their lungs out. The public has won. The government has agreed to everything in the Lokpal and all is well that ends well.

Or is it?

While a corruption free India seems to be what everyone wants is that what people really want? Can the Indians really live without corruption? Do not mistake me, I am not saying that corruption is good for the society. As an economics student I know the perils of parallel economy well enough. I am just trying to look at the other side of this opaque window. While end of corruption certainly means end of bad quality in almost all faction of the society it is certainly only a means to an end that our country is far from reaching. Because end of corruption means that the 21 year old boy who sells pani poori on the roads every evening by paying a 30 bucks bribe to the local police cannot continue to do so anymore. So what should he do now? He needs to feed the hungry mouths in his house so he does not have the luxury of attending college and earning a degree. In the extreme case he might of course take to the uglier sects of the society to feed his family. I am not saying that every jobless person turns into a thief, but that is where it begins. Even if this boy gets a day job somewhere, the country has effectively suppressed his dream to own his own business and one more entrepreneur has died before he could breathe.

The Lokpal is only the first step for our country in its path towards development. Unfortunately, we have a long way to go before India can even touch the foothills of this monumental mountain that we are planning to climb. It is impossible for any one leader or party to carry such a huge burden uphill. The people of India and every one of them from the billionaires to the last beggar should shoulder this responsibility. Till date our population has been our downfall. Our country is suffering from the burden of over population and our government from trying to keep everyone afloat. It is time for us to work individually and collectively for our country and for all of us. It is high time the people of our country join hands together. We have shown each other and ourselves the strength of our unity by winning the Lokpal bill. Now let us continue showing our spirit towards each other. Let us all pay taxes. Let us not pay bribes. Let us not look the other way when we see something wrong happening. I agree it is not an easy thing to do, but nothing worth achieving is. Remember that every time we do something right, we are correcting a small screw in this complex, defunct machine. It took a billion people to mess up this machine. Now it is going to take all of us to put it right.

If all of us perform our duties there is no way but up.

The book that lives – Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows II

After all these years, we the Potterers have come to the end of this great journey; the final movie in the Harry Potter series. If we, the dedicated Potter fans thought that the movie would do justice to the last part of the book, then we were highly disappointed. By itself, the movie was brilliant; the pace was just right, they had put in all the essential information without boring the viewer, and the visual effects were enthralling. Unfortunately, adaptations cannot stand alone. They need the book and the readers for judgement and the last part failed at this.

This might look like I am nitpicking, but hey I am a true blue Harry Potter fan and I can’t help make comparisons.

Changes that were good:

1) Harry’s torments when Horcruxes are destroyed. Nice touch.

2) Snape crying over Lily’s body. Touching.

3) Hogwarts protected by the good side’s spells. Beautiful and breathtaking.

4) The final dome formed from Harry and Voldemort’s spells.

Changes that were definitely a no-no:

1) RON HERMIONE KISS!! How could they do this to us?? After 4 years of waiting to see it on-screen, it was an utter disappointment.

2) Molly Weasley’s duel with Bella. Molly is furious guys. Fred has already been killed and Bella was about to kill Ginny. Molly is in a rage not cowering like a weakling, unsure of her spells.

3) Voldemort and Harry DO NOT DUEL!! Harry cannot even think of dueling with Voldy. He is just not that skilled. And Harry has the Elder Wand, which means that any duel would automatically result in an outright victory for Harry.

4) After 19 years, people grow old! Harry, and Ginny looked like kids playing with their parents’ dresses!

5) RON! What is wrong with the makers? Harry, Ron and Hermione are the Golden TRIO, not the Duo and Ron! Do you people hate Ron? Why don’t you let him speak for Merlin’s sake?

6) After years and years of people telling Harry that he has Lily’s green eyes, the girl playing Lily had brown eyes. At that point, I didn’t know whether to laugh or to cry.

I could of course go on and on, but it would only depress me further. Got to go and read the books to lighten my mind. Nothing can ever live up to the books and my own imagination.

All was well.

Terrorism – Timed to a T

Mumbai has been attacked again and 8 people have been killed. It has been less than three years since Mumbai was attacked violently. The incident brought the holes in the Indian security to international shame. Mumbai has still not recovered from those wounds and today we see another series of attacks. Not one attack but three! Ideally speaking, this should not have happened ever gain. We have Kasab, the guy responsible for the 26/11 attacks and we should have gleaned all information from him and publicly flogged him and hung him. But no, our government has other plans. Top security status, extreme media publicity, and still no punishment. If our government had not shot him down then one can only assume that they use him for other purposes; the only one that comes to my mind is to use information from him to prevent future attacks. Well today’s attacks have proved that if that is indeed the plan of our government, it has become hopelessly futile.

For a country that self proclaims to be peaceful, we sure have a history marred with bloodshed. One cannot change what happened in the past, but one can surely learn lessons from it? The only lesson that I see from the 26/11 incident is that our government is incapable of protecting its citizens. More than 40% of India’s budget was allocated to spending on defense. And this is the result. 8 people dead. India needs to fight terrorism yes, but it is not the people who have to do it contrary to popular belief. It is the people’s representatives who are duty bound to do it. The reason why we have elected people to the top is because we trust them to do the job so that we can work and take care of our families in peace. People can be only so much vigilant. We cannot walk the streets fearing every dustbin and every tiffin box. Nor can we walk around with weapons.  If every Indian has to resort to lifting arms to protect himself, it can mean only one thing;

Death of democracy.

Numerero

Numbers. Mathematics. Algebra. Trigonometry. Calculus.

I think 6 out of 10 kids would get nightmares thinking of these. Kids usually hate numbers and working with them. I hated numbers too when I was a kid, but not because I hated working with them but I loved working with them. I would get very frustrated when I did not get problems right. That was my first glimpse of the real world. I was always under the assumption that if you love something enough, you would automatically become very good at it considering how passionate you are about it. What a load! I have always loved numbers and still do yet I am not even remotely good.

Numbers are fascinating. They have a clear logic about them that is unfailingly perfect. You can play around with numbers, but never really master them (or maybe it is just me who can’t). I always tend to think in terms of numbers. A friend of mine who had an Intercultural Communication class told me that her professor told her, that my country people tend to think in terms of numbers. Let us face it. We are generally good with numbers (the exception being yours truly) than the average. Maybe it has something to do with a huge population and a consequent dearth of resources that had led us to practise our equi marginal utilities since we were kids.

But what is it about numbers that is fascinating? Sure,they are logical and all that, but so are several other things in life. Like, time, for example. One cannot change or alter time though one can tweak one’s perception of it. But why numbers? Because, they tell you the truth, or at least whether something is being hidden. If you are adept enough, you can truly garner enough information from numbers even from someone who is very good at coding things. Because numbers are truly logical, given enough time, once can discern any kind of information from numbers. This is probably why cryptography is so sought after. Because, numbers can hide, nothing.

And life goes on

Inspiration comes to you at the most random moments, which is probably why one should immense oneself in routine everyday work so as to relax the brain so that its neurons can dazzle you (yet again) with some amazing theory. Washing dishes, taking bath, washing clothes, mopping the floor all have their uses. Do I see a connection with water here? I digress.

Time and again, I have spoken a lot about time and this time, I will be doing it again. What does the phrase “Life goes on” really means? One cannot speak about it unless one has gone through it. Human beings are far more brave than they give themselves credit for. So, when tragedy strikes, humans eventually cope, in their own ways. Some face it head on, some retreat into their safe cocoons and come out when they are strong enough, while ignore the issues and go on like nothing ever happened. No matter the facade, wounds and their scars always remain inside, slowly healing, sometimes scabbing, sometimes bleeding, never disappearing completely.

Some say time heals everything while others say that time merely covers everything up but nothing ever really changes. I don’t know which school of thought I believe in, but I believe that time really does change things, or at least our perspective of them. Until 4 months back, I never thought that I would be able to live without my mom’s food. I am not a foodie myself, but home food occupied a very important position in my palate. Berlin has helped me find my own home food, which is certainly not as good as my mom’s lovely edibles, but nonetheless has a little of my pride in it and makes it palatable for me.

Take Tamil for example. I may not be the most eloquent speaker of Tamil, but I can certainly carry an entire conversation in Tamil and I love the language, its grammatical twists, its poetic beauties and its puns. I love verbally battling it out with my friends in Tamil and Tamil PJs (mokkais) are my absolute favourites. Once upon a time, I thought that it would be absolutely impossible for me to live without Tamil surrounding me on all sides. After 2 years of near complete absence of Tamil from my life, I have learnt that I could actually live without Tamil (albeit painfully).

These are just two examples. Was it the presence of time or the absence of stimulus that led to this ‘moving on’? I personally am of the view that it was a combination of both. We human beings are remarkably adaptive things. As we lose things around us, we quickly learn to live without them and before we know it, we even forget their existence. Time or adaptation, whatever we choose to call it, the fact remains that one can always move on over something that was and is no more. All that it needs is a true adaptation and acceptance of the change. Kickboxing helps too. 🙂

Visual treats

It has been a long time since I watched a match like this; nail biting, unmoving, adrenaline rushing and all that. Who would have thought that tennis would keep me hooked like this? Certainly not myself. I was never much interested in tennis because I considered it too slow and not too exciting at that. Talk about narrow minded. Today I bow down to the beauty of this game. It was terribly exciting and I did not even once glance at the clock which is saying something because I have a loaded schedule. I honestly don’t know much about techniques and stuff in tennis, but it was obvious even to a novice like me that this match was a classic. The tennis world has become dynamic than ever. The world is now seeing a new star on the tennis horizon, Djokovic and what a player. He is determination, perseverance personified. At no point of the game did he ever give up; not that he needed to. He was at the top almost throughout the game. Nadal might have the advantage of sheer strength, but it is Djokovic who persisted. He knew his strength and played up to it fully. Of all the long rallies, Nadal could take only few; it was Djokovic who overpowered Nadal in terms of longevity. Djokovic is now the World No 1 and the new Wimbledon champion. I am not sure how consistent he can be, or anything about form, but I sure am glad that I could watch the match where he won these statuses.