मेरे घर का पता ...

I got married recently. And as per the perplexing traditions of our society, I left my parent's home and entered a new home with a loving new family. Amidst all the celebrations and excitement, I wonder where do I belong now... This blog defines that for me. (I will include the English translation sometime later.)

जहां आसमान कुछ ज्यादा बड़ा सा है

जहां बोली का रंग थोड़ा खरा सा है

जहां धूप में कुछ ज्यादा गर्मी सी है

जहां हाथों में कुछ ज्यादा नरमी सी है

जहां फूटपाथ के किनारों पर पेड़ो के पत्ते कुछ धुन्दले से हैं

और सडकों पर बेवजह मेले से हैं

जहां गमलों के पौधों में कहीं एक गुलाब भी है

जहां रातों को छत से दिखता एक आफताब भी है

जहां पहलू में बंधा चाबी का एक गुच्छा है

जहां अचारों की अम्बियाँ का स्वाद अभी कच्चा है

जहां आँगन की धूप में कपड़े कुछ पके से हैं

और गिलहरियों के चबाये कुछ चने बिखरे से हैं

जहां चिरय्या के हौद में बाजरा अब भी रहता है

जहां सड़क पर राह चलता कभी भैया कहता है

जहां पेड़ों की ठंडी छांव है

गली के उसी किसी कोने में मेरा मकान है.

-----------------------------------------------Transliterated version--------------------------------------------

Jahaan aasman kuchh zyaada bada sa hai

Jahaan boli ka rang thoda khara sa hai

Jahaan dhoop mein kuchh zyaada garmi si hai

Jahaan haathon mein kuchh zyaada narmi si hai

Jahaan footpath ke kinaron par pedon ke patte kuchh dhundle se hain

aur sadkon par bewajah mele se hain

Jahaan gamlon ke paudhon mein kahin ek gulab bhi hai

Jahaan raaton ko chhat se dikhta ek aftaab bhi hai

Jahaan pehloo mein bandha chabi ka ek guchchha hai

Jahaan acharon ki ambiyan ka swad abhi kachcha hai

Jahaan aangan ki dhoop mein kapde kuchh pake se hain

aur gilhariyon ke chabaye kuchh chane bikhre se hain

Jahaan chirayya ke haude mein bajra ab bhi rehta hai

Jahaan sadak par raah chalta kabhi bhaiya kehta hai

Jahaan pedon ki thandi chhaaon hai

gali ke usi kisi kone mein mera makaan hai.


                                                              -- Archana

A Bedtime Story

I am not aware of the exact origin of this story but I heard it from my mother and it has stayed with me all these years.

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There was once a coastal town where the townspeople were dominantly fishermen who used to cast their nets in the waters to catch fish and sold it in the market to earn their living. They had been doing this for generations and gradually the fish population near the coast dwindled. This led them to decide that they need to go deeper into the seas to catch enough fish to subsist themselves. With time, they had also grown prosperous and had better boats and stronger nets to withhold the oceanic currents and hence they went off to their expeditions farther away from the coast. It improved matters and they started returning with bigger catches but they soon realized that the fish they caught did not taste the same as before. The customers who bought them complained that they tasted stale. The fishermen thought about it and figured out that earlier they used to catch fish near the coast and the time between the fishing and selling was relatively shorter. Now since they go farther from the coasts, by the time they return with the catch it didn’t remain fresh as before. So they all decided to carry large boxes of ice where they started storing the caught fish. Nonetheless, the customers still complained that the fish still would not taste as good as before. So it was decided that the fishermen would not kill the fish instantly but rather keep them alive till they reach the shore so that the dead fish would not go stale and tastes like the live fish off the coast. For this they carried large vats of water on their boats in which they dropped the fish caught in their nets. Now the fish remained alive till they reached the coast but, alas, the customers complained that something was missing and the fish would still not taste the same. This impelled a serious rethink among fishermen as this had started affecting their sales now. They observed that the fish in the large vats do not really swim around that much and hence they came up with a new idea. In the large vats, along with the small tasty fish they caught for food, they put a small shark. Due to the presence of the shark the small fish swam around furiously just as it did in the open ocean. Of course the shark would eat away some of the small fish but the fisherman still retained eighty percent of the catch. This is what they did and lo and behold, the customers said: wow, what fine fish you caught, it tastes just like before. And the fishermen were very happy.

Life is just like the small fish and the shark represents the various problems we face at different turns of our life. These problems keep us on our toes, in absence of which our life may lose its juice just like the small fish.

War on terror turns a corner

It is quite risky to write anything about Mr. Laden in general. Not least because he was the biggest goon of the world and the organization he spearheaded still lurks in some murky hole. More importantly, in view of recent developments the number of new snippets on his death far outnumber his alleged sightings while he was still alive (which is really saying something) running the bigger risk of sounding stale or redundant (or both)!

But I am ready to take this huge personal risk on this momentous occasion in the history of modern world. This is because it is so important to believe and record this event. Even though Al-Qaeda still survives, maybe as a mere shadow of its former powerful self, and the terror it perpetrated has metamorphosed into a faceless form defying boundaries - impossible to be contained within the 18 feet high walls of the triangular compound in which its head was captured; the capture and assassination of its head had become far too important to assert the 'don't mess with us' attitude of any human being who despises the dangerous world it wanted to bequeath our generations to come. This war has come a long way from being a struggle between good and evil and attained the status of a battle for survival. It has become the fight for the right to live, the right to choose and the right to progress.

The circumstances and details of his capture also underscore a significant shift in the way we perceive international diplomacy. The fact that he was sniffed out on Pakistan soil by USA does not undermine the tenet of sovereignty, rather adds a corollary to the idea of a free nation. The right to existence and independence as a nation or an individual is not absolute but comes riddled with responsibility, in absence of which it becomes obsolete. If you harbor a terrorist in your house, it can be bombed without issuing you a memo on a on a paper carrying official stamp and duly signed by the local municipal authorities. The fact or fiction about Pakistan's establishment being oblivious from start (= osama being right under their nose) to finish ( = US choppers, how and when ??? ) does not really stand its ground as a counter-argument for more than one reasons. It, in fact, gives us a cause for even greater worry and calls for more stringent international vigilance for Pakistan. A nuclear-capable state full of incompetent oblivious authorities, with "helpful" agencies like ISI at close call can be an inviting haven for any terrorist seeking refuge.

Pakistan will do well to learn from the recent uprisings in the middle east which have ushered the Islamic world into an era of International liberalism after a long winter. The extremist organizations like Al-Qaeda were conspicuous in the recent Arab spring by their absence. Its opportune coincidence with the killing of global mascot of intolerance has thrown us a rare opportunity to uproot the diffuse, yet weakening, global network of terror from its very roots.

Once upon a time I used to be a libran

Once upon a time I used to be a libran - not any more (People who are familiar with the zodiac signs will know that this is not a misspelt version of liberal, which I am not as will be evident shortly). Yes the apocalypse has preponed its date with earth (at least for me) and displaced all the zodiac signs forward by one month. If you want to know how that happened, check this link. But more importantly I am sick worried now what?

I am a virgo now going by the new zodiac rulebook. From being a charming, kind and romantic soul appreciating finer things in life (my modesty prevents me from adding any further), I unwillingly transform into a practical, inflexible and reserved bloke loving health foods (what happens to all the junk food which used to sustain me thick and thin - the latter rarely though!). Gone are the blissful days of indecisive languor, I will be seen fussing over cleanliness and hygiene both inside and off my plate with a tenacity which classifies almost as blasphemy in the libran cult. Also my used-to-be fellow librans, lay off your secret ambitions of a career in fine arts, for now you need to be pouring over volumes preparing to be a doctor or scientist ...imagine! And this is just the beginning of the astrophysical tyranny of astronomical proportions (literally too!). I was really anxious to know about my new zodiac identity so I skirmished some webpages on their traits. All the virgos seem to suffer an OCD (obsessive-compulsive disorder) about orderliness. Librans live life king size on a king size bed (queen in my case) strewn with anything required for human existence not farther than a foot. And what's up with this lady of the actual virgo sign (what she keeps holding one wonders) - Google told me that it signifies a virgin and obviously belongs to the feminine class of zodiac signs. On the other hand, libra is a masculine macho sign of the zodiac - look at Mahatama Gandhi, Amitabh Bachchan (go getters all of us). So, to sum up, this is what I have got after this celestial rearrangement.. from being this super balanced cool girl, I turn into this cleanliness-obsessed tyrant. I am angry!

But every cloud has a silver lining (like virgos save more money!). Me and my fiance have always faced curious to sympathetic glances of how incompatible librans and capricorns are (he was born in January, the birth month of all those cerebral boring people who faint at the idea of having fun). I hear that virgos and capricorns get along well though. But hey, even he is not a capricorn any more... :(

Pirates of Information

It seems that I have been suffering from writer's block (without being one!) or am simply short on time or both - hence the dismal rate of blogging. I have attempted to disregard both and made a fresh attempt below. Hopefully, I'll be more regular from now on!


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For anyone who lives in today's world and has access to internet, to know what a person across the diameter on the globe is doing is no deal. The burgeoning membership of sites like facebook, twitter et. al. have clearly done more to make this world a truly global village than all the the social and political reformations combined. Even the celebrity cult which , by definition, is often considered aloof in a hallowed sort of way has been seduced by this wave of bare-it-all (on a different beat though). Every single detail of every single moment of one's life can be 'shared', 'downloaded', 'discussed' and 'tweeted about'.

This wave of open access has recently assumed a much more controversial face in geopolitical scenario under the name of 'WikiLeaks'. It started with a release of 25000 diplomatic cables, obtained illicitly by Wikileaks(wonder how?,) which threaten to 'change' the face of world politics. Julian Assange, the public face of wikileaks and an australian-born hacker, asserted in a recent interview to TIME magazine that this will lead to a major rearrangement of viewings about many different countries. But will it? Going by the content of the leaks most of the 'revelations' have been a mere confirmation of what the world, inside and outside the corridors of power brokers, already knew. (There have been some amusing additions though, like the one where a US diplomat considers the North Korean dictator Kim Jong II 'flabby'). In addition, however, this exercise threatens to endanger the fuel that is crucial to run the engine of world politics - diplomacy. The art of diplomacy usually finds no common ground with transparency even in everyday life, least in the machiavellian ways of politics which are aptly described by someone as follows:

"In international politics, the union of two thieves who have their hands so deeply inserted into each others' pockets that they cannot separately plunder a third."

Even in real life if we are able to read each other's thoughts, I am not sure how may friendships will survive this open access lifestyle.

An even graver argument against such an exercise comes from an apparently unrelated incident which occurred on the Rutgers University campus (New Jersey) a few months back. A student committed suicide after his intimate encounter with another student in his room was published by his roommate on the internet via a web-camera left connected deliberately. The outrage felt at such flagrant invasions of privacy was evident in the harsh punishments requested by various parents and students.

I find the parallel between this episode and the recent release of classified information by Wikileaks disturbing. In both the cases the information was illicitly obtained without the knowledge of people involved in the scene and the release was preceded by boisterous claims. However, the ends to which the released information is used was clear in the Rutgers case (the apathetic idea of fun of a pathetic individual); in the case of Wikileaks the intent of the release is claimed (and hoped) to be more credible. Whether such a claim holds and will it lead to indeed more scrutiny and accountability for the state machineries across the world remains to be seen. For now it has shattered the flimsy comfort zones that thinly veiled the dangers within - let us hope this shakes the players on the world stage out of their complacent slumber. They will need to act fast before all hopes of a peaceful coexistence 'leak' away into oblivion.

Zara hatke music...

Check out the following youtube videos of a 19 year old who has a great voice and attitude for music. It will make you rethink about the various ad jingles we have grown up hearing and humming ... :)

The New Age Reality

Why will anyone sane tolerate some`thing' (someone maybe) like this? What is wrong with all of us? To what levels of voyeurism can we stretch ourselves....

These emotions are not an outburst any more - I have got used to feeling like this whenever I read about reality shows. I can't help not reading about them - the extensive coverage our media wallahs bestow on inki-pinki-dimpy is just phenomenal in its reach and obnoxious in its sheer volume. I have honestly started missing the doordarshan days when we all used to wait for 9:00 p.m. hindi news and 9:30 p.m. English news read by suave and elegant anchors like Salma Sultan, Minu Talwar, Rini ..(I forget her last name...). The content was usually centered around news (anyone of the current generation will be surprised!!) from national and international events inevitably ending with the char mahanagron ka tapmaan....(nostalgia..sigh!!).

Fast forward 20 years. Now the news studios are much better equipped with a constant array of flashy pictures behind the anchors sitting petite amidst a barrage of bright reds and greens. The reporters now have a much more informal and relaxed disposition to begin with and look like celebrities themselves - and all this could have been for the good you know! Unfortunately most of the times things do not work like that - you cannot giggle and pull your face in weird angles to compensate for abject lack of journalistic intelligence and substance especially when you pretend to work for a 'responsible' news channel. Period. I guess that is why news channels are making the smart move of redefining what is news all about in the first place - something which even a moron from the road can have an opinion and get away with. You do not need to be an Einstein to predict that once again the TRP ratings are highest for some Ekta Kapoor serial, or Amitabh Bachchan has landed yet another deal with few more crore in his kitty, or Rakhi sawant is deciding to do a jhatka dance in her forthcoming movie... the list is endless. Then again things do not stop here. I still vividly remember when Aishwarya Rai got hurt during shooting one of her films - one 'sabse tez' channel did a full half an hour feature where one of their journalists was asked to permanently camp outside the hospital where she was admitted and diligently cover all her visitors. The beacon of responsible journalism did not extinguish here. We were also illuminated with the time-resolved details of the tragedy as a digital clock kept clicking dutifully in the lower right hand corner of the screen while the journalist followed and questioned various visitors. I am not being apathetic all you Aishwarya rai fans out there - maybe you all really needed to know all this about your screen diva. At least she is good looking folks! But now this has gone too far...Rahul Mahajan !!?? Okay we can be interested how he was discovered almost dead on drugs soon after his famous father Pramod Mahajan's death, maybe how he was doing when he was jailed, maybe even when he decided to enter big boss house and coo sweet nothings into ears of some wannabe .... and then his swayamwar ..really? And now how many people can be genuinely interested in the even more tamsha this tamasha wedding is throwing all over the place, or how many women has he beaten up till date or when does he reunite with his battered and bruised darling wife? COME ON... give us a break! (I am sure Late Mr. Mahajan must be tossing and turning in his grave - he could have taken a few PR lessons from his media-savvy son to improve the fortunes of his party which is becoming increasingly obsolete on the political scene).

The argument which is usually forwarded in such cases is that of demand and supply. It seems many of us can't resist the cheap thrills of having a peep into anyone's and anybody's life, especially if it comes loaded with with all the nautanki! Let us start by at least refraining from calling it 'reality' television --- the glaring light of media cameras are adept at distorting, changing and engineering illusions. Further, I am not entirely convinced of the demand-supply argument --- imagine yourself walking down a road when you encounter a madman doing some weird antics. You are bound to give it a longer look than usual and might even be interested in what he is up to. He might garner a bunch of onlookers, in fact, if his maneuvers are sufficiently entertaining and non-dangerous. But does this imply that we find this nuisance engaging enough to be forced down our throats 5 days a week through a reality show where 10 madmen compete for some big sum of money by being their eccentric best (I should patent this idea I guess ...going by the times, you never know!)?? The unfortunate truth is that channels consider even their audience eccentric enough, to not only digest this rubbish but sometimes also participate in it by furiously voting for their favorite..er..madman.

So let us call upon Prannoy Roy on 'The World This Week' to announce that some 'Rajni' round the 'Nukkad' got along with 'Jasoos Karamchand' to save 'Hum log' from this 'Circus'. Hope that this will not turn out to be one of the 'Mungeri Lal ke Haseen Sapne'.