Friday, December 19

Snowed Out

Walking on a lonely road amongst evergreen trees, capped with snow, as the rays of the setting sun reflects a golden glow on the snow flakes by your feet .

The above statement is best enjoyed as a sentence on a piece of paper. Its not fun, especially the last 15 minutes of the hour long walk. Not fun at all.

Tuesday, November 25

Long time, no post, so here we go.

To start, those six letters that was so definitive of everything that I was for the past 4 years is no longer a reality. I miss my old life, friends and the identity that it provided me with. Then again, going along the lines of the second question in this article, time transforms not only your surrounding, but you "the person" as well. So me missing my past is about as realistic as me "missing" Brad Pitt's life. Pointless, both of those thoughts are.

Philosophically, I have kind of reached a stale-mate with my own arguing self. The fourth question in the aforementioned article is something that I have written about and thought about for many wasted lenghts of time. The fact that its not just me is mostly certainly comforting.

The never ending serials that has often given me company and solace throughout days and nights have taken a back seat. Its been more than 6 months since I productively utilized an entire day (and night) watching episodes after episode. A friend of mine recently called me a "TV junkie" for watching one episode per day. Hearing this, The Grand Father of all Knowledge is, I am sure, laughing his big fat brain out.

Ok, meanwhile, as all human beings know,a financial, economic and social crisis have hit our economies, banks and soceities. A combination of fate and fortune ( I really dont know which) ensured that I was the spectator and not a gladiator in the ensuing saga. I like movies; being the spectator is good. You can choose sides and explore all the emotions, still retaining the option to leave the hall unscathed. More on this later.

More recently, this news and this news had been a source of great pride for me. That was until this news appeared and now I am eagerly waiting for one more to wrap up all that pride and put it into a dumpster. Cheers to co-patriots.

Wednesday, June 11

Doomsday 2012

Nothing better than a doomsday conspiracy theory to cheer one up on a boring day! :)

Read this and this for a rather critical take on the whole issue. Read this for the fun, masala and escape from trivialities of ordinary mundane life activity.

And last but never the least, read this and this for that ever sublime "intellectual kick". :D

Sunday, April 20

A tribute to ......

A tribute to ******. An apple for the correct guess! :)

The twirling droplets of red,
Encircling a vision framed in blood
The searing impulse travels,yelling
A sensation; beyond articulation, a feeling.

The darkness outside seems bright;
A backdrop, worthy of the Final Fight.
The glint shines soft in unseen light,
Signaling its joy, a step closer to its birth-right.

The twitching limbs feel the still air,
As a cold sting on the standing hair;
Still the deaf nor the dead heard no sounds
The Night had spread its wings, deafening all earthly grounds.

The eternal Master moved ever so slow,
Savouring its actors as they moved along its flow;
Jets of crimson red played the carnal tune,a musical fountain:
And there I stood: cleansed, purged? An angelic baton.

Friday, February 29

Into the Wild

The cult of Chris McCandless. May it never die!

Read this article to know more. Jon Krakauer has writen a biography about him titled "Into the Wild". Also it has been made into a truly wonderful movie by Sean Penn. Do watch it, absolutely beautiful movie.

P.S. Kudos to Joy for recommending it!

Saturday, February 16

Disconnected( Arbit?) Thoughts

Couple of days back, I wrote a quiz on the "Literature and Environment" course. The course is more about philosophy than literature or environment and hence interesting in a vague sense. A lot of stuff like Eco-criticism and Eco- feminism are things that I neither find interesting nor agree with. But still, there are these golden flashes of an elusive treasure that keeps occurring throughout. There is something about philosophy which is frustrating yet intriguing. Its like that Pandora's box which is half open and lures you in. Two steps more and you think the end shall be seen but reality shows it to be a bottomless pit.

I have always wondered what would happen if all the philosophical questions had objective answers. It would mean an end to all doubts about purpose and karma. There wouldn't be any police or law enforcement agencies, since everyone would know* what is right and what is wrong. Everyone would do only the right thing, since what is"right" becomes an absolute truth which is no longer dependent on subjective intrepretations. It would be the ideal world, but a boring one at that. Isn't uncertainty the greatest boon of mankind? I remember the dialogue of Brad Pitt as Achilles in the film Troy "The Gods envy us. Because we are mortal, because we are doomed, each moment is so much more precious."

Words are powerful, yet at some level only a symbol of man's effort to propagate( to others) and re-assure( himself) his own ideas and the objectives behind his actions. Without words an enlightened man is no different from an ordinary mendicant. Actions might speak for themselves but not so loudly nor clearly as words. Where would we be without them ?

Without words, we would have no way of sharing ideas with others, which in turn means that we would either try to figure things out ourselves or stop trying at all. Maybe the real answer is that, *that there is nothing to be figured out*! Things happen just because that is the way things are. This again is an oft repeated concept in our course. The "is"ness of a thing whereby it just "is" what it is. Probably deep down we all know that it is the truth, yet the hope of a greater reality pushes us to do more. We are not satisfied by eating good food or getting a shelter to sleep. Our wants go beyond. Maybe the realization of such a truth, *that there is nothing to be realized* might mean a return to the stone age or even behind, to a time when all we would care for is a good meal and a safe sleep.

So while engrossed in these Eco poems and essays, I did some googling on the "Zen" school of thought. The zen philosophy says that to attain enlightenment one should be "intentionally aware" of the "present" without being "judgmental" about it. After thinking on it for sometime I concluded that it probably means one should clearly *know* and make an effort to understand what is happening ( around), without trying to figure out if it is happening for the good or bad. This again means that you shouldn't try to "interfere", but just let things be. I agree that the above statement appears to be self contradictory at multiple levels, since most of our actions are reactions to external stimuli and thus its impossible to act and yet not "interfere". At some level even our very presence is an interference. Then again, it might mean you should do those things which come *naturally*" to you, without letting the guiding hand of knowledge nor the filter of civilization change that natural course of action nor modify it. Would this mean a return to the hippie culture of 70s, where people try to portray the rebel image? I doubt. The problem with a being a rebel is that you again made the conscious decision of being a rebel. To follow zen philosophy would probably mean to act in a way as though the society was never there, neither *against it* nor *with it* nor *parallely*, but in a way that ignores its very existence itself.

OK, .. this will be continued later in another post.

Friday, February 8

Political Correctness

In terms of being politically correct in speech, our Indian media has kept pace with its western counterparts at a rather amazing speed. Yesterday I read this article in Hindu which referred to a "short person" ( political correctness again :D) as a "vertically challenged" person.

"Vertically challenged". wow

Monday, February 4

Apocalypto


I seriously* recommend this movie. Absolutely wonderful direction combines with brilliant acting. There is so much raw energy in this film that at no point of time does the pace slacken even a bit. This film shows that though coated thickly by the outward paints of civilization, deep down we remain what we are, animals. A particular scene, one where the lead actress, being trapped in a pit with her son, fights off a charging monkey is simply movie at its best. The film also questions the ethos of "civilization" at large, where subjugation and slavery of a vast majority is essential for uplifting the standard of living of a few at the top. This is again contrasted with the primordial hunter village societies where almost everyone is on equal footing with no great misery nor luxury. To sum things up, definitely one of the best movies I have seen till date. The rating of 7.9 in IMDB belittles its true value by a long way.

Wednesday, January 30

Yet another pearl of wisdom

As usual, in one of those enlightening conversations with the Grandfather of All Knowledge ( a cliched but most fitting sobriquet! :)) , another pearl of wisdom came out: Here it goes,

" The passion that one feels for something is inversely proportional to how much one knows about it"

Enlightened? DEpassionate(d)*?