New Year Wish

Yeh. On the new years day, I would like to stretch myself on the grass, lay under the sun reading a book, with a few butterflies fluttering by, some contemplation on the flowing creek, and a glad to be alive kinda feeling, that is weather permeeting.

On a Stone's Throw

A stone is thrown.
Plop.
Ripples now. The lotus sways a little. Reflections of the trees are still steady, a little distorted though.
And lo. There's some wind in the leaves, filling the empty spaces.
A butterfly has come from nowhere. White and Yellow. Buzzzzzz. Some noisy insect in the grass declares its right to freedom of speech. Yes little one, you are the king here.
And Splash; ducks have flown in, stirring the water. Ripples of fluttering wings. Few dives. And now they have settled, wafting gently with their red feet. Our King here has become silent now. Perhaps tired. The delicate one flips about upon the blades of grass.
And only the colors of pervading green, stirr the silence now.
All that on a stone's throw ! Ha !

Smiles and Laughter

Here's an extremely funny retake (in progress) on the great Indian epic Mahabharat, by Aashray. I found it via Desipundit.
And here's another Ashray, with glorious smiles (discovered by mistyping aashray above).

AnyWays

[Mountains darken as sun sets in the West]
"Listen"
"What"
"It will not work out"
"I never liked your writings anyways"
"I think I knew it always. But then you know the habits. Morning promises do not last the evening"
"Too vulnerable"
"Yes. Too Vulnerable"
"What will you do then ?"
"I dont know. How about you ?"
"Something. We all have to do something. Such is life, we cannot do nothing. It doesn't pass otherwise. I will always dislike your writings, anyways."
"Now that is a comfort"
"What have they decided for you ?"
"They say I have a choice. But you know how it works. You choose from their choices"
[Sun has set. Mountains are giant dark shapes now]
"Have hope. Tomorrow will be another sunrise"
"Hands of the earth, about the mountains, Tagore had said"
"Perhaps earth is reaching for the stars"
"The sun, the giver of life to earth, will rise tomorrow and vanish the stars"
"But there will be stars. Anyways"

A question

You become what you fill your mind with
Or your mind becomes filled with what you are
What, is true ?

Old Sailor

Sits by the shore, a sailor, with his tattered boat
watching the endless waters
Strength fails him, Old that he is
Yet defy he must, and once again embrace the sea
To live, to die
Sailing Free

Hill in the Distance

There is a small hill, in the distance from my window.
It is where the geese seem to return to.
Now the sun sets in. Will we see a magical evening ? Perhaps.
The sky looks wide and open. Inviting. I know. That's where
the geese's home is. That's where they return to. There on a walk
once, I have seen a home, where some noble soul has a pond, a garden, some trees.
Some evenings, the retreating sun weaves a melody of colors. Those days the small hill suddenly becomes wonderful, hewed in purple pink and blue. Like the home of the fairies.
There are houses spread on it's slopes. A car had left a while ago, along the slope. It looked like a bug. It's quite in the distance, the hill, you know.
A bug returns along the slope. It's dark now, the evening has passed away into night, the sun has eloped with its light, into the mountains.
Perhaps tomorrow, will we see a magical evening.
Yes. Tomorrow.
Until then, we let the hill sleep, in shimmering lights.

Value of Human Life

Wired News Reports(link):

The sudden influx of drug companies to India resembles the gold rush frontier, according to Sean Philpott, managing editor of The American Journal of Bioethics.

Why ?

Companies are attracted to India not only because of the huge patient pool and skilled workers, but also because many potential study volunteers are "treatment naïve," meaning they have not been exposed to the wide array of biomedical drugs that most Western patients have, said Stefan Ecks, a lecturer in social anthropology at the School of Social and Political Studies in Edinburgh who recently published a paper on the marketing of antidepressants in India.

The article ends with the reason:

"Third World lives are worth much less than the European lives. That is what colonialism was all about," said Srirupa Prasad, a visiting assistant professor of medical history and bioethics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Hmm. What does value of human life depend upon ? My theory is, that in modern-day world, it depends upon two things:

• personal economic status,
• and economy of country/nation-state you live in.

So though personally a developed country poor human has lesser value with respect to his own country-men, but he still will be more valuable then its developing country counterpart.

By nature, life survives by exploiting another life, which automatically becomes a lower life. And for humans, survival means not just living, but fullfillment of wants. The more you are capable of exploiting, the more is the value of your life, the more your chance of survival (survival implying fullfillment of wants here, like want to live, want to good food, clothes, shelter, ferrari, beach-house, want to equal opportunity, justice, want to owning the justice department etc.).

And your capability of exploiting (and thus your value of life), I believe, depends upon your personal economic status, and the collective economic status of the nation-state that you live in.

Now here is where Ethics come in. What is an Ethic ? It is a correctional behaviour by humans and for humans, so as to minimize the disparity between the value of different human lives, so as to provide an equal opportunity towards survival, to them.

Ethics exist because humans have memory, personally, and collectively, and because humans have the want to survive. It is this memory combined with want to survive, which makes them intelligent, and enables them to demand equal opportunity towards survival, of theirs, or others, survival here being fullfillment of wants, including want to live.

Now if you have too much of ethics, or too many of wants, you will screw up the system. British had too many wants, they colonised India. Indian socialists had too many Ethics and too many hidden wants, they sacrificed development for social-welfare and keeping in power . And so the India as a nation state is a poor economy today, and Indians are thus being exploited as cheap labour, guineas for clinical testing, dismantling of junk, and what not.

My Envy

I envy Desi-Women in Sciences. Especially engg Sciences.
Ask why is that ? It's ok. I will tell anyways. It's kinda funny, but the fact is that usually the Desi-Male is to Desi-Female ratio in the Engg. Sciences, is mostly eight is to two, nine is to one, or ten is to waiting for someone. Imagine their luxury, that all they need to do is shed a sigh or cut a finger, and all eight-nine-ten suitors will leave no moutain unturned, to provide comfort. Like there's was this once when a new entry cut her finger, and people went on war-footing to recover-discover lost band-aids, expired antiseptic creams and what not. And so goes the story that Out of ten five were thrown in trash bins labelled as bhaiya, three were left mending their hearts with band-aid, and the rest two fought a duel, which was won by none, because the new entry already had someone.

(To be Updated)

To the Tree

This I say to a tree friend of mine
that you'll have leaves in no time
O friend, though it's you whose leaves have fallen
Yet this hope and this suffering
is mine

Notes

relevance of the old is in the nurturing of the new.
you don't think differently to disagree. you disagree because you think differently.
only when you hit an obstacle, do you realize how fast you were going.
beauty is everywhere and so is ugliness. you cannot adopt one and disown another.
it is ok to get pissed. but it is not to remain so.
it is pointless to reason everything. and it is pointless to discuss pointlessness. be silent.