“”அற்றார் அழிபசி தீர்த்தல்; அக்தொருவன்
பெற்றான் பொருள்வைப் புழி.”"

Yes, charity is what I am talking about !! I hardly had any idea of a big mafia abusing the fact expressed by the above kural , until I read ezham ulagam by Jeya Mohan !!
He is one of the best writers in Tamil who is able to write deep and wide!! Every word he writes to emphasize the undeniable truth comes as a bullet!! If you expect heroism, twists and big surprising events racing like a Bond movie then this may not be the book of your choice. The story flows like a stream, every now and then strikingly portraying a totally different world which we often ignore.

The story revolves around Velu Pandaram and many temples in South India(especially the ones for Lord Muruga)where his begger mafia operates.He buys and sells beggars and calls them “urupadi”. He treats them worse than cattle,but he still claims “நாம ஆருக்கும் ஒரு தீங்கும் செய்யல்ல”. The more physically and mentally challenged they are the more they survive in his beggar mafia.

Muthammai a lady with a single arm and a single leg is forced to mate with other physically challenged people to give birth to malformed children , who are sold at a very high price!! She says “எனக்க பிள்ளைய பதினெட்டாக்கும், பதினெட்டு , சப்ரிமலை படிபோல பதினெட்டு.’ கண்ணில்ல, கையிலயும் காலிலயும் ஒரோ விரலு மட்டும்தான், கூனுமுண்டு, மாறிலயும் வயித்தலயும் அடிச்சுட்டுல்லா கரைஞ்சேன்”. Ahmed, reading news paper while begging and informing fellow beggars about the recent events , erukku a girl who loves perumal (person who is like a watchdog for the beggars) madly just because he tied a nuptial knot to steal her away from a hospital, muthammai ,her son rajini kanth(a kid as physically challenged as her),kuyyan who claims to kill himself if he doesn get to eat “payasam” are all beautifully portrayed.

There is a mild humour that runs through out, among the beggars.That makes us feel that though they are “urupadis” to the world above them , they live their life as full as every other human being. Slowly we begin to feel like a part of their world enjoying their company.
unni aachi whose primary job is to gossip, kochan , Nayar stand as symbols for some evil characteristics that have been a part of man’s primitive behavior ever. The author has also mastered in nagercoil-tamil dialect.
‘Uripadi’s don’t have an assurance of the next meal , things that bother the middle class and upper middle class like pride , money , god , religion, society etc etc .. don’t even exist in their world !!! They live outside every temple,but the “deity” inside doesn’t attract them. They have their own deity “maangadi saami” , again a physically challenged beggar who sits amidst them and sings.

The author has also depicted their view on the world above them , how they look at us and even make fun !!
Survival is the only force that drives the ezham ulagam just like it drives every other life!!
The book also talks about the ill effects of institutionalizing “religion and god” and in turn commercializing devotion which is yet again a pure form of love. Pothi who is a priest in the temple says “இங்கே பாருடே பண்டாரம், இது ஆறடி கல்லு, பத்து நானூறு வரிசமாட்டு பலரும் கழுவி சந்தனம் போட்டு பூ போட்டு கும்பிடுதானுக. நமக்கு இது தொளிலு. உனக்கு முத்தம்மை, எனக்கு இது. “

The success of the novel is clear when you finish it , you feel like every other character in the novel is questioning you how far you have understood mankind and life’s longing for itself !!!

This is the number of parties contesting the forthcoming elections in India !!!
I was shocked to see these many parties contesting !!! Does the growing number of parties indicate anything positive about the functioning of democracy in India ? No.I don’t think so.We are in for more surprises , If somebody takes a survey of the amount of money spent vs the number of votes , or if someone takes a list of the number of freebies announced by every party !! Is this a healthy democracy to have so many parties contesting an important election?I don’t know.
May be this is how democracies have worked in the past and shaped themselves.India has a long way to go. I truly believe in the power of democracy and our nation!!!

I happened to read an article by Gnanavel(titled the same way) on the remains of war.Here are some excerpts…

The author goes to the refugee camp in Rameswaram and finds Rathinavel, a victim of the cruelest aspects of war.
He lived with his wife , and four children happily, in SriLanka. He had three daughters and a son,(whom he claims to have been blessed by
Lord Muruga of Kathirkamam.)And the child did look like his avatar , resembling how Lord Muruga was described , in beauty and intelligence.

His wife , on the middle of a lonely night was raped by the soldiers of the army. The next morning he could only see her dead , hanging herself.
He decided to leave the country and sold his house for a much cheaper price and using the money obtained , gets on board on a boat with his four children.They were nearing rameswaram , and before they could reach , the boat stuck and they were told to swim for life.
His three daughters didn’t know to swim , nor could he save them.He finally decided to save at least his son as his daughters told him they would go to their mother.He grabbed his son and swam for a long time , and realized the shore was far away. His son became unconscious , nor could he carry him and swim anymore.He had no other go than to leave his son , to save himself.When he left him and moved forward , he reached the shore in 5 minutes.
Then , he realized, he could have carried him along a little more and went back to water , searching for his lost son , in vain.The war has thus crushed the family of six into only one.Had he not lost his mental balance , he would have killed himself as well.

The author narrates Rathinavel’s story, and strongly puts forth the cruel faces of war. He says , “Soldiers who die become patriots, rebels who die become brave hearts, but the people ??”.War is always a crushing force , one which is trying to hoist the flag of victory over the innocent people’s dead remains.

I got a chance to understand completely and appreciate the terms that were puzzling me earlier , like “string theory” , the eleven dimensions , unification of forces and so on.I grabbed a copy of The Elegant Universe by Brain Green.Thanks to Sridhar anna.

It started with discovery of gravity by Newton and went on to describe the effort taken , then on by the physicists to know the mind of God.It was so elegant in style and narration that it easily made even laymen understand the mind of Albert Einstein,and his thirst towards the unification of forces.
And how he could not just digest the degree of unpredictability discovered by Quantum mechanics and he said ,”God does not throw dice!!”.

I wondered at the amazing work by physicists like , John Schwartz , Michael Green and Edward Witten (who unified the five different sting theories which were existing and created the M theory).The strings (open ended and closed ended) , branes , parallel universes , collision between them etc were amazingly pictured. I was always not able to fully comprehend the extra dimensions and this video made a lot of effort to make people comprehend it.It talked about , the circles representing an additional spatial dimension that is curled up within every point of our three dimensional space and the six dimensions needed for the super strings to vibrate.One more video which helps in understanding the tenth dimension is here.

Will CERN or Fermilab be able to discover the S particle , the escaping graviton ? Will string theory be proved right ??Will it end up to be a waste of wonderful mathematics and physics over twenty years ?? God knows !! But , we are all blessed to live in an era where we have awesome physicists who try to comprehend the mind of God !! And we are gifted with resources to understand and appreciate their work !!Whether string theory succeeds or not , it will always remain a fascinating idea to me!!!

Yesterday was a day of lessons!! I had been to the railway station , to send my aunt off.I reached majestic after a really long journey (just as usual).. cursing Bangalore traffic.I was almost blaming everybody in Bangalore Development Authority for letting it expand like madness.

Then after reaching the station ,my next list to be blamed started There was crowd , just as expected.The station was quite horrible , with the railway tracks being public dustbins , wash areas and what not!!And adding to the list, there was no place to sit.And waiting rooms as usual were full !!The train came a bit (not very late though)late. There were no charts pasted with names.The train doors were not closed(letting the rats go in ).It didn’t look like it was cleaned(I was expecting it to be cleaned up because this is the source station).Nor could I analyze much as there was no light through out the train !!!

Some how I managed to find her seat using the mobile torch and sent her off.
Only when I walked back , I saw the ticket inspector and realized I hadn’t obtained the platform ticket Then my mistake struck hard on me !! I went on to pay the fine , I was shocked to know it was 250 INR , for a Rs.3 platform ticket !! I went on to check that up with the station manager and he confirmed that the amount levied was correct!! I paid and came back , nobody to be blamed anymore for my own mistake
I came back home and again a mistake struck hard I had kept the bathroom tap open when there was no water and when the water was supplied it was flowing off The tank could have been almost emptied !!
Ok , here goes my lesson , lets learn to turn the mirror inward and see our own mistakes , including making the railway station dirty , and using our own vehicles when there is enough public transport available!!Man makes the society , and he has to make it what he wants it to be !!
I would quote Jk again ” I am the world and the world is me !! “

Here is an interesting article from Sci Am , suggesting the existence of a pre-bang universe ,which would have imploded and then exploded to form the Universe we live in…

http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=big-bang-or-big-bounce&SID=mail&sc=emailfriend

I recently read an article on Martin Luther King and the power of love against injustice that he quoted , written by Mihir Shah.The author had thrown light on the prevailing economic inequality , hatred and injustice and probed so many questions on arriving at a tangible solution.

According to a survey by the World Bank , the income level of people who formed the lower 60% economic class of the world dropped down by 10 % , and that of the top 10% raised by 50 % over a period of hundred years or so.Now this shows the growing inequality more evidently than anything else could.

He says hate and injustice have always prevailed and are growing.He suggests , Martin Luther King’s Agape – the pure redemtive love a weapon against injustice.This great activist’s suggestion of the power of love , reminded me those of JK’s ideas on love.

King says “Power at its best is love implementing the demands of justice, and justice at its best is power correcting everything that stands against love “.And there will be justice only when there is no Power for the sake of power.Such power without  love is abusive and love without power is sentimental and aneamic.

There are conflicts, blockades to reach the justice , but conflicts have to be considered as problems seeking solutions and not as war yielding victory of one over the other.The author says , the greatest failure of the 20th Century’s economy was to find out an alternative to Capitalist society that would be implemented efficienlty to curb injustice.True, we have a long way to go as long as we are ready to face hard questions and bind together to produce tangible answers!!

Well , this break from blogging was scheduled.

I have been reading JK these days.. It is truely enlightening to know your life is under chaos(as JK puts it) and it can be lived merrily ,if we know the root cause of human emotions.

He talks so elaborately about human brain , the thought process , “ME” as an illusion (or rather a pile of perceptions about one self) , love without  attachment or possession, relationships , conflict . so on and so forth. The recent tragedies in the name of God are disheartening ..JK says “Man loves his God and releigion, because he invented them”.. I would say man loves his ideas , his policies , his beleif more than anything.It occurs to me that all these that are done in the name of God , reflect man’s fear of losing his beleif, his fear of detachment from the illusion about himself and his beleif.

Have the modern releigions really taken spirituality to people ? Do they really serve the purpose , they were intended to.God knows !!! Man has to know to live without divisions, divisions of releligion , origin, country ,etc..He should learn to resolve conflicts, both internal and external. Are we yet to evolve into that stage ?? I wish more great minds like JK be born,rise up and preach man what he was intended to do as a social animal in this planet.

This book is basically a tale of a lost sister in Babar’s Family and of two great cities Fatehpur Sikhri and Florence.It talks really a lot about the customs and how Florence evolved through renaissance.I read it at a slower pace , because it was more of history A man calling himself “Mughal of Love” arrives at Akbars court and tells him that he is his uncle(Babar’s Sisters son) and thats how the tale goes.

Here goes my most liked and least liked lists about the book,

Rushdie has beautifully portrayed Akbar’s reign, his court , and the people there.I really enjoyed the way he narrated AbulFazl’s tactics.

Akbar , for once has been portrayed with his weakness as well his greatness.It made me wonder at his thirst for knowledge and at the same time his regret for being dyslexic.However i had little knowledge about the renaissance and I had no prior reading so I could not understand Florence’s history much:)

He has rightly explained how an woman wants to make her will win in a men’s world and how she succeeds using her power of enchantments

I was not happy with how he had ended.Or rather I did not get it fully How can Akbar raise someone from death? Is he that infatuated towards that enchantress to be so  imaginative of her rising from dead ?? No clue.

I also wonder why  Jodha has been portrayed as  a  lady who was created by Akbar out of pure imagination and she incfluenced him totally by living with him in his unreal world.It was funny when Akbar’s mother tried tried talking to Jodha imagining she was sitting in a chair next to her

I was not able to fully enjoy the humor as some part of it was dry and sarcastic. Hmm , so I had fun reading the book though i did not like it as Shalimar the Clown, it was worth spending some fifteen hours

Two months passed since I came here and well , I am getting used to Bangalore This is one of the very few cities of really high cost of living in India.Luxury invites everybody here and thats how the living cost has shooted up.The climate is awesome in the months of june and july.(I am yet to see the summer here ) , just as everybody else here would comment.It is also a city of varied food starting from south indian , north indian and upto chinese food.(except for the fact the hotels are pretty costly). I have made a visit to all nearby hotels and markets. I am basically not used to throwing money away for anything just because it gets sold in a bigger airconditioned shop , or it has a good brand name.

The sad part is I hardly meet people who spend money reasonably.nobody even bothers to analyse the worth , before paying for anything.May be its an illusion at all places that costlier things are better Well, a similar thought shared in a blog made me write this.Life for people in most of the cities is spending what they earn and the more they earn the lesser they care for resources and the more they take money for granted, as simple as that…

And I have learnt a bit of Kannada also I am learning to read and write now. And about the stay here I am happy to be here , meet new people and learn a  new language