learnings unlearnings...leanings and not!

Everytime I meet someone I seek to learn something...and its never bad..learning can never be... bad..

Yes there are phases of amazement, amusement, sometime its a bit upsetting but hardly ever a disillusionment or annoyance...because every moment that there is a new learning it is an "ahaa" moment!

The observer in me never rests...and its a non tiring leaning towards greater insights...

People...seeing them deciphering their acts their mannersims and the way they are...the things they do and what they think...what an enriching and enchanting saga it all is!

In my 30 something years , where I have crossed paths with diverse sections of the homo sapien world I have come across many with common traits but no one the same with another. The unique attribute of every individual I cross paths with fills me with awe...thats exactly why they are individuals anyway right? What a word!! what a world!

I have met the shy, the joyous, the cunning the sly, the constantly cribby to the ecstatic..people with masks and some (very few) without, in this masqerade called life.

But what fills me with sadness at times is when people turn nasty, prepare hurdles for someone else and spend timeless moments conniving, planning and plotting...and such people are never comfortable nor positive and they bring with them too a whole "aura" of discomfort...they never bring happiness even when they smile, because somewhere deep down theres a horrible frown or more a "Joker" batman feel to the smile. As if its drawn to suck in all the positive that there is in this world and ellude us all...and only give back negativity.

Such people also have a "know-it-all" attitude..yet they never share that "knowledge" with anyone. It seems a mere charade and somewhere deep down an effort to run people down to cover their own complexities and insecurities. They are constantly trying to prove someone wrong with their so called "connections", "knowledge of the good" and whats right and whats wrong. they meander in narrow genarlisations about the human race and about all they meet. And they come to this conclusion about everyone VERY quickly . Yet they take to confrontations badly...they cow down or just admit they are wrong!

Yet they never give up trying to find the problems with others and what they dislike!

They also have a fear of being left out of groups and gatherings...they are scared of big groups too yet sulk if they are ignored...they over do it most times and retreat within to recuperate. They can also be patronising in bits and yet at the same time try and befriend and please to to end..their praise can at times suffocate! But well...when life breathes you out its time for a breather!

Of course I have met many of the kind but each in its way are different...

Why am I speaking of such people specifically ?...because much that I feel sad to see such nasty attitudes I feel sad for them too and yet feel thankful to them, I also never avoid them for long..because they too contribute something to my learnings about the human kind...

As always there is a silver lining to meetings with such people and greatly so... (and I have had the good fortune, yes good fortune to meet a few of this kind..of course with their own colours of character)I learn to value the good around us...the positive people around us and feel blessed that to value the precious beings around we need some black dots as pointers ...

Life is beautiful!

the 8th wonder of the world!

China.. a place I went to see the Great Wall, the Forbidden City, Tiananmen Square and Terra Cotta warriors to just name a few. But what I came back with was much more than just some pieces of a glorious past...the whole present and the "future to be" mesmerised me.

But first the history that left me speechless...the granduer of it all...standing at the Great Wall there was a moment when seeing was disbelieving...if it was possible to look back and ahead at the same moment..there was a moment so...the chilling winds from Mongolia ingrained it ever so more of the balance between man made structures of years gone by and nature in its entirety.

What moved me too were how well the land had preserved its history yet not stopped itself from moving on.

As for the impressions of culture, economy and politics...well left its mark larger than life. Even a visit to two cities in this vast land mass brought out realities from the core.

The concentrated development of productive livable cities amazed me. If we are talking of growing giants in the "super power" arena..well this giant has reared its head way way beyond the clouds but not lost track of its arable lands.

Reports of the Shanghai Conference (2004) somehow flashed before the inner eye every time I stepped into a corner of a street. The natural flow of things and the perfect balance between modernity and tradition. A muslim market with traditional fare, a night market not only tgo attract tourists and a mall where designer boutiques are the order of the day...nothing felt out of place...just integrated into the natural flow of things.

China doesnt deny its poverty. China doesnt deny its masses. China doesnt show the arrogance that we witness in a lot other developing "superpowers". I am not here to run any one nation down and praise another. All I can say is there is a welcoming attribute that the land has without wanting to cheat you off your mark.

There are two sides of the coin am sure , but what meets the eye has a definite semblance of truth . A strong government at the centre defintely does make a difference and a society denied of sectarian differences definitely leaves a positive mark.

I took my time to take off from just visiting the tourist attractions at one point to just let it all sink in...to let a place just touch me in its true sense..to just look through tv channels even if I understood not a word...or to read the daily news and just walk around places which were only where the resident went and pick up a CD with local songs...to get a whiff of the scent of the city and not just through its food and shopping. And what echoed out loud was a concerted effort for the whole land to move ahead and regain not only a fomer glory but something much beyond, without letting go off its roots.

Of course there are the dark corners...of course there are things hidden from the tourist eye...but whatever is visible is much more than a lot of other lands...

I need to venture back to get a closer look at this country where just a fragment has left me wondering, speechless in parts and curious to venture inwards.

Fem-in-ism

If each woman spent half the time she spends on getting annoyed by another woman, on rather looking within and feeling great for herself, and the half of the time she feels sorry for being a woman she diversts to feeling blessed she is a woman and has powers ...we wouldnt need so much of talk of what feminsim is!

And then if only we realised that being a feminist does not being anti men but being pro women...things would be MUCH easier...

To get the distressed and the distraught to believe in themselves we need each and every one to contribute...without either men or women neither would be able to live a full life...

We have to all stand up and take note of whats going wrong and why...not whether a man or woman went wrong...

Yes there are cultures societies where there is segregation violation and violence and its time we ALL raise our voices against it, make our own contributions, big or small to help look at society which does not divide based on biology...thats science..why let it come and topple our human relations?

Feminism is about each of us...its an ism we ourselves created because we just failed to understand that we were created different to make the world a more exciting place...

We have to accept that a free race cannot be born of slave mothers...and women need to realise that they do not need to have power over men but over themselves...

Men and women need equal anger if a woman or man is violated...they need to raise their voices equally when a leader is born without thinking whether its a woman or man and mourn together if a powerful human being passes on...

This isnt a dream like ideal situation am talking about...its not impossible..

as some one some one once said Impossible is nothing but I am Possible...

I believe because I can. Theres enough hate in this world anyway...lets not divide ourselves further...

I survived 2009! Will I 2010?

Oh yes! I did survive 2009! What a year...but this blog's not about the year that was but the years ahead and my usual musings..the whys and the wherefores..the waves that consume me at times and those that just pass by and I can only feel the wind and water...the smell of the sea within...the sandy beaches without...all in all a feeling of calm at times and yet a fire within too...a touch and go... and a feeling of sand within my tightened fist...

The year which I thought began on a beautiful note was bloodied with the killing of Nitin Garg in Melbourne...am sure this too will die with some stray protests, some one liners of regret and terms of co incidents to term this as non racist...and one more life will be wasted and forgotten...

At the very off set I HAVE to underline I have NOTHING against any country nation or community. (I am someone who believes there should be visa free travel across the globe because even that is a form of discrmination)What I do have a problem with is innocent lives lost for some cruel motive and any discriminatory act...

So where were we... yes, Nitin Garg..yes a young Indian student killed in cold blood in Melbourne...

India rising? Or is there a silent uprising (IF I may use the oxymoron) against the giant thats raising its head? what is this hate? Or is it hate or just the sickening lust of a few to just create havoc in the minds of many? Its just not racism but more cutural terrosism...creation of trauma across borders! There is no end to this...bilateral talks? How long do we see the end of it before some order of the day comes in? what do we do with opportunistic criminals?

I am not going to go on an emotional strain about a boy who had his dreams...OF COURSE he had , like all of us... and in the most grotesque way they were thwarted by societal imbeciles..who much to the dismay of civilization are still in a barbaric frame of mind... Who dont add the drops to that ocean of change and just blot it out with bloody spots.

This is becoming a world where dreams are thwarted by the wishes of a few... where some who have the power without kill the power within the whole wide world. I am not saying anything new..am not here to say anything new..am just thinking out loud and letting my words flow. AM just letting my anger take some avenue to help me cope with the ruthlessness in human nature and of nations gone astray...even one man gone astray can do that to a whole nation. Its not about generalising...DEATH is MORE than that!

How many more workshops, conferences and larger than life dialogue sessions will it take before theres some change? NOTHING justifies the taking of human lives and ACTION is needed...we can keep talking of what needs to be done till a few more lose their lives in some god forbidden territory!

It infuriates me to see the headlines talking endlessly today about the tallest tower being inaugurated in Dubai...and Nitins case as one slot which hardly spans 3 minutes...am i over reacting? Well...!!!!!! 26000 windows that Burj Dubai has and that need cleaned is repeated...what about the windows to self? How clean are they in countries that still practice racist traits and term them as acts of general rage? what sort of denial are we in?

Immigration laws and protectors of Law need to wake up and DO something...yes you want more hands to help you..we are there but DO something! Just one more column on Nitin Garg will be all the newspapers have tomorrow and then he will be lucky if he gets a paragraph hidden away on page 7...10...12? Isnt that what always happens....what sells today doesnt tomorrow...

The whole irony of courses being introduced in colleges on China and India and the total outrage against the citizens of these very countries...makes me question whether I will even survive emotionally this decade thats just taken off... somehow I dont have patience anymore to see slow change!

Lets hope this is the last of these killings that is seen in Australia...hope is the most we can do now...hope that makes us survive ...Nitin had hopes too...of a better life...yet that same hope made him travel to the land that killed it all. Are borders really ceasing in the world today or we widening the gaps ? Are we really anywhere as human beings??

I have nothing agaisnt any particular country or human being but I do have intolerance against ANYone that does dicriminate...we have NO right as mere individuals to question who has a right to live or not and where...we MOST definitely cannot take on a divine proprtions when all that we will be is a fistful of dust...why are we making mockeries of ourselves?!