Convictions that conquered the world!

So I visited Cambridge last week. The prestigious University of Cambridge was built in the year 1209. That place was magic; I had goosebumps when I visited the place where Ragland first committed his life to India. Watson and Crick drank in that neighbouring bar immediately after they discovered DNA. Rutherford discovered the electron in the next street. Isaac Newton was there a few hundred years ago. And inimitable Stephen Hawking lived there too.

For such a small village to have given so much to the world Cambridge was incredible. It had given 118 Nobel prize winners to the world told my tour guide. 118! Let that sink in! Just to walk in the same street as them, I felt privileged!

It suddenly struck me that people for all their importance in such a reputed institution were secondary. It was the ideas that mattered! The ideas which came through places like the Cambridge actually changed the world. No not the people! Of course, there had to be a Newton to discover the Gravity. But the Idea of Gravity was much bigger than Sir Isaac Newton himself.

Convictions are things certain! The certainty of the ideas which germinated in the minds of the people.

So here am I, promising myself to write about different convictions that conquered the world. One conviction at a time. Once a week in 2019. Look for this page people!

And some photos of Cambridge

Mayiraa pochu! (It is just the hair, let it go)

Mayiru! The dad used the word one day over a telephone conversation. I then knew that was a bad word used by people to scold somebody else in a fight. Mayira pochi! He used it again. In a different form. But I was old enough to know it meant the same.  He is a bad man, my dad. He uses bad words; it registered in my young mind.

As I grew older and started using those words myself, I realized mayiru means hair! HAIR! The bloody hair. The hair growing on our heads and if you are as old as I'm more hair falls than grows. But, how did mayiru became a bad word? How on hell do you scold somebody a hair? I mean, we don't scold someone in English using the hair word, do we? Even the holy bible has used the word often! It cannot be just a bad word, said my logical brain. My dad, the hero growing up, cannot be after all a bad man! Wink! Wink!

Come to the point, my boy! I can hear my dad's mind voice when he reads this!

In Tamil, that word is more often used to denote uselessness! Mayira pochi mean, it is just the hair, don't worry! Hair, the useless hair, the ones which will grow back and even if it doesn't it is okay; nothing in life will happen if we lose some hair, is all the philosophy behind the term mayira pochi.

When I saw this person 'R' had donated her hair for cancer patients, it hit me hard! Hair, the useless hair, is actually so precious that we find it difficult to do away with it. When I saw her photo, it just clicked that my mom cried that day she lost her hair. When that bloody disease and the treatment took her hair away, my mom felt it. She wanted her hair. That useless hair. Yet she wanted it! My mom, who did not mind working for the poor doing away with so much money found it hard to do away with hair.

Man! Are you called useless? Even the mayiru, the bad word it has become, is never useless.  Sometimes we don't realize that the cornerstone is the most important stone of the foundation. 

The great Indian wedding!

Phew! Mukesh Ambani is spending 700 crores on his daughter's wedding! 700 crores? He had Salman Khan, the superstar of Hindi Cinema dance at the background of his son. Aishwarya Rai and Abhishek Bachan, the first family of the cinema industry also gave a dance number. Beyonce, among the leading singer and songwriter of the world, is giving performances as well. Hillary Clinton dropped in at the reception.  Private jets picked and dropped people up. The who's who of the world were represented. Welcome to the world of an Indian wedding. The great Indian wedding!

Even as the wedding ceremonies were on, the social media went berserk. People were criticizing Ambani for wasting so much money. That 700 crores could have fed thousands of poor people in this country. What a waste of money! shouted the righteous Indian public. Rightly so, I think! It was a brazenly arrogant show of money power.

And lift up your hands all of you who thinks it is brazenly arrogant in spending that money! Yay! You are a hypocrite! HYPOCRITE! Each one of you! More so if you are married. Of course, it includes me, and mine.

I would have spent a measly 10 lakhs of rupees for my wedding. From when did 10 lakh become measly? Blood and sweat of both my parents for a year! And I'm among those privileged to spend within the expenditure limits of the parents. (And of course, marrying out of your parent's money is not a shame yet in India. Yet that is for another day). There are people who go into debt to get their children married. More so if you are the parents of the bride.

I know most of us who read this don't get into debts to get married to! But we are part of the system that brazenly throws away hard earned money on one day of celebration. And we are part of the system which pushes others to debt, coz when you do it, they have to do it as well.

I understand we have the right to splurge money, our hard earned money, in whatever way we want. And so does the Ambani's. His pockets are big. 700 crores would not burn his pockets.

So dear hypocritic Indian, before shouting out at the rich and their spending, look at yours. In a microcosm, we are the same! The same brazenly arrogant individual who cares two hoots about splurging money on weddings!

Lessons on TIME!

"I will be a minute late, sorry," read the text! The phone beeped again after two minutes. "No, I will be on time".

Why is she so obsessed with time. What will happen in a minute? These guys do a little too much! I was murmuring to myself. "I'm Swiss, I'm very particular about time". I am sorry! said she, as she walked in. Bang ON time!

Everything starts ON time. Everything ends ON time. Buses and trains are ON time.   If it is delayed by a minute or two, apologies are given. Permissions are asked if the meeting goes on for five more minutes. Every single meeting has an appointment. A set 'TIME' is given for that. It may be just friends meeting each other or an official meet. Some official meetings are cancelled if things become late.

It is a real eye-opener that 'TIME' and its value is taken seriously in this country and many other countries in this parts of the world.

So as Indians why don't we care much about the time? Is it that, we don't value people and their time as much as the people here do? Or is it one of those cultural things which have been deeply ingrained into our genes? Or we just don't care?

I'm changing my approach towards time. I am learning to be 'ON' time for every programme. I understand that 'TIME' is one of those gifts given to the individuals and I dare not indulge in anybody's usage of their gift. I have decided to not take people for granted and promise myself that the only 'TIME' I can waste is mine own.

Ah! The lessons you learn when you are outside that small comfortable cocoon called home!

Time we move on India!

It has been 26 years since that dark day in Indian history!

Demolishing any building of historical importance without the legal sanction is not right! Let it be a mosque, a church or a temple. It was wrong in 1992. It was wrong if it had happened during the Mughal period. I don't see anybody being punished for the demolition neither for the riots that followed. In the human parlance, justice will never be done. The court cannot and will not do justice in this context.

It is beyond human comprehension to do justice in cases like these. Let us leave that to the gods.

Let us wash our hands of these dark phases of our history. I know washing hands off blood is difficult. The stain just does not go away. The vengeance often lurks around in the remotest corners of the heart and one small spark and the fire will start burning again. Yet do we have a choice? How long will we be fighting over this?

As the best education minister in the country suggested, Let us build a university there. The biggest university in the world. Where the world will come to study. Let every subject on earth be taught in there. Pump in money on research. Social and scientific. Bring the world's best to head them.

I understand, demolishing a monument and building a university should not set a precedent. But let this be a one off! Whatever happened has happened. Wipe this off memory. Let these events be only for the history books, only to remind ourselves of the idiocy and its repercussions.

Forgive! Heal! Move on! It is just about time.

Gambhir, I bow down!

I don't like you Gauti! I seriously don't like you. You did not have the touch which I loved in Laxman or the lefthanded elegance of Sourav. You never had the talent of Shewag or the Charisma of Sachin. Some said you had the grit of Dravid; I don't think so Gauti. Dravid had a something which made him lovable. You did not have that!

I did not like the mood swings. The tantrums you threw around were irritating. Maybe it was the small town boy in me being jealous of a Delhi bred young man.

I was in class X, still dreaming of one day playing for India when I saw you open the batting with a chubby Vinayak Mane. Both my eyes were on Mane. He looked immensely talented. His straight drives reminded me of Sachin; When every time you took the strike, I wished to see more of Mane. Your style just did not warrant another look.

I now know why I hated you; Coz, Deep inside I actually wished I was you. I never had the fight you had! I wished the dog in you which never quit, could be mine, for you never left the fight in the middle like I often did. The timing was never there, yet you never stopped trying one more time. Sometimes you were hurried for pace, and then the next ball I have seen you dancing down to that same pacy fast bowler. I wish I can do that as well Gauti. To look at adversity in the eye and say, "Here, I come again";

When Sehwag was blazing through the inning, and you were playing and missing, we often did not want to see you. We wanted to see more off Sehwag. Yet, you were often standing in our way, shirt drenched in sweat, and the eyes blazing. That was the image you have left us with Gauti. The image of the man full of dirt and sweat, yet standing.

I was so sure you never had the talent to play at the international level Gauti. How stupid of me! You have proved sport and to a certain extent life, has nothing to do with talent and with sheer grit and determination one can shine so well in life and in sport.

I take so much from you Guati! So much! For I learn from you, a man who has top scored in two international world cup finals, that if I'm ready to fight, the world can be your doorstep.

Hearty wishes on your second stint! God bless!