This is a mobile post. Had to be really since i've lost access to the net and anything else upstairs thanks to my new complication Sciatica. (you'll have to google it to find out what it is, i can't link from my mobile. )
I ain't gonna describe the pain since it's horrendous- suddenly the sacroiliitis feels like a walk in the park.

But this isn't a post about the pain. It's a post about something i learnt while i've been here. Turns out that along with all the lovely folk who stop by and read this blog, i also get visited by "old foes". And they've been gloating about my present condition and how their "prayers" are being answered. (who/what they're praying too/for is a different story, apparently. ) I guess i just find it pitiable that some people refuse to let the past stop haunting them, choosing instead to "win" at any cost. And their victory, it turns out, is in my demise or some crap. Sigh. Sorry beeyaches, still alive.
Grow up, really. Live a life instead of behaving like spoilt brats who need to have the last word in to feel important in life !

What is instead heartening is finding out how many people from the past responded to the news of my condition. Friends from school ( the ever charismatic Thanni, blogrolled as Nithin T ) dropped by from his busy schedules. Collegemates took time off from their pg life,36 hour shifts and maternal duties to come visit. They've even taken time out from their own wedding to spare a thought. Calls have come in from Pune, Jharkand, Rajastan, Mang/Bangalore,Chennai,Trivandrum,Hyderabad, Delhi, from across the continent and beyond. Long lost relatives have gone way beyond the means needed to make me feel better, be it holistic or moral support.
What it has done is really give me a positive feeling. When people take the time out to care for you, you know you've done something right in your life. You know that with so many people praying for you and having you in their thoughts, the big Guy'll listen to them. I know because ( as i've repeated oft ) i believe he/she listens when you pray for someone else rather than yourself.
I've seen it work personally so many times even in recent years - when praying for a loved one to get married, when praying for the safety and wellbeing of an unborn child, when praying for a friend to deliver normally after having suffered a miscarriage earlier, when praying for a guy to get a pg seat. Darn thing really works.

As of now, i'm in an acute state of pain physically. Truth be told, it's worse than bamboo shoots up your fingernails and yes, even worse than tying me up and tickling my feet with ostrich feathers. But i have to say this too- i'm at peace mentally. There is just a belief that this's gonna end well and that the ill wishes/prayers of a few rich in the wallet will be trumped by the good wishes/thoughts of a lot of people rich at heart. Of course, now would be a nice time to also hope that the principle of that self help book "THE SECRET" is true. You know, the one where if " certain people" keep thinking negative thoughts, only negative things will happen to them. Hehe.

In the end, it's like that old song from the Wonder Years theme-
"I get by with a little help from my friends."
I really do. In hindsight, I find, I always have.

It is indeed the time for change. 

All my life, I’ve been used to seeing my house in various shades of cream or grey.. you know, the usual colours. This time around though, I was in for a pleasant surprise when I came home. I knew the house had been painted. I’d been told that it was a new colour... Mom had told me that the colour had been made ‘by computer mixing.’

Tadaaa.. turns out that a can of Barbie doll pink had illicit relations with a can of Smarties violet and their love child was the colour that was used for painting my house. 

Then again, I will say this much. I loved the colour. Shoot me with a spitstraw but people who know me will vouch for my fondness of bright colours so this was a welcome change as far as I was concerned. My parents too liked it, though certain pesky relatives thought otherwise.. bah ! Humbugs.

Anyway, part of the creativity (madness) included painting up the dog kennel. Well, now that’s a different story. See, I don’t think the doggy duo of Bruno and Leo appreciated the ‘alteration of their pad’. Quite frankly, I think they were embarrassed with the final result. It was like a major blow to the macho image they held in the neighbourhood. Going from 'Rocky & Rambo' to 'Pansy & Sissy' must have been hard.

As of now, they prefer to stay inside the kennel even if the doors are open for fear of being ridiculed by the other dogs. Heck, they only come out at night after it’s dark and even then, I could have sworn I saw Leo wearing a shawl to cover his face last night as he went out to ‘do the doodoo’. I guess he's passive aggressive... never should have let my mom use the old "When Bad things happen to Good People" self help book pages to form a makeshift flooring in the kennel while they were painting. You never know what these dogs read and imbibe these days. 

Ruby, their 1o year old mom , is a different case altogether. She gets pissed, she doesn’t hide it from us. She lets it all out. And she knows better than to bite the hand that feeds her ( mom ) or the hand that lets her sleep in the main bedroom ( dad ). So who does she vent out her rage against the new colour ?

Enter visiting doctor son aka Jackass who dog need not listen to. Sufficed to say, in the last 3 weeks, I have used ‘the good shirts’ maybe 4 times. Oh, and can you guess how many times Ruby’s used ‘the good shirts ?’ 4, did you say ? Close, but no cigar. She’s used ‘THE DAMN GOOD SHIRTS’  5 times, including the time she picked it out of a laundry pile after it had been ironed and after confirming it was mine( say what you want... I’m convinced she was checking out the XL sign on the shirt ), proceeded to wipe the floor with it. Man, she really loves that floor.

Anyway, plans to send her to Cambodia via air mail have been put on hold for now... mainly because I was vetoed 3-to-1, Ruby and my parents being the significant 3. Infact, seeing the glint in Ruby’s eyes, I wonder if she knows something I don’t...I wonder if she hasn’t been able to influence my parents to modify that plan slightly. Damn doggy feminine charms.

 I have a sinking feeling I’m gonna be knocked unconscious and sent to Cambodia via air mail one of these days.  

 

On the 3^rd of March 2009, the Sri Lankan cricketers had a miraculous escape after the bus they were travelling in en route to the Gadafi stadium in Pakistan was targeted by armed terrorists.  They were surrounded, the policemen killed and bullets rained on their bus. Half a dozen of them sustained shrapnel injuries, a couple suffered non- critical bullet injuries. Yet, they all survived luckily.

Riiiiiiiiiiight.And there are golden flying pigs in my backyard playing ice hockey with unicorns.

Do you mind if I just point out certain queries regarding this terrorist attack ? I’ll try to go in chronological order so that I don’t miss anything.Let’s start with an anonymous phone call the team’s security received that morning warning of a possible attack. It prompted the change in the route to the stadium. Noone verified the authenticity of the call, they admitted later ( pretty big admission that ).

God rest their souls, 6 policemen lost their lives in the initial skirmishes as the bus was surrounded. Being bedridden ( sofa-ridden actually ), I could watch the reports as they emerged in live time. The initial news was that 10-12 masked terrorists had attacked the vehicles with bullets, grenades and  rocket launchers. In the footage shown on Tv via CCTV, you can see them waltzing around in the open roads with their weapons in broad daylight. The latest footage shown as of yesterday night shows them nonchalantly walking away from the scene and getting into motorbikes and driving off, ‘mindful of the speed limit’ by the looks of it.

Wait a minute. 6 policemen ? You knew they were going to be attacked and you assigned a handful of policemen to defend these people who had been promised security equivalent to that of the President ? What were you expecting , Al Qaeda ninjas  ?

I’m not really convinced of the bench strength of the police that day in that scenario simply because every indication and revelation clearly shows that the terrorists weren’t in a hurry. They were ambling along, they had all the time in the world. A terrorist threw a grenade at the bus from right in front of it, which didn’t explode... you think he forgot to pull the pin ? 

The incident lasted 25 minutes, I believe, right ? Yet, with these guys in no hurry, with no real threat to their lives, with the bus surrounded and their bags filled with grenades and rocket launchers... they didn’t kill the cricketers. They had all the time in the world and they just walked away after having the victims at their mercy. After 25 minutes of firing, they could only hit the windows of the bus.. what did the reports say , 10 –  12 bullet marks on the bus ? Gee, that’s one bullet every 2 minutes using Kaleshnikovs and AK- 47s. What kind of Alzheimer patient terrorists were these, man ?

And the getaway. Ok, you calmly walk away from the scene of the crime without completing it. I get that. But you dump all your weapons there itself in the open ? Why ? You weren’t being chased actively. So what gives ? You wanted them found, didn’t you ?

Oh. And it’s just priceless that within half an hour of the incident, there were sketches of the terrorists available to the cops. Gee, sketches of masked men, that should be helpful. What’ya got, Captain ? Beady eyes, pointy nose protruding from big shawl and the hint of a beard flowing out of the bottom of that shawl ? Great, let’s round up the suspects. You go arrest every adolescent male in Islamabad, I’ll get Rawalpindi.

I don’t know how many of you were watching when it occurred live, but in the first few hours a news channel talked live with Javed Miandad. They started on the usual ‘how will this affect cricket in Pakistan’ but then moved in on his kid’s in-laws. You know. Dawood. Man, did he get agitated. He refused to speak on the topic even though the news reporter was pretty persistant ( I admire her for that ). The fact is – it’s a logical conclusion.

Cricket – Dawood - terrorism. You can’t avoid not drawing that conclusion whether it’s true or not.

As of now, noone’s owned up to the act. Talks of Indian hand and even LTTE are now coming out to add tar to the gravy. Who’s behind this – too many choices, really, if you ask me. There are too many discrepancies in the story playing out in front of me. My belief ?

It was planned ( duh ). A section of the police knew what was coming. The route was intentionally changed, security was not beefed up, the terrorists got their chance and took it. They did their duty to perfection – shoot and terrorise. If anyone died by a stray bullet, so be it. But, and I really believe this, THEY WERE NEVER GOING TO KILL THE SRI LANKANS. They had too many opportunities to do that. They chose to walk away from a bus after dropping their rocket launchers and grenades. ( It would take a major mujra-Mardi Gras collaboration for me to do that if I were the terrorist and I haven’t heard of any such collaboration till date. ) Their orders were to create mayhem, BUT NOT KILL.

My heart goes out to the Lankans. Much as I resent them for screwing us on the field, I admire their courage in both visiting this land at this time and also their restraint in how they reacted to the situation. I regret the lives lost by policemen who tried their best to save their nation’s pride. I applaud the driver who, by retaining his foot on the pedal, chose to somehow get the team to safety whether it cost him his own life.

But it’s over. This is GAME OVER for Pakistan, in every front. You've been clean bowled, mate. There isn’t gonna be any way to come out of this unscathed. People are walking the streets with rocket launchers like it’s a damn video game, you’ve ceded land to the Taliban, for crying out loud, international concensus is turning against you like never before and a coup is imminent. Nobody trusts you with their lives, whether it be foreign diplomats or your own men. Way to go, guys.

Of course, I know, you’ll make it hard on us Indians too on your way down. After all, in your eyes, we’re the cause of everything from terrorism to syphilis, right ? Then again, who knows maybe ‘another miracle’ will happen and you’ll decide to drop arms altogether and actually talk meaningful dialogues with each other and all your neighbours. Maybe there’ll actually be peace in your land someday decades from now.

And maybe my golden flying pigs will mate with my unicorns and give birth to little pigicorns, right ? 

"What is your caste ?”

I remember staring back a little surprised. In front of me was one of the world’s biggest Godmen. To say I was nervous back then was an understatement. I used to wonder back then just how far her powers went – could she read my mind ? Did I just have to voice my prayers mentally and she’d hear it and reply? Could she look into my eyes and see my flaws ? Would she say I was unworthy of her blessings.. surely there were worse people than me in that hall, right ?

 In between these fervent thoughts, in this private gathering, she posed me this question. I answered her. She smiled. She was pleased. My caste was relevant that day to the topic of that gathering - my feelings for a girl. She said so. I believed her. I was pleased my low caste was worthy of her smile and her approval. I was happy that God was happy with me and my answers. In my defence, I had no prior experience of being the fly in the spider’s web.

Two years later, I joined an institution for my post graduate studies. And for the second time in my life, I found myself being asked a question that was meant to determine how I would be treated.

“What’s your caste ?”

“I’m a Thiyya.”

“Is that a low caste ?”

I stared back at the senior doctor as he waited for my reply.

“No, we’re actually the highest class in Kerala. We’re the top most of the lot.”

He seemed happy with the answer, as two years earlier a God woman was too. He walked away. During my brief tenure under him, I was treated as any junior can be expected to be, but comments of being of ‘poorer blood’ never reached me.

Of course, I wasn’t exactly lying back then. You see, we Thiyyas are pretty high up there. We’re basically the coconut tree climbers as far as I gathered. The ones who climb up the tree and get you the coconuts for your daily meal. So you see, there really ain’t much higher than us up there on that coconut tree. I am high class blood.

My caste should have mattered neither to a Godwoman who’s preaching love nor a doctor who’s taken the Hippocratic oath. But it did. Both decided my future based on my caste. And I let them. If I had to meet them today, I’d have told the doc that I was infact low class blood and didn't care  and I’d have told the Godwoman that I was high class. Just so that I’d have a nifty story on how I proved her divinity wrong without burning myself.

Everyday, in every field, we’re moving forward, exploring avenues which our parents never had the opportunities to. Yet we hold on to the ties of our past. That is of course natural, perhaps even essential, but is it really that difficult to see which are the cultural ties that need to be cut and which we should retain ?

1. Do you really believe that being of your particular caste or religion makes you the best person around in God’s eyes, unlike the others ? That God doesn't listen to the others who pray because they aren't praying to your God ?
   
2. Do you really believe that a woman having her periods should be deemed unfit to enter a temple to pray to a stone idol
3. Do you believe that an inquisitive Indian should not be allowed to enter a temple because he is a Christian ( Padma Bhushan winner singer K.J.Yesudas, whose devotional bhajans ironically are the first sounds that greet these Gods in so many houses across India ) ?
   
4. Is a friend who’s converted her religion suddenly no longer your friend, or at best someone you can meet outside but can’t take home to visit your parents ?
   
5. Is it really ok to insult ‘meat-eater religions’ sitting in your potato-and-peas pious home, while doing animal sacrifices on holy days to appease the Lord ?
   
6. Do you really believe that your religion is the only REAL religion and that other religions are foreign (Christianity ) / evil ( Islam ) / demigod worship ( Hinduism ) / insignificant ( Sikhism ) / devious ( Jews ) / not even a religion ( Buddhism ) ?
   
7. When you vote to elect someone in the government, is it because of his policies for the development of the state or his religious inclinations and your love/fear towards the latter ? 
8. Do you believe the construction of a Ram temple in Ayodhya will satisfy God ? Will it atleast satisfy your religious convictions ?
9. Last but not least, in the future, would you be ok marrying off your only child to someone from another faith ?
   

 I guess I’ve rattled a lot of questions out there. These are all scenarios which have played out in front of my eyes at some point of my life. I'd really like to know your opinions on all these . As always, I don’t want the ‘right answer’. I just want a honest answer.

Move with the times, huh ?
Well, I was just really bored being bedridden and so went in for a whole makeover of the site.. while some of the old stuff is still retained, I've also added other fun widgets and gizmos to give it a fun look.. so those of you who have me on a RSS FEEDREADER and those who just stop by, please do tell me whacha think of this look..

I wish I could make the REACTIONS COLUMN at the end of each post more legible. But can't find out the place to edit the colour scheme for that.. any ideas, pals ?