History lessons

I was one of those students in schools who could not write 12 “points” for 6 mark questions in my exams, but could still narrate to someone what happened during the Blitzkrieg. I was never able to appreciate the fun of history, because it always used to be this huge burden of memorizing a number of snippets for each of the questions. When I think about it now, it seems so weird that we used to memorize stuff and relay it onto the answer sheets for credit and not understand a word of what we actually learnt from history. I am pretty sure this was because of the way history was taught in school. Be it the bronze age civilizations or the ancient kings of India, or the world civilizations or the spread of knowledge through Persia or the medieval ages, we could not care less to know what the chapters and notes mean to us in today’s world.  Would it hurt the teacher’s to talk about history in terms of implications? Did we really learn anything from all the trees Ashoka planted? Why would Hitler’s war on Europe be so important? What did the World War really lead to? The idea here is that history is purely a study of implications of historical events. If not for the consequences, the events themselves hold little meaning. For example, it is very interesting that even Rava Idli has a history that it traces back to World War II. Since India was still in British control during the WW II, we had severe rice rations imposed on us, and this forced Mavalli Tiffin Room (the famous MTR) to come up with an altrenative for the rice based Idli. They tried to use semolina to make the Idlis and they became an instant hit, so was Rava Dosa. The point I am trying to make is that the same concept of rice rations in India during WW II can be conveyed to students by this trivia, thereby helping them to understand what really was the implication and severity of a rice ration. (I understand that it is probably a little ridiculous to quote this example to demonstrate the intensity of rice rations, but I believe that student would remember this better than anything else!) I strongly feel that we should make history lessons more relatable by studying the consequences of events, and connecting them to present day occurences to draw a string and to realise the purpose of studying history.

Life Elsewhere

I never really expected any kind of change in my life once I moved, and I am not going to give the usual technology-keeps-people-everywhere-connected-all-the-time reasoning. As silly as it may sound, and as obvious as it may be, the sky above and the ground below are quite the same, wherever you are. The only difference was language, and I did not find the change particularly sudden, since I have been used to it over the last four years. Again, this is probably a premature post, since I have not seen much of this place over the short time I have been here, but I am pretty sure, that it would all come around to my way of living than anything else that is going to matter. I should admit that cooking for myself and earning, have been a breath of fresh life, but somehow my heart still refuses to believe that I live elsewhere, far away from what I have known all along, and however hard I think about it, I fail to understand where and what I miss.

Fatalism

I do not remember if I have written about this earlier, or referred to this, but fatalism is such a wonderful concept. I am sure I have not understood this properly, because it seems so easy. All that I need to do is to leave my work to fate, and if it has to happen, it will! This has pretty much been my driving force to do things, because, I do stuff not because I expect something out of it, but because I like doing it. It always turns out that the results either make me happy or  ends up changing nothing. This is exactly the Gita’s idea of doing one’s duty without expecting the “fruits” of the action. Of course, all easy philosophical ideas come with their contradictions. This kind of a mental framework hinders with scientific thinking and prediction, because all science can be brushed aside with the comment “Ah, whatever should happen, will happen!” (Also, astrologers will run out of customers if everyone is a fatalist )

Thinking a bit deeper, I realised that fatalism is not that contrary to natural thinking and is quite simple to understand once we come out of the impression that fatalism means zero control. Fatalism just means hidden control. To expand on this, let me take the example of breaking a piece of chalk. Science says that if you bend it enough, the chalk will break. Here, we need to be careful in invoking fatalism, because fatalism has already been enforced by science by a series of logical steps. The fatalism which says whatever is to happen will happen is enforced by the idea that there is something called the failure load of the chalk piece and on bending there are points on chalk which will attain this stress and so will start cracking and finally break. In some sense, fatalism is science, because it says things will happen. But it is just the hypothesis that fatalism asserts, and we need science to reason out the gap between the hypothesis and the observed result. So, to summarize, fatalism does not steal control, but just hides it from plain sight, unless you reveal the science behind (rather, in front of ) it.

What If

Every action of ours, has some doubt associated with it. Some uncertainty that we keep pondering over. Sometimes it becomes an obsession, sometimes just a fleeting thought which is brushed aside. Doubts have the greatest potential to destroy valuable time. Doubts about actions and choices. Man leads such a comfortable life when he is deprived of choices. He does not find the need to question actions, nature, incidents, when he is forced along a path. Once he comes to a fork, he is lost. Either way at the fork, gives him the feeling of being lost. The question of “what if I had taken the other path?” is just a step away from the fork. And all but a moment is required to have this doubt, and completely destroy the beautiful journey ahead. Greed, expectation, inherent interest to avoid disappointments make man constantly question his decisions. It makes him come up with ideas like, ‘oh, how much I would love if I could make that decision again!’ That moment, is when man loses peace, and starts to live two lives, the one he assumes he would have had otherwise, and the one he dreads in spite of it being the most comfortable life possible.

This question of “what if?” destroys one’s future. The question makes one dwell only in the past. For all we care about is the apparent better life from the other option. Man fails to accept the choices he has made. He fails to understand that a decision once made could never be reverted. Acceptance is the best way to deal with life and once acceptance is understood, the question of doubt never arises in one’s mind. In short, why think about the past if you can do nothing about it?

Nostalgia

Living for 21 years does not make anything seem like it is the past. Everything seems to be such a few steps down memory lane. Past is simply non-existent, because nothing ever happened “long” back. And that was pretty much what I had been thinking for a while now, until I went to Pondicherry a few weeks back. Something hit me really hard, and I realised that it was all coming back to me. All my experiences, every tiny incident associated with the different places in that town came back to me. It was all a long lost echo, returning, booming in fact. It was at the same time weird and yet familiar, scary yet known, and all that mattered was , I was once there, and 12 years later, I am back again, just to realise that, the town could change, but nothing could ever change what the town did to me. What I learnt, what I saw, heard and felt those five years in that little town. Looking back, it feels as though it is impossible to remember so much from the past especially, of such a young age. A few hours , back at Pondicherry after 12 years defined nostalgia as no dictionary could. And today, I might not remember the nostalgic moments of those few hours, but the moments of 12 years’ past is something I would relive every time I visit Pondicherry.

Sudden Vision

A few weeks back there was a string of thoughts, rather disconnected, but when I pooled them, it had a common destination. A destination, much longed for, and much awaited for. This importance that this destination gained over the past made it a vision, quite close at hand , but not close enough to reach. Only when thoughts of reaching it arose, did I realize a great change. A stronger, wilder, and scarier vision of things to come. Of a particular “thing to come”, which made me freeze and crippled further thoughts, for just about a second. The thought itself was silly, at some level, but then, it had quite an impact, in retrospect. The thought had at one go, brought things planned and going, to a complete standstill, or at least, had the potential to. This was confusing. A moment’s thought could possibly change my future? Unlike myself, I resisted the urge to ponder and moved on. I am yet to know if it is a good decision. But there is one thing I am sure of, and that is definitely my driving force. How better to put it other than in Frost’s words.

And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep

Inevitabilities and Uncertainties

It’s been a month since I posted anything here, and definitely not feeling great about it. I had several opportunities to blog but then, the point was not to force myself to post. This was not something i wanted to because it had to be done. I liked the uncertainty of my posts, and didn’t want it to be inevitable vent-outs. Nothing more, nothing less.

Now this very post was triggered by a thought trace to events which happened close to 5 months back when I experienced a good change, an unexpected change. Leaving the change aside, not because of lack of content, but lack of words, here I am looking at time that went by and found something totally different in my perspective. And the two words that I could find to explain them are the words that feature in the title.

It was at first something which I had to argue with myself to find the difference. It was as subtle as the difference between permanence and change. As subtle as the difference between a smile and happiness. But to me, the difference was glaring, and self appraisal helped.

No single person could possibly declare an absence of fear or at least apprehensions. Fear, in fact, is a fundamental emotion. Something that drives us in a direction, to say the least, away from the fear. I should admit that I totally agree with the existence of unfounded fear, but that doesn’t stop me from questioning it.

Fears, in an attempt to be extremely simplistic in classifying, can be parted to be based on the past or the future. Here, I want to take a look at the future-induced fear to exemplify the difference aforementioned. To further classify, a future-induced fear, can be split into fears of uncertainties and fears of inevitabilities.

To me, a fear of an uncertainty has a better justification than the fear of an inevitability. It is clear that uncertainties as such have so much of variation, as is evident from the name, and makes us feel insecure. Everyone prefers a certain, planned out life. Risks minimized, rewards maximized, future in sight and path well lit. The occasional wanderer still has all these requirements except probably a high risk tolerance and a much higher reward expectation. Nevertheless, my guess is that, it is a widely accepted fact that people would love their lives to be clear. I would like to stress here, that is clarity and not predictability that we seek. To rephrase we seek options, not uncertainties. Hence the fear of uncertainties.

Life is inevitable, death is inevitable, time is inevitable, and age is inevitable. My point here is, does it really matter to fear inevitability? Does it help? ( Fear, in essence doesn’t “help” does it? That would be the content of another discussion though) Why fear something that is bound to happen? What purpose does that serve? Few common examples would be fear of exam results, appraisals, evaluations, time bound projects and much more. A common thread can immediately be spotted to be the thread of time. As opposed to uncertainties, inevitabilities will happen. No stopping them. Again, is there a meaning to “fear inevitability?” Of course, it is uncertain when it would happen, but does it really matter? To be frank, I do not know. But the question persists, does it help?

The Pursuit of Happiness

Yes, i understand clearly that the title has now become quite cliched, but, the subject of this post is not about the movie, but about the title itself. Happiness is something that we pursue, if not directly ,at least by indirect goals. These goals, irrespective of the end point, are mostly set with the satisfaction and happiness one gets out of it. The immediate question that pops up after this statement would ask for a way to quantify, or to ask for the least, understand happiness. Happiness, predominantly, and quite exclusively, can be categorized into two categories, immediate, and happiness-at-some-later-stage (I hate it when i don’t get the right word). The first thing that strikes me in such a pursuit is that since the ultimatum is happiness, and obviously, since we are working for it, there is a very low probably that we would repent it.  A happiness that I desired a few years back might be silly and childish now, but that doesn’t change the fact that, at that time, I was happy, and now, and then, all I want is happiness, and I got it then, when I wanted it. Inasmuch as the pursuit’s methodology is simple, it is rather difficult to implement it.  The difficulty stems from the fact that in a pursuit of happiness, it is quite possible one might be selfish, but my point is not about being selfless. To elaborate, a particular act which makes one happy, might end up hurting another person. To a person, whose pursuit is his happiness, he could not care less about another person’s suffering, which is not ethical, to say the least. Particularly, this pursuit seems to have a potential for a good amount of collateral damage.  From this perspective, it does not seem just to be a great and in some sense all-inclusive  pursuit, but also, the associated problem which makes it quite an insensitive pursuit. Is one person’s happiness worth another’s lack of it?

Stuck with stuff

Ya, the title says it all. Busy with GRE, Intern, Project work. Give me some time. Maybe till Aug 4. Should be back in full spirit by then.

I read it, I don’t get it, It is a Haiku!

Poetry has not been something that I have appreciated or enjoyed in the past. But at least I used to understand what it meant! With Haikus, it has always been something different, the difference, of course, being I could not understand! It seems like they have been written with a purpose, like, I don’t know, maybe, the readers should not understand! Here are some examples of Haikus.

Where piss dribbles,
dribbles down…
irises

The snail does just
as he pleases…
curled to sleep

Staring at the man
burning leaves…
stone Buddha

The second one
doesn’t satisfy their greed…
New Year’s celebrations

Look at them! What do you get from them! I could write them!

And I warn you, in case you don’t understand, be happy, that is what we try with these “short poems”!

This is definitely the first time I have ever ventured into anything remotely related to literature and the like. And, again, brace yourself!

Today is Friday
and tomorrow would be
Saturday

Hey, I just realised
that writing Haikus
is not difficult

I see myself
when I stand and
look into the mirror

Why am I doing this
do I not have
anything better to do?

Hey, look again,
I think I could complete
this post, this way!

When writing Haikus,
a japanese song in the background
doesn’t help!

And in case, you need
help writing Haikus,
do not contact me

Because I know
nuts about anything related to
Haikus!

Aha! I came up with around 8 Haikus but, I know, I am sorry, some of them were easy to understand. Will definitely revisit Haiku sometime, and then, I shall write the perfect (?!) Haiku.