Why God? Why?

When you are having one of the worst days of your life (which you caused!) then most people wouldn't want to see something as sad as a documentary on Brothels of Kolkatta and the kids of the prostitutes.

It did change my day. Not because seeing people live in misery made me feel as if I should not crib about my problems. But because it proves that happiness can and does grow in the cracks of society.

A bit about the documentary here:
The title (if anyone is interested): Born Into The Brothels: Calcuttas Red Light Kids
Year: 2004 (year of filming 1998)
Won the Oscar for best documentary feature.
More info here!

Everyone should watch this. Its about this woman (quite young) who is a photographer by profession (not a social worker OR a teacher). She goes and lives in the red light district of Sonagachi in Calcutta for more than 2 years.
There she befriends the children of the prostitutes and in the process teaches them photography. She also gives them simple film based cameras to take pictures of their life and surroundings.
All the kids take so many pictures. And each picture screams out the same story.
The story of a fate pre-decided. The girls of prostitutes will enter the same 'line of work' because their relative or parents will sell them off. The boys will marry someone within the area and probably become their pimps.

But I am most impressed with the children. You wont find a more genuine bunch of kids anywhere else in the world. Kids who are practical about their fate. They know they will never get out of the hell that is their life. Yet they take to photography with as much enthusiasm as any bunch of kids. They are excited and have a sparkle in their eyes even as they wash dirty dishes with filthy water.

Oh the lady tries to get them out of the brothel all right... and get them into a boarding school. But no school will take them without an HIV test certificate. Imagine treating kids for HIV? It makes my head spin.
The good news is that they are all negative.
I smile!
They show a baby kitten playing.
I smile again.

For anyone who thinks they are having the most fucked up day of their life. Remember there is always hope and that if happiness can grow in the cracks of society it can surely grow in your cracked (or broken!) heart.

More about it:
The lady takes the photographs to New York (she is American). There she organizes an auction at Sothebys and an exhibition (where well fed and fit looking people come to peer at the misery of the kids).
All the money she collects goes right back to the kids. She also convinces some big shot photographer guy to come and work with the kids. The kids get their 10 minutes of fame.
There is this one kid who has talent. Maybe he will get a chance to get himself out of the red light area. But the problem is his mom's pimp burns her to death.
That forces him to say "there is nothing called 'hope' in my future". But there is hope. He goes to Amsterdam for a photo exhibition.

The end is sad. Out of the eight kids the lady gets admitted into schools only three stick on. In the five cases their parents pull them out of school probably to work in the same trade.
Misery multiplies.

Fight the good fight!

My life has never been simple. New challenges and opportunities all the time.
I have seen many things, done many things and had many things done to me.

Through it all I have sufferred a lot. But then I realised that there was a very easy way to defeat it all.
Just remove the emotions. Once you remove the emotions you remove the sufferring.
One needs to switch off the emotions in certain situations.
Switching off the emotions is not easy isn't it?
There is one way to do it.
Be patient. Be cool. Things are dynamic. They change. Wait for the right moment to bounce back.
Remove the frustration and remove the emotions.
:D

ACDM 2006

Yesterday I was under a lot of pressure.
Having slept only 1 hr the previous night I had to present a paper at my supervisors conference.
That too in the afternoon.
I managed to deliver a decent enough presentation and the general opinion was that it was good.
Thank the lords.

The Wheel goes backwards too!

Progress is often represented by a wheel. The wheel of course stands for movement.
The problem is that the movement can be in any direction.. even backwards.

India (with the Asoka chakra in the national flag) seems to have gone back in time when it comes to progress in thinking.
In the past we had great poets, thinkers, writers and dancers. Now we are reduced to copying things from the west. Regional language is almost dead with the upper segment of society (ones with the money!) prefering English language books (often unable to read any of the literary masterpieces written by the likes of Munshi Premchand).

In the past a semi nude girl was considered to be artistic. Something representing the ability of God to create beauty. Something to be celebrated. Then the wheel spun backwards and nudity became a taboo. Now it is being re-introduced but only to get the audiences. Showing the human body in all its glory has been reduced from an art form to softcore porn.

These days you can't even celebrate Valentines day or kiss openly in public without landing in deep shit. All this in the land of the Kamasutra.

Then people say all these acts are 'obscene' and not in our 'culture'. Those closed minded idiots don't know their culture since they never had the guts (or maybe were never allowed to) explore beyond what was told to them.

I just wonder how we managed to evolve into such an orthodox society after having such liberal and free thinking fore-fathers. What made us look inwards rather than reach out and grab our rightful place in the world stage.

Astro-crap!

Girls this is the kind of guy I am:

You are the kind of person who is afraid to voice your feelings openly and cannot express yourself or may be you are afraid of rejection. But once you have set your eyes on the girl of your dreams you pursue her and it may become an obsession with you. You are an intense and passionate lover.
You make woman of your dreams the happiest person on earth though still openly you may not declare undying love for her.

Brecon Beacons National Park

The Ghost (left: me) and The Darkness (right: Vikas) at Brecon Beacons National Park!

Clash of the Titans (L to R: Me, Prashant and Bhuvan).

Spaced out!

Another spectacular view.

Girls!

Love can Damage your health says:
hmmm u kno what u call a person who just smiles without reason
Arti says:
hahahaaaaaaaaa
Arti says:
Azahar's friend

Whatever does 'Azahar's friend' mean?
Does it mean that all my friends are crazy people?
Or that I keep all my friends in a happy mood?
:D
Some women sure do know how to confuse you (and to keep you in that state of general confusion for some length of time)!

Brecon Beacons National Park (Wales) (contd.)

(Panoramic shot I took using the photo stitch effect in my canon cam.)

Wales and Brecon Beacons!

Cleaning myself up under the waterfall in Wales.

Bridge over the River Severn

At Brecon Beacon National Park

Beach at Bude

Relaxing on the rocks


At Bude Beach


Waves!

A Question

My question to you:
What will you do when you know that the person you love deserves someone much better than you?

-Will you leave the person because you love them and can't see them going for someone like yourself?
-Will you change yourself where a change would mean something monumental. Something which you cannot do alone without support?

Or

-will you let things be as they are and do nothing?

What would be your choice?

The Road...

The M5 motorway (towards Exeter).


Some castle along the road.


Distant shoreline.


A wall..

Harland Lighthouse

The shipwreck of 'Johanna' (shipwrecked 31st December 1982)



Hartland Lighthouse


Life is a bed of rocks and water to drown yourself in.

Hartland Point

Towards Hartland Point - narrow roads!



From the Hartland Point Radar Station.


The MoD Hartland Point Radar Station


Towards Hartland Point Lighthouse

Dreamscapes along the Devon Coast!

Me and Rishi


Countryside of eternity


A house in the fog.


House on the borderland.

Atlantic Highway (A39)

On Good Friday I went along the Atlantic Highway (A39).

The Travellers:
Front Left: Bhuvan (Pilot)
Front Right: Azahar (Navigator)
Back Right: Rishi (Treasurer)
Back Left: Prashant (Catering)




Dreamscapes along the Devon Coast!

Emotions.. the lack off.

I was watching a Hindi movie yesterday. It had some scenes of family life. An almost complete family with a grand mother, father, daughter and son. A happy family.

It made me realise that living away from home and having no contact with any kind of family out here has made me loose those emotions. I just feel cold emotionally. Three years of living away from home with a month long trip back once a year. It hasn't left much scope for exercising these basic emotions.

I guess everyone must feel a degree of emotional vaccume when they live away from home for a length of time. Does it make us very cold emotionally? Do we loose the ability to love someone from the depths of our heart? Can we ever feel comfortable in a family setting? Or have we lost the ability to have any kind of 'family' based emotions?

One thing I do know, when you leave home you need to kill a part of you. Some people manage to kill it off completely but with me I have just damaged that part... it continues to bleed... and it will never heal.

Ghosts..

I haven't seen or felt one yet.
I don't believe in them.

In horror movies they show ghosts running around in a graveyard. How is that possible? Aren't people laid to rest under the sign of God? How can we have restless spirits there?
I guess you are safest in a graveyard from all kinds of evil spirits. :D

But in the end it is just about opening your mind to superstitions. Once your mind is open you end up seeing all kinds of funny stuff!

Remember mind is the most powerful engine around. It can lead to great good as well as great evil!
;)

Truth and TV

Yesterday me and my housemate were watching TV while eating dinner. I was going through the TV guide when I saw that we had some of the Hindi TV channels (Star Plus and Star News) free for a week.

Now since we had nothing better to do we decided to watch a soap opera (something which mostly women watch back home!).
The name of the soap was 'Kahani Ghar Ghar Ki' which means (approximately) 'story of a common house'. The only problem is, as my friend put it, the serial had nothing to do with reality. In fact it was SO far from reality that probably it would make a nice fairy tale for children. Of course there was also nothing 'common' about the houses or the people they show.

Here are some common trends in Indian soaps:
1) All women are super sexy looking even the old ones.
2) Women are decked out in 'full gear' through out the day which includes jewellery, sexy saris, makeup and ofcourse that good old sindoor.
3) Inspite of all the clothes and stuff they manage to do their daily duties (god only knows how but I hope I get a wife like that!) without breaking into a sweat or smearing their makeup.
4) People never look their age. Often mother-daughter pairs look like sisters.
5) Kids grow at exponential rate into adults (about 6 months worth of episodes) or don't grow at all (like good old Archies comics).
6) Adults always look and stay the same year after year (magic of makeup and soft focus!).
7) Old people never die and look like all nice and presentable (nothing like real life.. hell no!).
8) All the families (even the poor ones) life in houses that look more like a small luxury hotel!
9) The households never seem to have any problems with electricity, water or any other such day to day problems.

:D
And the name of the serials inspire such commonality.
Kahani Ghar Ghar Ki -> Story of a common house.
Kasauti Zindagi Ki -> The foundation of life.
Kyonki Saas Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi -> Because Once upon a time even a mother-in-law was a daughter-in -law.

Amazing!

Why bother...

I am not drunk (for once!) and I am not depressed.
Sometimes you just need to think some things through. Even if it does seem counter-productive to think them.

I am in a catch 22 situation.
I haven't spoken with the girl I love for a long time now. She is busy. I am free. Yet I don't see myself making that extra effort to reach out and touch her. Why do it I ask myself. Why bother her specially since she doesnt believe in outward show of emotions? Keep the pain inside you my heart thinks. It is just a matter of time before she would be well and truly beyond my reach. I don't mean the geographical seperation. I mean a seperation of emotions. A seperation lasting a life time. A seperation of the mind, body and soul.

But maybe I don't get a response because I am not responding myself. Too confusing.

Why does love have to be like a detective novel where all actions (implicit and explicit) have to read and re-read to find out their correct meaning. Clues pieced together bit by bit.
Where if you assume wrongly you loose more than just your self-respect. Where does the scrambling of signals take place and cause confusion to prevent two humans from just admitting that they love each other.

The tree-lined avenue
Begins to fade from view
Drowning past regrets
In tea and cigarettes
But I can’t seem to forget
When you came along

The world I love
The tears I drop
To be part of
The wave can't stop
Ever wonder if it's all for you
The world I love
The trains I hop
To be part of
The wave can't stop