My 10-year-old nephew's essay

 

The autobiography of a pencil

Hi. I am a pencil. I was born in a factory. We pencils have only one thing to do throughout our lives. That one thing is writing and we love to do it. The best part is we're born with the talent of writing. Before I was put in my box and sent to a shop, my father told me I have to go through painful sharpenings but they are for my own good and for me to write better and now I have realized how true that is. I live in a pencil box with a sharpner, an eraser, a ruler and a pen. By now, you will be wondering what I write on. You guessed it! I write on paper and in books. The pencil box I live and all these books are put in a bag and we are taken to a place called school. The thing about pencils is as we grow older, we shrink. I change pencil boxes every now and then. There are many types of pencil boxes that come in different colours. Looks like I'm shifting so I guess this is goodbye for now. See you next time.

 

The Buffalo Soldier law

In a move that has created a controversy of epic proportions, the Indian government today changed the national animal from tiger to buffalo through a backdoor ordinance that was not sent to the houses for a vote. Dubbed the “Buffalo Soldier” law, the ordinance takes immediate effect. Utter chaos prevailed on the streets of every major city and town as the bewildered new national animals were paraded by their owners in celebratory processions. Stampedes were reported from at least 13 places in which 10 buffaloes and twice the number of people have lost their lives. The topic is trending on Twitter.

It all began when 7 buffaloes belonging to a minister staged a walkout from the minister’s well guarded farm. They were protesting the maltreatment of human beings in the minister’s hometown. The buffaloes belong to a group called AETP (Animals for the Ethical Treatment of People). The animals were traced and brought back after a massive manhunt by PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals). The grateful minister has sworn to ban AETP as a “rogue outlaw oufit.” It is reliably learnt that the AETP responded to the news by releasing unprecedented amounts of methane into the atmosphere. In the national capital, the Chief Minister’s brooms are finally being put to use. When asked whether the AETP could not be enlisted to help trace dozens of missing children in his hometown, the minister dead-panned, “What children?”

Meanwhile, a relatively unknown tiger group called ISH (I’m Still Here) has petitioned the President against the “grave injustice and racial discrimination” and has threatened to take to the streets to have the ordinance reversed. Tiger activists are reportedly excited and hope to finally stop fudging their figures as the opportunity presents itself for a transparent census. When asked to comment, the Prime Minister was typically sagacious, “In a democracy, all voices must be heard,” he intoned. “Be thankful we haven’t gone to the dogs,” he added demurely.

The hills are alive...(and so am I)

After driving through some of the most spectacular hairpin bends in the Western Ghats (nine in all), we realized our resort in Waynad, didn’t want to be found. It was buried almost 10 km in the deep forests hundreds of meters up in the mountains. We overshot it the first time around because there’s no board to announce it as you’re coming in. We kept driving because the driver belonged to the male of the species and it was a blow to his ego to ask someone if we were lost though I kept gently (by my definition) suggesting to him that it did look like we were lost. By the time he made up his mind to swallow his pride and pop the question, we had driven to what seemed like the ends of the earth. When he stopped finally and asked “Which way to Kannampatta?” the guy answered with a question: “Kannampattay-yo? Why have you come HERE?” Believe me, that’s the last thing you want to hear. If we knew the answer to that question, we wouldn’t ask him. Then he said, “It’s all the way back there.” A sweeping wave of his hand suggested it could be anywhere in Asia (or Africa). “Do we have to turn back?” I asked the driver and it took every ounce of effort not to say “I told you so.” “Just for a bit,” he muttered under his breath and I’m sure it took every ounce of his effort not to say “Now, shut up and sit back till I get you seriously lost again.” He drove for what seemed to be forever before he spotted the board announcing the resort had been found – I’ve never seen a happier man. But that’s because he didn’t know what lay in store. Unknown to the unsuspecting driver, it would be another 10 km after it was found that the resort would actually be found.

We entered the forests through a road that seemed two fingerbreadths wide – it was the narrowest path I’ve ever seen anywhere. It looked like it could accommodate nothing more than one horse. Thick woods, mud hills, rocks on one side and sheer drops on the other. This was the only entrance into the resort and - like we found out to our horror, later – the only exit as well. We were driving on what might as well have been a rope and hoping an ant wouldn’t approach. If a walker came from the other side, we had four choices: a) He could climb over our car and keep walking. b) We could reverse 5 km with him riding on our hood or roof, to deposit him outside the trail. c) He could walk backwards 5 km because there wasn’t enough space for him to turn around. d) Or we could do the easiest thing: run over him – in which case he would literally and metaphorically pass over to the other side. If a car came from the other side, we had one choice: head butt it off the cliff. I made a mental note to tell the resort that they must ferry their guests either on mules or horses, but if the horse were to meet a fellow horse coming from the opposite direction, we were done for; one of them would have to jump over the other or walk backwards all the way. I finally understood why Tarzan was a happy man.

The driver sighed and giggled alternately and sometimes emitted a sound between a sigh and a giggle that meant “I’d love to simply stop the car right here, get down, and run away, you nut jobs.” And then it happened. To our collective horror, there was a car headed straight for us, from the opposite direction – apparently leaving the resort. “This is a new car. This is my first trip in the new car,” the driver whimpered. It was directed at God. Then he turned to us. “This is a new car,” he told us. “Congratulations!” I said brightly and sensed immediately it was the worst possible thing to say. I couldn’t read his face. Let’s just say he wasn’t happy. (Let’s also say if looks could kill, you would be reading my obituary now instead.) When the other car got close enough, our driver put his head out and yelled, “This is a new car,” “Oh,” the other fellow said, his face registering impending doom, “can you go closer on your side?” “Can I? Yes, I can if I can drive up the mountains vertically, otherwise I can’t,” our driver snapped testily. “This is a new car” he said to no one in particular. “Well, the only way I can go any closer on MY side is if I plunged off the mountain,” the other driver murmured thoughtfully. We waited with bated breath but he changed his mind.

Then began the finest demonstration of negotiations I’ve ever witnessed - these guys ought to be our diplomats in Pakistan, they’d do a fantastic job. With great politeness they directed each other where to turn, how to reverse, what to avoid and after what can only be described as 15 minutes of death dance, two cars miraculously passed on the bicycle track. I’m sure the road must’ve expanded – there’s NO WAY the cars would’ve passed otherwise. By now, our driver was perspiring freely in the chilly hillside forest. But he was a happy man. At least for a while. After we’d gone about 300 meters, out of nowhere a calf darted out. It saw the car and began prancing around trying to climb up the steep slope, sliding back, hopping around (I think on two legs) and generally acting cute and confused. “This is a new car,” our driver told the prancing calf and turned off the engine and leaned on the horn. The sound drove the calf crazy and it began darting about wildly like its tail was on fire. “Don’t jump on my car,” the driver begged the calf. “This is a new car.” “He will if you keep up with the honking,” I told him cheerfully and he quickly got off the God awful sound. And just like that, out of thin air, a man materialized with a lasso and began chasing the calf. It was a wild goose chase for the longest time as the man crouched, lunged, and sprinted trying to lasso the calf which kept bleating like a lamb as it ducked and dodged him expertly. After a while everyone forgot who was chasing whom. I think the calf forgot too and that’s how he got caught. The man folded himself and the calf and they stuffed themselves into the woods so we could pass and so it came to pass that nature, man, beast, a new car and a harassed driver delivered us into the lovely mountains of Waynad.

The flavour of the season: Mango!

I had sworn I wouldn’t write on politics ever again on my blog but I’m thrilled to eat my words now that Aam Admi Party has given both the major political parties a licking they’re unlikely to forget as long as they live, in the Delhi Assembly polls. And just when you thought it couldn’t get more bizarre, we now have all 3 parties holding the door open for one another to form the government. If all that the AAP has managed to do is to civilize the Congress and BJP whose high-pitched snarling has made this pre-poll season one of the dirtiest ever in living memory, it’s worth it. Serendipity couldn’t be sweeter. The BJP and Congress are now referring to each other as (get this!) “friends”, “my good friend”, “my colleague who I hold in high esteem” (insert joke here) and other such wonderful sobriquets. On television channels: the same television channels, the same anchors (who used every ounce of their own lung power to keep the two parties straining on their leashes, in their corners), the same TV audience whose dinner was ruined night after night by these same “friends” who behaved like they’d forgotten to take their anti-psychotic medication before coming out in public.

The most curious outcome of AAP’s win is this new found romance that is amusing the hell out of news anchors and viewers alike. From being a warring couple who couldn’t agree on anything, the two parties now can’t seem to disagree on anything. And they’ve teamed up to try and rush the Lokpal Bill through as well. All this is rip-roaringly funny of course. But the funniest of all is the position that the “mango men” find themselves in; when you make your bed, you have to lie in it. They remind me of a stunned guy with the deer-caught-in-headlights look, suddenly pushed out on stage from behind the curtain before the actual play starts. And the newly married couple (Congress and BJP) are like the real actors who can’t go out there and pull him back. But they can’t come out on stage and begin their play either. The guy who is on stage has gone into deep freeze. The spotlight is on him. The audience is cheering wildly. But the audience is equally confused and scratching its collective head (“Tell me again, what exactly is the guy doing?”) So, nobody knows what to do. Everyone is waiting to see who blinks first. There has been an election but nobody wants to rule, everyone wants to sit on the bench, so there’s no one in the driver’s seat.

This has to be the best make-it-up-as-you-go story.

Excerpt from Chapter 10 of Home with God by Neale Donald Walsch

Why do we have to reach out to you before you reach out to us? If you really are an all-knowing God, then you must know when we need help. If you really are an all-merciful God, then you must be willing to offer that help – without our asking. If we are already on our knees, bent over in utter defeat, why must we grovel even more and plead with you to rescue us? If you are an all-loving God, why don’t you love us enough to help us without us having to beg you?

And while we’re at it, what do you say to those who would tell you, “I have called out to you, and you have not been there! Do you think I have not asked for God’s help? For God sake, why do you think I’m so desperate! I’m so desperate because it seems like God has let me down! I’m utterly deserted here. And I want none of it anymore. I’m done. Finished. Through.”

What do you say to that person, huh?

                I say...

                I want you to consider now the possibility of a miracle. There is a reason why you have not experienced receiving a solution from me, but that reason is not important in this moment. What is important in this moment is for you to consider the possibility that now, right now in front of you, there is an answer. Open your eyes and you will see it. Open your mind and you will know it. Open your heart and you will feel that it is there.

                I say...

                Only if you call out to me in absolute knowing will you be aware that your answer has been given you. Because it is what YOU know, what YOU feel, and what YOU declare that will be true in your experience. If you call out to me in hopelessness, I will be there, but your despair may blind you, and block you from seeing me.

                I say...

                Nothing you have done is so horrible, nothing you have had happen to you is so beyond repair, that it cannot be healed. I can and shall make you whole again.

                Yet you must stop judging yourself. The one making the strongest judgment is you. Others may judge you from the outside looking in, but they do not know you, they do not see you, and so their judgments are not valid. Do not make them valid by taking them on as your own. They have no meaning.

                Do not wait for others to see you as you really are, for they see you through the eyes of their own pain. Know, instead, that I see you now, in wonder and in truth, and that what I see of you is Perfect. As I look upon you I have but one thought: “This is my beloved, in whom I am well pleased.”

                I say...

                Forgiveness is not necessary in the Kingdom of God. God cannot be offended or damaged in any way. There is only one question of importance in the entire universe, and it has nothing to do with your guilt or innocence. It has to do with your identity. Do you know who you really are? When you do, all thoughts of loneliness disappear; all ideas of unworthiness evaporate, all contemplations of hopelessness transmute into the wondrous awareness of the miracle that is your life. And of the miracle that is you.

                And finally, my beloved, I say...

                You are surrounded in this very moment by a hundred thousand angels. Accept, now, their ministrations. And then, pass their gifts on to others. For it is in giving that you shall receive, and it is in healing that you shall be healed. The miracle for which you have been waiting has been waiting for you. You will know this when you become the miracle that another awaits.

                Go then and perform your miracles, and allow your death to be the moment of your greatest glory, not an announcement of your greatest sorrow. Use death as a tool with which to create, not with which to destroy, with which to move forward, not with which to go back. In this choice will you have honoured Life Itself, and allowed Life to bring you your own grandest dream, even while you are living with your physical body: peace within your soul at last.

Six degrees of separation (or A toast to medical transcriptionists everywhere)

Imagine you’re an ill American patient. (Ok, imagine someone you don’t like – hereinafter referred to as ‘you’ – is an ill American patient.) You walk into a clinic/hospital, have your problem addressed, and leave (hopefully, not horizontally). You give no thought to who writes your report, what it contains, where it’s stored, how many people will look at it. You’re the patient, remember? You have enough troubles of your own. In the well-regulated American healthcare industry, you’re a crucial player. Your job is to fall sick and either stay sick or get well enough to fall sick all over again with great gusto. If you can’t fall sick, you can do other clever things like sawing off your thumb, getting shot in a drive-by shooting (formerly a crime, now a sport), dropping something heavy on your foot, dislocating your shoulder in a skiing accident…America is a land of infinite opportunities.

We’ve all heard how big the American healthcare industry is (12 billion US dollars at last count). Apart from you, the industry comprises medical facilities, doctors, non-doctor healthcare professionals, rehab facilities, pharmacies, insurance companies, and laws to govern everyone and everything. But you, dear sick patient, and all your fellow players, will collapse like a house of cards without me because I am the medical transcriptionist. I prepare your medical records and in that short time when I’m doing it, your life quite literally is in my hands. An accurate patient medical record is the link that connects all the dots in the healthcare industry and if there are only six degrees of separation, I’m the healthcare industry’s right arm.

As professions go, medical transcription must rank as one of the most intelligent and most demanding; it requires a wide range of premium skills such as research and logic/reasoning abilities, command over the English language, matchless typing skills, listening skills, medical knowledge in the areas of human anatomy, disease conditions, diagnostics, treatment, and pharmacology, and most of all a focused attention span of no less than a minimum of 7 hours – a minute’s distraction can literally prove fatal to a patient a continent away. Above all, it requires a commitment to lifelong learning. Transcriptionists not only must know almost as much medical language as a doctor, we must also be able to interpret the language of medicine accurately. We should be able to tell, for example, whether the patient needs a pill, a procedure, or a pastor by looking at his BNP. To prepare an accurate medical record and return it to its owner within its deadline, transcriptionists must synchronize all these skills perfectly every single minute on the job.

But despite our skills and technological advances, we still rely on a human voice talking to us from 10,000 miles away, to create a patient record – this is a transcriptionist’s greatest challenge. Though we’re service providers for the American healthcare industry, we actually service a global community of doctors who speak English in their own native tongues. Doctors not only come in different accents, they come in different moods, with varied dictation styles, dictating from you don’t want to know where. After a long tiring day spent listening to other people’s miseries, physicians are not exactly thrilled to dictate them into a recorder; they fumble, yawn, rasp, growl, whisper and sleepwalk their way through reports; regardless of how chaotic their dictations are, what they expect to sign is a well-researched, well-punctuated, grammatically sound medical document – a document that will be referred by their colleagues, filed for insurance claims, quoted by medical personnel, relied on by pharmacies, and hopefully never picked up by a lawyer.

Most times, we take our challenges in our stride and our skills for granted. The nature of our trade demands that we strive for perfection every single minute on the job, and we rise to the occasion more often than not. As medical transcriptionists, we’re acutely aware that our reports are not just about lines and deadlines – they are human stories, most of which are unfortunate and deeply disturbing. When we return quality work to our clients, we’re actually respecting the dignity of a faceless, sick patient. Sometimes, we forget what a vital role we play in patient healthcare and treatment planning and how much doctors depend on us to do their jobs well. What it takes to deliver a 99% accurate report is 110% of ourselves - that's what we bring to our profession every day. That's something we can be very proud of.

"Where's the patient, Ma'am?"

PART I - ADMISSION
"Where's the patient, Ma'am?" the girl behind the desk asked me politely.
"I'm the patient, Ma'am," I smiled.
"Oh...are you alone?" she asked looking around.
"Not if you count the other 10,542 patients you're housing right now in your hospital," I said smiling.
"But why have you come alone? Why didn't you bring someone with you?"
"Because I'm the only one I know who needs hospitalization at this point in time."
"Oh..." she said again uncertainly, "so you're admitting yourself?"
"Surprise, surprise..." I said cheerfully giving her my best grin.
"Are you ill?" She looked worried, like I could be dangerously ill and she wouldn't know.
"No," I said, "just blind...in this eye" I pointed to my right eye.
"Oh!" her hand flew to her mouth and her eyes widened in terror - like I had told her SHE was blind. "Why didn't you tell me, Ma'am?" she asked.
"I told you just now."
"Why didn't you tell me before?"
"Because you didn't ask me before."
"Madam," she said somewhat irritated at the witless exchange "I don't go around asking people 'Are you the patient and are you blind?' "
"Madam," I said "I don't go around telling people "I'm Aparna and I'm blind."

PART II - INPATIENT
"Where's the patient, Ma'am?" asked the nurse politely as she wheeled in the IV.
I pointed to myself, smiled and waved.
"Oh! Why are you walking around? Can you lie down? Why have you not changed into the hospital gown? Where is your attender?"
"Which question should I answer first?" I asked her.
"Madam, please change your clothes and lie down, I have to start the IV. Please tell your attender to come in. Doctor will come in now and he will want to speak with your attender."
"I'm the attender," I said.
She looked at me like I'd said I'm Mickey Mouse. "You said just now you're the patient," she said accusingly.
"I'm the patient and the attender," I said "Are we good now?"
"Who is with you?" she asked me and she was unnecessarily loud.
"You" I said very softly.
She gave me the I-want-to-hit-you-now look. "Where is your husband?" she demanded and I thanked my stars I didn't have one.
"I don't have one," I said.
"You're not married?" she asked incredulously "But your chart says you're 41!"
"How time flies," I said cheerfully.

PART III - MRI
"Sit in the wheelchair Ma'am, we're taking you to MRI," the bored wheelchair pusher yawned.
"I can walk, I don't need a wheelchair," I said and began walking.
"Sit in the wheelchair!!!" he said firmly, "you can't walk into the MRI room."
"Why not?" I asked perplexed.
He fixed me with a steely glare "Because you might not be able to walk back, you might be unsteady when you come out of the MRI machine."
"In that case, why don't YOU sit in the wheelchair and I'll push. We can swap on the return ride," I said smiling.
"Sister!!" he called "patient is refusing to sit in the wheelchair, sister," he whined.
"Patient is refusing to sit in the wheelchair sister," I mimicked in a soft sing-song under my breath and sat.
"Why would I be unsteady? We're not going on the Ferris wheel, are we? I know what an MRI is, okay?" I grumbled as he wheeled me whistling softly.

PART IV - POST-DISCHARGE
"Where's the patient, Ma'am?"
"I'm the patient, Ma'am" I was at the hospital pharmacy buying supplies for my infusion.
"Oh...so this IV is for you?"
"Bingo!"
"Do you know the infusion will take 4 hours? Why have you come alone?"
"Yes, I know the infusion will take 4 hours and that's exactly why I've come alone."
She looked a little miffed "We encourage patients to bring somebody with them; if something happens, we won't be responsible."
"Believe me, if something happens, you will be responsible and I will sue you," I said smiling.

MORAL OF STORY: Always wear a T-shirt that says "I'm the patient"....when you're going on the Ferris wheel.

Jog, incidentally

The four famous falls of Jog: Raja, Rocket, Roarer and Rani (in order - from left)

The swirling mist that rolls around the four falls

To understand the meaning of futility, you must try to describe in the written word, the beautiful fury of nearly 900-foot waterfalls plunging down in cascading roars – it’s absolutely futile. I’m sure there is a language sans words for everything not manmade – I just don’t know it. It’s not just Jog’s four famous falls but the whole spectacle – the sudden changes in landscape and climate as you near the falls, the sleet rain, the thick swirling mist that covers and uncovers the four falls in a dramatic “now you see me, now you don’t” playfulness that takes your breath away. But Jog is only the destination, incidental to the whole experience of the journey.
 

There’s no better season (and no better reason) to visit the Malenaad region than during the monsoon when nature is renewing herself, and as a side effect, stirring hope in the souls of her audience. The road to Jog gives you one of the most spectacular window-seat views of ever-changing terrain – a startling field of sunflowers dazzling in full bloom, the freshest green of just cultivated paddy fields, dark and broodingly ominous hills turning and running away out of the crosshairs of your camera lens. The scale and beauty of the terrain is enhanced a thousand fold by the silence. The silence touches you deeply – in some forgotten corner of your spirit - and the vastness of the silence stops you in your tracks. No beeps and clicks and horns and mindless chatter - the general jarring cacophony of daily life - nature has pulled the plug in one fell swoop. You don’t need to meditate. You’re part of nature’s meditation. It is in silence that she creates, sustains, regenerates, hopes, and yearns. Nature is constantly doing all of this – in stratospheric proportions: flaming dawns and mellow twilights, rainbows that span the horizon, entire forests in rebirth, brooks and streams that sustain and renew everything they touch for hundreds of miles, thousands of birds migrating a thousand miles uncannily guided by an internal GPS – and all of them perfectly quiet, their movement in their stillness, their grandeur in their subtlety, their imposing majesty in their humility.

In the countryside, nature seems to yawn at Life’s dramas. She simply couldn’t care a hang. “Okay –Lord of the Animal Kingdom - get over it and get on with it,” she seems to say “...and come to me when you’re done.” The thought makes me want to curl up and lick my wounds. It’s liberating to know that there are spheres where I simply don’t matter – in fact, from nature’s perspective, I’m completely irrelevant. A speck in the grand scheme of things. How’s that for a humbling weekend lesson?

At Inchara

Sunset at Chithritha

At Chithritha

So, sue me

In the rape capital of India, a young woman was gang-raped in a moving bus, beaten up, stripped, and thrown out of the bus.

That moving bus.....that's India
The woman who was raped, stripped, beaten up and thrown out.....that's us "We the People" of India
The rapists.....no prizes for guessing
The gang rape...well....in India, we call it governance

So, sue me

KONY 2012