It's Dark Inside

Death is the most life-changing experience. It's universal yet its enormity, its horror, and its finality can never be understood till it comes home. When you lose someone, you die with that person - the life you had with that person dies, a part of you dies, and you carry on living with that dead part inside you. It's a grief that will never go away and it's a grief that no tears or words can comfort or heal. You go on living simply because you have no other choice. It's not because you're brave or because you've gotten over your loss. You NEVER get over your loss simply because your life has changed forever. Things will never be the same again. The thought that you will never see the person again, hear his voice, or touch his hand is a grief that can never be put into words. You discover in how many ways you can miss a person, you discover how much more that person meant to you than you realized when he was alive. You rediscover your Faith which is the realization that Faith doesn't give you what you want from life - it only gives you a little strength to cope when life happens to you. You are completely alone in your grief and you will feel the loneliness most acutely when people surround you after your loss - when they comfort you, when they wipe away your tears, when you have to answer their questions, when you have to function, when the business of living cannot be suspended, when you must push back your grief, act "normal" and carry on living. That's when you realize how tough it is to pick up the million, fragmented, confused, hopeless pieces that your life has become within a fraction of a second and hold them together; you cannot possibly join them back into a whole, so you hold the pieces and you put one step in front of the other and you go on. But for you, it's over - through your smiles, your tears, your memories, your days, and your nights, forever, it will always be dark inside.

THE LAST LAUGH

Once upon a time, there were two kids, A and B.

A suffered from attention deficit hyperactivity disorder which made C very excited - C constantly lectured him, punished him, pleaded with him and generally gave him too much attention which A loved and his syndrome thrived. He truly was an empty vessel that makes a lot of noise.

B was a psychopath but he was a quiet one (still waters run deep). He was the real danger but no one bothered about him because they were so busy with A. This allowed B to indulge in some serious crimes, but C was so spent trying to pacify and control and change A that he ended up a helpless onlooker to B's grave crimes.

Now, here's a little puzzle for you - identify Saddam Hussein, Kim Jong-Il, and George Bush from A, B, and C.

Mohammed Afzal Guru vs Manu Sharma

Manu Sharma is the son of a heavy-weight Congress "leader" in Haryana. One of his aunts is ex-President Shankar Dayal Sharma's daughter. He's also Jessica Lall's murderer. Who admitted to killing the lady in a deadpan confession. He's also a free citizen of India. He's in fact, thriving.

If all goes well, Mohammed Afzal Guru will be hanged on October 20, 2006, for masterminding the attack on the Indian Parliament in December 2001. If at all Guru should be hanged, it should be for the security men who gave up their lives so that the rats inside Parliament can continue to live and prosper. Mohammed Afzal Guru did not actually kill anyone - painful as it may be for the security personnel's families to hear people protest his death penalty, the fact remains that Guru didn't pull the trigger on anyone.

Afzal Guru in fact did us a great service. He tried to cleanse the rot in our Parliament. For that, he needs to go into our history books as the greatest patriot that ever lived. He's a hero. He had the guts to do what any of us would've loved to do if we had his guts. We don't, so we vote - and in some cases, like mine, we don't do even that. (Of course, we blog which helps our great democracy a great deal).

As things stand today, India's only hope is to bomb Parliament when it's in full session (which it never will be unless MPs are hiking their pay). What can you say of elected representatives who will harbour and protect murders within their own families? There are numerous cases of high profile brats literally getting away with murder, but Manu Sharma's case beats them all hands down. Here we have a scumbag who goes on tape to admit that he pulled the trigger on a woman simply because she refused to serve him a drink after the bar was closed - she got killed for doing her job and this despicable apology for a human being roams free today - he's doing much more than that - he's thriving. Because his father happens to be in the right place at the right time. Life has finally caught up with him - hopefully (the confession tape was on air today and if he's not sent to the gallows even after this, the rest of us should hang).

If Guru can be hanged even though he did not actually pull the trigger on anyone, why can't Manu Sharma be hanged when he not only pulled the trigger without provocation but also admitted to doing it with a cockiness that comes from knowing he's above the law?

"Elected representatives" in our state legislatures all over the country are thugs. Many of them are illiterate. Some of them have been charged with murder and they make laws, pass bills, and "rule" us. Why shouldn't they be hanged? Everyone is incensed about the attack on the symbol of our democracy - what about letting murderers sit in Parliament? Isn't that an attack on the symbol of our democracy? Politicians of all hues are frothing at the mouth because Parliament was attacked - none of them died, remember? But millions of innocent people have lost their lives in this country to senseless violence in every single state, most of them "masterminded" by politicians. Why is justice never done in those cases? Why doesn't anyone ever hang? Why not hang Dawood? Narendra Modi? Manu Sharma? Santosh Singh? (Priyadarshini Matto's murderer) Vikas Yadav? (Nitish Katara's murderer who confessed to the crime and also makes a guest appearance in the Jessica Lall murder) The killers of the young IAS officer (I've forgotten his name - public memory, you see) who paid with his life because he stood up to the UP/Bihiar mafia - because he did his job? Why not hang VP Singh whose Mandal politics killed so many young students? Why not hang HKL Bhagat (I think he's already dead, does anyone remember?) and Buta Singh and all those who watched the massacare of Sikhs when Indira Gandhi was assassinated?

Arun Jaitley calls this "the most gruesome attack on India." In what sense? He doesn't breathe a word about the security men who gave up their lives to protect him - he's talking about the attempt on his life (which unfortunately for all of us, remains just an attempt). What kind of a democracy are we? If I sit in Parliament, my life is more precious than yours if you're standing behind a bar counter. Even if you're doing your job behind the bar counter while I'm bleeding the nation dry sitting in Parliament.

Oh, forget it. Let's celebrate "Gandhi Jayanti." Sanjay Dutt is preaching about Gandhian values to us - it can't get more ridiculous than this even in the theatre of the absurd. Thank God Gandhi is dead.

FAHRENHEIT 9/11

I'm reading The Official Fahrenheit 9/11 reader - yes, it's a little dated (only 2 years!) but I don't think books should be read and movies watched when they're basking in their hype; it takes away the attention from the content and the hype becomes a thing with a life of it's own - also, the spin doctors are out when hype is in the air, so you're never able to put the book or the movie in any sort of perspective. Anyway, bottom line - I'm reading it now and I'm going to recommend this to EVERYONE I know (of course, there's a real possibility I'm the last one to get my hands on it).

What doesn't add up for me though is HOW Bush could've won a second term despite this. I thought the American electorate was a lot more intelligent. This book contains pages and pages of documented truth about the Iraq war, the lies and the manipulation that made it possible. With lots of accolades for Michael Moore with letters by the dozen from born-again Democrats, first-time voters, vindicated Democrats saluting and thanking Michael Moore for telling them the truth - it's just amazing despite ALL of this, Bush got back in the driver's seat for a second term. I'm not sure whether it was Jay Leno or Moore himself who called Bush "the longest serving President to never have won an election" - that's on the dot. A couple of pages are devoted to how Bush stole the election from Al Gore - by getting his (Bush's) first cousin John Ellis who ran the FOX News Channel's election desk, to call the election in his favour in Florida AFTER all the networks and AP had declared Al Gore the winner. Once FOX called in Bush's favour, everyone followed suit. The book describes how the President had to cancel his traditional walk to the White House for the swearing in as 1000s of Americans poured into the streets of Washington DC to pelt his limo with eggs as it sped to what has now become symbolic of this presidency - a backdoor entry.

Also, the thing that doesn't add up is why Osama was let off when he could've been caught.
This book depicts in great detail the extremely up close and personal relationship that the Bushies shared with the bin Ladens, how when all flights were grounded post 9/11, "at least 6 private jets and nearly 2 dozen commercial planes" flew the Saudis and bin Ladens out of America - apparently, (this is chilling!) the bin Ladens and the Bushes and their friends have common investment interests in "the Carlyle Group, a multinational conglomerate that invests in heavily government-regulated industries like telecommunications, health care, and particularly defense." Osama's half-brother and a crowd of Americans were in the same room meeting about their investment interests at the Ritz-Carlton in Washington DC as they watched the planes go into the Towers - but the book also gives the impression (without stating so explicitly) that Osama had no sanction from his family to do this - but of course we forget THE most important pieces of the puzzle - greenbacks and oil.

Fahrenheit 9/11 is a documentary and it won in The Best Picture category, that too at Cannes. It must be Wow! I have to get my hands on this movie - I know, I'm only 2 years behind!

Jack-in-office (or it's not just the Peter Principle, stupid)

Lao Tzu, a 6th century Chinese philosopher, said "To lead the people, walk behind them." When you walk behind your people, you pick up things that you can never pick up if you're constantly sitting in a glass cabin into which you expect people to remove their footwear before they enter. It does something to otherwise ordinary mortals when they get into their cabins and sit on their thrones - wise exceptions continue to stay mortals, but most of them morph into insensitive jacks-in-office; these jacks-in-office live in an incredibly happy atmosphere and for the life of them, can never understand why others can't be as happy as they are!

Hello! I'm jack-in-office; I make all important decisions that I don't have to communicate - read that again - THAT I DON'T HAVE TO COMMUNICATE - those 6 words are the root cause of everyone's misery; they allow me to be completely insensitive to you because I don't even know you exist; I'm not the messenger, and people only shoot messengers. I will make a decision - Yes, No, Maybe - but you communicate it - and you get shot in the process, thank you very much.

But you ask, "Since I'm anyway getting shot, will I be allowed to make my own decisions and then get shot for my decisions instead of getting shot for yours?"
"No way! I'm jack-in-office, stupid. You're just jack's jack."

And how did I make these decisions? Not by talking to the people who will be affected by them or at least listening to assistant jack, but by talking to other jacks like me who also reside in similar glass houses and flick away their assistant jacks and other ordinary mortals from their cabins like flies. Assistant jack goes out to communicate jack-in-office's decisions to the ordinary mortals who revolt and flog assistant jack because they don't have access to jack-in-office to flog him. Assistant jack can't mollify his people, so he resorts to the next best thing - like third-degree torture.

Meanwhile, good ole' jack-in-office is protected from the mayhem, seated as he is in his sterile glass cabin, so he's happy and for the life of him, can never understand why others can't be as happy as he is!(Oh, sorry, am I repeating myself?)

Instead picture this: I'm jack-in-office; I want a decision I made implemented, so I go out and announce my decision and face the consequences, good or bad; I communicate and I (not you) am accountable to my subordinates; I listen to the concerns, I think about them, and a few egg and tomato omelettes later, I become sensitive; not because I've grown a brain at last but because I know now what it is to have my goose cooked, so it forces me to think about other people for a change, especially if I have to go out and meet them and talk to them and be accountable for my actions.

None of the above is practical in large organizations and that is why decision making should be decentralized at every level, organizations, city administrations, state, and even central administration. Instead, both these conditions don't exist. Decision making remains very centralized in most large organizations and definitely even in so called democracies despite lofty mouthings to the contrary and people who make the decsions are least accountable, least accessible, least connected, least knowledgeable, and the very least sensitive.

Blasphemy! If decision making were to be decentralized, what about me?!? I would be unnecessary and I'm not skilled to do what I'm asking you to do! So, what about me? Hush, hush now....

Peter Principle (with dollops of Dilbert)

"I get mail; therefore I am." - Dilbert

Laurence J Peter authored Peter Principle (published 1968) in which he contends that "In a hierarchy, every employee tends to rise to his level of incompetence." At the time it was published, the Peter Principle might've seemed novel but now we have Scott Adams' Dilbert who encounters the Peter Principle every day at work.

Increasingly, the world is being run - workplaces, factories, institutions, and entire nations - on the Peter Principle. Simply put, with a few exceptions, most people "running the show" are collectively mad, insensitive, and clueless about the implications of their madness on their immediate subordinates.

The Peter Principle's hypothesis (now a fact) is pretty simple: Promotions are made like this: I excel at my desk job, so I'm made manager of my department. There is absolutely no logic or coherence to this decision. I've only proved my prowess at the desk job and nothing else; I know peanuts about people, let alone managing them. But this unexpected windfall makes me seriously believe in my nonexistent capabilities and I go ballistic. I wreck the system with well-thoughtout, carefully debated mismanagement. To achieve this feat, I spend hours in my cabin summoning other incompetents (who have been similarly promoted) to my desk to tell me what I wish to hear based on which I make decisions that are either completely irrelevant or unnecessary (or both) to my immediate subordinates and are guranteed to obliterate any ounce of happiness they might have previously possessed as workers. They can't shake me up, they can't take me out, so they quit.

But I'm a manager, so I can't be demoted, therefore I'll get promoted again - in a bid to disable my capacity to do direct damage to the grassroots. But in my new role, I'm an unstoppable megalomaniac. My motto is "It's either my way or the highway." Here, I'm not doing direct damage to the grassroots, but I'm causing enough grief to my fellow incompetents in middle management for them to do serious damage to their immediate subordinates, the grassroots, which they do with impish glee.

But now, I'm unshakeable. People under me just have to pray for divine intervention. Morale has plunged, everyone is cynical about everything, workers are desperate, my contribution is there for everyone to see, but I sit royally ensconced in my cabin surrounded by my yes-men telling me things never looked better though there is not an iota of data to prove this hypothesis; customers are baying for my blood, workers are quitting like rats deserting a sinking ship, those who stay are simply biding time, but I sit firmly with my rose-tinted blinkers on because now I'm so far promoted, the world I inhabit has no connection to reality.
But the unhappy people who're actually slaving for me to earn my monthly bomb keep slaving miserably at their unproductive best. Their nonperformance makes me belligerent towards them but it never troubles my nonexistent conscience that I'm the cause of their misery because my incompetence is earning me a paycheck that is 10 times fatter than theirs. Instead of keeping these people happy and trying to address the cause of their unhappiness, I do everything I can to alienate my workforce even further. I can't be demoted for my incompetence, so I demote them if they don't give me what I demand - regardless of how unreasonable my demands are. That's secondary. I'm the BOSS - that's primary.

At an organizational level, the story might end with either the organization running itself to the ground or with hiring and firing the right people. With larger playgrounds, like cities, states, or nations, the story never ends. It's easier for me to perpetuate the damage across larger areas by simply getting lost in the system and installing other incompetents like me to both cover my own back and to avoid having to deal with the mess that that has now snowballed into unmanageable proportions. I should've been at my desk job - where I was doing good work and out of everyone's way. Or I should've been shot after my first promotion. If I'd been shot at the right time, I would've become a martyr (eg. Mahatma Gandhi). Now, I'm just a royal pain in the wrong place (eg. Sonia Gandhi).

That's how Popes are made. That's how High Priests are made. That's how Mullahs are made. That's how Presidents and Prime Ministers are made. That's how the WORLD runs. And you, you miserable nincompoop, you crib about your workplace! HA!

Go read Dilbert and be happy. You're not alone.

Another mountain-molehill situation

Somebody with a lot of time on their hands decided that the Muslims of India should not sing Vande Mataram, the national song, so naturally the BJP (which has more time than anyone else) decided this is unpatriotic and now, we have a raging controversy on our hands, in our newspapers, and on TV.

The media, especially in India, has become increasingly inflammatory in its coverage of sensitive topics. There's no reason to run this story day and night and stick a mike in every Tom, Dick, and Harry's face and ask for his opinion on the issue - which is basically a non-issue. In these volatile times, the media forces everyone to form an opinion and to mouth it. This is completely unnecessary and to a large extent, very irresponsible. Gone are the days when TV anchors were mere moderators in any debate. Now, they get into the debates themselves and hardly bother to conceal which side they're on. This is a very unhealthy trend. Agreed as individuals, they are entitled to their opinions, but as professionals they are required to remain neutral moderators. Instead, most of our anchors get into arguments with their panelists, guests, or audience further inflaming passions.

To come back to Vande Mataram - since when did singing a song define your patriotism or lack of it? Do we need these pseudo patriots who don't think twice before hiking their salaries "cutting across party lines" (and religious lines) when people are literally dropping dead with no food and shelter in a country where the divide between the haves and have-nots is so gaping? Why should a man who doesn't know where his next meal is coming from, sing on an empty stomach saluting his motherland? Regardless of what religion he belongs to?

Finally, why should it matter to me whether you sing the national song or not? Whether you're patriotic or not? Who is a patriot? Sonia Gandhi? Because she sings Vande Mataram?

Thanks - I'll go with the Muslims.

The Day We All Died

On August 27, 2006, a professor in an Ujjain college was beaten to death by his students because he and his colleagues cancelled student elections. That's the worth of a life - it can be traded for a student election. Five or six decades of a life spent learning, loving, teaching, being a father, a son, a sibling, a professor, a friend - all snuffed out for what? A student election. What does it say for us that we can kill - KILL - a man who teaches us? This is the land where "gurus" are worshipped.

The police stood in plain public and TV camera view and WATCHED as one "student" threatened his professors, then abused them, and manhandled them. The professor who collapsed and later died had undergone a bypass surgery a few days before this incident. Life is that cheap. TV makes it even cheaper. The professor died in front of TV cameras. Millions of people saw him take his last gasping death.

What, I wonder, went through that poor man's mind as he watched his wards morph into beasts; his heart obviously couldn't take it.

Incidents like these that revolt people like me also happen because of people like me - we the silent self-righteous "dignified" majority who blog but will leave it to others "less dignified" to take to the streets and protest and bay for the beasts' blood and keep baying till we see it. Unless we stop accepting these atrocities collectively, ordinary men will continue to kill other ordinary men.

That's scary for all of us - the thought that not a bomb, not a terrorist, not a murder, but your next door neighbour can snuff your life out if you simply disagree with him. It can happen to me...and to you.

The Joke's on You

The 1 p.m. News Comedy Show

Kofi Annan on air announcing a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah effective - get this! - tomorrow August 14, 2006, at GMT something. Not a ceasefire effective immediately, but tomorrow. Today, Israel and Lebanon can reduce each other to rubble and tomorrow - they even have a GMT - they can shake hands and go back to the crumbling remains of their lives.


George Bush warns his nation that they still face a threat from "Islamic fascists" - the one-foot-in-grave-the-other-in-mouth syndrome continues to rage with the President who just signed another death warrant for his people with that typically insensitive Bush remark.


The anchor tells us how India is celebrating her freedom on Independence Day, August 15th - with massive security, scared out of our wits, red alerts of impending terrorist strikes, not stirring out of our homes, avoiding all public places, no theatres, no malls, no public gatherings but a HUGE parade in the capital with more police than people - Jai Hind! We're free!

Soul Healer - Dr. Brian Weiss

Sometime last year, I picked up a book called Only Love is Real by Dr. Brian Weiss and was blown away by its contents. I finished it almost in a single sitting and picked up Dr. Weiss's next book Many Lives, Many Masters - I was spellbound; I picked up another Same Soul, Many Bodies - each one of them as absorbing and unputdownable as the first.

Dr. Brian Weiss is a practicing Miami psychiatrist. Over 24 years ago, during one of his routine hypnosis episodes, one of his patients, Catherine regressed into a previous life, then another life, and another and stunned Dr. Weiss with her vivid descriptions and narratives which were verifiably true throwing Dr. Weiss into a turmoil of excited confusion, doubt, and disbelief. The scientist in Dr. Weiss rebelled. He was not a believer in reincarnation. During her sessions, Catherine began to give Dr. Weiss messages from what she called the "Masters" - it was obvious to Dr. Weiss that it wasn't his patient talking at all. Forced to accept a concept that he had disbelieved in for so many years, Dr. Weiss watched his patient progress through her therapy and heal herself through her regressions into her past lives.

Catherine's accidental regression led Dr. Weiss to explore the theory of past lives and reincarnation with his later patients which is the theme of all his books. Over the years, Dr. Weiss has learnt (as have many of his patients) that most of our self-inflicted limitations, fears, and conflicts have their roots in another lifetime. Dr. Weiss has successfully regressed and healed and many of his patients through this discovery. All of his books are based on real-life psychotherapy sessions with his patients.

According to Dr. Weiss, the common thread he has found in all his sessions with his patients is that a soul is reincarnated over and over till it learns all the lessons it needs to in the human form. Not only does it learn its lessons, it also chooses its future incarnations through the actions and thoughts of its present life on earth. It has a free will and chooses when it will be born, how, where, and which lessons to learn in each of its births.

In all his sessions with his patients, Dr. Weiss heard the same thing over and over - not only individual souls are reborn, but they're reborn as groups! So a daughter-monther in this life could've been brother-sister in the previous or grandaughter-grandmother or friend-friend; in Only Love is Real, Dr. Weiss unites two lovers who have been lovers over many lifetimes but never been united in any of them - they finally unite in Dr. Weiss's office when fate brings them to the same therapist in the same city at the same time but scheduled apart from each other, each unaware of the other's existence but both in their separate sessions with Dr. Weiss travelling to the same past lifetimes.

In Same Soul, Many Bodies, Dr. Weiss not only regresses his patients but also progresses them into future lives and continues to heal his patients through his regression and progression sessions.

For anyone interested in knowing how much we don't know - about ourselves and our universe and its mysterious laws and workings - whether you believe in what Dr. Weiss has to say or not, his books are a must-read.