Wednesday, November 28, 2007

A BloodLetter Day !

I wrote about friendship many times. Do we get hurt in friendships? Yes, sometimes we do. When our close friends hurt us, it goes deep. And what do we do when we finds that we have hurt one of our friends? We might say sorry. That’s all? Then I have a different story to tell.

There was a guy and he had a friend, a girl. He considered her as his best friend. But he wasn’t sure whether this girl considers him as her best friend. But she never told the other way and she liked him.

This guy was working in a factory as an accountant when this incident happened. He did not like that environment. It was noisy and dusty and yes, there were mosquitoes too. The girl was doing her pharmacy diploma.

Though this guy was an accountant, he was good at science. So, when this girl was absent in the college, she used to bring somebody’s notes and used to ask this guy to copy it for her. Or some notes related work. This girl was an active Christian community worker and a good singer with a Gospel singing troupe.

One day this guy had a bad day at work. He came back home in a bad mood with a head ache and there she comes. Usually her presence was helpful to ease his mind, but not that day. She came with a bunch of books and gave it to him and asked him to copy. But he asked:

“What do you think of me?, your servant?”

Girl became very sad, tears came out of her eyes, yes she cried.

“I am going” she said

He did not say anything in reply, but he wished she stayed for a while more. But she left.

This guy became very sad. And there came this guilty feeling for hurting her. What can he do now? Many a times he had crazy ideas. Once he wrote a total nonsense story on the side of a birthday greeting card and gave it to that girl’s sister, which made the whole family laugh.

But this is not a time for a story. And there is this guilty feeling. He hurt his best friend, so the apology also should be best. He thought of writing a letter saying sorry.

He took a piece of paper, a pen which had no ink and a razor blade. He cut his finger with the blade, dipped the pen in the blood and wrote a ‘bloody’ apology. It started like this :


"I am writing this with my blood......"

And he posted it instead of handing it directly over to her.

They weren’t seeing each other for days. And one day he saw she rushing to his door. She did not enter his house but stood outside, on the road (house was adjacent to road) and asked him.

“Why did you do that? You know what happened? I was in the college when the post came. Mummy received the post and she thought it was from the community, since the envelope you used was very much similar to the one we used to get from my community.”

He stood thunderstruck. She added;

“Mummy asked me to not to come to your house”

“OK, I will talk to mummy”, he said. He also used to address that lady as mummy.

“Noooo”

“Yes, I need to explain to her….ok, I will write another letter and you give that to mummy, ok? Come tomorrow” he said

He wrote another letter to mummy explaining how his day was at work and how he felt guilty when he made her daughter cry. And yes, he was good at writing letters.

Finally the letter reaches mummy. The next day, he met mummy on the road. From a long distance itself they exchanged a smile.

“Mummy!, is everything clear now?’ he asked and she said;

“Yes”

They both smiled, a kind of a smile!!!!

‘G’, where are you?

My 100th Post!!

What to say?

Jai Guru Dev!!!

God bless you!!!

Tuesday, November 27, 2007

Show Your Face!

One difference between animals and humans are ‘faces’. We humans have multiple faces hidden within us. Many a times we pretend. When we pretend we are hiding the ‘that time’ true face with a mask. Anybody seen a dog showing faces? Pretending? Nope.

Thus we might have showed/worn so many faces in our life. But most of us won’t take any effort to look back into the faces we have/had/made. We see the world through two eyes. But these eyes don’t see each other (set aside the mirror). Though not in the same way, but in a similar way, these faces don’t see each other. Or may be we ourselves might not see these faces, together.

So, can’t we ever see them? And what happens when we see all our faces?

We see them when we go deep within us and reach closer to our Self. We meet all of them together. There these faces lose its identity and you will remain as the Self.


Monday, November 26, 2007

My Best Friend!!

I forgot to add one more topic that I happened to discuss last week – Best friend (and yes a little about boy friend too).

When I got asked ‘who is your best friend in real?’, I wasn’t able to give an immediate answer, though one name jumped into my mind...

It was like this, a friend of mine talks about being sad and I give a suggestion to talk to her best friend. Then comes the answer that, this person doesn’t have any best friend. It wasn’t a shock for me, but I actually thought she might have one, since she had lots of friends.

She never felt the need for having a best friend…Now one thing is becoming more clearer. Many people in this world don’t understand friendship or may be the need for a friendship. Many of then never got any chance to think in that direction since they always had many people around them. May be they gets acquainted with many people and they call them as friends.

Then why I wasn’t able to answer? Her question was ‘who is your best friend in real?’…Yes, in real


As I have written somewhere, sometime ago, a best friend is a friend with whom we are most comfortable with. And the practical reality is that there is no point in having a 'one- way best friend' relation and calling him/her as your best friend.

Why?

One might be comfortable with the other and what about the other person? What if he/she is not comfortable in the same way? Within this ‘comfort’ level comes the likeness or love , trust, care, understanding etc.

So, I said, ‘look, presently, what I have around me are virtual friends’.

But though I said that, I thought at least some of my virtual friends might be happy to meet me in person.

Today that thought came again in my mind for a recheck…

Does it mean that virtual friends can’t be best friends?

I still haven’t lost my hope.

Sunday, November 25, 2007

Another Week Gone!

There goes one more week. Sometimes it looks like the time flies. These days I am not putting much effort to keep my blog very alive. This happened coz, I put my effort on brushing up some of my software lessons, added some more applications to my software collections(this again required some research), took some personal time to help some of my friends who faced some computer related issues, spend some time with my net friends….(these are the things that came into my mind).

I talked/listened to about many things, like computer (related), marriage, number of kids we need to have, pregnancy and family planning methods, circumcision, reading habits, migration to Canada, etc ….

But there was one thing (other than software) which came repeatedly in many conversations, Religion.

It gave an idea about how people are ‘bound’ by religion. Some of them can’t put nail polish since their religion doesn’t permit it. Some of them are not permitted to use condoms, some of the are not allowed to abort an unwanted pregnancy, some of them are not permitted to use any birth control methods….and most interestingly, someone said ‘ premarital sex is considered as a mortal sin in our community’, which was very interesting (coz, that person’s country is world’s one of the top sex tourism place; a country where lots of pre marital pregnancy happens, where abt 23% (as per 2004 survey of UNESCO – youth aged between 15 to 24 years) of the young indulge in sex before marriage and where this person’s religion has an 80- 85% domination among the population!!!!)

Some people use religious beliefs very 'conveniently'.


I am happy that I gave enough logic/moral support to one of my friends to go ahead with a birth control method. These days, brining up a child is not easy but very expensive. And being a parent has the responsibility to give good/best education and other amenities to our child. If we ‘produce’ children like dogs or pigs, just coz religion doesn’t allow us to do a birth control, will the religions fund the education? Will the religion fund all the upbringing cost? Nope. And the notable part is, the attitude of the people and government in developed countries are different. We need to have a modern view.

Yes, in olden days, among farmer families, they had many children. This was mainly to avail cheaper labor by using the children (I dont mean kids) to help them. Education wasn’t a big issue then.

Religion and its scriptures should help humans to ‘open the eyes’ and not to put a blind.

Thursday, November 22, 2007

An Ancient Friendship!

There are lots of friendship stories in Indian mythologies. They might not be just stories for stories. Like the one I am going to tell.

This is from Krishna’s life. When he was a student (Those days it was the Gurukula system, the olden day boarding school system where the student lives with the Guru-teacher- till he finishes his learning), he had a buddy called Kuchela. They both were from extremely opposite financial background.

When the studies were over, they part. Krishna becomes the King and Kuchela lives in poverty. His wife used to tell him


‘ The King is your friend, why don’t you go to him and ask for help?’

But Kuchela always had a hesitation, or may be he had a complex. How can he visit his friend - who is the King lives in luxury and wears the best – wearing his torn dress? And he wished to give him some present, but he had nothing.

But finally, Kuchela decided to visit Krishna. There went thousand thoughts inside his mind….will Krishna identify him? What if he ignores him? What if he cant get through the guards and meet Krishna?.......

He told his wife that he want to carry something as gift. There weren’t anything valuable left in that house and his wife made puffed/beaten rice out of some grains left in the house. Next day morning, Kuchela went to the palace. But he had a guilty feeling for taking that beaten rice with him as a gift to the King, who eats all the delicious dish. What if he won’t eat? What if he thorough it out?

When he reached the palace, Krishna was looking out through one of the windows and he saw Kuchela.


What did he do? Did let him in? Did he avoid him coz he was poor and dressed like a beggar? Was he ashamed of admitting such a man as his friend, that too openly? Or did he allow him to enter the palace and show his face (while Krishna sitting in the throne) ?

Krishna ran out of the palace in ecstasy and as soon as he met him he hugged him, though Kuchela was all sweaty. And Krishna grabbed the shabby pack of puffed rice and ate it just in front of him, standing where he was. Tears of happiness came out of Kuchela’s eyes.

(And of course, the King helped his childhood friend)

How beautiful friendships are, isn’t it?

Saturday, November 17, 2007

A Week Ago

No posts for many days….huhuhu

This doesn’t mean that nothing happened or my brain is dead. I was after many other things which included downloading some software and exploring them and reading some books. Well, I wasted a lot of time also, but sometimes it happens in our life, not being productive. In between, there were cricket matches played between India and Pakistan (India won the series though one more match is left, with a lead of 3-1 in the 5 match one day series).

One of my friends fell ill during this period. But she escaped from a near pneumonia. So, it’s a mixed feeling leaving a relief as the final output.

Me as well as my country got teased by some of my friends. I even had a friend who believed we Indians don’t have toilets at home! Another person did not believe that I live in 11th floor (coz she thinks there are no high rise buildings in India!!!). Then I thought of writing something about India. That blog got written only in my mind.

A Christian friend justified drinking alcoholic beverages. Then I thought about Jesus. I never heard that he ever was drunk. I have read another interesting thing about the wine Jesus made, when he performed his first miracle - some scholars said it wasn’t fermented wine.

For the first time, somebody did not laugh at my arranged marriage. But it even brought that person think about how Isaac and Rebecca got married. And even agreed with me when I said – as per Bible, love starts after marriage and not ‘first you love and then you marry’. This was a surprise thing happed during these period.

I read the ‘Tuesdays with Morrie’, during this period. This is one of the books which many people consider as their favorite one, in my friendship/social network portal. But after reading this book, I really wondered why or what aspect those people found interesting in this book, since it had multiple dimensions and I had some idea about many of them (who like this book). I might write about this book later.

It was Deepavali festival during this period. And I was greeted by some of my (non Indian) friends which was a real surprise for me.

I happened to think about the gender of God. I could not convert those thoughts into typed words. But I will be writing about it, very soon.

There also was a leading-to-nowhere discussion about vegetarianism, rebirth and organ donation. We were at the opposite sides minus the friendship. Me a veg, doesn’t object the re-birth theory, and don’t have any problem in donating organs. And at the other end it was a person who had the opposite views.

Somebody (our acquaintance) asks lot of things about you. Does it show the person’s concern/love/friendship/care for you?

Well, sometimes it can be mere curiosity. Yup, this was one of the thoughts that revisited me this week

Monday, November 12, 2007

Jonathan Livingston Seagull

Long ago, I used to write Book Reviews in an (well known) online store portal. And I wasn’t a blogger that time. I thought I will post (repost?) a couple of them here in this blog.

I will start with a the book ‘Jonathan Livingston Seagull by Richard Bach. I felt like adding some more , but I didnt...

Find that perfection, May 20, 2005

First published in 1973 and still people reads it. And that tells it. You might get a glimpse of Jesus in this book...This book teaches:


- Don't think that you are limited
- Don't give up - Love ` your flock'
- Don't just try but feel
- don't just try to find who you are but understand that you are that " ....you must begin by knowing that you have already arrived.."

- The real question of why are we here...

" do you have any idea how many lives we must have gone through before we even got the first idea that there is more to life than eating, or fighting, or power in the Flock? A thousand lives."

" ...and another hundred again to get the idea that our purpose for living is to find that perfection and show it forth"

Not just that, I just mentioned a few.

I personally love photography; I own two good cameras too. But do we really need this much of gull photos in this book just to add more pages and price? Yes, it holds some values and you will like reading this book. (If your likeness is Biology, don't choose Trigonometry to avoid disappointment)


Sunday, November 11, 2007

Science and Spirituality

We stand at a neutral level, when we are at a ‘nothing doing’ state. We, being human, we can look outwards as well as inwards. You see unknown things/mysteries at both ways. When we go deeper and deeper into the external mysteries it becomes science. When we go deeper and deeper into our self, it is spirituality. So, science and spirituality goes hand in hand and not the other way.

Thursday, November 08, 2007

Everything Has Its TIME !

A friend of mine told me she will kill me…. In another context I said about buddy time and death.

But it was always as a joke. Death was one thing I happened to think about this week. So what is the serious part in it?

When I took up the Bible lessons, they mostly dealt with New Testament. But since the Bible I bought was a complete one (there are many communities which distribute only New Testament and I had a couple of such versions), I was bit curious about the Old Testament. And I had this thought of ‘how can Bible be complete without Genesis?’ I should have asked this to my then best friend who believed only in New Testament (and considered the Pope as antichrist!). I don’t know why I did not ask…Why? Why? Why?

One of my favorite from Old Testament is Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 which reads as follows:

To everything there is a season,

A time to every purpose under heaven:

A time to be born, and
A time to die;
A time to plant, and
A time to pluck
What is planted;

A time to kill, and
A time to heal;
A time to break down, and
A time to build up;

A time to weep, and
A time to laugh;
A time to mourn, and
A time to dance;

A time to cast away stones, and
A time to gather stones;
A time to embrace, and
A time to refrain from embracing;

A time to gain, and
A time to lose;
A time to keep, and
A time to throw away;

A time to tear, and
A time to sew;
A time to keep silence, and
A time to speak;

A time to love, and
A time to hate;
A time of war; and
A time of peace.


So there is a time to die. This thought brought me to another place. Where there is Time and where there is Death. This is from one of the stories from India.

Maharishi (great sage) Vyasa (it is he who divided the Vedas into four) had a devoted pupil. One day he decided to reward him and hence asked

“What do you want?”

“I just want to know when I will die” said the pupil

Vyasa got surprised by his student’s wish and he said

“I will take you to the Lord of Death and you ask this directly to him”

Thus they went to the Lord of the Death, Yama.

But Yama too got surprised by his wish and said:

“I am sorry, It is true that I take away life but it is not me who decides when to do that. I am informed by Lord of the Causes.”

So, they all went to the Lord of Causes and asked the question. He said :

“I too am sorry and it is Lord of Time that tells me and so, we better go to him and ask”

All the time the disciple was last of the retinue since others were highly respected ones.

So, they all went together to meet the Lord of Time, Kal Purush. Lord of Causes told him why they came there.

“Where is the disciple?” asked Kal Purush

They all looked behind and the disciple was missing and found dead at the door step.

So, they asked for an explanation

“It was fated that when he brings all of you here, he will die!!” said Lord of Time…….


Anyway, I don’t think I will die just after posting this blog !!


Wednesday, November 07, 2007

Love and Lust

Love ................................Lust

Sacrifice ...................................Hold
Unselfish .................................Selfish
Subjective................................Objective
Delivers ...................................Demands
Leeds to solace .......................Leeds to suffering
Compassion .............................Contempt
Divine .....................................Human

Monday, November 05, 2007

Recurrent Aphthous Stomatitis - RAS

For the past couple of days, I was nursing a mouth ulcer. So this mail came into my mind. This I wrote one year ago to somebody.

*****

Hi <>

.................................

I used to get it frequently (ie, RAS, Recurrent Aphthous Stomatitis), but not these days. Though you asked what I do, actually, it doesn't matter what I do since the cause ( and hence the tretment) is different. Since I had/get this condition, I read a lot (abt most of the ulcers) and hence can provide some useful info. There is no single cause for this. Many people might have their own trigger for this, apart from the physical trauma. Like, in many women hormonal change, in some pple, change or tooth paste, in some vitamin deficiency ( Folic acid or B12 or Iron, usually), sudden stress, allergy to gluten ( a protein present in wheat etc)………

As on today, nobody knows what the exact cause of mouth ulcer is. There are some indirect causes like brush abrasion, accident bites etc which are called the physical trauma (in my case this biting is the main culprit these days). You can find out many many other reasons like these. If physical trauma is not the cause, in your case, then there is something to do with what you eat and drink. Many scientists believe that it has something to do with over reaction of our own body's immune system, in some people like you and me (and not some one like Latha.) From my past 30 years of observation, I observed that it has also something do with your stomach/ bowl movement. Constipation can lead to ulcer and when there is ulcer it again leads to constipation (since we hesitate to take enough fluids, I think).So, make sure that you have a clean stomach during the ulcer period. For me, it also helps reduce the pain.

In my case, since I wasn't the person who cooks, or had a say on it , there wasn't any control over it. Many a times there weren't any choice (don't ask me why). So, avoid spicy food and acidic fruits. In some pple, taking milk helps (not for me), eat lots of greens (try avoiding papaya, and tomato, if you are regular with it), I use the Smyle mouth ulcer gel. At night, clean the ulcer and wash your mouth with any antiseptic mouth wash ( I use Listerine ). Washing with aspirin also helps, but better use some antiseptic. Though we won't feel like drinking water, drink lots of water. Never take any pepsi/coke stuff. Acidic food is best avoided during these period but somebody told me (when I was in a medical chat room, long ago) less diluted lemon juice helps . Never tried it. You can try folic acid tabs (if you go to a doc, then also he/she need to do some trials to find out the cause), if lack of that is the cause, it will fasten the healing process. I have tried that and as of now, I don't remember whether it was useful for me or not. And a veg diet is best for these period (avoid even egg, this was one of my earlier doc's advice)

And finally, there are many medicines available these days (including some injections which can heal the ulcer within 72 hours – but don't use). Since you are working and this ulcer and pain can even affect your mood, you can even consult a doc, if the pain is very severe.

Rgds