Contemplations and Ruminations

(August 3rd 2020) So my yoga group was discussing the above message, Choiceless Awareness, a term popularized by Jiddu Krishnamurti, an Indian philosopher and writer. They were talking about Brahmam, Atma, sat-chit-ananda and the like and how everything in this world tends to be an illusion, Maya. I’ve had similar conversation with friends many times, about detachment and its probability when one is in human form and how it sounds easy as a concept but quite difficult in principle. Anyway, this is what I wrote in the group… thought of posting it here. Choiceless Awareness as a concept is quite intriguing, but as social beings can one sincerely be without a thought, idea or opinion? Choiceless awareness could serve us well, when we learn to observe the happenings in our immediate environment (low energy events and negative vibes of the people around us) without prejudice or condemnation. Times like this, choiceless awareness can be a way of finding peace in the midst of unnecessary ...

Went to church for the 12:15pm English mass on Friday, 22nd July 2022. Vinod met us there and we went to manor again for lunch.  Ate a small plate of legumes, as you can see here... the potatoes with capsicum is my plate. The plate nearby is dad's, shawarma with hummus. This my sister took, chicken satay with some peanut sauce. This was also my sister's.... some dumpling  in sauce. My mom took some prawn dish... looks like rice noodles. Deep fried prawns were for all of us... five pieces. My brother's poke bowl... We then drove to Jussy to see rapeseed fields but they weren't in bloom so we just stopped by church 13 in Jussy. This Mother Mary statue in a box filled with stars was pretty. We then drove to a tiny village, Hermance, but it was too hot to walk near the lake... so we just stopped at the church in Hermance. Church 14 in Hermance... The beautiful graveyard in Hermance... Spotted a hobbit's house in Hermance... After this we went home, it was too hot to do ...

The Last Girl (2017) by a Yezidi survivor, Nadia Murad, is filled with the bone-chilling sort of evil that the ISIS is synonymous with. Nadia poignantly captures the plight of her Yazidi village, Kocho, as the threat of ISIS looms large in the distance before becoming a reality. As with the Holocaust, no one really anticipates the amount or intensity of evil that could reside in the indoctrinated hearts of men. Otherwise, nobody would willingly stay back in their towns or villages waiting for the genocide of their race. One of Nadia’s brother’s, Hezni, did try to go Germany, by crossing the northern Iraqi border on foot into Turkey, from where they (the brother and a few others) made their way to Istanbul, then paid a smuggler to take them into Greece. But they were discovered and had to spend a horrible time in prison. So, the fact is people did try to leave, but like Nadia explains, it isn’t easy to leave the only place one has ever known. I still think that being forced to ...

I saw this movie recently while travelling to Chennai in the train and before I knew it I was transported to a sleepy little Italian village on the coast where beauty abounds in every frame. Beauty herself forms a major character, she is everywhere you care to look and that's what the protagonist Mario (Massimo Troisi) discovers after he interacts with a well known poet in exile, Pablo Neruda. The Cuban poet, Pablo Neruda (portrayed by Phillippe Noiret), arrives in a small island in Italy after being exiled for his communist beliefs. And Mario, a reluctant fisherman, longs for another job and when the necessity of a postman to deliver mail to the most famous person on the island arises, Mario lands this job. He hesitantly starts befriending Pablo and reading his poems, this awakens his soul to the beauty of being, of observing, of existing. As I sat there on the upper berth watching this movie while everybody was fast asleep, I was moved by this fisherman who found magic in meta...

I've written about Tyler Knott more than once on my blog... how I came across his poems , how one poem of his evocatively captured all I needed to say after my recent trips, and how the phrasing in his poems is what gets your attention even though you don't necessarily agree with all that he says. So when I read on his instagram account that he would be visiting New York in November (2014) I was behind my sister and brother in law to attend his book signing event at a Barnes & Noble store. I had to plead, and make deals with them to ensure that they would attend the event. They assured me that they would, but every now and then, they would resort to blackmails and threats. If I said something they didn't like or if I pulled their leg, they would be like... 'do you want your poems signed?' So anyway, after all the trauma they put me through, they finally did go to meet him and they got my poems signed. Here is the man himself, Tyler Knott Gregson signing a...

So this is the November issue of the magazine with a few articles by me. Thomas Rhett's 'Beer with Jesus ' has been included here and I wrote something about the entertainment industry which might be a bit preachy...   Entertainment is not what it used to be When you switch on the TV or listen to songs by the biggest names in the music industry, you cannot help but cringe and wonder at the abasement of it all. How did this degradation seep in? When did it become cool to objectify women and let derogatory comments pass off as comedy? Most of the famous shows today have this cool character whose life revolves around drinking and sleeping with different women, perfect examples would be Charlie Harper and the legendary Barney Stinson. These characters are the epitome of being cool and having it all, and they have the best lines on the show. This is the idea that is being propagated to young people who watch these shows, that your life is enjoyable only when you drink...

So Autumn was just starting when I was in Geneva last year and all the colours of fall were pretty fascinating. I would pick up lovely autumn coloured leaves and preserve them in a book while I explored so many beautiful places with my sister. She would scan the ground too, to find leaves that declared the poetry of the season. And if my brother was with us, he'd stand at a distance away, pretending that he was in no way related to us sisters who were running around collecting leaves.  This is what I made for my brother, framed autumn leaves. It's pretty easy too, collect pretty autumn leaves and preserve them in a book. Make sure you preserve them properly with no folded edges, just place the leaf gently between the pages of a book and let it remain there for a few days. Gently stick the leaves to a chart paper; I used a black chart paper here. Then use a transparent nailpolish to gently brush all over the leaf to give it a glossy look. Write a few lines (or not), and ge...

So after my sister left, it was just me and my brother at home and he'd go to work while I continued exploring Geneva on my own. I'd buy a day pass and if I see anything interesting outside, I'd hop off and walk around and everything is so efficiently organised there, that with a few apps and with all the bus stops containing neatly typed out details of every stop and the bus timings, there is no way you can get lost... even if you try. And the bus timings really blew me away, I should have taken a picture of it...the timings were always to the point like 9:43 or 14:18 or 16:01 and the bus would arrive exactly at this time, it was uncanny, it was brilliant, it was hassle free. I've traveled more in Geneva in those few months than I did in all the six years I stayed in Madras.  This is a quaint library and antique store... This is where the 18th century Genevan philosopher, writer, and composer, Jean Jacques Rousseau  was born. Old canons...  Window box...