A Gateway to Terror

I sat through nights witnessing yet another terror act unfolding on TV. It was, I should say one of the most harrowing of experiences in recent times. I just sat there helpless, miles away, pained, frustrated, angered and sad at the situation we found ourselves in. I thought it was just another attack that would end in a couple of hours but even after close to 55 hours when I write this, it’s not completely over.

A handful of insane trigger happy kids held Mumbai to ransom and brought the commercial capital of India to a standstill. Images of weeping people frantically looking for the loved ones at hospital door steps kept me awake for nights. Terrorism does not belong to any religion; it is a RELIGION on its own for a few.

One of the most telling images of the night was watching the flight of doves/pigeons, symbols of peace and tranquillity, being displaced from the century old dome of the Taj Mahal Hotel, their nocturnal abode for generations, by the deafening sounds of fire power and the raging flames of terror. This image said it all. Peace had been shattered.

I see no reason in complaining about the break down of machinery, inefficiency of the system, intelligence gathering failure so on and so forth, how can one simply prevent a group of highly motivated people, so motivated with malice that they are willing to even kill themselves for a cause, known only to them, from running amuck. In situations like this even the best of machinery is bound to crumble. I was surprised in the way the western media particularly CNN portrayed the situation, they seemed to be indulging in the traditional Indian system bashing and criticising our inefficiency in handling such emergency situations, they should look back 7 years and see how they reacted to 9/11, attacks unprecedented such as these could not have been handled better.

On our own national front, not long ago in the very same Mumbai the cronies of a political party got together and thrashed the daylights out of small time Pani Poori vendors, Taxi drivers, menial labourers for not belonging to their state, here you had kids also not belonging to the state nor the country holding up the city, and heroes again not belonging to Mumbai trying to protect a potpourri of nationalities. Wonder where the neta and his cronies were???

The foreign minister of the biggest democracy claims on the aftermath of this dastardly act and I quote ‘I am sure that India will be unified to ‘FACE’ such acts of terrorism’ a typical quote coming from a 70 + year old foreign minister, I would have approved of his statement had he replaced ‘FACE’ with ‘COUNTER’. Words like ‘COUNTER’ would send a stronger message than the subdued ‘FACE’. Why should the so called ‘super power in the making’, the only country that has not declared recession in these times of worldwide economic turmoil ‘FACE’ acts of terrorism when we are capable of ‘COUNTERING’ them.

I’m sure that the think tank of the Bollywood, Kollywood, Tollywood and Mollywood are already drawing out plans to make movies probably titled ‘One night at the Taj’ or ‘60 Hours in Colaba’, ‘Colaba Killings’, ‘Mumbai Massacre’, ‘Nightmare on Marine Drive’. (I guess I should patent these titles). The likes of Madhur Bhandarkars, Sanjay Leela Bhansalis, Mani Rathnams and Priyadarshans might already be working on the script. I know its no time for humour, but wish these events are not made into just another movie or end up being completely forgotten after a couple of weeks, instead I really hope that this act brings about a drastic change in our systems and the way we look into securing our citizens.

Bombay (Mumbai) is a city that churns out heroes by the dozen, day in and day out in the erstwhile Bollywood who even in the last scene of their REEL life return unscathed after a successful hostage rescue mission with dialogues like ‘Main Hoon Na’ but what we witnessed in the last 60 odd hours were heroes from the REAL life who said ‘Main Hoon Na’ (I AM THERE) before the operations and were martyred by the words ‘Main tha na’ (I WAS THERE) after doing all they could to protect us from the ensuing danger. A real life ‘Main tha na’ will run eternally at the box office of our hearts compared to the Reel life ‘Main Hoon Na’s’ 100 days at the box office. I salute all members of the Army, NSG, Navy, Police, Hotel Staff, and members of the common public who have laid down their lives and have become immortal heroes in real life.

Pink slips…

Wonder why they are called Pink slips. I was told that in former times in the US when an employee received his pay slip on a pink colour paper with all dues cleared it meant that his services were no longer required by the organisation. One hears so much about them these days… but why pink... A lovely colour associated with lil girls, their toys & joys. Being a father of 2 daughters, I eat pink, sleep pink, and slip on pink occasionally, but fortunately so far for me I’m yet to receive the pink slip. My house is full of Barbie in Pink, Cinderella in Pink, and my daughter’s bedspread & pillows are also in Pink So much so that if I were to receive a pink slip from my boss I guess I would believe it to be a gift for my daughters from the company I worked for all these years. In the good old letter writing days, one used to begin a letter by writing ‘I hope you are in the pink of health’…I just hope & pray people refrain from using this age old jargon while addressing each other these days.

As a person who has spent all my professional life in the heavy industry I always believed that we are grossly underpaid compared to our IT, ITES, and Financial peers. By the way, I sell Pumps for a living. I sell different kinds of centrifugal pumps, but amongst them all, I take great pride in introducing myself as a person who also sells Sewage pumps for a living. One can imagine the ‘eeks’ and the ‘yuks’ I have received at social gatherings graced by Code crackers / creators, Networkers, and Number crunchers. It was a turn off almost at every party / get together. But I used to console myself saying that I have the possibility to earn my bread & butter atleast until the last day of civilised mankind’s existence. How true this has turned out to be….Recent times have made me realise that at times Shit matters…and being in the business of moving them matters even more.

Visit Maldives in Dubai…

Well!! Well!! I’m not insane…Was just proposing a possible relocation option to the newly elected President of Maldives, Mohammed Nasheed who recently went public that he is on the look out for a new home for his people. Relocating a country!!! A big business opportunity for the movers possibly, but however weird it may sound, it also has an aura of graveness about it.

Climate change & Global warming have played major roles in causing the sea levels to rise around these islands and possibly sink them in due course.

Middle Eastern countries like the UAE, Qatar & Bahrain are going full throttle on creating more beach based real estate by venturing into mega Island / reclamation projects, One calls it the Palm, the other the Pearl and another the Petals while one even builds an entire group of islands in the shape of the World… Seeing all this, a wild thought went through me. Dubai is finding it tough to come to terms with the world wide recession and is going slow on one of the Palm Islands. Why not lease out one of them or atleast the ‘Maldives’ in the World Islands they are building to the Maldivian government and ask the whole of Maldives to relocate to Dubai.

On a more serious note it is a rather deeply depressing idea that Maldives could be the first nation on Earth to lose their homeland due to Global warming and rising sea levels.

A tribute to one of the greatest villains in Kollywood.

The erstwhile villain M. N Nambiar is no more. As a child I grew up watching him on Sunday evening movies on Doordarshan perpetually playing the villain in movies alongside MGR. I remember vividly his well modulated dialogue delivery and the characteristic palm rubbing; eye rolling & tilted head were his trade mark histrionics that used to give me nightmares in those days.
He was a perfect example of a person who never took work home, one of the best villains in reel life and a saint in the real one.

Creativity shown the door at fancy dress competitions.

Last week we were confronted with the challenge of dressing up our daughter for a fancy dress competition in her school. The topic was Birds or Animals. The missus as usual went through all available pedias at home and came up with this brilliant concept of dressing her up as a Barn Owl. My first reaction was… A Barn Owl!!! What in the world is that????? Well when my wife explained we could use existing resources at home with some value addition I immediately seconded the barn owl. I learnt that a barn owl was white in colour (Could reuse her last years Christmas play white coloured angel costumes) and used to hunt mice from the barns and hence called a barn owl.
I can tell you we spent more than a couple of hours on constructing the wings and a mask. On completing it I complemented my wife’s efforts, though my daughter looked like a genetically modified cross between a Polar bear, Owl and a Human.
On the big day at school, I was in for a shock, almost all the children were wearing off –the-shelf costumes of a tiger, lion, dog or a donkey. The efforts that my wife and I put in were overshadowed by these made to order costumes.
The classes that had occupations as their topic were dominated by Doctors, Nurses, Teachers, Engineers, Pilots etc… I reminisced that we in those days used to also dress up as Bus Conductors, Rickshaw wallas, Fishermen / Fisherwomen or even a road side beggar. I’m not sure if the concept of dignity of labour has caught up with the young minds or the parents are just not willing to see their children in lesser light, even in a Fancy dress competition.
I clearly noticed that Fancy dress competitions had lost its creativity and was falling prey to financial might even during these times of recession. If one had the money one could be a Tiger one day or a donkey the other.
My daughter might not have won but I was really happy for the efforts we took to make a difference.

With luv from Marrakech...

I was in Marrakech last week. In my opinion Morrocco is a country that represents a melting pot of cultures from 3 different continents, Africa due to its geographical location, Europe due to its French colonial past and proximity to Spain, and Asia ( Middle Eastern) due to its historical past. Morrocco is also refered to in Arabic as Al Maghrib Al Aqsa which means the farthest West.

The trip was purely official, and hence got to see very little of the infamous wilder side of Morrocco. Though, after long sessions on strategies, synergies and synopsis we managed to have sips of some good Morroccon Red wine. One of the many bottles emptied is featured above.

Gambhir caught Shah bowled Patel.

Hang on… it’s not a Ranji score card nor is it a Delhi Vs Gujarat match.
It was India Vs England. An English team that had 3 PIO’s (People of Indian Origin) Owais Shah, Samit Patel & Ravi Bopara playing for them at Rajkot, was akin to the English team of yesteryears during the pre independence times, when names like Ranjitsinghji, Duleepsinghji, Ifthikar Ali Khan Pataudi figured in the English playing eleven.
India might today be the financial power house of cricket but a scorecard in an India / England match that reads Gambhir caught Shah bowled Patel is definitely a testimony to the Indian contribution to this great game of the colonial era. By annihilating England, India has sent a message that the cricketing world is currently witnessing a power shift not only in the financial prowess but also in talent.
Finally I see no harm in India playing bully these days when I see the likes of Mathew Hayden once back home in Australia call India a third world country. It is to this same third world country to which he will head again in a couple of months to receive an oversized wallet from Chennai Super Kings. If Hayden wants to remind us of our third world status I guess we ought to remind him of Australia’s 18th and 19th century penal colony past too.

A rare Arab perspective on Indians...

I recently came across this article in a newspaper in Qatar called the Qatar Tribune.

Since this is still not available online I had to post the scanned copy of the article as an image.

A wonderful eulogy on Indians from an Arab scholar. Read it and enjoy the moment with pride.

Of Open houses and online report cards…

I recently attended my 6 year old daughter’s open house in school. As a student I used to dread the open houses, even though it was a practice that I had to go through only during the last 2 years of my schooling. I have always been of the opinion that the trinity of Parent, Pupil and Teacher should never find themselves within the confines of the 4 four walls of a class room neither by choice nor chance. It invariably spells doom for the pupil.

Well this time it was a reversal of roles and I was ‘virtually’ shocked when the class teacher gave me a user name and a password and asked me to check out my daughter’s report card online.

An online report card…I thought to myself… The walk home the day I received my report card was a long one, thinking of ways to explain to my dad why I had lost those couple of marks in Maths, Science or Geography… The fear of presenting my report card to my dad and getting his all elusive signature on the dotted line was more than a stimulant to help me perform better in those days. Those were the days when we performed / excelled in our studies out of sheer fear and not out of promises or incentives that are doled out to the kids these days, A Barbie if you get a A+ in KG 1 or a play station if you do well in class 3 were never around in those days… Believe me the fear tactic worked better than the incentives.

I just realised the world has changed in more than one way I know, when I see my 6 old year watching Cartoon Network on TV and biting into a bar of Mars and makes a ‘by the way’ remark asking me to check out her report card on the web.

I just hope and pray that the time when my daughter sends me a user name and password to login to find out where she is, doesn’t confront me in the years to come.