Words

It's been a while since I've posted, and I thought I'd resume my post with a few updates, for those of you who read my blog to know what's up with me.
I'm still in Theological college, doing hopefully my final year here. I can study for one more year if I want to. I'm not sure what I want to do with my life actually. If any one of you out there who think I might be of help in your enterprise/organization, let me know. I am pretty good when it comes to computers and writing. Though I can keep good inter-personal relationships, I'm horrible at public speaking. As long as you work for justice and equity, I'm all ears!
Ok. that's it for the CV.
Right now, I'm reading a book on Trauma and Recovery; and I'm finding it very difficult to read it. It talks about how fragile the human mind is, and how it can be irreversibly broken by traumatic events or human atrocity. The psychological damage a rape victim, or a car-crash survivor, or a soldier that has seen battle goes through is immense, and though the the symptoms are more or less unseen, the cause is like a huge iceberg under the person's conscious being.
And an insensitive word, or a loose remark can actually create havoc in that person's mind; that the person could even drown in depression for days... And in today's world, there are more people than not that have experienced trauma; more likely because of domestic violence or child-abuse or rape or war, as opposed to being victim to a tsunami, or an earthquake.
While my close friend and inspiration, the Angry Old Man would shake his fist at the system, and fight to make sure abusers and war-mongerers are never born, I, being a little more passive; would watch out for those that need help, and try and help make right emotionally, mentally and spiritually the wrong that has been done to them. 

Trip to NE Post 1 Train Ride

The journey, though hot and tiring, was peppered with lots of fun and jokes.

This is the post you've all been waiting for! about the awesome adventure trip to NE!, well, technically, just Nagaland, with a longish stop-over at Guwahati. Nonetheless, the trip was awesome, not just as an adventure trip, but a learning experience in culture, language and err... travel-planning.

The train journey was 'AWESOME' Barney Stinson style. We had earlier booked Sleeper-Class tickets via apparently the 'only' train from Bangalore to Dimapur. It stopped at 70 odd stations! 3 days n 2 nights! But thankfully we had amazing co-passengers.
I remember, in the movie Spy Game, Robert-Redford tells Brad Pitt that cigarettes are the best ice-breaker. I was thrilled to know that the best ice-breaker in any sleeper-class compartment is a full deck of cards. I realized that almost 99% males in our lovely country knows how to handle a deck of cards. We spend 4 to 6 hot hours playing Bluff, Rummy and Donkey. We got to know the co-passengers, a bunch of Assamese laborers in Bangalore. Fun, honest and soft-spoken to the point of being coy. My friend and I, two average South Indians, with a loud sense of humor seemed like aggressive North Indians next to them.
 Another bunch of co-passengers, some Thangkul Bible College students also provided us directions to get around NE, and good suggestions about where to go and what to eat.

Parenting

While I was getting a hair-cut today, I was transported back in time when visiting the barber-shop was like visiting the dentist, (or like going to your piano-lesson when you know you haven't practised!) Basically, I could feel that sense of anxiety and worry for an unpleasant 15 minutes; where a stranger with no sense of personal hygiene runs a pair of blunt scissors through your hair, pulling it out, and pushing your head left and right, pretending you were some sort of rag-doll with a head that can turn 360 degrees!

However, my parents were sympathetic to my plight, and used to listen helplessly as I complained. Unlike the young mother I saw today. She came with her young son whom I presume studied in the Second Grade. While the barber was trying to cut his hair, she was the one shouting at him asking him to hold his head still, and pushing his head down herself when he didn't know how to. And I thought to myself. This is the ultimate betrayal! When you thought you could rely at least on your parents through this difficult ordeal, they break your trust, yielding to the pressures of conformity in the barber-shop, instead, of at least having the fun of watching the barber struggle as you refuse to conform!

I have seen kids become constant class-toppers because of this sort of up-bringing, and I have also seen kids cave in to peer-pressure later on. What struggle would it be, for a parent to tight-rope-walk the thin balance between disciplining your child and giving him his dose of TLC. It reminds me of the Calvinist-Arminian Debate! 

Allergic to books

Recently I put up a status-update on my Facebook account that said I was allergic to books, and then made a half-clever remark about the ebook revolution. Though not many on facebook know, it is very true. I AM allergic to books. Especially the ones in the library! I think it's the dust or the book mold, but whatever it is, whenever I open a book, my throat gets blocked, and I cannot breathe, and I end up coughing, and reeking with bad-breath.

The frustration is that most of what is so valuable to me is on paper and no where else. Unless somebody shows me how to find whatever I need from whichever book online - for free or for a very low price. (It is interesting how I now associate anything soft-copy with being free. What has piracy done!) Anyway, this is just a shoutout whoever happens to pop into my blog today. I need your prayers desperately! I have a fourteen page assignment to finish tonight. (16 hours, max) and I have a fever. I have 3 books I must read (I guess I'll use a bed-sheet or something to cover the nose) and 16 articles. And I need the brain-power to last (and focus) for the next 16 hours... 

SAIACS update

This is just an update of happenings at SAIACS.

things are going fine here. slightly too fast for my comfort though.

I had to make a power-point show (along with Jeremiah) for SAIACS as they're applying for accreditation to Mysore University.

It took us the full of three nights. The show was 10:30min long, with 97 slides. We had to record a voice-over, which included a lot of amateur sound editing (a first for me!) While it was a learning experience, it involved me staying up till 3:30am two nights in a row. (and getting up at 7:30am the next day) and no afternoon siesta. resulting in a bit of harsh flu.

But everything went off smoothly, and the presentation has been, well... presented, successfully.

Now I have to get back to my studies, along with flu.

Of course, something else has been stealing my attention these few days.

The SAIACS volleyball tournament. We won yesterday's league match convincingly, and lost today's the same way.

There are three more league matches to go, and all our heads are filled with strategy.

If only we had more than 24 hours a day!

It feels like I'm alive again, and though I may not be explicitly contributing to society in anyway, I am glad to be alive and enjoy God and society!

Until the next post!

Are we born snobbish?

The contents from this post is a result of a few insightful conversations with sensible people. Therefore, thank you, sensible people.You'll know who you are. (The post is not polished, and the chances of me editing it is rare.)

Ever since I got immersed in to the (non-activist) leftist movement at JNU, I have always tried to open my ears to the voices of the poor and the oppressed. I try to look out for those that 'fall between the cracks' by either blending in too much or by being too silent. The orphan and the widow; the bonded laborer, the HiV victim cannot find the words to express their distress. They have been taught to scream silently, so that people like ourselves wouldn't hear them when we walk over them. And while there are a few who take advantage of their weakness and snatch from them what little they have, the rest of us either choose not to look in that direction, or mumble a prayer before deleting the memory off our head. I however, try to keep my eyes peeled and my ears dirt-free so I can catch the slightest whimper to either pray for or do something about it. Or so i thought...

I now realize that I am far-sighted; oblivious to the problems budding in my own college campus, just until a prophetic friend pointed it out to me. There is an entire set of people in my own college that look at me as a hi-fi person. As someone brought up in several urban settings, with (relatively) extensive computer knowledge, and who calls English his heart-language, I get a status of being one of 'those' 'hi-fi' people, while the 'normal' or 'simple' people born in a rural or poorer urban set-ups do not relate with me. There are other people who refuse to converse in English, but  can understand it, and I don't make a move to get to know them. Well, we can't blame anyone for that; we all have our different wavelengths and areas of interest, and it is these that define who our friends are. 

But this obsession with sticking with 'my own kind' is the beginning of the polarization of our campus, where people form different cliques based on their ethnicity and class-status. Everybody has their own comfort zone. But this gradual increase in the chasm between cliques deafens our ears to any cry from help from outside the group. Even Facebook doesn't effectively bridge the class/ethnicity divide between groups in our campus. The Lord, who's eyes range throughout the earth looking for a heart committed to Him and His mission for the 'orphan' and the 'widow' would reject us; who refuse to lift our head outside our comfort-group-huddle and take a look around now and then.

But why is it that we don't look outside our group? Because it involves a sense of insecurity of thinking differently from those within. Thinking differently from the group could lead you to a slow exile from the group itself. But in order to stand between the gap for the poor and the oppressed such small sacrifices will have to be made.

To keep things going

It's been more than a month since I've blogged, and now, I'm back; because of an unintended yet pricking reminder that it's been too long since I've left me ol' blog-desk. We writers generally bump into writers block when we either have nothing to write about, or when we have too much to write about that we don't know where to start. Inspiration comes when we generally have just enough to write about. But it's not because of writer's block that I haven't posted for more than a month now. It's because of the censor board in my head that tells me that my new found yet close friends would not take my rants about them very well. (No guys, you're all nice people... luv y'all!) 

Today we had a great game of lawn-badminton sans the floodlights, wooden courts, competition and resulting tiredness. A few months ago we had a refreshing game of volleyball, again without the angry coaches, scouts and angry team-mates. Just enough to release a good deal of sweat and a lot of endorphin. Looking back at my post-adolescent days when there was this unexplained yet deep desire to prove myself to be better than everyone else at almost every sport/skill, I didn't seem to enjoy sports. But after so many years of physical hibernation, just playing the game for no other reason that just playing the game in itself brings so much joy. Sure, my volleyball game and my badminton game will never be as good as it was 4 or 5 years ago, but who cares? It's not like I'm competing for the Olympics!

Not that I'm aged now or anything, but it's interesting to see how age changes ones priorities. What was once an insecure adolescent who finds his happiness by building his own skills that he can hide behind them, is now one who tries to focus on building up the people around him. (All you cheeky cynics, note the word tries!!) Also this 'letting go' of such obsessions gives me this sense of peace, that I now realize was forfeited when I decided to be 'better' than everyone else.

Moral of the story: Utterly meaningless! Everything is meaningless. What do people gain from all their labors at which they toil under the sun?

(Hopefully my next post will come out sooner and better. Writer's block still not cleared. the nanowrimo experiment didn't help either)