Why do we pray to God?

Man has prayed to the power above us since time immemorial.None of us has seen God.Yet i have prayed...prayed everyday.I have often wondered about God but never doubted God's existence.I am not agnostic...certainly not.I believe there is a rhyme and reason to everything in this world.I guess that's what our myriad scriptures also say : there is an order a pattern to everything. How things happen daily,how our body works, how people talk, the rain, the sunshine, our busy lives, there is a set ordered pattern for everything.

There is even a reason behind our chaotic existence.Chaotic? Of course it is chaotic.Our lives are more mechanical than we can imagine and accept. Unwittingly, we have made ourselves like the
minute hands of the clock ticking away continuously.We are like puppets dancing away.How many of us have the time to stop and smell the roses?And yet there must be a reason behind our lives being so chaotic and mechanical.The fact that our chaotic , busy lives are small bits of an undisclosed broader picture cannot be overruled. I think it cannot be understood also.It is too complex to question the reason for our existence or to understand the broader picture.

But there are certain things that can be understood.....The fact that in spite of everything we still pray.We have progressed, are hard pressed for time, do not believe that God created us...but invariably we all do pray.I fail to buy it when someone says, he/she does not pray, does not feel the need to pray or does not believe in God to pray.That's hard to accept.One may never have believed in God or religion, never have been to a place of worship, but yet they must have prayed sometime in their lifetime.How? Because if one thinks more objectively, prayer is nothing but an appeal to the higher senses. Our notions of God and religion (most of them) are through man himself , but these higher senses are far more divine than we can probably know.These senses are within us and make us more human.One need not go to a church ,temple or mosque or any other place to pray.That may not be the only way to pray.When one pleads for mercy,for help, for justice ,he is praying.These higher senses, justice,mercy,compassion, understanding are too good to be human virtues.They are divinity manifested in all of us. I think god gave us that bit of himself to all of us when he sent us away.So when we pray to God, we just pray for the divinity to stay alive in all of us.

In other words we all pray to keep ourselves more human and less animal, even in our cluttered existence. We pray everyday for the human in us to rise above the animal. Some of us succeed and some do not. But consciously or unconsciously that is what we are doing when we pray. The broader picture remember? We have a penchant for complicating things but come to think of it things are quite simple and God is no complicated entity.He is right there and that's what some people have been trying to tell us all blokes since eternity ( all saints, gurus, messiahs everyone...)So for those of us who get cynical and say there is no humanity in this world...we are praying for it everyday...just that we don't realise it seems. So not everything lost for humanity , you see? not as yet.

Why are we rude?

Why are we rude? Yes...we are.And guess what we are also perceived to be rude.I have had american colleagues remarking that in India people walking on the streets do not acknowledge a friendly nod, or a smile.You smile at them they stare back as though you were invisible and they could see through you! Women especially are so much accustomed to road romeos who stare incessantly at them as though they were a specimen from outer space.

..."So you stare at them, smile...no response.If you are lucky you may not be mistaken to be a loafer and spared."

I heard this remark and did not know what to say. I mean what could i say? Why are people like that?

Come on this may not suffice to be called rudeness , but wait iam not done yet.

Retail has picked up pace in India.They are retail supermarkets in every corner of the country.Reliance fresh, Foodworld, Food Bazaar, More, Nilgiris etc etc etc...this list is expanding as i write. Good Service is also one of their several mottos.They recruit staff left and right. Of course they need staff don't they?If the person knows to read and write ..thats enough..( I seriously dont know what the selection criteria is ) The person learns on the job is evident from the fact that they never seem to know where which stuff is to be found, and also take up enormous amounts of time to bill the items.But then what about manners? Are they ever taught how to deal with customers?How to be polite?Most of them assume that their mere prescence is enough.They are not supposed to be of any help whatoever.

Queues? How can we forget that? People fall on you, step on your feet, swear at you ...all this just to save a few minutes. No one bothers to apologise. Waiting for your turn patiently is passe and jumping places and pushing your way through people is considered an achievement.

Customer service is abolutely non-existent .I have come across rude and curt replies from customer service executives.

Need one point out about "Road rash"? That people hardly follow traffic rules is well known, but what is really vexing is the lack of empathy people exhibit. Paedestrians are generally given a hard time and people swear incessantly to get their way.And when we are talking about rudeness , chivalry is best forgotten.It is a forgotten virtue. An extint virtue.

We teach our children alphabets, numbers, tell them stories, ensure they go to the best of schools and speak english better than our neighbour's child.But i wonder how many teach their children to be polite?Say "sorry" and "Thank You".Children are impressionable. In most cases they inculcate manners from their parents. A country that sees divinity in animals , mountains and rivers fails to respect and regard fellow human beings with grace. India is definitely a country of paradoxes.

Over here each and every person steps out of the house with the mindset that he is about to fight a battle. Everyone goes on a kill here and goes about thinking that every other person on the street is out to deprive him of something. Any advantage gained on another person is an achievement , a victory.So even if one has to compromise on politeness , they don't give any "damn" about it.

Music is divine...

The recent times have been bad for music lovers.One after the other,musical icons passed away.First Michael Jackson, then Carnatic doyenD.K.Pattammal and recently Gangubai Hangal.Each one of these talents and geniuses in their respective genres.And what distresses more is that they all were undoubtedly members of a dying tribe.Tribe? Geniuses? Sure! Prodigies in their life time? Sure! Famous ? Of course! But most importantly what strikes about musicians of their calibre is their passion when they perform.

No,not like the "out on your face" artificial display of passion, by a lot of today's "musicians", but a serene expression of bliss almost divine which makes us believe that these are indeed blessed souls.I have been held in raptures by the divine glow on Pandit Ravi shankar's face while playing the sitar,or the devotion evident on M.S.subbalakshmi's face when she sings a kriti. Seeing Lata mangeshkar perform in live concerts still gives me goose bumps.

Can we boast of any such musicians who could inspire such awe?Perhaps because, today music just serves as a ladder to fame and money and ceases to be a lifelong dedication , a love affair.This also explains the bliss of the faces of certain musicians when they perform.It is almost as if they had just that one moment to live.No wonder these musicians live on long after they are dead and gone.

Moneybags anyone????

RBI has decided to introduce 10 rupee coins soon. Industry has welcomed the decision saying that once this happens consumers will shell out 10 rupee coins without hesitation.( All in the mind....coins seem insignificant right?)
It happenened so when 5 rupee coins were introduced.People did not think twice before shelling out a extra five rupees for their purchases!

Smart thinking people I must say! But then what next?

Can we expect 20...50 ....100 rupee coins? Just imagine how it would be then? Paper money is just a modern invention.It took years for it to come to the form it has.Earlier ages ago, people were carrying metal money....gold coins, silver coins,broze coins...etc etc....I wonder will we soon be carrying moneybags?
Metal money to paper money...and now back to metal money.Interesting thought this is...

We may not be Mr.Bachchan ,but listen to us also...

We may not be Mr.Amitabh Bachchan, but we also need our civic woes to be listened to.It seems Mumbai's most famous resident wrote in his blog about the water clogging problem at his bungalow in Juhu and lo and behold, Mumbai municipal officials were at his doorstep explaining what went wrong and why the water clogging took place.

Municipal babu sahebs, we keep explaining to you guys what is wrong and you pretend to be deaf .Why so? Can we not have legitimate problems that deserve to be looked into?

There are residential localities with roads filled up with potholes, drains overflowing, not to mention that water clogging is a usual phenomenon in most of the areas in Bangalore whenever it rains heavily.Yet we common people are never blessed with a "darshan" by our municipal authorities in spite of our repeated entreaties. The day they react to our problems like they did to Big B's, our country will never be the same. Touch wood.

Books I hate to finish

This post has been on my "to post" list for a real long time. I thought of making a list of books i have never been able to finsh reading till date (I dont't think I have the courage to do it in future)
1)Untouchables by Mulk Raj Anand : I have made numerous attempts at reading this , but have failed.I think i might give it a try some time soon.
2)Dracula by Bram Stoker :This book was interesting and i stopped reading it when the story was in a interesting position.But thenI read a illustrated classics comic on Dracula( good one!) and also i have seen this in so many movies , I was not so much keen to go back to the book.
3)Persuasion by Jane Austen: Oh my god! What a book! I must have hardly read 2 chapters.
4) Dr. Zhivago by Boris Pasternak: One more torture of a book.The movie though was good.I actually made one of my friends undergo the torture of reading this book. Just to hear her reaction ( He he he).soory Div if you are reading this !
5)Moneychangers by Arthur Hailey:I have read other books by Arthur Hailey but found this passable.
6)Sands of time by Sidney Sheldon: Perhaps the only Sidney sheldon book i picked up and could not finish reading.
7)The Great Gatsby by F.Scott Fitzgerald: Iam quite embarassed while i type this beacause this book is always placed among the literary classics of the 20th century.Well i know ....I started reading this book and left it in between.Some one please tell me what is remarkable about this book.I might then consider going back to it.

There are a lot more books i have bought , but never started reading them ...let alone finish it. But then i will do justice to them some day....some day i will find the time....really what a wretched life this is...

Cuckoo ...koo...koo

Of all the things I am really gratified about , one is that I get woken up inthe morning by a great " Good morning" song these days! A Cuckoo has taken a fancy to a tree opposite to my balcony window and makes it a point to perch itself on its branches every morning and croon "good morning" koo...koo...koo....

It is also quite diligent about it...always on time.Touch wood. Just when Bangalore is getting crowded and polluted by the day, trees are being cut left and right ( Cubbon park! ), I happen to have a cuckoo croon to me everyday! What next? Perhaps a few sparrows hopping around in my balcony? Now that is what I call wishful thinking!