TV turnoff!!

We are officially turning off the TV...at least for this week. This is where "Mission Conversation" was launched.

I am not a TV addict. But there are somethings I watch. The BBC news is like my additional caffeine dose in the morning along with my cuppa. Then the few odd pleasures every now and then. But this week, nothing is acceptable. Of course with the profusion of entertainment in the form of radio and Internet, the NO TV idea is workable, but for additional measure I added a clause "No entertainment of any sort be it on TV or Internet". News I need to, for work (Rolls Eyes!) but nothing else shall stand. I mostly listen to the news programs on the Radio and NPR is like manna from Broadcasting heaven, and so that is permitted.

I don't think it should be difficult. I mean with the overdose of entertainment news from around the world this past week, I am so ready to not switch on the TV or Internet for any sort of stupid, mindless fluff. They were like the dust bunnies, the more you wipe away, the more they come..Eeyuck!! Anyway that is where things stand now. I managed to do without my morning news, just made my coffee stronger. Actually thought out a few things and feeling nice and empty and ready to take on the Big Bad world of Politics.

So any of you want to give it a try?? I promise it will be fun.

OH BTW!! I updated my Political footprints In case people are interested in my burgeoning political life.

Slide!!

A long time since I penned a Friday word. But here I am once again

Whoosh!! I could feel the air on my face
And a little heat on the seat of my pants
My brother chasing could barely keep pace
Whoosh!! Thud and down we went in a mess of arms and legs

Whoosh!! I felt like I was flying
The idea was to let the hands go
And let the wind carry you, squealing
Whoosh! Boy did I squeal my heart out

It was my brother who taught the fun
of coming down at high speed
Timing it to my grandma coming by, then run
Not stopping to listen to her mutter under her breath

She would do her prayers every day
and she had to take a bath every time we fell on her
It was perhaps more fun sliding into her everyday
than just sliding down for no reason at all

We learnt soon to slide with my grandpa
Slowing as he walked with his aching knee
And duck headed stick. I slid down once with pa
seeing if he had those hormones in him after all

I learnt to slid backwards and sideways, I learnt to slide
with my fee not touching ground
I learnt to even slide up from down, I would slide
all the way up and then all the way down

I would slide real fast when I was happy
An slowly contemplating each step I slid when sad
I would pause midway and sit when I felt crappy
I would go up and down and up and down when I was mad

The brown wood bore the marks of a dozen adults and a few more kids
It was all shiny from contact with bottoms of all kinds
It made kids silly and giggle, It made adults for a few minutes silly kids
It was my friend through thick and shine and it made my life complete

The banister at my grandpa's home, brown, old and shiny is where I lived
At times when I climb up some stately stairs in public
The wood tingles under my fingers, childhood beckons, I want to be the kid
Who came down the stairs with the wind in her hair and a twinkle in her eye

A Ray of Light.

Break in News

Finally someone has enough sense left to open their mouth or rather unscrew the cap of their pen. Dear God whereever he is heard my prayers. I have never been so irritated and so sad at the same time. I understand the curiosity, but this is insanity on a massive scale. A girl attempting suicide, a man bringing laddoos from kanpur, another naming his whole family after "The Family" another conducting mock weddings, another taking boiling milk bath, and yet some others sculpting and painting and embroidering. It is just a wedding people, just a wedding. Don't act like Chicken littles'. Pfft!!!Idiots.

Rude Awakening.

I was hibernating, in the cocoon of my basement. Sitting in the midst of books, papers, stapler, pen and everything else that would portray me as the desperate Grad student attempting to write a paper when in reality all she can think about is how amazing a plate of warm Bhel-puri and cool lemonade with black salt would be. Don't even ask me what the connection is or how I went from sanctions in Darfur to Bhel in Ghatkopar.

So many things have happened between now and then. The season is desperately trying new fads to keep up with the latest in fashion statement - Global Warming. India dropped to ridiculously low standards in cricket, journalism and celebrity fawning. Angelina Jolie has just saved another kid from the throes of poverty to drown him in ridiculous amount of wealth, cameras and everything else.A reporter was kidnapped in Gaza and feared dead for a while. But somewhere, some place things remain constant. People still die, some still live in fear and some in abject poverty. Some in courage, some in love, some in sadness. Some turn their heads for fear of knowing, some wallow in the bliss of ignorance and some others rooted in spot to their fast dying principles.

The rain fell in torrents, flooding the little street by my house, making the tiny stream behind my home to become a gushing brook. There was water everywhere and occasionally the thunder rippled in loud booms across the sky as one MAN sat above watching his handiwork. Who: One supreme being. Why: Unknown In Virginia, in the embrace of the Shenandoah valley it rained too. Blood from the lives lost, tears flowed like streams across the valley silenced by the deafening sounds of a bullet that ripped through the heart of an idyllic valley. Who: Someone mad and misguided and in control of some power. Why: Unknown. On the oil mixed sands of an ancient city, it rained through. Amidst the thundering sounds of misguided men blowing themselves up died 130 odd people. Who: Men seeking power in dying for their faith. Why: Unknown.

Were the 32 lives more important. Why does what we care for have to be orchestrated so much by what we see and hear. The 130 odd people became nothing more than a tally for a cause and destiny unknown. These 32 people will be praised, mourned and the relatives empathized with about their loss. Were their lives in anyway more important or more valued than the woman who went to buy vegetables, or the girl who went for walk. Didn't we create that too with our vivid imaginations, falsifications and a misguided value. Why not give that the same attention. Why not give Darfur where US imposes mindless sanctions be given attention. Why not the suicide of farmers in India because of one sided World bank policies be given attention.

I am saddened by the loss. As a student I don't want tog o in fear everyday to school. I can see how something as horrifying as this can affect people, a campus and a community. I am not complaining about the attention. It requires this attention if anything has to change. The fear is that it might not. Like all these other things, it might become mind numbing and just another spot on a time line of events. It might not bring a change anywhere. I don't want to think that way, but then sometimes I don't have a justification for thinking otherwise.