A philosophical fart and the senses went tart!

It’s better to have a cold war than a fully fledged hot war scattering trees, bones and earth by the raucous blizzards of bombardment. So China and America are full time busy in the cantankerous but innocuous cockfight. America is probing many a Chinese company to delist them from its stock markets. China’s foreign ministry releases aggressive statements on a daily basis in return. It releases the pent up, extra energies and assuages the ego a bit because each side can salvage brawny verbal points. Mind can invent as many victory points as possible. So what is the harm in formulating more and more!

As both the US and the Chinese try their level best to forge their truths, as all of us do, the fate of international geo-strategy hangs suspended pretty weirdly. At the grossest level of existence, 'Truth' is a little candy held tightly in the fist of the hand that is 'Powerful'! Let’s see who turns out to be more powerful to get the copyright over truth.

To keep India busy in the sweet sour cute cold war, China has been throwing chili now and then in the boiling pan of Sino-India relations by patrolling more aggressively along the rugged LAC in the Himalayas. Stones are thrown, abuses hurled in strange languages, and pushing and jostling takes place in Ladhak. Nepal and Pakistan are ever so happy to appease the Red Master. China proclaims Mt. Everest as its own. The democratically elected communist coalition—hatched by the holy land of communism itself—of Nepal doesn’t mind this diplomatic misdemeanor; rather they take it as an appeasing rap on the knuckles by the supreme aka. In a lopsided relationship, with one side almost a cringing servant and the other a bully master owner, a mild strike on the bum by the latter appears like an encouraging pat, like egging the ox to pull the cart harder. Nepal knows that China is a very hard taskmaster. So they pull the cart still harder and raise objection against the Indian road to Lipulekh pass. It’s our territory they say. To further rub salts on Indian wounds, the cringing communist head of Nepal claims that the Corona mutant from the Indian territory is more lethal and it has created immense damages in their territory. I hope he won’t demand war damages from us! The Red Master must be very much happy and would throw more Yuans in their famished pockets. A prominent Bollywood heroine of Nepalese origin gets carried by the patriotic fervor—a nice opportunity to sow the seeds of political career anywhere in the world—and supports her motherland. Many an Indian baulk with irritation accusing her to insult the land that has given her name, fame and life’s fun game.  

Taiwan’s nationalist leader Tsai takes oath for the second term as the island nation’s President. The Red Bull is chagrined beyond limits across the 200 Km strait on the continental mainland. More Chinese aircrafts are loitering like rampaging locusts, ready to chuck out the ripe harvest, Taiwan being such a beautifully managed developed nation. She but is a gutsy lady. It’s very scary to even think about the little island’s precarious position as the mighty mainland nation acts like a land mafia, always eying the territories of its neighbors. They are even itching with communist chili to grab Hong Kong well before 2047 as per their agreement with the Britishers.

Long before the cobra raised its hood, Dostoevsky had predicted well about the great eyewash that would set the stage for the grossest misuse of power in an institutionalized manner. Looking at the seeds of communism, one of his characters in the book Devils forecasts:

"...a final solution of the question of the division of mankind into two unequal parts. One tenth enjoys absolute liberty and unbounded power over the other nine-tenths. The others have to give up all individuality and become, so to speak, a herd, and, through boundless submission, will by a series of regenerations attain Primeval Innocence, something like the Garden of Eden. They will have to work, however. The measures proposed for depriving nine-tenths of mankind of their freedom and transforming them into a herd through the education of whole generations are very remarkable, founded on the facts of nature and highly logical."

Well, flawless forecast by the maestro! The experiment has been hatched in China exactly like he predicted 150 years ago. The one-tenth communist cadre and their cronies push the docile and disempowered nine-tenths like a herd of sheep. Nine-tenths of Chinese are the gentlest and most docile citizens of mother Earth. One-tenth are literally devil incarnation. God save us. And God save my Chinese brethren! There the best and the worst are living side by side.

O Almighty, let there be subtle strains of democratic vaccine against a diseased ideology! Cure is on the way! Hong Kong erupts again after the Corona-enforced curfew. I see a happy, healthy and restful China sometimes in future. My Guru Dalai Lama may bless His birthplace once again, and I may get blessed by bathing in Lake Mansarovar. Well, both postponed till democracy cures the dragon!

We have our very own nursery of communism right there in the heart of Delhi. JNU-type intentional untidiness—which they foolishly take as a mark of intellect and wit—gives, at the most, bespectacled morose look, guttery stench in armpits, rotten swab of wool in the navel (and somewhere unmentionable also), lice in hazardous hair and the communist bug in the soul. All that is required is disinfectant jet sprays for the body and Ramayana, Mahabharata and Gita lessons for the soul! The Pro-Hindutva Vice Chancellor appears to lie in wait for the same like a leery, happy fox.  

The US, nursing its wounds and looking for ways and means to maintain its superpower status that has been shaken a bit by idiotic Corona, is pumping up zeal into its lethal most aircraft and humongous gladiatorial aircraft carriers in South China Sea. Back home, the land of supreme individual freedom, is helping people to step out and breathe easily in free air. Any kind of restrictions on its citizens appears so unlike America. Americans love their individual freedom. Even their government can’t keep them tamed for too long. There is a drive-in theatre in a US stadium. The giant screen plays a movie. People drive onto the sports turf in their cars and watch the movie from inside cars, face masks and all, and nobody allowed to step onto the turf. It appears a new game. This life itself is an ever-unfolding game. So always be prepared for new twists and take it as a game only.

A typhoon in the Bay of Bengal seeks attention by its furious winds and storms. It ravages West Bengal and Orisa to push Corona from people’s psyche in that region. The honorable PM comes out to take an aerial survey of the devastation in the east. He has stepped out of Delhi after 87 days. He looks eager, enthusiastic but drained out after almost sleepless fight against the deadly virus. An air crash in Pakistan, killing more than 100 people, even breaks the ice between India and Pakistan and the Indian PM offers his condolences over the Paki loss. PM Modi has broken the ice. You can very well imagine the level of frigidity in the relationship between the quarrelling boys of South Asia by the fact that even a condolence message counts as breaking the ice.

Till there is a branded separate cure for Corona, the medical fraternity is juggling with alternatives. Some take Remdesivir as the wonder drug, others shout for HCQ, including President Trump who takes the latter to keep his armor braced for the Corona salvo that might be fired at him.

Afghanistan appears to shake off the dust of hardcore, unrelenting religious zealotry as it acts with common sense and turns practical to save life by cancelling state celebrations on the occasion of Eid. In any case, the holy message of Eid be better carried out in practice and celebrated in heart than in fulfilling mere rituals while carrying hate and malice in heart. Pakistan, as can be expected from the champion land of Islam, allows mass gatherings for namaaz to appease military and mullahs. Of, Eid Mubarak to all Indians! I hope I am not breaking some patriotic vow in greeting!             

People and governments seem to have come to terms with the Corona reality. The rising statistics hardly create scary ripples down the spine. Even misery has a saturation point. Too much of it stops giving pain and suffering as its sharp fangs lose their pinch. Even misery should know the rule of moderation; otherwise it melts in the ubiquitous sands of the rutted path.

People have surged out like a dam bursts suddenly. The cases in India are rising at the rate of nearly 7000 every day. It would have given heart attacks to government, administrators and people two months ago even to think of such a figure in a day. So even though India stands as the 11^th worst affected country in the world, people and government don’t find it too scary. Most importantly, business, life, office, desires, needs and cravings are more forceful than the fear of Corona. So people, having drilled their minds about basic precautions, are jumping over the fence during this transformative stage of Lockdown 4.0, before fully melting into the freedom of normal time again. Good thing is that the recovery rate is going up in India at around 40%, with people sneezing, getting feverish, breathing with difficulty and coming out healthy again. Strange are the ways of human anatomy, a thing that is fatal to someone causes just mild dis-ease in the other.

One more thing, the cases are hugely underreported in India and so must be the number deaths, given the shape and size of our demography and the puzzling socio-economic and cultural knots in between. It’s not possible to exactly document the Corona ravages across the teeming millions in the cauldron of poverty. Poorest migrant workers have scattered across the country, leaving hardly any trace of their pain, losses and miseries. Who will trace their footsteps to exactly chronicle the losses they have suffered, ranging from the loss of livelihood, hunger, fatigue and death? So this portion of Corona damages stays outside the pale of Corona management.

The issue of migrant workers’ miseries has finally roused the dormant political turtles, who were sulking for the last two months, their neck withdrawn into the hard shell and the sulking face lost under the cover. So the political opposition has finally something to croak about and the very same ear-busting debates have started on the news channels. Little does anyone realize that there are scores of poorest migrant workers—who waged the most lethal battle of their lives in reaching their home states, jumping over the lockdown fences, falling, getting wounded, walking hungry, sick and ill, injured and many perishing on the way—are quarantined in tarpaulin sheet tents without any basic facilities and left to fend off both Corona and hunger on their own. The fire is too far from the political citadel. It doesn’t burn the august occupants of the castle. It warms their spirit and lights their stage to go into politicking again to create fabulous careers out of the rutting miseries on the ground.

A gleaming golden fact out of the mangled remains of the global economy! It should also be taken into the parameters of economizing, profit and loss theories. There has been the biggest fall in Carbon-dioxide levels. Give some credit to Corona man! There are bitter lessons it has taught us. The plot is written in poignant phrases. A father is carrying his children in baskets tied to a pole carried over his shoulder. He has miles to cover in the sweltering heat. A tribal couple, bored with lockdown, decides to dig a well. The well is 15 feet deep and 5 feet across. Like a cute pair of sand beetle they wheedle out earth for ten days to reach waters for their tiny kitchen garden plot, their goats and a few swigs for other people in the dry land around them.  

All of us have to fight for our own stories and be our best version. This little girl takes firm steps, pedaling her way to stamp her signature on the fleeting currents of existence. 15 Year old Jyoti Kumari etched her new identity on the slate of miseries. Lockdown saw her stuck up in Gurugram with her injured father. Their home was 1200 Km away. She pedals to glory in 7 days, carrying her sick father on the carrier behind. The Cycling Federation of India Chairman has said that if the gutsy girl, an eighth standard student, passes the trial, she would be taken as a trainee at the state-of-the-art National Cycling Academy. Adversities flow between the banks of opportunities. We just have to force our way to the bank or perish downstream like a dead tree bough.  

And what do I do as a common Indian while all this is happening? I smile and take lessons from a beautifully blossomed red hibiscus smiling with little red bulbs of life against the background of cracks in the wall. Although there are cracks in life, she but smiles softly and whispers an assurance: "Don't worry, all is well!"

The tiny rose bud would have surely perished, if not for our tiny moisture of love that saw it being placed in the shade of a tree. The sun is firing on all cylinders at last to take the belated summer to its peak. The temperatures are over 40 degree Celsius. The bud blossoms to be a beautiful rosy lass and sprinkles her smile in the hot eddies of the pining sandy swirls. A smile is just one breath away, provided we give it a chance. Even in the fiery pits of burning summer, a blossom awaits our cool, caring shade to smile for life and living! I enjoy the smile of the sun-shaded rose! And when the afternoon sunrays come to kiss the shy, shaded beauty for a brief flirtatious moment, she opens her heart and gives a full smile. Guys don't miss to smile even at those who mean to rob you of your smile. Our own frown eats our smile, not other's intentions! After some time, the youthful full blossomed rose starts graying and a little bud opens just under it, shaded still further by the mother rose under the shade of a tree. Proud, protective Mama and her smiling angelica! Kindness leaves a sweet trail! Invest a few emotions of kindness and wait for the results!

Let China and America continue in their fight to save humanity from their own perspectives, I do my common man’s duty to sweeten my immediate mundane surroundings. A bucket of water lies under the tree shade. Hundreds of honeybees throng with a buzz to suck water and regurgitate it in their hive to save their larvae from a painful boiling death in this heat. To undo bitterness, we don't have to turn bitter and fight it. All it needs is to give sweetness more chances. Each and Every Honeybee saved means a sweeter world.

Dostoevsky states in Devils: "Forgive me for sins voluntary and involuntary. By sinning, every man has sinned against all other men, and everyone is at least in part to blame for the sin of others. There is no such thing as an individual sin. However, I am a great sinner, and my sins may exceed your own!" I take the onus for my individual sins as the contributors to others’ sins and do penance by looking at the selfless service of these little insects. Many of them perish to keep the hive buzzing. As parents, humans also do the same by the way! Let’s hope, we enlarge this family feeling to include more humans outside our families and then all of nature around!

A buffalo brays loudly. It must be thirsty. We farmers are very much obliged to them. They have been our lifeline. Moreover, a buffalo can take one to heaven also. Yamraj, the God of death, roams on a buffalo, and so does an enlightened sage like Paramguru Lao Tzu. Both take us to heaven in different ways. Yamraj does the deed like a tough peasant, Paramguru accomplishes the deed like a caring mother. I recall countless buffalo rides in childhood. Some were Mom type sympathetic and carried with affection and care. Some were nuisant and jumped, hopped and scattered their behind like the evil belle dancer to topple the rider like a coconut falls from the tree. Well, with buffalo being almost a living Goddess to my people, you can very well imagine our culture. Our culture is agriculture basically. And we have such pointed rough edges to our persona that nature appears to keep us to puncture bloated egos with our farming fangs.

Paramguru Lao Tzu on His buffalo! It makes him a father figure to me, not simply by his philosophy that I admire so much, but by his buffalo-riding look that instantly creates a niche in my heart. To we farmers, a buffalo has defined our lives the way gold has defined the lives of the trading community. A buffalo is almost a family member to unleash brotherly affection when in good mood and lynch with a switch when in bad temper. Well, but it is never one way show. Buffaloes too have had their mood swings and the resultant bruised bums, broken bones and toppled carts. Hail buffalo for He carries my Guru!

As we are busy in the little kindergarten of life, a team of scientists has observed that "a fountain of high-energy particles erupting from the ice" in the biting cold of Antarctica may in fact be a solid evidence of a 'parallel universe'. The standard model of physics might be swashed away. It resembles to a unique phenomenon known as "upside-down cosmic-ray shower". On the surface it looked just a cosmic ray, like one sees in a reflection off the ice sheet. However, it wasn't reflected. Keep your hold on your logic; it seemed as if the cosmic ray was coming out of the ice sheet itself. Another Googlie from Mother Nature!

Dear physicists, stretch your imagination as much as possible. It's a never ending spool of energy. It won't finish. You will always have the cord in hand and still more to come. Keep pulling for fabricating more convenience of life that you proudly name as ‘science’. Beyond that, kindly abandon the illusion of hitting the last mystery! Keep pulling! Forever!

As all of us set out again to claim our portion of freedom after the Corona hiatus, a philosophical fart tarts my senses. Long before we release our kite to fly for freedom, we tie it with the bondage of string. Before we set out to liberate ourselves, we enslave ourselves to dogmas, faith and beliefs. Is there any difference between what we take to be freedom from what we know as bondage? Don't worry guys; I have mild symptoms of Dostoevskian mental diarrhea! Relax! Don't catch it yourself! Haaa haaa!

You can very well estimate my situation by reading the following excerpt in Notes from Underground by Dostoevsky: "Oh, gentlemen, do you know, perhaps I consider myself an intelligent man, only because all my life I have been able neither to begin nor to finish anything. Granted I am a babbler, a harmless vexatious babbler, like all of us. But what is to be done if the direct and sole vocation of every intelligent man is babble, that is, the intentional pouring of water through a sieve?" Hope you got the clue for my mental diarrhea.

And finally, here is my recipe of a perfect human being: strong body, sharp mind and soft heart. I mean Shiva! Be a Shiva!