Month: February 2017

Impatience.

பொறுத்தார் பூமி ஆளுவார்.
That is a Thamizh adage transliterated as Poruthaar boomi aaluvaar.

It means that the one who is patient will rule the world.

I belong to a generation of Indians on whom patience was thrust upon. We simply had no choice in the matter. We had to wait in queues for just about everything. I distinctly remember waiting in a queue to purchase a token plate which would enable me to buy a limited quantity of pasturised milk once a day. If one did not have that, one had to compromise with adulterated milk supplied by a monopoly of milkmen. I also remember having booked for an HMT wrist watch and waiting for six months before it was delivered to me. People had to wait for years to get landline telephone connections and to purchase motorcycles and scooters besides cars. The less said the better about queues for booking railway and bus tickets and the planning that had to be undertaken months in advance to reserve tickets for both train and air travel. Such lives taught us patience and also value for things bought at considerable sacrifice.

The present day generation does not believe us oldies when we talk about those days. It cannot visualise those hard times at all because it is now a generation totally used to and demanding instant gratification. In other words, impatient for results. Gone are the days of plodding with the same employer for a life time of employment and retirement. It is rare nowadays to see some youngsters working in the same organisation for more than a few years!

Impatience, resulting in the desperate need for instant gratification, also results in debt of unmanageable proportions leading to stress at young age. In our times, we could not get loans to finance homes and durables, whereas now lenders are chasing prospective buyers with attractive schemes and instalment payment plans to trap them into the instant gratification trap and stress. Such lures even cover vacations!

The attitudes developed on the basis of such impatience manifests in almost all walks of life including the way the young drive nowadays. To state the obvious, such a value system also affects relationships and the way they are broken and new ones started clearly is indicative of a vastly different value system than the one that I grew up in,

Do I envy these young people? To be brutally honest, yes, to an extent, That extent is that things are now available. I will still not buy anything on hire-purchase and the three credit card issuers that I deal with must be very unhappy with me because, I use them more as a convenience than to repay on instalments. I do not envy their lifestyles and stress at all. I am willing to be patient.

Pravin has suggested the topic for this week’s LBC Friday post. You can see what the other writers of the LBC have to say in their respective blogs.  Maria, Pravin and Shackman.

Kaabil. (Capable)

The last of the three Hindi films that I had wanted to see in January but could see only earlier today turned out to be worth every minute of the 2 hrs and 20 minutes plus the time for ads, commuting etc.  I had written about the other two here and here.

This story is one of revenge but an unusual angle is given by making the hero and heroine blind. The action scenes are very credible particularly when one of the parties involved portrays a blind man. Every possible emotion is kindled in the viewer with remarkable ease by the very professional presentation.

What stands out in the film is the remarkable acting skills of Hrithik Roshan and Yami Gautam. Under the very capable direction of Sanjay Gupta both appear to be really blind and there is not one misstep in the entire film which is thanks no doubt to some excellent editing.

The others in the cast produce capable and professional performances, again thanks to some great direction assisted by very effective cinematography. Unobtrusive background music except for one very loud remix of an old favourite song, enhances the viewing experience.

If you can get to see it, please do not miss it.

The Supernatural.

Please click on the  image to get a larger resolution.

I have only one personal experience of the supernatural. It was way back in 1961 when I moved into a room above a garage in a suburb of Hyderabad on a monthly rent which was much lower than what I was paying as a guest in a rooming house close by. The first night was a bit scary as there was something moving with a rustle on and off outside the only window in the room. My imagination worked overtime and I could not sleep a wink till it was day light and I found that there was a coconut tree outside, a branch of which was swaying in the wind and rubbing against the window.

My readers should be able to imagine the kind of supernatural visions that I imagined up during the night.

With that out of the way, let me confess that I don’t have any belief in the supernatural. Never did and will not have in the foreseeable future.

I however like to play with words and can come up with Super Natural phenomenon like the following two stories. If nothing else, they should at least amuse my readers.

The first story is about being Super Natural in modern Britain. The weather there is friendly for such experiments.

The next story is a great distance away from Britain and with contrary seasons.

Shackman has suggested the topic for this week’s LBC Friday post. You can see what the other writers of the LBC have to say in their respective blogs.  Maria, Pravin and Shackman.

Loyalty 2.

This is a follow up post on my earlier post Loyalty.

Story 1.

AB welcomed the maid back but refused to consider giving the old job back to her as it would be unfair to the new maid who had settled down well. The maid was told that she could visit the children and the home as often as she wanted but the job was gone for ever.

Story 2.

GH told whoever approached her that EF had been unfriended by her and that the approacher can well do the same without hurting GH. That is what happened eventually.