Writing Feedback / A tree .. I am [4]

I feel myself a tree sometimes. A tree grown to maturity. The flowers that bloom on a tree such as I am have been coming and going in their season. Some fruit too, of the kind which grows on me. It isn't very sweet, I think, nor much use even after being processed. Yet, here I am, tree-like just as all other trees are. And these things cannot be denied. I am green, with branches wide, covered in foliage and those who come beneath will find its shade.

I do not have much need for tending, I think, for I have survived in arid land with little watering and no special care at all. I have this strange longing to be of use to others, even if it be the very wood I am made of. But I realize, that isn't for me to decide. People find me mostly unsuitable for any purpose to them, and just leave me be.

It doesn't matter I have been telling myself now. Because here I am, and every passing year, I age a little. When i am gone, the bands for each year I lived, would show up clearly. Just like in all other trees were you to cut through them. So, it is all fine - just this one message I would like to leave for you. If you don't like how I look, the texture of my leaves, or the occasional flowers which come, their form or their fragrance. Still, I ask you just leave me be.

Don't pick these flowers to smell them. I haven't any control over them, they will be as they are. They come without my asking, as buds among the leaves, then grow to a fuller bloom - which you don't like you said, and then I let them go as they're ready to fall. I am sorry their smell isn't one you like. I am truly sorry they fell so close to you, for I wasn't meaning to offend. It's just this is where I was planted, and meant to be.

So, now my friend, I wish you adieu.

Writing Feedback / The squirrel on the roof, basking in the morning sun [2]

Remember the metal staircase in the backyard? Used to be at the further end, made use of only by Vishnu-Bahadur's family while they lived here. It was not by any real plan, but because the neighbor wanted the foundation on that side to go deeper and block water from seeping into their basement after a heavy rain -- that, that side underwent some serious reconstruction. Part of which was to move the metal staircase where it is now, outside and right of the window of my room. I liked the idea, once I could imagine it. The black staircase adding something to the garden.

You will also remember, the view from this side, the temple to the right beyond the wall and the nursery to the left, some aging trees also visible. It was the same neighbor again who had the large land behind cleared. People walk the road, going left to the nursery, mostly in the mornings, but also others, the house-working ones, in the evenings, cutting through to their homes in the slum-like habitation which lines the road beyond the nursery, thankfully a little ways beyond it.

In the mornings I can hear the children coming to attend the school next to the temple, about the time when I am done with my own morning routine, bath and toilet, meditation and yoga, and I come to feel the morning freshness, and the sun as it rises from the left. Cup of coffee in hand, I walk up these garden stairs, sitting on the roof's edge my feet on the top most step.

The sunlight is beginning to reach the roof as it streams through the gaps in the branches of the trees. People walking out of the nursery, some who have walked from home, others towards their cars parked there, all have an air, a readiness to meet the day, and what it will bring. Children too seem to be looking forward to their school, probably the company of friends they will meet.

Then I notice this squirrel. I had noticed him as it first was skittering around, making its way up the tree. It's a favorite among the squirrels, this tree, a little too slender for the cat which is sometimes around to follow them up, and it leads all the way to the roof. As I sat there looking at the scene beyond our backyard wall, this squirrel too came and perched itself on a piece of brick lying there. The sunlight had just reached us, and I felt there must be so little difference in what we must both feel now. Sometimes it would twitch its tail, but otherwise as I sat there for more than fifteen minutes, so did the squirrel, basking in the morning sun, on this not so chilly winter morning.

Writing Feedback / Cultures .. one view of their dynamics; Pilgrims of Eastern origin [2]

Have you ever thought along these lines, that instead of those people, the pilgrims, the people who came to America were from India or another Eastern country ? How would the world have turned out?

North America was like a gift to all mankind at the time. A gift of beautiful and natural, wide land. So large actually, that by virtue of its huge size alone was it able to carve out the future of the world that followed.

There are two things which I believe would have been done differently had the pilgrims been of Eastern origin. One , the diminution of the Native American people. Easterners would have tried to assimilate with them, not being of such violent nature as the Europeans. The Europeans at that time were anyway conquering many countries, and doing so without check. They actually believed themselves the better people and entitled to what they could take, even forcibly.

The other thing that would have happened differently would have been, that they would not have brought the millions of people from Africa to do the hard labor of developing the land.

Once we get over these two facts of America's history, what has followed then is mostly all good.

The America we know, of the last thirty forty years, has brought a new culture to the world. And these are the three things that I believe resulted in the birth of a new culture. The first being the wide and untouched natural country land that it was.

Standing away from the whole of the living beings on the planet, from that perspective, one could say that this was a giant leap for all mankind. Enacted by the human species and an evolution for its own furtherance.

The progressive step here being, that where the cultures had become weighed down by many unnecessary things, a fresh start enabled them to make many things anew. Defining a new government and what it was based upon. Mostly, getting rid of their baggage from many centuries.

Of the things they did so shed, the one which stands out pertinently is religion. The little history of theirs I know, explains it as becoming a burden for some due to differing factions. But I would say, as its simply lacking a stronger core.

I wish to bring out this fact ..that the world was ready for the change. What is sweeping over the world is the discovery which happened in that country. In its larger part it is what the world brought about for itself. It has elements of its original discoverers, the Europeans, in their aversion and understanding of spiritual matters. But for the most part it is a step forward in the way humanity progressed as a whole. What various countries take from there is its generic part, each trying to leave aside that which is specific to its native European origin, and conflicting with its own.

To bring out the central theme more clearly, imagine four species of plants growing out from one place. As their growth increase, their leaves and branches become denser, and their need for nourishment increases. Though they are still growing along in their separate ways -- they turn now to encroaching upon other territories. The species have characteristics of physical nature which differentiate them, but being humans, these characteristics and their differentiation is more pronounced in their internal aspects. The system of ethics existing in each, that allows them to function as a communal whole. Which really forms the basis for all interactions among individuals in commerce mostly. But as important, the individual language of each. The meaning and manner of articulation, evolving as a generic trait of the fabric of each species.

Imagine now, that one being more aggressive begins to poach upon others, even attaching itself and sucking upon them like a parasite. After doing that a while, and feeling perhaps some inner revolt due its human nature, this more aggressive species finds a huge piece of fertile land to feed upon. That draws away its preying parts. Eventually its perspective and of the entire world , increases to the extent that it sees that there is no more space for it to grow any more. For it can see all the way round to the other side of the planet, and see it suspended in a void of space.

If you see this portrayal as factual, then it might help attach significance to the activities you are planning in your future. Whether it is to benefit one part of this grove, or bring about a balance; in recognition that what is common to all humans must lie within, something in the nature of the things we think about perhaps. But I do not want to lead and leave it here with this hope. That the forces you feel from various cultures are clearer now.. of where they came from in the past, and what they push towards for their future.

Writing Feedback / House of tramps, the owner unseen. [2]

Imagine a large room and three or four people sleep there in sleeping bags or somethings of that sort. The idea being, that at night they adjust their bags to occupy as much space they can when they're ready to sleep.

They are tramps, occupying this hall without any ownership. But as long as they remember, no owner or other official has ever come to challenge them or ask them to move away.

The room has a porch connected to it through a door which was at first kept closed. Until the person sleeping nearest to it, one day pushed it open and went in. He found a nice place, untended but otherwise clean, and enclosed with glass windows. Then onward, he slept here in the night, enjoying the solitude and being able to look out at the stars.

Those inside heaved a sigh of relief, for of late they had all begun bickering, and the person in particular who had moved into the porch, was becoming threatening.

As is likely in this situation, some of these occupants had been around since a very long time. It wasn't definite, but they said they had met the owner. And this fact showed in the manner of everything they did. They said the owner had been quite kind to them and had said they could live here. Things they did were what they believed or considered correct, as the owner would have wished.

The person who had moved into the porch however, established a newer set of rules of how he would go about. One can understand that he guarded the passage to the porch stringently. Otherwise, he was organized and had much less of clutter. At times when he let the other's visit the porch, they approved of what they saw. What did jar them though was his belief that they had complete ownership to everything here; not just the porch but of the entire house. He even discredited their claim, those who said they had met the owner a long time ago.

This is how it was then. The others came to visit and saw how he did things which they did mostly like. But then they sifted in their minds and took back only what they believed was in agreement with the idea, a sort of unwritten pact they had made with the owner. A pact they believed reflected their position, not just in this house, but the entire community in which they were all .. but only tramps.

Writing Feedback / On a changing social order in India -- a perception [2]

Some things have changed, or have they ?!

An ordering in society by wealth is no longer tenable. The idea was put in place by the British rulers. They enforced it as they were in power. It wasn't their withdrawal, but later when these subjugated peoples traveled and observed the way of life in Western countries, that they could tell that this was not only artificial, but wrongfully imposed. To the extent that following generations in the western countries felt disadvantaged by what their forefathers had done, and wished to quickly bring in some other measure of what is better and what is less so.

You might be struck by this if you watch 'Talent shows' like American Idol or X Factor and many others that have come up, as have their counter-parts in countries far flung like Indonesia, Turkey, Philippines and Ukraine. The audience participates in choosing the winners, and the favored are those who have been least fortunate in their circumstances and of disadvantaged situations.

The earlier criterion of talent alone is not acceptable. There is so much advantage that those in better circumstances have to nurture their abilities. Instead, those who wish to take their natural gifts to greater heights and do so in spite of their daunting surroundings, are the ones most worthy of being given a helping hand up.

In opening themselves to an easy access by those who had until recently been kept under by them, western countries acknowledge this need for a better measure. And it is not forcefully enforced either but a consequence of withdrawing the strait jackets of the past. When there is a free and open communication between countries from deep West to deep East, something fair in nature emerges in time.

The person sweeping the road outside or the boys carrying gas-cylinders, or even the persons driving your cars have long been wondering. What is it that these people have that we don't? It is time to acknowledge that actually there is little that entitles us to sit in drawing rooms, while they labor with such unequal compensation. And should we still insist on holding up any reasons for this distinction, then we are bigots, and will lose respect of ourselves as we are forced to acknowledge that others did so long ago.

Writing Feedback / Heirs to ancient knowledge; consensus is possible, but the issues must be put to test. [NEW]

In a world connected as we are consensus is possible. But to arrive there the issues must be put to test.

We, in India have long held up the greatness of our ancestral achievements, as not for ourselves alone, but all of humanity. We have this lingering sense, that our ancients had uncovered it all, had attained it all, in so many fields, even the very path to freedom from life and death.

And so we mostly believe. And so we say to others when we can. But over these last fifty years or so, this claim has become to ring less and less true. The promise of the great Indian heritage, of its literature and sundry achievement, may have begun by such personages as Vivekananda, Krishnamurthy, Prabhupada, Chinmayananda. All talking of greatness lying as if in some cave, to be reached in, or only to be waited for a little longer - then amidst the thunder worthy of their oratory, it would come spewing forward. And the rest of us, would win the world's respect for simply being Indians. Heirs to the great achievements of our fore fathers.

I have certainly felt this sense of awe, if one can call it that, from foreigners, specially western ones. Not that there is nothing concrete that carries from the past into our present. Yoga for one, and Ayurveda. But even more compelling, the ability in the younger of us who when put alongside others of their age, shine with an extra-ordinariness that defies all explanation but of something like an ethnic inheritance.

And so, like waiting on the side of an oil-well for what ever else may be forthcoming, the world has sat back and watched and waited. Not that their own people also sat idly by. They had harnessed technology, and have taken it with strides from strength to strengths. They harnessed even the youthful Indian intellectualism to work at their ends. But theirs' is an open world, and those who joined their efforts have done so, convinced of their system's impartiality. The only thing it has been partial to is that, it has driven towards its own goal. And that is quite different from the one India of the past had.

And this is where we find ourselves now. I think you will agree that the ground has shifted from what it was just fifty to sixty years back. If we extrapolate to younger and younger people, and what are likely to be their realities; what are those things which will be describing the landscape for them; what is important more than others. Then, concerned that the great traditions we so revered might slip away, as they have in these decades past, we need to reverse that trend. By actual discovery and not oratory alone.

Faq, Help / Note to the forum contributors [5]

While the onus is entirely on the author of the piece to get his/ her ideas across; I have to wonder if that means that those commenting on it have little to contribute in that process.

Most people submitting essays here are likely to be non-native speakers of English.

I am also thinking that for them the process goes something like this --

We have a prompt for which we write our response.

Here's the part I want to emphasize for the EF_contributors. We the writers have the idea in our heads which we develop for a period.

Then comes the difficult, or interesting part depending on how one feels towards it, where we attempt to express it in a manner which is best understood -- by native english speakers.

That's it. That's really all there is to it.

Consider this. An author of a piece spends 4-6 or more hours, and I think mostly in that part where he/ she looks and searches for just the right expression.

English is very different from other languages, one of which could be the one the author is native to.

To think it is simply about finding the equivalent expression is too much of an over simplification.

Much else that is different goes into creating the nuances which add or remove emphasis, and thereby convey the intended sense.

What you really see here is a piece, clothed in English but its undergarments are of an altogether different kind. And to carry that analogy further, the person himself is a non-caucasion, yet he wants to be accepted as what is acceptable in your country.

How would you make such a person comfortable, were you to meet him? And that is your responsibility.

You have not only to make him comfortable enough to speak what is on his mind, he has already shown his willingness to learn your language and even your other ways. You, gracious that you have been in accepting to help him -- cannot just be curt, or perfunctory. Not if you mean to be sincere with the task you have chosen, and are not putting on a show perhaps, of only doing so.

Thank you.

Writing Feedback / A fear of censure in Indian society; our conversation often turns to criticizing what we see lacking [2]

Often, sitting together as a group of adults, our conversation turns to criticizing what we see lacking in our society. Often we also attribute these shortcomings to the imperial rule and empire which shadowed us for two long centuries. We talk then of the attitude amongst many of us, of behaving like 'sahibs' with the poorer class; or of looking for ways to exert ourselves less and less. At such time, someone may point to things that we should have taken instead from their, that is, the imperial cultures -- like their timeliness, general politeness and greater regard for their environment.

Maybe we needn't feel all bad about ourselves, as we can all recognize the small changes which are yet taking place for the better. The malls are becoming better places to walk in than just a year ago; and so are the roads. We could look a little more closely at people's behaviors though, because there is much that is wanting there - and very little has changed. Isn't it like litter which we find strewn around us and we mostly feel, and I think rightly so, that the culprits are the poorer class of people. Similarly, I think, in our society the poor are most responsible for the uncouth behavior we see around, whether traveling through the market or any other public place.

But then, just as you and I try to keep our own community clean, what about those things which yet keep us wanting as a society, those we could do to make our life more pleasant and civilized -- like, behave more 'civilly' to each other. I am as much against the forced and artificial greetings with whomsoever I chance to meet as I step out. But perhaps there is something that can be done to improve ties between the people which is at a more fundamental level. Looking back again at the 'civilized societies' of the western countries, I asked myself the question, what is it which makes them behave so politely with each other in public? What is it that they do and we do not, or have here ? And this, apart from the corrosive influence of the behavior we generally find on streets.

Here's my answer. It is the disparity of the social positions of the two genders in our society. I may be struggling at expressing the thoughts in my mind, but I pause, and feel that I am not mistaken in believing this. I am straining to imagine how exactly this could be, but isn't it a reasonable idea, that one can think that the culture within our communities could also be as different, cleaner, just as we would like the gardens and our building to be. Males and females, please think along with me on this, and don't you agree, that if we could resist thinking negatively of every interaction between males and females, not of the same family, as having hidden overtones and meaning -- it would add to the health of the entire populace.

Many would recollect from their experiences abroad that in many situations, when some counseling is required, it is often arranged for the two sides to be of different genders -- it is a more natural exchange, an easier one, where outcomes have been found to be more positive. I can see the difficulty of trying to change the culture here, that would make such interactions happen more often. Yet I strongly feel that those who do try to overcome the nagging of fear from social censure -- will be like those who try to plant a flower or a bush when they come to live in a barren building. Hoping it will take root, because they know what a difference it would make to the entire surrounding.

Writing Feedback / Remnants of another culture that still linger on. [2]

Imperialism came to India from the English just as it did to the United States. There, it was put down decisively in the Civil war. We appear to have taken to it, without even examining whether it conflicted with our own values.

When we step out of our home in the morning and the person cleaning the lobby says 'salaam', and we ignore him completely, or nod with eyebrows arched as though looking downwards. That is imperial behavior. When the driver steps out to open the car door for us with a polite 'good morning sir, or ma'am' and we only mutter in reply, or patronizingly, that is imperial behavior. Sitting in the back-seat, we preoccupy ourselves with a newspaper or the mobile, as a way of dealing with the forced closeness with the person driving our car. Or when we talk with a vendor outside, we have the window half closed -- it is still the same.

It was the North -- the war is often called as between the North and South America. It was the North, led by General Lee and others, that won. South America, being not the present continent known as that, but the states falling in the southern part of the present United States of America. It is a sad thing about war that started on ideologies, it certainly isn't so for those fighting it. The ones who, lying in the trenches, know that any moment they could be blown to bits, or severely incapacitated. These men are quite oblivious to the reasons the war is being fought. The soldier once committed is only that. His death and dying though is no different from how you and I would experience it ..suffer a similar wound or shock, or impalement by a bayonet or a shrapnel, be burnt by fire or whatever..

These soldiers were mostly too young, and neither educated enough to believe in the ideology that started the war. They were given concrete things to grasp in their minds. A loyalty to their general and their fellow soldiers, or that they must not lose their ground. It came down for them to some piece of land to defend, or seize from the enemy. But that wasn't the reason for the battle. The reasons, in the minds of the higher ranking officers, the generals, and those with capacity to understand, were quite vivid. The losing side would lose everything, and more than anything else, their ideology.

What were these ideas of the Southerns so abhorrent to the Northerners? There were really no such concrete ideas differentiating the two sides. The emancipation of the slaves though it became a symbol of the war, I think many would agree, wasn't it! The ideology separated in Europe itself. For and against the King's rule ..that is, of the imperial order. As the colonialists settled in different parts of the United States they were already splitting into these camps. The black people were exploited by both, equally. It is that those of the north, realized that they had to relinquish the notion that some humans can be treated with lesser rights.

If you can remember the first few times when you visited United States and the newness of things there. If you can recollect, not just the vast buildings or the sprawling landscapes, but that feeling itself, of a freedom from some constraints we even would have carried from here. You know then that this is what triumphed in that war. It has given birth to a new culture, quite different and opposed to the earlier one. It wafts into Europe where the young specially embrace it ..and the intellectual freedom it carries, and it is making it's way into India.

Am I leaving you with the idea that Indians are welcoming the change ? Quite the contrary. Any one who has not lived abroad looks askance at this new thinking. It fills them with a dread. Not just as change, but because they feel it lacks a moral center. And then they dig their heels further into the earlier imperial way.

Writing Feedback / A memory of an old man [3]

There was a routine I had at Barnes and Noble. After spending an hour or more of some intense reading, I'd take a break to come and sit outside on the benches. For me, there was something to learn from simply looking at life moving around, at that time. People going to work, or just otherwise going about their business. There would be maybe, another person or two, like me also sitting there eating their breakfast.

I've wondered if I appeared, as people do to me, when I find them staring. I think maybe not, for it wasn't so much at any individual, but as if, just what he or she was doing that I would be looking at. All of it like looking upon a new scenery, so true and real that sometimes it only appeared clothed in an innocuous demeanor, but every individual so alive to what he was doing. It was the coolness of the morning air which also made it pleasant and possible to sit there, nondescript myself, and observe this life.

Some of it started to become more familiar. Those people who were regular in things they did. I wondered how I never saw anyone observing me, as I often did the others. There are wanky people everywhere, and I wasn't considered so much as one of those, but perhaps just a bewildered foreigner... There was this one time, a wanky person was passing by. I couldn't tell whether it was a man or woman. They are looking for anything or anyone to latch on to, and aren't so much a menace as a nuisance. But dealing with them requires a certain deftness and equally, some awareness of the local culture. Make a mistake in what you say or how you react, and that person will make a drama right there with you, an awkward and unwilling participant, and everyone around as their audience.

As I sat there this time, this person's eyes alighted on me and lit up. He or she only a few feet away. "And what do we have here?" I remember her saying, and a feeling like of a prey when it sees a predator fixing upon itself started to descend upon me. Before my would be tormentor could have me in her clutches, an elderly man whom I had seen pass by before, engaged her briefly in conversation and sent her on her way.

I had my wits around to know what had happened. I wondered if my savior knew my astonishment, that I thought him only a helpless old man who shuffled down the street each morning for his newspaper and breakfast, oblivious of me. But he had a positive impression of me somehow. And knew that I would not be able to deal with the situation. So he stepped in and rescued me. Then quickly ducked away somewhere, before I could express gratitude.

When I ever I see old men sitting somewhere now, in a park or otherwise. And if it is a place I go to regularly, then though I may never exchange greetings with anyone, I pause at the memory of this incident, and know that though I have never said anything to them, these geezers have a good sense of who exactly I am.