When disaster sells

"I am convinced that we have a degree of delight, and that no small one, in the real misfortunes and pains of others". Edmund Burke, On the Sublime and Beautiful. Sect. xiv. vol. i. p. 118.

As immediate furore around the Asian Tsunami dies down and people across the affected regions grapple with putting their lives together again, a macabre form of human interest in this large-scale tragedy is slowly seeing light of day.

Tsunami souvenirs such as VCDs, t-shirts and gory pictures of bloated corpses floating in the sea are being snapped up by a segment of both the local population as well as disaster tourists. The VCD industry is seeing the most brisk business and if dealers are to be believed, the Tsunami videos are outselling even pirated Bollywood and Hollywood blockbusters.

This has of course outraged the survivers and in some cases even called for police action. However, as always, it makes me wonder what motivates people to buy into another's tragedy. This is not a tragedy of the past - so the argument that it has historic value is limited. This is a tragedy which is still alive!

So what is it - an emotional response? Could it be that watching these horrific real-life pictures in the safe confines of our homes make us deeply grateful for having been spared?

Or is the response purely cognitive? It is now a known fact that sales of disaster movies go up after such events. So could it be simply a need to know what it was all about in the first place, to educate ourselves so that we are better prepared?

Perhaps both of these rationales are acceptable in a way. However, there could be something more to the story. Maybe by either snapping up pictures, touring the areas unnecessarily or by buying into these 'souvenirs', some people are trying to be part of the tragedy in a thoughtless way. They want to be seen as 'having been there and seen it almost first hand, albeit from a safe distance'.

While one must be cautious in drawing conclusions about people's motivations in any given situation, some articles in the Globe and Mail and CBS News are certainly of note in this context. Interesting how the US senator Bill Frist, before completing his rounds of the relief work in Sri Lanka, posed for photographs beside some Tsunami debris and instructed a photographer - "Get some devastation in the back".

Maybe disaster just sells; like many other things that are out of the ordinary, different from our otherwise mundane lives it simply piques our interest...such a pity though, isn't it?

Of swastika and symbolism

Earlier this month, a 20 year old prince wore a swastika arm band to his friend's fancy dress party. He probably simply thought it was "cool" or "fun" and did not in his darkest hours imagine the upheaval it would cause in the world around him.

This incident however, has led the EU to call for a ban on the symbol itself. To the western world, the swastika is associated with and brings to mind the horrors of the Nazi regime and holocaust.

Interestingly, the swastika was probably adopted by the Nazis as an Aryan symbol. In Mein Kampf, Hitler associates the symbol with "the fight for the victory of Aryan man".

In many eastern cultures, on the other hand, the swastika has been around for aeons as a revered auspicious symbol. It has religious significance in hinduism, buddhism and jainism. Even today, as my grandmother draws the swastika before her temple alter, it is purely devotion to her God and prayer for the well being of her family that drives her and not anti-semitism, nazi pride or impression of 'being cool'.

Amidst all this furore, what is most fascinating, is of course the way associations with symbols evolve over time and cultures. The swastika moves from being purely positive (religion), through the purely negative (holocaust) to a young boy's idea of a mere fancy dress costume...interesting!!

Food for thought

The Supreme Court in India has fixed January 2005 as the deadline for all states to provide a midday meal in school for children upto class V. The intention behind this midday meal scheme is two-fold. To provide the children from poorer communities with atleast one nutritious meal and thereby motivate these children to attend school and increase attendance.

True, the implementation of this scheme is a mammoth task in terms of the sheer logistics. But if it can be done, it would be revolutionary and most beneficial for atleast 40% of India's children who are malnourished due to poverty.

The directive also states that the responsibility of cooking these meals should be given to women from backward classes and widows, who should be paid a retainer. Again the intention is noble though the money being offered is really a paltry sum. (For example in Orissa it is around Rs. 200 per month, which is roughly USD4.5!)

As governments begin to implement the scheme in the various states, one of the teething problems seen to emerge is the social standing of the cooks. Across various regions in India, from West Bengal through Orissa to Karnataka, there have been cases where upper caste parents have forbidden their children to partake of the midday meal since they have been cooked by the 'untouchables'.

What is very upsetting is how the issue of untouchability still pervades through India in this day and age. One school in West Bengal 'averted trouble' by employing a head cook from the upper caste (she would do the actual cooking) who would be assisted by 2 lower caste women (who would help with the preparations but would not actually stir the ladle).

However, from amongst the children comes a ray of hope. Dr. A.R. Vasavi of the National Institute of Advanced Studies (NIAS), cites an interesting case in The Hindu.

"An SDMC member in North Karnataka, who was particular about who cooked the meal for his son, had to relent when his child insisted that he wanted to have lunch with his friends."

I sometimes wonder why adults cannot see that which is so simple in a child's eye. After all... it is just "a lunch with friends" isn't it?

The happiness index

My friend Charu has been commenting frequently on the various articles and studies on happiness.

As i read them with interest, i recall an equation my father used to tell me when i was a kid. Anytime I complained about how unhappy i was because I did not have everything that my friends had, he used to smile and tell me his formula for happiness and contentment.

"Happiness = what we have /what we desire. To be happy, the answer to this equation should always be more than '1'. There is no limit to what you can desire but there is a limit to what you have. So now it is upto you. You can choose to be either happy or unhappy"

Scientists today have worked out a far more complex formula for happiness . However to me, that piece of wisdom that i received from my father will always remain most precious and everytime i lose my way, i am sure it will lead me back onto the path of happiness.

The sixth sense

The tsunami that hit South East Asia on December 26th 2004 has touched all our lives in more ways than one. It has pointed out again how utterly helpless we are when faced with Nature's fury.

I think what is most tragic is how the tsunami caught people totally unawares. All the videos and photographs doing the rounds on the Net tell the story of how people on various beaches in S.E Asia were crowding around to watch the initial sight. The uncharacteristic giant waves was something they had never seen and so they were watching with utter curiosity and awe. Most of them did not feel any sense of impending danger until it was too late.

Caught unawares...a simple phrase with gargantuan implications. We were caught unawares because we did not know the appropriate reaction to the situation at hand. We saw the signs but did not read them right.

I was surprised therefore to read how the animals in Sri Lanka's Yala National Park had averted the danger and moved to safety in the higher grounds well in time. Scientists are arguing whether it is a superior acoustic sense or the mysterious sixth sense that helped these animals escape the tragedy. According to the article published in the Guardian, the only other people who had sensed the coming danger were perhaps the indigenous tribes on the Indian archipelago of Andaman and Nicobar islands.

How could it be that these animals and tribes, not having experienced a tsunami before, moved to safety? Is it indeed their ability to read Nature's signals better than all of us? Is it possible that as our civilisation makes quantum leaps in the field of science and technology, we are gradually losing our need and therefore the power to be in tune with Nature?

Also, could it be that the 'sixth sense', rather than being the illusory ESP, is just the ability to train our five senses more effectively to pick up signals from the world around us and harness that into giving the right response? One wonders...

A lesson in music

Philosophy is the highest music - Plato

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Last night, rummaging through my travel bag, i came upon a visiting card. The name on the card simply read - Professor Oak.

I remembered him well. Two months ago, strolling along the night market in Chiang Mai, Thailand, i had entered a small shop selling musical instruments, mainly flutes and fiddles. Seeing me browsing through with interest, the owner, invited me into his shop and offered to teach me the basics of how to play the Tro U.

As i struggled to play do-re-me-fa on the stringed instrument, we got talking. The owner introduced himself as professor Oak. He was a music teacher at the local college and he ran this shop on the side almost as a hobby. I learnt that he had also traveled to places like Vancouver to attend music conferences and shows.

"Learning to master an instrument needs dedication of a lifetime" said the professor. Then he went on to tell me how much he admired Indian instrumental music. "It is passionate and at the same time when performed by the maestros appear as something entirely sacred; it comes from deep within. No wonder these pieces are immortal and will never cease to enthrall us. Nowadays much of the music is so physical, so transient; everybody seems to be looking for short-cuts - they are here today, gone tomorrow!"

I tried to argue that there was nothing wrong in living for today, in valuing physicality and not seeking any immortality of sorts. Then all at once, the professor looked up, smiled and asked a simple question. "If this is what we value, then - what do you think will happen to the soul?"

That day i am afraid I did not learn to play the Cambodian fiddle beyond the basic notes. However, i had the privilege of meeting a great man in that little shop - a man who, with that simple question forced me to re-examine the way i looked at life.

From amidst the ruins

In my last visit to Jordan i met an elderly holy man in Jerash. His knowledge about the ruins was very impressive and he offered to show me around.

As we walked around the site, taking in the triumphal Hadrian's arch, the hippodrome, forum and temples of Artemis and Zeus, haji Muhammed told me that he visited those ruins almost everyday.

"Look all around you and try to feel what it must have once been like" he said as we strolled down the Cardo and all at once it was easy to imagine that colonnaded street alive with the footfalls of its original inhabitants. We continued for a while in silence and then i asked him "why do you like coming here so often?" What he told me in response will stay with me forever...

He said that those ruins had helped him over the years to remain religious and humble and lead a righteous life. He must have seen the puzzlement on my face because he explained "Look at this once great city. Great kings have ruled here...people trembled at their power and might. They were once creators of history and the rulers of men...they must have done great deeds...some good, some bad, some even terrible... but today all that remains of them is this ruin....nothing matters today...everything has bitten the dust...none but a handful of historians remember them. I think it is sad this oblivion of the once invincible, and this keeps me humble and strengthens my faith."

In the years that i have been travelling, i have visited many ruins with touristic interest - from the pyramids in Giza, Egypt, through the outpost of Palmyra, Syria to the cham ruins in Hoi An, Vietnam; but that day among the ruins of Jerash, i learnt an important lesson about life. Then, standing on the steps of the hyppodrome i gazed in wonder at the world around and silently whispered a poem by Shelley, read so long ago....

I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said:—Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them on the sand,
Half sunk, a shatter'd visage lies, whose frown
And wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamp'd on these lifeless things,
The hand that mock'd them and the heart that fed.
And on the pedestal these words appear:
"My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!"
Nothing beside remains: round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away.

A message from Mt.Nebo

Jordan - the place always brings a myriad images to my mind.

Mt. Nebo...from where Moses must have looked so longingly across the Dead sea. The land where his search ended but where he was never to set foot upon

As i watched the people enjoying a lazy morning in the waters below, i wondered if anyone could feel the old man's anguish in the gently blowing breeze.

A life of seeking and faith marred by a single act of aggressive disobedience - or was it just momentary vanity and the sense of power that temporarily blinded his vision as he struck the rock and commanded the water to gush forth?

I will never know... but as i stood there on that sunny morning, a voice in the wind whispered the following warning.....if you are given any form of power, do be very careful how you use it!!

Thank you Dina and Humorix!

Take the first step in faith. You don't have to see the whole staircase, just take the first step. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Well i finally managed to step into the world of blogging today, and i owe a great deal to the constant nudges from my friends, esp. Dina and Humorix(Avi).

Dina is a keen conversationalist and creative thinker. An avid blogger herself http://radio.weblogs.com/0121664/, she plans to give up traditional blogging this year and move to more exciting and advanced platforms of thought sharing.

Humorix is the eternal dream chaser and muse. Once the topper on the Ryze charts http://www.ryze.com/go/Humorix , Avi is also the creator of some of the most stunning digital graphics.

Here's to the new year of blogging!