“This is your story”
“You’ve come early”, said Omega snapping his book shut. He got up from the bench as the brisk morning wind blew on his face. “Have I?” asked Alpha, seating himself on the bench. Omega smiled, but his eyes had grown weak with helplessness. Alpha sensed something out of place, so he looked keenly at Omega, observing every movement. Omega turned and swiftly began walking enamalong the footpath. Alpha continued sitting. Sensing that, Omega insisted “Why wait, let’s go ahead”. Alpha stood up surprised and followed him, struggling to catch up with his pace. They walked along the busy gullies and crying crowds. They finally reached. Omega turned and said with his smile, “This was where I first met her” he paused and looked at a wall. “This was also the place where I proposed to her”. Alpha looked around where he stood. In front of him lay a white washed wall with lush green creepers on it. The creepers had tiny flowers sprinkled on it in myriad of colors ranging from pure white to crimson red to deep violet. To one side was an unkept barren land with wild bushes and one tamarind tree. On the other side was an abandoned building whose hollow interiors were visible because its windows were broken. “This place makes me so quiet. When I met her, words felt the rankest of superfluities. When we met, we just knew what we had to say. So we didn’t say it and just sat, looking into each other eyes”, said Omega seating himself on the parapet built in front of the building looking at Alpha. Alpha was still trying to imbibe the atmosphere of the place. “Well, it is ironic. When we both came here, neither she nor I spoke. But the only time we did speak, it was only to tell her I loved her no more”. Listening to this, Alpha turned his gaze down to Omega who was looking at the mud on his shoe. Alpha slid his hand into his jacket. “No, let’s not rush. That has its time.” Omega called out pointing at the hand in the jacket. Alpha, who was picking out his water bottle, slid it back into his jacket before he could even bring it out. Alpha said in his low voice, “My sister was dear to me. She told me she loved you. After I got to know you, I felt she would be happy with you. I was willing to give her to you. But you changed your mind. But instead of telling her you…” “Stop it there. I had my reasons to do what I did. Yes I made mistakes. But that was no reason for her to leave me. I loved her. I still do. She left me then,” said Omega sharply. He had lost his smile and he stood up. Alpha looked at him, straight in the eye. He then turned his gaze to the building on his right. He looked at the emptiness inside. “So that’s where it is going to happen?” asked Omega looking into the building. “Do you think so?” asked Alpha. Omega put on his smile again and turned to the building. Alpha followed him as he jumped into a window and got into the building. They stood inside a large empty shell of brown and black metal. The glasses of almost all the windows were shattered. The metal roof was high above, looming
around them like a brown rusted sky. As they walked, their footsteps echoed deeply in the hollow space around them. “Your sister tried to get back to me even when I did not want her to. I was deep in my own problems then. It was bad time for me. I had no time for her. I told her that. But she was reluctant to listen,” Omega proclaimed. “She was sad. Very Sad. That is all I know,” said Alpha walking along. Omega stopped walking and turned back to look around. “So where are we doing it?” “Doing what?” asked Alpha. Omega heaved a heavy breath. “Stop this nonsense. I know how you want it with your appreciation for aesthetics. You want it all like a great story. You would have built some intricate scheme to make this all look like a movie,” he said looking around. “Hmmm…” said Alpha startled by the response and looked around too. It slowly turned amusing. He randomly picked an object at a distance. He fixed his gaze at a metal staircase at a dark corner that led to a platform, about ten feet above the dusty floor they were on. Omega said “Just like your sister” and stared at the platform above. “I knew you like things to be dramatic.” Omega moved towards the staircase and Alpha followed thinking about what he said. As they walked he asked Omega casually “Do you like playing along my scheme?” Omega did not reply. They reached the staircase and a period of looming silence prevailed. Omega walked up the staircase and said “Your sister no longer loved me when we met the last time. She was angry. I had not seen her that way ever.” Alpha listened carefully. “I had to talk to her as I wanted to get back my things. In the blur of love I legally registered some of my possessions onto her name. I needed them back to settle the problems I was going through. But she did not listen,” said Omega as they reached the platform. The two stood on the dusty metal platform. “When did you talk?” asked Alpha blankly. He did not know about this event. “Oh, you know when,” said Omega. “When?” asked Alpha. His hand was shaking now. His heart steadily picked up speed. He sensed something dubious. Omega sighed a deep breath and said, “When we met at the bridge” twitching his shoulders. “You were at the bridge?” asked Alpha, now his eardrums moved with the pulse of his heart and his neck grew stiff. “Of course I was at the bridge,” said Omega and quickly said blurted “I do not want to speak about that. Do you really want to hear what you already know?” Omega said chuckling. Alpha held himself with grit and shot out all his anguish in a moment. He said, “Yes”. The statement hit Omega like dynamite. His smile collapsed and his eyes lay dead gazing into a void. After sometime, Alpha spoke, breaking the silence. “My sister committed suicide. She jumped off the bridge into the river. What else do you know?” Omega stayed quiet. Alpha moved swiftly towards Omega and said holding his collar “Why did she kill herself?” Omega struggled in Alpha’s hold. “Why would she? Don’t act like a fool. She never wanted to kill herself,” Omega spoke ferociously. Alpha left him and receded. He asked lowly, “What happened at the bridge?” A fulfilled wind blew through the hollow interiors raising the dust. Omega turned
and moved towards the railing of the platform’s end. “What happened at the bridge?” Alpha burst out screaming. Omega impulsively broke out, “What do you want? She started yelling at me and I got terribly pissed and I pushed her off and Lord, why do ask me to tell you the same thing again and again and…” Omega continued his blabber. A caustic pain rose through Alpha’s chest. All he heard was the pounding of his heart. His mind flashed images of his dear sister. But in front of him lay the man who he realized killed her. The wind picked up pace, and more dust was raised into the air. Omega stared at the floor underneath and said “I have hated myself for all that I did.” Minutes of strained silence prevailed. Suddenly Omega heard Alpha chuckle from behind him. Omega raised his head. “Ignorance is sometimes intolerable. Its makes one desperate to educate the other.” Omega looked straight contemplating , listening to the voice behind him in utter surprise. “You didn’t know I pushed her,” said Omega stuttering. Omega turned at once. As he flung his shoulder to the other side, a hand pushed his other shoulder with force and he lost his stance. He slipped on the dusty floor and just as his body sank, the railing pressed his waist, pivoting his body down the platform. Just as his body moved to throw itself ten feet down, with the fulcrum at the railing, two hands held either sides of his collar, keeping him a hold away from death. He squealed like a cat. Alpha, holding Omega’s collar, said, “Shh… don’t shout. I had no plan to do anything, but you got me here and ensured it happened. I came to tell you it was not your fault. I thought she ended herself.” Omega looked at Alpha’s jacket. “And you thought I had a gun in my jacket. It’s a stupid bottle,” Alpha screamed shuddering the hanging body. Omega shut his eyes in fear. Alpha tightened the clasp of the collar. His arms held the falling body steadily. “Open your eyes”. Omega opened them. “Now you tell me. You got me to do all this.” Alpha whispered. He took a deep breath and his body relaxed. The dusty wind steadily halted. He continued to speak. “I didn’t know you killed her. You told me. I was only an intermediary, an excuse. You got me to this place. You wanted to die. You gave me the reason. You got yourself to the edge, in every sense of the word. You ensured all this happens.” He looked into Omega’s eyes. Omega’s eyes expressed their natural state of surrender. Words were too crude for those moments, so they both smiled. Alpha looked down the platform towards the floor deep down. Alpha, holding Omega, took a sniff, looked back and asked him, “Now, tell me, what should I do? This is your story.”
ECLIPSE
PART I
Vishwanath sat down on his bamboo chair and opened the day’s newspaper. He moved to support his back and held the newspaper in front. He struggled to read the words but the headlines were clear enough. “Dakshayini, where are my reading glasses?” he shouted out to his wife. “Hmm… they were on that book you were reading last night”, she shouted out from the kitchen. “Here, take mine” came his mother Lakshmi, who offered her spectacles. It was a known fact in their relative circles that Lakshmi had incredible eyesight, while all her five siblings had almost gone blind by that age of seventy or so. “Thanks Amma”, said Vishwanath wearing the glasses. He glanced through the front page, opened the newspaper and a sudden loud bang. Dakshayini as usual dropped a steel utensil to the floor. “Amma please…” moaned her twelve year old son, Bharath. Bharath was intently performing his morning prayers, which was a rare scene in children of his age, or generally anybody in an urban to semi-‐urban livelihood. “I cant do anything okay. You sit in the middle of the house and expect silence?” said Dakshayini forcefully. Bharath ignored the comment and continued chanting his mantra softly.
Vishwanath continued reading the paper, in spite of the ruckus in the house. He was use to it for sure. Bharath started reciting a hymn loudly and Vishwanath softly murmured it with him from behind his newspaper. Lakshmi sat on a stool to the side reading a red colored book of a great saint. Bharath was concluding his prayers that Vishwanath shouted out, ”Dakshayini, milk for me”. Bharath shook his head in helplessness. Too much noise, he thought, Can’t the milk wait until I complete. “I’ll give you,” said Lakshmi getting up and rushing to the kitchen. Bharath got up, completing his prayer, and said “You all love noise know” as he poured the water he used for the prayers into the tulsi plant at the doorstep. Vishwanath smiled behind his newspaper and picked up a pen from the stand beside him to do the crossword of the day. Dakshayini came it to the living room rubbing her damp hands to her saree, “Kishore has been admitted to the ICU. The cancer has spread to the lungs. Doctors are doubtful whether he can survive”. Vishwanath put his paper down and blankly nodded staring at Bharath who was drying his hair with a pink towel.
Vishwanath had his bath and got ready to go to work. He put his laptop into his bag and walked out of the house. “Tell Dakshayini I will not come for lunch, Amma, and tell Bharath to finish his homework”, he told his mother leaving. Bharath finished his math homework with a calculator. Just when he wanted to watch TV, the power went off. He had no idea what he could do now. So he blankly sat beside his room’s window staring, thinking. He had some big questions to be answered. He tried remembering what he thought about earlier.
One question that tormented him was whether all the prayer that he did in the morning had a meaning. It was not whether there was God or not. The question was whether that big man up there affected him. Everybody around him said he
did. When asked how they would simply smirk in helplessness. It was disgusting for him. All that he saw as esoteric and religious around him, made no rational sense. But the prayer in the morning was nice. It gave him a sense of satisfaction, and surely a good image in relative circles. But Truth is not limited to the nice and the liked. He needed an answer. He was desperate.
His thoughts continuously tried crystallizing to direct onto an answer, but all crystallization was rough, never concrete. As he tried to do so, suddenly “Bharath, are you hungry?” shouted his mother. “Not hungry” he shouted back. He got up from his chair and walked into the living room in which sat Lakshmi with the Panchangam or the book that tells the movement of planets on an hourly basis for that year. He sat beside her and asked “Lakshmi (he called her by name, but not out of disrespect), does the Panchangam tell the future?”
Lakshmi removed her spectacles and said closing the book, “Not exactly Bharath, but if you know how to interpret it, you can tell the trend of events.” “Trend meaning?” asked Bharath. “See, I may say you will win today. But I can’t say whether you will win a cricket match or a chess match. It only tells the nature and intensity of the event, not the exact event.” Bharath kind of understood that. “What is the reason?” he asked sharpening his gaze at her. “Bharath, these things, like astrology, prayer, ritual, do not follow the logic we both understand with our minds. This needs logic of a different nature. We don’t know that logic, and I don’t think any of us can. So lets just derive the benefit we can from tool given to us and not ask how they made the tool. Okay?” she answered with a scholarly attitude. This explanation did not fit into Bharath’s way of thinking. He was more or less use to such misfits now. His questions were directed at how the science works, and not how one could churn benefit out of it. But he still trusted what she said. It all still was not mumbo-‐jumbo. It did work in his mind.
“So how is my day going to be?” he asked leaning forward towards the book. Lakshmi gave a bright smile and said, “Let’s see”. She opened the book, opened a folded sheet in it with Bharath’s and his parent’s horoscopes. She put the page in front of her eyes in one hand and ran her hand around the chart in the book on her lap. Lakshmi saw for sometime and suddenly her expression started changing. “What’s today’s date?” she asked without lifting her head. Bharath ran to the newspaper, checked and called it out to her. She nodded and continued checking. “Hmmmm…” she said removing her spectacles. “Today is a lunar eclipse, and the eclipse is occurring in your star. So if you are exposed to the eclipse, it may or may not have effects on you, but it will have tremendous effect on you father, Bharath. Such a positioning of planets would have adverse affects on your father. If the eclipse affects you, it will indirectly affect him, as the aspects in your chart that symbolize your father are not in a good shape today”. She lifted her head helplessly looking at his face. She turned the pages of the book to check her notes at the back of the book. She abruptly continued. “And the effect may be so big, my son, he may die. This is the worst positioning I have seen in years. This has clear indications of a father’s death in your chart. You being exposed to the lunar eclipse will make it certain. This is no joke Bharath. Take it seriously.”
Lakshmi was almost shivering now. Bharath had never seen her like this before. He was drawn by her intensity, and the certainty she spoke with showed all she said was no joke. It was serious business. Surely serious as it dealt with one’s life. His father’s life. Her son’s life.
It was time for the sun to set. The sky started turning bright white from blue. It was time for Bharath’s evening prayers. Bharath had a shower and sat for his prayers. The sky had got closer to grey now. His grandmother also sat beside him as he continued with the prayers. He looked at the sky from the window beside. As he faced north, the sunrays passed through window onto his head at this time. But the sky turned dark grey and the sun was nowhere to be seen. As he proceeded chanting his hymns, there was a sudden shuddering of thunder. His grandmother got up suddenly. He thought it was to remove the clothes hung outside to dry. He continued but his mind did not remain stable. It kept flying away with thoughts. He could not figure out the reason. Another thunder and it started raining. It was dark now. The house was gloomy as the lights were off. He ardently tried to complete his prayers without letting his mind fly away in thoughts but it was randomly jumping around like a drunken monkey that stepped on fire. The rain became violent now. Bharath finished his prayers. He got up and went outside to pour water into the plants. Just before he could step out of the house, something pulled him back.
He figured out what was tinkering in his mind. His father’s death. If he got out of the house, his father would be dead. This got him afraid. But the remedy was simple. Don’t go out of the house. Then why was the mind worried? He didn’t know. Bharath left his thoughts there and walked back, without stepping out of the house.
He sat on a stool and waited for his mind to settle down. Just then a cry was heard from the street. “Bharath!” shouted somebody. He looked up startled. “It’s me, Nanna, Help!” Bharath got up with start. He went up till the door and stood on his toes to see till the end of the road. “Bharath!” cried out his father who was down in the water till his shoulders. “I’m in the manhole, help!” Bharath was scared now. What should he do? He has to go get his father out of the manhole. Or else, his father’s going to fall into the manhole and die. Simple problem. Adrenaline rushed through body. But his heart felt heavy. Something was not in place. The hormone over took his thought and he lifted his leg to put it out of the house.
The same old force pulled him back. His heart suddenly lightened. He got the dilemma. His father is in the manhole. If he does not go to save him, death is certain. The rain was torrential now. His father again screamed. But if he did step, what his grandmother told will happen. Due to him being exposed to the ongoing lunar eclipse, his father will be affected, and thus he will die. If he remains at home, father’s dead for obvious reasons. If he goes out, his father’s dead for supernatural reasons. This hit him hard. And from this conflict emerged
a cold-‐hearted person, inside the house, who would put ideals to a test, at the cost of a life. He would step out to save his father. If he did, and did save his father’s life, all that occult stuff he was surrounded by at home was bullshit. It was a test to the question he was haunted by. The truth in all religion and related practices that worked with the same assumption of a God Almighty influencing us all was at the crossroads.
A determined Bharath put his foot outside his house and ran out. His heart was beating louder than the chatter of raindrops around him. He ran straight to his father barefoot and his clothes were already soaked. He reached his father who was bleeding near his chin, pulled him up and dragged him home. He reached the doorstep and his father was lying there motionless. Bharath, remembering his first-‐aid, gave Vishwanath a hard kick in his diaphragm, and with a start he woke up, coughing, wounded, but fully alive.
Lakshmi walks to the door murmuring, “Bharath, Kishore uncle just passed away. He had a major…” and she saw Vishwanath on the doorstep. Before Bharath knew it, she called Dakshayini, she called the neighbors, they called the doctor, and in twenty minutes Vishwanath lay on his bamboo chair, with a bandaged chin and twenty others around him. Bharath stood at the side, involved with himself, in spite of all the chaos around him. He got an answer. His father was very much alive. What his grandmother told did not come true. All that was esoteric had lost its credibility. His face developed a slight smile. This event concluded a number of things: his prayer was a waste of time, Panchangam was a waste of paper, and astrology was just a play of words and who the hell needed a God who didn’t matter. It was crystal clear. What he saw, what could be tested, comprehended, understood is what exists. Anything else is not real. Thus all that was supra mundane was not true. Maybe in parts it was. But the basic assumptions of religion did not fit into this framework. Thus, religion was flawed. Finally, why create an entity called God that does not matter to any of us in any true sense. Just an inconsequential assumption.
Just as he stopped thinking, as he got his mind set right, he looked up to see his mother beside Vishwanath and suddenly caught onto what she said: “Thank God, it was only a chin that is bruised”.
A wave of disinterest and disgust ran through Bharath. He shouted out “Why do you get that god fellow in the middle?”
PART II
It was the same old bamboo chair with Vishwanath in it. Only that Vishwanath
was twenty years older and beside him sat Dakshayini, holding his hand. Lakshmi was no more and about ten people slowly moved around the house. Vishwanath was seriously ill and at an age of about seventy, the body cannot take that much pain. And that caused complications, and caused ulcers in his stomach. They later burst and he was hospitalized. The doctors said at that age they cannot do anything and left it. So they brought Vishwanath back home and everybody was just waiting for him to pass away.
A thirty-‐two year old Bharath sat beside the door staring outside. A neighbor came jogging in and gave a piece of sweet to Dakshayini, telling her to give it to Vishwanath, as it was prasad from a temple. Seeing this, Bharath breathed out heavily in helplessness. If god really was sensible, why would he send sweet that would worsen the condition in his stomach, he thought. Bharath got up and walked into the living room. “Bharath” moaned Vishwanath, struggling to speak loudly. Bharath at once moved to him and sat on a stool beside him.
Vishwanath took a heavy breath, clasped Bharath’s hands in his and said, “There is something I have hidden from you all your life Bharath. Only your mother and I know this. Nobody else knows this. There is no point telling this to you now, but you needed to know the truth.” A tear trickled down Vishwanath’s cheek. “What is it Nanna?” asked Bharath humbly. Dakshayini clasped Vishwanath’s shoulder and asked, “Does he need to know?” softly. Vishwanath closed his eyes shut and nodded.
He swallowed some air and said, ”You are not our son, Bharath. You are the son of my friend who had an illegitimate child with a woman he loved. He gave that boy to us as your mother and I did not have children for a long time. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you this earlier. Forgive me for this. I’m sorry Bharath”. Vishwanath clasped Bharath’s hand harder and tightened his closed eyes revealing the tears filled in his eyes. “Why are you so disturbed, Nanna? You are more a father to me than anybody else could have been. It doesn’t matter who gave birth to me Nanna, it was you who guided me and protected me all my life. You are my father.” Said Bharath. It did not disturb Bharath a bit. Vishwanath had given him everything but a sperm. But curiosity caught up in his mind. “Who is my fath…sorry… biological father then?” Vishwanath whispered the name.
Suddenly, Bharath froze. He was shocked. The problem was not that somebody else was his father; it was what that person implicated. All that he strongly believed throughout his life was not making sense now. All that he vehemently opposed was now in a new light. It all seemed to be real. All his thoughts against the esoteric were shattered by just that one revelation. That which he thought as a lie had passed the Test. The Test he performed twenty years back. The results were exactly as his grandmother predicted. Bharath’s eyes turned keen and a single tear fell right down his face. He stared blankly at the wall in front. A flood had just cleared all the assumptions he made about the universe. His ideals had just crumbled into a void. From those ruins emerged a new, strikingly different understanding of the universe. He got up and stood at the doorstep of his house, staring out, looking, and thinking, with a crystallized understanding. No answer, but a path had opened. All he knew now was that he was Kishore’s son.
CRUMBLING KRUMMER
“My limbs were weak, my throat was dry, and my eye ached as I struggled to complete the code. The screen in front was so bright that my eyes were turning red. At four in the morning, I was the only one working in my room. But hard work does pay off, my friend. I completed the code. And I call it Krummer…” continued David Krum bragging about the new chess program he made. He must have told it to at least twenty people, and by this time he knew the lines by heart, knew how a person would react when he told a particular sentence and he did this with matching movements of his spectacles on and off his eyes, and scholarly motion of his hands. In no time the whole university knew about Krummer. It was an incredible program and all the people who tried to win against it, lost miserably. David himself could never win against it. He was ready to literally sell it to the Computer Science department. So with utter confidence and slight drunkenness he proclaimed on the notice board of the university: “The one who wins against Krummer will get all the money I receive when I sell it to the Computer Science Department, but if one looses, he will have to pay the same amount the department pays me.” And the money David spoke of was no small amount. It was equivalent to a tuition waver. Nobody rose to meet his challenge for about a week and then three came up. One was a former chess champion who lost a very close game. The second was the head of the Mathematics Department. She lost a miserably. The third was somebody nobody heard of in the university. Some knew his first name was Mark. Nobody knew his second. He heard of the Krummer challenge (that’s what everybody called it) when he was in the restroom and two others were talking about it. He knew what was on stake but he really didn’t care. Mark thought he was too clever for university. He attended classes just to keep his attendance at a bare minimum. He completed assignments the day he got them, mailed it to the professor, with comments on the assignment, and went out bike riding at night. He always got a B at his examinations, and was happy with that. He knew what he wanted in life and worked for that. The rest of time was spent with a bottle of coke and his motorbike. David heard Mark’s challenge and told him to get ready for the game in a week at seven in the morning. Time passed like a good night’s sleep and it was the day for the game. Mark was told to come to the red bench (reserved for senior citizens) in the park behind the library. Mark got up at seven o’clock, went to the bathroom, brushed his teeth and washed his face. He came out of his room and walked down the aisle to the hostel door. He came out of the hostel, wearing his blue-‐striped pajamas and light blue t-‐shirt. Barefoot, he walked on the cold stone footpath. With the morning’s small chill embracing his body, he stretched and yawned. He jogged lightly to his destination and reached the park. He could see a group of about fifty people on the other side of the park. He jogged till there, and as he reached there
he heard people whispering several questions asking essentially the same two things, why he didn’t come on time and whether he prepared for the challenge. Mark smiled brightly without uttering a word, as he did not do both. He came late and unprepared. But in what sense was he unprepared he thought, as he walked to the red bench on which David was seated with a laptop on his lap. Mark was unprepared in the sense that he played his last game of chess about a year back. But surely he did have strategy. A strategy no one could have perceived. As he seated himself on the seat and viewed the swarm of people coming closer around him, he thought through his strategy. David smiling gave Mark, who too was smiling, the laptop with a virtual chessboard on it. David sat back as if he were watching a movie. David gestured to Mark that he could start playing. Mark shrugged, cracked his knuckles and played his first move. Suddenly a couple of people around cracked into laughter. He moved the pawn in front of the right rook one step forward. This is the classic example for a bad chess opener. After computer played a move, he moved the same pawn he moved one step forward. Another foolish move. Move after move, he played foolish moves. David Krum’s smile turned larger with every move, but Krummer was in turmoil. Krummer was built to play against the best of moves. But not the worst. It didn’t understand what Mark was doing and with every other bad move, it steadily lost track of the game. It was never built to understand the worst move. Mark turned Krummer’s greatest strength into its weakness. And after about twenty minutes it gave up, its code could no more understand Mark’s stupidity. An unusual pop-‐up came. David’s extremely wide smile suddenly fell blank. The crowd had turning heads. Mark sat back in the way David sat back earlier. A girl just behind Mark tweeted “Mark wins against Krummer!”
That… ...off of the staircase and just as he reached his hand to the door nob, the shrill rumble of the daily machinery sighed out. The power was out. He rolled the nob with his sweaty hands and flung the door forward. He stepped into his house and pushed the door behind his back. It closed by disturbing the silence boldly for a moment. He approached his bed, dropped his bag by it and breathed out deeply. As he breathed the brisk cold air, he looked around. He seated himself softly on the bed. The dark room only had white beams of streetlight streaking through the room, giving the room just enough illumination to distinguish things. The bed sheet warped by the press of his bottom. He was not finding him anywhere around. Just then a slight rumble of a plastic container emerged into the air. He looked right at the direction of the sound. He found himself staring at the vague image of a closed bathroom door. A strained silence prevailed, which was only broken by the slight sound of footsteps approaching the bathroom door. “You there?” he called out. The silence continued without a sign of loosening up. He leaned toward the door, just in case he could perceive anything else. The silence relaxed for just a moment, felt by the most attentive of moments. He twitched his shoulder to lift his hand to knock, that a voice inside called out “Yah… I’m here.” He dropped his hand in conclusion and turned his back to the bathroom door. “What are you doing in there?” he asked moving toward his bag. A moment of uneasy quiet prevailed. “The door is stuck.” He went into a wry laughter. “How did you manage that?” he asked with a glee smile on his face, crouching by his bag on the floor. He searched for the slider of his zip in the dark. After finally finding the slider he realized there was no answer to his question. “Why aren’t you talking?” he called out unzipping the bag. “I’m not feeling good” was heard after a perceived moment of hesitation. “What happened now?” he asked. He waited for the answer, as he got accustomed to the delay. He picked out his laptop from the bag and placed it on the warped bed sheet. There was no sign of an answer now. He looked up sternly to the bathroom door and as he walked up to it he said, “What is wrong?” louder than normal. Instantly there was a reply. “I’m unwell. Just attending to my self”. “Cold or something?” he asked observing the different texture the voice had taken to. “Yah”, after the usual momentary delay. He got unto the bed and clutched his laptop. Holding the laptop in mid-‐air, he pushed himself back to the back of his bed. His bottom pulled the bed sheet back, removing it out of the fold it was tucked into. As he switched on his laptop, he bent back to the bag to grab the charger. He connected the chord to the laptop and felt for the plug as he looked through his books. As he ran his fingers in the dark along the chord, he reached the end
connected to the laptop. In frustration, he ran his fingers in the opposite direction and finally reached the plug. He held it and pushed it into the socket. Just under the socket on the ground was a bright white light. The light shone directly upwards aiming at him. He reached out to it and unturned it. It was a phone. He brought it close to him and saw that a video was being recorded. He instinctively stopped the video recording and went to see the media files to watch the video. “Your phone was on the ground,” he shouted. “Hmmm…” He played the video but in front of him lay the image of only the roof obstructed in the frame by only the side of the bed. As he paid attention to the video to spot any changes, a silence settled. In the looming quiet he heard soft sounds from the mobile. It was the audio of the video. He tried increasing the volume, but it was at its maximum. He looked around for a moment and then bent toward the side to reach out to the inside of his bag. He hunted for his earphones and finally picked them out. A gushing sound of water was heard from the bathroom. “Your fine now?” he called out. “Kind of” He plugged the jack of the earphones, lodged them into his ears and tried listening. He heard unclear murmurs but the voices were clearly distinct. Two different voices. “Your complete conversation is recorded on your phone. Whom are you talking to?” he shouted casually. He continued listening a in a moment, as he heard, he grew stiff. A sudden shudder of a hollow plastic cup hitting tiled ground was heard from the bathroom. The occasional silence regained its place. He looked into a void. “Whom were you talking to?” he asked again plainly. No answer came out. With a moment a hesitation he said louder, “Did that fellow come home?” dislodging his earphones. There was silence and silence only. He looked straight into the semi-‐dark looking blankly at the silhouettes emerging as he stared. He breathed deeply and asked sternly “Did you call that fellow home?” There was a slow shivering of leaves heard. He waited for a reply but none came. He knew there would not be a reply. “That fellow tried to bash you up in the morning. You know the reason. That fellow simply apologizes and you both shake hands. And in no time you both party at home. You know I hate this,” he roared. He wasn’t expecting an answer. He respected the fact there wasn’t a counter explanation. Just then he remembered something strange. As he stared into the lessening darkness, he called out “You said the door was stuck”. A slight sound of a crawling door bolt was followed by “Yah…it is”. He shook his head in denial and continued working on his laptop. As he worked he looked around in the light of the laptop screen for a book he needed. He lifted the laptop with his left hand and looked around his lap if there was anything. His
book was in his bag. He sighed in frustration and sagged his bottom to his right pulling the bed sheet with his movement towards his bag by the bed. He held his laptop in his left hand and threw his right one down the bed. He moved it to and fro until it reached his bag in the dark. He grappled for the opening and his bag tilted and it stumbled away a little. He hummed a cartoonish tune of despair and stretched his hand toward the bag into its opening. The laptop was lifted right above his head now. He sagged his back to the edge of the bed to reach out to the book that he figured was in the depths of the bag in the dark. He looked into the dark room, only indulging in the hazy sensation of touch. The heavy laptop was now tilting his upheld hand towards the right, straining his shoulder. He pushed himself a moment longer and finally grasped the book. He just wished it were the right book. He lifted his hand in the bag into the little space in it, off a firm ground. And in no time did his elbow twitch to gain support and his body tumbled down the bed to balance. His laptop with his hand flung like an arc and the weight of it made him to leave the laptop. As a final instinctive hope, his left hand held onto the loose bed sheet, which got pulled out like the flowing beauty of the night. In utter silence his right shoulder thud the ground, giving a moment of hatching pain in the middle of his ribs. His laptop clung to ground facing the bed on the old carpet floor. His eyes were shut all through and all he felt was the hard ground and the bundled up bed sheet over him held by his hand. He released a painful breath and simultaneously opened his eyes. In front of him was the bright screen of his laptop, whose light pierced through the darkness towards the underneath of the bed. He elbowed the ground with his right hand. The smooth bed sheet ruffled down to his left and he was terrified. In front of him lay a face with wide-‐open eyes, eyes filled with relieved hope but an iota fatal fear. The white light of the laptop illuminated his face, with cloth tied up against his mouth and a bruise near his left eye. With brute force he nudged his hand into the face’s mouth and struggled to pull out rolled cloth. He finally pulled out the gobbled piece of damp cloth and it followed a deep breathe through the mouth. “You’re fine?” he asked. “Yah…” was the reply in a gasping voice. “Why didn’t you tell…or…mm mm… at least indicate you were underneath?” he asked in hushed but caring voice. The sudden struggle of limbs made him see four limbs tied to the four legs of the bed, down in the dark of the under-‐bed. Suddenly, memory struck him. “I thought you were in the bathroom but your mouth was…” he said, as he grappled to approach the bed’s foot to untie, with an inquisitive stare. After a rugged cough an answer came out. “No…that fellow is in there.” He froze. There was a sudden crackling sound of glass on ground, and it resounded in the empty space. He lifted himself with a start and pushed himself
off the carpeted floor with all his fours towards the bathroom door passing through the streaks of white streetlight in the dark room. He heard a grappling sound from the bathroom and he pushed violently against the door. It was locked. He took a few steps backward and there was a flicker of the light bulb. He rammed into the door, unhinging the bolt off the wood and flinging the door open. The power cam back and the light shone again. After a momentary dazzle of light, he saw a body ultimately slipping out of the ventilator up near the roof, whose glass panes were removed. He rushed toward it, placed his leg on the blue ceramic commode and pushed himself up to reach, jumping up high as he extended his hand to grab that…
ARTICLE 1
I've always suffered from an inferiority complex.
Not from a mundane aspect like power in a group of people or a person or a petty little thing. And I am not sad because what I am inferior to what deserves to be superior. She surely is a beauty. She is so intricate that man has always looked at her for help, both for raw material and inspiration. Material, she has lots, and best, she does not ask anything in return for what we ask. Inspiration, she has inspired the most inspirational-‐ artist, poets, musicians, and many others. But the only problem is she is covered with a cloak. A cloak I call ignorance. Our species is surely a bunch of ignorance lovers. At least most of them. We like to the leave the cloak on her (we're lazy). But a handful was daring enough to try to expose her and try to remove the dark cloak and show her true pure self. The process of removing her cloak I call science. And the beautiful maiden is Nature.
Science is simple and has a single point agenda-‐ "drive out ignorance". The rest my friend is simple. All you have to do is look.
Nature is pouring out at your feet. From the microorganisms under your feet to the Darkness of the Cosmos, all these are a part of a single entity-‐ Nature. And we are lucky she follows certain guidelines. But sometimes the guidelines are too large and govern the majestic drifts of Galaxies. And sometimes too small and govern the extremely jarred movement of electrons. And we try to uncover these guidelines and we give the method an unneeded stylish name-‐Physics.
All of nature's aspects interact with each other. All of its elements interact. Sometimes violently, while sometimes constructively. These interactions are seen and recorded into a
study called Chemistry. Now an amalgamation of these guidelines with the interactions of elements has produced a feat never before seen in the universe. The most beautiful creation Nature has made, with the most detailed processes. It has surely taken time (lots of time) but patience surely pays off. The creation was Life. With her own mysterious and still unknown reasons, Nature has given life something; something nothing else has in the universe -‐ Freedom. Freedom to live, to grow, to feel, and to make choices. And the reason and the way it came into existence with the processes it performs is what Biology is all about. It is simply the search for How & Why life came to be and What life does and Can do.
So what you suppose to do?
Get up, run out and start looking. Be curious, ask, discuss and most importantly-‐ feel the harmony of Nature and nurture it, protect it. Because it has beautifully crafted itself with the most beautiful of methods and most intricate of details. And I am sure after experiencing the magnificence she has attained and still the exquisite attention she has held for petty little things like us, it is simple why I suffer an inferiority complex from Nature.
ARTICLE 2 A 2004 Company founded in a Harvard dorm room is presently the largest billion-‐dollar company on earth. What made it click? An extremely petty weakness of man: insecurity. A constantly lingering question in our minds: "what will others think?” And Facebook gives answers to that. Its mass appeal is due to the fact that it tells you what your "friends" think about you. Nostradamus prophesied about a web, which would cover the earth by the end of the 20th century. And surely the time has come. The social networking bug has spun a web into almost all our lives and penetrates into almost every aspect of our world in whatever magnitude. Though I have spoken a little blatantly about networking sites, I will now the neutral stance and talk of two observations I have had about them. The first is a tremendous advantage, which is the rate at which information is
communicated. I am talking about spreading a piece of information to a huge population extremely fast. I am talking about words like viral marketing, which are employed by films like The Dark Knight Rises or Inception. The best example is the song we here every where these days: "Why this Kolaveri di?” A silly Tanglish song is presently racing to become the most watched YouTube video. But how did this happen? It is due to these portals like Facebook, which makes everybody into what Malcolm Gladwell in his book Tipping point calls a Connector. Connectors are people with large number of acquaintances. Gladwell wrote this book before the surge of social networking sites when only a handful of people had large number of acquaintances. But with such a website, everybody has at least a hundred people in their "friend's list" and thus makes everybody a connector. Social epidemics spread wildly in such sites as once you share information, 100 people know it, and if it is nice, all the other 100 share it with their 100 friends. I one block of sharing, 10100 got to know about that piece of information. So the first point is the advantage social networking sites give us in the spread of data in the public. The second is a much more dangerous issue we have in hand. I heard a joke in which a man claims he is on Facebook all night because he puts a textbook on his face and sleeps. But I think we are slowly nearing such a situation where we do not greet when we see each other but openly shout out wishes on Facebook statuses. We put a book on our faces leading life ignoring each other's presence. A report a few weeks a report back suggests that a large proportion of divorces are occurring due to people being suspicious of what their spouse does on networking sites. The problem is can be stated in a much more clear form: sites that should be opening our worlds are slowly weakening our interactions with human beings. We are slowly entering an age where we have digital self and respond only to that. A recent Hindi film "Mujhse Fraaandship Karoge?" is a film about to people who fall in love on a social networking site and each of them discovers that who they fell in love with actually is not as good looking and as they claim to be on the website. The virtual self they created is the picture the world see of them. This can be extremely dangerous as the intrinsic behaviors of human beings and the details of their relationships are slowly lost. The beauty of a human interaction is killed and we end up icing in a small burrow with extremely minimal information about a huge number of people. So the second and an extremely dangerous situation we are heading to, is the adoption of a virtual self of a social networking site, which will destroy the joy of a natural inter-‐personal interaction. Akshar 7/2011
Occult Deciphered
Prologue William Strauss stood in front of one man with a gun pointing at the former. Strauss, charged with murder, was on the execution ground. The full moon light illumined both the men's faces and a dozen men a few feet away were looking on the execution. "What has he been up to?” one of the onlookers asked another "He believes he has some supernatural powers, he thinks he is some Messiah. Claimed the murder was a sacrifice to make God come down to earth." The onlookers stared waiting and a man asked Strauss if he had any last wishes. Strauss replied, "Something terrible awaits you men, great peril in a spark of fire, but the Lords will always bow down to Him one day, which is soon to come. I, the messenger, do not wait for death in your hands as it is written only in His. And remember, great peril lies in a spark of fire." The man received his nod and he positioned his finger on the trigger. He added weight on the trigger, ounce on ounce, it reached the breaking point and just a moment before the bullet left the barrel, Strauss shouted "Now" and the Gunman was ablaze with terrible flames feeding on his bloody flesh. Couple of onlookers fainted and everyone was awestruck by what happened seconds earlier and they found Strauss had disappeared into thin air. I David Letterman looked out side his window, staring at the fast moving cars and trucks from his room on the 14th floor. Retired as a Sergeant from the U.S. Navy, he studied Psychology and Martial Arts in his Bachelor Studies at Oxford and Forensic Sciences in his Masters at Harvard. He was never interested in research but the only reasons for him being drawn to such subjects were his interest in investigation. His interest in crime stories and their solutions came as a young boy when he read stories of Agatha Christie & Arthur Canon Doyle. He was now professionally a detective but he even earned money by giving tuitions to children in sciences. He had no thirst for splendid wealth and wanted a simple but comfortable life. He walked away from the window and went into the kitchen and made some Coffee for himself and came out and sat on this couch. He was sipping the coffee, watching random shows on his Television that his phone started to ring. He picked it up and he heard a lady's voice. "Mr. Fredrick wants you in his office in an hour sir"; she said and hung up the phone. David thought for a minute whether he had to go and then slowly got up and left. II Tom Sterling, a voracious reader, was reading a book when he got a text from an
unknown number: "Thou will reach Him". Sterling brushed it off thinking of it as one of the Personality Empowerment programs by the Local Churches. Sterling's flat was in a building with no walls but only glass panes that people could have a complete view of Central Park for their homes. He heard a sudden banging on his wooden door. He opened the door and no one was there. Sterling sat back on his couch. He kept reading the book and suddenly in front of him laid William Strauss. "Very well then, it's time for some revenge -‐ Movimento,” said William. Sterling's couch flung back, hit the glass panes and fell down onto the ground with the cracked glass from 144 feet. III Fredrick was an important officer in NYPD, but David did not know his exact rank but he was quiet a senior officer. David reached Fredrick's office and while he was entering the building Fredrick was leaving. "Fred", David called out. "Come with me, I have to talk to you” said Fred walking hurriedly to his Land Rover. David and Fred got in. Fred started driving and said "Remember Strauss, the madman who killed a fifteen year old kid last week, he escaped from the execution grounds and used his 'powers' and burnt down the executioner. An hour back Tom Sterling, head of Sterling Industries, was found dead. He fell from his flat on the 15th floor onto the road. Strauss left a message that he did it and that there was more to come. Forensics say his body contains no evidence of contact with any person for about 10 hours before his death and he only thing he touched minutes before his death was a cell phone and the book found with his body on the road. This man is bloody driving me nuts". The two men reached the crime scene. The road was blocked and the outline of the body was on the ground as the body was removed earlier. David looked up and he saw a tall building with a flawless sheet of glass but a single obstruction due to a patch of broken and cracked glass. "Is that his House?" asked David. "Yup" answered Fredrick. They both went up to the Sterling's flat. The flat was partially empty, as Sterling had just shifted into that house a week back. The two searched the whole house for any clues but everything seemed normal. David started examining the floor. He suddenly called out "Hey Fred, Take a look at this." Fred came and they saw two parallel lines of scratches engraved in the wooden flooring. They started it the middle of the room and went up till the shattered wall edge. "Could be the couch was dragged. The base could have scratched the ground and made these lines." said David. "No fingerprints on the couch man" replied Fredrick in denial. He looked at his watch and he saw that the seconds needle was stuck. It kept vibrating in its position and occasionally moved forwards or backwards. He asked Fred the time and it was fifteen past six. He had to hurry, he was getting
late for his tuition class. IV David was teaching a 14-‐year-‐old kid about Magnetism. "Magnetic fields are the regions magnets have their affect,” said David "The earth has its own field, everything in the field is attracted toward the North or South Pole of earth and that is how Compasses work. High magnetic fields can spoil devices like computers, television or even watches like mine now………." and David suddenly paused. He stood up with a start and told the kid his class was up. The partially asleep child got up and went out. David gave a call to Fred and told him to come to Sterling's Flat. V Fred entered the flat and saw David continuously searching for something. "Why did you call me?" asked Fred. "I figured it out, the couch flung out due to a magnet somewhere. This Mag Field detector is roaring with signals but I'm not able to locate the source,” said David. Fred understood nothing. David slowly bent towards the ground and a small nickel coin fell on the floor slipping out of his pocket. The coin moved a little forward and suddenly took an instant turn to a side and accelerated towards a point and stopped suddenly there. David took the field detector close to the coin and the field was unbelievably high and the signals were literally screaming. David immediately ran out of the flat, took the staircase to the lower floor and rang the bell of another flat. Fred followed and came beside him and asked, "What's wrong?” "I need to get into this Flat now, right above this Flat is Sterling's." said David. He rang the bell twice, then another time and out of irritation, Fred kicked the door and it flung open. David smiled and in front of them laid a feat of engineering. Two parallel rails on the roof holding a large Nickel cylinder with bare wire wrapped around it. David took a chair nearby and examined the mechanism. He pushed the cylinder and the cylinder moved along the rails. The two ends of the bare wire were connected to a switch on the wall. David pulled out a coin out of his pocket and asked Fred to turn press the switch of the mechanism. As soon as he switched it on, the coin flung into the air and got stuck onto the cylinder. "Beauty", David exclaimed. VI
It was pouring in New York and the storm showed no sign of retrieval. Alicia Harrison was continually trying for a taxi but she was not able to find one. She crossed one block and at last found one taxi parked a few feet away. She sat inside and the driver started driving. The windows were up and driver felt strange. Alicia then got a text: "Thou shall attain peace". Before she could register what it said, she looked up and she skipped a heartbeat. In front of her lay William Strauss. "Strauss, Your dead." "Am I?" "Your a Butcher?" said Alicia crying. "Aren't you? It's time we end this pitiful conversation-‐ Soffochi." Alicia was worried for a moment that it was a harmful spell but there was no affect. She smiled but suddenly exaggerating pain appeared in her chest and her vision blurred. She coughed vigorously. She saw a hand waving goodbye at her and her dead corpse fell along the back seat of the moving taxi. VII "What the hell are you up to?" asked Fred. "I'll explain,” said David " This large Cylinder is an Electromagnet. When we press the switch, it turns into a magnet. These rails allow the cylinder front and back along the roof. Now when the Magnet or the Cylinder is at the end of the rails, away from the window, right above it is Sterling's couch. Sterling's couch has a base made of Iron. When the magnet is switched on, the Magnet just a foot below attracts the Iron, across the flooring. When the magnet is moved along the rails towards the window, the Couch a feet above is attracted by it and too moves towards the magnet's position below and thus towards the window. When we move the electromagnet extremely fast, the couch above too moves towards the window very fast and even when the Electromagnet is stopped on the rails, the couch above cracks the glass and falls down due to its inertia. When Sterling was on the couch, someone was downstairs pushing this extremely strong magnet. No great magic, just simple science" said David, smiling. "Thank god you attended your science classes,” said Fredrick laughing. Fred's phone rang and he picked it up. "Shit, A corpse of a lady found in a taxi,” Fred shouted after a few seconds of conversation on the phone. VIII David and Fred reach the Taxi and in it lay a corpse of a middle-‐aged lady. "How did she die?” asked David. "No idea" said Fred. "An onlooker said two got down from the taxi and left behind the dead corpse."
Fred examined the Car and he slowly recognized a pungent small prevailing in the car. He called out to David. David came and smelt the whole car like a dog searching for food and the onlookers laughed their guts out to what David was doing. He atlas found the source-‐ the air conditioning vents. A lady came to Fred from the Forensic Department. "Forensics say the victim died of suffocation." she said. "Get me litmus paper from the Forensics" David asked the lady hurriedly. She ran and got two strips of paper-‐ one blue & one red. He took both of them and placed them in front of the A/C vents. He, Fred & the lady looked at the strips of paper closely. The Red paper stayed the same but in a few seconds, the blue papers edge slowly turned red. After a minute or so, half the strip was red, identical to the other strip of paper. The lady exclaimed, "It is acidic up there". "Clever Girl" said David. "I have no idea what is happening up here. Explain please,” Fred said desperately to David. "These litmus paper turn Blue from Red if they are in contact with anything Alkaline but turn Red from Blue if they are touching something acidic." said the lady "So we have something acidic around the vents,” said David. "Check the cooler could be releasing acidic fumes. That could have killed the victim,” said Fredrick. "And the victim's name is umm… Alicia Harrison", he continued. A man went under the car and one the Cooler. David went down and took a couple of Blue Litmus with him and put them on the inside of the cooler and the dozen of strips turned Red. David came out and dust dusting his hand, "The whole bloody cooler is acidic". The lady moved near the corpse and saw a cellphone fallen under a seat. She picked it up and checked the messages. The latest text said: "Thou shall attain peace". She showed it to Fred. "That madman did it,” said Fred showing the text on the phone to David. "We found such voodoo sentences even on Sterling's phone in his flat". David shouted, "Track the caller". "No use out of it, the two phones have been destroyed and do not exist and… you lady, who are you?" said Fred.
"Amanda Stewart, sir" said the lady. "Fred, that guy will text the other victim too. Do we have information about the other two destroyed phones?" "Yes”-‐answered Amanda. "Get to know where they war bought" ordered David. Amanda went running to a caravan. "David, if Strauss too was in the car, he too was exposed to the acidic fumes. He couldn't have worn a mask or else the lady would never get in. How could Strauss survive?" asked Fredrick. "Umm……… I don't know,” replied David. Amanda came rushing and said, "The two phones were bought by the two different men in two different shops, and both are not related in any way possible." "Give a call to one the contacts,” said Fred. Amanda dialed the number and gave it to Fredrick. Fredrick kept waiting for the man to pick up the phone and at last he did: "Hello" said a shrill voice. "Hello sir, we are calling from NYPD and we wanted to enquire about a cellphone you bought three weeks back at store two blocks away from your house." "Oh yes, I lost that phone. Went to get some groceries and lost it at the router while I was billing." "When did this happen sir?” "Last Week" "Thank you sir" David said, "bet this is the same story with the other guy" and it was. Amanda said "If both of them lost their phone in the same grocery store on the same day, we should check their CCTV Tapes." IX Amanda, David & Fred left to the grocery store. They entered the store and went to the manager of the store. The manager, a dark & huge man with a bloated
voice, said, " How can I help you people?" "We need to look at your CCTV Tapes,” said David. "Sorry sir, but their confidential" said the man nodding his head, side to side. "Please sir, its an issue of security" said Fred "Sorry" he said again nodding. Amanda got frustrated and pulled out her gun pointing it at the manager's head. "You show us the tapes or I pull the trigger" The manager said with a cracking and shivering voice, “We can't say no to a lady right?” The three men in the room were awestruck seeing Amanda Stewart's response. The manager took the trio to a dark room. The room was filled with cartons of CD's and Floppy's with one small 1970's Television set in the middle and five chairs. They ran through the tapes with people continuously moving on the screen and in the they saw, there were three items stolen from the shop without billing and the manager tried to hide his face when such a thin happened. Fred kept sniggering looking at the kinds of people but David & Amanda were continuously looking at the screen searching for any cellphone burglary. After ten minutes of investigating the Tapes they caught it they found a young kid pickpocketing a man's cellphone while the latter was at the counter. In the next five minutes they found two such burglaries by the same young kid with different people as victims. Fred slowly got interested in the process after looking at the kid's face. It was extremely familiar. It was a boy's face. He had seen it earlier. He was continually struggling to remember and thence got it. It was the boy who was killed by Strauss a week back. "David, its the same guy Strauss killed last week." shouted out Fred. "We have to go and meet his parents,” said Amanda. X Amanda got out of the car waiting for Fred & David to get down. The three went up to a small house and David rang the bell. A middle-‐aged woman came out. "We're from the Police ma'am and we are here to talk about your son."
She took the three inside and seated them in the hall while she called her husband. "Sir, we just wanted to know whether your son had any affiliation to William Strauss?" asked Fred. "No, why would a man like his own murderer?” answered the husband. "Sorry sir, but it looks like your son was close to Strauss before his death". "Yes, he was" said a voice from the background. It was the voice of the kid's brother, Thomas. "What?" said the wife. "Dan was close to Strauss for about 2-‐3 weeks before he died. Dan used to him in his house two streets away." said Thomas "Take us to his house" said David getting up. XI Amanda, Fred & David waited outside the Strauss' house for 30 seconds that Fred broke the lock and went into the house out of frustration. All of them searched for some clues on what Strauss was going to do next. Fred entered the basement of the house. After a little observation, it was clear it was a laboratory. He called David and they two searched the explored the basement while Amanda was upstairs in the house. David kept looking and he found designs of the mechanism he saw in the flat below Sterling's. The designs were so intricately designed that it felt like Strauss was a Genius. While David was busy understanding the designs and prototypes, Fredrick was getting a familiar odor. He followed it and his guesses were right. It was the smell of the acid in the taxi. The source of the smell was from a small flask labeled: Hydrofluoric acid (HF). "Hey David, this man used Hydrofluoric acid in the taxi cooler" said Fredrick. David did not respond. He kept looking at a design made by Strauss. It was a gun, which could deceive even the best ammunition expert. The most intricate of machines David had seen, it was an engineering marvel. "We need this guy in our military research centers man" said David to Fred and the latter sniggered. Just then Amanda came running down into the basement and said, “I found the other victim's number, it was there in Strauss’ diary". "Track the number immediately" cried Fred.
They came out of the house. The three were waiting in the car for conformation about number's location. Amanda got a call and she said, "Five blocks away, fast". Fred started the car and accelerated. They were there in three minutes. The three got down and searched but there was no a trace of Strauss or anything strange. XII John Hathaway was waiting for his car to come. He stood on the pavement and kept waiting. After about ten minutes he got tired standing and went and sat a bench a few feet away. Beside him was a man reading the newspaper. Once that man put down the newspaper, John gasped heavily. "Strauss" he said. "Yes, that's me,” said Strauss. "Heard you escaped your execution. Very Impressive Indeed." "Sure it is" "Why are you here? You cannot try any of your pagan shit around here" "Not going to, simply going to shoot you" said Strauss and removed a gun. Just then Fredrick spotted the gun and ran there to the bench. Strauss looked at Fredrick running towards him. He got up with a start, grabbed John's collar and they both started running. David & Amanda followed Fred. The five ran and reached a deserted dead end. Strauss left John's collar. Strauss charged onto Fred and both of them had a fierce duel with punches and kicks and blocks. Fred at last punched Strauss in the stomach and he fell groveling on the ground. The gun in his hand fell onto the ground and Fred picked in up. He aimed it at Strauss and shouted, "You move an inch and I'll pull the trigger". Strauss happily got up said, "Try me". Strauss took out another gun and shot Amanda. She died instantly David's heart skipped a beat. David was shocked by Strauss' reaction. Such courage, he had never seen. He slowly looked at Fred's gun and he understood why he was not scared about his death. "Fred don't shoot,” shouted David. "Have you gone nuts? He just killed that damn girl,” cried Fred furiously gripping his extremely hard.
Strauss got upend aimed the gun not Fredrick. "Fredrick, do not shoot" "That guy will bloody kill me" Strauss aimed precisely onto Fred's Torso. "Fred, Shoot yourself on the forehead" "What?" "Fred, Trust me, Shoot yourself on the forehead" Strauss came a step closer. Fred heard every single heartbeat like a drumbeat. He did not know what to do. He clasped the gun hard. He heard David shouting in the background but nothing got registered. Fred was I turmoil. Then he did it. Fred took a leap of faith. He aimed the gun on his temple and with a sudden push of the finger on the trigger, a gunshot was heard and Fred shut his eyes tightly. Fred opened his eyes slowly and he was assured he was alive. In front of him laid the dead body of William Strauss. XIII Fredrick & David were in the car driving to David's apartment with mixed emotions. They had lost friend they made just an hour ago. They had killed a murderer who escaped a week back. John Hathaway was sent safely back home. On the way, David read the personal diary of Strauss and he understood why Strauss was committing such crimes. David explained that the gun Fred was using to shoot Strauss minutes before a remarkable. It was gun designed to kill the shooter. David said he saw its design in Strauss' house and readily recognized it when he saw it in Fred's hand due to its bulky appearance. It was a gun where bullets did not come out of the barrel but out of the back of the gun. When it is shot, it kills the shooter. Fred and David came unto the house and they sat down and David started telling them about why William Strauss indulged in such practices. "Fred's parents held a cotton mill which was illegally taken over by Sterling Industries. Tom Sterling, John Hathaway & Alicia Harrison, headed Sterling
Industries. This takeover of the mill put Strauss' family on the roads and both the parents died out of poverty. Strauss had a terrible grudge against the three who destroyed his family and wanted to destroy them. Strauss was put in orphanage and he grew to be a Teacher of Sciences in High School. There he met Dan. Dan was quiet a notorious yet gullible kid. He easily fell in for Strauss, and he instructed Dan to steal three cellphones and intern he would give him five grand. After stealing the phones, one day Dan comes to Strauss and says he is going to the police to complain about what Strauss is doing. He gets furious and kills Dan. He then arranges the dead body and the room in a way that it looks like a sacrifice, you know, with dim lighting of candles and pagan stars and symbols. He thought the occult could make him escape, but the police didn't care a damn. They arrested him. Now we know the rest of the story from he execution ground to his death." explained David. "But we do not know two things in this tale. First, how did the executioner burn by himself with Strauss disappearance from the execution grounds? And Second, how did Strauss survive the acidic fumes in the taxi?" asked Fredrick "The second has been solved. Strauss took Calcium Gluconate, which is the anti-‐dote. Post-‐mortem reports showed large intakes of Calcium Gluconate pills in the last few days". "But the burning and disappearance during the execution?" "No Idea". Epilogue A week later David was filling gas into his car and some of it fell onto the ground. He moved the car in front and he looked back and the place where he spilt Gasoline was aflame. He stopped the car and went to put off the flame. He looked around why it happened and he figured out that the sparks of the cigarette of the driver who came after him fell on the liquid when he dusted the cigarette outside his window, above the liquid and set it on fire. He understood what happened there and suddenly, like stroke of enlightenment, he understood what happened on the execution fields. He immediately gave a call to Fredrick. "Fred, mail me the post-‐mortem reports of the burnt executioner now, immediately" said David. David went home, printed out the reports and analyzed them and spoke to some other people for one hour and without a word and then said "Bingo". He gave a call to Fredrick. "The executioner did not die due to any higher power. His reports say his skin had traces of Jet Fuel. His bathing soap was injected with Jet Fuel. Strauss could have bribed the janitor to do this. The doctors in the jail tested this a few days back when one of the officers said the soap smelled bad.
The executioner's body was covered with this ultra-‐flammable liquid when he came to the execution grounds and the slight spark of the gun before the bullet is fired near the chest is enough to ignite the liquid on the skin of body." "My God, William Strauss should be the Minister of Defense, but umm………. how did he disappear?" asked Fred. "A burning man a few feet away from you is an adequate distraction for anybody to escape", said David. “So, he used high school science and called it the occult,” said Fred. “Yup” answered David “The Occult is simply Science not Understood & Deciphered”.
By, Akshar
31/8/11 5:12 p.m.
RELATIVITY Once there was a boy who was little too curious he always dreamt of making a car who's speed was Super-luminous He worked all day, and he slept all night; and finally made a car, that goes faster than the speed of light. He got in the car, But with him got in three more entities; Distance sat beside him,
Mass and Time behind. He started moving, and in a couple of minutes, he reached half the speed of light, and he knew he was crossing speed limits. Distance patted him, and pointed to the outside, He looked to his right, and he saw a strange sight. Everything he saw, was three-fourth its size, A sleeping six footer, looked around a 5 in size. He looked at the distance calculator, and it said he travelled 1 million miles, but his friend gives a call and says, "You just travelled 0.87 million miles" He looked at his stopwatch, and saw he spent an hour on deck, but Time tells him, "around m70 minutes is what you sat on deck" He looked out, and saw the days passed by faster, he literally saw the flowers bloom, as time outside the car was faster. He then started accelerating, but his speed was changing slowly every time, he went from 1.7 to 1.8 million m/s in a second, but from 1.8 to 1.9 took much longer. He looked back and saw Mass had suddenly bloated, he was 1 tonne first, now he was 1.15 The car he sat on first weighed 30 times a tonne But now it became was 34.64 and the couldn't run
He was too tired so he got down and thought for a while and figured it out with a frown: "Light's speed is the universe's speed limit, Nature won't allow me to reach it "If I move close to the speed of light, I would suffer a terrible fright "1 meter outside becomes shorter from my perspective so even though I felt I moved a lot i moved less to be less productive "Time is slow in the fast car and much fast outside the car I felt a short time in the car but my friend calculated a larger time of me in the car. "Speed is distance by time, distance decreases and time increases thus high speeds never are as big as we think they are "coz my momentum is always constant, i became heavier, as i went faster so i could not go faster. "Even if you did reach light speed, your mass would be infinite So you would simply blast" "Nature makes the trio behind me its speed breakers, forget crossing the speed of light, As in the end you would become firecrackers."
IMAGINED REALITY
"I never believed in ghosts, but I was haunted by one almost all my life" he thought. He was going through incredible pain. His body wriggled around like a dying dog. But he knew, he wasn't going to die. A few thousand volts passing through a human being’s body could affect the nervous system but nothing else. The two diodes fitted into his body, one into his left heel, and the other dropped into his mouth burnt the tender tissues around them. With his limbs tied up with thick leather straps he could not shake around with ease. His shoulders could not bear the contractions of muscles around. He felt like piranhas were eating away the flesh under his skin. His eyes were closed but it was not black behind his eyelids but deep orange due to the blindingly bright light right above his face. His bones felt as if they were being stretched from both ends. His body was completely paralyzed, but worse, his mind was completely conscious to experience every ounce of pain and suffering inflicted on the body. With no way to express the pain he was suffering, he let out his anguish as a single teardrop trickling down his cheek. He contended himself, as all of this would result in a life, closer to reality. A few hours ago… "Why does he call us at one in the morning?" asked William Herschel. “You left free the criminal I caught at 9 pm,” answered David Strauss. David Strauss Jn. was a tall man of slim figure. David was grown under the shadow of his influential father, and this continuously pinched him deep within-‐ everybody called him the son of David Strauss Sr. But the only person who did not point back to his lavish and influential background was William Herschel. Because of this, he very easily built acquaintance with David and as he continuously entertained David’s ego, the two stayed friends. David and William entered the room of their chief. Both knew that each other’s hearts were beating incredibly fast as they were sure they would be fired that early morning. People generally never spoke to William. William never interacted with anybody but David and David generally did all the talking. " You have been incredibly reckless today David. We have been trying to catch that thief for the last six months and you let him go" said their chief. Both the men were preparing themselves for the next sentence. "Nothing can be done now, so I am setting you on another assignment. Sir Rutherford psychiatric center on Notting Island has the assignment ready for you and are not willing to tell it to the department and want you to know it directly. So don’t waste my time. Off you go, your ship will be ready at 10-‐tomorrow morning. " David's heart lightened. As he was about to leave the office, he stepped back and asked the chief " Sir, who else is on the project?" "You alone" "Can I take William with me sir" he asked pleading. The chief gave a vague expression and he simply nodded looking straight at David. The next morning, David, and with him William got into the ship. David had a very
wrong feeling about the whole context. Nature looked supportive: standing on the deck, the dark blue waters were slowly turning turbulent. The clouds a little away were deep grey in color and were slowly approaching. As his thoughts were slowly collecting and as he understood what was wrong, William patted him on his back and broke his thought process. The two got down from the ship and before them reached the dark clouds. Holding their caps and coats, William and David sat in a car and rode to the psychiatric center. He walked down the pathway and knocked on a huge wooden door. As the door opened, it made a screeching noise of metal-‐over-‐metal and there was an old man in white apron with deep red bloodstains on it. “How can I help you, sir?” asked the man. William hesitantly took a back step holding David’s shoulder. “I am David Strauss, sir, from the London Police,” said David extending his hand. “Ah yes… we were just expecting you”. The man took out a large syringe and stabbed into the extended arm. He forcibly pushed the piston and a wave of pain rushed through David’s vein with him falling flat on the floor. David got up with a blurred vision, tied to a bed with thick leather straps. He was incredibly drained and could not even speak. The man who welcomed him at the doorstep said “I know you have questions, son, but wait until you listen” As he cleaned bloodstains off his instruments, he said, “You suffer from schizophrenia, son. In layman’s terms, you cannot tell the difference between what is reality and what is in your mind. You have started imagining people, son. Next comes paralysis. I got to know about you through your chief, son. He said you were talking about a colleague who was never on their records”. David vigorously shook his head with tightly closed eyes, as he could not speak. He knew what the man was talking about. “Your chief could not afford this. You lost a criminal last night and almost two, last month. This interaction with an imagination is no different from that of reality for you, son. Actually, it is as true as are looking at me right” David stalled his shaking and tears rolled down his cheek as he accepted the truth with difficulty. “Your upbringing continuously lowered you self-‐esteem due to your father and your mind needed a let go. You needed something that would simply praise you and not your father. So your mind made an imaginary character, son. We need to treat you with this son. It is going to be painful. I’m Sorry.” ended the man smiling. David with opened his mouth and blew a tiring gush of air from his mouth and the old man figured out it was “Who?” The old man opened a file on a table beside and he read out the name. It was what David expected. It was painful but he had to accept it. It was not that that man was not there or was dead. It was worse, he had never been. It was William Herschel. A few hours later…
THE ETERNAL CYCLE
In the vast mouth of the sky, Mighty Chak gargling water; Spits out to the basin of the earth, To give it a watery wet cover. The drops are racing, Against one another; But all put together, Can destroy a tall tower. They come so fast, That they unevenly split; So far not realizing, They are just Chak’s spit. They collide against the barren ground, Splashing away the loose mud; But that one drop has the capability, To infuse life into a lifeless bud. Children are dancing in glee, But the cattle are about to flee; And the graceful peacock, Is swaying under the elegant tree. But then, clouds move out, And the sun resumes his shine; All he brings is happiness, He knows it is no crime. From the trees, the dew drops drip down, Slowly, steadily, still getting slower; But a beam of light streaks through it, To give us crystal clear color. Seven of them merge, To project pure white; Now split by a drizzle, To give an exquisite sight. A painting in the sky, Amidst the canvas of clouds; Shadows the dominating sun, Creating a smile from a frown. But the wind sweeps away, Blowing everything up and down; And there goes the rainbow, To turn smiles back to frowns. The sun dominates again, From days to weeks around; It makes everything cry in pain, Happiness is lost, nowhere can it be found.
Poor helpless little drops, While nourishing the bud; Are pulled up by the fiery fierce sun, From the barren ground, and loose mud. They rise higher and higher, Become light as air; Back to their heavenly prison, A goblet at Chak’s chair. The water tries not to enter, The mighty rain god’s mouth; They all try to escape, Attempting to get out. But the wise lord knew, That the world would perish, die; If he did sympathize, With the drops pitiful cry. All the water went into the mouth, Of the giant god Chak; And whirl pooled as he gargled, The drops only crave to escape the dark. THE DROPS COULD DO NOTHING, EVEN AFTER THEIR MIGHTY TACKLE; BUT LATER DID THEY REALIZE, THIS WAS NOTHING BUT, THE WATER CYCLE.
BY shiv AKSHAR CLASS VIII
March 30, 2010
THE LEARNING BRAIN My limbs were weak, my throat was dry, and my eye ached as I struggled to hack in the database of the Brain. My veins on my hands were protruding out and my eyes were as red as blood. The bright light of the screen in front of me blinded me of any thing a little darker than it. I had a huge burden on my shoulders. As I type violently, smashing the keys on the age-‐old keyboard, I remembered the days my father was building the Brain: I was about thirteen when my father, Robert Wiener, was working to build the Brain. The Brain is nothing but a replica of the Human brain. It remembers, processes, understands, interprets, executes and learns. My father, after almost a lifetime of work, built it. The Brain was licensed to run almost all systems in the United States. It controlled traffic movement, amount of electricity reach your
house, the winner of a judicial case, and in sometime it even chose our president. It was incredible. By the time I was twenty, almost all countries had their own mini-‐Brains and United Nations set up a Brain the controlled all the other mini-‐Brains-‐ The Brain. Everybody preferred to call it as the Brain and the rest as mini-‐Brains. The Brain solved problems between countries and slowly the concept of division of the world into countries faded away and the world became into one unified landmass, planet earth. All of earth was like utopia. Everybody earned 245.89 corlots a day (corlots was the universal currency introduced on earth. 1 corlot was about 54 dollars). All of the population was having a party. Only a group of hundred enthusiasts maintained all the brains and they were paid hundred corlots more. Everybody loved the brain, and I became famous as the son of the creator of the Brain. Nobody on earth needed to work. The Brain ran everything. It slowly exploited resources and distributed it equally amongst all. Before my father passed away, he wrote a small document a placed it in his safety locker. The safety locker was programed to open on a specific date and the day it opened my father told me to read it and follow its instructions. He passed away a month later. After a short period of sadness I continued enjoying my life like the rest. Then, on 23rd of June, six years later, the safety locker opened. I opened the file present in it and pulled out the document. It was hand written (something unusual nowadays) and read so: “Dear Son, This is a warning. Mankind is going to be in grave danger. The Brain is programmed to grow intelligent with the day. It learns. It is not perfect, but it soon will be. And I had not thought of it earlier but I soon figured out (may be in a couple of weeks from this day), it no more needs human beings to survive. It can design its own machines to maintain itself. It does not need the crew of hundred maintaining it. Humans are a waste of resources for it. And it will dispose you all like junk. This has to stop. The Brain is a danger I had not foreseen. I am feeling ashamed of myself that I built it. I am sorry. Now you have to stop it. The procedure to hack into the brain is provided behind this sheet. You will be thinking, how you should kill it. Remember, it is self-‐protective. You cannot physically break it. You have to hack into it from your computer and the only way to kill it is to confuse it. I did not build it with the logic of understanding the Liar’s Paradox. Use this as your weapon. Love, You Father.” I turned to the back of the page and read the instruction. I sat on my computer and started trying to hack into the mainframe of the Brain. It was not exactly as my father told me. They improved the algorithm a little bit, but I found my way around. After a couple of hours of strenuous typing and thinking, I had finally hacked into the Brain. I was time to confuse the Brain. I recollected the liar’s paradox:
If I say, “I am a liar” that means every thing I say is a lie including the statement “I am a Liar”. Thus it means it is a lie that I am a liar. That means I am honest. So starting from being a liar, logically I have deduced I am honest. That is a contradiction. The Brain cannot understand such contradictions and so it will overload and crash. I scrolled through the code of the Brain. It was one of the most elegant codes I had seen. I was searching for the command “All assertions true” which in lay man’s terms means “Everything I say is true”. I found the line and did the simple thing that was needed: I changed the “true” to “false”. This meant all it said was false. The brain is a Liar. It was the liar’s paradox. I held my breath and with all courage, pressed enter. Suddenly the whole place became dark. Everybody started howling. I knew it happened, the Brain was dead. In all the darkness around me, I knew a new era started, the End of the Age of Machine and the Dawn of the Era of Man.
HOW HAVE ADVANCES IN SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY CHANGED
OUR PERSPECTIVES ABOUT LIFE? What is a perspective? Oxford dictionary calls it “A particular attitude toward or way of regarding something or a point of view”. The way we experience and interact with events or objects is directly dictated by the perspective we have on it. Perspectives on objects or sounds or places or even memories are highly personal. When I hear the word “apple” what I is remember the company. That is my perspective. But my grandmother would remember an apple pie. That is her perspective on the word “apple”. Perspectives on things evolve with time and situations the person is present in. I use to think that the two thousand rupees worth Parker pen my father gifted me on my 10th birthday was the most important thing I possessed. I had a perspective that the pen was very precious. But now I don’t find it any better than a forty-‐rupee pen I find in any stationary shop. My perspective of the pen from being an incredibly precious thing had evolved into something that is not so precious. All the things we associate with have a certain perspective associated with them. “Everyone sees drama from his own perspective” said Jean-‐Marie Le Pen. Macbeth for me is a straightforward tragedy but my father sees it as story of philosophy. “Everything we see is a perspective, not the truth.” (Marcus Aurelius). Most of our knowledge is blinded due to
perspectives as we associate things with emotions and if we associate things with unpleasant emotions, even the best of music will be noise for us. If we were raised with no knowledge of a devise called a calculator and cubed 345.756 on paper, when approached with a calculator, I will think of it as the best device man ever created. But if I grew up in a place where I see all kinds of calculators all around me, I would never think of it as being something earth-‐shatteringly important. Now we can clearly see the perspectives we develop are highly affected by our upbringing and environment. The question I am trying to answer is whether science and technology has affected our lives and if it has, how has it affected our lives. Being a modern civilization, we are interacting with Science and technology. Before we move on, we have to understand the difference between Science and Technology. Science is simply a rule the universe follows and Technology is the possible way of exploiting the rule to use it for human wellbeing. Both of these have an incredible effect on any human being as they satisfy two human instincts: Learning of any kind makes man joyful. If it does not, there is something wrong with the man or the way knowledge is imparted. Thus, any scientific development makes anybody naturally excited as they have got to know something. The second instinct that is satisfied by Technology is the want for a human to become better. “Technology does not drive change -‐ it is change.” It allows man to be in a better state today than he was yesterday. It satisfies a deep-‐longing Charles Darwin called “Evolution”. That is the reason you see hoards of people running to an Apple Store when a new iPad or iPhone is released as they think that with that device, there life will be more exciting than it was until then. Thus the history of Human Evolution is nothing but the history of Technological Changes in the world. Science and Technology are so ingrained in our DNA that they drastically affect us. And thus our Perspectives change with changes in the sphere of the two. We may not have observed it, as it is vividly seen only after decades of time have passed by. If I asked my friends about the change in perspective they had due to changes in Science or Technology, they will not give a very insightful answer as fifteen or sixteen years in ten thousand years of Human development is like the size of a spec of dust compared to the size of a city. If we have to enumerate the changes in Science and Technology seen in the last century or so, we can clearly see the evolution of Perspective in
society. A Radical Shift in the way we understand the universe occurred with the publishing of the “Theory of Special Relativity” in 1905. A deduction of the theory accounts to the legendary formula E=mc2 which essentially tells that mass can be converted to tremendously high amount of energy and vice versa. The fact that mass and energy are one and the same thing was a simple physical reality, but this struck a cord in the minds of philosophers and this was used as an evidence to prove the beauty of being human. “1 gram of the human body can run the city of Chicago for two days” said Swami Yogananda and continued to tell the beauty of being human. So here we see the perspective of a physicist on the mass-‐energy equivalence theorem that which is simply about something that can enable the generation of nuclear energy, while in the perspective of a spiritual master, it is a way of telling people why it is so great to be human. Einstein himself brought a change in the perspectives Germans had about Jews. “The Jew has always been a people with definite racial characteristics and never a religion” said Adolf Hitler in his anti-‐Jew propaganda and turned the German society against them. But Einstein, who was the pride of Germany for obvious reasons, fled to America and claimed citizenship there. These events made the Germans question their racial behavior and change their perspective. A couple of decades later the first thoughts about robots in the 1920’s were about they helping in domestic work. That was the perspective every one held when they heard the word “robot”. But now it is about replication functions of the human brain and to replicate human behavior. This shift is due to advances in circuitry and figuring out algorithms that can replicate human intelligence. Fast-‐forward to 1946 and the US army built the ENIAC, a computer as big as a building to store data of all the files the US army had or to find the 10th root of pi. That was the perspective everybody held about computers for almost the next 20-‐30 years until the advent of Personal Computers which could be used by amateurs to write simple pieces of code or to store and compute household expenses. The perspective that the computer is a device used for complex mathematical and logical processes is now that of a personal device to help us do small and sundry works. Until the advent of the Internet, communication between two men in
two corners of the world was an incredibly tough task, but now we can send a message on Facebook to anyone in any part of the world in seconds. Connectivity in Rural Regions was a problem in India even ten years back but the latest census shows half of India carries a mobile phone in its pocket. This is the outcome of mass, low cost affordable mobile phone production and spread of connectivity in India. Behavioral patterns seen in different generations show how perspectives on different things have changed: My grandmother still has the protective plastic cover on her age-‐old radio as she lived in a time when a radio was a milestone in technology. I cannot even imagine myself listening to the radio, as it is obsolete in front of a television. My father is still proud of his Masters degree in Computer Applications, as he was a part of the second batch in India to get it. In his perspective it is an important achievement but now every second person has an MCA degree. That is the perspective I have about the degree. This change is due to the rapid production of computers that happened due to advancement in technology. My twenty year old cousin will check in the dictionary for the meaning of a word but I would simply “Google it up”. It is clear that changing trends in Science and Technology clearly affect almost all things in our lives. And as situations in life change the perspectives with which we look at things, they too change. Advances in Science and Technology have affected our manual labor and intellectual standards, our linguistic patterns and behavioral instincts, our engineering possibilities and social taboos, our anger control and frustration levels, and finally even our body health and lifespans. I am not trying to tackle the question whether advances in Science and Technology had a positive or negative impact on the perspectives we have about the world but to answer whether they did impact our lives or not. The only proper conclusion that I can give is this: Changes in Science and Advances in Technology is the way we experience life different.
HAPPINESS Reflect upon the following quote: “Happiness is like a butterfly, the more you chase it the more it eludes you. Once you turn your attention to other things, it comes and quietly sits on your shoulder” What is happiness? Webster’s Dictionary calls it “a state of well-‐being and contentment”. Oxford Dictionary calls it “feeling or showing pleasure or contentment”. Now both these definitions use the word “contentment”. What is contentment? Fulfillment of expectations you put for yourself and the world. So if we fulfill our expectations, we attain a state of in our body and mind of happiness. Before we plunge into the logic of the problem, we have to understand the difference between being pleasurable and being pleasant. Pleasure is highly affected by your habitat. If you’re outsides and insides are conducive, and you’re happy, its pleasure. It is conditional. It is not pure happiness. But if you are happy with yourself, irrespective of your outsides and insides, you are pleasant. It is unconditional. So the expectations we put for the world and ourselves are the only things that effect how happy we are. So lets define expectations. Expectations are essentially the way you would like yourself and the world to work. Expectations are highly affected by our upbringing and backgrounds. The standards we put up for ourselves are what we identify ourselves with. “I have to graduate from Harvard” this is what I expect from my self; slowly, I identify with that. I start thinking I am eligible to get admitted into Harvard, whether I am or not. Then, I start thinking I have to be nothing less than a Harvard graduate. This is a “character” I built for myself (with an element of it yearning to become a Harvard graduate). This is what sets the expectations I build for myself. And finally your state of happiness is affected by whether you fulfill the expectations your character has put forth (whether I get into Harvard). I expect myself to complete this article. When I complete it, I will be happy, as I have matched up to my expectations. Next I build another expectation of Kavita ma’am liking my article. What if she does not like it, I will be sad. After this I will surely put forth another expectation in my mind. So life is a continuous array of expectations, which we sequentially fulfill, and their results essentially affect our state of happiness. But what if I simply drop off my expectations. I have no expectations from the world and myself. What now? You will live in utter happiness. Till now, the button for your happiness was in the hands of the result of the day’s stock market or the reaction of your wife or your boss’s impression about you. It always ran around the expectation you put for yourself and the world that you have to make good money, your wife should love you and your boss should respect you. But what if you don’t care whether you earn money, or your wife hates you, or your boss scolds you all day long; you will simply live an ecstatic life. The world cannot affect you. “For men may come and men may go, but I go on for ever”(Alfred Lord Tennyson). It does not matter to you how the outside world is, as you have not put expectations on it. You will do what your
conscience tells you to do. It does not mean you don’t work for what you expect. You will work. But even after that, if nothing works out, you will stay unaffected. Your state of happiness is not at stake. Whether something works or does not work, it is for nature to decide. If it does well or does not do well, you will never really pay attention. Only if you expect something from it will you be affected by it. “All these activities should be performed without any expectation of result. They should be performed as a matter of duty, O son of Partha. That is my final opinion,” (Krishna in the Bhagavad Gita (18th chapter, 6th verse)) Not putting expectations on the outside world is one thing. But not expecting anything from yourself is in essence the rejection of your character. Our Character is a set of values you set for yourself and you expect yourself to act accordingly. We have to clearly understand the difference between “You” and “Your character”. “You” are the living entity distilled from all identifications and expectations. You are just what you are, no identity and nothing to live up to. Identifications and expectations forced upon “you” is your character. As you grow older you identify more with your character than yourself, as it is more convenient. “You” may not be capable of getting into Harvard but your character is crafted such that it is. Your character is essentially a glorious (Harvard Graduate) pseudo-‐self you create for yourself to generally feel happy about. But we have to face it. We are not are character. We are simply what we are transient, changeable living things. When we accept how small we are, we drop off all burdens on our shoulders (character & identity) and can walk freely on the path of life without any hassles. So, once you drop off your character, you will simply live not as a great glorious past you had or as a beautiful future that you will be, but as a humble living thing in this immense cosmos in the present. Happiness is a natural state of being. We were never born sad. We become sad. So once we shrug off all expectations, personal and societal, you will be simply happy as nothing can make you sad. Now how is having expectations related to chasing happiness. In essence, they are actually the same. The way we chase happiness is by continuously hoping our expectations are fulfilled. Our characters put up expectations and the process of trying to fulfill the expectation is the same as chasing happiness. We put up expectations as we think that is the only way we can remain happy. Expectations are the mundane manifestations of the deep want for happiness are life longs for. All we have to do is to work with every ounce of energy we have to get what we want, but if we don’t get it, we should simply walk away without any difficulty, as we have no expectation on the result. “Things won are done, joy's soul lies in the doing”(William Shakespeare). An argument may arise against what I just said. What is wrong in someone keeping himself happy by expecting results? Why should he drop-‐off expectations, which in practice is going against your character (and thus is terribly difficult)? And the reason is simple. Because everyday is not a Sunday. There is no guarantee in nature that what you expect happens. But you will surely be happy when you do not expect anything from anything, including yourself.
This is what the first quote tells us: As long as we do things and wish to be happy due to the results they produce, we chase happiness in the excuse of fulfilling expectations, you will stay happy temporarily, keeping you pleasurable (“Happiness is like a butterfly, the more you chase it, the more it eludes you”). Once you stop having expectations on your work and simply do stuff for the fun of it, happiness will just happen (“Once you turn your attention to other things, it comes and quietly sits on your shoulder”). Once you stop running around, stay satisfied with all you have as a humbled being, happiness would blossom by itself, as you have nothing that “triggers” your happiness, no expectations on yourself or the world to be fulfilled. You are unconditionally happy.
FEAR I
He was terribly scared. It was dark in the cell and the only source of light were the gleaming rays of golden light which were penetrating the bars of the cell and were falling on Carl Togo’s feet from a light bulb on the upper floor. He kept looking at his feet but all he could see were red marks of week’s old whippings and clots of ruptures of fights with other prisoners. As he kept whiling away his time an officer came near his room and shouted in a foreign language. Togo did not respond. The officer entered and lifted his baton and just a moment before the baton touched his flesh and penetrated to his flesh and broke the bones of his fore-‐arm, he gets up and sees in front of him a dark grey wall with a framed portrait of Adolf Hitler and a Red smeared on the its cracked glass. Nobody knew about his Past, as nobody wanted to know, except one man. Togo always feared that man. He gets up and completes his chores and leaves to his workplace. It was a heavy machinery production unit, which produced Industrial Steel. He had relatively a less physical job but it was by all means a rugged job-‐ continuous supervision on people needs tremendous patience that Togo lacked. He was always on his toes and kept moving around the 7-‐acre factory. It took him about 3 hours to get to know what the condition of machines in the factory, but more than data on machines, it was hard for Togo to understand people. He lacked the most basic of communication skills. And this prevented him from associations with people. He had but one friend, more a shadow than a friend; his name was John Cusack or “Jock”. He was no gifted man with special abilities but his “friendship” with Togo gave him enough professional leverage. He was on a solid idea of living of Togo’s name and Togo had no issues with it as he did have to an extra sweat to help Jock. One night after almost all the workmen left the plant, Jock came up to Togo and asked him if he would come with him for a walk. They went walking until Togo’s
house and Togo went home leaving Jock to walk alone. After a couple of hours Jock comes to Togo’s home with a deep bruise on the leg. Togo takes him into his bedroom and aids his wound with some anti-‐septic and clothe. Jock rested on the bed and his glance fell on the portrait hung affront. His heart skipped a beat and he immediately questioned, “Were you involved in the war?” An unusual silence prevailed in the room. “Were you involved in the war, Togo?” “Yes, I was” “What happened Carl?” asked Jock sternly. “It was the winter of 1943. I worked for the Nazi forces as I was of German origin. I had no affiliation to Germany or its politics, or even world politics. I was stationed in France and I fell in love with a women their. We lived together for about a year. One day after I came back from work from my camp and saw my house floor drenched with the blood of my lady. I collapsed onto my knees and held the women’s body in my hands weeping. I looked up onto a portrait hung in front of me and I, in a moment understood everything. That woman in my hands was Jew and that was the entire mistake she made. I went up to Hitler’s portrait and flung my hand on to the glass and cracked it. I smeared the woman’s blood in anger on the glass. This is that portrait and every day I look at I am reminded how one man’s personal agenda murdered almost a complete race on Earth. After I left my home after the incident, I went to my camp and in desperation and anger shot a person. Unfortunately, the person I shot was an Allied soldier who had just entered the camp. Just a few minutes away were Allied troops marching to invade the camp. The troops saw me shoot him and arrested me. I was sent to jail and that phase of my life was the worst. I had almost a broken bone every week but I everyday was accused of crimes I had just then turned against. I was there in Britain in Jail for two years and then escaped and fled to America. The Police department has been searching for me for the last seven years. I changed my identity, and ever since, I have lived here, in this room, working in that factory. Nobody knows about the crime I had done and my crime was not documented like several others in those years. But one onlooker in the Allies saw me clearly and he is the only one who knows who I am and he is who I fear. If he did not look at me, I would have nothing to fear.”
II
“You free?” asked a man knocking on the door. “Sure, come in,” answered Bill Jones.
“Got work for you, got to source some material for are weapon production” said the man who entered the room. “Sure, Chief” said Bill and the man left. Bill stared out of the window and kept remembering his days in the Allied forces. The war had ended on his side but a great distress remained in his memory, his brother’s death. In front of him, a Nazi soldier shot him dead and he went running to hi and pinned down the murder and arrested him. He knew that the murderer was in jail and he later escaped but he vividly remembered his face. Fear of his fate and destiny slowly clouded his thoughts, but work was the only sunshine to clear his fear and anger. Bill got up and looked at his watch-‐ twenty past three-‐ and rushed down to his secretary and told her to make a list of all the Iron & Steel plants in and around New York. After an hour of analysis on the list he finalized on Alfred Clark & Co. Bill leaves to that factory and goes to the director there. He tells the reason he was here and the director assigns a person to show him the place. As that person enters the room images of his dead brother jump up to his mind and he goes and holds that man’s collar with force. “Who are you?” asked Bill. “Who are you?” asked Togo. “Were you involved in the war?” “No” Bill left his collar and Togo told Bill to follow him. After an hour, he Togo completed telling Bill what he needed to know and Bill walked to the director and asked him that the Police Department will need a representative in their office from the factories side. The director thought for some time and assigned Togo. Togo accepted.
III
Togo knew that the person he faced today knew him during the war, but did not understand why he was so aggressive.
He got up and he left for the police station. His new workplace was a larger building next to the police station, which took care of all the administrative functions of the Police in the state. He climbed up the stairs. He went up to Bill’s room and Bill greeted him.
IV
Bill kept staring at Togo and he kept growing suspicious about him. Bill slowly recollected on detail of the incident in the French camp-‐it was raining then and that man slipped on a puddle of water and fell on a large rock and he was wounded deeply near his stomach. Such a deep wound must have been stitched and suddenly Bill knew how to confirm if Togo was the man who killed his brother. If Togo had a scar on his stomach he is the murderer. Weeks passed by and Bill’s suspicion against Togo slowly reduced.
V
Togo kept staying away from Bill’s eyes, as he knew that Bill was there when he was in the camp as he continuously asked him if he was stationed in France and if he saw some one dead in his life or if he loved his brothers. But the reason for such a strong suspicion was not clear. He walked out of his room and he saw it was raining outside. He stood near the window and saw a tree get uprooted by the wind and suddenly fell on Bills room. Togo went running their and he saw Bills leg under a branch. He lifted the branch up and saw a deep bruise on Bill’s leg. The first aid kit was too far from the place so he removed his shirt and tied it to Bill’s leg for temporary stoppage of blood flow.
VI
Bill kept moaning in pain and he was sure that Togo could not have killed his brother, as he was too considerate about people around him. But Togo removed his shirt and Bill was shocked to see the scar on his abdomen and his opinions about Togo disappeared and incredible rage filled Bill.
VII
Bill was taken to the hospital and Togo sat beside him. Bill was asleep but Togo kept getting negative vibes when he sat next to him. Togo looked at Bill’s leg and he knew that Bill had no grudge against him. Suddenly, looking at Bill’s leg, Togo remembered Jock. He wanted to meet him. He went to the office downstairs and gave him a call Jock said he would be there in ten minutes.
VIII Bill slowly opened his eyes and he saw Togo in front, talking to another person. He could not see Togo clearly, but recognized him due to his body structure. Bill’s eyes burn furiously and he reaches for his gun. He had no idea about his action’s consequences. He aimed at Togo stomach as his head could not move any higher as he was tired, to aim his head. One man fell to the floor but Bill’s vision prevented him from recognizing who died.
IX
Togo was shocked. As Jock and he spoke to each other the former’s pen fell down. As he bent down to pick it up, he heard a bullet shot and Jock fell to the floor with blood oozing out of his neck. Togo looked up and saw Bill with a gun. People crowded around, none doing anything. After an hour Police officers came asked people about what happened and took Bill into arrest and Jock’s body to the cemetery.
X
Togo looked out his window in his home and knew that he had nothing else to worry about as the only proof of his involvement in the war was behind bars and the only person who knew his past was in a place from he cannot tell anybody about the crime his “friend” had indulged in.
Carl Togo was there as a free person with nothing to carry from the past filled with no guilt or fear but only a sour memory of two of his associates’ dead corpses-‐ one he needed & the other who needed him-‐ and he was ready to face the world, without any FEAR.
By Akshar; August 5, 2011.
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