Comfortably Numb

"this right here is a song u just need to sit back to, relax and let the solo and mary-j take over."

Best thing ever said by some not-famous anonymous internet dude.

The Great Obama Mishap

In southern rural Nepal the bride's family give the groom some dowry so that he would take proper care of their daughter. The Nobel Prizes Committee seem to have learnt that lesson giving President Barack Obama the Nobel Peace Prize "for his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples." President Obama would go on to say that he was "humbled and deeply surprised" and that it was not an individual award but an affirmation of American leadership and not a recognition but an incentive for better world future. What a load of crap.

One can understand the intention here. The world economy is in shambles, America is involved in two wars and new countries with nuclear aimbitions are rising everyday. Poverty is rising, global warming is causing more and more environmental havoc and many countries are still abusing there citizens. Never has the world needed a leader who can guide them through a dire time, never has the world needed more hope and Mr. Obama no doubt is the hope. But, (and there is a but), is that all that is necessary for winning a Nobel peace prize, giving the world hope and nothing else?

It has been eight months since President Obama took to the White House with that historic speech where he promised anything and everything. Since then what has he done for international peace? Uhm, nothing, absolutely nothing. In his speech in Cairo he reprimanded the Israeli administration for building new settlements and urged the Islamic world for better cooperation with America. 5 months thereon, the Israelis are still building new settlements, the Abbas administration and Hamas are still fighting each other and furthermore Iran has declared a secret nuclear enrichment site. Iraq seems at peace but that was due to Bush administration and Mr. Obama has promised more in Afghanistan. Though he has promised to remove the new missile defence system from Poland and Czech Republic he is planning to install new warships in the Arabic sea. And there has been no substantial progress in the climate debate. In short Mr. Obama has done nothing so far which deserves him a kudos from the world community.

One thing people easily forget is that America elected Obama and that Obama is America's president and not the world's president. America elected him to serve its people first, world peace is only secondary. He would do whatever is in the best interest of America. I mean he is the same man who declared he would send his troops inside Pakistan to stop terrorist attacks in America if necessary.

Then comes the question, if not Obama then who else? How about Morgan Changvirai who saved Zimbabwe from total failure to some extent helped Zimbabweans from the torturous rule of Robert Mugabe? What an example it would set to other African leaders trying to prove their worth to the world, or may be te IMF which has managed to save so many world economies from the verge of collapse from the recent economic crisis, or may be even the famous U2 singer Bono who has been actively working to relieve the third world debt and alleviating Aids from Africa and surely if I can name this many, the Nobel committee can name many more. Besides, giving award to Mr. Obama though increases pressure on him to deliver peace (which is good by the way) it by no way changes other nations' approach to America or their own people. Since peace is a bilateral if not a multilateral one, Mr. Obama cannot do it alone so why not grant Nobel peace prize to all world leaders instead.

Think about it, isn't comparing the likes of Dalai Lama, Nelson Mandela, Mother Teresa or even Muhammed Yunus with a person who is just into the nine months into his presidency and has achieved nothing so far a little absurd? There is no doubt that Mr. Obama has a great charisma and is undoubtedly a great hope for the future. If anybody can bring peace and prosperity to this world, right now it is Mr. Obama. But he has yet to do it. Surely, awards are rewards not incentives for action. And so it should be. My Univeristy cannot grant me an honors degree in my first year of study so that I can study well.

President Obama can certainly deliver on his promise of better future for all global citizens, but can the Nobel Prize committee select a better candidate for their prizes? Yes they can.

i wish i was a punk rocker

Oh I wish I was a punk rocker with flowers in my hair
In 77 and 69 revolution was in the air
I was born too late into a world that doesn't care
Oh I wish I was a punk rocker with flowers in my hair

When the head of state didn't play guitar,
Not everybody drove a car,
When music really mattered and when radio was king,
When accountants didn't have control
And the media couldn't buy your soul
And computers were still scary and we didn’t know everything


When pop-stars still remained a myth
And ignorance could still be bliss
And when God Saved the Queen she turned a whiter shade of pale
When my mom and dad were in their teens
And anarchy was still a dream
And the only way to stay in touch was a letter in the mail


When record shops were still on top
And vinyl was all that they stocked
And the super info highway was still drifting out in space
Kids were wearing hand me downs,
And playing games meant kick around
And footballers still had long hair and dirt across their face


I was born too late to a world that doesn't care
Oh I wish I was a punk rocker with flowers in my hair

Sandi Thom

Our Place

I was just going through pages when I read about saw some dude feeling sorry for the beggars in his bus. He was frustrated about the human inequality and how everyone should be getting equal opportunity. You get the drift.

Its the rule of the nature that best of the lot survives. The resources at our disposal are scarce and we have to fight to achieve them. Whoever wins survives, others just perish away. Humans too, being a part of this nature, are made that way. It is therefore, a certainty that the best of the lots, here too, are meant to be successful. That "naturally" justifies inequality.

What also is true, though, is that humans were never meant to be slaves. The only reason humans are above other animals is because they can use their environment (including other humans) for their own benefits. So a man being a slave of the other is a rather strange occuring. Previously (thousands of years ago) , a man would fight to prove his point. No wonder wars were so frequent those days. What I see now is how the world order has been able to suppress or rather pacify a man's hunger and natural desire to compete and be successful. A war is big thing now, personal fights are regarded as ugly. We have suddenly become peace loving creatures when given a chance all of us would love to kick so many asses that surround us. So why are we suppressing our anger and building this wall of frustration inside us? Why do we have pay to some garage guy and break some glasses and window panes to vent out frustration? Why can't beggars stand up for themselves and claim for their rightful opportunities? A meritocracy, though unequal in nature, provides for equal opportunity for everyone and meritocracy is the only natural way.

So what went wrong?

Well, I have always felt that humans perenially manage to discover new ways to dominate the will of others. Earlier, it used to be the hope of leadership through the uncertainities of nature, then it changed to religion, and now it is simply consumerism. The idea that comsuming is more important that any other factors of human lives and that happiness comes out of personal possession. Stupid that it may sound that is the truth. Earlier, knowledge, spirituality or even philanthropy were just among many ideas of a successful person. Now there is only one way to the successful, to be rich! The person's success quotient now is based on the money he has or trather the amount he can consume of show off. No doubt Slumdog Millionaire was such a hit, no doubt we love watching VH1 Cribs and listening to that Nickelback song.

People at top have always figured out ways to stay at top. The few that manage to reach the top from the bottom are supposed to be the glimmer of false hope that society gives to its people so they don't burst out. Through education, religion, morality, law and order and even media are just promoting the propaganda that this is how our world is supposed to be and consumerism is the key to happiness. Couple that with the glamour and romance of making it rich to the top, there we have a perfect platform for turning people into these bots who have been  conditioned to believe that success and failure and all but materialistic in nature. "The American Dream" as they call it is an perfect example. When were humans this passive? When were humans accepting their "fate and place" in their society? When was being discriminated and disregarded a normal thing? The spirit of fighting back was always there and still is. But now there is a sense of failure than optimism. The problem though is there are so many filters kept in place to check the upward flow that making it to the top is now a big thing. And even if you make it big, the values and emotions have so run out of this humans society that happiness is best expressed in movies and novels rather than a human life.

So the I-feel-sorry-for-beggar dude, stop feeling sorry for beggar. Start feeling sorry for yourself and the whole mankind.

The Purpose

Few years back I was studying about moths. The male would die after it had sex and the female would die after giving birth. 

Many have asked me and I have asked many the purpose of our lives. Some say it is love, some say it is being remembered or some say its just having fun. What I am writing here may seem ridiculous to some while outrageous to others but I personally feel that the sole purpose of the human life is to have sex. Male, to have sex and female to give birth and just die. No more. That is the way every organism is suppose to behave. Its only natural. One might say that we are humans and in the sense superior to other animals/plants and should be able to justify our lives by doing something more. But look where it has got us into! Tribes in Amazon and Australia work for only 2 days a week and rest and have fun other days. The search for answers and quests has only got us into this complex mess of "organized and comfortable" world which feels nothing but comfortable. The simple answer lies in letting go. No animal thinks what its purpose is so it just does what it is supposed to do and that, precisely is its purpose. A lion eats its supper and produces baby without ever thinking why it is doing so. That though is what it is meant to do. May be we could be a lot happier if we did just that. Just give it a thought.

Agent Anderson popularly quoted in The Matrix that we humans are not mammels. We are viruses that adapt to an environment and then destroy it completely and move on to next environment to do the same. (Dunno why this is relevant but just felt like quoting it).