The Man who Dreamt. The Man who Did

Game-Changer is not a term I use often, but nothing describes Dr. Verghese Kurien better than that.

In a nation talking about socialism but doing little to implement it, he created a co-operative movement that successfully took on the might of multinational firms. Long before it became fashionable to talk about it, he realized that true change can only start with the financial empowerment of women. He brought about a paradigm shift by taking a model that worked in a few hundred villages and replicating it across the nation.

Visionary, Leader, Manager.

The Man who Dreamt. The Man who Did.

Verghese Kurien

(November 26, 1921 – September 9, 2012 )

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The Man on the Moon

On Sunday, I took my kids to the terrace, made them hold up their tiny thumbs, shut one eye, and blot the crescent moon out. “But if the moon is so small, how did Neil Armstrong walk on the moon?”, they asked.

“Don’t things look smaller when they are far away? The moon is actually very big- it seems so small because it is so very far away.” When they had digested that, we spoke about the stars, and of how very big the Universe was.

“So big?” they asked in wonder. Yes, and we are a part of it.

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"Science has not yet mastered prophecy. We predict too much for the next year 
and yet far too little for the next 10."

Neil Armstrong

(August 5, 1930 – August 25, 2012 )

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Those precious moments

Yesterday, while getting the kids home from school, the younger one dawdled. “Come on, we’ve got to go home. Mamma has work to do”, I told him, but he refused to listen. 

“Come on, Sweetheart, let’s go home.” I was rapidly losing my temper, but a tiny voice whispered. “Let him be. Do a couple of minutes really matter so much? What if something happens to either of you tomorrow, wouldn’t you regret not spending these moments with him?”

I joined him in looking under a car. A brown cat was feeding her kittens. I’ll always treasure that shared moment.

 “Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma – which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of other’s opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.”

Steve Jobs 
(February 24, 1955- October 5, 2011)
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A drabble is a story told in exactly 100 words.

What is news?

When Amy Winehouse dies, it makes front page headlines in India. Her “career” is recounted; and the cause of her death much speculated upon. She is news, after all- alive or dead.

But when Wangari Maathai passes away, we only hear of it through the electronic media- facebook and twitter. Mention her name, and all you get are blank stares- the first African woman to receive the Nobel Peace Prize, a winner of the Right Livelihood Award, someone who worked tirelessly to make the world a better place for everyone. And she is virtually unknown.

Except to those who care!

 "When we plant trees, we plant the seeds of peace and seeds of hope."

Wangari Maathai 
(April 1, 1940- September 25, 2011)
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A drabble is a story told in exactly 100 words.

Is Unforgettable

Long before appearing at charity events to create HIV Awareness became the most desirable fashion accessory. Long before people got around to even comprehending the sheer magnitude of AIDS. Long before HIV/AIDS became the most funded healthcare intervention in the world. Long before any of that that, one person spoke out fearlessly about the disease that had claimed the life of her friend.

That woman was Liz Taylor!

I may have fallen in love with her unforgettable violet eyes and almost Rubenisque features, but it was her courage and loyalty that kept me captive. She was unforgettable. Is Unforgettable.

‎"When people say, 'She's got everything', I've got one answer - I haven't had tomorrow."

Dame Elizabeth Rosemond Taylor, DBE

(February 27, 1932 – March 23, 2011)

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A drabble is a story told in exactly 100 words.

Love means

What can you say about a twenty-five-year-old girl who died? That she was beautiful and brilliant? That she loved Mozart and Bach, the Beatles, and me? Once I asked her in what order, and she said "alphabetically". I don't know if considered me by my surname, in which case I would be there between Bach and the Beatles, or if she.......

I first read Erich Segal's 'Love Story' when I was in my

Sophomore year in college, and fell hopelessly in love with Jennifer Cavalieri and Oliver Barrett IV. I could quote huge chunks of the book, and with some effort would be able to recall most of the exchanges even now. A friend and I even had this game going - one of us would throw out a line, the other would give the next one, and we would go on till we reached the end of that section. Neither of us ever faultered, neither could find fault with the other's memory.

'The Class' was the second of his books that I read, and though I did not think it would be possible, I liked it even more than I did 'Love Story'. Doctors, Prizes, Acts of Faith - I loved everything of his that I read. For a very long period, he remained if not my favourite author, definitely one of my favourite authors.

Erich Segal passed away the day I was running a marathon. I missed the announcement of his passing, and would never have known if the friend with whom I used to have the 'Love Story' marathons hadn't written to tell me that 'a part of our shared youth' passed away. I haven't read any of his books in years, but hearing about his demise felt almost like a part of my youth being takne away from me.

Through his orbituary, I came to know things about him that I never did till then - that he was born into the Jewish faith (should have guessed that), that he was a classics scholar and literary critic, and that at one time, both the men in the race for the US Presidentship had been students of his.

Tonight, I am going to pull out a well thumbed copy of one of his books and cry myself to sleep. And one day soon, I will buy 'Oliver's Story' and 'Man, Woman and Child' - two books which I unexplicably put off reading. Perhaps I subconsciously knew there would not be too many more books, and that was my way of dragging out the pleasure.

Erich Segal

(June 16, 1937- January 17, 2010)
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I leave with perhaps my favourite exchange between Jenny and Oliver-

"Aren't you a good Catholic girl?"

"I am good, and I am a girl. Two out of three isn't bad, is it?"

Imagine

Twenty-nine years back, a random gunman (okay, we all know his name, but he was a random guy all the same) shot down one of the most popular voices of the 20th century.

Whether you love John Lennon, or hate him (and few people who have heard of him do not fall into either category), you have to admit the relevance of his words.

The day George Bush Sr. sent his missiles into Iraq, I was with a bunch of undergrads who sat in the lobby of the University main building singing Imagine and Blowin' in the Wind. He wrote the words the year I was born, and the words are as relevant today as they ever were. And they will continue to be so till the world he imagines does become a reality.

To me, each word of the song is a prayer-

Imagine there's no Heaven

It's easy if you try

No hell below us

Above us only sky

Imagine all the people

Living for today

Imagine there's no countries

It isn't hard to do

Nothing to kill or die for

And no religion too

Imagine all the people

Living life in peace

You may say that I'm a dreamer

But I'm not the only one

I hope someday you'll join us

And the world will be as one

Imagine no possessions

I wonder if you can

No need for greed or hunger

A brotherhood of man

Imagine all the people

Sharing all the world

You may say that I'm a dreamer

But I'm not the only one

I hope someday you'll join us

And the world will live as one

John Lennon

(9 October, 1940 to  8 December, 1980)

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Remembering Indira Priyadarshini

Today, 25 years earlier started off as just another day, with just a tiny difference. India was playing a cricket match against Pakistan, so more people were turned into the TV and radio than was normally the case. Our geography teacher was droning about the continental drift when someone rushed into the room with news – Indira Gandhi, the then Prime Minister had been shot at and was battling for life at a government hospital. Any sensible person would have sent all the children home, but not our principle. He insisted on keeping the school open till the government confirmed the news, which it did not do till many hours after she had passed away.

Rumours kept trickling in. It was suspected that she had been shot at by two Sikhs, members of a then hostile community, easily identifiable by the characteristic turbans they all wore.

Even a thirteen year old me knew the consequences of not nipping that piece of news in the bud, but how can a government deny something it never declared in the first place.

By the time school got over at the scheduled time, the riots had started. Since our school bus was owned and driven by members of the Sikh community, the service was abruptly cancelled, and we were left to fend for ourselves. We took turns to use the school phone to call home, and even after many false tries was not able to do so. I knew my mother would eventually call my father to tell him I had not arrived, and that he would come to school to fetch me, but I also knew that could take a few hours. With many others, I settled myself to wait.

“Anybody here living in Gariahat?”, the watchman shouted.
“I live close to Gariahat!” I jumped up.
“These two men say they will take you till Gariahat”, the watchman informed. “Do you want to go with them.”
The men were total strangers to me and to everyone else, but without a second through, I climbed on to their motorbike.
“I live a little beyond Gariahat”, I told them when we were half-way home. “But you can drop me off there, and I will walk the rest of the way home.”
“Not a problem”, the man replied. “We’ll drop you home.”

They did, and my mother was so relived to see me, she didn’t even ask how I had come till I volunteered the information. After my father got home, we discussed the incident, and concluded that the men were not exactly good Samaritans- they had picked me up because they knew the chances of their motorcycle being attacked was much less when they had a child in a school uniform with them.


Thinking back, I shudder at my foolishness. When the city was up in flames, would not the prudent thing have been to wait for my father, even if it took time before he got to school. Had a mob set on me, would the men have offered me any protection. They were not even going all the way home – did I seriously think I could safely walk a couple of miles in a riot torn city all on my own?
They could have also been kidnappers, child molesters, rapists or anything else. But my life had been so sheltered I had not even considered any of those things.
Today, if my sons' school bus is a couple of minutes late, the call from their Daycare sets off a domino reaction of panic. I have the school bus conductor's phone number on speed dial, and still worry. How did people cope all those years back? Especially without mobile phones?

Indira Priyadarshini Gandhi
(19 November 1917 – 31 October 1984)
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The Lily Flower

Many months back, I found what looked like a lily bulb in a pile of raked leaves. I had absolutely no idea how it found its way into the heap, but I picked it up and planted it in a pot that I had prepared for a plant I eventually never bought.
For more than a year, I cared for the plant, and since one flowering season passed without any action, I never realistically expected to have it bear flowers.Last week, while watering the plant, thought I saw what could have passed for a tiny bud. The next day it had grown in size, and on the third day, it was a full-fledged bud.
On Thursday morning, it showed all signs of opening up pretty soon, and by evening, there was a beautiful red lily flower.
So beautiful was it, and so unexpected, that ruling against my instincts, I brought it indoors – after all, my younger son was now a mature three and a half year old, he now knows better than to pluck flowers!
The kids went berserk seeing the flower – they had never seen anything as big, as red and as shiny in a pot in their living room. The younger one smelt it, the older one took photographs of it, I was happy I had brought the plant indoors so we could enjoy it.
There was another bud too – I wondered if it would open out before the first one wilted away.

“Mamma, that pretty flower. Now it is many pretty flowers”, lisped the younger one, thumb firmly in his mouth. I had no idea what he was talking about, but since he seemed really excited about it, I left what I was doing and went to see.

He had reduced the flower and the bud to shreds. There was nothing left on the plant except the shiny green leaves, not even the promise of another bud, much less another flower.

To say I was devastated would perhaps start to describe how I felt. More than anything else, it was the randomness of the destruction that got to me. When you nurture something for months, without any expectations, then have it cut short in the first flush of youth – few things are more distressing than that.

All weekend, I mourned the loss of the flower and the bud. And then I realized that it was not as tragic as I made it out to be. The flower had bloomed. It had been appreciated. It had brought a new dimension of beauty into our lives. Maybe being cut short in its prime was better than seeing the flower whither and die?

Easter Lily

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And come back again soon.