Untitled

Achedyo yamadaahyo yamakledyo shoshya eva cha
nithyaha sarvagathaha sthaanurachalo yam sanaathanah

Still its saddening when the body that housed the soul is no more. And when you realize that the soul could have moved onto "any" "body" that you may have come across today or might come across tomorrow, you realize that you have to love everyone if you truly love your beloved ones.

I think many of those who die know that they are about to die when the time cometh. They cheer up, appear brighter, give us a ray of hope and then, the inevitable happens. Some day i am going to be given a chance to test my hypothesis. There is a saying in one of the Indian languages, the lamp thats going to run out will shine brighter for a few units of time just before it actually runs out.

Bhagavad Gita in 3 minutes

This song from the tamizh film Karnan attempts to summarize the Bhagavad Gita in 3 mins. The concepts of Atman, Advaitham and Renunciation are all captured beautifully. My fav line is this

Arjuna: Krishna, you know everything, all i know is You....
Krishna: When you know Me, you know that all life forms are Krishna...


If you don't know tamizh here's a gist of whats going on. The background should be known to all. Arjunan does not want to fight against his own grandsire, guru and brethren.

Krishna says (rather sings)

O Vijaya who is confused with the concept of death
Let me explain the character of what is called Death
The atman(soul) cannot be subjected forever to Death
It will be born again
Kill the skin, kill the skin
...
Even if you don't, their bodies are going to die some day

Arjuna is still worried. He knows he is not going to kill the soul but just the flesh that covers it. Still, killing is an act of crime, that too his own brethren.

Krishna, you know everything, all i know is you.
Paranthaama, how come you yourself goad me to committing this sin

Krishna then explains why it is not a sin.

When you know me, you know that all life forms are me/mine
...
All the Kings here are Me. All the people are Me.
All the trees, shrubs and creepers are Me.
The One who said this is Krishna
And the One who is saying this is also Krishna
Stand up and be bold so that Dharma is restored

Arjuna is still confused. He realises its his duty (Dharma) to annihilate evil as a Kshatriya. He also realises all the life forms are Krishna (ie have the divinity in them). He himself is Krishna, so are the ones who are going to be killed. But still, there is the concept of Karma...

Krishna, if i accept your advice and commit this sin
Still the committer of this sin is me
And the Karma will have to be borne by me
O Krishna Tell me
Would you be willing to share the Karma?

When Arjuna asks Krishna if he is willing to share the Karma, he is in fact asking Krishna whether Krishna would have done this if he had been in Arjuna's place?

Krishna replies with a smile

If the world terms this act pious
Let the credit be attributed to Me
The praise from the praisers
And the scorn from the scorners
Let them all be attributed to Me
...
It is but me who is attacking
It is but me who is killing
Pick up your gandivam
And gather your skills
Let redness smear
this battle field

This i think is the concept of renunciation. Renunciation need not necessarily require relinquishing daily life for a life of austerity and penance by the side of a river in a distant forest. Renunciation is not about inaction. Renunciation is all about not wanting to enjoy the fruits of one's actions. Whatever you do, do it for the Lord, the Lord that is in you, the Lord in all of us and the Lord in all the life forms. Basically whatever we do, we do it not for our betterment alone, but for the benefit of the whole world. When we have that perspective of considering how each of our actions affects the universe and its various life forms, our actions will be pure and no longer self-centered. Lust, greed, anger and such will then have no place in our thoughts. I read Gandhi's idea of renunciation was quite similar, if not the same.

Thus ends the beautiful song.

Sivaji Ganesan

Whatever the world might think about him, I like Sivaji Ganesan. I can't see how someone cannot like him, especially the Sivaji of the b&w era. I recently watched his old film 'Manohara'; you get to see an young Sivaji Ganesan as the son of a King who has lost his senses to a court dancer. The son's pain in seeing his mom, the dharmapatni, slighted and his pain on being suppressed by his own mom from alleviating her sufferings endears the character to our hearts. Though words like spell-bound would sound hackneyed, i sure did enjoy his acting from the start to the finish. Of course, given that its an old film, the plot's quite thick with sub-plots as well. Thats the primary difference between today's films and the films of the b&w era. Back then story was seen as the primary strength, now glamour and special effects are seen as the primary strength. I think i will watch Uthama Puthiran next, the tamizh version of 'The man in the iron mask'.

Commenting on comments

Read this

The real fun is in the comments section. So lets head over to there.

One commenter says

"I REALLY hate to clean. If he really loved me, he would make the meal AND clean"

This is obviously a feminist. Poor guy, i mean the man in her life.

A philosophical commenter says

"Every relationship is a compromise. If my wife went the extra distance and slaved over a stove to cook a special meal, I wouldn't have any problem doing the dishes. I know she would do the same for me."

Another person really wants to get screwed (yeah screwed as in screwed)

"I'd say it's win-win because now I really WILL get screwed - as in hot monkey sex all night! Show me the way to sink boys!"

Interrresting facts about me

I got tagged by JK. I didn't expect to find enough stuff to write about me... But somehow managed to unearth a few...

1. In my childhood days, i dreamt of being India's dictator. I even promised my sister half the land.
2. I have a 11 month old son who can say Acha (actually attttaa) meaning Dad. 'Acha' to him is quite overloaded(polymorphic?) though, it has many meanings including Mom, take me from here, iam enjoying it, answer me etc.
3. My friend once remarked that i should probably get wedded to a computer (actually a computer with a h*le).
4. Once i hit a dog when driving on Airport Rd(Blr) on a motorcycle. The impact was such that i made atleast 4-5 somersaults. The guy who helped me get back on my legs shook my hands (congratulated?) saying he has seen such stunts only in movies. The dog was unharmed and in fact had to be stoned to prevent it from jumping onto my limping body.
5. I was supposed to be born with a silver spoon. But i forgot it in my mother's womb. I am that forgetful. Have been to the school without my school bag, been to interview with sneakers, been to the bar without cash, been to client presentations without a belt etc etc.
6. I am highly self critical. I almost always end up with myself to blame.
7. My wife calls me a 'low maintenance husband'. I prefer 'idli + chutney' over 'paratha + panner tikka', 'kuthari (brown rice) + pulissery(yellow curry from diluted curd)' over 'biryani + pepper mushroom'.
8. I have accumulated enough bad karma to be 'reborn' quite a few times. So i am more concerned about global warming than most others are.

This branch of the 'tag-chain' stops here, simply because i don't know anyone who can be tagged.

Lullabies

A good lullaby is undoubtedly your best ally in putting your baby to sleep. Trust me on this, you will automatically devise one when you need one.

If you are from Kerala, then you would have probably heard the 'Omana thingal kidavo' lullaby. You can listen to this lilting lullaby here (use IE). Its one of the hugely popular lullabies and is no doubt elegant, written as it was for putting the prince Swathi Thirunal to sleep. This is what my wife sings to put our baby to sleep.

Given my musical talent, rather the lack of it, i use the much simpler 'Harae raama'. Surprisingly my son likes it a lot. After some experimentation it appears some of the syllables can be stretched for additional impact. So instead of 'Harae raama', i sometimes use 'Haraeaeaeae Raaaaamaa'. So my lullaby is simply

Harae raama harae raama
raama raama harae harae
Harae krishna harae krishna
krishna krishna harae harae

My mom on the other hand uses 'Yaadevi sarvabhudeshu'. You may or may not have heard of it. Its a very nice hymn with a good meaning. All the stanzas look almost the same, one word is replaced to give different meanings to each stanza.

Yaadevi sarvabhudeshu
vidya rupena samsthithaah
namastasyai namastasyai
namastasyai namoh namaah

Here vidya can be replaced for ex with budhi, matru, shraddha, shakti etc.

I think the power of these simpler lullabies is in their words like harae, namastasyai etc which have the right tones for inducing sleep in babies. And when repeated many times, they soothe the baby to sleep (hopefully).

My wife's mom uses some wildly funny lullabies. For ex

Ambili ammaava thaamara kumbilil enthundu
kumbittiruppano maanathe komban aana purathu

And if our son is a bit irritated or is crying his heart out with his eyes closed (often at midnight and probably after some nightmares) a resounding & reverberating 'Om' stops the wailing on its tracks.

Fighting sore throat

After some experimentation i have come up with this what-think-is-a-sure-shot formula for fixing sore throats. The fix is a combination of

1. Gargling with warm (not too warm) salt water as soon as you figure out that you have a sore throat and once before going to bed.
2. A Himalaya koflet, one every 4 hrs (not before gargling)
3. Abstaining from drinking or eating anything cold or anything too hot. Basically sticking to warm food.

I have seen this fix the sore throat in a day. I think following up this with 1 tea spoon of powdered palm sugar every 4 hrs on the day after the sore throat disappears will be beneficial as well.