Do we need a 'training' on Morality and Humanity?

I just watched To Sir, with Love and the first thing to come in my mind was, "Why didn't I watch it all these years?"
Being a teacher myself, it was quite an enriching journey to watch Sidney Poitier win over the hearts of a bunch of hoodlums. The movie reminded me of my English teacher, more popular as Sir. When the scaly arms of this world wrap me up, it's his words that keep me sane. It's his wisdom, his guidance, his teachings that help me keep my chin up, head held high. All my life, I have grown up seeing men like my grandpa, my father and Sir. And now I know that it is never possible for me to idolize someone who is not even close to their stature.

The other day while talking to him over phone, Sir mentioned a raucous experience he had in his class. He had just finished reading aloud Guy de Maupassant’s famous 1884 short story, The Necklace. And few of the students laughed at it(he has also posted about this in his blog). Shocked, I asked, "Mane?" Sir replied, even he was shocked at their reaction. The students found the damnation of two lives funny! Unbelievable!
And if this doesn't shock you, I'm sure the following news will... Read on.

Today's news about the gruesome murder of a wife by a software engineer in Dehradun tops the inhumanity in man.
News report says:
"On December 13, 2010 the Pioneer reported that in a gruesome incident, a software engineer battered his wife to death with an iron object, chopped her body into eight to ten pieces and kept her body hidden in a freezer in Dehradun for two months. Rajesh Gulati, 38, kept updating his wife’s status on her social networking websites so that her Delhi-based family and others could not learn about her death until a week ago." Though 8 to 10 pieces is just an under statement, since 27 pieces of HALF her body were recovered.

What else is left to be done? If this is not inhuman, what is? It pains me to think that today's world is filled with such INHUMAN WRETCH OF MONSTERS! And to survive with sanity amongst people who are always trying to pull me down in the grimy and lackluster world, I must say I am thankful to those few people I am blessed with: the three venerable men of my life and last but certainly not the least, my mom!

Their words of wisdom and knowledge have always guided me to stand upright and abhorred me from doing anything for which I would lose my self-respect. It shivers me to think about the future of this world. Who knows what is in store for these people and for the generations to come!

The Prophet, The Wanderer.

For quite some time I had been hunting for an anchor to restore my tranquility. Failing to think of any fruitful option, I landed at Starmark. After traversing through the floors and inspecting almost every section( and shelf) of the book store, I stumbled on a big fat Omnibus edition of Kahlil Gibran.

I had read Prophet earlier, but the sight of the complete collection lured me to empty my pocket.
The second book after Prophet in this complete collection is SAND AND FOAM. It is a collection of short stories and aphorisms which will not only amaze you but also make you wiser. It throws light into the deeper layers of life, which, unfortunately is missing from the superficial life of "hi-tech world".

I went to the mountains a while later after getting my hands on the book. All throughout the journey, this book was my only companion. Every time I read and re-read the short stories and aphorisms in SAND AND FOAM, I was dumbfounded. I went taciturn for hours, lost in a different world.

I am quoting some of the Wanderer's words here:

"Now would I fulfill myself. But how shall I unless I become a planet with intelligent lives dwelling upon it?
Is not this every man's goal?"

"A pearl is a temple built by pain around a grain of sand.
What longing built our bodies and around what grains?"

"Once I knew a man whose ears were exceedingly keen, but he was dumb. He had lost his tongue in a battle.
I now know what battles that man fought before the great silence came. I am glad he is dead.
The world is not large enough for two of us."

"My house says to me, 'Do not leave me, for here dwells your past.'
And the road says to me, 'Come and follow me, for I am your future.'
And I say to both my house and the road, 'I have no past, nor have I a future. If I stay here, there is a going in my staying; and if I go, there is a staying in my going. Only love and death change all things."

"When you long for blessings that you may not name, and when you grieve knowing not the cause,then indeed you are growing with all things that grow, and rising toward your greater self."

A new addition to the history of blasts!

"History is nothing but the activity of men in pursuit of their ends."
-Karl Marx


Around 60-70 years back, an Argentine writer, named J.L. Borges, wrote about BENARES, without ever visiting the holy( now blood-stained) place.

Today morning while I was surfing through the news of the pernicious blast at Dashashwamedh, couple of links related to the blast popped up. But then I was bemused to see that a scroll bar on the right hand side of the page gave links to 15 pages(!), each containing news of about 20 blasts that took place this year around the globe.

It's the 63rd year of 'independence', as per historical records, but the innate disdain in our souls continues to goad us into destruction. We are still prey to the divide and rule. Perhaps it's rightly said that "the sun never sets on the British empire" because its span across the globe ensured that the sun was always shining on at least one of its numerous territories. And that certainly includes our hearts and minds, if not geographical territories!

"History does nothing; it does not possess immense riches, it does not fight battles. It is men, real, living, who do all this." -Karl Marx

Then why are we still so eager to repeat that history at the cost of our lives?