Your 30s Are For...

...realizing that while you possess the intellectual capacity to contemplate the deeper puzzles of life and pursue them to their artistic, philosophical or academic conclusion (on or off social media), you actively choose not to, instead devoting much of your free time to constructing penis & fart jokes.
Until you are confronted with a situation that demands you summon your highest self and act from a place of reason, nuance, kindness and empathy. In which case, you influence outcomes as positively as you can (from voting mindfully in an election, to helping an old person cross the road or being kind to a telemarketer) so that you can go back - as soon as possible - to your raison d'être i.e. constructing penis & fart jokes.

https://edwardsheridan.wordpress.com/2014/04/21/raison-detre/

My Slutty Democracy

I woke up this morning to read about the latest episode in the soap opera that is playing out in the run-up to May 16th (when the election results will be announced). As the Congress turned its attention back from the TDP and BJD to the Left and Lalu, I was reminded of that episode of Friends when Rachel tells Ross that sex between them will 'never be off the table'. I suspect Ross and Rachel had more legitimacy to their decision than most of our political parties do.

In the whorehouse that Indian politics seems to be descending into, I picture our political parties slapping on gobs of magenta lipstick, donning their flashiest petticoats, oiling their hair with badam tel and hanging from doors & windows, hawking themselves to the highest bidder. It's not about who's a better lay, it's about who's willing to pay more.

Saw a ridiculous episode of 'We The People' on NDTV. The discussion revolved around the bizarre notion that Mayawati could be India's Obamavatar. Hello? Obama isn't just a black man who became president. The man has depth, an education and visionary idealism with the strength of character to convert it into reality. Plus, he is backed by a group of people who are just as talented and loyal in carrying his vision forward. Are you telling me that Mayawati (who no doubt has conquered great odds and has had the 'audacity to hope') has enough time between transferring officials who piss her off and building shrines to herself, to look beyond caste politics and have a coherent vision for the nation (forget the globe) as a whole?

I'm aware that the vastness and diversity of our nation implies that its politics will be as diverse. And perhaps when you have these many players in the field, there's bound to be a bit of chaos. Chaos, I'm okay with (after all it's the Indian way). Power brokering? Well, sure. I can't be all doe-eyed and believe that it's not part of the political process. But does it have to completely ignore the basic point of democracy?

Instead of talking about the issues, Indian democracy has been reduced to an incestuous play-by-play account of who's f^&*king who. Ideology be damned, I'm just waiting for the day the Left aligns itself with the BJP because that'll bring them into power. Let's not even talk about Obama, please. In a 5 year period that saw a massive upswing in terrorist attacks, countless farmer suicides, large parts of India including its financial capital brought to its knees by floods, the Satyam scandal and much much more, I find it absolutely abominable how our leading parties are prostituting their ideologies just to gain power in the Parliament.

Right now, I'm angry and to be honest, as an educated and non-apathetic citizen of India, I'm at a complete loss on how to understand the current scenario. I'm not really looking forward to May 16th. I'm dreading the drama that'll play out. The worst thing? It won't even be a high-class piece of entertainment...it'll probably be as bad as a cheap porn film.

Whote vote?

Voting from the Vasant Kunj constituency is interesting. I say 'Vasant Kunj' constituency because not even my candidates seem to know which one we belong to. The EC website says we're West Delhi. My Congress and BJP candidates seem to think we're South Delhi (even though they are officially candidates from West Delhi). It's all so bizarrely convoluted and no one seems to care.

It disturbed me greatly that up until an hour before I was to cast my ballot, I knew more about the US Vice Presidential candidates than I did about those running to become Lok Sabha members in my own backyard. At 7 am on voting day, I ran a quick internet scan and checked my newspapers to learn more about them (incidently both major candidates from my area had the same first names). At the end of my research I discovered that 2 candidates are pro-Gujjars and the Congress guy was running on the goodwill generated by his brother (who was denied a ticket by his party this time round - why, I wonder.)
Having no love lost for caste politics and not knowing much about the 3rd gentleman, I had no option but to vote for party over candidate.

This is the first time it struck me (and I've been voting since I was 18) that most of us in this nation have gotten into the nasty habit of not knowing about our candidates and therefore not expecting anything from those who come into power. I don't support abstinence from voting, but I also think it is a bit pointless to walk into a polling booth knowing nothing about who you're voting for. Why don't I know anything about my representative? Why haven't they bothered to communicate with me? Why don't I know where they hold their rallies? Is there something wrong with the system, with the campaigning rules? Am I, as a middle class voter, not as important as a voter from other sections of society (how can that be when the papers announced that the highest turnout was that of the middle-class voter). Or is it me? Am I that apathetic? Do I really believe 'they're all the same' so why should I bother?

So, with all due respect to all those (including me) who campaigned for the very idea of democracy, who said that just putting your vote forward s putting your voice forward, I beg to differ. It's simply not enough to get a blue ink mark on ones index finger. We've got to know more, find out more, care more about who we're selecting as our representative. We've got to demand more.

Homebound and brimming

Been at home for two weeks now. No new project and plenty of time to do as I please. Had me two marvellous experiences...

The first was reading Saeed Mirza's book 'Ammi - Letters to a Democratic Mother' and the second was watching the 2 hr Nat Geo special on the online films collectively titled 'Hometown Baghdad' (http://chattheplanet.com/).
Both are intensely personal and human takes on national and global events and neither allows us to remain cocooned in the safety of war-stats and newspaper headlines.
These are throbbing, pulsating and REAL accounts of the horrors of what man does to man. There are no fingers of blame being pointed. Just mirrors being held up. Look, they both say, look - this is happening all around you and but for the grace of God, it could just as well been you. Or me.

And then we have young people who think it's 'too hot' to go out and vote. It's the bare minimum we can do...