Shevlin Sebastian's Blog, page 19

An erotic short story on the Juggernaut app

And as my former boss told me, tongue-in-cheek, this is the closest I am going to get to former porn star and Bollywood personality Sunny Leone

The life and times of Roger Federer

By Shevlin Sebastian

In July, 2004, I was in Athens to cover the Olympic Games for ‘The Week’ magazine. One day, after a tennis match, I slipped into a small hall. Roger Federer sat on a chair on a small wooden stage. He was wearing a white T-shirt and shorts and white sneakers. The organisers had placed chairs in a semicircle. Just as casually, I plonked myself on one in the first row.

It was a laid-back press conference. The questions began in three languages: English, French and German. Federer answered with fluency in all the languages and had a perpetual smile on his face. He was a man who let off a lot of positive vibrations.

I cannot remember whether I asked any question or remained tongue-tied. Later, when Federer stepped out into the corridor, competitors from other disciplines mobbed him, but he remained patient and smiling. He enjoyed the small talk and the pats on his back.

So, it was no surprise I would be an early reader of ‘The Master — The Brilliant Career of Roger Federer’ by New York Times columnist Christopher Clarey.

Clarey, like Federer, had travelled all over the world, covering several Grand Slams and Olympic Games and other big-ticket events.

Clarey also had unparalleled access to Federer. Over the years, he did around twenty one-on-one interviews, lasting many hours, in places as diverse as Buenos Aires, Dubai, New York, and a small village in Switzerland. He also did interviews with eighty people who know Federer well. These included players, coaches, family members, agents and company executives.

As a seasoned journalist, Clarey has an easy-to-read style. The book details how Federer showed early promise. Recognising his talent, his parents encouraged him, and so did the coaches at the local club. Soon, Federer set out on the long and arduous journey to become World No 1 and a legend in the game. Today, he has 20 Grand Slam titles.

Clarey confirmed what I had intuitively felt in Athens. Federer enjoyed meeting people. He had gone to Buenos Aires to play exhibition matches just so that he could imbibe the culture and get to know the people better.

Whenever he went to a city to play, his wife and children accompanied him. Between matches, they would go to museums, parks and amusement centres. Unlike most players who stay cocooned inside their rooms, especially during the hours before a final. Federer was different. Once, on the day of the final of the US Open, he took his children for a stroll in Central Park in New York.

The result of this relaxed attitude — he became the men’s champion.

“What fascinates me about Roger then and now is that he lives in the present. He has an exceptional ability to take things as they come. He lives the moment, experiences it fully, takes pleasure in it, and finishes it, then moves on to the next,” said Marc Rosset, former Switzerland No. 1.

It is an unbelievable lifestyle. Flying from place to place in a hired jet, living in the best hotels and houses money can buy and yet, despite all this, according to most intimates, Federer remained grounded and unaffected by the fame and the money.

“Everybody likes to have more money, but not everybody can deal with it. I think Roger deals with it very well,” said Severin Luthi, Roger’s coach.

It is a tough individual sport. Writes Clarey: ‘Tennis does not allow a champion to coast. Every match is a fresh chance to stumble. The awareness of that sharpens the mind, quickens the steps and staves off ennui and existential dread.’

If you are a tennis fan, this book is worth a read.

There is little chance anybody from India can become World No 1. We simply do not have the system to nurture talent from kindergarten all the way to the world level. Those who make it in individual sports do so despite the system. Think Prakash Padukone, to name one. Somehow, unlike in the West, we do not realise that if you nurture talent, and it becomes world class, everybody makes money: the coach, agent, player, federation and the sponsoring company.

In fact, Nike had made an early investment in Federer. When he was only fourteen, they signed a deal with him worth $500,000 over five years.

Today, thanks to their sponsorship of Federer, and other top-flight sportsmen, the company has an annual turnover of over $50 billion.

In the mid-2020, in the pandemic's depth, Forbes named Federer as the world’s highest-paid athlete with an annual income of $106.3 million, of which only $6.3 million was official prize money. He was ahead of football players Cristiano Ronaldo, Lionel Messi, Neymar and basketball greats like LeBron James and Stephen Curry.

As the Bangkok-based fan Varghese Kalathil told me, “There will never be another player like Roger Federer.”

Fragments that hold you in thrall

 

The UK-based writer Farrukh Dhondy has written an absorbing autobiography

By Shevlin Sebastian

When I first read the title, ‘Fragments Against my Ruin’, I could not understand it. But a Google check revealed it is a line from TS Eliot’s poem, ‘The Waste Land’. Just wondering whether the title will be a put-off for would-be buyers.

The cover is predominantly black, but the voice of Farrukh throughout the book is upbeat.

But these are minor quibbles. This has been one of the easiest reads in recent times. That’s how smooth the writing is thanks to Farrukh’s story-telling gift.

It is a story of a Parsi boy who grew up in an upper-middle-class household in Pune and went to London to do his degree in natural sciences from Cambridge. Thereafter, he settled in England and had a successful career as a journalist, writer, activist, teacher, TV commissioning editor and scriptwriter.

It is a book rife with many anecdotes of Farrukh’s encounters with the famous and the distinguished like TV personality Oprah Winfrey, serial killer Charles Sobhraj, activist Coretta King, actor Malcolm McDowell, singer Cat Stevens, documentary filmmaker Anand Patwardhan and the Bollywood director Subhash Ghai. He also had an unexpected friendship with the Nobel Laureate VS Naipaul, the writer.

His analysis of Naipaul’s writing style is perceptive. “Vidia’s works are in windowpane prose,” he said. “You are invited to see through it to the object or emotion beyond. The contrast is with writers who use stained-glass prose, where the picture in the glass is the proffered object of attention rather than what one can see through it.”

One memory took me back to my late teens.

As Channel 4 Commissioning Editor, Farrukh had commissioned a documentary series on blacks called ‘Black Bag’. He had appointed an experienced white producer Bernard Clark to supervise a group of inexperienced black filmmakers.

Alkarim Jivani, a journalist at Time Out Magazine, came to interview Farrukh.

One question he asked was: “What would you say to someone who said you were acting like a colonial despot, putting a white man in charge of blacks?”

A phrase from his Poona days came to Farrukh’s mind.

“‘I’d say, ‘Kiss my cock and call me Charlie’,” said Farrukh.

This was, wrote Farrukh, a rude expression passed on from British troops of the Raj.

I had to laugh aloud. This was a sentence we used often in my college days in Calcutta.

The situation becomes even more hilarious.

Farrukh writes: ‘Two hours later, Eva [Farrukh’s secretary] said that the director of Programmes, Liz Forgan, wanted to see me. I went down to her office on the second floor. John Willis, the programme controller, and my direct boss was seated in the office. Liz asked me to take a seat.

“Did you tell Alkarim Jivani to kiss your cock and call you Charlie?” she asked with an absolute straight face.

‘No, I didn’t!” I replied and told them both he had asked me what I would say to someone who accused me of behaving like a colonial despot, and I had replied that’s what I would say. I repeated the riposte with an equally poker face.

John burst into laughter. He couldn’t hold it. He nearly fell off the chair.

Liz broke into a huge and alluring grin, as she often did. “Please, Farrukh, don’t say these things to journalists,” she pleaded.

Every time I passed him in the corridors of the channel, John would, sometimes quite solemnly, repeat the phrase.’

Despite the flippancy, Farrukh had a sharp nose and intuition to know what ideas would work and what would not. So, when his ex-wife Mala Sen wrote a book called ‘India’s Bandit Queen: The True Story of Phoolan Devi’, Farrukh felt it would make an excellent film.

One day, he invited the director Shekhar Kapoor and the producer Bobby Bedi to a pub. He asked Shekhar whether he would direct the Phoolan Devi film. Shekhar replied he could only decide after seeing the script.

Farrukh was under pressure. His boss, Michael Grade, had allotted 1 million pounds for the film, and he had to show the script and the director was in place. But the script had not yet been written.

Farrukh told Shekhar he would write the script.

He said, “By the time I drain this beer, Shekhar, please say yes or no, so I can start phoning other directors in India. But, of course, you are my first choice.”

Shekhar bit his lip and stayed silent till Farrukh’s pint of beer was down to its last inch.

“Ok, I’ll do it,” said Shekhar.

The film was made. But before it could be released Phoolan Devi made a hue and cry about the depiction of rape. After several weeks of protests, Farrukh flew down to India, met Phoolan’s husband Umed Singh and gave him a cheque of 40,000 pounds. Phoolan immediately withdrew the case and said she was fine with the film.

When it was released, the film made an impact. It won the National Award for Best Feature Film in Hindi, and the Filmfare Critics Award for Best Movie and Best Direction. It premiered in the Directors’ Fortnight section of the 1994 Cannes Film Festival and was screened at the Edinburgh Film Festival.

The film earned ₹221 million worldwide.

This is one of many absorbing anecdotes in the narrative. Overall, this is an interesting book about an interesting man.

The Golden Pen

 

The biography of legendary Bollywood lyricist Anand Bakshi penned by his son Rakesh is an engaging read

By Shevlin Sebastian

Pics: The cover of the book; (from left): Singer Mukesh, Anand Bakshi, Lata Mangeshkar and RD Burman in the 1960s

For a book in English, it was unusual to see a Hindi title: ‘Nagme, Kisse, Baatein, Yaadein’ — the life and lyrics of Anand Bakshi.

There were two reasons I picked up the book, which is written by Anand’s son Rakesh. Over the decades, on LP’s, CDs, cinema and television screens, and YouTube, I had always seen the name Anand Bakshi next to the word, lyrics. I realised I knew little about him.

Second, the photo on the cover was eye-catching. The far-away look in the eyes of a young Anand, the curly black hair, the thick ring, the long nose, and the thin, but determined lips. The author’s photograph is by Amit Bakshi. This could be a brother.

The book is an enjoyable read. The one drawback is that there are a lot of Hindi lyrics, but in some sections, there are no English translations in brackets. So, if your Hindi is not strong enough, you can miss out.

It is a story of a poet who chased a dream but faced rejection for a long time. Anand, a refugee from Pakistan, quit his job in the Indian Army and went to Mumbai. In his first attempt, he made no headway and returned home to Delhi.

He made a second attempt, and success eluded him. Anand had a wife and daughter back home. His in-laws stopped supporting him. His parents were dejected. The pressure to return grew intense. He had run out of money.

One day, in 1958, the jobless lyric writer sat at the Marine Lines railway station, writing poetry in a notebook. A Western Railway ticket checker, Ustad Chittar Mal Swaroop, asked him whether he had a valid ticket. Anand replied in the negative. Chittar Mal asked him to pay a fine, but Anand said he had no money.

Chittar Mal noticed Anand had written some poetry. He asked Anand to narrate it. What Anand did not know was that Chittar Mal was a lover of poetry. Anand’s poems impressed the railway employee. When asked about his life story, Anand told him he was on the verge of quitting and returning to Delhi.

Chittar Mal stared at Anand. Then he said, “I live alone in Borivali. My family lives in Agra. It gets lonely, and I would like the company of a poet. You stay with me. I don’t want any rent. You narrate your poems to me. When you get work, you can look for your accommodation.” So, that very day, Anand began living with Chittar Mal at 24H, Jawala Estate, SV Road, Borivali West.

Little did they both know then, but Anand ended up staying with Chittar Mal for the next four years. That was how tough it was to gain an entry.

After several attempts, Anand got an appointment with Roshan Lal Nagrath, who was a leading composer in the 1950s. He was supposed to go to the composer’s house in Santa Cruz at 10 a.m. But the previous night, it began to rain heavily. By the morning, the streets got flooded. The local trains and BEST buses stopped plying.

But Ananad was not deterred. He walked from Borivali West to Santa Cruz, a distance of 19 kilometres. It took him three hours. When he rang the bell, Roshan, on opening the door, looked at the completely drenched Anand and jokingly said, “Are you a man or a ghost?”

Anyway, Anand impressed Roshan when he recited his poems. So, Roshan told Anand to write the lyrics for ‘CID Girl’ (1959). Anand’s first song from that film became a hit. Thereafter, Roshan and Anand worked on many films together.

Several years later, when Anand established himself as a lyric writer,

Roshan’s son Rajesh was making his debut as a music composer. This time Roshan asked Anand to write the lyrics for the film Julie (1975). The songs, Bhool gaye sab kuch, yaad nahi ab kuch and Dil kya kare jab kisi ko, kisi se pyar ho jaye became super-duper hits and remain popular even today. That’s how life turned 360 degrees. The composer who gave a break to a novice then asked him for help on the son’s debut album.

Anand had hit songs for five decades, working with multiple music composers like SD and RD Burman, Laxmikant-Pyarelal, Naushad, Kalyanji-Anandji, Anu Malik, AR Rahman and others. Some of his most famous songs could be heard in the films, Bobby, Amar Prem, Aradhana, Mera Gaon, Mere Desh, Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge, Pardes, and Taal.

He had written the lyrics for 4000 songs. And he remained a success right till the very end. The songs he liked the best were from Amar Prem, and he was proud of the one line that became immortal: ‘Kuchh to log kahenge logon ka kaam hai kehnaa’.

Anand died in Mumbai of multiple organ failure on March 30, 2002, at the age of 71. He had remained friends with Chittar Mal over the decades and always remained grateful to his friend. Chittar Mal died in 2001.

Enclosed are quotes from the book:

Good songs exist in good stories.

The actor is the face of the song.

Success and failure are solo journeys. Except that in success, we have the support of people, whereas, in failure, few stand by us.

There is something inside me superior to my circumstances, stronger than every situation of life.

You must adjust to everyone and deliver to everyone.

(As director Subhash Ghai said, ‘Anand’s best quality was not his ability to write profound thoughts in simple, everyday words, but his discipline and respect for time. He never delayed a single song that I asked him to write.”)

I decided I would never show off my talent and success because something within me told me that the day I misuse the gift that was granted to me by God and time, I would be nowhere soon. Never abuse a blessing or gift. Be humble.

I have seen the most formidable and talented people fail overnight — because of an unhealthy attitude towards their work and their success. Because they did not respect what time had brought to their threshold.

Time has never stopped for any power, any emperor, any culture, and any civilisation. Perhaps time is God.

Time has a design for every man and woman.

I let time take its decisions for me.

I will write till time wants me to.

One day, the show will end. My end — every kind of end — is only logical. As I overtook the others, one day, some others will overtake me, sweep my fans off with their new or better styles. Life is a chakra that keeps turning.

Destiny is all-powerful.

I wanted to be someone whose words, however simple, touched the hearts of every man, woman, and child.

Age does not matter in a profession. Talent, discipline, punctuality, hard work and purity of heart matter. 

The Death of A Rain Tree

By Shevlin Sebastian 

Just like that, workers of the Forest Department chopped down the massive rain tree at Padivattom, Kochi, near my house, in the name of development. According to news reports, over 250 trees will be cut,  because another section of the Kochi Metro is coming up. This will connect Jawaharlal Stadium in Kaloor with Smart City 2, comprising 11 stations and covering a distance of 11.2 kms.

The branches of the rain tree provided a welcome canopy during hot summers and rainy days.

For years, a few parents with their children stood under its branches, in the early mornings, waiting for the school bus.

While some came in cars, others arrived in two-wheelers and those who lived nearby walked it. We smiled and greeted each other while the children milled around us in their uniforms and bags.

The tree remained a soothing presence, even as our minds and bodies felt stressed, as we tried to balance jobs, marriage, parenthood, and household responsibilities.

The children began as toddlers and ended up as teenagers. Now many of them have moved on to colleges and post-graduate studies. I haven’t gone to the bus stop in the early morning for a few years. I am out of touch with those parents, too. What are their children doing now? 

I am sure new parents and children are going through the same routine at the same bus stop. The cycle of life continues from one generation to the other. When I saw the fallen tree, I realised time had passed. 

The time when children listened to whatever we said, observed and picked up their attitudes and nuances of behaviour from us. Now they have independent minds and are on the way towards independent lives. Some of us are facing the ‘empty nest’ syndrome, especially wives who were so enmeshed in their children’s lives that they forgot their husbands.

I remember meeting one woman, in her sixties, who told me she felt shocked when the children no longer needed her. Like most mothers, she had focused completely on the children. It is the most fulfilling job of their lives, no matter even when they say they had fulfilling careers. 

She realised the relentless tick-tock of the clock had now pushed her to a new space. A space where children do not exist except on once-a-year visits, voices through the phone, in online chats, and as images or videos on WhatsApp.

Why is she shocked? All she has to do is to look back. She also had to leave her parents and stayed in touch only occasionally. This woman told me she had to work very hard to rebuild her relationship with her husband. Her husband, a sporting man, took her back into the marital embrace. Not all men are accommodating. Marriages have broken up because of this neglect.

But how can you blame a woman? These children have come out of her womb. Hence, she feels a biological and emotional imperative to protect and nurture them. In the early years, it is the mother’s nurturing that is so vital for the all-around development of the child. It is time-consuming and exhausting. More so, if the woman has a career. Former PepsiCo Chairman & CEO Indra Nooyi details this aspect in her recently released memoir, ‘My Life in Full: Work, Family, and our Future’.

Here is an extract:

“I’ll never forget coming home after being named President of PepsiCo back in 2001. My mother was visiting at the time. “I’ve got great news for you,” I shouted. She replied, “It can wait. We need you to go out and get some milk.”

So I go out and get milk. And when I come back, I’m hopping mad. I say, “I had great news for you. I’ve just been named President of PepsiCo. And all you want me to do is go out and get milk.” 

Then she says, “Let me explain something to you. You may be President of PepsiCo. But when you step into this house, you’re a wife and mother first. Nobody can take that place. So leave that crown in the garage.” 

The death of the tree also reminded me of the various deaths I am coming across now. Parents, uncles and aunts, friends of our parents, and relatives. They are all exiting the planet one by one.

One feels a keen sense of mortality. In our fifties, we can no longer pretend life will go on forever. There is a finite nature to it. Sometimes, you feel sad your time is limited.

Some have regrets about the career they chose. A few recounted mistakes that hampered their professional growth. Some underwent financial stresses. 

Others have emotional sorrows. I remember a friend, who passed away a year ago, had told me, “I made the biggest mistake of my life by having an affair. It destroyed my marriage and affected my children. I am no longer with this woman. It was a total loss for me.”

It is a time when we look forward as well as look back. There is a desire among some of us to embark on a second career. 

But surely, a day will come when we will become a physical blank. Like the rain tree at Padivattom. There is a lot of sunlight there, but sadly, I saw blocks of concrete where the tree once stood. 

The vanishing tree is a metaphor for our lives.

We will become dust-laden photographs on the wall. And nobody will look at us. The next generation will be busy with their lives like we had been once. Now our destination is getting closer. Depending on your religion, it’s six feet under the ground or 100 grams of ash floating in a holy river.

Happy Marriages?

By Shevlin Sebastian

During Onam, on social media, there were many photos of happy marriages and families. Husband and wife are smiling and so are the children. It gives the impression that everybody is happy.

But are they?

A former colleague told me of a couple she knew, married for over 25 years, who would step out in public, smile adoringly at each other, and sometimes hold hands. But at home, the husband remains ice cold towards the wife, does not have any physical contact, rarely speaks to her and sleeps in another room.

She told me of another couple who had a fractious relationship for 50 years. They rarely spoke to each other and slept in different rooms. When the husband died, the wife did not go to the funeral, so great was the animosity. So, why did they not opt for a divorce? She is not sure about the reasons for that.

A friend pointed out to me a photo of a couple on her mobile phone. It was taken during Onam celebrations. The husband wore a saffron juba while the wife was in a Kerala-style saree, in a pleasing beige shade. Both smiled happily at the camera. “She hates him,” my friend said. “He is a womaniser. But she has no career, hence, no income, and is afraid to leave, for a life of uncertainty.”

This illusion of ‘happy marriages’ is a staple of Kerala society.

The problem is that it is still not socially acceptable for middle-aged and older couples to divorce. So, they live with each other even though there is no love or joy in their union. The thinking is: too much time has passed. What is the point of breaking up now?

If divorce had social sanction, maybe a few would have opted for it, especially if they are well-to-do. In a paradox, Malayali society has accepted divorce among youngsters.

When a daughter wants to divorce, the parents offer support and even encouragement.

Divorces happen often, and on flimsy grounds. “He snores at night,” was one excuse. “He hid his baldness under a wig,” was another reason for the swift dissolution of the marriage.

So, in Kerala, what you see is not what you get. Behind closed doors, a dramatically different drama takes place. But the fear of public ridicule and snide remarks makes all this remain indoors. But fragments of gossip slip out when the wife might tell a friend who might tell another friend and it goes on.

So, how do you gauge whether you are in a discontented marriage?

One of the surest signs is if the husband and wife sleep in different rooms and refuse to have any physical contact.

A few years ago I went to interview a thirty-something marriage counsellor whose clients were couples in the IT industry. She said, “One of the first questions I ask is if they are sleeping together. If not, it is difficult to save the marriage.”

Sometimes, a physical touch or a hug can provide a healing balm. Just sleeping next to each other at night might help. Most problems are minor irritations that get magnified.

But the man-woman relationship rarely works. They are on two different wavelengths. What she likes and desires, he is not aware of, and vice versa. Plus, spouses get bored with each other. The sexual desire for each other has long faded away. In a consumerist culture, this boredom gets even more acute. Sometimes, husbands and wives slip into affairs. All this is simple to arrange thanks to the mobile phone. But an affair rarely brings any form of satisfaction. It ends in recriminations and sorrow.

One is not sure about the impact of all this on the children.

I know of a teenage daughter who was furious with her mother for divorcing the father. Then the girl got even more upset when the mother married again. “I can’t live alone,” she told her daughter. They rarely speak to one another. So it was a surprise to see a ‘happy’ family photo they posted during Onam on Facebook with the new husband, in a crisp white dhoti and mundu, in the centre of the frame.

Most children of unhappy marriages feel relieved when they get away from the family nest. They escape to the wider world and get busy with their lives and careers.

Maybe the time has come, that once the children have grown up and moved away, the spouses could split up in a friendly manner, and go off in different directions. Why carry on this agonising relationship till the end of time? Life is so short, anyway. Why waste it in frustration and hatred? What do they gain by sticking together?

It is devastating to see the fake drama of closeness of most marriages at social functions. Of course, body language is a giveaway.

At a wedding reception, a couple, probably married for over 25 years, stood to take a snap. The sign that all was not well with the marriage was when the woman leaned her face away from the husband. Happy couples lean into each other.

Why did she lean away? What is wrong with them?

There is an enormous elephant in the room: domestic violence.

Does he beat her up? Is she bearing up with it, for the sake of the children?

Apart from physical abuse, verbal abuse can be equally damaging. It lacerates the heart.

What are the solutions?

Counselling, of course, can help. Meditation too. An easy one like Vipassana can have a calming influence on the psyche. Finally, the time has come for Kerala society to accept middle-aged and older divorces so that people can have a second stab at this elusive thing known as happiness.

The Chattering Mind

By Shevlin Sebastian

The other day I read that, on an average, according to scientists, we think about 50,000 to 60,000 thoughts a day. I am not sure how they had calculated this. For a while now, I realised my mind was an endless conveyor belt of random, silly, and aimless thoughts. 

One day, for about thirty seconds, I noted down what I was thinking: I roamed through 12 different topics and thought about different people. It would have been more, but my mind had become self- conscious. 

When I told a friend about this, she said, perhaps, the brilliant scientist Albert Einstein would have very few thoughts, hence the clarity of his thinking. One thing is clear: the moment you stop thinking, by listening to your breathing, you enter the silence within you. But to silence the mind is a gargantuan task. I believe I spend one minute out of 24 hours in the present. The rest of the time, I am in the past or the future. 

So, in this state of pessimism, it was no surprise when I saw the book ‘Quiet your Mind by American psychologist John Selby at the Ernakulam Public Library, I grabbed it. There was an urgent need within me to silence the mind and expand the abilities of the brain. 

The book is a simple and easy read. I have taken some suggestions and have tried to implement it. The one good thing I gained from reading the book is that now I am conscious of what I am thinking. 

This slows down the mind.  

Here are some quotes from the book: 

Most of our upsetting emotions are caused not by what’s going around us, but by fear-based thoughts, habitually running through our minds. 

All human beings are constantly judging the world around them through ‘automatic’ thoughts. These thoughts judge present situations based on past experience. 

Our thoughts almost always stimulate emotional responses in our bodies. 

Our chronic thoughts: memories of the past, judgements of the present, and imaginations of the future. 

As soon as you consciously accept the truth of the moment, your heart can open, and your intuitive mind can come into play. 

You cannot change the present moment. But reality is constantly evolving, and you can take part in the evolution. 

Anger is always a response to thoughts running through our minds. 

Our thoughts influence our minds. 

The simple act of shifting one’s mental focus from thinking to experiencing changes one’s basic neurological and physiological functioning.

We should purposefully shift from a negative thought to a present-moment sensory input such as breathing, sounds and enjoyable sights. 

Conscious perceptual shifts can change your inner experience. 

In contemporary society, there is a chronic fixation upon deductive thinking as opposed to intuitive reflections. 

In order to enter the higher states of consciousness, we must shift our attention to the physical sensory realm of immediate perception. 

The shift to sensory awareness quiets the usual chatter of the mind so that a deeper intuitive experience can emerge. 

When your inner voice is habitually anxious, it thinks worried thoughts, and these generate fearful emotions, choices, and actions. 

In every situation, consider to what extent you fully process the actual perceptive experience as opposed to projecting what you expect to see in that situation. 

When thoughts stop, the body knows what to do, and does it with perfection and pleasure unknown to the thinking mind. 

The key to deep sensual release lies in quieting the flow of thoughts through your mind while making love. 

Open Vs Closed Societies

 In his thought-provoking book, ‘Open’, published by Atlantic Books, Johan Norberg, a Swedish historian and thinker, has said that a study of human history has shown that societies flourished when it was open and stagnated or collapsed when it became closed. In a closed society, there is a heightened degree of nationalism, an Us Vs Them mentality and the stifling of all critical voices. 

As authoritarianism grows all over the world and with the advent of snooping software that penetrates into the deepest levels of a person’s life, Johan’s book is an important reminder of the dangers we face. 

A section of the blurb: From Stone Age hunter-gatherers to contemporary Chinese-American relations, Open explores how across time and cultures, we have struggled with a constant tension between our yearning for co-operation and our profound need for belonging. 

Here are some quotes from the book: 

The government’s role in an open society is to protect the search for better ideas, and people’s freedom to live by their individual plans and pursue their goals through a system of rules applied equally to all citizens. 

We all have psychological predispositions that push us towards tribalism, authoritarianism, and nostalgia, especially when we are threatened by recessions, foreigners or pandemics.

By glorifying conquest and national superiority an unceasing culture of blood thirst has emerged that will end up undoing civilisations and will surely end in blood and tears. 

Openness makes us uncomfortable and we search for a kind of certainty and belonging that freedom does not guarantee. 

Two-thirds of the average person’s material worth is determined by where in the world they happen to work. If people were allowed to move to the place where their labour is paid the best, the gains to world income would be astronomical. 

Mankind has always been on the move. We have always searched for a better climate, richer soil, or mate. We have always tried to escape hunger, troublesome neighbours and violence. 

Groups that are too similar are afflicted with group thinking. 

Fire grew our brains since cooked food releases more nutrients than raw food.

Some thoughts as I saw myself in a news video

 

By Shevlin Sebastian

When my sister sent a 6:49 minute video from Nanma 24 Channel, I clicked on it. So imagine my shock, when, at the 2:21 minute mark, I found myself in the video walking in a blue T-shirt, shorts and sneakers.

This was what happened. In the evening, as usual, I had gone to Attipetty Nagar for my evening jog, but found a barrier right at the entrance. So I stopped, parked my two-wheeler and walked through. I noticed a man holding a microphone in his hand.

I also observed large perpendicular cracks in the road, next to the Edappally canal, and assumed some road repair was going on.

But that was not true. The road was in the first stages of collapse. The mud beneath it had shifted, thanks to recent rains, and according to the voice-over in the news video, the road could cave in at any moment.

It was an odd feeling to watch myself from the back. I thought I looked a bit fat around the hips. But, when I sent it to a friend, known for her reassuring remarks, she assured me I looked fine. When I enlarged the image, I realised she was right.

It also raised a question for me: what do people think about me when they see me from the back and the front? What conclusions do they come to?

Recently, an aunt of mine met a few friends of hers who had seen me run. They told her they thought I was from North India.

This is partly true since I have spent many years in Calcutta.

One of them added, “Why does he have to run so much? And so fast?”

What do I think of my running?

I am not running very fast. It takes about 600 metres before I can feel my creaking joints get into some sort of rhythm.

So, what I think of my actions, and what others think of it may be the opposite.

It could be a revelation if you were to ask people: what do you think of me?

I also observe people even as I run, my mouth agape, gasping for breath and sweat dripping down my face: So, is that thirty-something couple married? They talk so much. Do married couples speak so much? Not in my experience. Why do they walk slowly? How can there be any physical benefit if they do not put the heart under strain? You need to walk fast, and pant a little if you want to gain something from this walk.

But after their walk, I am sure they would have felt they had done a good bit of exercise.

Another couple in their seventies: I always hear constant bickering between themselves as I speed past them. Looks like all affection and love have been burnt out.

What about the girl in her late twenties in a T-shirt and track pants? Does she not have any friends? Why does she always come alone? Is she married? Or divorced?

What about the pony-tailed woman, a mother of two sons who ride cycles? She is always speaking to somebody on the phone, through her earphones. So I think, ‘Who is she talking to? A woman? A man? Her mother? A colleague? A lover?’ Sometimes I think, ‘Have never seen her husband at all.’

She could say the same thing about me.

This analysis is happening both ways.

One day, a man stopped me and said, “Are you a doctor?”

“No,” I said.

“Oh, a lady walker told me you are a doctor,” he said.

So we spoke. And he was a priest. I would never have guessed that because he was in a collarless T-shirt and denim trousers.

A young nursing student stopped me and said, “What is your name?”

My first name is very unusual in Kerala. So, they play the word over in their minds and nod imperceptibly.

“You run very well,” she said.

“Thank you,” I said.

But do I?

The standard is so low in our state and country. So few do any exercise. So, if someone does a bit, it’s considered great. My cousin from Chicago told me he runs 10 kms a day. So that put me in my place .

Another walker, Rafiq (name changed), a successful entrepreneur, in his early thirties, also put me in my place.

“For a runner, you do have a paunch,” he said.

I looked down at my stomach, not very big, but felt embarrassed by what he said.

I took it as a challenge.

I immediately cut sugar and rice from my diet. Astonishingly, two months later, my stomach is nearly flat, my trousers have become loose, and I had to increase the notches on my belts.

So happy for that put-down by Rafeeq.

I was about to say, “You come with your mother?” when he told me, “I come with my wife. You must have seen her.”

I nod, glad that the question about his mother had been stuck in my throat. Since she was wearing a hijab, I could not guess her age.

So, everybody is evaluating each other as we go about our exercises in the evening, trying to keep healthy.

Interesting, the thoughts that came up, as I saw myself for a few seconds in a news video.

No heart at all

 

By Shevlin Sebastian

Just a day before my mother returned to Kochi, after five months with her daughter and son, following my dad’s passing away, my wife went to her ground-floor flat to do a clean-up.

In the kitchen, she noticed that in the third drawer of a built-in wooden cabinet, five baby rats were scrambling among the plastic bowls and a couple of rolls of cellophane paper. She pushed the drawer shut.

Later, she told me about it. I wondered what to do. Like my wife, I feel queasy when I see rodents.

I took the help of George, a watchman of a nearby building.

He pulled out the drawer, and we took it to the side of the house.

On the other side, there is a one-acre banana plantation.

“Let’s tip them over,” I said.

“Okay,” he said, and did so.

During the day, the mother rat foraged for food and brought it to the babies at night. It probably chose the drawer because it felt it was a safe place. The house had been empty for so long. Outside, in the grassy land, among the teak and coconut trees, there were numerous frogs, snakes, cats, dogs, and an army of centipedes, scorpions and ants. In short, there were too many predators around. I have seen crows pouncing on these baby rats.

George inserted the drawer back into the cabinet. We began searching for the hole.

It was a mystery. There were no spaces under the doors that led to the outside. We checked the windows. They all had wire meshes. But in the work area, beside the kitchen, as George removed a bucket on a cement ledge, there was a circular hole that led to the outside. I assumed it was made to put in the pipe of the washing machine so that the water could run out.

He rolled a piece of thick cloth and pushed it in a few inches. It was now tight and blocked.

“The rat will get the smell of her babies, as soon as she comes near the wall,” said George. “It will not come inside anymore.”

I thanked George, gave him a cash token, and he left.

The next morning, when I came in, I got a shock. The cloth had been pushed aside. I called George. He looked surprised, as he stared at the hole.

“It looks like because of the rains, the mother could not detect the smell of her babies,” he said. “There is also the possibility the crows ate the babies one by one. The mother assumed the babies were in the drawer. She must have made a supreme effort to push the cloth away, to get at her babies. That is the power of the motherly instinct. Since animals live in close touch with nature, they have more intense feelings than us. It is more genuine too.”

Indeed, it would have taken hours to push aside the cloth.

I can imagine the devastation the rat must have felt to see all her babies had vanished. She must have realised she made a horrific blunder by sheltering the babies inside a human habitation.

George stepped outside.

He took a small stone and placed it at the entrance of the hole.

“Because the mother has lost its babies, there is little chance it will come back again,” he said.

He turned out to be right. The stone remains where it is.

And we stone-hearted human beings remain where we are.

We have re-confirmed to the mother rat and her friends we are the most heartless and cruellest beings on the planet.