Either you find religion or religion finds you. Those who take pride in their faith tend to behave like they are doing something special but in practice, they are replicating all those who followed their faith system before them. Without a hint of pride in your faith, it’s quite impossible to be religious. Expecting fellow human beings to be devoid of even 60 gm of arrogance would be cruel. That said, there is nothing miraculous about your parents choosing your religion for you. If anything, whether you admit it or not, you are being pious because you love your parents more than the gods they believe in. Without that filial plug, you would be irreligious through and through.
When you have crossed 35, you finally reach a stage where you can answer one of the most theatrical questions out there: does god exist? Your experiences in life have provided you with enough evidence (or lack of it) and discourse (or surplus of it) to decide categorically. There have been many moments where you felt like giving up and yet, you didn’t. You genuinely thought somebody looks out for you, or that prayers are more than just self-pep talks. Why is this so? Because humans are the most rational irrational creatures. We seek meanings in things that don’t know what a dictionary is. Some of us stare at the sky for its serene blueness while others stare it for divine intervention. Some of us break idols while others look out for gods in perhaps the oldest thing—remnants of rock—in the world. And when you take all these factors into consideration, you can answer for yourself that only you exist. Everything else is an illusion.
Ask anyone you know to name 10 of the most beautiful temples in India. If they manage to list—which I highly doubt given the lack of architectural awareness—you’d notice that more than half of these names are centuries old. In other words, the greatest temples were already built ages ago and not just in India but also in Indonesia, Sri Lanka, Cambodia and Vietnam. For instance, the sheer scale of Angkor Wat is mind numbing and the aerial shots of the complex show that it was done within a perfect rectangle, more than eight centuries ago. Closer home, you’d be amazed to learn how Kailasa temple—the largest monolithic structure in the world—was carved out of a single rock. On to read about Brihadeeswara and its many mind-bending designs, you are floored. Literally. This list goes on and on. The older the temple, the more marvelous are its contours and much mysterious too. It’s safe to suggest that the modern temples can’t touch the glory of the past. Yes, Akshardham temples (all three of them) are stupendous and the upcoming Ram Mandir is beautiful but do they inspire jawdropping awe? Perhaps there is a reason why it’s important to hold onto the ruins because a civilization rooted in its timeless architecture can’t afford to forget.
In the ancient era, those who traveled from south to north of India and vice versa—covering all the significant pilgrimage sites—were looking for religious places of worship. But in essence, they were seeking gods. Just to know that Lord Shiva once inhabited Varanasi was enough for them to undertake the arduous journey to greet the Ganges. Or that Lord Rama passed through Nashik during his exile was more than enough of a lure to visit Panchvati. Not to mention the incredible journeys they undertook in the hills, at the foothold of Himalayas. So many of them would perish without even seeing their destination unfold, but even in their death the myth of salvation was already planted: if you die in the middle, you’d find yourself closer to moksha. One way ticket. I wonder whether any such old pilgrims got lost in their ways and ended up somewhere else—it’s difficult to find anything without G-Map nowadays—far away from their pilgrim sites they originally intended to reach. And whether they found what they were looking for. There.
The Hindi film industry can make the most of its ongoing BO lull if the makers bother to reflect a bit. That’s all. Instead, the current narrative is hellbent on finding a scapegoat for their collective failures. Everybody else is to blame except the industry. You can read long articles on how the society has become polarized and communalization is on the rise and blah blah. But none of them appear to address a core tenet: people watch what they wish to watch. The market of 2022 is not the market of 2012. Things have changed so much and things are continuously changing. The rise of OTT and the decline of economy thanks to the pandemic, among other factors, have a massive role to play in BO collections. In their zeitgeist for excessive marketing, Bollywood stopped believing in the power of word-of-mouth. If anything, the lockdowns and extended social distancing brought people closer to each other. So much so that they would take the word of a fellow human being more seriously than a exubereant digital ad.
It’s that time of the year when popular brands try to rain gyaan on a particular community on how they should be celebrating their festivals; festivals that they have been celebrating perfectly well for centuries. It’s a cute postmodernist twist in marketing. My understanding of these gimmicks is arbitrary: they do it for the simple task of garnering attention, by trending for a bit on social media, and betting on the best possible outcome. Which is a fair take as in a free market, anything goes for profit and attention is scarce. What is interesting, however, is how the same brands project themselves as victims later. Well, you can’t have it both ways.
Actors make good activists only when they are portraying an activist in a movie. Otherwise, their sphere of influence is pretty limited. Moreover, no actor would go against themselves. Never. Their skin in the game extends only to their personal growth. George Clooney supporting Darfur bears no conflict for him. Zilch. Similarly, Angelina Jolie’s call for arrest of Kony falls in the same bracket. Brad Pitt did one seemingly benign movie called Seven Years in Tibet (1997) and got banned from China. Not a word against the Chinese establishment so far. Why? Business matters. When you are into making movies, there are many stakeholders you are answerable to. Richard Gere is probably a worthy exception here as his 1993 Oscar speech in support of Tibet ensured that he is never part of a blockbuster film again. Pure economics. You can see this behaviour in Bollywood: not one actor worth their salt makes a sound against the government. Even the British actor Riz Ahmed avoids making a statement in support of Shia/Hazara/Hindu minorities in Pakistan, let alone the military reign. An actor, at the end of the day, is there only to act. And in most cases, in their best interest.
Sacred Games (season 1) is arguably one of the greatest TV productions to emerge out of India but there is one moment in this show that left your mouth open longer than usual: Subhadra (played by Rajshri Deshpande) baring her chest for a scene. Despite the influx of scatological yet witty dialogues, nobody expected to see that happen. Given how sexually repressed Indian society is, it’s worth pondering if such powerful moments can go a long way in educating men about the normalcy of human anatomy. That breasts are normal, and so are a man and woman in a bed together. A very common event. Nothing that should warrant an oho gasp or a schoolish chuckle.
The humour police want to dictate what you find funny. A ridiculous proposition. Laughing has to be one of the most sacred bits of our (mostly) sorry existence. When you laugh responsibly, absolutely nothing happens. The key word is ‘responsibly’, like it is true for drinking. Just because you have a great sense of humour doesn’t mean you visit an orphanage with your parents. In a similar vein, it’s insensitive to laugh at those you haven’t earned the trust of. It’s one thing to make fun of your bald friend and quite another to throw shades at a random bald fellow minding his own business in Delhi Metro. There are lines in comedy which only comedians are supposed to cross. We, the lesser mortals, must stick to responsible jokes. That said, we must always remember that nobody is above humour. Not god, not religion, not state, not emotions or sentiments, not old men, not young women, not even children — nobody. Everybody can and should be made fun of. Thank you for attending my sed talk.
All your life, you are given ample chances to improve, to fight back, to get up and going. You are given choices and you are expected to do what is right. You will fuck up. Everybody does. That is the core beauty of being alive: there are more losses than wins; there are more bruises than grins. Yet, for what it’s worth, you are supposed to continue and find reasons to not kill yourself. You, regardless of how difficult it is to believe, are a significant piece of this universe. Despite your consistent screw-ups, you are contributing to the cycles. With you gone, there’ll be a void that can’t be filled. And that is also why your exclusive time on earth matters. It’d be better if we do our very best. Our fate reckons even if we are filled with darkness. We have to keep moving, in whatever direction possible. The trick is to keep moving. After all, the light at the end of the tunnel is you.
We talk a lot about being nice and it only goes to show that being nice is the first step towards becoming a kind(er) person. Compassion doesn’t come easy in this indifferent world of ours. Not my problem, is a common refrain. After all, just because something bad happened somewhere doesn’t mean I should be responsible here for it. Fair deal. My amma has a slightly different take on this subject. Spoke to her last weekend and this is what she had to say.
Me: “What should a person always aim to be?”
She: “A person must try hard to be filled with compassion (karuna).”
Me: “Isn’t that a difficult thing to do?”
She: “It is. And that’s exactly why we should try.”
I advocate compassion and kindness. But I also think that we as a generation are experiencing something called “compassion fatigue” because of the being in constantly touch with everything that happens globally thanks to social media. So, I always wonder where should we draw a line when it comes to practicing compassion? Thanks for letting me rant.
I wish I can also write like you!