The Mirare

I am Viji, software professional; yeah, still managing to be one in these troubled times :)
And this is my first attempt at writing a blog.

This is an attempt to reflect my thoughts on varied topics; to use this space as a platform to meet quality people and have meaningful discussions.

"Mirare" is the latin origin of the word "Mirror". As this space reflects my personality, so I have choosen this name. And why Latin?, as they say, just to be "different".

As I prefer variety during a read, this blog reflecting my interest; will have a format of a mini magazine, having four sections; "The Main Story", "Humor Section", "Food for thought" and "The Last Word".

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The Main Story: Lakshya – An unique movie watching experience

Few months back I was watching the Hindi movie "Lakshya" on Television. Yes the one which has Krithik and Preity Zinta as protagonist. This movie shows the growth of the hero from a confused young guy to a focused man in life with the background as Kargil War.

It is one of my favourite movies & so I was watching it all over again. Some time along the movie my neighbour's kids' Chinnu [studying in 2nd grade] and her brother Munna [studying in 7th grade] joined me in watching the movie.

Soon as expected I had to answer slew of questions getting shot from them, intervene numerous discussions happening among them selves and give explanations. I could hardly watch a scene peacefully; you know how it is to watch a movie with kids.

As the movie proceeded I had to explain about Kargil war and Indo-Pak relationships, how Pakistan army was involved in this attack and so on.
And during the discussion Munna all of a sudden made a blatant statement "All Muslims are like this only, we should be careful of them". I was choked with shock at his comment and my first reaction was to shout at him to shut up, but in a split second I reminded myself that he is still a kid and calmed myself down.
His comment was followed by Chinnu explaining that her brother was right. Infact, they were advising me to be careful of "such" people.

I understood that these biases were deeply ingrained in their minds and no explanation from my side would help. So I sat through the movie uncomfortably, listening to their disturbing conversations.

When the movie got over and titles were coming up, I insisted that these kids read through the titles. The director's name said "Farhan Akhtar". I read the name loudly and said yes he is a MUSLIM. Both the kids looked at me with a "REALLY ?" expression on their faces. Ofcourse after that, I did give them a lecture about how such biases are wrong and they should treat all their friends the same way irrespective of their religion, caste, or what ever.

But the more worrying thought is that how these young kids get into such mindsets. It could be the influence of what they see/hear in TV, internet etc, but don't kids pick up most of their habits/behavior from their own elders?

Every time there are some security issues like bomb blast in the country, I have seen the so called "educated" people make sweeping generalization and outrageous comments on entire communities as such. They don’t even bother to see if kids are around or not. How can the educated parents/elders, be so biased, be insensitive to this extent, and be so out of touch with ground realities.

If the so called "Islamic Terrorism" is growing dangeroulsy, isn't "Hindu Fanatism" not growning in India? Haven't we heard/seen "state programmed terrorism/riots" in some states of India? Isn't is spreading to other states too?

Isn't both form of terrorism equally dangerous and FATAL to India as a country, to India as an idea? Can we for once be honest with ourselves irrespectvive of our communties, religion, and get ourselves one round of reality check done?

That might do a lot of good, for us, for our kids and for our country.

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Humor Section: Small story of small letters

This incident happened when we were filling up our I semester Exam application forms of our graduation course.
Those were the days when the forms with "boxes" for each letter had just come out for, so we had to fill in one letter per box.

Me and my friend [Sushma] were filling up the form and when we came to the "address" section, we found that given boxes were not enough to fill in the entire address.

Being the studious types, we diligently went to office and enquired with clerk as to what can be done. [ok don't laugh, that’s not the joke, see what the clerk replied].

Clerk who was completely involved with his work simply replied "write in small letters, space will be enough".

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Food For Thought: Game of Bow and Arrow

Relationship between parents and kids are like Bow and Arrow. Unless bow releases, lets-go the arrow, the arrow will never reach its destination.
Nevertheless, it is essential that before leaving, the right direction and strength should be given by bow, so that arrow reaches its right destination at right time.

I guess this is meaning of a Hindi poem [whose name I have forgotten] which describes how important it is for the parents to let go their kids; guide them with out being possessive about them.

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The Last Word: The Last Name Funda

I have always wondered right from my school days as to why I have one only "Initials" in my name, that of my father's name. And why is my mother's name not included in my name. Have even asked my dad about this and the answer I got was so typical "It has always been the case, it’s been followed for so many years now".

But that did not answer my question nor did the curiosity die. As I grew up, these questions have always pondered me. We equate everything in nature to mother; Land, Water, River, Fire, Earth, Soil, Country, the list goes on. Mother is given so much respect that she is positioned just next to God and nothing less than that.

That being the case, why shouldn’t a mother have her name attached to her own kid's name, why do we attach only father's name. Not just father's name, people even attach caste, place of birth, as their last names, but no, not their mother's name. Strange isn't it?

I don’t know what the so called "tradition" has been, I don’t care what the reasons have been for this kind of tradition, I never did and never will understand such practices. Neither do I care about the psychological, political or legal reasons of last names.

All that I know is, when I am a mother, I will have “last word” on this subject. My child will have two "Initials", "V" and "*", [ok, or rather "*" and "V"], and yes "The Star" is yet to be identified :)

If I don’t do this, then I too will be giving some absurd explanation of last names to my kid, just like my dad did, which I myself don’t understand.

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