Thursday, March 29, 2012

अहो गुणवती भार्या , भांडा वित्तम न याचते !

The Saint and his pupil.

Once upon a time, not very long ago, lived a Saint named Alpaanada at the foot hills of the Himalayas.

He used to train disciples in history and philosophy and was pretty well known in the Yogi academic circles. He had a wife called Sundari, who was famous for her big mouth.

Sundari used to keep nagging her husband about the poor quality of life in the Himalayas, but Alpaananda, true to his name, was quite happy with his life.

One day, one of his students, Pungavaabhirama, invited him over to his house for lunch. Pungavaabhirama wanted to make fun of Swami Alpaananda for his inability to deal with his wife's nagging.

So, Pungavaabhirama made his wife, Komaalangi a deal."Tomorrow, when the Guruji arrives for lunch, I will pretend to be abusing you. I want you to ignore my abuses, and pretend as if I am incharge of the house. If you do this, I shall give you money enough to buy the Kantthabharana (Necklace) you've been asking since long."

Komalaangi took a few minutes to think about the offer and Said, "Ok, I shall pretend as you say, and I will also prepare the Best meal for your Guruji. But Remember, I will only put up with this until 100 abuses!"

The next day, Alpaananda took his wife's permission and reached Pungavaabhirama's house just before lunch time.

Pungavaabhirama greeted him and shouted "Komalaangi, you lazy donkey, come here and offer the guest some water to wash his feet!", and proudly grinned at his Guru.
Alpaananda smiled nonchalantly.

All through the Lunch session, Pungavaabhirama kept abusing his wife, and tried to show his Guru that He was the man of the house. He then shouted again, "Where is the Dal (a main course dish in India) , you lazy monkey?!"

Komalaangi, who was really angry by now, was keeping calm because of her greed for the money to buy herself a Kantthabharana, was silently counting her Husband's abuses.
She realised that Pungavaabhirama had exhausted his 100 abuses, and was about to warn him after serving him Dal from the earthen pot she was carrying.

Pungavaabhirama, who had noticed the Guruji's indifference to his actions, saw his wife returning from the kitchen and said "Make it fast you sloth faced woman!"
Komalaangi lost her temper, and crashed the earthen pot into her husband's head, and said, "Now, Give me my money, you useless man"

Alpaananda, who was none the wiser about his pupil's deal with Komalaangi, smiled and said " अहो गुणवती भार्या , भांडा वित्तम न याचते !"
"I am so fortunate to have a wife, who is truly a treasure of values, since she has broken many pots on my head, but never asked me to pay for those pots!"

Tuesday, March 13, 2012

We Could Fall....

What is worse than a forest guide mauled by a tiger?

I always was morbidly afraid of snakes. And never thought I would realise that a far more deadly predator existed... This predator was more close to us than any of the so called wild beasts... He existed within us.

The video of LTTE Prabhakaran's son's killing by the SriLankan Troops is another example of how low humans could fall!


I can never understand why the incident ever happened. Was the 12 year kid a threat to national security? Was he a terrorist? was he a part of whatever his father had done???
And I don't want to understand either.
We do hear people saying "You can't fall any further!".
But incidents like this one show us the truth... That WE COULD FALL...
We could keep falling as long as we wanted to..

The worst part is that this event will fade away into oblivion... :(

I am editing this post  after almost one year of first publishing it to thank the journalists whose work has now brought international focus to this issue again.

I was right when I said that the event will fade away into oblivion... I truly hope that this time it won't...

I can't even say "Rest in peace" Balachandran... I can just hope for it... :(