2012: A travelogue and last words ...

For those who tried to use calendars from mesoamerican times hoping for catastrophes 2012 has been quite a disappointment. Astronomical phenomena for stargazers were perhaps the most dazzling for the last year in its entirety.

In my personal life, there has been fire, something unquenchable, likening what was encountered at a burning bush long ago by an erstwhile prince of Egypt and a then shepherd. My last travel for the year was on 24-Dec-2012, and I landed between the days of 30-Dec and 31-Dec, perhaps to write this blog entry before it is too late.

The real prey

Recent news in India has the media focusing on a heinous crime, involving sexual assault in the capital city of Delhi inside a bus. The public have raised their voices in protest against the inability of the state machinery to stop the crime while the victim herself is fighting for her life while her own privacy has been threatened. The perpetrators of the crime have been condemned by several people through social media, blogs, newspaper articles and vociferous protests to have acted in the most inhuman manner ever. While the Police have apprehended suspects, the nation is erupting with more and more crimes against women getting reported and being given nation-wide attention.

Discrimination in India, by every name ...

I had just gone to fill a few forms in my company as part of a document audit. I was surprised at the kind of information which was found.

Each form requires one to provide

1. Proof that they were Born to Parents of social standing.
2. The Birth Certificate usually is sufficient for this.
3. Next comes the "community certificate" - at this stage each human belongs to their family with their aspirations to a good future. Furthermore in religious "tolerant" India, they would like to know "Religion" in detail. These definitions are perhaps the first among many mistakes in an extremely connected world. These are the social acceptance criteria laid out for us.

Further, walk into a free forum and find people gravitating, not by interest, but by their lingua. A subconsciously induced interest to limit our interaction with only those whom we are already familiar with.