Coal or diamond..!

16-03-2010

Robert Clements

There’s really nothing extraordinary about Bill Gates if you look at him, he’s got five fingers just like you and me, and if good Bill pulls off his socks maybe he’ll show you he’s got five toes on each leg too. Same two hands like you and me and two legs too.

But if Bill and you walk down to yon local bank and Bill he kind of shows off and pulls out his passbook then you’re gonna need a tanker full of water to revive you, “So many zeros Bill?” “Yeah Bob, even I didn’t know once, how many zeros made a billion!” There’s nothing really extraordinary about Lincoln if you look at him, scruffy beard, not a very good looking face, deep haunting eyes, too lanky if you ask me, and yet if you look around, as I once did, at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington DC and stare at tearful faces around, you’ll know this man was somebody, “So many tears?” “Yeah Bob, I was quite an ordinary feller!”“But!” shout the crowd in unison throwing aside their cameras, “You did extraordinary things Mr Lincoln!” And then I hear a voice roaring through a mike, “I have a dream!” “Yes sir, Martin Luther King, you sure do, But so do the rest of the world, we’re all day dreamers sir, each and every one of us!” “But I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at a table of brotherhood.”Ah Mr King, stop dreaming sir!

And then a black man wins an election, steps into the White House and there is a hush as the whole of America remembers Martin’s dream.Ordinary people! Extraordinary deeds! People who were born like you and me, who faced failure like you and me, heard the laughter of others jeering at their dream, saw the sneers of those who had already reached the top, “You trying to get to where we are young yuppy? Here’s a kick for your efforts!” But like coal that becomes a diamond, each sneer, each kick, each failure spurred them on. We’re all coal, ready to be thrown into the fireplace, ready to give one bright flash of light, one spark, one simmering glow and then die, but if we can see within ourselves the making of a diamond, if we can light a zeal, ignite a passion, fan a bonfire within ourselves, then we can escape the fireplace of the ordinary and move into the portals of the extraordinary where like a Kohinoor we will glow and light the world with our dazzling brilliance.

Such coals were ordinary men; Gates, Lincoln, Luther, not buckling under, but harnessing pressure, sparkling radiantly forever, deciding to become diamonds! What’s your decision today? Coal or diamond?

Get ragged be ready..!

15-03-2010

Robert Clements

Suddenly we are all up and against ragging: We have anti-ragging laws, anti-ragging police squads and now an anti-ragging national culture. Sad in a way, because if we don’t know how to take our ragging in college, we’ll find it rather hard having to go through it later in life.

I’m totally against sadistic ragging, and would certainly love to see such in jail, but other good natured ragging which we all went through in college makes a man of out of a sissy. A few years ago while judging a one act play competition, at the local IIT Mood Indigo, I suddenly realized there was something amiss, and the next moment saw a young girl contestant coming on stage, announcing that her team was withdrawing from the competition because they were being booed. I asked whether I could intervene. “Booing,” I told the hall, “Is part of life!” “Whether we’re doing something good, worthwhile or silly, there will always be people to boo us, but,” and I paused, “The important thing is to continue doing what we are doing, and still the people who boo us!”

“How?” asked the same girl.“One,” I said, “by giving a performance that will have the booers tongue tied and two by not hearing their boos!” I sat down and watched as same girl and her team gave a performance that was so powerful that there was pin drop silence in the hall, even though there were a few boos at the beginning, they were stilled into quietness. “Thank you,” she told me as she took away the first prize, “You’ve taught me a lesson for life!”

I thought about that incident this morning and wondered where that same girl was now, and like to think she’s gone far and achieved much because she’d learnt that day not to be over sensitive and not to take herself too seriously: And that is what ragging is all about: A time to be able to do the most ridiculous, ludicrous things and laugh with others as they laugh at us. We as a nation take ourselves too seriously. We always feel somebody is poking fun, having a dig at us. I went for a wedding last week where I saw an old couple, elegantly dressed sitting in the pew at the back and said, “You look like the bride and bridegroom!” “Are you making fun of us?” asked the lady sternly and I looked up and prayed they’d learn not to take themselves so seriously. But we’ve banned ragging, we ban jokes and even go on a rampage when somebody has a good natured laugh at us, so much so I can expect a tourist circular for those traveling to the sub- continent saying, “Say only nice things when you reach there, they have no sense of humour!” Get ragged be ready! It’s when we are over protective with our children that they don’t know how to face the world later..!

Changes in the Indian Parliament..!

Robert Clements

Things are going to change in India’s Parliament but not the way you think it’s gonna change: With the Women’s Reservation Bill ready to be passed we will soon have hundreds of the fairer sex thronging its otherwise boring portals!

“My makeup bill will go up hundred percent!” sighed an old MP ruffling his bald head, “I’ll have to cut down on expenditure for my constituency and spend instead on my beautician, hairdresser, manicurist and pedicurist!” “What will you cut down on sir?” asked his worried PA. “That bridge which we laid the inaugural stone for last week, I am sure the villagers can wade through the river for a few years more, I won’t build those three schools and also that hospital in my village, delete them from my list!”

“But you will lose many votes sir!” “Bah! Who’s bothered about silly votes, when the women vote me as the handsomest Parliamentarian!”

His wife was livid! “You say you will be spending more time in Parliament?” she shouted, “then how will I take the children to school without the official car? How will I buy vegetables without your PA, your assistants and secretary helping me out? Who will see that my brother’s daughter and my cousin’s son get admission in the local school if you are not here?”

“My country comes first!” said the MP. “How is it your country never came first before?” “Because my country has just become more interesting,” said the MP as he hurriedly fixed an appointment with the hairdresser. “Where are you going?” “To the hairdresser!”

“But you have no hair to cut?” “There is a new process to grow hair!” “But that is a costly process!” “Ask your father for a small donation, some leftover of the dowry, and could you give me a small loan!” And in the corridors of power some elected representatives were huddled in a corner listening to a learned colleague reading from a hard bound book, “What is the book?” asked the Speaker curiously as he passed by.

“Etiquette and Manners..!” said a junior MP and the Speaker smiled and thought, “It’s going to be a Women’s Reservation Bill which will finally see a new bunch of polite and courteous MP’s! We should have thought of doing this much before..!”

A dose of forgiveness..!

10-03-2010

Robert Clements

Something that startles me no end is to hear people talk about old hurts, insults and old humiliations, and know that forgiveness has not taken place. And as I listen to bitter, shrill voice expounding on such old incidents, I want to shake them and say, “It’s you who are killing yourself carrying your bitterness on!” And more than that, “You kill present day relationships, because nobody knows when dormant volcano within you, will erupt and intrude into everyday situations!”Dr Frank Boehm learned long ago that not everything that happens to our body is assigned to medical facts. “My father who escaped the Holocaust believed that anger, resentment and unforgiveness, bred disease of the soul, as well as the body. Forgiveness is good medicine he told me.”

Some years ago a patient came to see Dr Boehm about her constant neck pain, headaches and high blood pressure. But he couldn’t find a medical cause for her ailments. “Tell me about your life,” he then said. She told him she was in conflict with her two sisters because they had forsaken her in her time of need earlier. Recalling his father’s words, the doctor encouraged her to forgive her sisters. Years later Boehm received a letter from his patient. She had made peace with her sisters and sure enough her physical ailments had abated. “She found forgiveness and from this good health,” said Boehm. “When you are treated unjustly by another, anger is a natural response,” says Robert Enright, professor of educational psychology and author of ‘Forgiveness is a Choice’. “But if these resentful feelings are not resolved, a grudge will form: Victims, may want to hold a grudge because it gives them a regained sense of control and superiority. However when nursing a grudge you’re essentially stuck in the victim role and are inviting anger to become a companion in your everyday life and a toxin to your body..!” Says Dr Redford Williams, author of ‘Anger Kills’, “If you don’t forgive, resentment can erupt at any time and the cost to your body is ongoing. It’s like taking small doses of poison daily!” Forgiveness is not denying you’re angry or pretending the injury didn’t happen. Forgiveness is to reframe how one feels about the offense and those seen as responsible. It is moving from continually replaying your personal grievance story to revising it so that you are no more a victim of your past.

Start small by learning how to forgive minor slights. If you arrive home and trip on your son’s bicycle in the verandah or driveway, recognize that he isn’t out to get you, and forgive him.“By changing your thinking you can decide whether your anger is appropriate,” says Williams, “and over time you will be able to forgive tougher injuries.” “One forgiving act is the beginning,” says Enright, “as you continue offering forgiveness, your identity will no longer be that of a victim but of one who is powerful in the face of adversity!” Want to be healthy? Swallow a dose of forgiveness..!

 

Blaming mom..!

09-03-2010

Robert Clements

Way to go Mel, blame mom for all your problems right! Your nicotine, your drinking, your womanizing, and whatever else you do, and don’t want to blame yourself for.

And since you’ve started on this blaming game, why not blame mother for some other things?“Like what Bob?” “The fact that you’re a millionaire?” “Blame mom for that?” “Yeah, I mean it must be her genes that got you started right? Her determination and tenacity?”

“I don’t know?” “But you’re sure about the smoking right?” “Yeah Bob, she used to smoke like a chimney!” “A terribly bad habit right?”

“Yeah can you imagine smoking away ciggy after ciggy, not bothered whether poor Mel will pick up the habit later?” “Oh poor Mel!”

“Yeah thank you, thank you, I just want people to know who we pick these bad habits from and then just can’t give it up!” “Sure Mel I’m sure the whole of America must have heard what you said about your mother and if I know your country, lawyers must be already lining up to sue parents about their children’s addictions!”

“You don’t say so?” “Why Mel you know how your lawyers are?” “So I can sue my mother now?” “Why not, but…” “But what Bob?” “I’ve got a notice I’ve brought from your ma, here’s it!” “Is she suing me?” “Read it,” I told the actor, and as he read the notice from his mother, he had tears in his eyes: Dear Mel, For the nine months I carried you while you were growing inside me: No Charge.

For all the nights that I’ve sat up with you, doctored and prayed for you: No Charge. For all the trying times, and all the tears that you’ve caused through the years: No Charge.

For all the nights filled with dread, and for the worries I knew were ahead: No Charge. For the toys, food, clothes, and even wiping your nose: No Charge.

When you add it up, the cost of my love is: No Charge. Love Your Ma. I watched Mel Brooks wipe his eyes, and say aloud, “I’m sorry mother, I’m sorry..!”



 

Moon water..!

08-03-2010

Robert Clements

“..There could be as much as 600 million metric tonnes of water ice in the dark craters, near the moon’s north pole..” Hindustan Times, March 3rd and in the water starved regions of the world, there is rejoicing; “Our water worries are over,” cried the UN chief. “Now all we have to do is get the water from the moon to the thirsty nations of the earth!” “We will get it across,” said the American envoy firmly, “We have the money, the knowledge and infrastructure to support such a project!” No!” roared Chinese rep, as Chinese soldiers pointed bayonets at the moon, “We will undertake the venture, we are cheaper than any other country in the world!”

“Your cheaper will get us contaminated water!” sneered America. “Your infrastructure will get us water costlier than petrol!” sniggered China. The UN chief looks worried, “No fighting!” he chastened the two countries, “We need to do this without any fights okay?” China and America glowered at each other, then looked up as the envoy from India rushed in, “We will undertake the project!”“You?” asked China and America suppressing a guffaw, “How?”“Do you plan to get a giant hose?” asked England with a sneer. “Or maybe use buckets with your billion people forming a line from the moon to earth?” grinned Australia. The UN chief looked worried, “India I don’t think you should get into this, leave it to America or China!” “Did America or China find water in the moon?” asked the Indian envoy. “No you did!” conceded the UN chief, “But that’s because they didn’t really look for water!” “Bah!” said the Indian, “Even if they’d looked they wouldn’t have found water!” So what do you propose India?”

“Mr Ramaswami here will explain everything!” The UN chief looked even more worried as Mr Ramaswami stood in front of him, “First I will have to be taken to the moon!” he said. “Along with my laptop!” “That will be looked after,” said the UN chief.“Then I will convert all the water there into a HTML code!” “What?” asked the UN chief surprised. “How do you carry huge attachments, graphics and so on?” asked Mr Ramaswami, “By converting into simple HTML text right, so we will convert all the water in the moon by the same formula, then send it by gmail to my account in India and hey presto the world has moon water!”

The world watched on TV as the UN Chief, and representatives from America, China, England and India stood up to give Mr Ramaswami a standing ovation. “Our water is safe..!” said the Man in the Moon to his wife.



 

Train training for Bangladesh..!

07-03-2010

Robert Clements

Mamata Bannerjee (India’s Railway Minister) announced that India would set up railway training centres to train personnel from Bangladesh and other neighboring countries... Times of India, March 2nd

Namoshkar madam railway minister, here are the first batch of railwaymen from Bangladesh who have come to receive training from us!” “Very good! Very good! I will personally train these men! Shagatom! Are you all married?” “Yes madam!” “And do you listen to your wives all the time?” “Yes madam, all the time!” “Very good! Very good! Now first thing you must train your wife to sit on the engine when you are driving!” “Bujhtey paarchi na! Sit on the engine madam?” “Yes, because in my country and yours, all passengers sitting on the engine right?”

“Right madam!” “On the window and everywhere right? So you cannot see anything from engine driver cabin, but when wife sit on engine, wife will instruct you to drive fast or slow, wife will tell you when station is coming, when to blow horn…” All this madam when she sit on the engine?” “Yes, yes, so teach her to balance well, if you have wife who is imbalanced then get girlfriend, but railways will not pay for second marriage, and no compensation if they fall off engine!” “We will not see madam, wife will see! We will listen to her!”

“Very good, Bangladeshi railwaymen like Indian railwaymen, very clever! Always listen to woman! You have passed exam, go back to Bangladesh and start driving train!” “Madam should our wives be sent here for training, so they will give us good instructions?” “Have I given you good instruction just now?” “Yes madam!”

“You think I get any training?” No madam!” And I have given good railway budget, ah? Woman don’t need training, also..” Yes madam?” “Remember all trains must start from Kolkata!” “But we are from Bangladesh madam!” “Whether Bangladesh, or Madras, Kashmir or Timbuktu all trains must start from?” “Kolkata!” “Khoob Balo! Khoob Balo! You will be very good engine drivers, next..!”
 

Rough hands..!

05-03-2010

Robert Clements

The middle aged woman who looked more like she was in her sixties wiped the sweat from her brow as she entered her little house. She saw her teenaged daughter lying on the only bed they had, she noticed there were tears in the little girls eyes.

“How was college my child?” she asked. “Terrible!” wept the little girl. “Were the teachers bad or the subjects difficult?” “Neither,” said the little girl. “So why the tears on your first day my child?” “I don’t want to go to college ever again mother” “But your teachers were good and your subjects were not difficult?” “My classmates were horrible.” “Oh! Oh!” said the mother. “Did you have a fight with them?”

“No mother I didn’t.” “They laughed at you?” “No.” “Then how were they horrible?” asked the mother. “They ignored me ma. They talked to each other. They cracked jokes with each other. They ragged one another, but they kept away from me.” “And you felt bad?” “Mother it was horrible. Not just them ignoring me, I also felt different.

They wore the latest fashionable tops and skirts, the latest Levi’s and Nike shoes. They were all carrying cell phones and chatting and SMSing all the time. Oh mother I felt strange being there.”

The mother looked at her little girl and went over and sat on her bed. The hands that stroked her daughter’s body were rough and blistered. “It’s going to be a tough year for you,” she said. “Yes mother,” murmured the little girl. “But you can make it easy for yourself,” said the mother.

“How mother? How?” sobbed the little girl. “By doing in college what you entered college for,” said the mother. “You didn’t enter to make a fashion statement. You didn’t enter to impress the others. You go my child to study hard and be somebody one day.”

The mother stroked the little girls head. “My hands are rough aren’t they?” “Yes mother.” “Remember them, my child. When you see those flashy cellphones think of your mothers hands. When you see mini skirts and costly tops imagine these blisters.” “Why mother?” asked the little girl.

“Because my child, if you can give those five years all you’ve got, if you can see the goal you have set out to reach and see nothing else then you need not have hands that do the work I do. Forget those phones, those fancy clothes, they will be yours when it is time. Walk tall in what you wear, shine in the subjects you have taken and grudgingly but surely will you get your due.”

The little girl kissed her mothers hands. “Why did you get such hands ma?” she asked. A tear dropped from the mother’s eye, “Instead of studying, I wasted years with fancy stuff,” she cried, “My hands pay the price today in the menial work I do..!”

Giving up for lent..!

02-03-2010

Robert Clements

Bob what have you given up for Lent?” This is a question that’s asked to me every year, during those forty days before Easter which to those who are not familiar, is called the period of Lent, and I turn and ask, “What have you given up?” “Drinks!” “Meat!” “Fish!” “Sweets!” “Smoking!” And the list goes on, and again the question to me, “What have you given up Bob?” Yes, what is it that I’ve given up? “Myself!” “Yourself?”

“Yes myself!” “You can’t give up yourself Bob! You’ve got to give up something, like chocolates, drinking, eating meat!”

“No I’ve given up myself!” And I see a God above smile and angels laugh, “Yes Bob we’ve got you!” “It was tough God!” “I know Bob, but that’s the only way!” “I tried to wriggle, struggle, run away, hide, I tried to lose myself in the pleasures of the world!” “Oh yes and we watched from up here, watched you dabble with things that burnt you, watched you move into things that hurt you, we watched you try and escape and my angels cried!”

“Why didn’t you just catch me and pull me to you, why?” “Because you had to give yourself up my son!” “Yes!” I say joyously, “I had to give myself up!” “Is it a good feeling giving yourself up?” they ask, “Giving up smoking, drinking or the pleasures of life itself for one month is quite a sacrifice you know?”

“Sacrifice?” I ask and laugh. “What do you laugh about?” “When I give myself up, it is the most glorious, joyous feeling! It is not me who’s sacrificing anything, it’s Him above who sacrificed His goodness to hold my dirty hand..!”

And somewhere up there I hear the sound of laughter as angels hold me then pass me around, cuddled and loved like a baby. Good feeling, giving yourself up..!

My harmonica and hymns..!

01-03-2010

Robert Clements

Sometimes when my soul cries out in agony, and even the soothing sound of rustling leaves, the cry of birds and the beauty of flowers fail to lift my mood, it is to my harmonica I turn. I close my door and play my heart out, tunes doleful and sad, heartbreaking and sorrowful but ever so slowly I find same tunes changing and it is to the hymns of my youth I return to. And then the strains change, plaintive notes become strong, my hand which holds harmonica, grasps instrument more firmly and the melody that pours out turns assertive and confident. My harmonica and hymns, ever linked to each other.

A few months ago in the colony I stay in there was a talent contest for adults, and as usual no adult ventured to give his or her name, “Bob why don’t you do something!” said my neighbours.

“Like what?” I asked. “Mimicry or do a dance?” “Mimicry or a dance?” I cried out and imagined myself in front of mike like Johnny Lever giving a performance; mimicking all and sundry and felt a shiver down my spine, “No,” I whispered and then put my name down, “I’ll play the harmonica!” Well once a name is put down, I guess others rustle up same courage and soon mimicry artists and stand up comedians who hadn’t mimicked or stood up in years were competing with me. “What are you going to play?” asked my two girls, “We’ve never heard you play a filmy song and dad only such songs win prizes!”

I thought of the few songs I knew, and even practiced some. “Ladies and gentlemen,” shouted the MC, “And now we have someone from our midst who’ll play the harmonica!”

I stood in front, placed harmonica to my lips and suddenly knew it couldn’t be anything else but a hymn. “May I?” I asked, “Play Gandhiji’s favourite hymn?” And that is what I did, and even walked off with the first prize. My harmonica and hymns, ever linked to each other.

And today as I feel my soul cry out in agony, and even the soothing sound of rustling leaves, the cry of birds and the beauty of flowers fail to lift my mood, it is to my harmonica I turn. I close my door and play my heart out, tunes doleful and sad, heartbreaking and sorrowful but ever so slowly I find the tunes changing and it is to the hymns of my youth I return to and my tears stop, my mood changes as a God above through my little harmonica reaches out and comforts me. My harmonica and hymns ever linked to each other..!
 

Mamata and her budget..!

27-02-2010

Robert Clements

Not many of us realize the preparations that go into the presentation of a Railway Budget, luckily I was party to the rehearsal that took place with Mamata’s trainer before the railway minister addressed Parliament.
“No, no madam minister, you don’t have to enter Parliament shouting slogans, and screaming, no posters, no placards, no demonstrations, it’s your budget! Of course you can eat tomorrow, there’s no hunger strike, no fast to death, no threatening self- immolation! You may rehearse the speech madam!”
“Lalu Prasadji!” “Who?” “I am addressing to Lalu Prasadji I am telling him, I have better budget!” “You have to address the speaker madam, not the former railway minister! Now will you please start again!” “Madam speakerji, I present the railway budget of the government of West Bengal!” “What? What did you say? West Bengal?” “Yes, yes, this is the budget for my state!” “This is the budget for the Government of India madam!” “No, no, see, look, most of new trains, new locomotive factories, new stations, are all for the state of West Bengal!” “But you are the railway minister for the government of India!” “What is that?” “What is what?”
“You just said no, some government of India? What is that, where is that place, I know only West Bengal! You are confusing me! I have to make speech and you are disturbing my thoughts telling me about some place I do not know!” “I am sorry madam, I am sorry! I do not want to perturb you! You may start your rehearsal again!”
Madam speakerji may I present the budget for the government of West Bengal!” “Railway budget madam! Railway budget! You are the railway minister!” “No, that what was my last speech! That is over!” “And what are you now madam?” “The Chief Minister of West Bengal and..!” “And what madam?” “You are interrupting me! You are making me confused, I am feeling, what is that word?”
“Perturbed?” “Yes do not perturb me, I have to make speech for my beloved Bengalee people, and you go on talking about this India, India, bah..!”
 

A fool named Khan..!

24-02-2010

Robert Clements

The rich and famous, have realized the best way up is to avoid controversies, avoid stepping on people’s toes, don’t go near touchy issues, keep clear off contentious concerns; be neutral. That is the surefire formula for success, popularity, fame and money.
And the guy who puts his neck on the line, decides to stand up for what he thinks is right, delivers an opinion, gets his point across is, ahem, a fool.Who but a fool would put his reputation at stake, who but one would say this is what I believe in and let the world know such, who but a fool would tell the world what the whole world wants to ignore and still love, “I am a Muslim!”
Shah Rukh did just that! At a juncture when the world looks at any with beard and skull cap with suspicion, a time when a mosque is looked at with misgiving, a time a woman in a hijab is avoided, Shah Rukh shouted, “My name is Khan!”
Only a fool would do that right?I watched the movie on Saturday and wept not at the misfortunes of a young boy stricken by autism, but of a young man who finds the world looking at him with suspicion. Like Rizwan in the movie I also have been detained at New York’s JFK, for no other reason than sporting a beard, which to any officer and people abroad gets them into a tizzy about Osama Bin Ladin. Shah Rukh has no beard in the film, he didn’t need one, he had a bigger albatross; his name; Khan.
“My name is Khan!” says the autistic lovable Rizwan, “And all Muslims are not terrorists!” Years ago when Punjab was faced with terrorism and everyday carried news and pictures of killings and bomb blasts, I recollect most Sikhs were looked at with suspicion, till a police chief decided to differentiate between those who wanted to live by the sword and those who were being carried away by wrong information and fundamentalist thinking. Punjab was saved, and is now back to being a prosperous state with one of her son’s being the Prime Minister, and an able one at that.
Today the world needs to see this movie by this fool called Khan, sorry Khhan from the epiglottis! Today our youth need to understand a word called courage, and the rest of us about being bold not just beautiful.
And as the national anthem played that evening in the theatre, I stood, proud we had such fools in the country; men who dared stretch their necks, fools who dared stand to be counted..!

God, in the driving seat..!

23-02-2010

Robert Clements

Hush, said the Lord, “let me sit beside you and drive you home.” “No,” I said, “you should sit behind and let me drive.” “Bob,” smiled the Lord, “lets go.” I sat in the car beside my Lord and wished I had cleaned it.
The car started and it seemed the Lord was quite an expert. There was an old jalopy in front. The grey haired owner was lighting a cigarette and trundling along.

“Blow your horn God,” I shouted, “the stupid fellow doesn’t know who you are.” The Lord smiled at me and smiled at the man. The man looked at Him and nodded, then ever so slowly moved his ancient machine to the side, a look of askance on his face.

The Lord smiled at him and smiled at his ancient car. I looked back, the old man was smiling. “I suppose he knows who we are now,” said the Lord. I put down my head. It started to rain. I saw the Lord drawing the car towards a bus stop. “Come on in,” He said to a wet old woman. “Come in,” He called to a filthy man. “Step in,” said the Lord to a miserable drunk.

“Lord,” I protested, “they’re dirty.” God looked at me and smiled, “I see no dirt, Bob,” He said, “they’re clean inside, even cleaner than you are.” The car drove on and the Lord dropped the people off one by one. I watched them as they went away, smiling at the Lord. There was a difference, I was the one who felt dirty. I watched the Lord as He drove. There was ease and confidence and power. I watched Him smile at the people around Him. I watched them smile back at Him. I slid down in my seat and smiled happily to myself, it was good to have God with me... And then I heard the sound. “God,” I said, “there’s someone on top of the car.” “I know,” said the Lord, “he’s been there from the time we started. He is more used to sitting with you in the car than out of it though.” “Who’s he?” I whispered. “Why your good old satanic friend,” God replied. “He’s usually driving the car with you as you shout and yell and cuss everyone, and now he feels this is his permanent seat.” I looked at God, and His eyes were sad. “I want you here with me always,” I shouted, “don’t leave me ever.” The Lord smiled as He said to me, “The choice Bob, is yours..!”

The Dalit room..!

22-02-2010

Robert Clements

“…BJP chief Gadkari does a Rahul, has lunch in a Dalit’s house..” Rediff News, 17th Feb Pretty expensive room! I told the hotel manager as I walked into the spanking new five-star hotel they’d constructed near the airport and pointed to the tariff card. “That’s our Dalit Room! Our costliest and most wanted room, booked for the next two years! Come I’ll show it to you!”

I walked awestruck behind the manager, past chandeliers and paintings, my cheap shoes making marks on the red carpet, certainly not laid out for me, till we suddenly came to a part of the passage lit with oil lamps giving an eerie glow. “The Dalit corridor,” announced the manager as he opened a door of wooden planks crudely put together, stuck onto the original door. I entered and gasped as a waiter and hostess busy reading the newspaper inside, saw us, disappeared for a moment and came out in tattered rags. “Welcome to our poor abode!” they cried in unison. “Sip our water, though it is not boiled or filtered!”

“No thank you!” I said firmly. “Don’t worry, this is just their prepared speech,” said the manager, “The water is the same as we serve in the other rooms!” I looked at the room; it had a specially crafted thatched ceiling, dirty rustic seating, a low broken table, shelves falling apart and a small calf, which looked curiously at me. “Would you like to sit down?” asked the manager. “It’s not dirty, it’s just painted that way, makes good photo copy!”

“Will you take that calf away, “I said, “It gives me the jitters.” “A fiberglass toy!” said the manager as he lifted the calf and made it face the other way. “We’ve even designed it to moo!” “Good sir! Let us tell you our story,” said the hostess who had changed into a poor woman, “We have had nothing to eat the last three days as the village headman has taken away our fields!” “Whoa! Whoa!” I protested, “I just saw you eating sweets and nuts!” “It’s just a prepared speech sir,” said the manager wearily. “I’m sorry,” I said apologetically, “But why is this room so expensive?” “One night here and you can make it to any political post in the country!” said the manager as the waiter who was now a poor householder asked me, “Would you like to pose with us for a photo? You can either walk behind my wife carrying bricks or help me break stones!” “Choose your pose!” said the manager as he shoved a photo album towards me and I gasped as I opened it and saw two familiar figures. “This is hypocrisy!” I shouted. “It works in our country..!” said the manager as the poor woman and her husband got back into their normal work clothes.

Slow down and live..!

19-02-2010

Robert Clements

For years on end, my time spent in the shower could have got me a mention in the Guinness world records as the shortest time taken to bathe. I stepped into bathtub, and with same movement switched on the shower, steadied my feet and reached for soap.

Everything else, the scrubbing and toweling were all done with the same quickness and ambidextrous movement. One day however, while at a party, I heard an artist friend telling everybody that his ideas came while having a shower. “What about you?” he asked, “don’t you get your creative thoughts from the same place?” “I’m in and out in a jiffy,” I told him proudly, “no time to waste!”

“What a waste,” he said, “that’s the place you need to slow down, its full of great thoughts!” I tried it out: I slowed down the whole process, started enjoying the warm water, taking a little longer to soap myself and even spending more time just enjoying the luxury, and realized how much I’d missed in hurrying up all these years.

A woman told me of how she sought to convince her continually harried friend that she needed to find ways to relax. So she gave her a videotape on stress management and relaxation techniques, and encouraged her to watch it right away. Fifteen minutes later, her friend handed back the tape. “It was good,” she said, “but I don’t need it.”

“But it’s a 70-minute video,” the woman replied. “You couldn’t have watched the whole thing.” “Yes, I did,” her friend assured her. “I put it on fast-forward..!” A major social problem of the 21st Century is Hurry Sickness. We hurry through work. We gulp down fast food. We shop at malls. We lament that we haven’t enough time. We race through the days and weeks until one day we look back in amazement and comment, “My, how the years flew by.” Or until we hit a “speed bump” — like illness — that stops us cold. Then we realize the heavy toll we paid to travel the express lane.

Hurry Sickness: Its symptoms include stress and anxiety, ailing relationships, lowered work performance and numerous physical maladies. Some people don’t survive it. What’s the cure? “For fast-acting relief try slowing down,” quipped comedian Lily Tomlin. Slow down and live, for life is too short to be lived fast, and too precious not to be lived well. “I have no time to be in a hurry,” said John Wesley. And he accomplished more than most of us ever will! Maybe it’s time to slow down ...and live! Start with the shower..!

Stop working; love your job..!

18-02-2010

Robert Clements

Ever heard about the guy who said “I like work! It fascinates me! I can sit and watch it for hours!” Probably the same guy who went to his supervisor to ask for a raise. “I am already planning to give you a raise,” she said.

“Oh, great!” he said. “When will it be effective?” “As soon as you are effective!” shouted the boss. Someone said, “Find a job that you love, and you’ll never work a day in your life.” Some people are fortunate enough to be able to find a job they love. But not everyone can follow their joy into the workplace. I’ve had jobs where my motto was closer to “Early to bed and early to rise, ‘till you make enough money to do otherwise.” I had to decide to at least try to like what I do, since I did not find myself doing what I liked. There are benefits to learning to enjoy at least parts of what we do if we can’t do what we love.

It stands to reason that the more pleasure we find in our work, the more effective and successful we will become. And usually we will make more money. But mainly, who wants to spend a life dreading to climb out of the bed every morning only to spend the rest of the day watching the clock tick off endless minutes and hours?

Can you concentrate more on the aspects of your work that you enjoy? Can you find ways to develop nurturing relationships in your workplace?

Can you remember why you are working; to educate your children or to save for retirement? You remember the story of the workman working away near a temple, being built; a king came up to him and asked, “What are you doing?” “Chipping stones!” came the surly reply and the king went up to the next man and asked the same question, “What are you doing?” “I’m building a temple!” came the smiling reply. Can you see yourself less as just chipping stones or can you see yourself as building a temple? In other words, can you see the big picture of what you do all day? Are there ways you can serve others in your work environment? All of these techniques and others can help you to learn to find more enjoyment at work.

It was Kahil Gibran who said, “Work is love made visible. And if you cannot work with love, but only with distaste, it is better that you should leave your work and sit at the gate of the temple and ask for alms of those who work with joy.” And finally I leave you with this thought: If you can’t do what you love all of the time, learn to enjoy what you do most of the time..!

Spreading terror among our children..!

17-02-2010

Robert Clements

Shah Rukh Khan spent crores building his bungalow in Mumbai, making it spectacular, showy and also safe for family and himself, yet all the Shiv-Sena leader had to do was threaten the film star and make his little daughter tremble!

Is that what our politicians are doing? Do they spread hate and make children afraid. “My child look at this wonderful bungalow I have built for you, it’s got a view of the sea, a swimming pool, and look at those guards outside to protect you!” “Daddy I’m scared!” “Scared?”

“An old man said boo!” As I read the statement made by Shah Rukh, I thought of the thousands, nay millions of children who live round the world, and who live in fear:

Fear of bomb blasts, fear of riots, fear that their dads may be killed, their mother’s molested, fear of bullets hitting them, of stones being flung at them, oh what is it that today’s kids aren’t afraid off? “Hey politician, don’t you have children of your own?”

“Yes I do!” “Don’t they live in fear?” “No they don’t, they have 24 hours security, black cats, policemen and gun welding guards. Our homes have got bandobasts and barricades and nobody can come within a stone throw of my family!” “So you frighten other little kids do you?”

“Ha! Ha! Ha!” I gift a nightmare of terror to these hate mongers. “I hope your own child gets terrified!” “Terrified?” “That you will walk into their bedroom and hear them screaming, daddy, mummy help, help! And you will cry! What is it my child?” “I am afraid!” “There is nothing to be afraid off, your daddy has looked after everything! What is there to fear?” “Look daddy look, see those figures at the window, screaming, squealing, wailing, waving their fists at me, can’t you see them daddy?”

“No!” “They are the lumps of fear, shivers of terror, trembling of dread you have put into other children’s minds; they have come here to haunt and torment me. They are coming to get me! Help daddy help!” Such nightmare do I gift the children of those who spread terror among our own..!

Salary and the open drawer..!

15-02-2010

Robert Clemnts

Was just reading that a municipal corporation in one of the big cities while presenting their budget revealed they had no money for development work, no road concretization, no beautification schemes, no bridges, no flyovers as the bulk of the funds other than being used to meet the city’s water crisis would go towards the pay hike their employees were demanding! Which led me to think, why are they being paid at all? I’d visited a municipal office last month, and found every now and then the sound of a drawer opening and shutting, you know the drawer just below the desk where these guys rest their files and pretend to work. Like I said every now and again a drawer opens and bangs shut! I slowly walked over to a man who was having a conversation with an employee, their was laughter, slightly forced, then the drawer opened, and as if on cue the visitor threw in a bundle of five hundred rupee notes; the next moment the drawer banged shut.

The sound of opening and closing of drawers continued throughout the time I was there and I didn’t even dare to guess the moolah they had all made that day. And now they demand a pay hike! Many restaurants pay their waiters very poorly but allow them to pick up all the tips which turns out to be a substantial sum, while some hotels add ‘service charges’ to the bill, which is the tip you are supposed to give to the waiter and which I’ve heard a portion goes to the owner:

“So municipal worker here’s a suggestion!” “Wait let me close my drawer, what’s it?” “You decide: No salary only bribes! Or take your salary and we also get a part of the money you make in that drawer!”

“No!” “No what?” “We want both increase in salary and the money in the drawer!” “But that ain’t fair!” “You want your building to be passed? Garbage lifted? A new water connection, here!” “Here what?” “My open drawer!” Which leads me to think of another solution; lets give them a salary hike, a good one at that but… “But what?” “We take all the money you make in the drawer!” “Why?” “So we can build flyovers, concretize the roads…”

“Sir, with the money in there, you will be able to make Mumbai into Shanghai, Chennai into Washington and Kashmir into another Switzerland overnight! You want us to give all that money to you? Ha, ha, ha!” “So why the salary hike?” “We should get paid no sir for opening and shutting the drawers?”
 

No difference at all..!.

14-02-2010

Robert Clements

I am a very secular person!” announced Mrs Kapoor one day to the girls who lived in her house as paying guests, and then she heard the noise. It was a sound she’d never heard after shifting into the building; the sound of the door opening in the flat just above hers. No one stayed there.

The flat belonged to the builder who had refused to sell it to anyone. Mrs Kapoor ran up the stairs and found the door open. A worker was sweeping the floor inside. “What’s happening?” she asked.“Sahib asked me to clean the flat,” said the worker sweeping dust onto Mrs Kapoor’s feet. “Who is sahib?” asked Mrs Kapoor visibly annoyed. “Abdul Sahib!”

“Muslims?” said Mrs Kapoor as she went down and met the girls who were staying in her house as paying guests, “Why are we having Muslims in our building?” “I thought you just said you were a secular person!” said Susan.

Obviously Mrs Kapoor wasn’t, as she tried everything in her power to see that the flat didn’t get into the hands of someone from the minority community, but it seemed a bit late as the flat had already been transferred and there was nothing she could do but look angry and sulk. Once in a while Mrs Kapoor heard the sound of the door of the flat opening and even heard a baby cry. A carpenter was heard and she had gritted her teeth with each nail hammered. Till one day the doorbell rang. She opened the door and beheld the most incredibly pretty woman she had seen. “May I borrow some milk, my baby is hungry!” said the lady. “Of course!” said Mrs Kapoor, “Come in, what’s your name?”

“Nafisa!” said the woman and Mrs Kapoor realized too late who it was. But hospitality was Mrs Kapoor’s forte and she boiled the milk helped pour it into the feeding bottle and then as the baby was fed, they talked; the beautiful Nafisa and Mrs Kapoor.

It was plain girly talk, about shopping and life and babies and pictures and TV serials. “What time does your husband come home?” asked Mrs Kapoor as she poured Nafisa her second cup of tea and her own third, “I want to you to come to meet the girls who stay as my paying guests, you are just like them.”

That evening the girls met Nafisa, cuddled her baby and walked with her to the door when her husband’s car arrived. “She’s just like us!” said Mrs Kapoor to the girls that night. “What a fool I was trying to prevent Nafisa from staying in the building!”

The girls smiled but didn’t say anything and it wasn’t long before Mrs Kapoor and Nafisa became close friends and it wasn’t too long either before the baby upstairs started being brought home by Mrs Kapoor, “This house has never heard a baby laugh or cry,” she exclaimed. “No difference between the laugh of a Muslim baby, a Hindu baby or a Christian one!” whispered Susan, “They are all made by the same God..!”
 

Live beyond yourself..!

13-02-2010

Robert Clements

To see the plight of others when you yourself are blinded with difficulty, to feel his pain or hers when you lie critically wounded yourself, to hear the cries of those in despair when you are dejected with the hopelessness of your own, ah, to be such, one has to truly conquer himself, live beyond his own plight, infusing hope, spreading light where despair and darkness reign.

Diagnosed at the age of eighteen with bone cancer he decided to run across Canada, with one fine leg, the other amputated below the knee; he called his run, the Marathon of Hope, a run to raise money for research that those stricken like himself with the dreaded cancer would one day find a cure.

I heard Judith his sister speak yesterday, I heard her talk of her late brother’s indomitable spirit, I went home and watched a video that showed him running, I cried as I watched a young lad, resolute, firm, one fine leg the other amputated hopped across Canada, mile after mile.Mile after mile, one step, then a hop as he lifts the metal leg, then the next, a hop and the next, a hop, and millions of such steps, face set, eyes not just on road but goal ahead, not weeping for healing, crying for relief, but pushing tired body to free those suffering, there in those hospitals he’d visited. Terry ran a marathon a day for 143 days and when he was two- thirds across Canada the cancer spread to his lungs, and nine months after he’d started running he died. He collected 24 million dollars with his incredible marathon run, but he lives on, not just with the 500 million dollars that has been collected since by the foundation named after him, but by the gift he gave the world; the ability to live beyond ourselves.

It was dear friend Gul Kripalani, President of the Indian Merchants’ Chamber along with other partners of the event who organized the conference at the Trident, who introduced us to the fearless young man who’d died fighting but whose giant presence filled the room. It was Leander Paes, winner of an incredible 11 Grand Slams who informed the gathering that this coming Sunday over seven thousand school going children and adults would run from the Trident Hotel to Marine Drive Flyover and back, that money raised would go to the Tata Memorial Hospital to fund cancer research.

“The night before my operation (amputation)” says Terry Fox, “my coach brought me a magazine about a man who ran after his leg was amputated, it was then I decided to meet this new challenge head on and in such a way that I could never look back and say that it disabled me!” This Valentine’s Day, cheer those who run, contribute your mite to cancer research and you who lie dejected, disappointed and in despair with sickness, disability or depression, rise up and walk, nay run, the way Terry did: Live beyond yourself..!

A lil’ bit of luck..!

12-02-2010

Robert Clements

Open your mailbox and a flood of chain mail jumps at you. ‘Send it to ten people,’ says one ‘and you’ll have good luck smiling at you within twenty four hours!’ ‘Pass this on to twenty of your friends and luck is yours!’ says another.

Well don’t feel a coward that you’ve secretly send those dozen letters, just in case! Because some years ago an American scientist visited the offices of the great Nobel prize winning physicist, Niels Bohr, in Copenhagen and was amazed to find that over his desk was a horse shoe securely nailed to the wall with the open end up in the correct manner to catch the good luck and not allow it to spill out. The American said with a nervous laugh, “surely you don’t believe the horse shoe will bring you luck, do you Professor Bohr?” Bohr chuckled, “I believe in no such thing my good friend, not at all! I am scarcely likely to believe in such nonsense. However I am told that a horse shoe will bring you good luck, whether you believe it or not!”

So who’s taking chances what? In January 1998, in Queensland, Australia, a man and his companion were driving along a highway. The car crashed into the side of a fully laden 600 metre long train at a level crossing and got wedged between two carriages. To the horror of the passengers they saw it dragged sideways along the tracks!

Moments later they reached a precipice, the car was struck by a pylon got dislodged from the train and spun several times before coming to a rest and as everyone watched, the ‘lucky’ pair managed to free themselves from the wreck and the man climbed away from the tracks onto the road to get help.

Suddenly on the highway he was hit by a car and was crushed to death! What happened? Did he exhaust all his luck at one go? And don’t we all blame someone else for our bad luck? As the case of an old man who was rather ill. Sitting by the bed was his wife. He turned to her and said, “You know dear, you’ve always been by my side through thick and thin, through good times and bad… “I remember the time I lost my job, you were there by my side! And when I joined the social service agency you to volunteered to work by my side, so you’d be with me, and when I had that terrible accident you remained constantly by my side. When we went through that financial crisis, you were there right next to me! And now that I’m ill you’re right next to me. You know something dear, you’re bad luck..!”

And did you hear about a lost dog, brown fur, some missing due to mange, blind in one eye, deaf, lame leg due to recent traffic accident, slightly arthritic, goes by the name, ‘Lucky’ Ah folks here’s my footnote; it’s not luck but strength from above you need to get you through and well..!

Other options..!

10-02-2010

Robert Clements

Can I come in? “Sahib is sleeping! He’s eighty-four and needs his afternoon nap!” “Let him sleep!” “You will come later?” “No I want to just sit in the hall for half an hour!” “But sahib will not be able to see you!” “I don’t want to see sahib!” “You don’t want to see sahib?” “No!” “Then what do you want to do?” “I told you!”

“You just want to sit for half an hour? But sahib sleeps for an hour!” “I want only half an hour!” “To meet sahib?” “No to sit in his hall! Lovely hall, lovely chair, lovely…” “No, no, don’t use that bathroom, that is kept locked, that is the one Michael Jackson used when he visited sahib!” “Okay I will just sit here!” “And wait for sahib!” “No, wait for half an hour!” “Do you want anything?” “Yes, can you just look out of the window for me?” “What do you want to see?”

“Who is outside?” “Press, camera’s, TV channels..” “Did they see me enter?” “They see everybody who enters to visit sahib!” “Good, good! Will they show sahib’s visitors in Delhi TV channels also?” “Yes!” “Will it be seen in 10 Janpath?” “I am sure Madam and her son will see who visited sahib’s house!” “Good, good!” “Where are you going?” “Out! Thank you for a very pleasant visit, thank sahib for giving me so much time and yes I will most certainly come and visit sahib, again and again and again!” “Why are you speaking so loudly? The TV people are picking up everything!” “Yes, yes it was a most enjoyable visit, most enjoyable, sahib and I share an excellent rapport!” “Sir this is NTTV! What did you and Bal Thackeray discuss?” “No comment..!”

And ‘I am’ feeling..!

09-02-2010

Robert Clements

I sit in the car and close my eyes as Mano drives and talks, “Bob!” he says after awhile, “You aren’t listening to me!” “I am!” I say. “You are?” “Yes I am!” “You are listening to what I’m saying?” “No,” I tell him, “I just am!” “You’re talking strange,” says Mano, “What do you mean ‘I just am!” I open my eyes and look at him, he hasn’t changed from the Manohar, my classmate in college many, many moons ago, not an extra ounce of flesh, nor a hair missing, I wonder what the secret of his eternal youth is, then close my eyes.

“You’re doing it again!” “Doing what?” I ask. “Not listening!” “Did you say anything?” “No!” “Then it’s beautiful being in this ‘I am state’” I tell him, “You know what it means?” “That you are right here, not any where else and enjoying the feeling!” says Mano brightening up. “That’s your ‘I am’ feeling!” I nod and feel the car go forward. We are driving towards a book launch, Shree had brought out another book, “Harper Collins this time,” he’d said, “Mano will be there too!”

“Wow!” I’d said and taken the next flight to be with them. Three college friends, writers all of us, one with a doctorate in English, the other an acclaimed author with half a dozen books to his credit and me a self proclaimed columnist.

“I was saying,” says Mano, “Whether we’d made the right choice!” “Becoming writers?” I ask as Mano nods. I sit in the car and close my eyes and think. “Suppose you’d made a million bucks? Maybe a billion what would you do?”

“Like Bill Gates?”“Yep!” “I’d buy myself an island, have a room overlooking the sea and…” “And what?” “And write!” “So who wants an island..” “And who wants a room overlooking the sea…” “As long as we can write!” Mano drives, I close my eyes and smile as we reach the bookshop where Shree launches his latest book.

Kill joys in the Government..!

08-02-2010

Robert Clements

Sometimes, nay oftimes I think we have a bunch of killjoys in the government, I mean why else would they want to close down places where people come and enjoy Themselves, it’s like they look down from their official apartments and shout, “Hey what’s happening over there?”

“Where sir?” “There in that little strip next to the art gallery!” “Can’t see sir! It’s a very small strip!”“There those people sitting and…” “Enjoying themselves sir?” “Yes, yes! How dare they do that?” “You want me to do something about that sir?”“Stop them! Give them a government notice! Say, they can’t have fun!”

“Yes sir!” And it’s not just eateries and other places we love to frequent, I’ve seen this in parks: “Hey where do you think you are going?”

“Into the park!” “What’s the time?” “The right time to enjoy night air and some cool breeze!” “It’s closing time!” “Closing time? But this is the only time I can enjoy this park!” “And this is the time I have to go home and enjoy my dinner!” I’ve spent some of the best afternoons at Samovar, the little café next to the Jehangir Art gallery, sipping beer and enjoying its famous delicacies, which unlike other places made hardly a dent on my p ocket. I’ve spent some lovely times at the Café Naaz and even thought the place the right one to propose to the girl who became my wife.

And today I feel guilty about those nice times. “That guy!” “You mean that fellow with a beard?” “Yes, I don’t like the fact he looks happy!” “It’s the times he’s spent in those affordable, adorable…”“Enough!” “Enough what sir?” “Calling those hateful places by those names!” “But they are affordable and…” “I said enough! Serve them notice! Throw them out and let’s see the grin fade from that fellows face!”

Like I said I do feel guilty, and the grin’s going to fade from my face if my Samovar next to the Art Gallery in Mumbai is scrapped, just like they did to my beloved Naaz. But I have an idea Mr Killjoy, “What about exchanging your palaces which we’ve put you into for these little strips of happiness you’re taking away from us? Sir! Sir! Can you hear me?” “Sir cannot hear you, he is busy constructing a memorial in the sea, for you to enjoy..!”

Aussie in the house..!

07-02-2010

Robert Clements

Yep, there’s a new fridge in the house! “How’d you get here?” I asked. “The same way you got here!” he said cheekily. Now I’m a tolerant sort of fellow and give a person a long rope to hang on but when a fridge acts saucy on the first day it’s come in then I got to admit I got a short fuse.

I opened it’s door roughly to bang it shut and show the fellow who’s the boss, when it grins and I looked behind and I saw the wife, “What’re you doing Bob?” “Opening the fridge!” I told her meekly. “You know something?” she said, “You have to handle it gently. Like this.”

Now I’ve seen fridges and I’ve seen fridges, but this chap was actually smirking as the wife showed me how to handle him. “This is how you do it,” she said and gently, ever so gently, she pulled its door open. “Oh,” I said, “May I try now?” And I held the door and was going to pull the fellow open when the wife screamed, “No!”

“No what?” I asked as the fridge, it started grinning bigger. “You haven’t washed your hands!” “I’ve never washed my hands before opening a fridge!” I said angrily, “What’s so special about this fridge?” “It’s from Australia!” “Australia!” I shouted looking at the smirk becoming a sneer and the sneer turning into the beginnings of a jeer, “Why did we have to get a fridge from Australia?”

“They’re the best!”“They’re not,” I shouted. “They’re…” “Ssshhh!” said the wife, “Wash your hands!” I washed them as the new guy in the house, Australian fellow grinned at me. “Now,” said the wife, “Open the door gently, let’s see you do it Bob!”

“Okay!” I said and held the handle, and pulled ever so gently, it didn’t budge. I pulled a little harder, it still didn’t move though I could see grin widen. I pulled with a mighty show of muscle, the fridge, Australian, opened suddenly and flung me to the other end of the room.

“Are you hurt?” “No!” I whispered then saw it was the fridge the wife was addressing. “Racist!” I shouted as the fridge grinned even more. “What are you doing?” screamed the wife as I pulled it outside the house and hauled my old dear fridge back.

“Bad enough giving us problems Down Under, now they’ve come into my own backyard?

Out!” I shouted and felt an old man, leader of a political party grinning at me, “Now you know why I throw their cricketers out!” he said as I nodded in agreement and patted my old fridge.

Chauffeurs & their cars..!

06-02-2010

Robert Clements

Have you ever seen chauffeurs and how they keep their cars? Some of them, not all, take out clean cloth and dust every speck of dirt fallen on bonnet and hood, clean windshield, shine hub caps, open hood, check water in radiator, fill distilled water in battery and see if all lights are working.

They look under chassis and from nearby tap direct flow to get rid of clinging obstinate piece of dirt and mud. Then when done, they stand proudly next to their car waiting for owner to come and be seated inside. Like I said some of them, not all of them. There are many who care a damn. The car is not theirs anyway, and they treat it like some stray dog the owner has asked to hold onto. The dirt can gather for days, hubcaps can roll off for all they care. They bang the doors and mesh the gears as if they drive a pick up truck!

They seem proud of dust and grime and have never looked beneath to see caked underside. The paint looks tired and jaded, a little water would have done wonders but the chauffeur is busy or too big to do such job.

And when the owner comes they are nowhere to be seen. They stand near teashop or sit on culverts chatting to other drivers. They see owner waving frantically and they look as if it is to someone else he waves to, till finally with grimace and grumble and grin to friends they stroll to their car. They make no effort to seat the owner in. Its the owners problem to open and shut his door, while driver sits with smug expression and looks askance through rear view mirror or just cleans his teeth or nose, or teeth and nose and pretends the owner isn’t around.

He turns the key, the car refuses to start. He turns the key again and curses as wheezing sound comes from where the engine is. He sits in car till owner gets down and pushes..!

Later, the owner looks around. Inside there is dust and dirt everywhere.

But the owner of the car whose driver cares for his set of wheels sits in elegant comfort. Inside, the car is clean and comfortable. The cushions have spring, and upholstery bright and cheerful. I have seen both types of such chauffeurs: The latter is happy with whatever car he has.

Even old model in his hand is transformed into proud possession, whereas driver who doesn’t care can break sleek limousine into old jalopy within months..! But before we criticize, let me ask, ‘What type are you?’ You have been given a body to use here on earth, maybe not a shining gleaming one. Ill and sick, not too tall or good looking. How well do you look after your body? Is it clean and sparkling, so well kept that when the Owner sits in it, you are proud of how well maintained it is? Or have yesterday’s drinks, and today’s cigarette smoke made it look dull and listless? Are the interiors filled with strange smells of empty beer cans and used condoms? What kind of chauffeur are you?

Break free brakes free..!

04-02-2010

Robert Clements

Many years ago there was a huge oil refinery fire. Flames shot hundreds of feet into the air. The sky was thick with grimy black smoke. The heat was intense, so intense that firefighters had to park their trucks a block away and wait for the heat to die down before they could begin to fight the fire. The fire however began to rage out of control.

Then all of a sudden, from several blocks away came a fire truck racing down the street. With its brakes screeching it hit the curb in front of the fire. The firefighters jumped out and began to battle the blaze. Immediately all the other firemen who were parked a block away saw this and they jumped into their trucks drove down the block and began to help their comrades in battling the fire. As a result of that cooperative effort, they were just barely able to bring the fire under control.

The people who saw this teamwork thought, “My goodness, the man who drove that lead fire truck—what an act of bravery!

They decided to give him a special award to recognise him for his courage in leading the charge. At the ceremony the mayor said, “Captain, we want to honour you for a fantastic act of bravery. You prevented the loss of property, perhaps even the loss of life. If there’s one thing you could have—what would it be? Without hesitation the captain replied, “Your honour, a new set of brakes..!” After you’ve had your laugh just think a moment of the number of things we are scared to do, because we always apply brakes. One of the easiest ways of identifying a learner driver is to watch him or her literally sitting on their brakes. The red light behind flashes all the time.

I remember some years ago asking my wife to drive my car. She did know driving and drove her own light car, but as she sat in the drivers seat and pressed the accelerator pedal, my car moved forward like some sluggish buffalo. We drove a awhile and then she smiled and said, “You’ve got a very slow car Bob. It hardly moves!” Now let me tell you, no man likes to hear stuff like that about his racing machine! I glanced down and nearly roared with rage; the handbrakes were on!She unclasped the brakes and the mean machine jumped forward. I wonder how many of us are driving through life with our brakes on? We take a few steps into whatever we have set ourselves to do, Cautiously with our feet firmly on brake pedal or with hand brake permanently on.

Maybe its time we drove like that firefighter and with no brakes, venture into all that life offers.No brakes into the love we can give! No brakes into the effort we can put into our jobs! No brakes into total obedience to a God above! I remember the look on my wife’s face as my car leaped forward. There was adventure and excitement and a gleam in her eye. Suddenly the stops were off and with no brakes, she broke free..!
 

Setting criminals free..!

03-02-2010

Robert Clements

Not a day goes by without newspapers showing pictures of criminals with black cloth thrown over their heads being brought to court. They peer through slits the police have made and look at a world, which hates them for the crime they’ve committed.

They wonder whether they will ever be forgiven by society, which makes them harden all the more. But one day when I was called to speak to them in jail I saw them cry, and this is the story I told them, a story that may also help others who think they are beyond being forgiven for something they’ve done: “A certain man had two sons. When the younger told his father, “I want my share of your estate now, instead of waiting until you die!” his father agreed to divide his wealth between his sons.

A few days later this younger son packed all his belongings and took a trip to a distant land, and there wasted all his money on parties and prostitutes. About the time his money was gone a great famine swept over the land, and he began to starve. He persuaded a local farmer to hire him to feed his pigs.


The boy became so hungry that even the pods he was feeding the swine looked good to him. And no one gave him anything.

When he finally came to his senses, he said to himself, “At home even the hired men have food enough and to spare, and here I am, dying of hunger! I will go home to my father and say, “Father, I have sinned against both heaven and you, and am no longer worthy of being called your son. Please take me on as a hired man.”

So he returned home to his father. And while he was still a long distance away, his father saw him coming, and was filled with loving pity and ran and embraced him and kissed him. His son said to him, “Father, I have sinned against heaven and you, and am not worthy of being called your son.”

But his father said to the slaves, “Quick! Bring the finest robe in the house and put it on him. And a jeweled ring for his finger; and shoes! We must celebrate with a feast, for this son of mine was dead and has returned to life. He was lost and is found.” So the party began.

Meanwhile, the elder son was in the fields working; when he returned home, he heard dance music coming from the house and he was angry and wouldn’t go in, so his father came out and begged him, but he replied, “All these years I’ve worked hard for you and never once refused to do a single thing you told me to; and in all that time you never gave me even one young goat for a feast with my friends.”

“Yet when this son of yours comes back after spending your money on prostitutes, you celebrate by killing the finest calf we have on the place?”

“Look, dear son,” his father said to him, “you and I are very close, and everything I have is yours. But it is right to celebrate. For he is your brother; and he was dead and has come back to life! He was lost and is found!”

And as I finished this story from the Holy Scriptures, hardened criminals cried as they suddenly realized that the law of the land imprisons and punishes, whereas a loving God forgives and sets them free. A God who knows that those who deserve love the least, need it the most..!

Full cycle..!

01-02-2010

Robert Clements

Watch out! I shouted as my driver swerved to avoid the cyclist then jumped out of the car and ran to pick up the fallen man, “Saab,” said my driver to me, “It was not my fault, let us go.” I nodded, assured that the man was okay and turned back to my car.

That’s when I saw his bicycle. It lay near my gleaming car, old and rusty and now a little bent where the rear wheel had been hit. I stood and looked down at it and it seemed a quarter of a century was slipping away: I was back as a teenager. My dream, to get myself a set of wheels which meant a bicycle. “There’s one for forty bucks,” my neighbour told me and I walked with forty hard-earned rupees, earned by writing radio plays, but that’s another story.

The boy who was selling his bike wasn’t there but his mother was. “Forty-five rupees,” she said sternly to me. “I was told it was forty,” I said bravely fighting the tears of frustration in my 15- year- old eyes. “ Go home and get five rupees more,” said the lady, “and come back soon before I sell it to someone else.” “This is all the money I have,” I whispered, I don’t have any more.” The lady looked at me and reached out to take the crumpled ten rupee notes. “Okay,” she said, “Take it!”

It was an old rusty piece of junk, but for me, a dream come true. “Saab,” said my driver, bringing me back to the present, “Let’s go! Soon the public will create a nuisance.” I nodded but my eyes returned to the cycle on the road and my thoughts went back again:

It was the first day of college. I rode down the road on the same bicycle I had repaired, part by broken part for the occasion. It was a workable bike, all set to take me to my seat of learning. In my eyes a worthy steed!

“Get off the bike, junior,” shouted a Charles Bronson type from the group who blocked my path. I hastily obeyed. I’d been told about the ragging and put my bike on its stand, which tilted dangerously towards the ground. “Stand straight!” he shouted. I stood at attention. “Not you, your junk!” laughed the brawny senior. I tried to hold it straight, but a spring was missing; it was a second-hand stand that was a lot worse than the original.“You dare come to college bringing something like this!” shouted the senior, kicking my dream machine onto the ground. “No,” I screamed as I lashed out with skinny arms. “Leave her alone.” It was a badly battered, bedraggled and bruised junior who crept into college that day, rescued they say by a professor on his way to his class.

I patted the old leather seat on my way home: “Nobody will touch you as long as I live!”

“Saab,” said my driver tugging at my sleeve, “It’s getting late, I’ve given the man ten rupees, he’s happy.” I walked to the cyclist who was examining the bent wheel. I took the ten rupees from his hand and slipped two hundred instead. I bent down and touched the cycle. “For her,” I said and walked back to my car.

I did not want him to see the tears in my eyes.

Ruchika’s school..!

25-01-2010

Robert Clements

“..Why do you blame Ruchika’s school? Prayer meet to express solidarity with school management…” TOI, Jan 18th While having the greatest respect and regard for all those who are expressing concern over the school being blamed, I would still like to ask a few questions:

One of the first things I learnt in school was to stand up for what is right, even if I had to face a mob, “Truth my dear Robert,” my principal an Englishman used to say, “is not something you hold only deep in your heart, but something that has to stand against untruth everyday and be tested!”

I’m sure the school Ruchika studied in believed in the same principles, right? Well dear sister, you who got Ruchika rusticated, why didn’t you stand up for the poor girl? No doubt you were under pressure, truth is always under pressure, no doubt the school could have faced problems later in grants, in aid, in water connections, in police protection, no doubt you’d have been threatened with closure, with harm, and I am sure that the grinning face of Rathore we have all started hating must have leered at you in your office and told you, you had no choice. Ah, but you had a choice! The choice to compromise or not! “Throw her out and we will leave your school alone!” Difficult choice sister isn’t it? Or was it? You must have looked at the school, built with the sweat and toil of visionaries and wondered whether all those years of hard work could be undone because of silly girl who ‘allowed’ herself to be molested!

But did you look at same girl sitting by the window, looking out with tears as big as her earrings, crying as she remembered a man’s rough paws on her tiny body?Did you have the courage to go up to that girl who needed comfort and tell her, “Child we stand by you?”No you didn’t.You chose the easy way out, nay let me not be so harsh, you chose the easier way out; you thought maybe that you could save the school pain by inflicting that pain on a single individual.

Maybe what you didn’t know was that truth somehow ‘outs’! Bishops, priests and students attended that prayer meet to express solidarity with the school and Sister Sebastina, the principal!

I have the greatest respect for all them, but sirs I hope that in that gathering you bowed your heads down, not just in shame, but in prayer that a God above would give us strength next time to fight for truth even if a million grinning Rathores stand in front..!

Professional parenting..!

24-01-2010

Robert Clements

As I hear about children committing suicide I think about a talk I’d given to parents sometime ago at a school down the road on how to bring up children. I had asked myself that time and I still do as to how I was selected to do justice to such serious talk, and wonder whether it had anything to do with bringing up two daughters, who I have little doubt would laugh if they’d known their dad thought he’d become proficient in a subject they still considered me a dud at. But it made me do a lot of thinking and something I realized at the end of my research before the talk, was that there isn’t a job or profession on this earth that does not have courses, degrees and lectures to equip oneself before one starts on the job, but parenting; most of us have a baby in our arms with no knowledge how to bring it up.

So often I have heard grownups talk about the terrible childhood they have had, and when I talk to the parents of those adult children, they tell me how they invested time and money, love and affection to bring up their children.

Obviously there’s something that children want that parents don’t know they want: This is when I read about this little survey by “Quote Magazine” (September 1, 1985) Children from 24 countries mentioned ten qualities they wanted in parents.

Here they are: (1) They want harmony. They do not want their parents to have unresolved and destructive conflict in front of them. (2) They want love. They wish to be treated with the same affection as other children in the family. (3) They want honesty. And to be told the truth. (4) They want acceptance. They desire mutual tolerance from both parents. (5) They want their parents to like their friends. They want their friends to be welcomed in the home. (6) They want closeness. They desire comradeship with their parents. (7) They want their parents to pay attention to them and answer their questions. (8) They want consideration from their parents. They do not want to be embarrassed or punished in front of friends. (9) They want positive support. They wish for their parents to concentrate on their good points rather than their weaknesses. (10) They want consistency. They desire parents to be constant in their affections and moods.

(2) It appears that these children want what all of us want - respect, appreciation and love. Let’s give it to them and watch them blossom, shine and grow, and tell others as they do well in life, “My parents were professionals, they knew the art of parenting..!”

Wiping away grief..!

22-01-2010

Robert Clements

He cried into the phone this morning and I wept as I felt his tears, “He’s gone Bob, he died this morning!” I was silent, there was nothing I could say awhile except share his grief. “I know what you go through” I whispered as I felt the phone being put down, and for him and for my niece who lost her mother this same week do I repeat these lines below:

I cannot say, and I will not say That he is dead. he is just away. With a cheery smile, and a wave of the hand, He has wandered into an unknown land. And you-O you, who the wildest yearn For the old time step and the glad return-Think of him faring on, as dear

In the love of there as the love of here; Think of him as the same, I say;He is not dead, he is just away!….. James Riley

And then the words of Plutarch come to me: “Since he is gone where he feels no pain, let us not indulge in too much grief. The soul is incapable of death. And he is like a bird not long enough in his cage to become attached to it, is free to fly away to a purer air, so let our outward actions be in accord with this, not with loud lamentations and mournful chants but with hearts pure and with minds calm..” In the bottom of an old pond lived some larvae who could not understand why none of their group ever cane back after crawling up the stems of the lilies to the top of the water.

They promised each other that the next one who was called to make the upward climb would return and tell what happened to him. Soon one of them felt an urgent need to seek the surface; he rested himself atop the lily pad and went through a glorious transformation, which made him a dragon fly with beautiful wings. In vain he tried to keep his promise. Flying back and forth over the pond, he peered down at his friends below. Then he realised that even if they could see him, they would not recognise such a radiant creature as one of their number. And so the fact remains that we cannot see our friends and loved ones, or communicate with them after the transformation which we call death, is no proof that they cease to exist.They are now beautiful beings, our eyes can’t recognise with new robes the Creator has dressed them with. Who among us has not lost cherished beloved? Who sheds not silent tear when memories choke the mind?

But in such moments, my dear friends Manoj and Rahul, my niece Ann, and all those families who are grieving for loved ones, let us lift our eyes to yonder sky and know loved one lives well, then let smile take place of tear, and on wings of joy, they will roam free without the burden of our grief..!

Vision and our visionaries..!

21-01-2010

Robert Clements

Was invited for the first anniversary of an up and coming TV channel in the city and was delighted when I saw the theme, it was tv9Vision 2010-2020! The invitation went on to say that there would be a seminar of four major groups comprising decision makers, opinion builders, money movers and city icons. “Right up your street Bob!” I told myself, “You’re going to hear visionaries talk about their vision for the next decade,” and I settled myself down in 5 star luxury and waited for visions to unfold: It didn’t, the deputy chief minister spoke of the history of the city, how it was once seven islands, then became one and with it came an influx of people, hundreds and thousands who were just jamming the infrastructure and laying havoc with the system.

After him came a former Chief Minister, more articulate, more vocal, who spoke same thing using better vocabulary, stronger words, “Stop the Influx!” he roared and I wondered whether I had mistaken the theme when I’d entered. “Maybe they changed the theme and didn’t have time to let me know!” I thought till I looked behind roaring speaker and found that the banner spelled same theme that had been on my invite, no it wasn’t about ‘influx’ it was about ‘vision’!

It was only later that I was given a chance to speak for a few minutes, but what I wanted to say was more, much more; ‘My Dear Visionaries, where is your so called vision? You were not called to give history lessons, nor was it called for to talk against the constitution of our country, which gives every citizen the right to travel and settle anywhere in this country! You were invited to share your vision!” “What’s that?” “What’s what?” “Vision?” “Vision sir, is to visualize the problems of tomorrow and find solutions for them today!” “How do you do that?” “Did you come to this venue in a chauffeur driven car sir?” “I am a minister, of course!” “Sir vision is when your driver looks not at the car in front but ten cars ahead, and drives his vehicle accordingly. He sees a jam forming and decides to shift lane, he sees a pattern of a road block and takes another route, whereas the driver who looks just at the car ahead is…”

“Is who?” “Why you sir!” I congratulate the TV channel for a brilliant theme and wish them well as they move into the future, I also congratulate them for showing me the kind of vision our visionaries have, just enough to see the car in front…after the jam is formed..!

Put on hold..!

20-01-2010

Robert Clements

Thank you for being with us, we appreciate your calling, and will be with you shortly, thank you for calling we appreciate your calling and will be with you shortly, thank you for calling we appreciate you...” “Whoa, whoa, what’s happened to him?” I asked his wife as I visited my friend at the hospital.

“He was put on hold when he tried to complain about his mobile bill and they’ve kept him there through the day,” said his wife woefully. “Now he even keeps repeating all the advertisements they play when you are on hold!” “Effective from January all SMS messages will be charged one paisa. Thank you for calling, we appreciate your calling and will be with you...”

“Why didn’t he disconnect?” I asked. “He did the day before after being kept two hours on hold, but yesterday he was determined to get through.” “Did he?” I asked. “I don’t know,” said his wife wearily. “ He’s got his phone pressed to his ear. They can’t pull it off his hand so I brought him to this hospital,” said his wife. “Thank you for being with us, we appreciate your calling, and will be with you shortly,” “Has he eaten?” I asked. “Hasn’t touched a morsel,” said the wife, “ wants to be ready to speak once the customer care attendant comes on line.”“Are there any other symptoms?”

“He hums and sings a tune,” said his wife. “That’s the tune they play when they put you on hold,” I said as I listened to my friend humming. “Its terrible,” sobbed his wife. “What?” I asked “His singing,” said his wife. “He could never pitch and he sings through his nose.” Then don’t listen,” I said and then found myself singing in the same lifeless way my friend was doing. “Even the nurses have started doing that,” she sobbed, “Its contagious. Stop it!” I looked at my friend as he murmured, “You are in queue, please wait! You are in queue please wait! You are in queue..” It was later that night my wife let out a scream, “What happened?” I asked, jumping up and out of bed and found her standing over the bed, arms akimbo, staring at me angrily. “I just asked you if you love me and you murmured, “You are in queue please wait! What are you up to you rascal?” “It is certainly contagious..!” I murmured to myself and cursed companies who put people on hold and nearly wrecked their marriages.

Official figures department..!

19-01-2010

Robert Clements

I’ve always wondered why there is so much disparity between the actual figures and what the government officially states: The truth and the official truth! So I decided to visit the government office and find out more about the same. “Ah you want to visit the OFD!” said the peon at the door and stretched out his hand for his baksheesh.

“What’s the OFD?” I asked. “The Official Figures Department,” said the peon frowning at me. “I’m in charge! Come with me, we will go to my office!” We entered an untidy room with just a table and chair and walls lined with charts. “What are they?” I asked. “Addition, subtraction, multiplication and division tables,” said the peon. “I failed in my kindergarten you see!”

I stared puzzled at the charts as the phone rang and the peon beckoned me to listen. “How many people dead? Twenty-three!” He then walked to the wall and looked for ‘two plus three.’ “The official figure is five!” he said putting the phone own and looking at me. “There’s been a bus accident on the highway, the figure reported was twenty-three dead. But our official one is five.”

“How did you arrive at five?” I asked incredulously. “The accident involved a government bus, right? So I take twenty- three and split it into two and three, then I add them together and get five. Simple.” “If it had been a private bus?” I asked. “If it’s a private bus traveling on a government road, then I add two plus three and minus it from the twenty-three,” said the peon, showing me the whole calculation already done for him on one of the other charts on the wall. “If it is a private bus on a private road, then I add up twenty-three and twenty-three!”“That makes forty-six,” I said. “If it’s not the governments fault we can’t be bothered!” “Do you use the same formula for floods and earthquakes?” “For everything!” said the peon. “Look at the wall; there’s a formula for any eventuality” “Tell me,” I said quietly, “What is the actual water cut in our city?”“That is very easy,” said the OFD head as he went to a part of the wall, which had just been written on, “Since it is the fault of the government for not foreseeing such a problem, for not implementing other projects to bring water into the city, for allowing slums to mushroom and builders to construct, I have had to work out a brand new formula!”

“Which is?” I asked. “You are actually receiving only 15% water, but here in the OFD we officially maintain there is only a 15% water cut! Clever isn’t it? No addition, no multiplication, its simple, 15 is equal to 15, the bigger the government’s fault, the greater the official bluff!”

Hands that work miracles ..!

18-01-2010

Robert Clements

Where’s Monica? I asked this morning as I entered the physiotherapy department of the local hospital where my aching writers neck was being treated. “She’s gone on leave,” said the disinterested new face and we walked to the stool where she would use the ultra sound machine on my painfully throbbing neck. A little lotion of some sort was always rubbed first so that the machine would run smoothly. I heard a spluttering noise this time and realized the new girl had decided to hold tin over my neck and press the contents of the canister over my neck. She did this a few times and I felt the oozy stuff trickling all over.

She did not deign to rub it off. A little later the machine started its job all over the back portion of the sore section, but there was a difference, I felt her disassociate from the healing process; knew the girl wasn’t involved in her job, but far away in her own thoughts and mindlessly worked my neck till the buzzer signaled the job was over. I got up, there wasn’t much difference, I missed Monica’s touch. She was an old nurse with strands of grey, but every patient felt more than just the machine: They felt her involvement. Some years ago a huge departmental store; part of a global chain opened its doors to the public, and some shoppers from the other little shops around started going to the huge store because things were cheaper. But many didn’t. Many people continued to frequent a little shop round the corner. They avoided the huge doors of the departmental store with its discounts and sales and marketing gimmicks and trudged down to the little shop, stood in line after buying their stuff and came out with a smile.The marketing team was asked to find out what was being offered in the store that the huge departmental chain couldn’t match. “Why do you go to the store round the corner?” they asked an old lady. “Because she puts the change into my hand,” replied the lady. “And what about you sir?” “The same reason,” said the gentleman. The marketing man went into the store, bought a few bars of candy and laid a hundred dollar bill on the counter. The pleasant looking middle-aged lady at the counter smiled at him, counted the change and then wonder of all wonders held his hand like a child while she put the change into it. She then smiled at the person behind, and there were many people behind!

His boss at the department store put his hands up in frustration when he heard what the marketing man had to say, “Miracle hands!” he whispered, “That’s one competition we can’t beat!” Yes, hands that reach out and touch, work miracles..!

The new fronty..!

17-01-2010

Robert Clements

Nearly a quarter of a century ago, when the first lot of Maruti’s started coming out of the production line, I got mine, and noticed something strange, whenever I needed a spare part and went over to the dealer and asked for a grill or side mirror or whatever, he’d ask, “Which model?”

“Maruti 800!” “No, no, car or van?” “Car!” I’d say and he’d shout to the worker at the back of the store, “Grill for Fronty!” “Fronty?” I asked him the first time. “Ah you have front no? Van has no front no?” The van has no front, as I found to my dismay, when I nearly lost my life in an accident and escaped by the skin of my teeth, nay toes:

I drove a friend’s van one day for a picnic to Alibagh. On a narrow road very near the cottage we’d booked, a state transport bus stopped in front of me, I realized quite a few people were getting down so I switched off the engine and waited. The bus driver suddenly decided to back his bus and the next moment to my absolute horror I found the huge bus had smashed through my windscreen, and maybe hearing the noise, he braked just in time as the bottom of the bus sat on me. I was pulled out with shredded glass all over but unhurt.

Saved like I said by the skin of my toes! From that time on, I’ve distrusted the van and even if I had to fill my little little ‘fronty,’ I’ve managed; I didn’t want to test fate a second time and till date whenever I see one on the road, I shudder to a very traumatic scene of an ST bus sitting on my lap!

I guess there must be others who’ve shared similar experiences, and I guess in one of the meetings of the manufacturer’s, they must have asked, “We should have more sales for the van! It’s the best alternative to the old Fiat as a taxi! It can take more passengers and there’s lots of luggage room at the back!”

“It’s not safe sir!” “You can’t have everything!” “We can sir!” “How?” “Put a fronty to the van!”

Engineers must have rushed to the parking lot, stared at the fronty, stared at the van and mentally joined the two, “Brilliant!” they must have shouted rushing to the drawing board and rushing back with the sketch.

“Brilliant!” the MD must have yelled. I look at the advertisement of the combo in today’s newspaper, peep at my toes, which are still there, then stare in the general direction of the automobile dealer shops and wonder, what they are going to say when somebody wants a spare part?

“One grill for the Frontyvan!” Frontyvan? Why not? If former defence minister Krishna Menon could have imported a truck for the military from the Mann company in Germany and renamed it Shaktimann, then Frontyvan, doesn’t altogether sound too bad, does it?

Blessings for a new car..!

16-01-2010

Robert Clements

We were standing next to the church, the young priest and I, when his cell phone rang. I watched curiously as he listened intently, then replied he would be with the caller within an hour. “Emergency?” I asked curiously.

“Yes,” he replied a little hesitantly. “Somebody dying?” “Somebody buying a new car.”“So where’s the emergency?” “He wants me to bless it before he drives.” “May I come along?” “Sure,” he said and then as an afterthought asked, “Why?” “So that I can hear what kind of blessing you give the car.” “I pray,” said the priest, “that the car will take him safely everywhere. That he and his family never meet with an accident in it.”

“That it won’t ever break down or ever have punctures on highways,” I added. “Yes, yes, I must include that in my blessing,” said the priest happily. “And till he gets you to give all these blessings, he won’t drive?”

I asked. “I guess it makes sense,” said the priest. “He wants the car to be safe before getting behind the wheel.” “What about him?” I asked.“What about whom?” “The man who’s buying the car, isn’t he the fellow who should be prayed for? That he may drive this new car of his without being under the influence of liquor..” “I don’t know…” said the priest uncomfortably. “That he obeys all traffic rules; doesn’t try to bribe policemen when he gets caught? That those on the road outside will know that a godly man is sitting at the wheel?”

“This is a blessing for the car not the driver,” said the priest sharply, looking at his watch. “Sure,” I said, “Would you bless my shoes?”

“Your shoes?” “That these shoes will not lead me to wrong places, that they will always take me down the paths of right living and not into the broadways of wickedness?” “It all depends on you,” said the priest simply. “Not on your shoes!” “Maybe the new owner of the car you are going to bless needs to be told the same,” I said, “that he will drive without an arm around his secretary or mistress. That he will be able to fill the car with the laughter and happy voices of his family, including the barking of his pet dog in the rear seat..”

“You’ve got a point,” said the priest looking down at my shoes, “but…” “But what?” I asked.“I wouldn’t want you to come along!” “Why not?” I asked pained. “I just want to hear you bless a car!” “Your kind of blessing,” said the priest as he hurried away, “Would see me out of business..!”

Hey kids don’t do it..!

15-01-2010

Robert Clements

Hey kids don’t do it!” “But I can’t take it anymore!” “Take what my child?” “The taunts, the struggle, the fights, the laughter, oh god it’s terrible!” “Come here!”

“No I don’t want another lecture, I’ve heard enough! Enough!” “It’s not another lecture, I just want you to look at somebody, come here a moment, just look at him! Can you see him?” “It’s me, that’s a mirror, that’s me!” “Now look out of that window, who’s that down there?”

“A dog!” “And in the other window?” “Another dog who looks just like the first dog!”

“And have you ever found someone who looks the same as the person you just saw in the mirror? Someone with the same nose, same mouth, that lovely hairstyle, those shining eyes, have you ever seen that person elsewhere?”

“No!” “But the dogs, many look alike don’t they? Have you ever thought why with six billion other people on this earth, which means there are more people than dogs, still we all manage to look different?” “Why?” “Because you are unique! You’ve been made different! There’s no one who’s like you in the whole wide planet earth! You’re one of a kind!” “I’m an idiot! I’m ugly! I’m terrible!” “Says who?”

“All the others!” “How can they say something about somebody who’s not like them! Only you know what you are! Only you can understand yourself! There’s only one of you, and only you can take care and nurture that person! Look in the mirror! You’re frowning! Just try to smile!”

“I can’t!” “Tell yourself you can! Tell yourself you will!” “I can! I will!” “Look you smile! Now tell yourself you are special, unique, one of a kind, that never more will what people say effect you, that you will smile when you want, and not cry when others want! Tell yourself that the rope you have tied to that fan will never entice you because that’s a reaction to what others want from you, but what is your reaction going to be from now on my child?”

“To live!” “Yes my child, to live and smile as you win against a struggle, laugh as you overcome a problem, and cry and rise again if you fall, because you are…” “Unique! I am one of a kind in this world of six billion!” “That’s right! Smile my child..!”

Women’s hug power..!

14-01-2010

Robert Clements


Yesterday when Bangladesh’s Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina visited India, most newspapers carried pictures, not of her shaking hands with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, but of Sonia giving her a warm friendly hug.

“Look closely at that hug!” shuddered the Pakistani President as he looked in the general direction of India and Bangladesh, “It’s a woman, woman thing! It means they are ganging up against a man, and the only man I can think of is…” “You sir?”

“Yes, yes, it’s always me isn’t it? “What are you going to do sir?” “Abdicate! Give up! There’s nothing you can do when confronted with woman power!” said the President and shuddered again as he looked at the photo. In Sri Lanka both the President and the General who had won the war for him and who was now standing against him in the upcoming election, looked at same picture in their respective papers then looked away then looked at the phone and dialed one another, “I guess there’s nothing else we can do but get together!” said the President to his political opponent, “You can’t win against women power alone!” “Yes sir!” said the general and donned his uniform again. And in far off America Obama yelled to his missus, “We need a photo of us hugging each other!” “But aren’t we always doing that honey?” “It’s got to look how these two are doing it!” said Obama showing her the picture. “Husband!” laughed Michele, “When we sisters hug the whole jungle quakes, that’s an old Tarzan saying!” “Heck, but I can’t let this happen!” “Well maybe you could let me and Mrs Clinton hug each other? What a picture for the world, the president hugging his secretary of state!”

“President?” whispered Obama, “But I’m the president!” “Yeah but once they see that pic, they’ll know who the real President is, right Barack?” Obama shivered, as back home in India, the new leader of the opposition shuddered, “We’ve got to make a woman alliance like this!” he thundered. “We can have Sushma hugging Uma Bharti, or maybe even Jayalalitha?”

“This isn’t a photo of two tigresses fighting, whereas Sushma and Uma or Sushma and Jayalaitha would…” “I get the point sir,” said his aide quickly, “We don’t want to lose the next election too!” “You’re a good hugger ma!” said Rahul to his mother that evening and then watched in horror as Priyanka entered and his mother hugged her, “Mom!” he screamed, “What about me?”

“There’s more power here!” said his mother, hugging her daughter. Zardari, Obama, the Sri Lankan President, Rahul and India’s opposition leader shivered as they looked at the photo again: Woman power was here to stay..!

Nothin’ unusual ‘bout it..!

13-01-2010

Robert Clements

Come now me Indian friends, whatcha makin’ dis big noise ‘bout an Indian being killed ‘ere in me Australia? Dese things happen in all dem big cities, I don’t know ‘bout udder big cities, but it done happen’ in the de cities Down here Under” “You know whatcha mean? No?

Ah well, let me tell ya in simple words you will be understandin’, You walkin’ down de road right, not in dem small village in me Australia, but in one of dem big cities, and sudden like you see dat big shadow fall across de ground behind you and you say to yerself oh me gosh I’m bin followed!”

“Now why de hell you bin followed? Because yer in a big city dammit! Yeah! In dese big cities you git followed and sudden like you see dem big shadow all round you and you tell yerself, ‘oh me gosh I’m in a big city and I’m gonna be killed!”

“You gotta realize dat in a big city dese things happen! So whatcha do next? Why get on yer knees dammit! I ‘aven’t become de deputy prime minister of deese big country fer nothin’! You get on yer knees and pray, yeah man you pray and pray and pray dat de shadow behind will go away and if it don’t, well den goddamit you pray some more, because ‘ere in dis big city de only thing dat can work dammit is to get on yer knees and jes pray. Dis is Down Under man and I know dis country like you know yers and dis ain’t India, it’s what?”

“Yeah Australia!” “Now I’ll tell you one lil’ secret, and you gotta believe it, you be prayin’ right and you be on yer knees right and you be all afraid and cryin’ out loud and sayin’ lord ave mercy, lord ave mercy, dats how you pray right and suddenly you got another big shadow jes behind de one behind you and you know yer prayer you bin prayin’ its bin answered. You know dat dat shadow behind de shadow behind you is dat of a…”

“Yeah, you got it right, its de shadow of a policeman!”“And you pray and you tank god in heaven and say, lord I bin on me knees and me knees are sore, but you done sent a policeman to rescue me and tank you lord, tank you and you start to gettin’ up” “Oh I’m sorry, I clean be forgettin’ dat it be an Indian on his knees in Australia, so me story be a little different right?”

“So you start to get up and dis ‘ere shadow of de policeman behind de shadow of de one behind you, he says, hey dats not one of ours!” “And de shadow behind you, it laughs and says, ‘no it ain’t bobby it ain’t!’ “And de shadow behind the shadow of de one behind you it go away and leave you alone wid de shadow behind you to be killed!”

“Dese things happen in all dem big cities, I donna ‘bout udder big cities and I donna ‘bout yer cities in India, but it done happen’ in the de cities Down here Under, oh yeah it does, and I know Australia, otherwise I wouldn’t be de deputy PM right? Dere’s nothin’ unusual ‘bout it let me assure you..!”

Look for the godfather..!

12-01-2010

Robert Clements

Classic example of, ‘Bolting the barn door after the horse has escaped’ isn’t it when government says ‘Give back the medal we gave you!’ Too little too late sir!

Giving a medal to someone who is being investigated for moral turpitude is like giving a criminal a pat on the back and saying, ‘Go ahead rob another house’ or ‘Kill another man’ or in Rathore’s case, ‘Molest another child!’What we need to find out is who gave the medal, and, I do not mean who pinned the medal onto his monster chest, but who recommended him and in so doing we could get a little deeper into the malaise that existed. Normally it is, ‘You cover my back I’ll cover yours!’

Which means that friend Rathore was obviously keeping his bosses very happy to have got them not just to turn a blind eye to his activities, but even recommend him for a medal. Find who was behind his medal and huge monstrosities will be uncovered: “Here Rathore I’m recommending you for a Police medal!” “That’s very good of you sir!” “You’ve kept your mouth shut about me and…” “You’ve kept your eyes closed about me!” “For which I am now occupying this post and you Rathore…”

“Get a medal! Thank you sir!” The smile on Rathore’s face as he walked out of court said it all, didn’t it? “Ha! I can do anything and get away. I’ve always got a godfather!” It’s time we catch these godfathers and what better way than to find who is behind the medal giving of all the tainted officers who have been decorated.

Find the godfather, and start digging, and soon you’ll hear voices beneath the muck and debris, “Help I was raped!” “I was killed for opening my mouth!” Voices! Voices! Ever seen pictures of the concentration camp where the Nazi’s killed the Jews? In the silence of horror, you hear the screams of six million gassed and killed.

Dig into the lives of these godfathers and hear same screams and cries, weeping and moaning. The police medal was a reward for covering up, for shutting up; don’t just take back that piece of brass, find the godfather, uncover the rot the medal was covering. The bigger the crime of the accused, the bigger that of the godfather’s..!

A workable New Year resolution..!

11-01-2010

Robert Clements

I know the New Year has come and gone, but for many of us who enter this New Year with fear and trepidation here is a story I’ve written to strengthen them: It was the night before the New Year! The old man sighed as he watched his family sit together that night. He knew they would be leaving soon for the Watch Night service, and he had got his best suit pressed so he would look good as the New Year came in.

His wife sat by his side and smiled at him, she gave him a piece of paper and a pen. He watched as the others wrote on their own pieces of paper. “Dad!” said his elder son, “you aren’t writing anything?”“Yes grandpa,” said his eldest grandson, “you’re supposed to write New Year resolutions on your paper. See what I wrote grandpa..”

“Sssshhh son,” said his mother, “you’ve got to read it after the New Year has come in.” The old man sighed as he looked at his family. “Remember dad you were the one who taught us this habit?”“Yes,” sighed the old man.

“I remember one night I wrote so many resolutions I never slept that night,” said his younger son, “and then next morning I couldn’t find the paper..” “That’s because I took the paper out of your hand and hid it,” said his mother.

“Otherwise you would never have gone to sleep with so many resolutions to write!” smiled the old man, his father as he remembered that night.“And what were those resolutions?” asked a curious granddaughter, “and grandpa did he keep those resolutions?” “Yes,” said her grandfather, “he did, for exactly one day, and by the end of the day, he had already broken two!” They all laughed and continued with their writing. The old man, held his blank paper in his hand and looked at them. He cleared his throat once, but did not say anything. “Dad?” asked his elder son, “is there anything bothering you?”

“Are you feeling unwell?” his wife of many years asked, looking with concern at his blank sheet. “I’m okay,” he smiled at her, but she was a little unsure, as she looked his paper. Then suddenly he wrote something, folded it in two and put it in his pocket. “I’m going to change,” said the grandfather as he walked out of the room. He watched as they all looked at the pocket where he had kept his little piece of paper. He smiled as his wife followed him into the bedroom after some time. He left his shirt on a chair and walked into the bathroom to have a bath. There was a smile on his face as he heard his wife tiptoe to the chair, he listened as she took the paper from his shirt pocket and rushed back to where the others were waiting:“What did dad write?” asked the elder son, with mounting curiosity. They all watched as their mother opened the paper: “My new year resolution,” said the sheet, “Is to allow God to take over my life and to leave all my worries and cares on His Divine shoulder!”

There was a smile on the old man’s face as his family, opened their new year resolutions the next day. “Isn’t it strange,” he said, “we’ve all written the same thing! But its the only workable resolution..!” And they all nodded and smiled to a God above.

Surging sales and cheeky cars..!

10-01-2010

Robert Clements

With sales going up I ‘m realizing the four- wheeler’s getting a little too cheeky as when the wife went down to her car one morning, turned the ignition and it didn’t start: “Bob!” she called out, “Car’s not starting!”

“Turn the ignition key!” I yelled smugly. “I just did,” she said. I walked to the car, sat myself down and turned the key; like summer tempest, the engine roared to life. I strapped on safety belt and took the car for a spin, “What’s wrong?” I asked, “Can’t you be gracious to a lady and start?” “Just a bit of fun!” joked the car, “It’s good to see their faces when we fool around!” “Fool around?”

“Well like not starting when they turn the key, especially when they know their husbands are watching and thinking they are such fools!” “What else do you do?” I asked. “Ever seen a woman turn right with her blinker signaling left?” “Many times,” I said, “don’t tell me you cars do that on purpose?” “Good fun,” laughed the car. “Seen women standing in the middle of the road looking helpless with a flat tire? Ask the puncture man whether there actually was a flat?”


“What do you mean?” I asked angrily. “There’s never a flat, we just let the air slowly out of the tyre.” “That’s a shame,” I said indignantly. “Hey come on, you’re a man, join in with us. Have a laugh. It’s harmless fun!”

“A lady helpless on the middle of the road? You call that harmless fun?” I asked. “Well most times a knight in shining armour comes to their rescue,” smiled the car, “and ever so often a highway romance blossoms!”

“I wouldn’t want my wife having a highway romance just because you feel she needs a new man,” I said angrily. It was a few mornings later that the car didn’t start again, “Car’s not starting!” shouted the wife. “Turn the key!” I shouted back. “I did,” she said.

“Now get out of the car,” I said. “Give it a kick in the rear! Get back and turn the key!” I watched as the car roared angrily to life. It was a smiling wife who came home that evening, “You know something,” she said, “I had a flat on the road!”

“Oh no!” I whispered, imagining a knight in shining armor. “So,” she continued, “I got out and gave it a kick in the rear like I did this morning!” “And?” I asked incredulously. “There was no flat, the tyre was full of air again! It’s incredible; cars are just like men, one whack and they fall in line..!”

The sound of it’s engine..!

07-01-2010

Robert Clements

I felt a little jealous as I looked at my kids admiring the different cars that the country now had, “Can you recognize a car just by hearing its engine sound?” I asked. “Come on dad that’s impossible!” “Impossible?” “Yeah dad, how can anyone know a car just by its sound? You’re joking right?” “Nope! You’re looking at that man right now!” “You can?” “At your age I could I could tell what car it was just by the sound it made!” “Wow!” “Yeah,

I would hear a car down the road and hey presto I’d tell my friends what it was!” “That’s something dad!” “You’re telling me? It’s not that I strained my ears or anything, just the purr or roar of the vehicle and I’d guess!”

“I wish I could do that!” “It takes practice children, practice; a keen ear, intense concentration and brains!” “Brains?” “I had to decipher the car’s Rpm, its horse power; for that you need an analytical brain right? I heard the sound of its horn and recalled what horn it was. That was a good memory right?”

“You’re a genius dad! I’ve got to tell my friends ‘bout you! Hey guys you know something my dad can tell the make of a car by it’s sound!” “You’re joking!” “No I’m not, dad, tell him I’m not joking!” “Uncle!” “Yes?”

“You can guess the make of a car just by the sound of its engine?” “Yes, when I was your age, yes!” “You can’t do it now?” “No, I can’t! I’m much older now!” “Or is it that we’ve got too many cars now uncle?”

“What do you mean son?” “How many cars did you have on the road then?” “Well quite a few son! There were Fiats and Ambassadors, and Ambassadors and Fiats and sometimes a lone Fiat and very often a lone Ambassador!” “Dad?” “Yes?” “So all you knew was the difference in sound between an Ambassador and a Fiat dad?” “Oh no ever so often I would even hear the sound of a Standard Herald!”

“That’s a lot of cars you had to guess from those days dad?” “Oh yes, oh yes, I could make out each sound, Ambassadors and Fiats, Fiats and Ambassadors and sometimes a lone Ambassador or Fiat. I was a genius..!”

The ex-governor’s good intentions..!

06-01-2010

Robert Clements

Poor ex-governor Tiwari: All he had were good intentions when he went to bed with two women in the buff. Now I know there be many who look at me and say, “Good intentions? What good intentions when you are caught naked? To which I can only say, that you could catch a billion naked men in bed with someone, maybe not two, every night!

‘But not when you are eighty-six years old!’So therein lies his fault right? At eighty-six you are grandfather material, you don’t romp around like young men bedding nubile women, you sit on swing and sit grandchild on lap and tell him bedtime stories. Maybe that was one of Tiwari’s good intention’s to see that old men were not thought of old anymore!

‘Look at me on the video!’ ‘Yes that’s what we are doing ex-governor sahib!’ ‘Do you see an old man or a young man?’ ‘A man without his pajamas…’ ‘…Can only be young right?’

‘Very right ex-governor sahib!’And all over the country eighty plus grandfathers and great-grandfathers get off their julla firmly put their little babas on the ground and walk round proudly. “Grandfather what are you doing? Sit with lil’ baby on the swing?”

“Swing? Yeah I’m gonna swing again like Tiwari!” Like I said ex-Governor sahib must have had all the best intentions in being caught in what is morally called a ‘compromising’ position.

Or maybe it was a rescuing act! “Rescuing act?” “Yeah there he is the governor of Andhra and what does any governor want in his kingdom?” “Peace and quiet!” “Right! And what does he see?” “Andhra burning!” “So what would any good governor do?” “Get the people away from their fighting! Refocus them onto gentler issues than cutting each other’s throats and cutting Andhra into little Telangana bits! You mean to say the governor was trying to do that?”

“Right! The good governor was making a bold statement, “Make love not war!” “And this could have been with the approval of the high command!” “But poor man got carried away; Delhi didn’t expect two women!”

Like I said, poor ex-governor Tiwari, all he had were good intentions when he went to bed in the buff that night..!

Learning to be a fraud..!

05-01-2010

Robert Clements

“Clue to a pooch’s love for you lies in its wagging tail!” Current Biology. I stared at my sleeping dog, who woke with a jerk and glared at me, “I felt somebody staring at me,” he growled. “I was,” I said. “You out of work or something?”

“Me out of work?” “Yeah that’s the only time you stare vacantly at me with that helpless pleading look!” “I think that’s a very unkind thing to say,” I said. “So why were you staring at me?”“This article here says a lot about dogs and why they wag their tales!” I said.

“Oh horror! Horror!” “Horror?” I asked puzzled. “I’ve got to go out and inform the other dogs,” said my dog rushing to the door, which was locked, “Open the door massa!” “No,” I said.

“But I’ve got work to do! I’ve got to tell my friends that finally humans are learning our language, that soon all our actions, our woofs and bow wows will be analyzed and understood!” “When dogs feel positive,” I said reading from the book, “they wag their tail to the right side of their rumps!”

“This is terrible!” howled my dog, “we’ve hidden this for thousands of years!” “And when you have negative feelings…” “We wag to the left,” continued my dog, his tail wagging vigorously to the left. “This is the end of our world!”

I stared at my weeping dog, “Why?” I asked are you so upset?” “For thousands of years,” growled my dog, “we could read you humans like a book! We knew your happy moods, your depressions, sulks and melancholic swings, times you wanted to be alone, and times when you needed us to nuzzle you. We learnt about you massa and kept you happy…”

“So now we are willing to learn about you,” I said. “When one human studies another, “ said my dog sadly, “its to make more use of the other! You look for weaknesses, so you can bully! Inadequacies to feel more powerful!” cried my dog and tried desperately to stop his tail wagging to the left. “What are you planning to tell your friends?” “To stop wagging left when unhappy, right when we’re glad, tail straight when we are tense and ears perked up when we love somebody!”

“And?’ I asked. “To change,” said my dog sorrowfully, “to learn to hide our feelings; not to be spontaneous! To learn to be a fraud! Otherwise it will be a dogs life for us!” I watched as my dog went into a corner and tried to wag its tail to the right and not to the left, so that it could learn to fool people like his human masters had been doing for thousands years.

Love Pakistan..!

04-01-2010

Robert Clements

About two-thirds of those polled in India and almost three-fourths of those in Pakistan said they desire a peaceful relationship between the two countries..” Times of India, 1st Jan

Couldn’t have been a better New Year’s gift than the headlines in the Times this morning, ‘Love Pakistan’ it said, followed by pages and pages how it was imperative peace reigned between the two neighbours, who shared same culture, same love for cinema, almost the same language, and once the same land.

Nearly ten years ago when I was asked by the Pakistan Observer, one of the biggest papers in Pakistan to write a daily column for them, I panicked. How was I equipped to write banter for Pakistan? How would my writing agree with people who were hostile with mine?

But, a decade later I must say, it’s like writing for the people of India. We share same thoughts, laugh at the same things, have politicians at the top who continue doing the most ludicrous stunts to survive up there and we both have those same diabolical men and women called terrorists who blow themselves up to blow up our own sons and daughters and other loved ones and bring us to tears day after day, year after year!

I realized a partition had taken place geographically, but inside, deep down we are family; bonded, connected, and like two siblings fighting, albeit fiercely, waiting for someone to point out, “Hey boys enough! You’re only killing yourselves!” That day I think has come.

War, my dear brothers and sisters in Pakistan and India, has got us nowhere. Money we should’ve spent on our poor we’ve spent on arms. If we could buy books instead of AK 47’s, if tractors could replace tanks, bridges, mines, if judiciary could be strengthened instead of the size of the army, if peace could reign instead of the threat of war, then a formidable sub-continent could together challenge the rest of the world in trade and commerce. Europe was made up of scores of little nations who waged bitter war with each other till a little while ago they sat and thought, “Aren’t we a bunch of fools?” Today the EU is a strong, powerful union with a mighty voice heard worldwide. That day has come for the peoples of India and Pakistan.

What a powerful combination we could be if we in India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka laid aside petty differences, subdued our egos, put resources together and faced the world as one people! That day has come..!
 

Victory of a cheating husband..!

03-01-2010

Robert Clements

Newspapers show picture of retired Inspector General of Police SPS Rathore coming out of a court with a small sentence of a measly six months for molesting 14 year old Ruchika who later committed suicide because of the shame, stigma and harassment her family underwent. The papers show his face grinning in victory, and next to him his wife in lawyers gown, smile on her face too: She fought his case and got him out!

“Hey Elin” shouts Tiger Woods as he looks up from the morning paper he’s been reading, “You saw this?”

Tiger’s wife doesn’t look up as she hurls another plate at him, “You lousy cheating husband!” she yells, “Don’t talk to me ever again, I’m leaving you, along with the children and half your money!” And after Tiger’s gone, she takes the paper and sees what Tiger had wanted her to read, “ Hey Mrs Rathore?” she whispers, “How did you stand by him? Not just a man who cheated on you, but one who molested a girl child?” “I fought the case and won!” “Won what? A victory for whom? Look at his grinning face, not only did he wrong you by trying to seduce someone lese, but wronged womankind by molesting her, not only did he get away scot-free with a mere six months sentence but he had his wife fight the case for him! Do you know what he is grinning about?”

“What?” “That he fooled the world and fooled you!” “But I won the case!” “You lost Mrs Rathore! You lost!” “I won!” “Won what?” “My husband’s freedom!”

“You think a man who does such to a little girl should roam free? You think that a husband who actually fooled around with another should have his freedom? Look at him! Now look at my Tiger! He did not molest! He did not cause suicide, but the whole world knows he will not get away with what he has done! Half his money and custody of his children! Whereas you?”

“Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha!” “Whose laugh is that?” “Your husband’s Mrs Rathore. His victory guffaw! It is he who won! You lost a terrible defeat, not just for yourself, but womankind!”

Tiger walks in, “Did you read the papers?” Tiger ducks as a plate flies and hits him squarely on his weeping head while in India a child molester laughs as his ‘lovely’ wife holds his hand.

It’s de ole flyin’ day’s again..!

01-01-2010

Robert Clements

To many of my younger readers it may come as a shock that once upon a time there was only one domestic airline: “You must be joking?” “And to say you had arrived in life, you needed to have an acquaintance who could book tickets for you in the railways and another to….”

“Book your tickets in this one airline, right? You’re still not joking are you?” “No I’m not, and the planes left whenever they wanted to and arrived when felt like, and the airhostesses..” “What about them?” “Never smiled!”

“Why ever not?” “Because it didn’t matter, whether they smiled or gave you great service or no service you just had to fly with them again and again and again!”

“It must have been terrible huh?” Oh yes it was, and I did think that that horrible chapter of our nation’s history had been relegated to the past till I flew in from Delhi last evening: “On the same airline?” “Nope! On a private airline?”“The airhostesses smiled right?”

“Nope I think they were still getting over being nearly laid off!” “But the plane took off in time?” “Not even an announcement made, except some pilot with a Russian voice at the end of the flight apologizing for delaying me for two hours and then delayed me for another half hour on the tarmac itself maybe because I mimicked him; Theese eese your Kapitan speakin..” And the service?” “I asked for a newspaper, he forgot!” “And?” I asked again for a newspaper, and he forgot!” “And?” “I asked him once again and he brought me a glass of weak lime juice!” “And the food?” “Ah the food! The food! Was good ole food of yore! The best! Which is why I’m saying it was de good ole flyin’ day’s again: Good food, no smiles, or announcements that you are late; it doesn’t matter to them you fly with them again or not…”

“Why?” “Because I think they’re all running at a loss and really don’t want you aboard; that’s how I felt last night; it was de ole flyin’ days again..!”

Grandpa’s words of wisdom..!

31-12-2009

Robert Clements

A friend sent me these gems of wisdom penned by a grandpa, and I thought I would share them with you, maybe there’s something here for us: Whether a man winds up with a nest egg, or a goose egg, depends a lot on the kind of chick he marries.

Trouble in marriage often starts when a man gets so busy earning his salt, that he forgets his sugar. oo many couples marry for better, or for worse, but not for good. When a man marries a woman, they become one; but the trouble starts, when they try to decide which one. When a man has enough horse sense to treat his wife like a thoroughbred, she will never turn into an old nag.

On anniversaries, the wise husband always forgets the past –but never the present.A foolish husband says to his wife, “Honey, you stick to the washing’s ironin’, cookin’, and scrubbin’. No wife of mine is gonna work.” The bonds of matrimony are a good investment, only when the interest is kept up. Many girls like to marry a military man - he can cook, sew, and make beds, and is in good health, and he’s already used to taking orders. Eventually you will reach a point when you stop lying about your age, and start bragging about it. The older we get, the fewer things seem worth waiting in line for. Some people try to turn back their odometers. Not me, I want people to know “why” I look this way. I’ve traveled a long way and some of the roads weren’t paved. How old would you be, if you didn’t know how old you are?

When you are dissatisfied and would like to go back to your youth.... Remember about Algebra. You know you are getting old, when everything either dries up, or leaks. I don’t know how I got over the hill without getting to the top.

One of the many things no one tells you about aging is, that it is such a nice change from being young. Ah, being young is beautiful, but being old is comfortable. Old age is when former classmates are so gray and wrinkled and bald, they don’t recognize you. If you don’t learn to laugh at trouble, you won’t have anything to laugh at, when you are old. First you forget names, then you forget faces. Then you forget to pull up your zipper, but it’s really worse when you forget to pull it down. Long ago when men cursed and beat the ground with sticks, it was called witchcraft.I hope you enjoyed grandpa’s words..!

No stranger in my bedroom..!

30-12-2009

Robert Clements

Every ad I’ve been looking at during Christmas says little TV in my bedroom is as old as the hills and I need a new one: But I doubt anything’s wrong with her! She’s served me well, fifteen years and still going strong.

Amitabh still looks like Amitabhji, a little older perhaps, Aishwarya Rai; as beautiful as on my neighbors set and so are Deeepika and a host of other youngsters whose faces I don’t know not for lack of picture clarity but want of knowledge on my part. Oh yes and the news readers speak with the same urgency on my old set pretending that ancient governor romping in Andhra is important enough to switch off favorite Raymond show and listen to intense, impassioned prattling.

Nothing wrong with my TV sir! She may not offer me as many channels as my neighbor’s which is why my fingers look less worn than his from pressing remote all day long!

She sits in a little niche in a cupboard in my bedroom, has seen me age without aging too much herself, and when I write like I do now, she sits blank and patient, not offering seductive glances with ‘wide screen’ or ‘flat front’ but with rounded matronly figure quietly waiting for me to caress knob and leap her into action.There’s nothing the matter with her sir! “Bring her in,” shouts the salesman, “and we’ll send you back with a fantastic exchange!”

“But what’s wrong with her?” I ask.

“How old?” “Fifteen!” “You crazy?” “Should I be?” “What about your neighbors?” they whisper, “Your friends? Relatives? Don’t they object? Haven’t they said something about this ancient bit of history?”“History?” “Yeah! She’s dinosaur in a Rolls Royce world!”She sits in niche and smiles at me; I stare back happy, “T’would be difficult,” I whisper to her, “to adapt to stranger in this room! No matter if they be blessed with robust flatness and slim frame! To have such sleek, sensation staring fixedly back would take too much adjusting my dear, and to what avail, after all Amitabh still looks like Amitabhji on you, Aishwarya also as beautiful, okay it’s Katrina Kaif today right?”

“No exchange!” I say firmly and pat her on the head; a little too firmly maybe; she stops working; nothing that a rap and a shake on her tough sides doesn’t sort out, and she’s back to normal!

Now which flat screen, slim sides could have managed that? No, I don’t need no stranger in my bedroom..!

Babe talk..!

28-12-2009

Robert Clements

The two little unborn babies, not yet born and waiting to be delivered to expectant mothers below sat in their abode above looking down at the planet earth. “What a beautiful place we are going too soon,” said the first unborn baby gleefully. “Look at those meadows those streams and wonderful gardens, those snow capped mountains, those friendly hills.”

“Yes,” sighed the second unborn baby sadly, “I can see them all.” “Can you see that lovely woman down there too.” “Yes,” said the second unborn baby, “I do.” “That’s going to be my mother.”“And that, “ said the second unborn baby pointing to another woman, “is mine.” “She’s so beautiful,” said the first. “I know,” said the second.” “Oooh, I can already feel my mothers arms around me, her love, surrounding me. I can feel her breath as she bends over me and showers me with care. I can feel her doting on me, her little baby.” “Yes,” said the other listlessly. “And when she calls me by my name, I will run and hide and watch from my hiding place and see her anxious eyes, growing concerned that she cannot find me, and just when she is overwhelmed with worry I will come out and shout, “Mummy..!” “Mummy,” mumbled the second unborn baby. “And my mother will run and smother me in her arms and crush me with relief and hold me to herself with deep felt joy. Oh mummy how I ’m waiting to come and be with you.” The other unborn child looked down at her mother and sighed.

“There will be father too,” said the first. “That’s him down there.” “A good man he seems to be,” said the second unborn baby. Where’s yours?” asked the first. “I don’t know,” said the second.

“Soon I will go down into my mothers womb,” said the first unborn baby, “and I will grow in her, till one day I will come into that world below to enjoy it with her and my dad. Oh how happy we all will be. Aren’t you waiting for that day?” “I will never see that day,” sobbed the second unborn baby. “Never.” “But, what a beautiful mother you have!” “Who will end my life before I see the world! Never will I see a sunrise or sunset. Never will I feel the love of a mother. Never will I be born. But she in some dark, dingy clinic will see that I am scooped out and thrown as waste!” “No,” cried the first unborn child. “No! It is your right to be born!” The two unborn babies looked at the beautiful mother of the second as she flirted and teased and gave herself up to men who waited to bed her. “No!” screamed the second unborn baby. “No..! Don’t kill me before I’m born, don’t, please..!”

What sign are you?

27-12-2009

Robert Clements

Quite often I’m asked, “What sign are you?” “Like in road signs? Halt and go? Stop and Proceed? Maximum speed 15 Kmph? Curve ahead? Do not overtake?” “No, no. Star sign? Like Scorpio, Gemini? Taurus?” “What does Scorpio say?”

“Determined, dark and dashing.” “Yeah that’s me!” “You’re Scorpio?” “No, determined, dark and dashing and a dreamer.”

“You can’t be a dreamer.” “But I am.” “Scorpios are not dreamers.” “I’m not a Scorpio.”

“Then you can’t be determined.” “No?” “Nor, dark and dashing!” “No?” “What star sign are you?” “Why?” “I’d like to know the kind of person you are.” “From my star sign?” “Yeah.” “You’ll know all about me from my sign?” “Yeah.” “What’s Gemini?” “Sexy, suave and scary.” “Yeah that’s me.” “You’re Gemini?” “No sexy, suave and I don’t know about scary. Am I scary?” “Are you Gemini?” “No.” “Then you’re not scary.” “Thank God!” “Nor are you sexy and suave.” “So what am I?” “What star sign are you?” “Does it matter?” “How else will I know you?” “What sign are you?” “Sagi. That’s cool, composed and cocky.” “You’re not any of that.” “The book says so!” “What book?” “Star signs. Sun signs. What’s wrong with you?” “You’re not very cool, or composed, or is this the ‘cocky’ part?” “What sign are you damn it?” “God’s sign!” “What does that mean?”

“That I’m unique: That there is no one else in the world made like me; no one else with my temperament, my qualities, my personality, my character. No other person in this whole wide world is created like me..!” “Wow, that is some sign..!”

A broken voice for Christmas..!

26-12-2009

Robert Clements

Now that you’ve retired ma what do you plan to do? asked her children as she came back from work the last day at the office. “Join the church choir!” exclaimed the mother. “But you don’t know how to sing ma!” they all said in dismay.

“Ah my children but I have much to sing about! When your father passed on the Lord took over and I have a song to sing for the comfort He gave. When I was jobless and penniless He gave me the will to succeed and I want to praise Him! Oh children now that I have the time I want to sing for Him and what better time than Christmas!” The choir conductor looked at her doubtfully, “I like your enthusiasm,” he said, “but here we need voices!”

“Ah that I have my son, that I have! A voice that will glorify the Lord’s name; that will shout and bring the rafters down! That will rise above all others! And…” “And what?” asked the choir conductor worriedly.

“And its Christmas time! What better time than now to sing praises to the little babe in the manger about that first Christmas after my Ben died, no money for sweets, I cried to Him above, the bell rang and the neighbours walked in with the most delicious cakes. I remember…” “Yes, yes,” said the choir conductor irritably, “But do you have a voice?”

“A voice that will bring the roof down with praise and thanksgiving!” The choir conductor looked fearfully at the roof of the old church. “We will have to do a voice test!” he said and walked to the piano. “Now sing the scales with me will you!”

“I failed the voice test!” Her children, no more little, all settled in good professions because of her looked at each other and smiled, “Ma,” they said and strangely in unison, “Ma we’ll arrange a concert for you! Just family! You write your carols of praise to the God who stood by you, we’ll come with our families and hear you sing!”

That Christmas as the choir conducted by their conductor sang in the old church, the people felt there was something missing, and at night as the conductor prayed his prayers, he asked, “What was missing today Heavenly Father?”

“Ah!” said the Heavenly Father, “We were all down the road listening to the woman with the broken voice, I and all my angels!” “But she has no voice!”

“A voice rising from a faithful heart my son is worth a million that come from the throats of professional singers! Words rushing out in praise my son are like pearls to those composed by poets and lyricists!”

Her children were surprised to see the conductor at their home the next morning, “Join the choir,” he whispered to her, “It’s voices like yours, that gladdens God’s heart at Christmas..!”
 

Smaller States..!

23-12-2009

Robert Clements


With so many political leaders all over the country wanting to form their own states and even going on fasts to achieve their end, I wasn’t surprised when the chairman of my colony called me for a meeting and I was told in no uncertain terms that our housing colony would soon get statehood:

“Will you agree to be an ordinary citizen or would you insist on becoming a minister like all the others are demanding?” he asked me and I saw all the other members of the committee who had gathered in the room looking anxiously at me. “I’ll have to ask the wife,” I said. “She’s already said she wants to be a minister!” said the chairman.

“And we know she will be an excellent one!” said another member as all the others in the room nodded in agreement. “Our only problem is you!” “Me?” I asked weakly. “Yes we are not sure what role the press will play in our new government!” “Or if we want it to play any role at all!” said the wife as she walked into the room and all the members got up to greet her. “But don’t you believe in the freedom of the press? This should be an integral part of the laws your new state adopts!” I said angrily. “I told you he’d give problems,” said the wife as the others nodded in agreement. “Whoa! Whoa!” I shouted, “I think this is getting out of hand!”

“I think you are getting out of hand!” said the chairman as the wife nodded. “Lets gag him!” she said.“Gag me?” I asked incredulously. “Here put this on him!” said the wife as she took out a large handkerchief of mine she’d brought along. “Now that we have gagged him, let’s get on with the meeting!” said the chairman of the housing society where I live. “First we have to choose a president!” I watched as they all turned to the wife who nodded and took the chairman’s place, “My first declaration,” she said, “Is to declare this state a dictatorship!” “A dictatorship?” I whispered weakly through the hanky. “Get the watchmen ready!” shouted the wife who was now the President. “Pick up your sticks!” said the wife to the watchmen, “Lock these people in that dark room!” “You can’t do that!” I tried to say through the cloth round my mouth.

“Quiet!” said the wife, “There’s nothing you can do; we’ve gagged the press!” The chairman and the other members looked at me appealingly as they were led away, but I pointed to my gag and closed my eyes. “You shouted in your sleep,” said the wife the next morning, “You said you were not for smaller states!” “I must have been dreaming!” I said sheepishly and then stared horrified at the hanky in her hand.

Babe talk..!

22-12-2009

Robert Clements

The two little unborn babies, not yet born and waiting to be delivered to expectant mothers below sat in their abode above looking down at the planet earth. “What a beautiful place we are going too soon,” said the first unborn baby gleefully. “Look at those meadows those streams and wonderful gardens, those snow capped mountains, those friendly hills.”

“Yes,” sighed the second unborn baby sadly, “I can see them all.” “Can you see that lovely woman down there too.” “Yes,” said the second unborn baby, “I do.” “That’s going to be my mother.”“And that, “ said the second unborn baby pointing to another woman, “is mine.”

“She’s so beautiful,” said the first. “I know,” said the second.” “Oooh, I can already feel my mothers arms around me, her love, surrounding me. I can feel her breath as she bends over me and showers me with care.

I can feel her doting on me, her little baby.” “Yes,” said the other listlessly. “And when she calls me by my name, I will run and hide and watch from my hiding place and see her anxious eyes, growing concerned that she cannot find me, and just when she is overwhelmed with worry I will come out and shout, “Mummy..!”“Mummy,” mumbled the second unborn baby. “And my mother will run and smother me in her arms and crush me with relief and hold me to herself with deep felt joy. Oh mummy how I ’m waiting to come and be with you.” The other unborn child looked down at her mother and sighed.

“There will be father too,” said the first. “That’s him down there.” “A good man he seems to be,” said the second unborn baby. Where’s yours?” asked the first. “I don’t know,” said the second.

“Soon I will go down into my mothers womb,” said the first unborn baby, “and I will grow in her, till one day I will come into that world below to enjoy it with her and my dad. Oh how happy we all will be. Aren’t you waiting for that day?” “I will never see that day,” sobbed the second unborn baby. “Never.” “But, what a beautiful mother you have!” “Who will end my life before I see the world! Never will I see a sunrise or sunset. Never will I feel the love of a mother. Never will I be born. But she in some dark, dingy clinic will see that I am scooped out and thrown as waste!”

“No,” cried the first unborn child. “No! It is your right to be born!” The two unborn babies looked at the beautiful mother of the second as she flirted and teased and gave herself up to men who waited to bed her. “No!” screamed the second unborn baby. “No..! Don’t kill me before I’m born, don’t, please..!”

Needed: Regular maintenance..!

21-12-2009

Robert Clements

A Kansas cyclone hit a farmhouse just before dawn one morning. It lifted the roof off, picked up the beds on which a farmer and his wife slept, and set them down gently in the next county. The wife began to cry. “Don’t be scared, Mary,” her husband comforted. “We’re not hurt.”
Mary continued to cry. “I’m not scared,” she responded between sobs. “I’m happy … ‘cause this is the first time in 14 years we’ve been out together.” I read the story with tears in my eyes as I like so many others can identify myself as the husband in the blown farmhouse. How often I have found myself doing so many other things than being with the one I decided to be with when we got married. Many, many times indeed! Says the same writer who penned the little story: Little things, such as too little time and attention, will hurt an intimate relationship (marriage, parent-child, or close friendships) more than anything else. We can usually get through the times of crisis; it’s neglect that often destroys closeness and intimacy. The longer we postpone maintenance, the faster the rate of deterioration. I don’t know of anything of value that does not require time, attention and lots of maintenance! In one week’s time I once worked on two plumbing problems at home, caulked bathroom tiles, replaced a heating element on the dryer and another on the stove. At the same time my car needed two new tires, windshield wipers, a battery, new brakes and a starter motor. But everything of value requires maintenance. And I am in trouble when my home or automobile receives more attention than my closest relationships. Even if a marriage is made in heaven, the maintenance must be done on earth. Mother Teresa said, “The hunger for love is much more difficult to remove than the hunger for bread.” Lack of regular maintenance will turn your valuable relationship from an ideal into an ordeal. But daily maintenance – spending enough time, listening and touching, laughing and caring – will keep you close. And isn’t that what we’re hungering for?

Maintenance! Maintenance! It’s not just the car that needs it

Regular oiling and cleaning and other things that need fit

Maintenance! Maintenance! It’s that husband, child or wife

To whom you promised, you’d maintain through your life..!

Keep batting..!

20-12-2009

Robert Clements

Something I hear very often, is that opportunity only knocks once, very true, but I’ve found quite sadly that temptation seems to pound on my door forever. Even opening up and letting it in doesn’t seem to make it go away. More temptations come along and the beating goes on.

Those temptations that cause me the most problems are those that pull me away from being my best ‘me’. Heard about the Swiss woman who was served dinner on a domestic American flight. She opened up her dessert - a delicious looking piece of chocolate cake - and immediately sprinkled a generous layer of salt and pepper over it. A shocked flight attendant exclaimed, “Oh! It’s not necessary to do that!”

“But it is,” the woman replied, smiling. “It keeps me from eating it.” She found a way to drive temptation away from her doorstep, at least for a while. I wish I had such formula. The most persistent temptations in my life are distractions that keep me from doing what is in my best interest.

I forgo some much-needed exercise because I “just don’t feel like it” today. Have you ever felt like that? You may want to quit that yoga group, that aerobic class or those music lessons. It’s easy to become distracted and get discouraged. Or maybe we say we just “can’t find the time” to spend with those closest to us, such as family. We may want to do these things; it’s just that sometimes we need a nudge. Something a great cricketer once said can help out here. “My motto is to keep batting,” he said. “Whether I am in a slump or feeling badly or having trouble off the field, the only thing to do is to keep batting.”

Sometimes we all need to do just that. And if we tell ourselves that all we need to do today is to take one more swing at the ball that may be enough. We can always take one more swing. And who knows — today we may hit a four or even a six! I once heard a sermon I keep reminding myself that the worst enemy of discipline are ‘moods’ And since you need discipline to keep you out of temptation, when you get into a bad mood or someone does something to put you into a foul temper, what goes out of the window is firm resolve.

You need to tell yourself that whatever mood you are in doesn’t stop you from batting. Have a frown on your face, but hit a six. Growl in anger or cry out in hurt but just go ahead and bat through life. Suddenly you’ll find those moods disappearing, those bad days going away and bereft of temptations you’ll find yourself batting onto a century of a good, healthy happy innings called life.The secret is to keep batting..!
 

Sir! did you?

18-12-2009

Robert Clements

The cars were honking on the road this morning as I made my way to the park, drivers in trucks had their heads out yelling, and motorcyclists worried expressions behind their visors as they looked ahead to see only a jam.

I walked on ahead and soon found the culprit; a little auto-rickshaw that had got stuck in the middle of the road. There were beads of perspiration on the driver’s face as he pulled the starter handle up, again and again and again; nothing happened, “No petrol,” I thought to myself and then found myself getting furious, “Why doesn’t the ass move his rickshaw to the side!” I thought, so did all the others who honked and yelled and cursed.

He got up wearily, and the passenger in the rickshaw got out, a young man, white shirt, tie and button down collar, who was on his cell as he stood by the stalled vehicle and watched the driver try to push it uphill and to the side. “Stupid guy!” I said aloud. “Who?” asked the man next to me.“That youngster with the phone, can’t he lend a helping hand?”“And spoil his shirt?”“Yeah!” I said, “They don’t know to help, only to make money!” We watched as the poor driver heaved and pushed his stalled vehicle to the side, we watched as cars, buses and trucks went past cursing the poor man and as the passenger on the phone took another rickshaw and was off.

“Couldn’t even help the poor driver!” I muttered as the rickshaw he had got into passed me.“Spoilt young brat!” said the man next to me.“Yeah!” I said shaking a fist at the passing young man. The rickshaw driver was trying to remove the spark plug, “Stupid passenger!” I said to him, “He couldn’t help you!” The rickshaw driver slowly got up from his crouched position next to his broken down rickshaw, “Sir,” he asked, “Did you?” I looked at him guiltily and looked away, and walked away fast, angrily and then slowed down as I entered the park, “Did I?” What had I been doing as the traffic jam took place? How had I helped ease the problem? Did I help the poor man push his rickshaw?

Oh yes, I’d done my bit, with my mouth hadn’t I? Called him stupid, called his passenger a spoilt brat, even shook my fist at him! But narry a muscle had I moved to solve the problem. I walked slowly this morning, round and round the park, and asked myself what the rickshaw driver had asked, “Sir! Did you?”

Osama’s hiding place..!

17-12-2009

Robert Clements

“Osama in Pak … er … Afghanistan …” TOI Dec 8th Aha! In the caves of Pakistan..er..Afghanistan you look for me? But it isn’t there I hide. I hide in the minds of men! Why should I seek the dark, loneliness of stone and rock when your soft inviting mind invites me in? In Obama’s country I hide in the white man’s mind. I come out whenever he sees not his president but a black man in his Whitehouse, I snigger as I hear him whisper, “Bloody nigger!”

And in the country that supposedly harbours my caveman existence I live in the minds of religious zealots, whose tempers rise in fury when they behold church, temple or Buddhist statue! Men, who with holy book in hand, but intolerance in their mind, wipe out others who bend their knees differently when they worship God. I laugh to see those missiles fly into yonder cave when me who you search for exists inside yourselves. Call me not Osama, call me prejudice, call me hate, call me fanatic, fundamentalist. I was not born yesterday, I was birthed when man was born! You could not eliminate me when you killed your Hitler. Nor kill me when you defeated the slant eyed Jap. You threw atomic bomb to end a bloody war and allowed a hundred me’s be born anew. You rained those missiles down on Afghan soil and sent your men into Saddam’s Iraq, but with every death a hundred more of me sprang to life. I live in the minds of man!Two planes I used that brought yon towers down.But with no planes, or knives you my brethren continue what I so meticulously planned.

You Sri Lankans who look at your poor beaten Tamils with vengeance, you are bigger Osama’s than even me. Yet no one dares bomb or smoke you out, because you live not fugitives but free in the castles of your minds! And you in nearby Indian state, who rant and rave in Parliament today about ancient mosque you cruelly brought down; how easy to say you bear no remorse for evil done; tearing apart harmonious land with devilish, depraved, diabolic design.

Aha! I live on in the minds of men. No bomb can kill me. No missile smoke me out! Kill your Osama’s first before you look for this bearded one. In the mountain caves you search:But it is not there I hide. I live in the minds of men. Dare you smoke your Osamas out?

Eviction notice..!

16-12-2009

Robert Clements

Someone was knocking at my door. It was late in the morning and I pretended not to hear. The knocking persisted, I walked to the main door, opened it to find a pleasant roly-poly lady standing with a notice in her hand, “It’s an eviction notice!” she said as she thrust it into my face.

“Whoa! Whoa!” I shouted, “And who are you?” “Mother Earth!” “Mother Earth, like in earth, earth we live in, stand on?”“Yep,” said the round lady turning to go. “Wait!” I shouted looking at the notice, “You can’t just push this on me!” “Have you ever gone through your tenancy rights?” “Sort of!” I said. “What happens when a tenant breaks the agreement?” “He’s thrown out!” I said lamely. I stared at her as she picked up an old computer I’d placed outside for the garbage man to pick up, “So you don’t want this?”

“No,” I said. “And it’ll be tossed into a garbage dump, where it won’t rot, or decay but just remain as it is! Not biodegradable, you know! Couldn’t you have made it with material, which would have dissolved, disappeared once its use was over? Does your tenancy give you the right of making me your dumping ground?” I continued pleading with her as she walked out, “Please!” I said and then cursed as my driver seeing me, started the car and pressed the accelerator; its fumes made me yell at the stupid man. “Don’t curse him, its you who invented this machine which poisons my air and waters! You aren’t satisfied with letting them spit fumes on the ground, but have filled my skies with carbon vomiting flying creatures!”

“I’m sorry!” I pleaded. “How long is your lease?”“My lifetime!” “D’you know how many tenants I had before you? The same ground you stand on this moment was given to hundreds and thousands before you! I didn’t mind too much though I cried a little when they started chopping my forests, but they said it was in the name of progress, and I kept quiet. Then you started with my rivers and seas and skies, filling them with chemicals and gases worse than Hitler’s holocaust!”

“I’m sorry,” I whispered. “Listen Mother Earth the government is going to announce a major cut in emission intensity in Parliament today!” I asked looking at the eviction notice. “To the gas chambers!” said Landlady Earth with tears in her eyes, “We’ll die together; the Tenant and Landlady. You know what you’ve been?” “A bad tenant..!” I sobbed as I took the notice from my weeping landlady.

Best in tests..!

15-12-2009

Robert Clements

We won! We won! We’re the world’s number one! We won what dad? “The cricket match!” “What?” “Yes, yes, yes!” “But dad, I didn’t know there was a cricket match on, didn’t see anyone standing outside TV shop windows, didn’t see anybody taking an off at college, or even teachers not coming to work, what time was the match yesterday?”

“What time?” “Yes dad, was it a day match, a day-night match or a night match?” “It was a five-day match!” “A what match?” “A five-day match!”

“They have matches like that?” “Yes!” “And they play for five full days?” “Yes, yes! They have two innings and each team bats twice, but in this case India batted only once, we built a fantastic total and made the other team to follow..” “Dad!” “What?” “Do other countries also play this kind of cricket?” “Yes!” “And do people watch this err kind of cricket?” “I did, every single day!” “Other people dad? You know stadiums jam packed, people glued to TV’s?” “In my days..” “Now dad now!” “In my days..”

“Dad do people watch this five day, two innings stuff anymore? Is there a nail biting finish? Do the tail-enders smash the last overs and win matches?” “The tail enders hang on to get a draw!” “What’s a draw?” “Oh never mind!” “Dad?” “Yes?” “Are you sure it’s cricket you’re talking about?” “Yes, it is! We are the best, the best in tests!” “Right, but are the others we beat still interested in playing this kind of cricket dad, or have they become the best in one dayers, the best in T 20’s and finally when all have forgotten to play this game, we’ve become the best in Tests?” “I don’t know son..!”

Say it like it is..!

14-12-2009

Robert Clements

It’s well becoming a fashion today to use buttery words, lofty phrases, sometimes sentences that ramble, and as I listen and try to figure out what people mean, I feel like yelling, “Say it like it is!” In the days before the advent of so many motor cars on the road, and also so many motorised two wheelers, we used ordinary bicycles to get from one place to another. I loved cycling on the more or less empty roads, smooth and well tarred and with hardly any potholes to disfigure the blackness.

However, suddenly at the end of the road, and most roads for that matter would be a sign “Halt and Proceed.” Halt and proceed, meant to me poor cyclist that I had to apply my brakes, stop my bike, look at the junction, to see whether there was traffic coming and then proceed by starting to pedal again.

Simple! Till one day a cyclist did not halt. A policeman, lurking as usual behind a lamp post stopped the poor cyclist and asked him for an explanation for breaking a traffic rule. “Sir,” said the poor fellow, “I do not understand what the sign means!” “Halt and Proceed!” barked the policeman. “But what does halt mean and what does proceed mean?” asked the thoroughly confused man. “It means to stop and go,” said the policeman, as he hauled the poor chap to the police station.

I was surprised to see after a few weeks that the board now said “Halt and Go,” and a few years later, “Stop and Go,” and lately when I visited the same spot, the board just said “Stop!” “Stop!” that’s all that was required, yet such heavy, cumbersome words were used to get instructions across to the poor road user. How like us. Most often, instead of using simple, precise words we tend to enjoy showing off a it using archaic, ancient adjectives which only leaves the listener more confused. Woodrow Wilson, a famous former president of the United States was once practicing his inaugural speech in front of his father. Every once in a while, his father would interrupt and ask him what he meant by such and such a word or sentence. Woodrow would explain, and finally his father burst out “Then say it like it is!”

Yes, say it like it is. Throw out those huge monstrous words you have looked up in the dictionary for. What’s the point in using such words when your listener, or reader doesn’t understand what you mean by it? “Stop” awhile today and listen to yourself and ask yourself if you are saying it like it is..!

Water..!

13-12-2009

Robert Clements

Protest over water cut turns violent…” Hindustan Times, Dec 4th Water, or rather the lack of it turns men into beasts! I have heard of friends becoming enemies, riots happening, pitched battles taking place, women screaming, men punching, even killing each other over a bucket of water. Water, or rather the lack of it turns men into beasts!“Pump man!” shouts the owner of the ground floor; who owns all the flats and has even occupied the colony garden, “There’s no water in my tap!”

“Sir there’s a water cut and you’ve used all the water, watering your garden!”“Quick! There is an emergency here!”“What emergency sir?”“My wife is in the bathtub, and she needs fresh water in the tub before she steps out!” And the pump man rushes to the person in charge screaming, “Water problem!” Water problem!” Most often when I think of a water shortage I imagine some poor wanderer lost in a desert, parched throat, eyes bloodshot, searching for a drop of water, as he gasps for breath and looks into the distance, where he sees a mirage, of fountains, lakes and gushing springs. I think this is also the mirage people see when they fight for water.“I see water flowing from my tap, I see my staircase being thoroughly swabbed, my car being washed, my lawns evergreen!” “But there’s no water in the lakes sir!”“So?” “There’s no water for your staircase and car and lawns!”“But I can see it!” “It’s a mirage sir!”“You dare call what I see a mirage?”“Sir the monsoons were weak, the lakes are dry!”“So what do you expect me to do?”“Stop looking at your mirage sir, stop dreaming! You’ve got to stop washing your car with a hosepipe sir, stop cleaning your staircase and watering your lawns!” “Next you’ll tell my wife to stop using the bathtub!” “Eeeeeoooow!” “What’s that sound sir?”“It’s my wife, she’s run out of water! Quick! Quick put on the pump, get water across to her. What? There’s no water? I’ll kill you!” Like I said water, or the lack of it, turn men into beasts..! It’s not more water we need, but more discipline in it’s usage, otherwise lives will be lost as we pursue a mirage our politicians will surely exploit..!

Trim the bristles..!

11-12-2009

Robert Clements

Hi! Hi! I offered back in return as the stranger with a beard longer than mine, and much whiter, looked at me with kindly eyes as we sat on a bench in the park, “What do you do with your old toothbrushes?” he asked. “I throw them away!”

“Don’t,” said the stranger, “Trim the bristles and you can use them for a much longer time! You see it’s the outer bristles that give way as you brush everyday, but the inner ones are intact.”

I looked at the stranger to thank him for his unsolicited advice but he’d gone. I went home trimmed the bristles and looked at an old toothbrush as good as new. “Did you trim the bristles?” he asked the next morning and his eyes sparkled with interest. And it’s as good as new!” I offered.

“Bob,” said the stranger with the white beard, “Have you heard about the Korean millionaire who was flying economy?” “Yes,” I said, “A passenger next to him asked him why he was flying economy when he was a millionaire and he replied that he was a millionaire because he flew economy!”

“Yes,” said the stranger, “That’s just what you did by trimming your toothbrush!” Become a millionaire?” I asked hopefully. “On your way to becoming one!” he laughed. “I wish it was as simple!” I sighed. “It is,” said the old man, “The further through life I drift the more obvious it becomes that I am lacking in thrift!” “Who said that?” I asked. “Ogden Nash, an American humourist poet!” said the old man, “And he couldn’t have put it better, it’s thrift that we lack today, the stuff millionaires are made of, and when you find yourself drifting away into poverty, hardship and want, you know you’re adrift from thrift!” I grinned at him but found he’d gone, a piece of paper lay where he’d sat, I read it out aloud:

D’you need to drink Scotch when a glass of beer will do? Is your car so old you need to change it for one that’s new? Is your house falling down that a bigger one you need? Is it necessity that governs you or is it, just greed?

Just trim the bristles around your brush today And watch a million, nay a billion, come across your way..!

Don’t look farther..!

10-12-2009

Robert Clements

There was a farmer in Africa who was happy and content. He was happy because he was content. He was content because he was happy. One day a diamond merchant came to him and told him about the glory of diamonds and the power that goes along with them. The merchant said, “If you had a diamond the size of your thumb, you could have your own city. If you had a diamond the size of your fist, you could probably own your own country.” And then he went away. That night the farmer couldn’t sleep. He was unhappy and he was discontent and discontent because he was unhappy.

The next morning he made arrangements to sell off his farm, took care of his family and went in search of diamonds. He looked all over Africa and couldn’t find any. He looked all through Europe and couldn’t find any. When he got to Spain, he was emotionally, physically and financially broke. He got so disheartened that he threw himself into the river in Barcelona and committed suicide. Back home, the person who had bought his farm was watering the camels at a stream that ran through the farm. Across the stream, the rays of the morning sun hit a stone and made it sparkle like a rainbow. He thought it would look good on the mantle piece. He picked up the stone and put it in his living room.

That afternoon the same diamond merchant came and saw the stone sparkling. He asked, “Is Hafiz back?” The new owner said, “No, why do you ask?” The wise man said, “Because that is a diamond. I know one when I see one.” The man said, “No, that’s just a stone I picked up from the stream. Come, I’ll show you. There are many more.” They went and picked some samples and sent them for analysis. Sure enough, the stones were diamonds. They found that the farm was indeed covered with acres and acres of diamonds. Can you imagine that poor Hafiz didn’t realize there were diamonds in his own backyard!

I see this very often with most of us.“What is it you wish for?” asks a friend.“Peace of mind!” we say wistfully, “Happiness!” “And how do you think you’ll get it?” “Maybe get that job in America, you know how they pay there, by the dollar!” And we travel to foreign land and break our backs trying to earn a living and establish ourselves. We come back every two years and tell our envious relatives of the Porsche we have back home and the dishwasher that does all the dishes, while actually looking with envy at the comfortable, easy paced life style our relatives lead here.

Towards the end of our lives we realize the diamonds were there in our own backyard, back home. Or it could be the hunk next door or that beautiful woman you met at the office party. You have a fling. You leave home and hearth and as the bitter truth hits you later, you know who the real diamonds are. The diamonds are where you are right now, and that sparkle comes from those you are with. Don’t look any farther..!

Talking himself to death..!

09-12-2009

Robert Clements

Despite the police shouting themselves hoarse against speaking on the cell phone and driving I still see many doing the same, proving a danger to others and themselves: Like this young man driving the latest fancy car who had an arm on the steering wheel and the other hugging his cell phone in an intimate embrace. “Did I wake you up?” he asked, speaking seductively into the mouthpiece.

“No,” replied the husky voice at the other end, “you just got me out of the bath!”“Out of the bath!” exclaimed the young man, not seeing the cyclist in front.“What was that noise?” asked the seductive voice at the other end.“What noise?” asked the young man breathlessly holding the cell phone even closer, and not noticing the man and the cycle falling behind.

“You know you shouldn’t phone and drive.”“What are cell phones for?” asked the young man, “if not for taking the boredom out of driving!” The signal in front, suddenly turned to red, but the young man with his phone pressed to his ear and his mind pressed elsewhere did not notice the change and continued driving through. “What are you wearing?”

He asked, holding his breath in anticipation and literally looking into the phone. He did not see the startled scooterist veering dangerously to avoid him. All he felt was a thud, which he mistook for the sound of his own heart beat as he repeated the question “What are you wearing?”

“Come and see,” sighed the husky voice at the other end lustily. Yes I’m coming,” whispered the young man accelerating, “and I’m not going to put this phone off till I reach you!” The other drivers tried desperately to pull their vehicles quickly out of the way of the speeding car. “Hello, hello,” said the young man, suddenly realising his phone had gone off. “Damn,” he shouted, “damn,” and drove faster.

An old lady with a walking stick did not see the approaching car. She was flung up high and the crowd gathered round her knew she would never need a stick again as the young man in the car only shouted deeper into his cell phone. “Hello, hello, damn, damn, damn………..” A schoolboy, whose father had taught him diligently how to cross at zebra crossings only, jumped out of the way in time, but decided not to obey the signals again. Meanwhile, the young man driving the latest fancy car, one arm on the steering wheel and the other hugging his cell phone, bent down to press redial so he could talk to his girlfriend again. He did not see the ten ton truck switching lanes in front.

“Hello!” said the husky voice at the other end of the line, “Hello,” she shouted as she heard the piercing scream and sound of tearing metal but the young man one mangled arm on the smashed steering wheel, the other still clutching his cell phone, lay still, never to hear her again…!
 

Be still..!

08-12-2009

Robert Clements

I guess it happens to all of us, we get so caught up with rushing and pushing and getting things done that suddenly we find we’re not just pooped but also feeling a little depressed. It happened to me last week when getting caught in the whirlpool called life I found myself going down.

That night while trying to sleep I felt the light on my cell phone blinking and looked at the message, it was, “Be still and know that I am God!” I smiled. It seemed a message from Someone who’d been watching his child floundering and had decided to tell me in two simple words; Be still!

Be still: It was a command; stop wriggling, stop moving, stop, just stop rushing around, stop getting worried, stop, stop and let me handle things. Many, many years ago, I remember a little plaque hanging on a wall in my childhood home.

Is that the truth? Is that what the birds think when they look at us with those disgusted eyes from the tops of trees and lampposts, wondering why we don’t just connect to Someone above who is just waiting for his children to connect with him.

‘Be still!’

I tried everything those few days when I was hassled; deep breathing exercises, breathe deep all the goodness you can and exhale all the negative thoughts. Again, and again and again, all the breath my lungs could take, then somebody suggested a massage man who would give my legs and knees a good malish, “He knows all the acupressure spots on your feet that cause worry!” So it was mallish and deep breathing, deep breathing and mallish, but finally a message from above, solved it all. A group of Americans made a trip with Brazilian natives down the Amazon River.

The first day they rushed. The second day they rushed. The next day they rushed. One day, anxious to continue the trek, they were surprised to find the natives seated together in a circle. When asked the reason for the delay, a guide answered, “They are waiting. They will not move further until their souls have caught up with their bodies.” Do you owe it to yourself to BE STILL and let the Divine catch up with your body?

The joke’s on us...!

07-12-2009

Robert Clements

Very often in my mailbox are jokes about women and I admit I spend a few minutes having a laugh as I did today reading stuff like the ones below:

When we are born, our mother’s get the compliments and the flowers. When we are married, our brides get the presents and the publicity. When we die, our widows get the life insurance. What do women want to be liberated from?

I smiled, nodded and continued reading: A man was walking down a street when he heard a voice from behind, “If you take one more step, a brick will fall down on your head and kill you.” The man stopped and a big brick fell right in front of him. The man was astonished. He went on, and after a while he was going to cross the road. Once again the voice shouted, “Stop! Stand still! If you take one more step a car will run over you, and you will die.” The man did as he was instructed, just as a car came careening around the corner, barely missing him.

The man asked. “Who are you?” I am your guardian angel,” the voice answered. “Oh, yeah?” the man asked “And where the hell were you when I got married?” I was really grinning from ear to ear when my eyes fell on something my daughter had sent me and as I read it my grin vanished and tears rolled my cheeks as I realized what humbugs we men really are: Read on: Mum and Dad were watching TV when Mum said, “I’m tired I think I’ll go to bed.” She went to the kitchen to make sandwiches for the next day’s lunches and started the coffee pot for brewing the next morning. She then put some wet clothes in the dryer, ironed a shirt and picked up game pieces left on the table, put the phone back on the charger and telephone book into the drawer. Watered the plants, emptied a wastebasket, hung a towel, yawned and stretched and headed for the bedroom.

She stopped by the desk, wrote a note to the teacher and signed a birthday card for a friend, addressed, stamped the envelope and wrote a quick note for the grocery store. She put both near her bag. Dad called out, “I thought you were going to bed.” “I’m on my way,” she said. She put some water into the dog’s dish, put the cat outside, made sure the doors were locked and the outside light on. She looked in on each of the kids, turned out their bedside lamps and radios, hung up a shirt, threw some dirty socks into the hamper, had a brief conversation with the one up still doing homework. In her own room, she set the alarm; laid out clothing for the next day, straightened up the shoe rack.

She added three things to her 6 most important things to do list, said her prayers, visualized the accomplishment of the day and waited for her man who about that time, turned off the TV and announced to no one in particular. “I’m going to bed.” And he did...without another thought. Ever thought the joke’s on us lazy men?

Set your sights high..!

04-12-2009

Robert Clements

Every once in a while we see someone with a far of look in their eyes, jaw locked with resolve and face steely with determination. The world laughs as they try to sell some far flung, huge, unimaginable idea.

And then when we have all but forgotten them they appear again, millionaires or billionaires who have succeeded because they thought big. When Henry Ford decided to produce his famous V-8 engine, he chose to build it with the entire eight cylinders cast in one block, and instructed his engineers to produce a design for the same. The plan was made on paper, but the engineers agreed to a man that it was impossible to cast an eight cylinder engine block in one piece. “Produce it anyway,” said Ford. “Impossible!” they all cried. “Just go ahead and do it,” ordered Ford.

The engineers went ahead. At the end of a year Ford checked with the engineers and again was told they had found no way to carry out his orders. “Go right ahead,” said Ford, “I want it and I’ll have it. They went ahead and then as if by a stroke of magic the secret was discovered. Ford thought big and won, what about you? Are you setting your sights too low? There was a woman who fished all morning and never caught anything. But a man in the next boat was reeling in a fish every time she glanced over. Then, to make matters worse, he kept the small ones and threw the large ones back into the water! She couldn’t stand it any longer. She called over to him, “How come you’re throwing the big ones back?”

He answered by holding up a little frying pan. “I only got a small pan,” he cried out, “so only de small fish fit in!”How silly, we think, but aren’t most of us holding up small frying pans? Every time we throw away a big idea, a magnificent dream or an exciting possibility, are we measuring it against a tiny pan? When our minds are small, when our imagination cannot see success, then we start throwing away opportunities. Change the size of your frying pan, think big and see the difference. Henry Ford had a big frying pan; a huge gigantic one that brushed passed objections of qualified engineers. Author Brian Tracy reminds us that “you are not what you think you are, but what you think, you are.” Think big. Dream big. Pray big... and look for big results. Can you imagine the immense possibilities, once you throw away your old frying pan you’ve been using all this time to measure the size of your dreams, and replace it with a larger one? Like Henry Ford, your success will be huge and big and like Ford you will throw the little fish back and keep only the big ones..!

A gift called love..!

02-12-2009

Robert Clements

They sat together on the rocks and watched the waves come in. She felt his arms around her and felt safe and secure. “Thank you God!” she whispered, “For giving me somebody who loves me so much and who I love so very much too!” She heard the soothing sound of the waters and she nuzzled closer into his muscular arms.

The gentle lulling sounds of the waves must have made her doze off for a few minutes but she was suddenly all alert: She felt his arms, they were not around her. His hands had left her shoulders and were slowly tracing a circle around her neck. His hands were now like roaming tentacles and she felt passion in his movements. He tried to lay her down on the rocks.

“No!” she said gently, “No!” “Why not?” he asked a little too roughly, “We’re going to be married, it’s okay!”“When we’re married it’ll be okay!” she said with a smile. “I thought you loved me,” he said, his passion unabated. “Very much!” she said, “I had a dream just now when I dozed off. I dreamt I was outside my body and that I was walking towards it. Like a house of God!”“Yes,” he said slightly disinterested. “There were lights inside my body and the lights shone out for all the world to see.” “See what?” he asked with a smile. “See that God was dwelling inside the temple!”“Inside your body?” he asked incredulously. “Strange isn’t it?” she asked looking at him with a smile. “But I saw my body was the temple of God and that He was living in me.”

The waves from the sea gently splashed against the rocks and there was a silence between the two young lovers. “If God dwells in your body,” he said slowly, “Then it is a holy place!” “If God dwells in my body,” she said, “I need to keep myself holy!” He looked at her and slowly put his arms around her again. She felt his strength and sureness and also the fact that he had understood. “He dwells in you too,” she said with a smile.“I know,” he said and looked at her with eyes of love. “We need to keep ourselves pure and holy for God to continue abiding in us,” she said, “I wonder though, why I dreamt there were lights in my body?”

“Lights for others to see God in you!” he said simply. They watched the sea as it gently kissed the rocks and they felt their eyes on each other. They turned to each other and their faces grew close in love as their lips touched each other. “Strange,” he murmured, “I love you so much more now that I do not lust for your body!”“Our bodies are God’s holy temple,” she whispered as she held him close and thanked God for a gift called love.

Life is short..!

01-12-2009

Robert Clements

Even as we hear of bomb blasts and train accidents, and look at the obit column and see familiar faces we realize time is short. I remember the scream that came from a neighbour’s house: The daughter ran upstairs thinking the worst, and saw her mother weeping uncontrollably, hunched over the morning paper, “She’s gone!” cried the old lady, “She’s gone!” And she pointed to the obituary column. “I didn’t even know she was sick! Oh my dearest sister how could you go without telling me? Why did you die before we could make up?”

The daughter looked at the paper and saw the photograph of her aunt, whom her mother had stopped talking to after a bitter fight years ago. She watched her mother weep and then whispered, “I told you ma life is short!”

Many years ago Phillips Brooks talked one Sunday to the people who sat in front of him. Bitter, unbending people who refused to forgive and forget. “You are letting miserable misunderstandings run on from year to year, meaning to clear them up someday;

“You are keeping wretched quarrels alive because you cannot quite make up your mind that now is the day to sacrifice your pride and kill them; “You are passing men sullenly on the street, not speaking to them out of some silly spite, and yet knowing that it would fill you with shame and remorse if you heard that one of these men were dead tomorrow morning; “You are letting your neigbour starve till you hear that he has died of starvation; “Or letting a friend’s heart ache for a word of appreciation or sympathy which you mean to give him some day;“If you could only feel and see that ‘life is short’ how it would break the spell. How you would go instantly and do the thing which you might never have the chance to do!”

After he spoke that Sunday, people who had never spoken to each other in years suddenly smiled and greeted each other, and discovered it was what they’d been wanting to do all along. Neighbours who had disliked and avoided each other walked home together, and were astonished to find how very much they enjoyed doing so.

All at once they felt happier and more content, felt at peace with themselves and the world. The words of Brooks struck a responsive chord in their hearts. Today I urge you to do the same: Forget past grievances. Bear with the faults of others even as you would have them bear with yours. Be patient and understanding. Life is too short to be petty and unkind. Put down the paper after you’ve read this piece and make a call to someone you haven’t talked to in years..!
 

Friendly fire..!

27-11-2009

Robert Clements

In Lexington, Virginia, lie the mortal remains of a legend, General Stonewall Jackson. General Jackson earned his nickname at the First Battle of Manassas. This was during the American Civil War, the Confederate soldiers were hard pressed.

General Gerard Barnard Bee was desperately trying to rally his troops to withstand the Federal attack. General Bee rode up to inform General Jackson that his forces were being beaten back. Jackson replied, “Sir we shall give them the bayonet..!”General Bee immediately rallied the remnants of his brigade telling his men, “There is Jackson standing like a stone wall. Let us determine to die here and we will conquer!” His men followed him routing the Yankees. They won because of Jackson’s strong words and from then on General Jackson was called, “Stonewall Jackson.”

Stonewall Jackson was instrumental in the Confederate victories at Second Manasses, Antietem and Chancellorsville and many say that at the rate he was winning the Confederates could have won the war. But it was not to be. At the young age of thirty nine while riding at night he was shot accidentally by the bullets of his own men and died.

Friendly Fire or fratricide is a military term used when troops of one nation kill their very own. Fratricide has tragically become a fact of life on the battlefield. George Washington reported that during the French and Indian wars, four hundred casualties resulted from soldiers who panicked and sent volley after volley into their own ranks.

Perhaps 10% of American casualties of World War II and 15% to 20% during the Vietnam Conflict were the results of fratricide; bombs which were dropped by accident; errant rifle fire or artillery shells landing on the wrong targets.Friendly fire is the cause of countless casualties even today. Not in battle but at home and in the work place. Teachers who are assailed by parents burn out in a few short years.

Spouses fire verbal and sometimes physical shots at each other until mortally wounded marriages finally die taking the children along.

Today as I watch and see the BJP fighting among themselves, I realize how true this is. Instead of getting their act together and working towards the next election they hit out, scream and shoot each other down.

Someone said so well: To come together is a beginning. To stay together is progress and to finish together is success. Can an organisation or family succeed against the assault of friendly fire? The secret to handling friendly fire is in the word ‘together.’

We have come together for important reasons. We are in it together. Through conflict and disagreement we must stand together, pray together and in the end, we finish together. Otherwise like Stonewall Jackson, we will fall to our own bullets..!

Chemo for the BJP..!

Robert Clements

6-11-2009

In another stinging blow to the faction feud ridden BJP,RSS boss Mohan Bhagwat has diagnosed that the party is grappling with a life threatening ailment that needs nothing short of drastic surgery or even chemotherapy…TOI, 28th Oct.

Now that’s pretty drastic isn’t it? Telling your party it needs chemotherapy? I mean it’s like telling somebody who’s got what he thinks is a simple cough and cold that he’s on his deathbed. I’m nor sure the BJP needs such severe treatment, but I do know harsh medication has its side effects, and maybe the chief should be told the side effects of chemo:

Anxiety: This is a serious side affect of the treatment the RSS chief has recommended for his BJP and he should be prepared for it, “Hello! Hello!” “Who is it?” “Advani!”

What is it Advaniji?” “I would like to lead our party to victory in the next general elections!” “But that is five years away!”“Yes but I am anxious to be announced as the next prime minister designate!” “Just go back to the hospital will you!”

Confusion: According to the medical profession, patients of chemo go through bouts of confusion, and this could create chaos for the party. There is some speculation in the country that this is what caused some befuddlement when Advani visited Pakistan: “Jinnah is a great leader!”

Who?” “Jinnah!” And later Jaswant Singh, “Jinnah is not to blame for partition!”

Eye Problems: Having problems with your vision is one of the serious side affects that the RSS chief may have to contend with, especially when he raises the temple issue: “We need to build the temple!” “It is already built!” “Are you blind what are you talking about?”

God resides in our hearts, the temple is already there!” Memory Loss: Yes loss of memory Mr Bhagwat is also a very serious side effect: “Who are you?”

I am the RSS chief!” “What’s that?” “What’s what?” “The RSS!”

Now sir I am sure you agree by now that chemotherapy is too strong a treatment. Maybe a dose of Democracy and meditation on the Constitution could work wonders sir! Maybe..!

Go with your boots on..!

Robert Clements

30-10-2009

There was a gleam in their eyes and joy on their faces as I met them this morning. He was Kuldeep Sapat, formerly with Air India and she, Bharati, his wife of many moons. He was seventy one, tall but walked with a slight stoop; I found out later the reason; he had had his gall bladder removed and carried an illiostomy bag near his waist into which emptied out his large intestine.

She was little, petite, maybe a year or two younger and I knew had been operated on both her knees. “You both seem happy about something?” I asked. “What a picnic Bob!” he exclaimed, “what a wonderful time we had!” “The picnic for the senior citizens?” I asked and they both smiled and told me how fifty senior citizens from their area had been taken to the Karnala Bird Sanctuary. “We played antakshari on the way!” laughed Bharati, and her eyes twinkled as she recollected the fun they had.

We started at 7.30 am said Kuldeep, “and reached in an hour and a half and you should have seen everybody opening up, singing, playing the harmonium and playing the fool!” I left them both and walked on, he had told me before about this picnic he was organizing; he had driven himself to the location first, looked at the place worked on the itinerary, arranged the caterer, installed a group to work on the games and seen that every detail was looked after. I marveled at his dedication and enthusiasm and slowed down so that they could catch up with me, “What makes you do so much?” I asked, “after all you can just lie back now and enjoy yourself?” “Bob,” he said and again I saw the glint in his wife’s eye, “ I believe we should go out of life with our boots on!”

Ah! What advice, “Go with your boots on!” I thought of someone else I had met a few weeks ago; I had driven out of the city to see an old folks home in the suburbs for an uncle of mine. It was a beautiful, elegant, imposing structure, and as I looked at the building I was joined by a tiny, little lady from inside the building. “Who built this?” I asked my friend who had taken me there.

Sister Eugene,” he said pointing to the little lady. “No,” I said, “who was the contractor?” The nun next to me smiled, “I hired the labour, lived in a room over there, bathed in the river flowing next to our land and got the building put up!”“She fell sick and nearly died!” said another sister who was standing by, “but she carried on and look how beautiful the home is!” I remembered Sister Eugene this morning as I talked to Kuldeep Sapat and his wife Bharati; they were all made of the same cloth.

The similarity wasn’t just that both helped old folks, but they carried on despite illness, in spite of pain. Only when one sees their glowing, joyous faces does one realize their healing therapy is in the work they do: That to go with their boots on is a healing better than any medicine available. Maybe there’s a lesson for you and me today, as we whine and complain, wail and moan about illnesses and problems; just look around, pick up those old boots and put them on again..!

Who is your neighbour?

Robert Clements

29-10-2009

A 45 year old man who suffered an injury on his left leg bled to death at the gates of the Chennai Government Hospital The shabbily dressed man, with a plaster on his leg, had been lying under the scorching sun for 20 days…” TOI, 23rd Oct.

Twenty days! Not an hour or two, not a day nor two, but twenty days in the scorching heat of Madras, lying not at the gates of a five star hotel or rich man’s bungalow but outside a hospital, meant for such as him. And from the filthy pavement the suffering man cries, “Doctor! Doctor!” Doctors rush by, their minds on patients they are going to save, their ears closed to the cries below. Again his pitiful cries and relatives of one who has just recovered, pass him by, happily bearing a box of sweets for the nurses who have saved their kin. The poor man cries out, not for an hour, not two, but twenty days.

The beggars feed him. From their scraps and tit bits they give him some. And in their homes and offices the people of that city are angry. Angry for their neighbouring brethren in Sri Lanka, Tamils just like them who they feel are getting a raw deal in a country across the sea.

“They are our neighbours!”“Tamils just like us!” “Being ill-treated by the Singhalese!” “No human rights!” “No rights!” they shout about their brothers a thousand miles away.

The poor man cries out, not for an hour, not two but for twenty days, as the beggars feed him outside the hospital gates with scraps and tit bits they scrape out of their nearly empty plates.“Hello sir, yes, yes, you who walk with fuming face, you who are so angry about human rights across the sea, come with me!”

“Where?”“Just across the road, to the general hospital!”“Why!” “A man lies there, dying!” “What do you want me to do?” “The same you are trying to do for those across the sea! Come!” “No!” “Why?”“Because it’s easier shouting about someone a thousand miles away, screaming about human rights and poverty across the sea than lifting and feeding someone across the street..!” And the man bled to death.

Sedated husbands..!

Robert Clements

20-10-2009

Poor Arnold, muscleman, superstar, governor, passes a law and finds wifey doing just the opposite. “Join the club Arnold!” “Club? What club?” “The ‘sedated husbands club’!” Strange name! You got other members?” “Yeah about three billion world wide!” “Three billion! That’s half the world, what about the other half?” “They’re all women Arnold!” “You’re trying to tell me all husbands are members?” “You don’t believe me, see that guy there, go over and say hi to him!” “Hi! My name’s Arnold! Arnold Schwarzenegger! ” “Ugghh!” “He’s not talking Bob?” “He’s sedated!” “Sedated? What’s wrong with ‘im?” “Nothing, he tried to subdue his wife, kicked a racket, made a row, tried to make rules…” ”And?” asked Arnold trembling. “Wife said okay! Yes dear, yes darling, no problem darling, obey whatever you say dear, and this chappy was mighty pleased till he found…” “Till he found what I found,” shouted Arnold, “The wife doing just what she wanted to do, even after I’d lain down the law!” “Yeah,” I said. “Ugghh!” said the other guy. “So why the sedation?” “Arnold what d’you plan to do now that your wife’s been found breaking your rule?” “I’m plannin’ on goin’ home and givin’ her a piece of my mind!” said the muscleman, superstar and governor. “And what’s your wife going to do?” “She’s gonna say, yes Arnold, I’m sorry Arnold, I’ll never do that again dear, will obey you till death do us part dear…” “So what’s the best thing you can do?” “Ugghhh!” said the other guy, taking out a pill from his pocket. “What’s this?” asked Arnold. “Sedation pill! Take one and you’ll believe alls well! That she’s listening to you! That you’re the man of the house!” Arnold took the pill and swallowed it, his mighty Adam’s apple bobbing. “Ugghhh!” he said to me.

Attaboy Arnold!” I said, “Join the club of three billion!” “Uggghhh..!” we said happily together as Arnold waved to Mrs Schwarzenegger driving past with her ear pressed to her cell phone.

Roti first, then Mandir sir..!

Robert Clements

19-10-2009

“…In Vashi, Advani talks of Ram Temple…” TOI, Oct 10th

The old man wearing khaki shorts under his starched dhoti held the blueprint of the proposed temple in his hand and looked in the direction of Ayodhya whispering. “Pillars of bronze that will rise to the sky!” A hungry beggar crept up to the old man wearing khaki shorts under his starched dhoti crying, “Bread! Bread! I’m hungry, give me bread!” The old man whispered, “Marble flooring!” “Bread! Bread!” “Carvings carved by craftsmen from Rajasthan and sculptures that will be the envy of the world!”

“Bread! Bread!” cried the beggar as he held onto the leg of the old man wearing khaki shorts under his starched dhoti. “Domes!” cried the old man, “Domes that will resound with the silence of a people who will stand under in awe at its magnitude and glory!” “I am hungry!” wept the beggar, “Give me bread to eat!” “Gold idols and silver vessels!” “Bread! Bread! I’m hungry! I’m going to die! Bread! Bread!” The old man wearing khaki shorts under his starched dhoti held the blueprint of the proposed temple in his hand and looked in the direction of Ayodhya. He was joined by thousands of others who stood around him, all wearing khaki shorts under their dhotis and peering at the same blue print as they looked in the same direction. Around them millions of thin, starving men and women clutched their feet. “Bread!” they cried.

“Marble flooring!” cried the men and women looking at the blueprint. “Bread!” “Carvings carved by craftsmen from Rajasthan and sculptures that will be the envy of the world!” “Domes!” cried those around the old man, “Domes that will resound with the silence of a people who will stand under in awe at its magnitude and glory!” “Bread! Bread!” cried the thin men and women as they held onto the legs of those standing around the old man wearing khaki shorts under his starched dhoti.

“Gold idols and silver vessels!” “Bread! Bread! We are hungry! We are about to die! Bread! Bread!” The old man smiled as he saw the temple rising high, looking beautiful in the rising sun, splendid in the rays of the setting sun. “My dream!” he cried, “My dream!” and he folded the blueprint and turned to face the electorate.

He did not see the beggar fall, he did not see the beggar die. Nor do the others see the starving millions, as they talk once more of making the temple an issue with which to fight the elections, while millions die! Advani Sahib, “Roti first, then Mandir sir..!”
 

Close the windows..!

Robert Clements

Creak! Squeak! Creak! I’m trying to open a window; amazed at the audacity of a government telling me what to do and when. “You can’t buy liquor today?”

Why?” “Because it’s a dry day!”“Dry day?”“It’s the birth anniversary of our revered leader!” “There may be people who would celebrate a birthday with a glass in their hand?”“That’s against our culture!” “Are you sure?” “Yes!”“Lets open that window and see what you mean by our culture! Hey what’s that guy sipping while his family watches TV? And in the next house and the next and the next, what’s that sound? It’s the clinking of glasses, the opening of bottles, the laughter of men as they listen to one another’s stories!”

Close those windows!” “Want to open the windows of our political leaders and see the same thing?”“Close the windows!” “Why? Before the world sees our hypocrisy? That a dry day is a wet one behind closed windows? Tell me, how much does the Supreme Court fine political leaders for enforcing a bandh?” “Why?” “Because the same fine should be levied on the government!” “On the government?” “Yeah for enforcing their ‘dry day’ bandh on people! Like goondas go about downing shutters against our will, the government is imposing its will on my freedom of choice! It is my right to decide what I want to do, and no goonda or government has the right to impose themselves on me!” “But drinking on voting day could cause a law and order situation!” “So arrest those who cause problems, like you arrest those who drink and drive!”“Now close the windows!” “No!” I said, “Let the world see our hypocrisy!” I heard the angry sound of windows being closed and looked out to see bootleggers and illicit liquor sellers looking at me angrily, “We are closing the windows!” they shouted.

Why?” I asked. “Because hypocrisy is profitable!” they shouted and laughed as they passed a bottle through the window to the people inside..!

Fighting in the air..!

Robert Clements

AI Crew in Mid Air brawl…” TOI, Oct 4th I’m not sure I’m too happy about cabin attendants and cockpit crew slugging it out mid-air while giant plane zips across the sky. I mean isn’t it enough we have to be fearful of hijackers, careful of fellow passengers, wary of strangers striking up a conversation?

Aren’t we burdened enough with security checks that treat even Shah Rukh Khan like a terrorist and other passengers like unwanted riff-raff and now to find our pretty flight attendant as she explains safety measures interrupted by a pilot flinging her across the aisle into a passengers lap?

No why did you do that commander?” “She didn’t greet me when I entered the cockpit!” “But she was hauling that old lady’s luggage onto the rack above, running with a glass of water to the man who threatened her with a diabetic attack, then giving the bawling child a toy to stop him from crying!”

She didn’t wish me!” “Did her not greeting you cause you to get disturbed commander?” “Yes! My hands shook as I held the joystick, I couldn’t see the tarmac below, and my head throbbed with anger! Do you know what could happen if I’m in such a state?”

Tell me commander?” “I could lose control and the lives of every one on board could be at stake!” “Just because she was too busy to wish you?” “Too busy doing trivial things!” “Commander!”

I am still shivering with rage!” “Commander!” “Look at my hands!”

Commander do you know who pays your fancy salary?” “The airlines of course!” “And who pays the airlines? You don’t know? Ah commander I do! I pay the airlines and you get paid from the ticket I pay for! So if the pretty girl you just threw spent her time looking after me instead of you, you should be happy because she was actually seeing that the one who filled your pay packet was being cared for! Hey what are you doing sir?”

Ladies and gentlemen this is your commander speaking, we are turning the plane around!”

Why ma’am?” “Insubordination!” says the airhostess. “Why? What did you do to him?” “It’s you, this time!” “Me! But I’m a passenger!” “You gave the pilot a lecture! The commander is calling for security as soon as we land, till then he has ordered me to muzzle your mouth and handcuff you to your seat sir..!”

Your inner castle..!

Robert Clements

Come summer, and every resort and hotel, by sea and hill station advertise themselves silly. Glamorous bodies play ball on seductive beaches and coyly beckon you through news pages to join them in underwater fantasy. With over filled bag and more than over filled wallet we rush to these exotic mirages and return disillusioned.

The sea was not as blue as photograph showed. The beaches were crowded, and serene lake had blaring music coming over the muddy waters. Arms of loved ones were exciting but disquieting..! “It is the will of God for us,” says Evelyn Underhill, “that in the worlds most crowded street, in the din of life, when the rush and hurry are at their most intense, in joy or sorrow, in love or in bereavement, in all that makes up our outer and inner life that we should have a place of retirement, a permanent retreat, ever at hand for renewal and peace.” “ It is God’s will for us that we should possess an Interior Castle, against which the storms of life may beat without being able to disturb the serene quiet within; a spiritual life so firm and so secure that nothing can overthrow it.”Aha an inner castle.

So isn’t that where we’ve been making a mistake all this time? We have been looking for that inner peace in our annual vacations, in that promised trip to the mountains, in that time we were going to spend by the sea, or in the company of our beloved.

We look for that peace on top of mountain, where prophet and sage say that peace exist. All we find are empty beer cans mocking us with one eyed hole from which loosened spirit gave some mortal, temporary oblivion.

The hang over when back from mountain top crushes one with hopelessness, despair. Whereas that inner castle, refreshes, relaxes, rejuvenates. A place divine. An inner citadel.

But, for that inner castle to really be effective we need to have the divine living in it. God needs to be in there. Imagine for a moment what a wonderful place it could be for you to disappear every once in a while during the day to go and spend precious moments with your maker. When a divine peace full and holy envelopes your troubled mind and you have peace and calm.

And from the holy scriptures, I lift this verse; “The Lord is my shepherd, so I have everything I need! He lets me rest in the meadow grass and leads me beside the quiet streams. He restores my failing health. He helps me do what honours him the most”

That my dear friends is what the Lord promises, as you enter into a holiday with Him. No temporary mirages of scenic beauty. No mountains of sadness. Or oceans of tears. But days and nights of joy and laughter. Holiday with God in your Inner Castle..!

The orphan girl..!

Robert Clements

20-09-2009

She was six, little, and part of a group who were singing Quawali songs, on communal brotherhood. An orphan, I was told, part of a home run by a charitable institution. I watched her bright eyes, oh how they twinkled, growing serious when the words needed such expression and shining with happiness when the words talked of unity and love.

The other little boys and girls in the group had mothers and fathers in the audience, who smiled and waved and cheered and their children’s eyes sparkled as they sang a little louder or smiled a little broader seeing their parents wave or shout or clap.

But the little orphan girl had no one. Yet I saw joy in her eyes, gay abandon as she threw herself into the dance, I saw her body move with the rhythm of the music and her wide mouth delivering lines which I wondered her little self understood, and as I looked around I saw that others like me where mesmerized by her.

Slowly parents stopped looking at their own and looked at this little mite, who had no one in the audience but who now had all eyes on her.

And I thought of some woman somewhere in the country who should have been in the audience to proudly shout, “That’s my girl!”“That’s my girl, yes the one with the bright eyes, the one you are looking at, that’s my girl, the one who smiles as she sings, who’s step and gait you so keenly watch, that’s my girl!”

But she had no one to say these words.

How, I wondered had she come to the orphanage; some unwanted pregnancy? Maybe thrown in the gutter when the whole family wanted a boy!

But dear mother who gave her up, if you could see her now, you would have cried out with pride, “That’s my girl!”

And the audience would have looked at you with envy, “What a daughter you have?” they would have said silently, “How beautifully she dances!”

“She’s only six!” “She’s going to be somebody someday!”But now the chances of her being somebody someday from an orphanage are dim, dear woman, very dim. She’s six and not adapted yet, and will stay the rest of her growing life in the confines of a home for others like her.

And slowly as the years go by, as warden and superintendent enforce rules and cruelty wrapped as discipline on her, those eyes will sparkle less, that smile will fade and she will become another faceless woman married off to some faceless man, who one night will look at her, after she has cleaned his place and his plates and that of his mother and father and her children, “Why do you look so wistful?”

And she will turn those same eyes I saw this morning on him and whisper, “I wonder what life would have been if I’d had a mother?”

Who walks with you?

Robert Celements

19-09-2009

He was the colony bully: A tough fellow, who used swear words like others their good mornings and goodbyes. I had to go down and face him as he had attacked my supervisor and even the watchman. “Lord,” I prayed, “Walk with me!”

I went down and looked him in the eye, talked gently to him, and it seemed the bully in him disappeared; a new meek fellow listened. I walked back home and grinned to a God above, “Thank you for walking with me Lord!” Her name was Carol, and she was eighteen. She was on a one- week cruise of the Hawaiian Islands. It was a wonderful cruise with friendly people on board, but for days the others on the cruise had watched as Carol walked around with a limp and knew she had on an artificial left leg.

Today was the last day of the cruise and a talent night when all the passengers participated in a contest. It was finally Carol’s turn. She came on stage wearing neither shorts nor Hawaiian garb, but a full length dress. She looked beautiful.

She walked up to the microphone and said, “I really don’t know what my talent is, but I thought this would be a good chance for me to give what I think I owe you all, and this is an explanation. I know you’ve been looking at me all week and wondering about my fake leg. I thought I should tell you what happened. I was in a motorcycle accident. I almost died, but they kept giving me blood and my pulse came back.”

“They amputated my leg below my knee and later they amputated through the knee. I spent seven months in the hospital – seven months with intravenous antibiotics to fight infection.”

She paused a moment and then continued, “If there’s one thing that happened to me at that time is that my faith became very real to me.”

Suddenly a hush swept over the ship. The waitresses stopped serving drinks. The glasses stopped tinkling. Everybody was focused on the tall eighteen year old blonde.

She said, “I look at you girls who walk without a limp, and I wish I could walk that way. I can’t, but this is what I’ve learned, and I want to leave it with you: “It’s not how you walk, but who walks with you!”

At this point she paused again and said, “I’d like to sing a song about my friend who walks with me,” and she sang: And He walks with me and He talks to me, And He tells me I am His own, And the joy we share, In our time of prayer, None other has ever known!

“Thank you!” There was not a dry eye, not a life that wasn’t touched that night on board that cruise near Hawaii.

I wonder who walks with you as you limp through life? I wonder who walks with you as you face bullies and insensitive people every day? Just remember what Carol said on board that luxury ship, “Its not how you walk but who walks with you..!”

Someone’s lil’ daughter..!

Robert Clements

15-09-2009

“..Gujarat corps killed Mumbra girl in cold blood, finds probe…” Times of India Sept 8th Five years ago when I first saw those sad pictures of Ishrat Jahan lying on the road, killed by policemen, I asked myself; whether we as a people had become so hardened not to see in that still stretched out form; someone’s little daughter?

Nineteen years old! Think about it; a college going girl, maybe shy, giggly, pretty, maybe conscious of her good looks, yet handling the lewd stares of ogling men and touching perverts everyday to college, just another girl, on her way to becoming a woman but not yet there, keeping thoughts of marriage and children away as with classmates she ‘bunks’ boring lectures and finds a movie more welcome.

Nineteen years old! Someone’s lil’ daughter! Have we become so cold and callous that there was narry a squeak of a national protest that such child was killed? Killed by brutal policeman who did such acts just to please a man whose reputation for allowing the same isn’t too far behind. Just imagine your daughter or mine, going for a picnic, and I’m sure they do, unless you’re the type who keeps them locked at home, which maybe isn’t too bad an idea considering that gun toting policemen are out to shoot them, so let’s suppose your daughter or mine was off for a picnic and we hear a few hours later that they were not only shot dead but were terrorists.

And lets also suppose you were not even from the minority community and you shout out, “My name is Kapoor!” or Pillai and the cops laugh and chuckle or do what whatever cops do when they hear a joke and reply, ‘He’s no more a Kapoor or Pillai, when he became a terrorist he changed it to Abdul or Mohammed!”

That’s how far the cops have gone! And for months or years you’ll see a lone father or mother running from court to police station trying to convince inspector and judge that it is not so. This is happening throughout the country!

For the policeman it is easier to pick up innocent children and put them in jail then to go in search of the real terrorist, and it is time you and I woke up to this. What do we do? Raise your voice today against the death of this beautiful, innocent lil’ girl, start raising questions when you hear about someone being arrested with even a little doubt about their innocence. Open your eyes stop being blind to such acts of sheer savage brutality. If you don’t: The next killing could again be someone’s lil’ daughter and that someone, horror of horrors, could be you..!

A bigger slumbai..!

Robert Clements

14-09-2009

A UNDP report says Karachi’s Orangi slum has surpassed Mumbai’s Dharavi to become Asia’s largest slum…” Times of India, 7th Sept. In the office of the Mumbai chief minister there was an eerie silence as the news that Mumbai was no more the biggest slum was taken in, “How did this happen?” whispered the CM his face ashen, his normally neat hair now in disarray,

“We have worked hard so many years to see that our Mumbai is the biggest slum and now we have been overtaken? Somebody will pay for this! Call the ward officers!” The municipal ward officers trooped in, “Sir,” said their spokesperson as the rest of them shivered under the CM’s relentless gaze, “We have done all in our power to see the city has the most number of slums. I have personally encouraged slum dwellers to construct, not one, but two, three and four stories over their shanties!” “And I,” said a second ward officer picking up courage, “have even gone to the railway stations to tell migrants coming into the city, to build their huts on any pavement that is still unoccupied or encroach on any land that looks vacant!”

“Then how did this happen?” asked the CM, his eyebrows arched in rage, a rage they had not seen even when the terrorists had laid siege to the city, “How did this happen?” And he shoved the newspaper report across the table to the municipal officers. “Sir!” said an aide running to him, “The PM is on the phone!”

“Yes Prime Minister? I am sorry sir, I am sorry, yes I know Pakistan has beaten us, I know how the nation gets upset when they do, I have seen it in cricket, but they must have done something surreptitiously to have overtaken us sir! I assure you Mumbai will get back her rightful place as the biggest slum in Asia!” The CM put down the phone and glared at everybody in the room,

“If he had glared like this no terrorist would have ever struck Mumbai,” pondered his military attaché as he stood at attention behind the CM. “Okay!” said the CM, “We need solutions!” “Maybe we could supply the people with straw, hay and even bricks free to build their huts sir?” “Good idea!” said the CM gruffly. “Paint maps at railway stations showing where land is available?” “Excellent!” said the CM as the people in the room relaxed. “Sir slums come up, but are demolished by demolition squads when they do not get their hush money!” “That is true,” said the CM, “They should not be demolished!” “There is only one way, “ said Sanjay Nirupam, the MP representing Mumbai in Parliament, “Regularize all post 2000 slums!” “Why post 2000?” said a ward officer, “Regularize the hutments even as they are being built!” “Thank you,” said a beaming CM, showing a fist in the direction of Pakistan “Now we’ll show you who’s the winner..!”

The spiders web..!

Robert Clements

11-09-2009

How often I’ve noticed that God’s solutions are sometimes the simplest, so simple maybe that you can slap yourself for not thinking of it. I’m sure you’ve heard of the story of the spider’s web, if not here it is, and if you have, let it renew your faith in a God of solutions:

During World War II, a US marine was separated from his unit on a Pacific island. The fighting had been intense, and in the smoke and the crossfire he had lost touch with his comrades.

Alone in the jungle, he could hear enemy soldiers coming in his direction. Scrambling for cover, he found his way up a high ridge to several small caves in the rock. Quickly he crawled inside one of the caves. Although safe for the moment, he realized that once the enemy soldiers looking for him swept up the ridge, they would quickly search all the caves and he would be killed.

As he waited, he prayed, “Lord, if it be Your will, please protect me. Whatever Your will though, I love You and trust You. Amen.” After praying, he lay quietly listening to the enemy begin to draw close. He thought, “Well, I guess the Lord isn’t going to help me out of this one.” Then he saw a spider begin to build a web over the front of his cave.

As he watched, listening to the enemy searching for him all the while, the spider layered strand after strand of web across the opening of the cave.

Hah, he thought. “What I need is a brick wall and what the Lord has sent me is a spider web. God does have a sense of humour.” As the enemy drew closer he watched from the darkness of his hideout and could see them searching one cave after another. As they came to his, he got ready to make his last stand. To his amazement, however, after glancing in the direction of his cave, they moved on. Suddenly, he realized that with the spider web over the entrance, his cave looked as if no one had entered for quite a while.

Lord, forgive me,” prayed the young man. “I had forgotten that in You a spider’s web is stronger than a brick wall.”

We all face times of great trouble. When we do, it is so easy to forget what God can work in our lives, sometimes in the most surprising ways. And remember with God, a mere spider’s web becomes a brick wall of protection..!

Pretty woman..!

Robert Clements

‘..It’s now established. Pretty women make men nervous..’ Times of India, Sept 5th Ha, ha, ha, I laughed as I read this absolutely hilarious article in the papers, “Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha!” “What’s so funny dear?” asked the wife from the kitchen. “Nnn..nnnothing!” I whispered suddenly.

You were laughing about something?” “Whh..hat abbbout?” I don’t know, I heard your laughter?” “He, he, he!” “That’s a nervous giggle! I heard you laughing, like ha, ha, ha!”

He, he, he, he!” “What are you giggling like a teenager Bob? You seem nervous about something?” “Me nnnervvvous, he, he, he!” “There’s something wrong with you,” said the wife coming out of the kitchen and standing in front of me. “Are you feeling okay?”

Okkkay!” I said, “Okkkay! Okkkkay!”“Let me take your pulse,” said the wife. “You’re trembling, shivering, your palms are sweaty, is something the matter with you? Let’s call the doctor. Doctor come quickly, my husband seems to be having an attack! What attack? I don’t know what attack, but it’s some sort of a nervous attack! What do you mean you thought so? What? You’re telling me to go out of the room and send our son over, okay! But it’s a strange line of treatment!”

Hi dad?” said my son coming into the room as the wife went out. “Hi!” I said. “Mummy said something is the matter with you?” “Do I look like something is wrong?” “No you look as fit as a fiddle!” “But you had some sort of an attack?”

Ha, ha, ha, ha!” I laughed. “Hey,” shouted the wife from the kitchen, “You seem okay now, are you okay?” “He, he, he!” “There he goes again,’ said the wife as she came back, “Something is wrong with him son!” “He, he, he,” giggled my son, “You also? You getting that nervous giggle too? What’s this?” said the wife as she looked down at the paper I was reading. “Oh my God! Don’t tell me that’s why you both are nervous?” “He, he, he!” I giggled. “He, he, he!” giggled my son.

How sweet of both of you,” said the wife hugging us both, “I’ve forgotten I was pretty till you both just reminded me I still am! Thank you! Let me tell the doctor its okay, or maybe he knows! Doctor I think I found the reason for my husband’s nervousness….” “He, he, he..!” giggled the doctor nervously.

My female ‘he man’..!

Robert Clements

“…Meet Britain’s rarest cat…” ADC Aug 31st Ours isn’t a very cat country, oh no it isn’t. It’s more dog country here, though other than Salman and a few other stars most of the dogs are tiny, snapping Pomeranians.

So it’s not everyday I see articles about cats, and as I went through this piece in the ADC, I thought of my own very special Flash who’d died more than thirty years ago and for whom I’d composed a tune which if you press me hard enough and don’t mind seeing a grown man cry I’ll play for you on my harmonica. My mother loved cats, my father dogs, so we had both. “What’s its name?” asked the vet gruffly. “Flash,” I said looking lovingly at my Persian kitten. “Flash?” asked the vet. “Named after Flash Gordon!” I said proudly, “My favourite comic hero!” “Isn’t he a man?” asked the vet. “Like my little Flash will be someday,” I said looking at my little fellow, “A he man cat!”

“Sorry,” said the vet, “but your he man cat is a female!” I stared at my little kitten, uncertain what to do, “You’ll have to change its name!” said the vet with an air of finality, “maybe Kitty, or Pussy?” “No,” I said stubbornly, “Flash she is and Flash she will remain!” And Flash she remained. Flash grew up more dog than cat, waited for me to return from school and later from college and followed me around like a devoted puppy. She was jet-black, fluffy and the cynosure of all the toms around. She had one strange habit, to climb onto my mother’s shoulder via her sari, which she used as a ladder.

And then one day we heard faint mews, but no Flash, the cries getting fainter, and my brother, mother and I searched the house, then outside but no sign was there of Flash, till my mother looked down an ancient well and found her right there below, getting weaker and weaker as she swam around slowly losing her strength.

I lowered a bucket, which only scared poor Flash, till my mother suddenly started unwinding her sari and lowering it into the well and Flash with Pavlov instinct with us all cheering started her long climb up, wondering why she wasn’t reaching my mother’s shoulder, but ultimately reaching safety, our welcome arms and looking apologetically at our glad tearful eyes. “Oh Flash!” I whispered as I hugged her, “I thought we’d lost you forever!”

She was nine when she died, hit by a stone thrown by some cruel fellow. “She’s gone,” said my brother, “Bury her,” I sobbed from my bed, “I don’t want to see her dead!”

And later that day when the house was empty I pulled out my harmonica and composed a tune to my dear departed friend. Many moons have passed and tears don’t come easily for me now, but if you press me hard enough and if there’s a harmonica around, then like summer tempest will flow my tears for my female ‘he man’ cat..!

Thank God we are vegetarians..!

Robert Clements

“Ashok Patil, state DIG (prisons) told the Bombay High Court that serving non-vegetarian food in jails could be ‘dangerous and create tension’..” —Times of India 1st Sept

Thank God we are vegetarians: It’s because we are so that there is no tension in our country, that we do not riot, do not pull down or desecrate mosque, church or temple, and as our men and women eat vegetables and fruits and roots, not a thought enters our minds of attacking others from weaker sections, raping their women, burning houses, putting burning tires around helpless children, oh no with vegetarianism such thoughts do not exist, oh no they don’t!We are vegetarian and so peaceful.And in America, horror of horrors where meat is eaten, citizens roam the streets killing each other and millions die everyday from gunshot wounds and from stones and arrows when bullets are not available.

Women do not venture outside their skyscrapers as men pounce on them and do with them as they wish right there on the road or street or avenue or whatever they call gullies in a non-veg ruffian land called America. Thank God we are vegetarians: It’s because we are so that we are today incorrupt. No policeman, government employee, municipal worker takes a bribe, no judge, no politician asks for a paisa as cases are judged fairly and politicians rule impartially and without prejudice. Motorists do not cut signals and when they do pay their fines without opening their wallets to cops who if they so much as scent a pay- off march the culprit to jail and throw the key away.

And in those countries where meat is eaten, countries such as those in Europe, dishonesty reigns, as the prime minister of England bribes his Queen to become the prime minister and the president of America bribes members of the senate to become the president and the people bribe the president to continue having democracy in their country. They are non-veg, so different. Thank God we are vegetarians: Where freedom of the press is so respected that no hooligans ever enter newspaper offices, don’t blacken the editor’s face, nor break computers, or throw chairs and tables on helpless female reporters and workers. Thank God for vegetarianism that we can speak what we want and not have a howling mob at our doorstep frightening our children and women.

Thank God we are vegetarians that we don’t thrash someone from another state and call him an outsider just because he speaks the national language and not our own, that we don’t slap and touch women in the guise of being moral police. Thank God we are vegetarians in a country, where a man with such immense, intricate and intellectual knowledge of the repercussions of eating non-vegetarian food can rise up to the post of Deputy Inspector General of Police and voice such so unashamedly before judge and jury..!

—Email: bobsbanter@gmail.com

Changing times..!

Robert Clements

Victim of hate is messiah of peace: man whose house was burnt to ashes in last years riots, convinces Hindu and Muslim leaders to fight communal hatred jointly…”Mumbai Mirror, Aug 29th

The times are surely changing! Today a black man sits in the Whitehouse, not nominated, not selected through reservation or quota, but elected by the majority of whites! The times are surely changing, and in India as we see a party which lived on hate slowly disintegrating, it’s time we also learnt that you can sell hate in small scoops but you can’t sell the whole shipment anymore.There’s this simple story of a king who after conquering his enemies took them into his favour and had them about his court. His courtiers remonstrated with him saying that he should have destroyed them. ‘But I destroy my enemies in the most effective way of all,’ he answered, ‘when I make them my friends!’

I wish every political party, every politician would follow this simple, effective method; instead of getting onto the platform and ranting and raving about another community, instead of inciting the mob to burn homes and rape women from other religions, if they could only be inclusive: “Come on, we need you!”“Me?”“Yes you, entering the mosque, you going into that church, you walking to the temple, let us sit together and work for the benefit of each other!”“But you hate me?”

I don’t anymore. I was told to hate you, but I’ve stopped listening to those hate mongers!”“So you and I can be friends, can’t we?”“Why not?” And walk with him to within those temple walls, let him tell you about his faith, about the god he worships, and as you listen your fears will vanish and as he listens to you, his will also disappear.

Then look into his eyes and you will see a friend and say: ‘Today I have added to my wealth a priceless treasure. To find it, I did not have to dive to the bottom of the sea, nor blast the granite mountainside, nor dig a field, nor quarry a mine, nor play a magicians trick. I looked straight into a man’ clear eye, spoke a true word, received a signal of understanding and now, for life, I have a friend.’As a black man reigns in the white’s domain, as a ‘hate’ party crumbles, this is the time to cross the divide and make friends of those who you once were told were your enemies: Be bold! Go ahead! Discover the lie you’ve been living in..!
 

Your ‘near death’ experience ..!

Robert Clements

Many of us go through ‘near death’ experiences don’t we? Then creep to our offices after that or to our homes and whisper, “I nearly got run over!” “What?” “Yes, I slipped on the platform as the train was coming in but luckily this stranger pulled me back or I would have gone under!”And maybe if you are the religious kind you visit temple, mosque or church and offer a prayer of thanksgiving and if you aren’t you thank your lucky stars. But, have you ever wondered whether there is a purpose you’ve been singled out to live a little longer? World famous author James Michener went through such an experience and these were his thoughts when he came out of it: One stormy night in the South Pacific his plane was trying desperately to land on the Tontouta airstrip but could not do so. After several attempts in the dark of night, his knuckles were white with fear.

When they finally landed safely, Michener went out and walked the length of the airstrip, looking at the dim outlines of the mountains they had so narrowly missed. He wrote this: “And as I stood there in the darkness I caught a glimpse of the remaining years of my life and I swore an oath that I would live the rest of my years as if I were a great man! I did not presume to think that I would be a great man.

I have never thought in those terms, but I decided I would conduct myself as if I were one. I would adhere to my basic principles. I would bear public testimony to what I believed in. I would be a better man. I would help others. I would truly believe and act as if all men were my brothers. And I would strive to make whatever world in which I found myself, a better place!”

In the darkness a magnificent peace settled over me, for I saw that I could actually attain each of those objectives, and I never looked back.” Michener says that the very next day he started to draft the book Tales of the South Pacific. And if it can ever be said that he became a great man, I suspect it was only because he decided to be a better man than he was before. Maybe ‘greatness’ is not your goal. But you and I can be a little better today than we were yesterday. We can leave the world a better place tomorrow than we found it today.

Dear friend, you don’t need to wait for a ’near death’ situation to start being a better man or better woman, you can start right now and when you decide such, like James Michener, I am sure a ‘magnificent peace will settle over you’ as you set about attaining each one of those goals you’ve set before you..!

An amazing love story..!

Robert Clements

Men use different methods to win the hearts of the women they love don’t they? But this love story is different! He met her at a party. She was so beautiful and outstanding that many guys chased her, and she paid no attention to him. At the end of the party, he invited her to have coffee with him, she was surprised, but being polite, she agreed. They sat in a nice coffee shop, he was too tongue tied to say anything, she felt uncomfortable, she thought, ‘please, let me go home’.... suddenly he asked the waiter, “Would you please give me some…salt? I’d like to put it in my coffee.” Everybody stared at him in surprise! His face turned red, but still he put the salt in his coffee and drank it. She asked him curiously; why he had this odd habit? He replied: “When I was a little boy, I lived near the sea, I liked playing in the waters and today I can feel the taste of the sea, just like the taste of the salty coffee. Now every time I have the salty coffee, I think of my dear childhood, of my hometown, I miss home so much, I miss my parents who are still living there”. While saying this, tears filled his eyes: She was deeply touched. “This is a man who has deep, true feeling,” she thought, “A man who can talk out his homesickness, he must be a man who loves home, cares about family, has a sense of responsibility.” Then she also started to speak, spoke about her faraway hometown, her childhood, her family. They continued to date and she found that actually he was a man who met all her demands; he had tolerance, was kind hearted, warm, careful. He was such a good person and she missed him when they didn’t meet! And to think it all started thanks to his salty coffee! Then like every beautiful love story, the princess marries the the man of her dreams and they lived a happy life, and, every time she made coffee for him, she put some salt in the coffee, as she knew that’s the way he liked it. After 40 years, he passed away and left her a letter: “My dearest,” it said, “please forgive me; forgive a lie! This was the only lie I said to you—the salty coffee. Remember the first time we dated? I was so nervous at that time, actually I wanted some sugar, but I said salt. I tried to tell you the truth many times in my life, but I was too afraid to break something that had given me so much. If I can live a second time, I would still wish to have you for my whole life, even if I’ve to drink salty coffee again”. Her tears made the letter totally wet. Someone asked her: what’s the taste of salty coffee? It’s sweet. She replied “I am so happy that salt got me such a man that it tastes sweet in my mouth..!”
 

Making a spectacle of yourself..!

Robert Clements

It was a few years ago I realized it wasn’t the print that was getting fainter but my eyes getting weaker and I ordered myself a pair of reading glasses. They were the type that rested on the tip of your nose and when you looked at what you had to read you looked through them and otherwise looked over them at the world at large.

They were half glasses; telling the world you aren’t really the glasses wearing sort but the half glasses wearing sort, whatever that meant. But they kept slipping off your nose, especially at times when I didn’t need them to, so I picked up, or rather my wife picked up a real pair for me, and also the eyes grew a little weaker, which brings me to where this piece is about to begin:

A courier boy rings the doorbell, you rush to the door, and as you know most landings are dark during the day and lit up during the night, but then courier boys don’t come in the night do they, and he points to a space on his sheet for you to sign, and you sign holding sheet against the wall and find you’ve signed on your wall; you aren’t wearing your glasses, because who picks up his glasses to open the door?

Sir sign here sir, on the sheet, next to your name!” “My name, yes, yes, my name, one minute let me get my glasses!” I rush into the house leaving the door wide open and look for those suddenly very evasive spectacles, who’ve suddenly decided to play truant with me.

There’s a scream at the door, I rush back, without my glasses of course and find my dog pinning poor courier boy against the wall. “Sir!” he shrieks in agony as you get the dog down and in, “Sir you haven’t signed as yet!”

One minute, my glasses!” But there’s no sign of them and with the help of the courier boy who takes your hand, like a blind man being led down a busy road, he puts it where the signature is required and you sign sheepishly and he goes away.

Where the hell have those glasses gone?” And you find them, there on your pillow, where you left them when you fell asleep last night. Why don’t they invent either mechanized glasses that walk to you when you need them, no I don’t need them to climb up and perch on my nose, I’m not that lazy, don’t get me wrong, but at least come to me when I call out for them?

The local Albert Einstein says that would be difficult. Okay what about a beeper on the glasses that will beep when you press the remote. Good idea he says and makes one. Courier boy comes, you open door and smile at him, because now you are in control, you go in and search and search for the remote, which has the switch that activates the beeper that beeps on your glasses.

But there is no remote, because you can’t search without your glasses, dammit! And the courier boy laughs as I sign on the wall again..!
 

Elections code of conduct..!

Robert Clements

Newspaper reports mention that a local political party in Mumbai has sent a strict warning to its party MLA’s, MP’s and councilors not to do anything that will hamper their election prospects! “No taking bribes! No asking for donations, no accepting money!” “But what about my coffers, the party coffers, my family coffers?”“After the elections!” “No beating up ward officers, no shouting at the public, no hiring goondas to thrash your rivals!”

But when can we get even?” “After the elections!” “No closing down shops!” “But when..” “After the elections!” “No beating up outsiders!” “But…” “After the elections!” “No burning buses or blackening the faces of professors or principals who don’t give your children admission!”“But when..” “After the elections!” “No mixing with the underworld or being seeing with them or going to their birthday parties or weddings!”

But..” “After the elections!” “No opening fancy clubs, on public land or constructing temples and other religious places to appease the majority or minorities!” “But when..” “After the elections!” “No flying to Switzerland to deposit your money, or foreign jaunts with family at government expense to spend your cash!”

But..” “After the elections!” “No shouting!” “No yelling!” “No murdering weak people to give your builder friends their old bungalows and houses for them to redevelop and make fortunes!”

But when…” After the elections!” “No stealing!” “But..” “After the elections!” “No hooliganism!”

But when..” “After the elections!” “No…” “But..” “But what?” “What do we do now sir?” “Win the elections! Then go back to doing all the things you were doing before..!”

My Lil’ Puck and I..!

Robert Clement

I played the harmonica this Independence Day! Oh yes I did, and surprised even myself, because it’s been a long time since I played the mouthorgan for a contest. It was many years ago, when I realized I wanted desperately to learn the piano but dad a businessman, and who was struggling at that time to establish himself told me it would be better if I learned something less expensive. “A piano costs thousands, maybe something cheaper Bob?”

I chose the cheapest, the harmonica, which at that time cost me only five rupees! “You mean you can play a tune on that?” asked my brother looking at the tiny instrument with amusement. “Yes,” I said and struggled to play ‘Twinkle Twinkle Little Star’ which must have sounded like Jack and Jill, Humpty-Dumpty or some other such cacophonic noise to his poor ears.

But I struggled and one fine day heard my dad whistling a tune I knew had just come out of my little instrument. “Hey dad you’re whistling what I just played!” I said to my startled father and he smiled his acknowledgement that his son had finally learnt his first nursery rhyme, never mind a toddler would have learnt it faster. “Give me the harmonica!” said my father and then surprised me, and the rest of us by playing a tune on it. “You didn’t tell me you could play!” I said, as he winked at my mother and then proceeded to tell me how to wamp on it, how to cup my hands round it and make the weirdest sounds but which slowly became plaintive and sad when you wanted it to sound that way. And one day there was the competition: She played the piano, a concert pianist, and I stared mesmerized at her fingers as she rolled them down the keyboard and produced divine melody. I watched the audience, the judges, and they seemed as hypnotized. I fingered the little Hohner in my pocket.

How, I wondered had I dared enter this contest? I placed the little instrument on my lips, looked at the audience and it seemed as if the little fellow pressing himself against my mouth was reassuring me, egging me on, and then I allowed him free into the tune I’d planned to play. When I drive long distance I find that suddenly on the highway, my machine and I become one, and the car speeds, zips, moves as if controlled by my thoughts, and that was what was happening to my little harmonica and me. I heard the applause, heard the claps get even louder as they announced the prizewinner; it was a tie between the pianist and me. I could have wept tears of joy. And this Independence Day I played again; Gandhiji’s favourite hymn, I thought the others deserved the prize but the young judges God bless their pretty faces awarded it to me and to another.

Again a tie! Again I was thunderstruck to hear I’d won, till I heard the little fellow in my pocket say, “Bob you and I we make good music huh?”

Yes,” I smiled, “We do, my dear lil’ Puck we sure do..!”

—Email:bobsbanter@gmail.com

Be still and listen..!

Robert Clement

I love to think of nature as an unlimited broadcasting system through which God speaks to us every hour if we only tune in.” …… George Washington Carver.

Ah the monsoons! If only we would stop awhile and look at nature at its splendid best, we would realize that God speaks through the budding flower, the lashing rain, the waterfall! There is a lovely story by Nil Guilemette, entitled- The Shy Lover:

Eighteen year old Amanda, unusually simple hearted and deeply religious decided to write a letter to God. Taking her best stationary, she wrote, “I love you” and addressed her letter to Mr God, Paradise. She did not put a return address in case the letter was returned and people would think her crazy, but she waited for an answer nevertheless.

Days, weeks, a whole month passed, but no letter came. She consulted an old priest who was amused at her novel way of approaching God and told her, “Don’t worry Mandy, God’s answer will come in due time. But you’ll have to be patient and still, and then he’ll answer.

Amanda waited and decided she would continue doing so even if it took years. But despite her resolution she often felt hurt by God’s silence, till one day sitting near a brook, she thought she heard a voice nearby.

Looking around she saw nobody. She bent over the brook and listened deeply, and she heard the water saying very distinctly, “I love you too!” God was indeed answering her letter.

After this incident Amanda trained her senses to listen to nature, and heard the words, “I love you too,” in the sigh of the breeze, the whisper of the trees, the rustle of the dry leaves, the twittering of the birds. She even found the sky proclaiming the message in its blueness or in the clouds which formed the letters: I love you too.”

In grateful thankfulness she murmured, “God! All I had to do was to still myself and listen!” Ah the monsoons!

If only we would be still and listen to the sound of the rain. If we would stand and watch the rainbow strutting across the sky in its full glory, vividly arranging its colours in perfect symmetry. What better time to still ourselves and listen quietly to a voice saying, “I love you too my son, I love you too my daughter!”

And with another small thought would I like to end this piece: One moonlight night a mother was strolling along a meadow, her little son by her side. His curious eyes took in everything in sight—flowers, trees, houses, birds, and he offered a comment on each one of them.

They rested on the grass, with the little fellow stretched out, his head on his mother’s lap. The lad gazed skyward in wonder and awe. After a while his mother broke the silence: “What’s on your mind son?” she asked.

He fumbled for words, then finally said, “If the underside of heaven is so beautiful, how wonderful must the real side be..!”

—Email: clements@bobsbanter.com

Monsieur President is dead..!

Robert Comment

President Sarkozy faints while jogging…” Times of India, July 27th

Monsieur President! Monsieur President! Get up! Get Up! Oh my God Monsieur President eese dead! Monsieur President eese dead! Aidez-Moi!”

Shut up you fool! I am not dead. I have fainted!” “Oh my God Monsieur President has fainted!” “Why are you shouting like this?” “I am telling the public to get help, you are fainted, you are fainted!”

Bah I am not fainted, mind your language, I have fainted!” “Monsieur President has fainted! Monsieur President has fainted!” “That sounds better, but why are you shouting?”

To get help!” “I do not need help!” “No?” “No!” “Then what do you need?” “Rest!” “Rest?”

Yes rest you numbskull, rest, rest, your President needs rest and you by shouting are disturbing me from my rest! My much needed rest! I am so tired, so tired, I just need some rest and you cannot give that to me you numbskull?”

But Monsieur President we will get you home…” “No, nooooo, there is no rest at home, she is there, she is everywhere!” “Who Monsieur President?”

She, she, I need rest before I go back to her, and you are spoiling my rest!” “But you should get rest at home Monsieur President!”

Silence you idiot! There is no rest at home. She will come to me, rub her hands on my chest and say ‘Comme il est beau !’ , You are so handsome, and I will look at her and say with lust in my eyes, ‘Qu’est-ce qu’elle est mignonne!’, she sure is cute and then, and then like a wild cat she will be on me and I like a young garcon am upon her, but..”

But what Monsieur President?” “But I am fifty four years old, and she…” “And she Monsieur President?”

She is beautiful!” “You are very lucky Monsieur President!” “You fool I am not lucky! I am tired, and when I try to get some rest, I have a fool shouting Monsiuer President is dead, Monsieur President is fainted! Quel désastre !” “I am sorry Monsieur President” “Bah! Now let me sleep!” “Monsieur President, but what do I tell the security?” “Tell them Monsieur President fainted!” “Monsieur President is fainted! Monsieur President is fainted..!”

Vive la France and her English Grammar!” whispered Sarkozy as he curled up for a much needed rest from his youthful life, there on the jogging track.—Email: bobsbanter@gmail.com

Carry your dreams with you..!

28 May 2009

How often we see people who’ve grown old; eyes filled with misery, their body language that of a listless person, their gestures hopeless! What happened? We ask silently. Where did things start going wrong? Didn’t you have dreams like others when you were young? What happened to those dreams?

Here’s a little illustration I’m going to use today: There were once 2 brothers who lived on the 80th floor. On coming back to their building one day, they realized to their dismay that the lifts were not working and they’d have to climb the stairs up.After struggling to the 20th floor, panting and tired, they decided to abandon their bags and come back for them the next day. They left their bags there and climbed on. When they have struggled to the 40th level, the younger brother started to grumble and both of them began to quarrel. They continued to climb the flights of steps, quarreling all the way to the 60th floor.

They then realized that they have only 20 floors more to climb and decided to stop quarreling and continue climbing in peace. They silently walked up and reached their home at long last. Each stood calmly before the door and waited for the other to open the door.And then to their horror they realized that the key was in their bags which they’d left behind on the 20th floor.

This little story reflects what happens in some of our lives, doesn’t it? Many of us when young dream big dreams, but like others, live also under the constant expectations of parents, teachers and friends. This pressure starts building up, and some of us instead of holding onto our aspirations, start listening only to the expectations of others and throw away what we imagine we want and follow what others expect of us. So around the age of 20 we get tired and decide to dump our dreams.

Being free of that stress and pressure and having youthful energy on our side we work enthusiastically and try to be ambitious in what we are doing. But by the time we reach 40 years old, we realize that just ambition by itself cannot keep us going. We begin to feel dissatisfied and start to complain and criticize. We live life with misery, as we are never satisfied. Reaching 60, we realize we have little left for complaining anymore, and try to walk the final years of our life in peace and calmness imagining there is nothing left to disappoint us, only to realize that we cannot be at peace with ourselves because there are unfulfilled dreams which we’ve left behind, dreams we abandoned 60 years ago.

Those dreams haunt us; maybe you see a writer and wonder why you’re a businessman when you once dreamt of writing or wanted to be an actress and now a housewife. So here’s some advice: Don’t wait to reach the eightieth floor before finding out you’ve left your keys behind: Whatever age you are, whichever floor you are on, stop, feel your pocket and if your dreams aren’t with you, retrieve them, and start all over again!

Then when you reach 80, you’ll smile and tell all around as you jangle the keys in your bag, “I carried my dreams with me..!”
 

The sucker festival..!

27 May 2009

Quite often I meet old friends, happy, cheerful people I’d met maybe in my childhood and find they’ve changed horribly; I look at hardened faces, unsmiling mouths and angry eyes and wonder where all the happiness went. “I’m divorced Bob!” some tell me, “My husband was a toad!” “My wife was a flirt and I found she was having an affair!”

And I feel sad for them but wonder how to tell them that the whole world isn’t as bad as the experience they’ve had, that there are millions of good people in the world and that the bitterness and suspicion they have for all mankind could stop them from getting back on their feet:

We’ve all been made suckers, right? But the idea is to feel bad about it for awhile, then bounce back: I’ve never visited the town of Wetumka. But I understand the folks there celebrate a day every year when they laugh at themselves. They call it Sucker Day and they plan a town festival on the last Saturday of September to commemorate it.

It all started in 1950 when a man calling himself F. Bam Morrison arrived in Wetumka and persuaded local residents to put up money to bring a circus to town. They did not know F. Bam, but he was a nice enough fellow and they trusted his word. Merchants bought plenty of food, beverages, and souvenirs in preparation for the crowds of people who were bound to attend. And Morrison sold advance tickets. The people were ecstatic at the thought of a circus in their very own village. Children could hardly sleep at night.

On the day the circus parade was to march down the main street, ecstasy turned into dismay when nothing happened. F. Bam had slipped quietly away in the night with all the money he had collected. There would be no circus. The good folks of Wetumka had been swindled.

It didn’t take long for their disappointment to turn into amusement, however. Someone came up with the idea of holding a four-day celebration anyway. And why not? They had all the food and goodies, and besides, everyone’s heart was set on having a good time. They called their party ‘The Sucker Festival’. In a display of good-natured fun, people celebrated the fact that they’d been conned, snookered and cheated. And now Sucker Day is an annual event at Wetumka; a good excuse to come together, laugh, and have some rollicking fun. We’re all going to be fooled sometime, especially if we easily place our confidence in people, but are you going to give up trusting just to avoid being had? I expect I’ll get suckered plenty of times yet by friends and strangers I believe in. But I hope the next time I can learn from the good folks of Wetumka and laugh at myself because I’d rather be a sucker for a day than unhappy for a lifetime..!

Monsoon tamasha 126..!

26 May 2009

Every year in Mumbai, am sure it happens in other cities in other countries too, but in Mumbai, just before the threatening monsoons there’s a lot of shouting, screaming, shrieking as civic officials haul up sleepy staff, political leaders who rule the corporation stand precariously on river banks, shouting at ward officers to get gutters cleaned and being photographed as they point to some sand at the bottom of some nullah which others can’t see but they with their great dynamic vision have spotted.Then the railways get into same act; GM screams at his workers, at his stationmasters and assistant stationmasters, who bawl at gangsmen to clean the tracks and finally screech at the municipality for not allowing future flood waters from railway tracks flow into fields and open spaces that do not exist anymore.

Every year same tamasha; and we, impressed by the photographs, roused by their rhetoric and deeply stirred by their seeming dedication, wonder how when monsoons come, roads flood, drains clog, trains stop and city halts. But this charade takes place without fail every year, misleads the whole city, dupes voters and makes a fool of you and me. Which reminds me of the time, hardly a few months ago, when I decided to wallpaper my bedroom; I dislike the smell of paint and also wanted distinctive design that would take away the monotony of a bare wall:

“How do you like this design sir?” “Too loud!” “And this?” “Too big! I want something so subtle, it should not stand out but people should feel its presence! You know what I mean?”“Ah sir, you need design No. 126!”“126?”“Yes sir, that design does all that you say a design should do!” And so it was design 126 I got pasted on my bedroom walls. “When are they putting the wallpaper?” asked the wife as she came home that evening.
“It’s on!” I said proudly, “Just feel the wall, the contours of the design, can you see its subtlety?” “I can’t see anything Bob!” And that’s the wallpaper I’m now stuck with in my bedroom, where even when the sun comes pouring in I can’t see design or shape, or for that matter colour, not that, this stops me from showing my bedroom off to people, “How do you like the wallpaper?” “Wallpaper?”“Yeah, it’s so refined, so classic you got to have an eye to see it!”

“Yeah! Yeah! We can see it!” Well the wallpaper fellow fooled me, I fool the people just like you and I are fooled year after year by the pre- monsoon tamasha, which if you’ll permit me, I’m going to call the Monsoon Tamasha 126! “Good name Bob!” say the politicians. “Good job sir..!” I gasp from beneath flooded roads.
 

The net and the newspaper

25 May 2009

Doomsday predictors predict we will soon attend the funeral service of the Newspaper: Dearly beloved we have all gathered round this grave, to lay to rest someone who has been with us for well over two centuries. During this rather long life that our friend enjoyed in our midst, he not only educated but entertained with his daily comic strips and cartoons, and of course informed us with reverberating, earth shattering revelations.

He came in the morning before most of you were awake, lay on your doorstep, waiting for you to stoop and gasp with surprise over the immensity of whatever he had to reveal that day.

Of course there were days when he had nothing to shock, when he allowed your eyes to wander and relax over nude and semi nude pictures he so generously titillated you with. Those were the days when the rustling wind also rustled through its pages and left you relaxed and rejuvenated. But today our friend is dead, and we have all gathered here to pay our last respects to someone we cherished every morning along with our bed coffee.

Now before we deliver his body to the ground is there anything anyone else would like to say. “Yes!” “And what sir do you want to say about our dead friend the Newspaper. “That he is not dead!” “Ah sir you mock all of us who have gathered here to bury him. You mock also our dear friend who lies dead!”

“He is not dead!” “Are you a doctor sir?” “Yes and No!” “You cannot be both sir! Either you are a doctor or you are not! Either you can certify him dead or you cannot!” “I am a doctor of research, not a medical one, I have done research on our friend here, you so quickly want to bury, may I ask you your name?”

“I am known as WWW!” “Yes of course! You are the World Wide Web! And wouldn’t it be convenient for you to see the Newspaper buried!” “You offend me sir!”“If I have, I am sorry, but Mr WWW, let me tell you, it will be a long while before my friend the Newspaper dies. You my friend may offer your reader instant gratification by getting him specific information in a jiffy, but..”“What?” “In a newspaper it is not the information I seek that I read, but it is pages spread out with headlines and information opening themselves and offering themselves to me, saying take, read and I look and choose after seeing the spread offered to me. You sir, cannot offer me the spread at one time which yonder Newspaper you have tried to throw in the grave offers! Look!”“What is it?”

“He moves, he is alive, look he kicks the lid of the coffin you tried to nail on him. Ah arise my dear Newspaper, come out and be with us, you have lived a hundred years, nay two, and you will live another hundred, nay ten..!”
 

Some political humour..!

22 May 2009

The Indian elections are just over and here’s some humour on all the parties that contested the elections, some you know, some you don’t, but just join me and have a hearty laugh about many who are now either smiling in victory or sulking in dismay:

I do hope this new government gives protection to cartoonists and humour columnists who poke fun at them, but here goes; it’s all about party symbols: Why is the Samajwadi Party’s symbol ‘ Cycle’? Because after banning English and the use of computers, that’s all we’ll be able to afford!

Now here’s one you wouldn’t know even if you voted for this party: Why is Congress symbol ‘Hand’? To remind Indians that their fate is forever in the hand of one family!!

And this one about the losers: Why is the BJP’s symbol the ‘Lotus’?

Lotus is the symbol of Sarawasti and learning and BJP will educate us through the wisdom of Varun Gandhi and Pravin Togadia. Maybe that’s why they lost because India doesn’t want that sort of education! Right?

Now here’s one for the biggest braggart in this election who thought she was too big for her shoes till the voter taught her a lil’ respect: Why is Mayawati’s symbol ‘Elephant’? It’s a self- portrait! And we’re talking about ego, okay! I don’t know whether I’m hitting below the belt but tell me why is Jayalalitha’s symbol ‘Two leaves’?

Because that’s what remained after she ate up all the fruit Again one from the same state: Why is DMK’s symbol ‘Sun’?

So that Karunanidhi can justify wearing dark sunglasses indoors! And here’s one for the man who’s cursing his gamble in which he lost all he’d gained as railway minister: Why is Lalu’s symbol the ‘Lantern’?

Because there’s no electricity in Bihar! Ho, ho, where’s poor communist Karat, he’s got to hear this: Why is Communist symbol ‘Hammer and sickle’?

Because that’s what he just used to commit political suicide! Here’s one for the ever- eternal prime minister in-waiting: Why is Sharad Pawar’s symbol ‘Clock’?

Because his time never seems to come! And after telling you the last one, run: Why is Shiv- Sena’s symbol ‘Bow and arrow’?

Don’t worry you don’t have to run, their aim isn’t too good nowadays, thanks to sharp shooting by the MNS under Raj..!

So easen up, laugh a bit, it’s about a neighbouring country and we all wish her well as she gets another five years with a bespectacled man and a family of three..!

After the vote..!

21 May 2009

Can you hear the drums? The drumbeats of victory, the triumphant march, the dancing on the streets, the firecrackers, as results pour in. But suddenly a change; same humble face that begged you for votes, same pleading voice who promised the moon, now stares arrogant, scornful from TV screen and begins his real agenda: His campaign is over, you voted him in, now his true colours.

A powerful senator dies and his soul arrives at the Pearly Gates, where he is met by St. Peter, Welcome to Heaven,” says St. Peter. “Before you settle in, it seems there is a problem. We seldom see a high official around these parts, you see, so we’re not sure what to do with you.” “No problem, just let me in,” says the senator. “Well, I’d like to but I have orders from higher up. What we’ll do is have you spend one day in Hell and one in Heaven.

Then you can choose where to spend eternity.” And with that, St. Peter escorts him to the elevator and he goes down, down, down to Hell. The doors open and he finds himself in the middle of a green golf course. Nearby are all his friends and other politicians who had worked with him. They run to greet him, hug him, and reminisce about the good times they had while getting rich at the expense of the people. They play a friendly game of golf and then dine on lobster and caviar. Also present is the Devil, who really is a very friendly guy and who has a good time dancing and telling jokes. They are having such a good time that the time flies, before he realizes it, the senator has to go. Everyone gives him a big hug and waves while the elevator rises. The elevator goes up, up, up and the door reopens on Heaven where St. Peter is waiting for him. “Now it’s time to visit Heaven.” The next 24 hours pass with the senator joining a group of contented souls moving from cloud to cloud, playing the harp and singing. They have a good time and, before he realizes it, the 24 hours have gone by and St. Peter returns. “Well then, you’ve spent a day in Hell and another in Heaven. Now choose.”

The senator reflects for a minute, then answers, “Well, I think I’d be better off in Hell!” So St. Peter escorts him to the elevator and he goes down to Hell. The doors of the elevator open and he is in the middle of a barren land covered with waste and garbage. He sees all his friends, dressed in rags, picking up trash and putting it in black bags. The Devil comes over to him and lays his arm on his neck. “I don’t understand,” stammers the senator. “Yesterday I was here and there was a golf course and a beautiful club and we ate lobster and caviar and danced and had a great time. Now there is only a wasteland full of garbage and my friends look miserable.” The Devil looks at him, smiles and says, “Yesterday we were campaigning. Today you voted for us!” And after you’ve laughed, can you hear the drums even louder? Oh, they’re coming back to give you a barren land with waste and garbage, with all of us dressed in rags, picking up the trash they throw out of their BMWs, Mercedes and oh yes the bullet proof Ambassador cars we’ve gifted them with. For the next five years we’ll see same hell again..!

No big deal..!

20 May 2009

Was reading in a city tabloid that actor Gulshan Grover on a recent visit to the USA was overheard saying unkind stuff about pretty Freida Pinto of Slumdog Millionaire fame: According to the newspaper Gulshan or Gullu as he likes being called kept telling his American hosts that Freida’s success isn’t a big deal. He also went on to say that every other Goan girl resembles Freida!

Hey that’s a bit nasty, what? His foreign friends however didn’t quite like his comments and told him that Frieda was definitely hot and worth all the hype. Now dear Gulshan or Gullu as you like being called, here’s a small story: Once upon a time it was announced that the big bad devil, you know the fellow, with horns and all, well he was going out of business and would sell all his equipment to those who were willing to pay the price. On the big day of the sale, all his tools were attractively displayed. There were Hatred, Malice, Deceit, Sensuality, Pride, Idolatry, and other implements of evil display. Each of the tools was marked with its own price tag. Over in the corner by itself was a harmless looking, wedge-shaped tool very much worn, but still it bore a higher price than any of the others.

Someone asked the devil what it was, and he answered, “That is Envy.” The next question came quickly, “And why is it priced so high even though it is plain to see that it is worn out more than these others?” Because replied the devil, his horns and all shaking away to glory, “It is more useful to me than all these others. With this I can pry open and get into a man’s heart especially when I cannot get near him with the other tools. Once I get inside, I can use him in whatever way suits me best. It looks worn out because I use it on everybody I can, brother against brother, husband against wife and few people even know it belongs to me.” Gulshan or Gullu as you like to be called can you imagine this tool was priced so high that no one could buy it, and the tale goes that to this day it has never been sold. It still belongs to the devil, and he still uses it on mankind. And another tale Gulshan or Gullu as you like to be called: You ever heard the crab story? No, no my friend not the ones we eat at Mahesh lunch home, I know, I know they are delicious, but these ones in my tale are alive, yeah man they haven’t been killed as yet and are being taken to the market to be sold and then served for dinner at, ha, ha, yes Mahesh lunch home maybe. Now these live crabs, they’re in a basket and the basket, now hold your breath Gullu, isn’t covered. What did you say, they’ll run away, ha, ha, but Gullu or Gulhsan whichever you like to be called, they don’t, you know why? Because when a crab tries to climb and move out of the basket, the other crabs pull him down! Nice story nah? I believe we Indians are like that, we pull down any other Indian trying to come up; shouldn’t we be cheering for Freida, trying to make it big in the international arena? We know you feel bad you refused the inspector’s role in the film, never thought it would make it big at the Oscar’s did you? But she took the opportunity and is climbing up, let us cheer her, applaud her efforts and at the same time cheer and applaud others making it big, without ever saying, ‘No big deal,’ because to strive and win is a great big deal..!

Quetta

Muzaffarabad

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