Feast for Thought

 

A transferable job is a boon and a bane. One gets to live in different places, but it also means ever-changing neighbourhood and schools, besides repeated establishment of home infrastructure. As part of a sixth move (this time to the great NCR) in a period of 11 years , I just started on the job of classifying household things into "needed" / "give-away-when-usable" / "recycle". If you are a 'goal-oriented minimalist' trying to de-clutter sincerely, you will find good company in efforts such as - "How to Live With Just 100 Things". As for us, the single dominant motivating factor is the comfort that we (sincerely try to) practise anti-consumerism, and this alone should, I hope, help us meet the challenge of fitting all packable household stuff into ten 2X2X2 trunks. (I hear horror stories of some family's 75-box inventory - what a morale-booster!) For those who need inspiration to declutter, whether "physical, emotional, even ...

" Kipple  is useless objects, like junk mail or match folders after you use the last match or gum wrappers or yesterday's homeopape. When nobody's around,  kipple  reproduces itself. "  Kipple seems to be a combination of entropy and capitalism. I don't think past civilizations had the resources to produce so much packaging to hold our stuff until we buy it or consume it. Don't forget the First Law: "There's the First Law of Kipple…'Kipple drives out nonkipple'." Kipple is useless objects, like junk mail or match folders after you use the last match or gum wrappers or yesterday's homeopape. When nobody's around, kipple reproduces itself. For instance, if you to go bed leaving any kipple around your apartment, when you wake up there is twice as much of it. It always gets more and more. No one can win against kipple, except temporarily and maybe in one spot. From  Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? , by  Philip K. Dick . P...

Note: This was written in early 2014, in the context of KSRTC issues in Kerala's capital city Thiruvananthapuram. One is extremely disturbed - to say the least - to read about the woes of the Kerala State Road Transport Corporation (KSRTC), and the woes caused to other road users by KSRTC buses. The organization is the lifeline for ordinary citizens. Unfortunately though, it is not a thriving venture at present; and it seems that its buses are culpable in a tragically large number of road accidents. In this “blessed” state of India, where villages seamlessly transition to towns, most roads other than national highways and a few stretches of bypasses, are too narrow to accommodate heavy vehicles. One is often bemused and amused to watch C segment cars, luxury sedans and enormous SUVs flow out of palatial premises to occupy unfair amounts of road space. Most streets and alleys seem to have been designed with only processions of the political kind in mind. After all, ...

Recounting a fortuitous journey from 6 years ago. The longing to revisit will persist forever! Visual Recap  

Mangoes gala Woman goes gaga!