Adieu Michael

An american superstar better known as the king of pop, MJ passed away on 25th of June 2009 in Los Angeles, California, USA after a cardiac arrest which he could not sustain. It is being said that it happened because of a drug overdose, a painkiller injection that had been pushed by his doctor. Whatever the cause might be, the truth is that he is gone and the loss is irreplaceable. Talents like him are not born everyday who can come, change and win millions of hearts all over the world. He changed the whole pop industry and took it to newer heights. His music will live forever and each time we talk of an entertainer, he will always be No 1. Adios and May your soul rest in peace. May you be the child you always wanted to be.

LET'S MEND OUR WAY

No matter, what you do in your life, there is always a reason to whine about. This is a human tendency. I have realized it with my own life, with others as well that howsoever successful you might be with money, luck and position humans always try to find out what they still don’t have and are upset about it. It started with the the most trivial like the pencil that had an eraser in its back (a scented one), a pen-pencil, the next GI-JOE in line, an electronic watch and so on. It was always like, that someone had it and that you don’t have it and that’s the reason why you need to have it. It is like a vicious circle, which goes on and on and on but with different things that you wish to have, sometimes a pencil, a toy, a computer, a glare, a newly styled jeans or a haircut that you always wanted to sport. It seemed as if things are not at all in place and are not at all beautiful and that if you buy it (the thing you want) things will become the way, you want it to be, happy as ever. However, once it is yours, the marginal utility of that product somehow according to its very law starts to diminish and two months down the line it is a forgotten thing which has its place in some dust-din or some remote place where you don’t even want to peep into.

As long as it remained with worldly things, it was perfectly fine but when this habit started creeping into your relationships, it’s a deadly affair. Just imagine a guy totally mad about a certain girl, the world seemed glum without her and he thought he would sacrifice anything and everything for her. Things went the way he wanted, he proposed and things fell in line that is to say that they were connected and they started dating. One year went by, the second as well and the guy started realizing that he has got his heart for yet another girl whom he saw a few days back in his tuition classes and that he cannot get her out of his head. He also understood that the last one was over and he needs to start something afresh. Cause he has lost all interest in his girlfriend and now he needs someone else. Ain’t it deadly. A bad habit that started with pencils, moved on to real time people, and destroyed a few lives. Here, the reverse is also true. Imagine a freshly graduated MBA from a renowned institute who has ample opportunities lying in front of him, a couple of calls from good organizations providing good package and post. He started with the best one he could have imagined and in roughly about six months or so, started finding his job monotonous and boring. Thus, he switched to the next best one. It took him 2 years of vigorous switching to realize the no jobs will ever give him what he wanted. I personally never understood what a good package is. A person will go on to earn something like Cristiano Ronaldo does and even then try for a raise. That’s how WE are. No matter if you have a Bugatti Veyron in your garage and you wear Gucci or you sip on to Cognac everyday you will be any happier. Cause happiness doesn’t come from owning a few worldly things. The person lying by the roadside might be happier than you are and that’s the beauty about happiness. We crave more and more to make ourselves happy and get trapped in a habit which destroys the very way of healthy living. We get enamored to different things in life one after the other and hanker for it only to find out that it is not the very thing we want in life.

This is how we keep swinging from one rope to another like trapeze artists in front of an audience called Life. And when its all over we realize that we have lived almost the whole of our lives doing nothing but running after some useless things which never mattered to us. And that we have missed on a whole lot of things which we should have enjoyed and cherished a bit more longer.

VOICES

I hear the voices in the dark
The voices that are loud and clear
It talks of distant days
When we will be free and fair.


They speak of sweet nothings
They speak of righteous ways
They have a distinct way to speak
One which I try to fare


There is a message that silence has
To one who understands what its ‘bout
It says more than words can hold
And shows you the right way to mould


Silence is all that one can have
Leaving everybody far behind
It shows you who you are
Whether in crib or in knell


Conscience has a haunting style
Of carving your gruesome flaws
To be or not to be
The way this world moulds you like


I dream of those dearer days
When things will be all fine
When the tussle between me and my-self
Will hit the ending lines


Its time for the dawn to break
And the sun to shine its way
With it brings a new day to dream
And to follow what we b’leive in

---Priyam Mukherjee

A soul thats mine

Have you ever listened to the falling rain
As somebody has truly said, it has an argot in its vein


Have you ever seen a pauper kid
The one who runs down the street


Have you ever seen a bird with a broken wing
Trying to fly in the sky with all its zeal


Have you ever seen a tear rolling down your cheek
Leaving a mark as it passes your beak


Have you ever seen a dew drop on a leaf
On a moonlit night when the stars were at its peak


Have you ever seen a white cloud swaying across the sky
As the deadly wind bend its arms and give out a cry


Have you ever seen a flower bloom from it bud
A beauty eternal shining in all its pride.


Have we seen these things in time
The simplest of moments but the rarest to find

---Priyam Mukherjee

An inconvenient truth

Many of you readers would be confused as to where this title came from. Well, it is actually a movie I saw the other day on HBO. It is a documentary movie which talks about global warming. There is a saying, ‘The only thing permanent in this world is change’ and this is something to which the world even abides to. With changing trends and necessities we come up with solutions which satisfy such needs. Coming back to the movie this is what it is about. It talks about, how global warming takes place and what its consequences are. Talking about consequences, I can bet my life on the fact that it is going send a shudder down your spine.

The reasons might be one of the below:

1) The greenhouse gases which trap heat which is transmitted by the sun to the earth and makes the thin layer of atmosphere thicker day by day.
2) The soaring levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and the rate at which its growing each day due to misuse of energy that most of the times, WE do.
3) Research shows, that the growing levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and the soaring levels of heat shows similar trend.
4) The melting of glaciers, polar snow and drying up of lakes and rivers which later on results to flood, drought, more diseases, tornadoes, tsunami, and many such natural catastrophes.
5) The growing trends over the years show a huge upsurge in levels of heat in the atmosphere and projected trends (i.e. 50-70 years down the line) shows levels at which the existence of life on earth might be at stake.
6) Generally, people believe that changes in nature are brought about in generations and through centuries. This might be very untrue at circumstances.
7) Researchers believed that icebergs and glaciers would take years to melt into water. But the momentum at which its melting, actually takes a few days.
8) Due to changing patterns which are actually the after effects of global warming, came into picture almost thirty new diseases which have devastating effects. Viruses which are potentially more harmful and powerful. SARS is said to be one such disease which came to existence during the period when the environment was going through such changes and brought devastating effects. Several viruses which were previously brought into control through several immunization practices are again regaining their potential. Insects are evolving and are changing their behavioral patterns.

One premier reason behind global warming:

The population which is growing in geometric progression will eventually result in scarcity in several strata’s such as:
--Food
--Shelter because land is scarce
--Water
--Electricity and other energy sources

The world today is reaching newer heights. Whether we talk about financial sectors, automobiles with its product design developments to innovations regarding product features, they are growing steeply and saliently. All of them aim at registering higher volumes of sales, profit, and customer relationship. It’s a perfect rat race. What we fail to understand is that it is not too far that all of this might come to an end if appropriate measures are not taken. The newer issues that most of the times are a concern for all of us are b) terrorism c) communalism d) security measures e) nuclear power etc. There is something which we are forgetting. a) Nature. If not taken care of, it might lead to disasters and natural catastrophes which will eventually draw a line to our existence. An Armageddon is in the offing which might shift the cycle to yet another ice age.

A LONESOME MIRROR

A lonesome mirror, a can of beer
A feeling distraught, a mighty fear

A glaring sun, a pile of sand
A dusky lad, a one-time cad

A morning dew, a withered leaf
A guilty conscience, a broken wing

An addicted soul, a moment to regress
A mad contorted smile, a time to redress

A broken heart, a gloomy forest
An empty nest, a time for test

A mellow feeling, a joint or two
A willful struggle, a day ought to

A new morning, a flash of light
A dream past with the night gone by

A time to rhyme, an hour to whine
A story untold, a reason to unfold

---Priyam Mukherjee

The new faces of business: Charity se chori tak

A few days back I came across a company which sells charity on behalf of an NGO. I use the word sell because they generate charity funds on behalf of their client (an NGO) in exchange of a commission. So, if a person donates an amount of 6000 rupees, the first share of commission goes to the person who generates it, i.e. the business developer. He gets one-sixth of the amount i.e. 1000 rupees. The second share is taken by the branch manager under whom this business developer works. Last but not the least the third share goes to the person who has cracked the deal with the NGO or has generated this business format. So, ultimately the donation given by a person to a so-called representative of that NGO (the rep does not disclose his identity that he is working for a company which generates funds) who poses to be doing it voluntarily without any monetary intervention helps generate the charity and reduces it to half its amount by distributing it among themselves. Thus, the charity made by a person to an amount of 6000 gets reduced to 3000 which actually goes for charitable purposes. This money is to be used for treating cancer patients in CMRI hospital at subsidized rates. The business format is good and viable. The only unviable part is that the donors who pull out a cheque of these (1k/3k/6k/12k/15k/25k) amounts out of an intention to serve the poor, old people is quite unaware of the fact that their hard-earned money is being distributed half-way and is being reduced to half its worth when it reaches the oldies.
Surprised. Don’t be. This is one of the new faces of modern businesses. Will be coming up with a few more modern business concepts, in case I come across.