FOOLS...Really??

The first of April, some do say,/ Is set apart for All Fools' Day./ But why the people call it so,/ Nor I, nor they themselves do know./ But on this day are people sent/ On purpose for pure merriment.


Poor Robin's Almanac


He who knows not and knows not that he knows not is a fool — avoid him! He who knows and knows not that he knows is asleep — waken him! He who knows not and knows that he knows not wants a beating — beat him! But he who knows and knows that he knows is a wise man — know him.


Proverb


Fools are wise until they speak.


Randle Cotgrave


A man who cannot reason is a fool, a man who will not reason is a bigot, and a man who dare not reason is a slave.


William Drummond


We must learn to live together as brothers or perish together as fools.


Martin Luther King, Jr


A wise man gets more use from his enemies than a fool from his friends.


Baltasar Gracian


A fool without fear is sometimes wiser than an angel with fear.


Nancy Astor


This is the day upon which we are reminded of what we are on the other 364 days

The mother of all clashes

30^th March 2011…a date which is going to be historic in the annals of cricket ….paramount, colossal, eminent…its gonna be as big as it can perhaps get….

India have set a semi final date with Pakistan on at Mohali after ousting the defending champions Australia in the 2nd quarter-final at Ahmedabad.

Mohali is going to be an epicenter of frenzy and fanaticism as the two arch rivals grapple for supremacy at the greatest cricketing spectacle on the planet.

India –Pakistan encounters have always been the ones which garner the maximum out of the players and the spectators alike, but when it’s the question of a place in the grand finale, things are bound to get tenser and hotter at the centre.

People from across the border are equally eager to witness their team emerge out of the dark and shut the mouths of the critics who feel that the cricket in Pakistan has succumbed to corruption and match- fixing.

It has been a credible performance by Pakistan so far in the tournament, to obliterate all the controversies that surrounded them prior to the tournament and beat formidable sides like Sri Lanka and Australia.

India, on the other hand were termed as favourites before the tournament commenced but lived upto that tag only when they outplayed the defending champions in the quarters.

Both the teams have got the players who can win games single handedly on their day, but the team which reconciles better and holds its nerve at crunch moments will eventuall emerge victorious.

Being an ardent fan of the Indian team, I earnestly want the men in blue to maraud their arch rivals but its high time that they learn from their mistakes and implement it in the match. Firstly, the fielding needs to be as good as it was against the Aussies and the pacers need to fire.

India also need to be vary of the threat which Shahid Afridi poses as a bowler. Thus,M.S. Dhoni and Gary Kirsten have their work cut out Its now or never.

Now, the question is: Can we beat Pakistan? We have better batsmen; they have superior bowlers. It promises to be another mouth-watering clash. A real cliffhanger

I would say, the odds are 60:40 in our favour. I know they are in ominous form. But we have the home advantage. We are also the better fielding side. But, more importantly, we are perhaps equipped to tackle their formidable spin and pace attack.

I will be praying for an India victory. But I will also say: Best of luck, Pakistan!

A Walk....

This story is dedicated to the following lines by Albert Camus;

“You will never be happy if you continue to search for what happiness consists of. You will never live if you are looking for the meaning of life.”

Months after it was sown in the most anally retentive manner, the gardener with a watering can in hand surveys the garden with the exactitude of a hawk eyed hunter and music leaving like chopped wood from his chapped lips. “Lush”, he said with sarcasm as a fine line of perspiration was making way behind his ear. Months of grind had produced a shapeless patchwork of green and brown that without proper water, manure, and sunlight showed reluctance to coalesce, much to the agony of the gardener. A couple of furlongs behind the bungalow among the labyrinth of irregularly planted apple and plum trees lay the mound of concrete, steel and earth from the newly constructed bungalow. Shade is an unending season in this hopeless mountain of refuse, but tufts of delicate green grass with small sharp blades have made their way through like a guttersnipe does all his life in pursuit of survival. The grass here sucks up human filth from which even its producer maintains a fair distance.

I believe in justice and the concern for the hands that bring it about do not in the remotest way concern me for the end here precedes the importance of means that achieve it; all my life I have tried to find ways to break the walls of desperation that only get thicker and bigger more from my inaction. I am in a separate cell because my answers at the Court were so true that they could not have been uttered by a man of sane disposition and so I can be a threat to the prison inmates; in any way I hate these gormless convicts and love the peace of the cell, which sometimes becomes boring but never intellectually idle. All my life I had been a pedestrian filling the unimportant gaps, waiting to become something from which hope and courage would spring but all I ended up doing was cleaning the world of a drug pusher by injecting many doses of Meth into his anatomy in a fit of convulsive nervous energy. I am trying to picture the act, the trial, and everything from the mind’s acceptance of the initiation of act and its final purpose seemed to reverberate first and then dwindle; I felt some peace that even in the act of, let’s say, murdering people I had acted with some kindness when seen in the light of my firm conviction that it’s not a crime to do what the courts of justice fail to do in time. Years have passed, yet the desire to get out of the mire in which I have become numb is as fresh as when I entered because from the depths of abyss does one really desire the smooth white light that comes many a time from path of action and never from hope that is masquerading in guise of blissful ignorance and slavish obedience of a system of exploitation.

More refuse, and the winter that is same for the stone by the roadside or the sapphire in the crown have ended the struggle of the grass. Without any desire or remorse I was walking listlessly along the narrow muddy alley between the barracks with an uncommon spring as opposed to the leaden footedness I had become used to when a convict of weak constitution and quirky behaviour shared a piece of bread with me although his eyes spoke nothing but hunger. I ate some and put some of it on the windowsill of my cell, perhaps for tomorrow, and as I was laying on the cold floor my back felt like the cracking of autumn leaves under the feet of running children. I know not when but while looking at the piece of bread that I had brought down from the windowsill, I quietly slipped into the lap of sleep and from there into some densely wooded valley bereft of anything living; I was walking with uncertain steps following the smell of unknown plants or maybe flowers when I sighted on my right under a great oak tree, a turtle trying to climb on to some rocks. It started to snow, the stitches of my manky shoes could hold on no more. I walked a long time in haze and storm till I reached a natural exit to the wooded valley with mud and dead leaves clinging up to my waist and before me was a burning field of corn with a broad road in the middle of which lay a harvest table fully laden with fruits and pots of juices and alongside the table were steps raised towards a half finished pedestal. I hesitated for some time and even took a few steps back but then I walked up to the pedestal and lo and behold! A cherub in a silver basket lined with fleece was playing with the shadow of the tree on the basket; the silhouette of the skeletal tree against the orange sky creating enthusiasm with the sun calling after brief hiatuses from behind the tree. Beyond the mountain and towards the sun, I continued.

11 rules you won't be taught at school-Bill Gates

Rule 1: Life is not fair - get used to it!

Rule 2: The world doesn't care about your self-esteem. The world will expect you to accomplish something BEFORE you feel good about yourself.

Rule 3: You will NOT make $60,000 a year right out of high school. You won't be a vice-president with a car phone until you earn both.

Rule 4: If you think your teacher is tough, wait till you get a boss.

Rule 5: Flipping burgers is not beneath your dignity. Your Grandparents had a different word for burger flipping: they called it opportunity.

Rule 6: If you mess up, it's not your parents' fault, so don't whine about your mistakes, learn from them.

Rule 7: Before you were born, your parents weren't as boring as they are now. They got that way from paying your bills, cleaning your clothes and listening to you talk about how cool you thought you were. So before you save the rain forest from the parasites of your parent's generation, try delousing the closet in your own room.

Rule 8: Your school may have done away with winners and losers, but life HAS NOT. In some schools, they have abolished failing grades and they'll give you as MANY TIMES as you want to get the right answer. This doesn't bear the slightest resemblance to ANYTHING in real life.

Rule 9: Life is not divided into semesters. You don't get summers off and very few employers are interested in helping you FIND YOURSELF. Do that on your own time.

Rule 10: Television is NOT real life. In real life people actually have to leave the coffee shop and go to jobs.

Rule 11: Be nice to nerds. Chances are you'll end up working for one.