RIFLE RANGE BOY

Money Heist (La Casa De Papel, House of Paper) Spanish miniseries, Netflix Season 1-3; 2017- present It is no secret that countries which are secular in their politics perform better in economics. Look around. Nations who appear to showcase Roman Catholic in their day to day running of their lives, e.g. countries in the Iberian peninsula, in Latin America and the Philippines, perform worse off than their Protestant counterparts. We need not talk about Muslim nations or countries struggling to go all conservative to stay relevant.   It seems that nations that look at pleasing the Money God seem more progressive and advanced technologically and socioeconomically. By this, I mean these countries look at acquiring wealth at a level more important than to satisfy the imagined Man in the heaven or the intangible Forces of Nature. They feel money can solve their problems in this life and do not need to follow preset rules on Earth to receive its unassured retribution in another ...

American Factory (Documentary, 2019) Netflix The Industrial Revolution transformed countries from the Western World by leaps and bounds. That, together with colonisation, it improved their living conditions radically. In the USA, industries flourished. Immigrants trickled in from the world over to work to their last drop of sweat. Being employed was a cool thing to be. The first and second generations were hardworking. All the way things happened. The subsequent generations became complacent. They did not have to work to survive. Work became optional. After all, the country took care of everybody.  All these while, the countries in the East missed the Industrial Revolution bus. Not only were they thrown under the bus, they also had to be contended staying subservient supplying the raw material to fuel the big wheels of the machinery of their masters. Times change. The slaves, looking up at their masters all these while, have caught up. They have learnt the trade and ...

The Indian Detective (Canadian Miniseries, in Hindi and English; 2017) Netflix (Season 1, E1-E4) The 1950s were important in world politics. The Second World War was over, but the world, never learning from its past mistakes, was building another. The world was divided into two, those subscribing to capitalism or communism. The Cold War was brewing. The newly independent nations, the Third World, was up for grabs. In that environment, in 1955, a few countries got together in Bandung, to assert that they were not aligned to either side of the fence. The Americans, however, viewed it as the ranting of the newly-independent third world states with a slight socialistic stance as they were not invited but China was. One of the prescient thing that the then Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai had said was that the Chinese residing in different countries should show their allegiance, not to China, but to the countries they are residing.  That too must be applicable to the Indian diaspora...

Salam - The First ****** Nobel Laureate (2019 Netflix) His tombstone was defaced. The epitaph which read 'The First Muslim Nobel Laureate' had, with the Government decree, the word 'Muslim' be removed from the headstone. Professor Abdus Salam, the first Pakistani and Muslim scientist to win the prestigious award, was of the Ahmadi faith. The country felt that he was not Muslim enough to claim to be one. Even Pakistani textbooks do not mention him as a national hero. The younger generation has not heard of him. His story is of particular importance to a country like ours as we seem to be pursuing the same rabbit hole as their Big Brother Pakistan took when they clawed themselves off Hindustan back in 1947. Instead of speeding forward from the race-line, they took a backward trajectory that may send them back to the Stone Age. Rather than investing in human capital and knowledge-based activities, they have only successfully managed to shoo off intellectual away fr...

Joker (2019) It was a time when I was a teenager. I had been selected to play the role of Jesus Christ in a pantomime. It was an Easter play depicting the Resurrection. Obviously, the most alluring girl in the Sunday class, Catherine, was cast as Mary Magdelene. Everything went on all, and the show was enjoyed by everyone. I realised the hard way that people are generally not nice, and children are imps. Life is not fair. There is no justice on Earth, and we are kidding ourselves that there is a higher judge out there who would mete out appropriate justice when the time is ripe. As if pacifying a wailing child, we convince ourselves, rather foolishly that payback may happen in the afterlife or next birth. After the show, the children started teasing me as 'Black Jesus'. Of course, I did not know then that Jesus may have had Negroid features, but I felt particularly offended with the word 'black'. The teasing went on, joined by the other. One particular chap, Jere...

S2B: Seoul to Busan It is not a race.  Ep #1 Meet the P-stars.  Ep #2 Fighting the demons!  Ep #3 Bare necessities that we need!  Ep #4 7 Samurais set to go! ©Bob The day is here!  Ep #5 The time is now!  Ep #6 Time is a river of passing events. Ep #7 Episode 8: Day 5 S2B (10.10.19) Resolved to end the tour today, we made an early start, at the first sign of daylight. At least, that is what we thought. By the time we saddled up and tightened up a few loose ends, it was 0630 by the time we left our bike motel.  It was a chilly morning, slightly windy and foggy at 7C. Everything was going on fine for the first half of the day.  Korea decided to save the best for the last. She took us through multiple hills, some as steep as 13%. We managed most of the hills except for a few which proved too long too strenuous. The world of Maya. The cloud-like fluffy structure in the bottom half of the picture is the early morni...

S2B: Seoul to Busan It is not a race.   Ep #1 Meet the P-stars.   Ep #2 Fighting the demons!   Ep #3 Bare necessities that we need!  E p #4 The day is here!   Ep #5 The time is now!   Ep #6 Time and tide. Ep #7 Episode 8: Day 4 S2B (9.10.2019) After knocking ourselves out in slumberland at Zone Hotel in Gumi, North Gyeongsang, in what we call a ‘love motel’, we hit the saddle again. The love motel was the closest that came by when we hit Gumi all weary yesterday evening. Yet a sumptuous simple Korean dinner came in front of us when we entered a restaurant, told the chef to surprise us in rudimentary caveman sign language and grunts.  0830, back to the grinding mill.  Weather was generally beautiful today with the sun was out by 7am. The temperature was cool at 7ºC and slightly windy. We were fine, and we had a feeling that something good was on our way. Hence, we set to do 120km for the day.  The sun pe...