RIFLE RANGE BOY

The End of An Affair (1999) It is not so much about an affair but rather about believing in God. This 1999 version is a remake of the 1955 version starring Deborah Kerr and Van Johnson; based on a bestseller of 1951 novel by Graham Greene.  Set in WW2 London, a writer starts a steamy affair with the wife of a bored civil servant. Their affair comes to an abrupt end when the room they occupy is shelled. The wife ends the affair for no reason, in the writer's eyes. The writer goes off to war and returns a year later when the war is over. The writer meets the civil servant husband, who is in a dilemma. He suspects that his wife is cheating on him. He is in two minds trying to hire a private investigator to snoop on his wife. The writer sees the  PI on his behalf. Actually, the writer is also curious about the new lover. A bumbling PI comes to the scene. He mistakenly assumes that the wife's meeting with a priest is a romantic meeting. Next, the writer's catchup with the wife...

Kadavul Irukindran from the movie 'Ananthi Jothi' (1963) It seems that poet Kannadasan started off as an atheist. With time, through his voracious readings and research for his songs, he claimed to be an avid practitioner of Sanathana Dharma (Eternal Duty) or Hinduism in his later years. Many of his later compositions brilliantly express the entity we assume to be God - the Force that puts order to things around us, the seen and the invisible, the heard and the silent, the felt and the void. Here, Mahakavi Kannadasan, in a 1963 composition, tries to explore the meaning of God, which carries different visions to different people, from an external force that oversees every move to an internal mechanism so intricate that it does its own checks and balances. You say He is not there because you cannot see Him. When you float but cannot see the air, you are hovering upon. When you close all your senses to the external stimuli, is the something you feel is God? In the crypts of darkn...

Gauri There it was, another family celebration and another tête-à-tête with my favourite uncle. Whilst the rest were immersed in their revelry, we were pretty engaged in our own private discourse - with him looking for someone to impart his 85-year old life experiences, and I, just listening and sometimes trying to tease more out of him. This time around, we discussed the role of the significant other in the family, among many things. This post is what transpired out of that. They say that behind every man's success, there is a woman. Many are quick to quip that behind their every fall, there is another, the other woman. Women have the uncanny ability to create as well as to destroy. With the biological assets that they are endowed with, they can create, nurture and sustain life with their tenacity and ever-embracing progestogenic demeanour, like a mother hen, able to hide her chicklings under my wings away from the prancing eagle. And they will protect their little ones with the ...

© Juan Rumimpunu People, mainly the theistic type, are in a dilemma now. They are currently undergoing a test of faith. On the one hand, they feel they should not have been subjected through such a trial. Whoever had heard of Man-created laws preventing believers from performing their daily mandatory salutations of the Divine Forces? Furthermore, at this time of calamity, if they cannot turn for Divine help, where else can they turn to? But wait... Why did the Divine Forces 'send' such a test to us? Does he not love us so much? After all the cajoling over the generations, and the importance that humankind had accorded to the celestial forces these times, why are we continuously put to the test? Is it some kind of Divine Mirth for the amusement of the Maker and a testbed to gauge our devotion? Why do they feel that this time around, when the fear of COVID-19, the first place to be emptied are the places of worship? How can they be hotbeds for infection? Are they j...

They are both from the rodent family but people's perception of both these furry animals are worlds apart. One receives awe of cuteness when seen roaming around the garden whilst the other received shrieks of panic. One has a fluffy springy tail whilst the other has a slim tapering tail. Both had their bodies evolve over generations to suit the environment they live and their need to survive. The squirrel's furry tail may aid in the balance as it jumps from branch to branch. The tapered rat tail helps escape through tight fissures. The bushy tail of the squirrel has its own added coincidental benefits. Being around flowering plants, the hairs on the tail aid in pollination. Certain internal traits could have evolved over time as and when the environment demanded. Other incidental features, like the fuzzy tail, performs accidental purpose to the survival of other species. Who decides on this? Is there a higher power who plays the role of an intelligent designer who, f...

It all started with a digital election glitch in a locale in Brussels in 2003. The officials realised that an unpopular local candidate secured more than the vote she should. The number 4096 struck a chord with the IT personnel but passed it off as teething problems of digital voting. That is the number of votes that the computers accidentally added to her tally. A further assessment suggested that 4096 is 2 to the power of 12 (2¹²). As input into the computers is in multiples of 2 (2⁰, 2¹, 2²....2¹¹,2¹²...), somehow the part (bit) which controlled (2¹²) got lit. Hence, this flip caused the addition of 4096 to the tally.  Now, the challenge was to ascertain where the surge to this flip came about. Investigators were soon made aware of similar unexplainable occurrences in the airline and automobile industries. There were instances where autopilot settings had to see re-set as it had gone berserk. There was even a plane that suddenly plunged into the ocean. Aircraft, as they ...

You are made to believe that the way to do it is divine. That, the effort that you put in your work is like serving God. That, you are performing the Almighty's job on Earth. You do not have to display your piety for others to see. All you have to do is to serve, everything else will take care of itself. You follow suit.  Then you realise that life cannot be all work. The people that you thought you have been sacrificing all your life for suddenly turn their back against you. They start hurling accusations of this and that. That you had been shortchanging them; that that is your job - your only job is to serve them. You, on the other hand, thought they would be eternally grateful to you for you had sacrificed everything for them in the course of your vocation. You thought yours was a calling. It, apparently, was not. It was just another job. You are just another spoke in the machinery of society that moves it forward. The tale that the people before you told were just t...

Yet another perspective of trying to understand the secrets of life. Perhaps there might be another way to tap wisdom from the Intellect around us. www.scienceandnonduality.com The vessel to concentrate energies.  The location,  on a  particular grid,  in relation  to the  Earth's  magnetic powers  coupled with the specific  placing  of  deities on certain  metals  to act  as  conductors  and linked to  the  chanting  of  'mantras' attempt to open the  gateway  for a seamless flow of  knowledge of the  Agent Intellect. Imagine a shortwave radio or a ham radio. In order to receive transmissions, it needs to be set at a specific frequency for unhampered communications. Their whole function is determined by the ability to pick up signals by setting the dial at a particular station and for the antenna to absorb the waves. The devices in the ...

Using the smartphone app Waze is pretty much like using our senses to manoeuvre ourselves through the journey of life. Getting from Point A to Point B has never been easier. Whether you are new to an area or need to go somewhere in fastest possible time, Waze comes to our rescue. So, we would like to think. And we pacify ourselves that it must be the shortest route or the speediest one. Is it really? Sometimes, we cannot wonder but ask ourselves, are we actually taking the best route? More often than not, on our return journey, we had been made to realise that there is indeed a more convenient route than the one we had used earlier. But then, who is to know how it would have been if we had indeed taken the other path? Is it a question of the grass being greener on the other side or a case of sour grapes just to pacify ourselves? The situation is pretty much the same when we are told early in life how life should be lived. We are told to follow certain rituals and rules ...