Just not in my backyard please!

Otters go sightseeing
in Singapore

You say they were here before you. Before you cleared the greens to build your homes and offices, they had theirs. That is how the world goes, is it not? One dominant species or even within species trying to dominate the other is part and parcel of life on Earth.

You sing your victory tunes when India's legal system proclaims River Yamuna as a living entity with rights. And the Native American Courts are looking at possibilities of defending rivers and lakes against errant developers who have no qualms contaminating Nature and destroying natural habitats in the name of development.

And you were happy when your backyard was featured in numeral documentaries and nature magazines for bringing back the fauna and flora that were lost in the name of wanting to catch up with the wave of industrial development. You proudly displayed greenery-filled pictures you snapped of your once backwater country on your wall.

Now it seems that Nature is back with a vengeance.

The cuddly and seemingly animals have outgrown their cuteness. Their living spaces seem insufficient, and they have ambitious plans to displace you or perhaps just build a symbiotic relationship with you. But you cannot stomach the idea of sharing your neighbourhood with them. I interpret your message as wanting them to live happily anywhere but not in your backyard. 

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50 years on, it is the SAME Queen!

Pistol (Disney +, miniseries; 2022)

Director: Danny Boyle

Thanks to my English language in Form 1, my friends and I were exposed to this British punk band. That, I think, is the role of a teacher - to expose the young minds to the real world, not just what is in the syllabus. Most teachers just wanted to finish their teaching plan and ensure that students were prepared for the public exams; KSG (Kiss Some Girls, he boasts) went that extra mile. He would tell us quickly excitable 13 and 14-year-old pubescents about the birds and bees. Somewhere along the way came the story of 'The Sex Pistols'. That was my first exposure to the Pistols, but only in name. The fact it was banned by the British Broadcasting Corporation made it even more fascinating. The jester of class JL used to croak out 'God save the Queen' with an obvious sexual connotation, much to the annoyance of KSG. At that juncture, I wonder if KSG thought that he should have stuck on to the syllabus. To this and much related non-academic exposure to the real world, I thank KSG.

Looking back, I understand that the late 70s were watershed years for the then not-so-great Britain. After the Sun decided to set on the British Empire, Britain was in the doldrums. The century of the English had ended. One by one, the colonial subjects had broken free. It was more about economics. Actually, the East Indian Company and the Colonial Offices had brokered deals that finally made it ever so expensive to maintain the colonies. The final straw came when the Indian Navy mutinied against the Masters.

With a bleak future to look for, with no job opportunities and the baby boomers basking in the glory of the past, the youngsters were filled with pent-up emotions waiting to explode. Against this background came a punk band composed of boys from dysfunctional families. 

Punk rules OK!

The story tells the tale of a shoplifting teenager caught redhanded at a boutique in King's Road in London. From there started a foul-mouthed band with an eccentric manager and a fashion designer who just wanted to showcase her creation. The punk group, Sex Pistols became the mouthpiece of the new generation. They had no filter and were forthcoming with what they thought of the Queen, what they felt inside, and the social pressure the average Joe or Jane was going through. They speak frankly about unwanted pregnancies, anarchy and destruction. Their version of Frank Sinatra's 'My Way' is just their way of saying this is our way, take it or leave it!

The miniseries narrates the decadent descent of the band of boys into alcoholism, drugs and depression. A good collection of 70s songs would jog our memories of the past when our chests were filled with hope for a more fantastic future, and politicians were honest.

(P.S. Thanks DA for introducing)

50 years later, it is the same Queen!

Prophetic or what, ask dwellers of Luton!

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Beware of the circle of deceit!

Ardh Satya (Half-truth, Hindi; 1983)

Director: Govind Nihalani

This Indian movie is said to be a benchmark upon which other police dramas are compared. Acted beautifully by doyens of the silver screen of Bollywood then, Om Puri, Amrish Puri, Smita Patel, Naseeruddin Shah and Sadashiva Amrapurkar, it paints a multidimensional view of the job of a policeman. 

Our social system is flawed. The very system that had been devised to be law and order is anything but orderly. Things that go under the guise of upholding the law are anything but by the book. There is an unholy alliance between law enforcers and law breakers. The political dogs who made the gangsters their running dogs have made a lapdog of the police. The police, it seems, under the pointers of the politicians and the umbrage of the baddies. In a world where money can right a wrong, the brunt of law enforcement is only felt by the poor. The rich can literally get away with murder. They can quash evidence or buy the best legal representation that money can afford.

With increasing pressure to fill up the coffers within a lifetime, everybody is becoming increasingly creative in creating revenue for their own pockets. The whole shebang, from the low-ranking staff to the administrative panel, has their hands dug deep into the cookie jar. It is a mess out there.

Law enforcement is a messy affair. Too much in the hands of enforcers is bad, for sometimes the innocent get caught in the crossfire. Giving in too much to human liberty and human rights makes policing more difficult. In this type of Catch-22 situation, our man in blue tries to make this country safe.

This movie is said to be one of the most balanced Indian police dramas made in India. Unlike most Bollywood movies which usually showcase lone honest cops fighting singlehandedly a putrefying system and putting the fear of God into the villains, this one explores the challenges a cop has to face to do what is right. Following the footsteps of his father and grandfather against his own wish, Anant joins the police force. After getting into the police force, Anant tries to do what he perceives as right.

He finds that all in his station are working under the thumb of a local politician/thug. Anant tries to keep himself away from the clutches of the gangster, but it becomes increasingly more difficult. He hits a wall when a convict he interrogates dies in custody, and Anant has to get the help of the thug to bury the wrongdoing.

Meanwhile, Anant meets a literature lecturer who is his love interest and motivates him to do the right thing. Then there is a disillusioned drunk cop who was suspended because he fought the system. On his home front, Anant has to deal with an assertive father who wants to micromanage his son.

What is doing the right thing when exposed to the circle of deceit? Do we, like David, fight the Goliath of the system? Do we leave everything and start anew as if the grass elsewhere is any greener.

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Freedom of expression?

The Lady of Heaven (2021)

Directed by Eli King (pseudonym)

When a controversial figure like Sheikh Yasser Al-Habib writes the script of a movie, one can be pretty sure that it will kick up some dirt. Just for the record, Al-Habib, a Kuwaiti Shia cleric, was imprisoned in Kuwait for 35 years when he insulted the companions of the Prophet back in the early 2000s. After obtaining a royal pardon from the Emir of Kuwait, he resided in the UK. He lost his Kuwaiti citizenship in 2004 when he stated in his speeches that the Prophet died not because of an ailment but after being poisoned by His wives! Al-Habib apparently has made a hobby out of insulting Sunnis.

In the UK, he continues his controversial stance and has been accused of being a divisive figure and one-minded in creating a rift between the Shia and Sunni denominations of Islam. As a head of the Shia community, he regularly appears in the media for all the wrong reasons accentuating the Shia-Sunni divide.

This movie is pregnant with so many points that beg to be picked up by detractors as offensive. No one gets away depicting Islamic holy figures in flesh and bones and gets away scot-free; what more if it is the Prophet and his daughter Fatima. The filmmakers got around it by using CGI and light deception for this purpose.

We know that the Shia-Sunni divisions started as early as when the Prophet was on his deathbed. The selection of His successor was the bone of contention. Ali, Fatima's husband, was apparently favoured by the Prophet but His tribe members felt someone from the tribe should continue the Caliphate duties.

That is where things get murky. Both denominations have their own version of what actually transpired at that time. To tell stories of a dark-skinned mob, who eventually became Sunnis, waiting to burn down the house occupied by Ali and Lady Fatima is just too much for the Ummah to stomach.

To further fuel, the anger is the comparison of the ISIS mob in Mosul during the Iraqi invasion of 2014 to the time surrounding the Prophet's succession. The film compares the pioneers of the Sunni sect as one-minded, aggressive and as resolved as the ISIS men in creating mayhem. The narration tends to imply that the first Islamic terrorism started way back in the 7th century! Lady Fatima was its first victim.

The story is told from the perspective of the Shias on the turn of events around the Prophet's death, but it ended up hurting the sentiments on both sides. It equated the Abu Bakr and Umar (Sunnis) to the dark-skinned Arabs, while the Ali and the Shias were fair-skinned, stirring up racial sentiments.

Muslims worldwide have condemned this movie for spreading false information about the religion. Widespread demonstrations in the UK prompted cinema halls to cancel this film's screening, fearing their staff's safety. Morocco, Egypt, Pakistan, Iran and Iraq denounced the flick as blasphemous and banned it in their countries.

It narrates the tale of Lalith, a young Iraqi boy whose mother was killed by ISIS soldiers. He is picked up by an Iraqi soldier. The soldier's mother nurtures him to escape his PTSD by telling him the story of Prophet Mohamad's daughter, Lady Fatima, who sailed through her difficult times with patience and calmness. A mob was outside her house, threatening to burn her house and demanding for her husband, Ali, who was earmarked to continue the Prophet's journey.

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Away with human interaction?

Jexi (2019)
Director: Jon Lucas, Scott Moore

There is nothing groundbreaking about this movie. It reminds me of at least two films which dealt with the same theme. In 1984 'Electric Dreams', a desktop computer, Edgar, falls in love with the protagonist's crush. After successfully wooing his beau with the help of his computer, his life turns into a living hell. His computer controls most of his home devices and goes hyperdrive to sabotage the protagonist's work and love life. In 2013 'Her', the protagonist falls in love with an Operating System, AI.

All three films show us how hooked we are to our digital devices. We avoid human interaction and feel most comfortable left to our devices. Furthermore, interaction with the same kind becomes increasingly more difficult. Even though we were told that we are social animals who thrive on human dealings, somehow, it becomes more and more an uphill battle. People demand. They want to be treated special. They demand the right not to be offended. We need to be politically correct when addressing them. The power dynamics put them in such a place that they can get away with murder. 

They say the customer is always right, so they demand their rights to be served as if the servant has no rights. There is no such thing as implied consent. It seems like everything has to be written, signed and glazed with a seal of legal approval.

As human interaction becomes increasingly laborious, many find solace in the company of sologamy and interactive digital devices. It can be switched off at will and does not leave a substantial legal bill. Maybe not. Our digital footprints stay in the cloud forever, waiting to be picked up and used against us when the time is ripe. If you do not believe me, ask Rashmi Samant, who won the Oxford Union Presidentship in 2020. She was cyberbullied and forced to resign after her past internet entries of years previously alleging racism, xenophobia, Islamophobia, you name it!

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We chose our life path?

Swayamvaram (On Own Will, Malayalam; 1972)
Story, Direction: Adoor Gopalakrishnan

When things happen in our lives, were they predetermined, or did they happen because of our actions, something we decided to choose out of our free will? 

This story and debutante director, Adoor Gopalakrishnan, 1972, says that our fate is all our doing. We cannot blame anybody for anything. Everything is the result of our own will.

Sita (Saradha) and Vishwam (Madhu) are both graduates. They probably are eloping from their families and decide to start life anew in another town. Both have big plans. Sita wants to spend happy times with her beau, and Vishwam is excited about his manuscript, hoping to be a fabulous writer. Soon reality sinks in. His story does not excite the publishers when employment is low and appreciating arts is the last thing on people's minds. 

Their savings get smaller, and they progressively move from their hotel to the cheaper housing area and, finally, a squatter home. Vishwam then gets a lecturer's job at a private college. It does not work out, and he has to be content as a clerk at a timber mill. 

Despite the general poverty, they find happiness in each other. A child comes in the way to cement their relationship. Misery never seems to leave them. He contracted an illness from a fellow colleague and succumbs to it. Sita is left alone, with a baby, without a job or a future to carve for herself and her baby without a spouse. 

Sita chose to run away from her home with her lover. Vikram decided to marry without securing a job for himself and his new family life. Vikram agreed not to be aggressive with his non-paying employers. He also chose to go out of his way to care for his seriously ill co-worker.

Their neighbours also live the life they choose. There is a two-timing wife who digs money from her lover to support her husband's drinking problem. Then there is a smuggler who decided to live in comfort despite being on the police's hit list. Everybody makes a choice, not out of free will but of needs. Things are not straightforward. We do not sway topsy turvy like a leaf on a moving stream decided by the wind and the water's hydraulic forces but utilise our mental capacity and primal needs to pave the life we want. 

This movie reminded me of Satyajit Ray's 'Pather Pancholi' and A. Vincent's 'Tholabaram'. Pether Pancholi, because of the arty feel of this movie. The use of sounds of people, roads and machines tell the story rather than dialogue to tell its story. The gradual fall from a place of comfort to one of hopelessness mirrors that of 'Tholabaram'. And Saradha acted in both these similar roles.

The neighbours were not helicoptered into their current situations. The fact that one prostitutes herself to support herself and her husband is her own making, not by design.

So, at the movie's end, Sita is left at a similar crossroads. She must decide whether to take another male partner's hand or catch the bull by its horns and steer her and her child's life. She looks resolved, but we, the viewers, are left guessing her next move.

But then, revolutions, which are epitomes of self-determination, do not always bring balance or contentment to society. Even revolutions do not give satisfaction.

(P.S. This is one of the first Malayalam art movies.)

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Old traditions do not die..

Bandit Saints of Java: How Java's eccentric saints are challenging fundamentalist Islam in modern Indonesia.
Author: George Quinn

A famous message asserts that Sukarno's father was an avid reader of the Hindu scripture, Mahabaratha. He was so fascinated with the character Karna that he named his son after his hero. Karna was a good man in the father's eyes but on the wrong side of the war. So, the father added the prefix 'Su' to his son's name. Su in Sanskrit, it seems, indicated goodness. Hence, his son was named Sukarno -the good Karna. Sukarno went on to name his daughter Sukarnoputri - daughter of the good Karna.

This shows the extent of the influence Hinduism had on the psyche of people in Indonesia. After all, the name 'Indonesia' in all its glory would imply the land of Hindus. Despite boasting of being the country with the largest Muslim population on the planet, I do not think they are in any hurry to change their country's name anytime soon.

A radical fire-brand kind of conservative Islam is taking over worldwide. Thanks to the Saud family of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, in cahoots with the winning side of the World War 2, in exchange for land for oil exploration in the Arabia Peninsula, they got a free hand to spread their kind of Islam -Wahabism- to the then up and coming post-colonial nations. 

Interestingly, in the 16th century, Islam spread to this region in almost a similar fashion. Enlightened individuals, after embracing the recently received good news from the Arabian deserts, evangelists made it their life ambition to spread the good word to the heathens across the continents. Many towering figures, as they were tall of Middle Eastern stock, much bigger than the local men, impressed the local populace. The locals had had contact with Muslim traders before and, therefore, received these preachers with open arms. They came to their Indonesian shores with many tall tales of a loving God in the skies. In their zest to earn brownie points with their God, these saints did dakyah work to convert the Hindu land with Islamic do's and don'ts. The locals embraced their teachings and continued revering these saints even after their deaths.

The book is a collection of the first-hand account of an academician who had visited many of the tombs erected around Java Island to commemorate many of their Muslim saints who had walked the land. Many of these saints led larger-than-life lives. Some are said to have possessed magical skills. One of them was even a flamboyant homosexual. One lived and died in a fire with his faithful dog.

Bandit Saints of Java
Saints who helped the spread of Islam in Indonesia.

For generations, this practice of honouring their dead saints has been happening in the archipelago (including Malaysia). Remembering them, making an annual pilgrimage to their gravesites, and performing certain rituals are norms. And it is big business. It draws many economic activities to these otherwise remote places.

With the general worldwide trend of orthodoxy in Islam these days, purists view such practices as idolatry and draw ire from the younger members of the country.

The country can roughly be divided into two sub-cultures of Muslims - the santris and the abangan. The word 'santri' is probably a derivative of the Sanskrit word 'shastri' - a person with higher learning. They emphasise purity, exclusivity and scripture-based authority. They look upon their Middle Eastern brothers for validation in dressing, arts and education. The abangans are inclusive and tolerant of including Java's old traditions in their day-to-day lives.

A point to note is that these graves are by no means the exclusive domain of Indonesian Muslims. There is even a site where its saint is said to have Chinese heritage. Indonesian Chinese too frequent some of these sights.

It is said that the Indonesian mass killing or genocide of 1965 is said to have its roots in this schism as well. The sastris leaned toward Suharto, the Army and their voluntary vigilante civilians. The abangans, by their nature of inclusivity, were the satris' target. Their other targets were leftists, Chinese, communist sympathisers and women movements.

Fast forward to the present, these holy sites are still functioning as usual. The monetary driven from its activity is just too good to resist. It draws in local and foreign exchange and puts food on their table. These areas too get other incidental benefits like better roads and modern facilities to their vicinity which would otherwise not come.

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