Ideas transcend borders!

Monalisa No Longer Smiles (2022)

An Anthology of Writings from Across the World

Editor: Mitali Chakravarty

My father had an uncanny ability to read faces. No, he does not identify people's medical risks, personality traits or even the prediction of their future. He could tell a person's origin, caste and creed. He was proud of his achievement and held steadfast to the idea that caste division is a necessary tool for society to progress. 

He would choose where he ate and sometimes refuse invitations to people's homes or even functions of people with questionable status in the caste hierarchy. 

My mother tried to knock some sense into him that the whole world had moved on and things had changed. But he was having none of it. She even reminded him about Periyar EV Ramasamy's speech when he visited Malaya, to leave all the bad discriminatory habits they acquired in India and move forward. But no! He was unmoved and reasonably contended with his way of pigeon-holing people. 

I convinced myself that things would change when I grew up. People would become more learned and open-minded. I assumed that religion would take a back seat as science was slowly answering all the loose ends of knowledge then. 

How wrong I was. 

In the 21st century, the present turned out to be a far cry from what I perceived the future to be. People are congregated in factions. They found ingenious ways to divide and subdivide tribes so that one would dominate the other. Religion has made a comeback in a big way. Fundamentalism has taken root. Putting aside the science and symbolism behind worship and beliefs, believers are more focused on the ritual and blind following of the herd. 

The space between the haves and the have-nots is ever-widening. Materialism has crept into all crevices of our lives, and the future does not look bright. 

Against this gloomy background, this anthology tries to make its readers that there may be hope if we try. 

Borderless Journal, Editor Mitali Chakravarty's brainchild, is hopeful that the world will indeed be one whose borders will be torn down and where everyone will live as one. There would be no discrimination against people by caste, politics, or creed. There would be no wars to show the dominance of one over the other. 

Trying to recreate past glory and relive past grandiosities is no use. In God's creation, everyone is supposedly created equal, so why is there a clan of oppressors and oppressed, the powerful and the weak. Through art, literature and storytelling, this anthology, from its interviews with famous moviemakers, thinkers, poets and writers, from its fiction, 'Monalisa No Longer Smiles' and 'Borderless Journal', through its editor, Mitali Chakravarty, tries to create a possible world where borders do not matter. Ideas transcend borders. 

https://borderlessjournal.com/our-anthology/

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Life in the fringe!

Wind River (2017)

Director: Taylor Sheridan

We are all seekers. We want to understand things. Our brains have been wired to try to understand things around us. As children, we feel insecure with unfamiliar faces and environments. We wonder about the darkness that we see outside. We try to find out when exactly the light goes off when we shut a fridge door. We eavesdrop to find out where babies come from. We want to know what actually happens when we die. Looking at the stars, we wonder if they are any intelligent life forms there. Did Santa Claus put those presents under the Christmas tree? Did God help himself to Prasadham that we offer?

As we grow older, everything will fall into its place. We learn biology, geography, theology, astronomy, and so on. 

Biology gives glorious explanations to all the burning questions we want to know but are too shy to ask. Geography demarcated the lines drawn between humans. Theology told us to limit our inquiries to things that our simple minds can comprehend. Astronomy reinforced the notion that we do not matter. Yet we think we know everything and try to put a closure to everything. 

Rituals are mocked as their meanings are lost!

Was there police brutality when Kugan and many Malaysian Indian petty thieves died in custody? Was the fireman,  Muhammad Adib, assaulted or was his accident a misadventure? Was MH370 remotely controlled and disposed of by China without a trace? Is Jho Low really off everyone's radar? Is Mohd Ridzuan, Indraganthi's husband, who converted his underaged daughter, really untraceable?

We like to think that some questions have no answers. That is what the victors believe when they write history. Some things can never be verified. The system is controlled by people of interest who will want to carry items in specific ways.

Nothing has changed much from the time of slavery. In the heydays of sugar plantations in the Caribbean, it is unbelievable that it was thought it was economically viable to work slaves to death and replace them every seven years than to care for them with their medical and sanitary needs. They were mere commodities in the marketplace. The world has no qualms about subjugating God's creations to such humiliation, just based on their skin colour, appearances, culture and poverty of military might. Nothing has much, all through the Industrial Age, space age and now in the 21st century. 

We are familiar with 'Black Life Matters'. The often-forgotten part of society is the Native American community. Before Columbus and the band of looters arrived in the New World, thinking they had found an alternative route to India, the Native Americans had a rich culture and complex civilisation. Now, they remain lost, forgetting their ancient and symbiotic living with Nature. 

They remain in a sad state. Their social indices all remain depressing. Many unexplained deaths in custody, deaths with unexplainable etiologies and the plethora of cold cases remain frustratingly common in the community. 

This story revolves around the rape and death of a young Native American woman. For the layperson, it appears like a cut-and-dry case. Unfortunately, the bureaucracy does not make it so simple. The police investigation drags its feet. The autopsy cannot make it simple for the prosecution to persecute. Most end up as cold cases. 

It looks like the long arm of the law and the machinery that works for it has no interest in dispensing justice. It is more interested in pleasing its masters and playing fetch for them. 

That may be why fringe societies have no confidence in authority and instead take care of their own affairs by compulsion. The law only carries clout as long as people think their interests are protected. 

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The mirror looks back!

Black Mirror (2023; Season 6, E1-5)

Created by: Charlie Brooker

A mirror reflects the light wavelength that hits it. That is what it is meant to do. Logically a black mirror cannot exist. A mirror that absorbs light (appears black) will not be much of a mirror.

The way I look at a black mirror is that it is like a two-way mirror. When the viewer views a conventional mirror, he sees a reflection of himself and his antics, plain and clear. In a black mirror, however, unbeknownst to him, his duties, actions, inactions, body language, facial twitches and grimaces are noted, not by himself, but by a third party. A two-way mirror is a misnomer, actually. It cannot be viewed both ways, as it is reflective on one side and transparent on the other. It gives the appearance of a mirror to those who see the reflection but allows people on the clear side to see through, as if at a window.

Interestingly, even a conventional mirror is viewed with scorn by traditional societies. They were worried that it may suck part of their souls. The same goes for cameras and photographs capable of reproducing an accurate representation of a person.

Most modern gadgets which transmit information come with a monitor that can be gazed into. Since its introduction, whether in a television set, desktop screen, mobile phone or i-pads, people have been worried about mind control by those in power.

There is no doubt that modern devices are capable and are already collecting data on human behaviour, spending patterns, political leanings and predicted responses. We also know digital component providers can make calculated moves to trap and influence our decision-making and behaviours. Data on human predictability is now a saleable commodity.

Since the first season, the Black Mirror series has painted a bleak dystopian future for mankind, primarily due to technological advances. Man of the future had unwittingly signed away their liberty and freedom with disastrous outcomes. Essentially, thinking had been outsourced to artificial intelligence (AI). Human beings are 'moronised'.

This much-awaited season came out with a bang after a hiatus of four years. The scary thing is that, over the years, since the first episode's release in 2011, we are slowly seeing some of their predictions coming true. Drone technology, technology-based mercenaries, chatbot-controlled central administration and trivialisation of the human mind is slowly but surely materialising.

Boy,  the new season came out with a bang with five episodes with different settings. The first two episodes deal with how TV streaming affects the day-to-day running of our lives. One includes the folklore of werewolf in it. Another two are set in the past but with a component of sci-fi. My favourite is 'Demon 79'. Set in 1979 UK, when the economy was in the doldrums, and racial discrimination was high. A lonely, bullied shop assistant has a demon manifest in front of her to offer a deal to save her from miseries. The catch is that she has to kill three people.

The episode 'Joan is Awful' is every netizen's nightmare. What if all our daily actions and inactions are digitalised and streamed for everyone else to judge? This could be a possible danger of quantum computing.

With so much documentation of crimes available in our archives, everybody can be a documentary maker. In 'Loch Henry', another engaging episode, the protagonists find out the hard way that sometimes our own backyard is not so squeaky clean.

With our lust to consume news on the trivialities of the rich and famous, we have created a fleet of money-hunger paparazzi who would at nothing for a fistful of dollars, not even to a werewolf attack in 'Mazey Days'.

As space travel becomes accessible to whoever can afford it, there is a lingering reluctance because of the long period of absence from loved ones. In an alternate 1969 universe, in 'Beyond the Sea', scientists devised a way to periodically transport a replica astronaut back to Earth. Unfortunately, trouble brews when one of them is murdered by a mob on Earth. 

An engaging season, highly recommended, 4.5/5.

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Jesus Complex?

Sometimes you wonder. Is it just you, or is everybody going a little mad? Are people increasingly indulging in self-defeating activities which will, in a matter of time, blow up right in their faces?

Why do they open themselves up to vulnerability? Is their desire to express themselves so important that it has to be imprinted digitally to the end of times. Why is there a pressing need to be with them or against the rest? Is there no middle ground? Why do they think it is a test of love to exhibit bedroom antics to the full view of the public? And still call it expression, even when others call it exhibitionism.

You know there is no wrong or right answer? Truth is a multifaceted son of a gun with the last laugh when it finally comes to the fore. Your time is getting near, and you want to ride in the sunset, hurting fewer and fewer people every day. You want to thank your lucky stars for the times in your life, which you had in your own right, which had been unpredictable, but in the end, you hope you really had the time of your life.

You want to reduce your sins, collect brownie points, and make the remaining times on Earth less controversial. You tell yourself to let bygones be bygones. Lest, you need not forgive nor forget, but let it be.

But hell no! People do not want to let it be. They want to have the final say. They find joy in holding tightly to the rein. They find joy in saying, ‘I was right; you were wrong!’. If I, an able body, can think this way, why not a more confident people who exude piety through all their orifices can indeed assess the whole imbroglio in such a manner?

You give up. In times like these, you develop a Jesus Christ complex and engage in a solitary soliloquy with yourself. Forgive them, God, for they know not what they do.

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Nothing really matters!

Old (2021)
Director: M. Night Shyamalan

This may not be the best of his movies to watch. After The Sixth Sense (1999) and Unbreakable (2000), his films have been unremarkable. The dialogue is much to be desired, and the plot may have a few holes here and there. Nevertheless, it stays true to most of Shyamalan's movies that explore the paranormal. It even makes one think. In this offering, one is made aware of the dangers of freebies, the subversive nature of Big Pharma and the triviality of our holding of ill feelings and grudges. 

The main protagonists, Guy and Prisca Cappa, are going through a separation. To break the news to their two preteen children, they thought the family could have one final memorable outing together. Prisca is delighted to have found a fantastic bargain for a beach vacation online. Interestingly, as the movie involves Time and ageing, the couple has contrasting occupations - Prisca is a curator in a museum (purveyor of ancient relics), and Guy is an actuary (predictor of future events). 

Surprise, surprise. The whole beach resort is a front for Big Pharma to identify clients with specific medical conditions and put them up for human experimentation with new medications, without their consent, of course. That particular resort had access to a secluded beach with its unique rock formation markedly accelerated the ageing process. Thirty minutes of the passage of Time is equivalent to a year of ageing. Hence, Big Pharma could determine the efficacy and dangers of newfound drugs in record times. 

With or without the drugs experimented on them, the cruel effect shows their sad transformation from their springy gung-ho self, brimming with confidence, to one where minor skirmishes and shortcomings do not matter anymore. Somehow, all the minor dissatisfactions and disappointments in life do not matter. The brutal assault of Time on our ego is blatant. We reverse roles. From an all-knowing adult who juggles wearing multiple hats, our senses fail us miserably. We are clueless about what Time has in store for us - a tumour, mental disorder, debilitating illness or whatever.

In our desperate search for the elixir of youth and immortality, we have sold our souls to Big Pharma. In return for their uninhibited access to our medical information and other unspecified data, we have become sitting ducks to their snake oil and mumbo jumbos.

P.S. The idea that rock formations profoundly affect Man's growth reminds me of the concept behind constructing a Hindu temple. It could be built as and where lands are available. It had to be aligned to the magnetic pole of the Earth. The erection of the main structure is specific and involves the usage of various metals. The conditions needed to be followed for its intended use. A temple was meant to act as a cradle for charging the 'human battery'. People were expected to drop in to 'charge' themselves to meet their daily challenges. Over Time, as monotheistic religions became vogue, to stay relevant, their functions changed. They had to steer their believers away from Ahura Mazda and the desert gods. In essence, rocks, with their mineral contents, affect humans.

8 mysterious ancient temples which lie more or less on the exact geographic longitude of 79° E 41'54" and these famous temples are Kedarnath Temple (Uttarakhand), Kaleshwara Mukteeshwara Swamy Temple (Telangana), Srikalahasti Temple (Andhra Pradesh), Ekambareswarar Temple, Jambukeswara Temple, Annamalaiyar Temple, Nataraja Temple and finally Ramanathaswamy Temple (Tamil Nadu).

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Pleasure in pain?

Crimes of Future (2022)
Director: David Cronenberg

Despite all the good deeds attributed to Tipu Sultan in fighting the British and planting the seed of nationalism amongst the people of Bharat, the Muslim monarch is infamous for signature torture. He would slice off his enemies’ noses. There was a time in South India when many defeated Hindu soldiers with gaping nasal openings on their faces. 

It is said the peddlers on market squares of old India were trying to insert prostheses to correct the victims’ nasal defects. Two visiting surgeons from the UK saw this during their visit to exotic India and decided to write it up in medical journals. That was the birth of rhinoplasty and the conception of cosmetic surgery. 

Tipu Sultan

Soon everybody found something wrong with their appearances; too fat, too plain, too Asian-looking, too unalluring, lines of ageing or even too short. Everything could be corrected if one were daring enough to go under the scalpel. The fear of surgery itself was a put-off to potential customers (not patients since they were not technically sick).

For those who braved the procedure or danced the nectar of joy of improvement of their perceived looks, an enhancement to the first cut became the norm. In a way, the first cut was not the deepest but became a stepping stone to many more to follow. As experience had proven, it soon became an obsession, no longer a therapeutic correction. In the real world, repeated nose jobs have resulted in necrotic nasal cartilages and the nose literally dropping off one’s face! If the rumours about Michael Jackson were true.

The movie tells us of a not-so-distant future where humans develop tolerance to pain, and somehow people do not get infections. The human body constantly evolves and is able to produce synthetic organs. A group of people can digest plastic. Because pain is ‘pleasurable’ and is tolerated well, surgical incisions and public displays of self-mutilation replace traditional sex. In this topsy-turvy world where growing new organ is an art form, the authorities try to register new organs!

Kosaji, after his nose job

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Slavery never stopped!

Beyond the Neon (2022)

Director: Larry A. McLean

By the first 10 minutes into the documentary, I was hooked. I thought it was going to be some kind of investigative journalism. A daring YouTuber who was bored with his usual pranks and social experiments decided to do something more impactful. The YouTuber Joe Salads and his team found many name cards distributed on the streets of Las Vegas, offering escort and other forms of intimate services. Equipped with hidden cameras and microphones, Salads try to get the services of an escort to document her story in the flesh industry in the Sin City of Vegas.

The team managed to record the conversation for a short while before the female escort scooted off, suspecting something fishy. Footage of this interview made it online and became viral. Someone identified the escort as her lost sister. 

That started the rush to get the sisters reunited. By then, one gets the idea that the whole presentation was scripted. It turned out to be more like a B-list film with bad dialogue creating awareness about the lucrative human trafficking industry right in the heart of the most prosperous country in the world, the USA. 

We know that the flesh industry is as old as the history of mankind. What it turns out to be is that it is as ugly as how slavery turned out to be. It is no different from human slavery, ala the Royal African Company and their shenanigans in the Caribbean. Agents go around scouting for potential workers from their physiques. They are lured by the promise of a better life. By deception or force, the sex workers (aka slaves) are whisked away to the promised land of milk and honey. They are forced to work to the bone but see nothing of their hard work. They are tattooed with specific insignia, much like how Kunta Kinte and his fellow men were branded of ownership with hot irons. 

Freedom for slaves remained an elusive illusion. Most times, the release comes from the soul leaving the mortal body. 

People can scream at the top of their lungs about discrimination and abuse. Are they saying this because the powers that be cannot collect revenue from the clandestine industry? The last we saw, the enforcement team also had their hands deeply entrenched in the cookie jar. It is like civil society asking the British government to abolish slavery in the late 18th century. Taxes from slavery prospered in the kingdom. The burgeoning export of slaves developed the ports of Bristol and Liverpool. The democratisation of the industry just took slave capture from an appointed Royal company to public enterprise, again more slaves and more revenue. It did nothing to the welfare of slaves.

The documentary/drama did, however, highlight that there exist avenues for victims to escape the clutches of their pimps. Annie Lobert, a victim of the sex trafficking ring of 10 years, started a safe house somewhere undisclosed in the heart of Nevada. She has to keep her location secretive as thugs from the industry are hellbent on keeping their merchandise on their watch. Hell hath no fury if anyone would mess with their girls. They even have the state enforcement team under their thumb.

It is a wake-up call. Not everything is glitzy as it looks. Beyond the city's neon lights that never sleep, the Sin City, Las Vegas, thrives a lucrative sex industry where guns, violence, brute force and money speak louder than words. It is not a Sunday School. Jokers may say leave people alone. Let them do what they want. Let them do with their bodies; it is women's empowerment. The reality is that people are threatened and live in fear of death or bodily harm to themselves or loved ones. And it is one way to hell. In a civil society, this should not exist. To think about it, the world never was. As cavemen, we tried to dominate our neighbours for food and accommodation. Then as we became an agrarian society, we needed 'substandard' homosapiens to do our work. Imagine a time when the British were taking Africans for bonded slavery in the Caribbeans. The Vikings and Barbers kidnapped people from the western coast of the UK to sell as white slaves. 

Religion has nothing to do with it. Islam justifies the conquered as loot for victors to be used as slaves. The Church was silent and was, in fact, benefited from the trade itself. The Western civilisation thrived on it. 

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