A child is a sapling

Source : Google photo

Synopsis : A child is like a sapling that needs nurturing,care and a proper environment to grow in. Where a child is not provided such care and the proper environment to grow results in a social problem where such a child becomes deviant, drop out and can get into criminality . The blog focuses on this issue with examples.



I often see a child like a sapling that grows into a beautiful tree someday given the sunlight and water and a lot of space around it.  A child also needs the proper environment to grow in, lot of love and care and the space to grow in just like a sapling. This care comes from his parents, his siblings and others who help the child grow up into a nice person.

I used to know a kid in the village who was about 4 years old at that time and was innocent just like any child of his age. He was not chubby but not skinny either and had the innocent eyes of a child. He was very playful and swam in the stream just like a duck. He was not afraid of anything and back flipped into the water from the steep banks while we looked in wonder at his skills at that age.

He would climb the date trees to pluck the sweetest dates and give them to me. I knew that it was hard to climb a date tree but he was not afraid and climbed like a monkey. He did not have a lot of vocabulary but was learning fast. His energy made him hyperactive so he was always running around.

His mother and other siblings did not pay much attention to what he did the whole day or where he went in the village may be because they had other things to worry about. They were poor and always worried about how to meet their daily needs. The father had died and the mother who was an illiterate village woman  did the best she could which was not much.

They had some rice from their farm and one daughter was working as a teacher so they pulled on somehow and always received me warmly whenever I visited them.

Many years passed before I could return to the village again so I visited them to say hello. Many things had changed in the mean time. I was old now and the old lady was much older and bent with age and ague. Then I saw an old man hunched and sitting in one corner listlessly who did not look at me so I asked them who he was. They said he was Babu. That was the name of the child I knew and was shocked.

He was like a skeleton, bent and disheveled. His hair was long and matted and his ribs showed through his torn under shirt but what shocked me was his eyes. They were vacant and without life. They were dull and unfocused.

I was then told that he had become a drug addict and dropped out of school long ago. He kept company of bad people in the village and often lay under a tree or somewhere senseless so people had to bring him home. He had no purpose in his life except to get his next fix.

How did this happen and how that vibrant innocent child of yesteryear turned into a zombie that I saw now? What went wrong? Did their poverty make them care less for him when he needed it most? I don’t know all the answers but here was the case of a healthy green sapling that did not get enough sunlight and nourishment to grow into a healthy tree and withered.

There is another case more tragic although I do not know what is more tragic than a failed person who is now a drug addict but the following story is certainly more tragic.

She was a child of about 10 who used to sit with us while we did our home work in the evening. We did not know where she came from and who were her parents or siblings. I am sure she told us her name but I have forgotten it. We found her curious because she often asked questions about our home work and was a gentle and lovely child so we welcomed her. Ma often gave her something to eat and drink because she felt that the child may be hungry.

She was thus growing up and stopped coming to our house. One day we heard that she had hit her teacher with her shoes so she was promptly expelled from the school. We did not know the details and why she hit her teacher but we felt that something was wrong with her.  We had no idea what really was wrong until one day we saw her near our house being restrained by several men. She was in chains and she was fighting like a tigress and bit the hand of one of them. The girl was insane.

We felt really sad finding her in this predicament and felt very sorry for her because we remembered her as a gentle sweet girl who used to sit with us while we did our studies. So what really happened? How a sweet girl of 10 turned insane a few years later? Why her parents did not take care of her? What were the circumstances under which a seemingly normal person turned totally insane? One day she was found drowned in the river.

We take our normal upbringing for granted not realizing that we were blessed to have loving parents who cared for us and provided us with the environment to grow into normal healthy beings. How many people are so lucky? In any community you will find the people who become drug addicts, deviants, drop outs who turn into the life of crime and self destruction .Their parents divorce and shatter the home life with just a stroke of pen and leave their kids without their protection and care.

Once I saw an old woman in a country fair in the Mojave Desert community that I was visiting. She was a pathetic example of a failed person who was drunk and holding a big bottle of whiskey in one hand while fumbling for a cigarette. She offered me a drink but my friend took me away from her saying that this woman was scandalous. Her teenage daughter was nearby but she was a problem student in his high school where he taught. I could now understand why seeing her drunk mother in the fair grounds.

So it all comes down to the environment in which a child grows up. The poverty per se is perhaps not the reason why someone goes wrong in life. I have mentioned in my previous blogs that in African villages, the kids are well behaved even if they are poor because the elders in the village look after them and punish them if they step out of line. They live in a community where people care for each other and support each other when needed.They do not perhaps turn out to be doctors or engineers but they do turn into honest simple people who in turn raise honest simple children.

In our modern society in the vast suburbs where many middle class people now live do so in isolation. They do not know their neighbors and no one really cares to know who you are. Kids are neglected so they start seeking company that often comes with a price. By company I do not mean the Bible thumpers who avidly seek new recruits in high schools and even in colleges but those who are into mischief , who start growing long hairs, show disrespect to the teachers in the class room and bully other kids for no reason except their looks or because they are smarter than them.

It all starts to go down from there. Smart kids go on to college and become doctors and scientists or teachers but their classmates end up in prison or dead due to drug overdose. Women suffer the most because they end up getting knocked up in their teen years and become promiscuous that has its own consequences  like dropping out of school and ending up selling hamburgers in a McDonalds somewhere or worse  trying to raise their illegitimate kids who are  the future inmates of a jail somewhere.

The fabric of the society starts to be torn by the generation that did not get the support and care of their parents when they needed them most and suffer the consequences. This is happening in many countries where people are under tremendous pressure to meet their basic needs but keep on producing kids they cannot provide for.

I live in Asia where the divide between the poor and the middle class is so stark that it is mind boggling. If you just turn the corner into any street in the poverty ridden section, you will be surrounded by hundreds of kids who come out of the woodwork just like termites. They are mostly illegitimate and their parents  live in the cardboard houses  surviving on whatever jobs they can find which is often not much and does not provide them two meals a day but they are the heaviest breeders  of such children.

Is it any wonder that many of these kids become drug addicts and are shot dead by the police? Is it any surprise that these sweet girls become prostitutes? Given the proper environment to grow, they too could become successful in life. No one wants to be a drug addict or a prostitute. That is perhaps out of desperation that they do it.

In Brazil there are thousands of kids who live in the streets like feral dogs and scrounge for food in the garbage bins. They are the abandoned children of failed people who try to survive on their own and are often killed by the vigilantes or police. The government treats them like vermin that they try to eradicate. They say that it creates a bad impression on tourists and shows their country in a bad light but it is a social issue and not a criminal issue.

The church padres keep on repeating like mantra their opposition to family planning and sex education in schools even in poor countries. They say that the kids are a gift of God but fail to show the poor people how to raise them. That is not their problem. They claim to be the experts in these matters even if they do not raise their own family although some secretly do and others become pedophiles.

People in more developed countries ignore these padres and do what is right. The rich people do not have the problem of money like the poor people although they may have other problems that may be a subject of another blog someday.

The point is that we all need support to grow up normally. It is not a gift from the parents but a right. Often children come because of lust and not love but they too have the right to demand a good environment to grow in.

That little boy in the village called Babu did not get it and that nameless child who became insane did not get it and drowned in the river. Who is to blame for such tragedies?



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Fallacy of white supremacy

Source : Google photo


Synopsis : The white supremacists in many countries spread the hate campaign and beat up immigrants from many countries because they push their agenda of supremacy over all other races which is a very outdated idea that the whole world repudiates. I focus on the fallacy and its shameful place in the human history .


This is a topic that is in vogue now more than ever and is causing a lot of debate everywhere so I thought of putting my two cent’s worth on the subject not because it may become an obsolete word someday but because it is a very thought provoking subject. Some whites may not agree with me after reading my blog but I hope it will provoke them to think.

The word racism is inherent in many cultures around the world although the whites take most of the blame or the responsibility for it. Perhaps it is in the human nature to look down on others who are not like them and always find an excuse to denigrate them by saying we are better than them. It does not have to be the skin color although it plays a dominant role in the attitude of some people. Often it is something else.

I come from a country where most people have dark skin so those who have fair skin ( they call them wheat complexion) look down on those with dark skin and feel good about it.  It makes them feel superior so they treat dark skinned people with disdain. Now the mountain people and people who come from superior breeding stock have fair skin but they are still considered non white by the white people.

But dark skinned people also look down on others who are not like them and call them names and feel good about it. I have seen this in the Philippines. The jokes about Sikhs in India or others is a manifestation of disdain because they are different and do not play by the rules of the disdainers. It is the same in the United States where the Italians are called names because they put grease in their hair and have a swarthy skin tone that comes from the Mediterranean sun.  There are a lot of jokes about the Polish people or the Irish people that may not have anything to do with their skin color but the disdain shows.

It is after all in the human nature to feel good about self by denigrating others.

I was once visiting an American friend who had a pretty child. Their visitor was an old American white woman who said to me that my children will never have blue eyes like that of the kid. This statement was so shocking that I got tongue tied which does not happen often with me. This old woman was talking about naked racism that she believed in.

I thought about Pearl Bucks stories in China where she wrote about how the Chinese regarded the blue eyes as wild and not pretty but I was not in the mood of discussing her racist comment and let it pass.

I have many white friends who are not racist and are wonderful people so let us not paint all whites with the same brush. Let us assume that they are a minority in a country like the United States where education and technology combined has made people of various races work together and even intermarry in some cases that has brought in more comprehension of other people.  The TV and the movies are an example where blacks and whites work together and romance each other without any negative outcome.

Some of the greatest Hollywood stars are black whose self confidence shines in their movies or TV series. Some of the greatest entertainers are blacks or Hispanic who can turn the white audience into frenzy with their songs. White girls were fainting in adoration of Michael Jackson when he performed in Budapest and had to be carried away in stretchers.

Hundreds of thousands showed up to listen to Obama in Germany where they adore him. So the non whites have made progress and are given due recognition by the whites but there is always a minority faction that clings to the idea of White Supremacy and they have voted in a very racist president  who openly supports them.

This has given rise to the hidden and not so hidden sentiments of these people to come out in the open and shout insults at the blacks and Latinos among others and is backed up the KKK people who are opening new chapters everyday somewhere. The white policemen are now more aggressive if that is possible toward anyone of color and ask for IDs in an insulting tone with a hand on their unbuttoned holster.

The store clerks follow the non whites around to see if they will steal anything and tell a black lady like Oprah that the bag she is looking at is too expensive for her so perhaps they can show her something cheaper.

The kids take their cue from their parents so they have started bullying their Asian classmates and people of color and wear swastika bands and give Nazi salute to each other. In Europe this kind of behavior is coming out in the open where the white skinheads beat up African and Asian immigrants who have dark skin therefore not worth any consideration. In Australia Indian students have been beaten up in Melbourne and other places for the same reasons.

This fire of hatred and superiority feeling among some whites was smoldering for a long time but now is catching the flames because the racist president is blowing hard on the flame for his own political agenda. It is all right now for some to say nigger to a black person and treat him unfairly.

I have lived in the United States for a while in California where I had many white friends who were sterling people. I remember how Alison’s blue eyes sparkled with love and friendship who would come at midnight to pick me up and bring me to the bus station when I could have taken a taxi.

I remember Howard who was so nice to me that it was unbelievable. I remember the Cambridge professor and his wife who kept writing to me for years and there are so many others I do not have space for here but they are white and they are wonderful people so the idea that all whites are racist is totally false and it should be repudiated.

Remember that millions of them voted for Obama and made him a two term popular president. I remember the white women in a church in California who invited to me to speak on Vietnam and lovingly listened to me. The racism that we talk about is therefore not as widespread as it is made out to be but it exists in all countries even among people who are not white as I mentioned earlier.

Let us now see the root cause of this phenomenon called white supremacy and why some die hard whites of low education who live in poverty cling to this notion that their skin color makes them superior to anyone else but superior in what sense?

A black woman wrote a beautiful article on this subject that I cannot reproduce here but basically she asked all whites to examine their own conscience and explain why they feel superior to others when their history is full of rape and pillage, of mistreating slaves and promoting their self interest with the use of white policemen who still use force and intimidation to put non whites in their place. 

Now we supposedly live in a democracy where everyone is supposed to be equal in their voting rights but the Republicans constantly deny the blacks their voting rights so that they will not vote against them. They do this by asking for the proof of their citizenship when white voters are not asked such things. They put less number of voting machines in predominantly black districts so that many cannot cast their votes even if they wait whole day in line.  

They intimidate and threaten non white voters and claim that they are flying voters and vote in different places but cannot back up the voter fraud claim. They put up rigged voting machines where the voter presses one button but the vote shows up under a different name. They discount the absentee voters from overseas by saying their votes were not delivered on time etc.etc.

The white supremacists are a diehard bunch who feel that it is their manifest destiny to rule over others within their borders and even beyond. This feeling of self importance even if they do not deserve it makes them dangerous enough to vote for a total bigot who thrives on fanning this flame of hatred in their heart. They are not the majority but an obsolete voting system called the Electoral College votes gives them the upper hand even if the opposition gets the most number of votes. They lose by three million votes and still win the presidency because of the Electoral College system that no one understands.

The historical reasons behind the claim of white supremacy:

We have seen the rise of apartheid regime in South Africa that was so racist that practically the whole world condemned it and clamored for Mandela to be released. The world mourned the death of Biko in the hands of the brutal police because he was protesting the injustice of apartheid in a peaceful way.

When a white preacher married a beautiful black woman, their child was considered impure although she looked very white and they were outcasts in their all white community. The child could not be admitted to the school because she had some black blood. It finally ended in the suicide of the black lady.

So the question here is why the whites felt that way and still do in some parts of the world?  I think the answer lies in preserving their advantages they had gained in keeping black slaves in the south whom they worked to death making money for them and lived a good life. The same thing happened in South Africa where they stole the land from the Zulus through treachery at first and later by massacres when they brought in the guns.

So people who lived a life of privilege were loath to give it up in the name of equal rights for everyone. They said that some were more equal than others and still do. This ideology that some are more equal than others is now playing out in the heartland of the United States and in Europe where the Nazi salute is once again fashionable.

The whites write the history that shows them in good light and is taught in all the schools. The massacres of Native Americans, forced repatriation to their reservations, betrayals of the treaties, outright   stealing of their land to build homesteads, the denigration of the natives as savages by the missionaries and their forceful conversion to Christianity by the rabble missionaries using the military as their enforcer etc are downplayed in their history book but the massacre of the Little Big Horn is taught to every child black or white.

They omit the part where the Texan rangers massacred the men and women of Mexican descent but emphasize the Alamo so that is what the kids are taught and that is what they know.

They teach that the whites were the scientists and explorers and wrote books of philosophy so even today every college kid has to read Kant and Hegel. Who else is there? They teach that whites were and still are the inventors who have sent people to moon, have broken the records in flying, diving and sailing. The whites have climbed the Everest first ( It was with Tenzing Norgay) so white are the superior race no matter how you look at it or so they claim.

They conveniently omit the mention of non whites who have been scientists and inventors and who have contributed to the uplifting of the human race in a significant way. 

The fallacy of this ideology:   

Now I come to the part where the fallacy of this white supremacist ideology will be seen in its proper light and come to some conclusion.

We all know that we all descended from Lucy who was black and lived in the Rift valley millions of years ago and spread to different parts of the world tens of thousands of years ago so basically we are all black under our skin that changes color through evolution and the climate where people live. This is not based on euphemism but scientific fact that we carry the DNA marker in our blood that has been traced from Africa to Europe to Eurasia to Asia to Alaska and on to the Native Americans that tie us all together this way. 

The facial architecture and hair among other physical traits have evolved through thousands of years of evolution and is still evolving.

Intermixing of Mongol blood from the East with the European can still be found in the features of some from Ural to southern parts of Europe. The Moslems who ruled Spain for centuries until chased out have also left their imprint in the blood of some Spaniards who dislike admitting it.

In the United States just ask any American about his parentage and he will start by saying it is part Irish, part  Apache, part Italian and part some pirate blood of unknown heritage  so they are of mixed blood.

So we see that the term white is somewhat misleading. It is also known that during the period of slavery, not all whites were slave owners because they were dirt poor and often worked as slave hunters for the rich plantation owners who paid them to bring back the slaves who has escaped. They were called the white trash and disdained by the rich whites.

The slaves have long been emancipated and are now getting education, jobs and vote in large numbers even electing a black president for the first time. But the white poor people  from the heartland of America still believe in segregation and teach their children  that they are better than the people of color although fail to explain how they are better.

The whitewashing of the pillage and abuse of others in their history books does not change the facts because people are not easily fooled.  I think the passage of time will prove that we are all black under our skin.It is a beautiful color so be proud.

Bertrand Russell was once asked about his religion and he said he was a humanist. Perhaps we can all learn from him and be a humanist first and embrace everyone as our brothers and sisters. Then perhaps the racism will die out but it will not happen in our lifetime. I am sure of that.

Note :  My blogs are also available in French, Spanish, German and Japanese  languages at the following links :

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Blogs in French
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Anil's biography in French.
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A life worth living

A life worth living 

                                  Source : Family photo of the British medal 


Synopsis : This is the story of my father who was an extraordinary person and so was my mother who lead an exemplary life of devotion and piety. We can all learn from such persons  how to live a life with honesty and dignity even if they remain poor.


He was a young boy sitting with his brothers around a kerosene lamp in the mud house in a rural obscure village that had no electricity, no paved roads, no running water, no decent shops and full of uneducated and superstitious village folks.

Outside it was pitch dark with wind howling through the bamboo clumps and making mournful sound. The pitiful howls of jackals could be heard that reminded one how remote the village was from any civilization.  He did not mind and concentrated on his lessons.

His father relaxed in his cushion on the mud floor which was dry and clean and kept an indolent eye on his children and no one had any inkling what was coming next.

The disaster struck so suddenly that it left the kids speechless and they froze not knowing what to do but their father knew. A big and extremely poisonous king cobra had struck his thigh while chasing a mouse that it missed and struck his thigh instead. The poison took immediate effect but he managed to say “Thank God it was not my kids that the snake struck. Please bring me outside where I can feel the cool air” and he expired.  There were no doctors and no hospital, no transport even if there was one and it was late at night so there was no help. King cobra did not give much time to people.

His wife rushed in and saw what had happened and fainted. Others came and found the body in its last throes of agony but they all watched helplessly and could do nothing. The snake had disappeared.

His elder brother who lived far away was sent a telegram but it took him several days to come the country being so vast but he came as was his duty to take care of the funeral and help the family although he did not know how yet.

It was in late 1800s when the country was ruled by the British. Soon the question came up about what to do with the kids now because their mother was an uneducated village woman who did not know anything and depended on her husband to run their small farm.

He was a very honest man who had run a farm and managed it for a widow who was illiterate to boot as most women in those days were and asked him to deduct his modest salary each month from the farm income. But her son who grew up spoiled and with gambling debts in the big city one day said the amount he deducted was illegal as there was no legal document to do so. It was all verbal so now he demanded 5000 rupees which was like a fortune in those days.

This honest man was heartbroken and protested but could do nothing as the old widow had died in the interim so there was no one to support his claim that it was his salary that he took each month. It failed to convince the young man and found himself in dire straits. He sold some of his farm land to pay off this huge amount but it was not enough.

Now he was dead of snake bite leaving behind his seven sons and a huge debt so the future looked dark. His elder brother now was a Godsend who came and decided to place the kids in foster care where they would be given free board and education.

So one day the young boy carried his small bag and walked on the rice paddy dikes for miles to reach his foster home leaving his home, his siblings and mother for an unknown future. He was so young and fearful. He was also sad.

No one could know what was going through his young mind because it was all so sudden. He did not know who the foster parent was and what he was like. He did not know anything about his future but he was to soon find out. His foster home was run by a priest so the young boy had to help him anyway he could. When the priest got paid with a sack of rice for his services, it was the young boy who carried the heavy sack on his frail shoulders balancing himself gingerly on the rice paddy dikes.

When the priest got a basket of vegetable or other things, the young boy carried that as well. 

The room and board was very modest but he stayed as he had no choice and concentrated on his studies. He was a smart kid and was good with numbers. He was sent to a local school where he was the smartest in his class and one day graduated from high school with a gold medal. He was perhaps 16 years of age by now.

This gold medal and his innocence got him a job with the British officers who saw in him a bright boy with very good potential so the young boy who had never left his rural surroundings and had never boarded a train was now set on a lifelong and exciting journey that took him to distant parts of the great country. For the first time he saw how vast the country was and how diverse the people were. Everything was new to him, the food, the languages and the clothes people wore but he was smart and learned quickly to cope.

He was now an accountant  but had to pass tough exams to become one  and served the British well wherever they sent him. Sometimes it was the South and other times in the far west in what is now Pakistan. He never forgot to send home some money. He also sent his younger brothers to school and paid for their expenses.

Then one day a co worker said to him that there is a beautiful girl who is perhaps 13 years old and from a very good family so he should now consider marriage. He was perhaps 22 year old now so he got married and sent his bride who was just a child to his village because he could not keep her with him where he was. He was living in tents in Waziristan which is a mountainous and primitive area even today.

The young bride who was the apple of her parent’s eyes and who had grown up in a city now was making a journey in the company of total strangers who had promised to bring her to the remote and primitive village somewhere in the east. So with fear and trepidation she followed because she trusted her husband whom she only met briefly during the marriage who was now her life partner. She was also very shy so could not tell the strangers that she needed to go to pee somewhere so suffered the pain silently. It was all very traumatic for a girl so young. 

Her husband through the arranged marriage lived somewhere west of the country she did not know exactly where but was sure that someday he will bring her there when the time was right. That he did. They lived in many parts of India and raised their growing family as best as they could. Their children were all born in different cities as they moved around so much.  

The young man one day was called by his British officer who proudly presented him a silver medal minted in London with his name inscribed on the rim and said the British government  gave this extraordinary medal to him in recognition of his loyal and sterling service to the empire. The photo of this medal is shown above.

But he was a humble man and never showed the medal to his children. He loved to play a musical instrument called Esraj but his children never saw him play. He had many talents but never talked about them.  

Times passed swiftly for him and his family. The kids were growing up so he demanded and got a transfer to a bigger city where the kids could go to proper school and perhaps colleges later on. His daughters got married one by one and left the family. 

He now longed to go back to his native village where he wanted to retire but his relatives would have none of it. They were making windfall profits from his share of the farm that would stop if he retired in the village so they opposed. This is the real sibling relationship no one talks about.

So heartbroken he then built a decent home in the city. His wife sold her gold ornaments to pay for the land and some costs but finally she had her own home and she was proud of it. Together they raised the family and sent the kids to school and later college.

They were the ideal couple who seldom quarreled, seldom spoke harsh words, seldom spanked their kids and always taught them good values, honesty, hard work and tolerance to all faiths.  They were the kindest and most loving couple one could imagine. People respected his integrity and fair treatment of others. They were the most generous and hospitable people one could find.

But the fate had a very different plan for him. One day he was diagnosed with cancer which he ignored at first but it got worse and had to be operated. He suffered the pain silently along with his loving wife. She stood in crowded buses for hours to bring him food everyday because the hospital food was so bad. No one gave her a seat in the bus so she suffered silently due to her lifelong devotion to her husband who needed her now.

The operation was not successful so he died a few months later at home and in terrible pain. No one could do anything but watch tearfully as he took his last breath. His wife lived on to an old age and a life of saint but finally one day she too breathed her last thus ending a long life of trials and punishment, adventure and tragedies, a life full of travel and uncertainties, a life full of joys as well as sorrows.  They were my parents. I miss them terribly.


Note :  My blogs are also available in French, Spanish, German and Japanese  languages at the following links :

Blogs in French
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Anil's biography in Japanese
Anil's biography in French.
Anil's biography in English.
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Everything fades

  Source : Google photo

Synopsis:  Eventually everything fades into oblivion because nothing is permanent except the pyramids. The glory, the accolades, the publicity and the fans that follow the celebrities fade away and the new generation remains ignorant of the past celebrities. This story is about my uncle.


I saw him for the first time when I was a just a child but the memory is still vivid. He came to our house with his beautiful wife and a baby to visit. We were told that he was a movie star and had appeared in many movies already and may be working on new ones.

People did not believe us when we told our friends that a movie star had come to visit us but it was true. I will reveal at the very end of this blog who he really was but not yet so hold on.

In those days in the 1940s the movies were all black and white and made in only 16  mm format. The cameras were primitive when compared to now and the sets and settings were simple. Often the movies were shot in villages or gardens or cities as the story demanded so no elaborate studio settings were needed.

We used to make fun of such movies because they never showed the hands of the hero if he was playing piano or other instruments like violin because they did not know how to play piano or violin so someone played and the hero just pretended to play.

It was also true when the heroine started to sing because we knew that she did not know how to sing. She just lip synched the songs someone else sang. This is still true. When the scene was shot in the studio, it was quite evident when the moon painted on a screen wavered because of electric fan but it was all fun just the same.

The movie star explained to us that they had to ride a mock up horse to show they were riding a real horse but it was all fake and legs of the horse were never shown because it was made of spring that someone had to shake out of the range of the camera to make the horse seem galloping. But it was all fun just the same.

The movies in those days were also called bioscope although those words have faded altogether from the collective memories of people.

The movie industry has come a long way since then with ultra modern Dolby sound , 72 mm wide angle screen, modern cameras and very elaborate sets and settings not to mention huge budget. No one will watch a black and white movie anymore in 16 mm. Those days are over.

The movie goers are now used to tremendous computer generated scenes, actions that are breathtakingly difficult and often dangerous, 3D movies, scenes shot with multiple cameras in dazzling colors projected on a screen 4 stories high and 75 feet wide. We watch movies like The great wall in aircon comfort munching on pop corn and just plain stupefied by the cinematography  and acting of Matt Damon.

But in those days of 1940s, everything was primitive. The movie houses were full of bed bugs, dirt and torn seats. The most expensive seats were at the back that costs 75 US cents but the front seats went for as low as 20 cents. After running for several weeks, they sold the tickets at reduced rates so we often waited until it went down to reduced rates.

At the back of the movie house worked the artists who painted the posters in bright and gaudy colors that were then paraded downtown on the heads of coolies to advertise the showing. These posters mounted in frames and decorated with lights were all joined with long cables attached to a generator that people pulled so the parade of posters was a spectacle by itself with the all the colored and dancing lights and a band in front to make tremendous racket.

There was no advance booking so we had to fall in line to buy our 12 cent worth of reduced rate ticket but getting to the window was a struggle because there was no discipline. People shoved and pushed while the touts and scalpers offered the tickets at a higher price to those who did not like shoving and pushing.

There were no double features either. You had to show up on time and not in the middle of the show and had to leave when the show was over so the janitors could get to work and clean all the peanut shells people scattered.

We kids were very naughty so we rolled the coke bottles down the slope from behind which made a lot of noise especially when people were very engrossed in a romantic scene or tragic something. We also brought the tin frog to make more racket while people tried to hush us furiously while pinching the butts due to bed bugs but it was all for fun just the same.

At half time the lights came on and people rushed out to pee in the alleys because there was no toilet anywhere but first had to get a token from the gate keeper who checked it when you returned to your seat to make sure that you were not sneaking in without paying. At this time the chai wala kids took over the place and rattled the tea cups under your nose to take the order and annoyed people to no end. The peanut sellers were not to be outdone either.

Then the movie started after some endless commercials of soap, digestic tablets or vitamin pills and some trailers of the movies to come but finally the title of the movie and the names of actors etc. started to show up. It was hand written and filmed such was the technology.  We had to endure such movies for at least two to three hours because people wanted their 12 cents worth and not less.

In religious movies, the pious audience even threw some coins onto the stage where the urchins fought for them in plain view creating more ruckus. Those were the days.

With this background let us return to our movie actor hero visiting us who told us many stories and how movies were made in the studios in sweltering heat with strong make up and people crowding behind the camera.

The heroines wore make up for sure but their lips looked black in the black and white movie. The color was not invented yet or the producer could not afford it but no one complained.

Our movie hero lived in style and was mobbed by young female and male admirers but mostly females that have not changed a bit after all these years so I feel pity for Matt Damon and Brad Pitts because they are always hiding or running away from the fans and the paparazzi.

His wife was so pretty but she was a housewife and did not like the movie world so all of a sudden at a young age when he was making a lot of money and was popular, he quit the movies and retired. The movie people were in shock and could not understand why and where he went.

He came to our home town, built a nice house and planted roses in his garden. His once handsome face now burnt black in the hot sun was unrecognizable except to his friends and relatives and he grew old. He had a golden voice and was a recording artist in his heydays. He made many records at the HMV studio in those days before the age of LPs but he sang no more now and played no more violin and piano.

He said that he was old and had lost many teeth so he was a shell of his former self so was very self-conscious about it. He preferred directing dramas where he taught young boys and girls how to act and sing during the pooja festival.

Twice we saw his drama played in the rented movie houses where the tickets were all sold out but that too was now in the past. He was a great artist in a true sense because he could act, play violin, sing and was very good in painting water or oil color masterpieces. This much talent in one person was hard to find in those days but I saw him wither before my eyes.

One day I approached him in his house when I showed up with a small tape recorder and requested him to sing but he at first hesitated saying his voice was no longer the same as before etc. but I was persistent so finally he pulled out his harmonium and sang no less than ten songs that I recorded.

The small Sony tape recorder recorded all the songs faithfully but was unable to play in their full grandeur because it had very small speakers but that changed when I was able to record the songs in my computer many years later and transferred them all to a CD that I played in my stereo. Only then his beautiful voice reemerged as if time had cast no shadow on it. I was thrilled to have made this recording of this great man and preserved what I could in a CD.

I then visited him at his new home where he usually stayed indoor and rarely went out because he had aged and had many illnesses.

His once beautiful wife too had aged and was only a shadow of her former self reminding us all that beauty is so fleeting but they welcomed me warmly. I saw some of his paintings on the wall that I photographed, printed and gave him copies and I sent the CD full of his songs to his son who is also a good singer and is making a name for himself.

He waved from his balcony sadly as we pulled out of the drive way on our way to the airport because I had a feeling that I was never to see him again. The sad news came only after a few months that he had passed away.

So this is how it all ends. Where is Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor? Where is Hepburn and Bogart? They just remain a distant memory for some as they continue to fade away until the next generation says who was he? Does the cruel passage of time make us all irrelevant someday? He was my uncle.

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