Tomichan Matheikal's blog

Old man.  Still going around grabbing. Grabbing both girls and land. Does he look holy? Just look at his face.  I have taken this photo from today's Hindu newspaper. The latest report on him from that newspaper: P anel to look into Asaram's "illegal" ashram in Ridge area . I'm looking for a Baba who can give me some holiness!  Hahaha... But I'm not joking! Just search the internet and you will get umpteen such reports about Babas and Modis.  Good nexus. Good Holiness, I mean. Goodness Heavens! How many of us will survive in the world of such holiness? Are we creating another Hitler in the form of Modi? I'm not going to post all the links on Modi's verbal assaults on people.  A simple Google search will give you all those. Modi and his Babas will reign.  How long, but? As long as we (I mean WE, the people) choose. I'm not saying that Modi supported the Babas.  I'm saying that the Babas created Modis. Joke.  Hah

Fiction Ravinder was a fighter.  But that was once upon a time.  When youth boils in the blood like a witches’ brew, it’s easy to be a fighter.  Time, however, puts out the fire beneath the brew eventually.  Experience, rather than time.  You keep fighting with monsters for years, monsters some of whom are real, some illusions and some others are like Quixote’s windmills.  Real monsters have varying motives.  Some want to capture positions of power, some want to swindle money out of the system, and some others want to appear great by belittling others.  Motives abound in the world of monsters.  Monsters are the most motivated creatures, mused Ravinder. And you keep fighting them all through life.  Fight for your dignity, for your principles, or sometimes even for your survival.  And then comes a time when you give up fighting.  You get used to the arrows.  Your skin becomes thick enough to be a shield. Why can’t the world be a place of cooperation rather than competit

Happiness is when I lie down on a beach and listen to the relentless music of the ocean. Happiness is when I touch a flower and feel love in my heart. When I sit on a mountain top feeling the mist washing my soul. When I know that people are what they are because their circumstances made them so.  And so I can understand them.  I can accept them.  As they are. Knowing that everyone is driving the car at the best of her/his potential.  Hooting is a cry for help. Happiness is when I help.  Happiness is knowing that helping is the most painful task I can fulfil. Happiness is the realisation that I don’t need anything more than I already have.  That I can call it quits if I want.  Because I don’t want anything more.  Happiness is the realisation that less is more. Mulberries outside my temporary residence Happiness is the situation in which I can do the job I know on my own terms.  Teach without lesson plans.  Write without research.  Can read Damon Galg

The temperature is soaring in Delhi.  It's less than a month since we, Delhiites, cleaned our woolens and shoved them into the remote parts of the almirah and pulled out the cotton linen for the summer.  The temperature rises at the rate of one degree Celsius per day.  The very air outside scorches your skin. It was not surprising to see honey bees trying to suck water at the taps outside the school's dining hall this morning.  The bees were not worried about the boys coming to wash their hands.  They flew away letting the boys wash and came back as soon as the boys were away. I became curious about the honey bees' requirement of water. A simple Google search gave me the following information: [courtesy:  http://www.glenn-apiaries.com/bee_photos_10.html ] Honey bees collect four substances, nectar to turn into honey for their food source, pollen as a protein source to rear the baby bees, propolis to seal crevices and coat the inside of the hive with an antimico

Fiction Religious centres are the best places for studying human nature.  All kinds of people assemble there.  The best and the worst, the poor and the rich, the mathematician and the novelist, the entire spectrum of human behaviour is available at religious gatherings. People are driven to religion by entirely different motives.  Dag Hammarskjold, a very famous UN Secretary General and Nobel laureate said, when asked why he went to the church every week, “Loyalty to the tribe.” I was at a Christian retreat centre for a week’s retreat.  Retreat is a kind of meditation, self-analysis, prayer, or whatever you would want it to be.  I had gone for the retreat because I was failing in my life.  I was becoming an alcoholic.  Rather, I had become one.  And someone suggested the retreat as a remedy when all other remedies including psychoanalysis had failed.  I said “someone”.  But the someone was none other than my boss. My boss was a good man.  He was religious.  I

Silas Marner, the eponymous hero of George Eliot’s novel, is too good for the ordinary human society.  He has a childlike trust in both man and God.  He loses that trust, both in man and God, when he is falsely accused of theft.  He leaves the place and settles down in a richer place where he lives a very lonely life.  People view him with fear and suspicion; fear because they believe that he has some magical powers since he cured someone’s illness that was considered incurable.  They do not believe him when he says he has no magical powers.  Marner is a good weaver and the profession brings him a lot of money.  His single obsession and source of joy becomes the gold and silver coins he amasses over the years.  But one day his fabulous wealth is stolen.  Marner is faced with a terrible sense of emptiness within.  His present situation elicits some sympathy from the people.  Marner’s life undergoes a radical change when a three year-old child walks into his house one day. 

I must thank my cousin, Jacob Matheckal (as spelt by him), for compiling the history of Matheikals .    No connection with Matheikals Of course, this may not be of any interest to anyone who is not directly related to the family.  I found it an eminent enterprise and wish to thank Babychettan (Jacob Matheckal) for the amount of labour that he has put in for bringing out this history.  The fact is that I know very few of the Matheikals mentioned in the history.  I look forward to getting to know a few of them at least in the near future, though I’m not sure how far I’ll be successful in that venture.  My hesitation owes much to my reticence and lack of interest in spending time with people.  I prefer books to people.  During a light-hearted telephonic conversation with the author of this history some time ago, he asked me, “Shall I present you as an icon for all the mad people in the world?”  I laughed and said, “Why not?”  But what he has actually written about me is