Tomichan Matheikal's blog

Some phone calls are ominous.   There was a time when I used to dread them.   Mercifully they are very rare.   They come from someone or the other associated with an institution of which I was a member for ten years of my youth.   Though I bid final adieu to the institution somewhere down the line, the institution took a diabolic interest in haunting me throughout my life and making as much a mess of it as it could.   Image from ArtStation When the call came today, I ignored it as I often do with unknown numbers. But when the call was repeated a few hours later, I answered it.   As soon as I heard the connections mentioned by the caller, I knew I was doomed.   It meant that they are going to mess up my life now that I have brought some order to it after I dealt with a protracted depression and the concomitant downsides of it. A couple of days back, ‘destiny’ cropped up in a discussion in a class I was taking. I told my students that I never believed in ‘destiny’ as a y

Is Arvind Kejriwal a symbol of the increasing effeteness of truth?   He has been issuing apology after apology, the latest being to Nitin Gadkari.   Earlier he apologised to Bikram Singh Majithia.   Along with Manish Sisodia, he apologised to Kapil Sibal’s son Amit Sibal.   The offended are accepting the apologies with surprising promptness.   There are 30 more defamation cases against Kejriwal.   So are we going to get 30 more apologies and 30 more prompt acceptances? It is understandable that Mr Kejriwal does not wish to waste his time on court cases.   He says he wants to devote his time to more fruitful administrative activities.   That’s fine.   The people need those services and not court entertainments.   But the promptness with which the offended people accept the apologies raise our suspicions.   Is truth being buried facilely with each apology?   Do the apologies and their prompt acceptances mean that it is not easy to defend the truth in today’s India?   I

Hi Friend, “April is the cruellest month,” T. S. Eliot declared, “breeding / Lilacs out of the dead land…”   April is my summer break.   I’m going to celebrate it with a lot of writing, “stirring (certain) dull roots with spring rain.”   Daily blogging is one of those challenges.   ‘One of’ implies that I have taken up another challenge too.   That will be revealed towards the end of April.   This is to comply with Blogchatter: reveal the theme of my AtoZ posts.   I wrote a few days back that “My A2Z may begin with Abracadabra and end on a magical Zenith.”   Yes, the theme of my AtoZ posts is: Life’s Magic . It can be read as: 1.      Life is Magic 2.      Life has Magic 3.      The Magic of Life The first post will indeed be titled Abracadabra and the last Zenith .   Abracadabra starts off the magic.   I hope to take you to the Zenith of a magic mountain by the time we reach the end of April.   I’m not the wizard, however.   You will be the wizard with

There’s a part of me that stopped growing somewhere at adolescence.   That part emerged very strongly the other day when I visited a Park as part of the staff tour from school.   I found myself cycling round in the Park with the passion of a young boy. I was touching a cycle after a gap of some three decades.   When I was an undergrad student at St Albert’s College in Kochi in the early eighties, I was an ardent cyclist.   I went to college by cycle.   Whenever there was free time in between due to the absence of a lecturer, I cycled to the Ernakulam Public Library which was over a kilometre away from college .   When college was over, my cycling came to an end. Cycling has a unique gracefulness as I realised once again recently, decades after college.   The cycle needs very little space and you can manoeuvre it through almost anywhere.   It just swans along with an unassuming poise letting the breeze waft straight on your face.   It doesn’t pollute air with the exhaust

The Congress has asked the Election Commission to return to paper ballots since the EVMs have chosen to be Every Vote for Modi .   While the paper ballots may exorcise the spectre thrown up by the deus ex machina, will it help the Congress? The real tragedy of the country is that it offers no respectable alternative to the craftiness of the Modi-Shah combo.   Rahul Gandhi has grown up in the last couple of years but is still a dwarf beside the colossal images of the crafty combo.   All others of any significance are mere local patriarchs with no national appeal.   Moreover, instead of fighting the communal card played by the BJP and its allies, the Congress is also showing communal fangs when required.   It has always been an opportunistic party from the time of Indira Gandhi when it comes to religious sentiments.   It kept on appeasing certain sections of the country’s population merely for the sake of winning votes.   The appeasements really achieved nothing more than v

A view from the Watchtower at the place Nestled in the lap of nature, Mango Meadows at Kaduthuruthy in Kerala offers a unique experience with its glimpses into the traditional plants and agricultural practices of the state.   It is branded as “Agriculture theme park.”   Like most contemporary ads, it seeks to rope in children with the professed intention of making them familiar with varieties of plants that are on the verge of extinction.   It is a commercial venture, however.   Like all commercial ventures, it has to keep on modifying the professed goals and objectives if it has to be commercially viable, let alone successful.   The entrepreneur behind this venture must be a dreamer.   I’m glad he created the Garden of Eden too in the little available area.   He has brought as many species of fruit trees as possible in a little space.   They are all hybrid plants, however.   New Gen plants for the New Gen children.   But no children were found appreciating any of th

When I left Delhi for my village in Kerala three years ago, a friend remarked that I would not last more than a year in the village.   I quipped, “You’ve given me a whole year!   I’ve given myself only 6 months.” I never thought I would fit in my village.   The fact is I haven’t – not in the usual sense.   I live as solitary a life as possible in the village and the people are apparently happy to leave me alone.   My fear was precisely how much solitude would be granted me.   As I’m completing three years of my existence in this village, I’m more than pleased with the whole-hearted cooperation of people in leaving me to myself. The plain truth is that there are no villages in Kerala.   Villages have undergone much change with most people living alone in their big houses, some of which look palatial, travelling by their own private vehicles, and mostly avoiding meddling with other people’s affairs.   In addition to all that is the fairly large migrant population in the vill