How to spot a Child Molester in the family

Anita, an 8-year-old repeatedly tugged on to her mother’s stole to tell her something. The mother, single now was battling with her own divorce war with her ex-husband over the rights to various trusts and funds and the trading business they shared when together.

Anita’s maternal uncle, her mom’s cousin often came to help her mother and babysit Anita – but there was a problem. Her uncle was expressing himself in a sexual way to the child causing great stress levels on the 8-year-old. Her judgement was getting clouded and she could not make up her mind whether to scream or to just endure.

This would not have happened if her mom, though living in her own hell could have spotted the following signs –

• A family relative who has history of broken relationships and he is not able to explain why the break up happened.
• A person who is lonely and does most of his things alone
• Likes to help you in times of distress but your spouse has clear negative feelings about him. Listen to your spouse especially if he/she is the father of the child even if you are getting bitterly divorced
• Likes to sneak onto your family space. It might seem harmless to you at first and later you would get used to it, but spend sometime thinking why an uncle is paying a visit on a weekday at 2 pm in the afternoon when he should be at work.
• A relative who might have rivalry towards you or your family but is putting up a show of reconciliation – there could be ulterior motives
• Your child does not want to spend time with the relative
• Your child is restless when he /she hears the relative’s name
• Your child expresses strong views about the person – positive or negative
• In the company of such a person your child is agitated
• The relative is in a habit of speaking of sex when the child is at a hearing distance.

A mother is the best judge and I hope these guidelines help you in keeping a child molester at bay.

Mani Ratnam ka Avatar

I saw Mani’s movie yesterday for which I had locked up lot of expectations, thanks to incessant publicity about the locations, cast and the directors past projects which form huge credibility with the fan base.

Now where do I start, I am partial and do not want to bash my favourite director, his technical team and Vikram (Anniyan). Why is Raavan portrayed with mud pack, henna pack and turmeric on his face to show his anguish on various situations? It is conveyed that Beera is 32 years old, and one who knows the forest and worships the forest and the customs, instead the audience are fed to an over fed Abhishek Bachchan who seems lacking in the overall tribal look, his teeth grinding acts shows us a well-kept mouth which has used many teeth cleansing and whitening products which is not line with the movie character.

Abhishek is a good actor but playing an urban lad comes easy to him…Beera is definitely is not his cup of tea. Aishwarya does not stop showing cleavage to Raavan and like in the last scene where Raavan falls in the ravines whilst trying to hold her hand, her cleavage shoots up at all wrong situations.

Not many days ago, I saw Avatar, and could not help but relate Avatar to Mani’s Raavan and joined them for comparison since the morals of the two stories are more or the less similar.

Jake Sully (Avatar) fights the white man’s civilization on Pandora. Jake is an outsider and is a product and executioner of the same civilization, he turns himself inside out and fights the war and wins against the rape of land, abolishment of natural resources, culture, lifestyle of the Navis, that is in progress by the US army.

In Raavan, I could not miss the point that Mani was inspired by Cameroon’s message – Beera is a naxalite leader, opposed to developments planned by mainstream India which is headed by police brutality in tribal areas, Beera promotes, natural living, works on strengthening cultural values, respects his own race and fights the civilization attempts for which he is sought after by the Police. Beera and his people use natural resources abundant in the jungle to make food, feed themselves, torture enemies etc. Mani’s love for eco-friendly living was flowing abundantly in all the scenes.

Every scene captured is a gem and the geographical beauty of Kerala, TamilNadu in India surpassed the artificial beauty created in Cameroon’s Avatar by miles but to my disappointment the movie could not deliver the message that Mani was so desperately trying to deliver.

Thanks but no thanks for the movie Raavan.

Remote tutoring is gearing up like there is no tomorrow

A english speaking bright student in the villages surrounding Chittoor in Andhra Pradesh is teaching a girl in Irvine California on a online teaching device.

A normal day for the tutor is as follows –

She comes to the training center after traveling 20 kms on a bicycle. She brings her lunch with her as she knows it is going to be a looong day for her. The student in California starts her online classes at 6 am in the morning, which is 12.30 pm IST.  After they exchange pleasantries online, they get to business with revising what was taught in the last class.

Personal attention is given to the student. Questions are answered promptly and tests are taken frequently. This prepares the child for other competitive exams in his/her country.

An amazing way education is spread across boundaries. Countries like Finland, Belgium etc are great contributors to the education system and are often hailed as the countries with best education system. Here comes India with a complex education system, where the potential of individuals is yet to be reached, there is hunger to adapt to the rest of the world.

Secure network is required to carry out these noble ideas of tutoring across the boundaries of continents and countries. What a world it will be if education is imparted with this creativitiy.

Brick and Mortar education system is redundant

Garbage Glossary for glossing the garbage

Some years back the saying went, clothes maketh a man which can now be translated as Amount and content of garbage determines the character of a man/woman.

We consume and discard multitude of items in a day that a small 5 liter trash bag gets filled easily and we don’t even bat our eyelid. From the home trash can, the garbage flows through various facilities and finally is processed and released into the nature and it remains in the environment for a long time

Consuming lesser products and disposing off the correct way is the only solution to prevent the next generation from eating the poisonous fruit planted by us.

Even the developed countries have not come up with efficient ways to recycle household garbage. The grass root involvement is the crucial participation that is required to make the world a greener place.

Following are some suggestions w.r.t some of the countries I have been to and lived.

United States

• Consume less.
• Take your own cloth bags for grocery shopping or even to Macys and buy only the things that you can add in your cloth bag. Do not accept plastic bags from departmental stores
• Use cloth diapers for kids
• Avoid mental stress and physical stress for women and maintain equilibrium of your body cycle so that you have controlled menstrual bleeding. Practice yoga….reduce use of sanitary napkins
• Buy clothes and shoes made of bio-degradable matter
• Do not drink soft drinks from vending machines. If soft drinks are required drink from a fountain
• Drink without a straw
• Spend more time on cycling outdoors than in the gym

Belgium

• Same as above with following adaptations
• Use public transport than cars
• Do not put the plastics in the recycling bins…instead do not use plastic bottles at all
• Buy a  soda maker instead of soft drink bottles

• India
• Use designated trash boxes to dispose the garbage
• Inquire with your garbage lifter on what he does to dispose off the garbage
• Follow all steps above\
• Ban all processed food
• Do not buy soft drinks in bottles
• Take shopping bag for all shopping and refuse to take spunky from departmental stores

Fresh Heroine in the states

In two incidents this week, happening in two different parts of the world with different sections of society  – one twenty something starlet more famous for her doping habits than anything was pinned down by the United states to appear in the court.

In Jamaica a series of shootings have been ordered to extradite Dudus Coke a drug cartel kingpin who is hiding in the slums of Jamaica.

Consumption of heroine, cocaine by budding starlets is not uncommon, Lilo is going a little too far in her race to death game. A breath analyser gadget called Secured continuous Remote Alcohol monitoring system costing the state 1500 dollars has been her latest accessory. For non followers of Lilo news, Lilo’s ass has been canned (at the cost of the tax payers money) because she failed to follow her probation criteria and was partying (read inhaling heroine) at the Cannes French Film festival.

Putting the latest science and technology to use, the SCRAM like enhanced device can be used by NARCO teams all over the world to signal kg’s of cocaine. I wonder why money is not being spent wisely in this area, than spending huge amounts of money for extraditing, court trials of starlets and devastating beautiful countries for a single drug cartel leader…

A heat seeking missile, was invented to detect and pursue humans hiding in a deserted building, a similar detection mechanism is needed which can highlight the possession of cocaine and other delusion inducing substances.

Our Ancestors and the act of aping

Apes bear starking resemblance to the humans and research made by scientist over the world makes us believe that we were apes before civilization struck us like a lightning making us the evolved individuals that we are proud to be now.

How did we accomplish the learning process and what sides of our brains we used? When did we copy others and at what instances we corrected from our follies and when did we try the unbeaten path of innovation. What percentage of these actions cause the civilization?

Cheap vacations and airlines

Whenever I open a news page or other entertainment pages I am often greeted by hoards of popup ads and online advetisements for exotic vacations and sometimes I get tempted to open it at least once…I am sure many of you go through the same phase of a hesitant surrender to the alluring offers created by the combo of travel websites, airlines, car rental and hotels.

I am not spitting sarcasm at the need for vacations, a brief period of relaxation/family get together/ Christmas travel has not done any harm to the mankind…but the extent to which the average consumer tries to have it all in his constricted budget and under the shadows of recession is overwhelming.

Travel websites are trying to fulfill the demands by beating other competitors in the game. On the surface it looks like they are searching the best deals for us by peeping into the databases of all airliners and hoteliers. Behind the wall they are also dealing with the providers to skim the service which they are not so reluctant to do but just waiting for a catalyst to appear.

Over-worked pilots and crew, old airplanes and bad takeoff and touchdown decisions are a few parameters of this equation which have taken toll over many lives

I bring to the attention, the recent tragedies that occured in two different parts of the world…

Afrikiyah airlines crashed near Tripoli, Libya this month. 60 Netherlanders were off to South Africa for a vacation trip. The French experts are still researching on what exactly caused the crash, but on the whole the Libyan government has blamed the crash on the morning sun rays that blinded the pilot and made him make one bad decision during touchdown. At the end more than 150 people got killed leaving a lone survivor.

In another accident within a weeks time the Indian air carrier, Air India flight from Dubai to southern city Mangalore crashed in the wee hours. Bad judgement , overworked pilots and a sensitive landing strip (one of the many that have valleys on the sides) was the

A year ago another landing accident

quick conclusion.

Kasab, Should he be hanged?

Kasab

Death Penalty is often sought for the gorriest crimes of all times. Some crimes happen unplanned whereas others are planned to great detail. The main accused in the 26/11 attacks on Mumbai fall into the latter.

Kasab was in limelight for the past 17 months for his lapse of memory, inconsistent statements on the pre and post 26/11 happenings. Amidst the histrionics millions of people keenly observed his audacious lack of repentance.

Indian court of justice has not given a capital punishment since 2004 and in the history there have been very few convicts who endured this punishment. The historically notable death penalty was the hanging of Nathuram Godse for assassination of Mahatma Gandhi.

Will Kasab get a second chance…or should he be given a second chance? Will the court consider his age and nationality – Pakistani an attribute to determine the punishment?

Do you know PTSD can kill you and others?

More than 200000 US servicemen are in active service in Iraq, Afghanistan and Krgystan and so on…

Serotonin raising medicines are often prescribed by Army doctors to relieve the disorder.

On an average an adult can take several months to recover from this disorder – some can do it never and would end up killing themselves or commiting crime and landup in jail.

There aren’t enough doctors available to treat these patients with PTSD…it is an epidemic of this war torn world.

What has changed over years?

Economies tank, politicians get assasinated and governments fall… these are the major headlines that the press and the readers click to read. Lets ponder and understand what has really changed and that really impacts our lives

Eating habits – We went from over-greasy french fries to eating solemn salads and drinking vegetable juices all in a span for 2 decades

Drinking Habits – Global economy made all types of liquour available at your door step. Drinking increased… so is the use of cocaine and marijuana. Drinking water became scarce…

Learning Habits – People learnt more on the internet , more ideas were shared. Kids became smarter and adapted to mouse clicking and console operations like there was no tomorrow.

Sleeping Habits – People became more sleep deprived. More electricity was consumed as people stayed awake for longer… more consumption caused environment pollution

I keep wondering why none of the above ever make headlines on a major newspaper…?