(Satire)

Weak…Oh Really!!!

“To have a successful life you have to work hard and for that you must take healthy diet. You are really weak.” This is what an interviewer recommended me during my interview for a PG program.

To which I replied, “I am thin, not weak”. This made the interviewer smile.

I don’t understand why people use these two words interchangeably. They are not synonymous. As per the Oxford dictionary, meaning of the word weak is ‘lacking physical strength and energy’ and that of thin is ‘having little fat on the body’.

Whenever somebody meets me, the first sentence used by the person is ‘tum bahut kamzor ho gai ho’ (you have become weak).

My walking pace is more than the average walking pace of an Indian woman. I can survive in the chilly winter of Delhi and I can also bear the harsh summer. Even if I think hard I cannot recall when I have visited the doctor for the last time. I never had a body check-up done because it was not ever recommended by any doctor.

During the stormy season people recommend me not to go out because I might fly. I wish I could experience that.

The concerned society even asks me, “Do you take something to get rid of this weakness?” to which I reply, “No…not even the tension”.

Society, please provide me the scale used by you to measure my ‘strength’; I want to check it myself.

Unshared Toffee!!!

Well! To start it with conflict will not be a good idea, so let’s talk about peace first. Let us think deeper on what can be done to bring peace to the society. Before thinking about making the environment around us healthy and bringing a peaceful change we must look inside us, are we mentally healthy to think healthy around us and what is the condition of peace at our homes. I believe conflict does not uproot at the world level first. It uproots in our minds and reaches to our homes, from homes to states and finally to countries. As many homes make a state and many states a world. So, why not to start peace building at our homes first, as the phrase says “charity begins at home”…

While pondering over ‘conflict at home’, the first conflict that came to my mind was ‘conflict over property’. Through my experience I can say this conflict takes place in many homes if not at every. While reflecting on the topic again and again I was thinking who is to be blamed for this conflict…the two siblings, their spouses (the wives, as I am considering the case of two brothers here), their children, or the circumstances??? But none of these answers fit my thought, to understand it better lets rewind the life of the two boys…

Birth of the second child brings a companion to the first, a companion to play with, to fight with, to share with and to share “everything”, starting from the toffee. And if ever he denies doing it, he would be made to listen to the words ‘tum bade ho’, the words which define ‘you are elder to him that’s why you have to build the habit of sacrifice’. Every time he brings something from outside, receives a gift from somebody, buys a toy or anything just anything; he has to share it with his buddy. Through my experience I can say, the case is not the same with the commodities belonging to the younger brother. If ever the elder one wanted something from the younger he has to again come across the same words ‘tum bade ho’, which here means ‘we will get it for you later’. This sharing does not end here it is just the starting, it will go on further to the chocolates, notebooks, pens, t-shirts, gadgets and finally to the property.

Through these words ‘tum bade ho’, parents are inculcating the sharing behavior in the elder child, teaching him nothing is more important than the younger one and unknowingly developing the habit of demanding or asking for from the elder, in the younger child.

Reflecting on it further made me ask a question to myself, can it be the reason of conflict over property? Parents might have never thought that the words used to bring peace to the homely environment will actually crop conflict in future. If it is true then they might be shocked to know that the sufferer of this upbringing is not only their elder child but also his whole family.

When the younger one asks for the best piece of property, the elder one considers it his duty and hence without questioning him, gives him more than he deserves and that leads to the starting of a conflict within his family. His wife and children warn him that his younger one is making fool of him.  If he listens to them, there will start a conflict between the two families. What comes to my mind here is –nobody is wrong here, neither the elder or his family nor the younger, but the ‘unshared toffee’. The unshared toffee leads to uneven distribution of property and hence bringing conflict at home.

I would request the parents and the parents to be to please distribute the “first” toffee to decrease conflict over property.

People might not be wrong if they ask who I am to question at the upbringing by the parents at this young age. To which, I would love to quote an American politician, diplomat, activist and ‘the object of almost universal respect’ as referred by the New York Times obituary, Eleanor Roosevelt who said, "Learn from the mistakes of others. You can't live long enough to make them all yourself."

I would request the young generation to think about it, reflect on it and bring the change – a change to decrease the cases of killings of own brothers. As Gandhi said, be the change you wish to see in the world.

CRITICAL COMMENTS ARE WELCOMED