Watch A Teacher Make Her 3rd-Grade Kids Hate Each Other For The Best Reason Imaginable

This video will teach you so many things, it's quite path-breaking ....

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The Journey

Over the past few months the name Mary Oliver has been jumping out at me from blogs, websites and even Facebook and a little voice inside kept saying ‘read her, come on, read her poems’ and I, stubbornly, kept putting it off. Until today, I found a poem of hers whose first two lines so resonated with me and with my present state, it was like I had put on an old pair of shoes that fits ever so comfortably, wrapping its knowingness around my heart that I just had to read further and needless to say, I am hooked :) Well, simply because the whole poem is so simple and so incredibly wise and gets straight to the heart of the matter, what could I do, but just nod and nod and swallow the lump in my throat and share it. Maybe, I’ll also get down on my knees and thank the Universe ....

The Journey

One day you finally knew
what you had to do, and began,
though the voices around you
kept shouting
their bad advice --
though the whole house
began to tremble
and you felt the old tug
at your ankles.
"Mend my life!"
each voice cried.
But you didn't stop.
You knew what you had to do,
though the wind pried
with its stiff fingers
at the very foundations,
though their melancholy
was terrible.
It was already late
enough, and a wild night,
and the road full of fallen
branches and stones.
But little by little,
as you left their voices behind,
the stars began to burn
through the sheets of clouds,
and there was a new voice
which you slowly
recognized as your own,
that kept you company
as you strode deeper and deeper
into the world,
determined to do
the only thing you could do --
determined to save
the only life you could save.

~ Mary Oliver ~

The almost shot

This is today's daily poem which I almost forgot to post coz it also went with the daily photo.

The almost shot

Here I had stood

in the gathering dusk

pointing my camera

at a passing train

There you had been

looking up from the newspaper

out the train window

directly on to my lens

Our gazes had clashed

on the viewfinder

and I had stood dumbstruck

forgetting to click

The train had swiftly

whisked you away

and the moon had dropped

into waiting trees.

And I had walked on

train rumbling in the distance

trying to fill the emptiness

of a shot not quite caught

Chrysalis

The other day I was walking in my front yard, where the grass had grown tall and was interspersed with tiny yellow wildflowers. I noticed a tiny little butterfly alight on one of these flowers. It sat there, light and airy, probing around for nectar when the wind began to blow. Hard. So hard that the flower stalks bent down and the flowers almost touched the ground. I expected the butterfly to get blown off, such a light-looking creature it was. But to my great astonishment, the butterfly stayed on the flower, clinging tightly, even as the flower swayed madly in the wind, tossed here and there. Even as the wind beat on my face and flapped my clothes. I wondered about the strength of the butterfly then, such strong legs it must have to hold fast to that dainty flower in the force of what might have been a strong breeze to me, but which was evidently quite forceful for the grass and the flowers.

I wondered then where this strength came from. Until I remembered the chrysalis. Inside the chrysalis the young butterfly goes through a period of growth. But when the time comes for it to emerge, it has to struggle to break open the walls of the chrysalis. What has been a protective cocoon so far is now restrictive. So it struggles, its efforts pushing the fluid into the wing veins so that they can open up. Its legs and mouth probably straining against the chrysalis walls, tearing them open. Until the butterfly emerges, light and strong.

It seems to me that my struggles have also been like that. Maybe this struggle and pain was necessary for me to break open the walls of my chrysalis and to emerge as a butterfly. Maybe it will give my wings lightness and my legs strength. Maybe it will also give my heart the wisdom to learn to let go of the past, just as the butterfly discards and forgets the chrysalis as it flies away into freedom.


                    \      /
                      \  /
                       O

A violet vision in a dying day

As I go on my walk I see many flowering bushes, pink roses, spotted tiger lilies, delicately pretty pohutukawas, but today I see a vision that takes my breath away. A bush full of violet flowers, large velvet-petaled and stamens that bend into forks at right angles. The flowers hover like a violet cloud over the bush and even the ground underneath is made beautiful by the fallen violet petals among the autumn leaves.

The autumnal leaves look lovely everywhere, yellow-orange and crinkled, sprinkling the green grass in a violent contrast, on footpaths and huddling on the edges of gutters where the water gleams pink from the clouds above. I walk to the river where the heavy rain has transformed it into a rushing current. The blue waters speckled pink rush merrily along, rippled and foaming, carrying logs and leaves. But for the sound of the river everything else is still as the day dies.

The sun has set in the distant sea but its rays still linger in the sky in a reluctant farewell. The pink in the sky turns deeper into peach and then into a vivid rose as the interspersed clouds turn a deep shade of grey. The trees silhouetted on the horizon turn a dark shade of green. I wonder if we can be like a sunlit day, spread light and warmth while alive and be so gloriously alive in our dying moments that even they sparkle with joy and beauty.

As I walk alongside the stream the song of the flow mingles with the muted music of the birds in the trees. Dusk approaches rapidly and lights come on on the hills among the tiled roofs and the treetops. This is my favourite part of the day. It is as if the day is parting but with the promise that it will be back soon. Somehow there is always hope in the departing light.

As I near the house, night has fallen and the trees appear mysterious among the shadows. If the clouds clear away, soon the stars will be out and hopefully a laughing crescent moon. Everything is so perfect in nature, so effortless, so simple and so beautiful. If only we could learn to live like that.

Musings on a rain drenched walk

It is late evening and I am taking a walk when it starts to rain suddenly. First in a light smitter-smatter and then in a heavy drizzle. I have no raincoat or umbrella so I let myself get drenched. The raindrops caress my face in gentle strokes and slither down my nose and chin in large drops. And when I look up, in the bowl of the valley among the backdrop of the hills, there it is, a rainbow, a perfect arc, stretching from base of hill to base of another hill. Stark in the vividness of its colour and radiant in its beauty. As I walk, it fades slowly and disappears altogether. Then just as suddenly the rain stops, as if its only purpose had been to paint a rainbow in the sky.

Then it strikes me how effortlessly Nature does things. Without seeming to put in any effort it conjures up a rainbow from thin air. No stress, no striving, no deadlines, no bottomlines, just effortless ease. Just the intention and then the manifestation.

After the rain, the asphalt road has turned a shiny shade of black and the foliage, ah! they have turned a cleaner, crisper shade of green. Moisture hangs in the air like a secret and as I pass by trees, they give off a woody fragrance that mingles with the smell of the damp earth as shadows gather among the leaves and the sun bids a smiling farewell.

A River Soliloquy

I sit by the riverbank watching the river flow. It has a tempo of its own, it flows to the rhythm of nature, the beat of the earth and slowly I relax to match its tempo. My breathing slows down, my body loses its rigidly-held tensions and it feels as though the weight of my burdens fall off and flow away with the waters.

There are fallen logs rotting in the water on the edge, green with moss and coming apart slowly. Looking at them I realize how things come full circle, the cycle of life and death as things return unresistingly to the source. How different is man, how we cling to this transitory life, this false permanence.

Sometimes ducks come out to feed, foraging in the shallow waters. Also black swans, gliding like black clouds over the blue surface, their gait unhurried, their necks graceful. A duck with ducklings joins in sometimes, the babies, balls of fluff frantically following their mother around. Love wells up inside me, and breaking the barriers of my heart it flows towards the little family, embracing them in protection. But occasionally, the duckling number dwindles and I guess the mother learns to let go without attachment.

The river is mostly flowing, the current creating a dancing, rippling surface and a quiet music, but after a heavy rain, the river is muddy and full-bodied and rushing towards the sea. But even in the speed there is calmness beneath. And on some days, the waters are totally unmoving, or seems to be. Then the surface is like a glass lake. The trees on the banks peer at their own reflection even as I do, white clouds glide on the still surface and birds flap their wings and swoop without creating even a ripple. Things are not as they seem, the river seems to say. Be aware of the illusion of things.

Spring blossoms and godly contests

Ah! Spring is here! There are flowers everywhere and red, tender leaves at the tips of branches. Our plum tree is aglow with buds turning into blossoms on all the lichen-covered branches with not a single leaf in sight. The daffodils are out in full bloom, whole beds given over to these smiling, yellow-headed bell-shaped beauties. It lifts my heart and brings on a smile whenever I see daffodils nodding gently in the breeze.

The variety of flowers is amazing, from tiny star-shaped white flowers cascading over fences to large magnolia and rhododendron clusters. When I go on my walks I pass a tree bare except for pink flowers. I stand under the tree looking up at the blue sky visible through the lattice of delicate pink. And I feel like a queen.

Once I saw a tui bird, a distinguished gentlemanly fellow with a dark green body and a small white pompom at its throat looking like a bowtie, having his meal. It had a long tapering beak which it tucked into yellow bell-shaped flowers and drank deep of the nectar. then it skipped on to another branch and did the same. I stood watching it in fascination until it few away.

At the crack of dawn, the ‘Dawn Chorus’ starts its combined singing, sweet, dulcet tones combine with chirrupy warbling to create unusual melodies. And just as quickly they fade away as the birds take off for the day in search of food and other pursuits. The same is repeated in the evening as the birds come home to roost. Occasionally a lone owl calls in the dead of the night.

There is an ongoing contest between the rain god and the sun god. For the past few days the rain god has been winning, so the rain has been steadily falling even at night when I wake up to the steady beat of the rain on the roof. My office window looks out to a verdant view. The mist sits on the hilltops and the folds between the hills and it looks like the hills are in dreamland with their heads in the clouds. The trees and the grass are a fresh shade of green which only rain can conjure up. And the red-tiled roofs contrasted against the green looks striking. The windows are sprinkled with tiny streams of rain water which look more beautiful than any decoration.

But the sun god watches from behind the clouds, smiling. He knows his day will come, when the clouds will disappear and people will look up smiling at the blue sky and bask in the sunshine, and his light will wink off faraway windows, and dance on the surfaces of leaves rustling in the wind, and shimmer on the tops of rippling waves.

The rain and clouds are only temporary while the sun is always there even if you don’t see it sometimes. Just like God.

My place of worship

I have a litle forest in my backyard, tall trees grow close together along with ferns and bamboo and flowering bushes and the ground is carpeted with brown, rotting leaves. On sunny days, sunlight slants in and lights up the spaces in between. Leaves rustle in the still air and sometimes birds call in lilting cadences. This is my place of worship. The trees standing tall are the columns of the temple and the bushes are the altars. The birds are the unrehearsed choir and the camelias are the offerings. Here my soul bows to a gentle presence, here my soul sings His rhapsody, here I touch His soft-footed feet, here I find my God.

The serene air

The day dawns misty and rainy, the hills outside our window fade in and out of the mist like specters. The rain is a fine spray on the windshield. As the train runs past the sea the hills in the distance are completely obscured by the mist and the bay looks like an open sea, vast and endless. There is no colour visible except varying shades of grey from white to a shiny, steely blue, and Mt.Victoria rises in the distance like a ghost hill, mysteriously stripped of the dwellings clinging to its sides. In spite of the dark, brooding sky and the colourless landscape, I feel a serenity matched by the floating mist, the still air and the gentle presence of God in the wind gently caressing the steel sea.

Flower musings, pumpkin and lemon

It is Sunday morning and I am in the backyard. This part of our yard is secluded; it is cut off from neighbours’ eyes by fencing and from our house by thick clumps of trees, like my own piece of paradise. The cranberry bush is laden with fruit and I pluck them off and eat the sweet, juicy berries as a prequel to breakfast. The pumpkin vine in the vegetable patch gleams a tender green, the leaves with tiny translucent spikes, and a pumpkin in the early stages of infancy. There is also a single bloom, yellow and radiant, with a bell like base flaring into the delicate petal. I peep inside and to my wonder and surprise there is a bee inside, doing a kind of dance which I’m sure only the bees know the steps of. It is such a wondrous sight, nature in the process of symbiosis, giving and taking, wordlessly.


I walk past the clumps of trees, giving off a woody fragrance, exclusive to trees on early mornings or under damp, moist conditions and my heart rises in joy and gratitude like as if the trees had just sung a ghazal. Past the bird bath, the water turned rancid and brown, and the elegant ferns with fronds rising like fans fit for queens, till I reach the lemon tree. There are a few flowers and fewer fruit, nature is winding down for winter. Lemon flowers have this most delicately exquisite fragrance and when the tree is in full bloom, I just stand next to it and drink of the smell or when I am passing by, a whiff hits me and makes me pause and remember that the beauty in life lies in the tiny, imperceptible things that we so often unknowingly pass by.

Weekends, among other things …………

There is a practice here in the workplace that I found a bit odd in the beginning – asking about your weekend. I used to find it difficult to answer at first, but then I realized that it was just a means of starting a conversation. You are free to say anything you want, even invent something and often it leads to other discussions that can get quite interesting.

Then one day I said to a friend “why do you ask me what I did on the weekend, I might tell you all that I did but not what I experienced. I might not tell you that I stood on the balcony at night and watched the full moon rise over the trees and even the clouds that hung over the moon couldn’t dilute the magical quality of the light that filled the sky and lit up the hills, the trees, the grass, the house with a gentle, dreamy light. And in spite of the moonlight, the stars twinkled and the universe that stretched out into eternity, God’s benediction everywhere, His lovely smile everywhere.

Or that the petals of the rose that felt velvety to the touch, God’s love and his joy of creation in every fragrant whorl, as if God’s saying to me, ‘Let you every act be an act of love, my child. Let your every thought, every word create beauty, bring harmony, introduce joy’.”

Daybreak

Today morning I am catching the early morning train which is rather unusual but such a treat. The day is just breaking and patches of silvery sky are visible behind the clouds. The river gleams silver into the distance where it meets with the sea. The is a lone paddle boat in it, the rider gently paddling away like a ghost oarsman. As we come to the sea the scene is eerie, the hills are in shadows and water is a rippling sheet of silver, the light cast by the sunlight escaping from behind soft, cottony clouds has a mystical quality to it. There are a group of oarsmen rowing a canoe in perfect unison. Wellington gleams dully in the distance caught by stray patches of light, willing it to wake up.

Daybreak is a herald of new beginnings, like God has kept his promise and it is up to us to seize the opportunity. It brings hope and light into the darkness that has gone before and the light breaking out through the gaps in the clouds fills my heart with gladness and joy.

Surprising enough the train is full, Wellingtonians like to start early. But the sleep tugging at my eyelids reminds me that I am a nightbird still.

One heck of a lady

There are lots of things about Kiwis that are commendable but their die-hard spirit and independence often stand out.

My friend's 80 year old mother suffers from Leukemia (incurable) and her Dad (also 80) from Alzheimers, who sometimes has difficulty remembering who he is and who his wife is (who is the old lady with grey hair in the other room?). Both of them live by themselves and refuse to move into the children's homes. Her Mum drives herself and her husband around, does the shopping, housework, pays the bills etc. When her blood count drops, she requires transfusions and last month she had to be rushed to hospital with a clot in the leg.

So yesterday when my friend said to me that her Mum's going to Australia alone for two weeks, I was surprised. I asked "Why?"

"Oh ! She's got cousins. She has put Dad in a respite home so he'll be okay. She said she needed a break and wanted some time to herself".

All I could say was 'WOW !"

I know that different people will call it different things, but I call it 'nurturing yourself'.

Saturday stories

Gull politics

It is Saturday and hubby and I are engaged in shopping. We take a break at lunchtime and are sitting on a bench on Petone beach eating hot chips. Soon we are joined by a lone seagull, orange beak, orange feet and orange lined eyes. Hubby throws bits of chips at him and the gull merrily gorges on junk food. We wonder about the fact that he does not even utter a quack to signal to his gull mates that there is food available. But soon another seagull joins us and then the fun begins.

Gull-1 undergoes a transformation. He starts squawking hoarsely and runs after Gull-2, pointed beak open, trying to run him off the place. Now Gull-2 is a smart fellow, he strategically retreats behind the bench where he is content with the bits that hubby throws backwards occasionally. But Gull-1’s squawks have attracted others of his kind and soon we have  a happy crowd of about 10-12 gulls, some of these, we notice, have black feet, beak and kohl-lined eyes. Owing to the fact that these black-eyed beauties are hovering on the fringes, and are smaller in size than the more flamboyant orange eyed-lined fellas, we conclude that the former must be the females.

Gull-1 is now really busy because more gulls are arriving by the minute and he is spending so much time squawking after them and chasing them that he has ceased to notice that bits of food are still being given. In the midst of his squawking and frantic chasing, the newcomers manage to snatch up the food which he has ignored probably with the mistaken belief that he can run all the others off the beach and be the only partaker of the food. Gull-2 at the back has also established his territory and is valiantly defending his turf.

I cannot help think that this is precisely how humans behave too. We are so busy fighting over land and territory that the basic needs of our people get forgotten. There are some countries that probably spend more of their GDP in defence expenditure than in providing food and basic amenities to its people. Even though we know that there are enough resources to feed the whole world, some of us are intent on cornering most of it in a concerted attempt to have more of more totally disregarding the fact that in the process others are getting less of less. When the US went to war in Iraq, they increased their defence budget and guess where the money came from. Some of it came from social welfare, elderly care and basic medical care. They actually cut back spending on these areas.

Sad to think that we are not so highly evolved after all.

~~~

Daane daane par likha hai khane wale ka naam


It is evening and in order to fulfill a greatly felt need for caffeine we stop at a coffee place. We placidly sipping our lattes when Mathew notices that the person at the counter has just thrown a muffin from the tray into the rubbish bin. “Maybe it was damaged, and they didn’t want to sell it”. A short while later we observe that another batch of muffins is being discarded. And then we watch aghast as tray after tray of unsold muffins vanish into the rubbish bin. It is then that we realize that it is closing time and they are throwing away all the unsold food. Our Indian mentality kicks in and we think, what a waste, surely this could have been given to the poor. But where are the poor? The charitable organizations are state-funded and probably wouldn’t need left-over food. What about poor families, new migrants, refugees? We try to work out the logistics involved in taking the food from eateries and carting it to these people. For the amount of labour and time involved we find that for the business owner it is not viable. The amount of food that restaurants, cafés, takeaways discard everyday must be colossal and yet all around the world people go to sleep hungry, die of starvation everyday. 

Kahi daanon par kissi khana wale ka naam nahi hote,
Kissi khane walon ke kismat mein chand daane nahi hote.

~~~

Lambton landscape

Walking down Lambton Quay one bright, warm, sunny afternoon, my senses are flooded with impressions.

People streaming down the sidewalk, dappled sunshine, warm in the sunlight, cool in the shade.

The aroma of coffee, freshly baked cookies, deep-fried fish and chips, curry, canapes, fresh bread, Indian food tinged with banana leaf (olfactory hallucination? Deep-seated desire?)

Baby blue eyes, black sparkling eyes, slanting eyes, sad eyes, sunglassed eyes.

Mothers pushing strollers with babies, mothers pushing strollers with babies in the fathers’ arms, lunchtime family interlude.

'Abra-kebab-ra' selling kebabs, 'Suzette' selling French crepes, 'Chow Mein' selling chow-mein, 'Tastebuds' tempting the tastebuds.

Drooping mouth, kissing-goodbye mouths, cherry-red mouth, sensuously laughing full mouth.

People with pamphlets – ‘Save the children’, ‘Save the forests’, ‘Save the world’.

Flowery skirts, mini skirts, layered skirts, tightly-clinging skirts over swaying legs.

Shop windows beckoning, Christmas trees twinkling, traffic lights turning amber-red-green, steel-glass structures next to elegantly rising churches.

Sautering walk, hurried walk, lazy hip-swinging sexy walk.

Crying children, happily-skipping children, tantrum-throwing children, toddlers gazing fascinated out of mothers’ arms.

Office-goers picnicing on patches of grass, construction workers on scaffolding hammering, lovers walking hand-in-hand.

People waiting at bustops. Waiting for love, waiting for heartbreak. Waiting at the crossing, ‘Don’t walk’, ‘Go’, just like life.

Stockinged feet, tired feet, sandaled feet, spring-in-the-step feet.

Silvery notes of laughter, broken bits of conversation, music pouring from the CD shop, tenor voices raised in carols, meloncholy rising from a one-stringed violin.

A medley of images, smells, sounds impinge on my senses and I come back feeling like I have just visited a painting.

The amazing Constable

I went to see the John Constable exhibition on tour here at Te Papa on Saturday. What I saw was simply breathtaking. I could have spent the whole day there looking at the paintings again and again. Constable was the son of a prosperous miller and spent a long period of his life around the place he grew up in and painted the scenes of his everyday life with such clarity and such beauty. He evidently loved the place and the love comes through in his paintings. His paintings have a three-dimensional quality and standing in front of them makes you feel like you are actually there watching the scene through the painter's eyes. You are transported back to the place and time almost two centuries ago looking at pastoral scenes or ships in the harbour or London in the distance, thinking 'this is how it was, this is how the painter saw it'. And any moment you expect the leaves to move or the water to start flowing, such is the dynamism in the paintings. Truly a memorable experience.

Soul consciousness

The other day while reading someone else's blog I came across a reference to the Aasthavakra Geeta. I googled it and found the most extraordinarily enlightening dialogue between Sage Aasthavakra and King Janaka. I read only a few lines but musing over them led to the realisation that I should relinquish my need for acknowledgement, encouragement, appreciation and even love. For the soul is above these ego needs, it exists in perfect equilibrium and bliss and already knows everything. It is the ego that feels disappointed, disheartened, unloved. The soul is love and knows only love, how can it be unloved? However, it requires great vigilance to be aware of oneself as the soul, for the mind is forever trying to engage in activity that keeps us identified with the ego, to pull us back to the world of the senses. Let go of the ego, become aware of the mind, of the games it is trying to play and the emotions, the slave of the mind. Awareness leads to consciousness of the Self which then leads to the Divine - perfect peace and perfect love.

You do not consist of any of the elements -- earth, water, fire, air, or even ether. To be liberated, know yourself as consisting of consciousness, the witness of these. 1.3

Train tales

Today was the first day at my new job and after a long time I was taking the train again. The ride into Wellington is indeed marvellous. This being the only city I have visited where the hills lie on one side of the tracks (and road) and the sea on the other. This juxtapostion of the green and the blue really blew my mind when I saw it for the first time. And there is this stretch of rail where the tracks run so close to the sea that when you look out of the window it appears as if you are in a boat because the land is hardly visible and all you can see is the sea.

So coming back to today, sitting in the train hearing the clackity-clack of the wheels again sends shivers up my spine and the air laden with moisture and the grass so lush everywhere and all manner of verdant growth takes me back to the train rides in the monsoons through the lush landscape of Kerala. I could almost envisage smoke curling up through coconut fronds. And passing green-carpeted soccer fields, and rain-washed driveways and the Hutt river, placid no more, but tanned and full-bodied like a Malayalee damsel. Rushing past wind-swept stations until the train stops at mine.

Yes, train rides are food for the heart for romantics like me ;-)

The Huka Jet experience

The Huka Falls never fails to hold me in awe. Even though I have seen it many times before. The tons of clear blue water that hurtles down the narrow gorge in a deafening uproar is Nature at its most majestic. So I decided to have a closer look at the Waikato River on which the falls are situated. What better way than to take a ride in the Huka Jet?

So here I am in the front seat all belted up and reinforced against the spray. I am sitting next to a man who is part of a group all speaking a strange language, so I ask him where he is from. It turns out that they are originally from Holland, moved to Spain, but now living in New Zealand for the past twenty years. I am about to ask if the language they are speaking is Dutch or Spanish, when we are interrupted by the arrival of another group who turns out to be from Korea. Then the driver jumps in and I say to my neighbour "He must be the only Kiwi in the group".

So off we go, whizzing over the water, setting it on fire, the ducks ducking for cover, the black swans placidly looking for food, their necks undulating gracefully. Past cliff faces, past the hillside covered in tropical ferns, the boat veering dangerously, doing 360 degree spins, spraying us all with water, the wind rushing past my ears, my cheeks, the water and wind in a frenzy. And I have the feeling that I am airborne, flying over the river towards Huka Falls. And the falls in the distance, gushing blue and we are at the foot amidst the boiling, gurgling water.

The jetboat ride that took my breath away with its sheer audacity, its dizzying spins and the breathtaking beauty.