From A Matter Of Life & Death, here’s the video for Iron Maiden’s Different World.
Day: June 19, 2011
Accident In Koratty
It took me two day to even think of writing about it. I saw an accident on Friday evening at around 6:15pm. This was just after I left the office in Koratty and was standing at the bus stop waiting for a bus to Chalakudy. I had probably waited for around 10 minutes and was looking towards the right side of me and just as I turned back to the right side (from where the buses would be coming), I witnessed it.
This guy, I’d say of around 45 or so, had jumped the median in a hurry to cross the street and a white Maruti Swift was speeding on the highway and hit him! The driver of the car had jammed the breaks but as he was going quite fast it was too late. I heard the screeching of the tires and saw this man getting hit by the car, being tossed into the air atleast 10 feet and landing with a thud on the front of the car before hitting the ground. The windshield of the car had a huge crack that spanned it’s entire height and the hood of the car had these huge dents where the guy had landed. He has also hit the ground hard and when I saw & heard it, I thought he was dead.
Like most onlookers I was stunned and my hand was covering my mouth. Next thing I knew people were surrounding the car and the man but no one was touching the body. It got too crowded for me to go near and see if the man was still alive. The cops soon arrived and they escorted the driver of the car & his passenger to move their car towards the side of the road. The two were both bleeding profusely from their foreheads, obviously as they braked hard they would have hit their heads on the windshields. I heard cried behind me and two ladies with 3 small kids were quite upset on seeing this and with the help of another person, I flagged down an autorickshaw and made the ladies & kids get into it and had the driver take them to their destination.
It took me a couple of more minutes to see that the man who was hit had been taken away to the hospital, barely alive. I have not been able to find out if he made it, what kind of condition he is if still alive. The crowds were dispersed by the cops and I soon left for my place. I’ll never forget the sound of the car tires screeching as the driver of the car hit the brakes or the two thuds as the man hit the car and then the road! Shudders.
Girl, Don’t Touch That Cell Phone!
A body of the Paikali Khandayat caste in the state of Orissa have banned cell phone usage amongst unmarried girls! This they say is to prevent them from “going astray”! The decision was taken by the leaders of the caste after a 3 day meeting. About 10,000 families reside in Orissa’s Ganjam district and the Paikali Khandayat Samaj said in a statement that they feel that is no great urgency for young unmarried girls to have a cell phone. They feel that the cell phone provides them an easy way to fall in love with boys and spend a lot of time sending SMSes (texting) or on calls.
“So, we have advised parents not to encourage their unmarried daughters to use these devices. There is nothing wrong in this directive and several educational institutes have also prohibited the use of mobile phones on their campuses,” Samaj president Somanath Nayak said. Although there is no fine or punishment decided and the directive is on an experimental basis, the samaj has advised all members to follow it strictly.
Wow, India can be so narrow minded and backward thinking. Do we really live in a democracy?
But he does have a point! Take my state, Kerala, for example. Over the last 3 to 4 years I have noticed a whole lot of romances blossoming up all around the cities & towns. When I pass by on the streets I can see girls & young women talking on the phone as they make they way to or from work/college/home/shopping/restaurants/friend’s houses etc, yakking on the phone as they do so. When you see that sickly smile & a bashful blush you just know who she is talking too! It’s unmistakable; all you have to do is ride the bus on the streets or just walk by for 10 minutes. In those 10 minutes you will see atleast 5 of those girls, probably more.
Now, I am not going to say ban them cell phones. I am no dictator nor do I want to stop them for going on with their lives. All I am saying is that easy access to cell phones and cheap call rates have made it a whole lot more easier for these girls & guys to hook up and most of these romances are over the phone and they rarely meet up alone. And stupid thing is that most of these romances fail as well, just creating a lot of heartbreaks because their parents won’t approve. Most of these romances won’t end up in marriage and they look like jokers as the romance “fails”.
All because of cell phones. Anyway, do what you have to do. Most families in the state, although that is changing a lot, will not allow their daughters to marry a guy that they have fallen in love with but rather want them to marry someone who they have selected. Arranged marriages, you know. So if you can’t do something like make up your own decisions and end up marrying the guy of your choice, then why bother pursuing a romance in the first place? But ban the usage of cell phones. Fuck no! What these girls & guys need is a reality check, some common sense and perhaps wiser parents.