RETURNING THE FAVOUR

"On Thursday, police clashed with demonstrators as hundreds of thousands swamped the streets in Barcelona and other cities.          Unions said 800,000 people joined the protest in Barcelona. Police put the number at 80,000.  Some marchers in the city smashed windows and set rubbish bins alight.                                                                                   Police fired tear gas and shot rubber bullets at the ground, TV pictures showed."

This was what BBC reported about the latest protests in Spain.

"Frankfurt airport cancelled about 80 flights and said services would not be back to normal until Thursday.

The strike has also grounded 142 Lufthansa flights, mainly on domestic routes, with Stuttgart, Munich, Cologne and other airports hit.

Verdi is pushing for an 8% wage increase for its two million federal and local government workers."

Similar is the story now at Frankfurt the third busiest airport in Europe.

"SNPL had closed its garment unit in Biratnagar from June 15 citing insecurity following violent protests by the workers. 

The prolonged labour problem, according to the company management, forced the company to permanently close the garment unit." 

This is what happened at Surya Nepal earlier  as reported by Ekantipur.

So, the protests are not just a part of the Nepalese society but that of highly privileged European society as well. When strikes happens/ed in Nepal, and  foreign medias roll their camera in the street, we feel a sense of loss. We feel ashamed. We are made to look upon as fools who hardly know economics. The elites in the media ask the protestors with a quote of some billion of losses in a day!


 In one gloomy day for Nepal's sovereignty, the ambassadors of the superpowers united and shamelessly declared to slam a visa and fund embargo for people and organization that would call for a strike. Well, I would like to know what they are doing right now for the strikes in their own backyard.Ain't the cacophony of the worker's chant strong enough for them to realize protest can turn up even in a well-to-do "civilized" society?


We can be sure that the protestor's in Europe enjoy far more higher living standard compared to that of the workers in Surya Nepal. Yet an European diplomat will have enough courage to question the morality of the strike here at a Nepali enterprise. They would teach us to wear a black ribbon instead of burning off tyres. That's fair. However, protestor's action not only depends on their morality but also on their level of frustration. When we have nothing to lose, we resort to most violent and meanest way of protest to a level to which rarely a "suited and booted" diplomat in a blue number plated Land Rover reciprocates to.


Now, that the Europeans are feeling the heat of a hard recession, austerity measures have created unpopular sentiment in the continent ranging from Germany(the biggest lender of EU) to Greece(the total bankrupt).Everybody knows, cuts in benefits, social welfare, government jobs etc would lessen the burden in Economy. So, why are the civilized taking it to the streets torching dust bins? It is because of frustration, similar to that we are used to here at Nepal. The have the same hostility within as that we have towards our leaders, who have failed to leave up to their promises!


So, next time a foreigner pricks you about protesting for a valid reason, don't think twice to return them the favour! All of us know that one day when social equity and prosperity envelops Nepal, such act of random protests and strikes would gradually go away from our culture. Till then, protests and strike will act both as boon and curse for the welfare of us the Nepalese and an integral part of Nepal's yet to bloom democracy.

Why Can't Printing More Money Make Us Rich?

Since, my early childhood I wanted everyone to be rich. I was aghast to be forced by mom into a bus that had no vacant seats!I usually thought what if everybody could buy a car, nobody would be forced to cramp into a already jam packed bus! For that we need money, all of us need big money! Whoever printed money, Why wouldn't they print as much as for all of us to buy a Car?

Many of us might have been confused by the same thing but in different situations in different ways.

I  found the answer.It was not my curiosity that led me to the answer. It was a mere coincidence.

So why don't the FED publish more money to make us rich?

We had a course named Engineering Economics, this semester.Now that the exam was over and afternoons were filled with slots of regular load shedding, I had nothing to do!Then i caught up with my sister's book in Economics ( i just wanted to cross check what was the difference between ours and their way of economics) and I read its preface. Luckily the preface was so well composed that it drew me into its content."I believe that everyone should study the fundamental ideas that economics has to offer..... You will be glad that you studied economics"These lines would make me look into whatever it had between its cover.

The first chapter, that of Principal of Economics, would end the age old curiosity. The Ninth Principal is titled as "Prices rise when the Government Prints too much money"!

So let me explain it to you in simple terms. When government prints too much money, people will have much money but the number of goods available in market would be the same. Like all of us had 10 lakhs to buy a Maruti 800 but their would be the same number of Maruti 800 in the market. The industries due to its limitation cannot fulfill the supply. Hence a sort of competion begins between customers to buy the car which makes it a more scarce commodity. Hence, the price of the Maruti 800  would adjust (increase sharply).This is known as inflation. Again, all of us wouldn't be able to afford the car and the persons who where earlier incapable of riding a Maruti would still be the same!

So we came to know, why printing money would not make us rich! But you may again think why do then government acts crazy and prints too much money creating inflation. There is a reason for that as well.

Let me carry on from above example. When people have more money, they will try to spend it. So,  people will want more of Maruti 800. Though the company can't satisfy all of us, it shall surely increase its production to whatever level it could to reap benefits of increased sales. Hence,to increase production of cars the company must hire more workers. Thus the unemployment would go down. Thus Inflation and Unemployment are inversely proportional to each other in the short term. At least most of the economist believe in this theory!

So next time if you ask God for  trees that have money instead of leaves, that is not going to work if everyone of us could implant that tree.

(The book i was referring to is "Principles of Microeconomics",Mankiw,4th edition,Cengage Learning,Indian Edition)

Gathering Hopes

It’s almost like 1:30 in the morning when I have started writing this. I was awake up to midnight just because a twitter friend of mine was replying to my tweets, as soon as she stopped I thought of sleeping. Is this my life? I questioned. I was just about to flip my laptop and do the same with my eyes as I suddenly realize that this day was to be over. So, same would be with tomorrow and same with day after tomorrow and in another January I shall have my 22^nd birthday and lament for a  fraction of that day that I didn’t do what I should have done that year.

The tough thing about life is how we view time differently when it comes to past and future. While lamenting about the past we take it as a bulk, we see our failure not as a result of regular carelessness of every “yesterdays” rather we just disgrace the passing month passing semester….and more. And when we lay plan to future we seldom wait, if u want good grades this term you plan of it weeks before end semester whereas the effort was to be put not only at the beginning of the semester but rather since the start of your course in the very first class of the first semester. And surprisingly we reach your future to feel if you would regret your present. I still remember asking my friend if we would regret if we never fall in love( I mean be in a relationship before marriage), he said yes with at most certainty and later maintained he knew he could never make one.(well that was a bit of fun anyway).

In this sense,the past month has been especially interesting to me. I have been in middle of conversation with my friends where I find myself supporting my arguments with basis of thoughts that my mind proposed to myself and hence very susceptible to failure. That has been problem with many of us, we seldom do our homework (I mean not the usual assignments), but we want charismatic results.

 I started Lolita it remained unfinished, Pride and Prejudice it too remained less than a quarter read. Same was with other factual works like “A history of Knowledge” and the same with my academic ambitions. The subject that I adore yields to least of the grades. You feel like this CRAZY stuff is going to change the world say it to 10 of your class and 9 disagree and u wonder if that is how you were going to change the world. Sometimes we can’t complete much of anything though we love it much. It may be anything, let’s say a movie of your favorite actress, a portrait of your mom, a crush on your lovely neighbor anything. That is the time when we question our ability, patience, fate and result to doing stuffs undermining our actual capability and original goal.

Such examples comes in plenty in situation as of ours, you just went to a café shop near your university lined up your sight with a pretty girl/boy, added him/her in FB asked his/her ph no. thought both were going along u propose and lo… she/he is in another world. She/he dates another you feel like u were played second fiddle just an option that would have been picked if the better one had not obliged, you feel ordinary about yourself comparing to the other “lucky” fellow, you get crossed with yourselves ,probably feel pathetic about your fate and end up with fellows u never should have.  Such things happen but you need to gather hope. You send an article to a newspaper, and they never reply not even to say you were rejected you never write again your ability dies while it must not have. An editor of a daily with 2 pages of op-ed can’t give space to every Nepali writing aspirers but if u have the will u will maybe do away with a book one day, they shall write a review in their newspaper call you up for an interview and you say with that humble smile actually this same newspaper rejected me when I was 21. Most of us are no Laxmi Pd Devkota or Baburam, very few of us were first every while but all of us have the skill to take us to paramount of success.

Take positives out of everything, that’s how life shall be a success. So, people are saddened Birendra died, if he hadn’t we would have never been a republic. Many would have died as Maoists would have never gave up. So, think the king died for his country. What happens ,happens for the good! 

So what we need is hope, the same hope that some 30 odd out of my 270 friends in FB (because I have left my link here) will view my blog, 15 of you would have completed this and ya 5 of you must have been able to relate this to yourself and I love you for that, and I hope I at least 1 of u will remind me when I am 70 I wrote this when I was 21. Hence its already 2 am and I am still not asleep because I have real hope that some of us will be going far ahead with this. Remember life was never designed to be easy if it’s easy for you,  either you are challenging yourself with light weight objectives or you are pretending tough jobs to be easy, one way or the other you are in a pseudo sense. Get over it, try the real damn hard thing hit the stuffs right after tomorrow mornings alarm bell (if you are reading this at midnight) and yeah u will fail(because human were designed to fail more than succeed) but by now you must have known to gather hopes.

Story of a Trafficker

It must be the happiest day of my life.

The clouds were coming over from far mountains to question the dominance of blueness in the sky. That couldn't bother me. I was just happy. Would you believe me, I a SLC fail could do this? I know I am clever, but did you? Am i a overconfident bloke, nope I amn't. I was just so clever, just that bit more so that i could puzzle the border patrol.Do you know that bloody fool? Yeah, that who got something of a somewhat hero award. She has a whole setup. She gets dollars to fund her wicked system, still I got away. Doesn't that mean I am clever?

So, why is this the happiest day? Aren't you curious, so was Sanu Maya? When i first told her jobs were easy and money would flow like the swirling sugarcanes in the monsoon wind, she looked at her hands bruised by the leaves of the paddy.She looked at me anxiously bamboozled to say the least. For one who had to quarell a fortnight to see a movie in a floor of a cinema hall, that was delightful.You know greed is a bad thing. Sanu Maya was. So she must have been punished. I was sent to punish her and didn't I do it in a better way. Did a simple persuasion of mine, a gentle touch of sympathy would get her  going to the city? No, not certainly. It was her greed that led her to come to me.

You may believe I am greedy. Yeah a little bit but not more. I swear I am not greedy.Don't you know why I didn't touch Sanu Maya even though I faked a marriage with her. It is simple. A virgin had  triple a price at Mumbai,and you know I was seriously meaning some business. Do you say that an act of my greed,no I don't.

And if i was greedy, I should have put all my money for myself. Would i have paid all the charges of the pub including that of Birkhe, Birey and even that of Chepe who stole my money last year. No, I wouldn't have. And would i have bought this lovely necklace for my wife. Aha, you must know the price of Gold, but i still bought it. Would you have done it. I know some of you delayed your daughter's marriage just for the sake of rising gold price. You greedy horse shits. Don't you know what have i bought for my daughter. None of you might have seen this before. She is 6 but she is going to look a princess tonight. I won't tell, who knows you will buy the same for your daughters.

And this conductor whistles, the bus pauses and the engine shuts off. I am in a hurry don't these people know this. I have to show this to my wife and daughter.Wait! Wait!! Be clever. Act simple, that was what i told to Sanu Maya at the border. You know the pickpockets don't you, they may eye me if i act this way.Let me act calm the same way Sanu did.

OK! I got off the bus tight and secure. I am clever.

I enter my house. Its late in the evening, my wife is suprised just looking at me. What will happen if she knows what i have in my bag? My daughter is doing her studies in a dim Laltin light, what shall happen to her. Certainly this must be the happiest day of my life.

So, I gave my daughter the secret dress. Okay! You don't know where i bought it from. So you will never know what it really is.

My lord doesn't she look pretty.

My wife is anxious but I can't let her know now.I just gave her few grands letting her know we would survive this winter's famine. We had dinner. She bought some meat. She is clever too. She baught me 2 mannas of local brewery from Suntali's pub. So, the dinner was joyful.Truly it was turning out to be the happiest day of my life.

So it was night time. This was the time when I would like to reveal my secret. I awarded with her the most precious thing that i stuffed into my bag. She was happy. She might have thought of showing her to Birkhe's wife tommorow, but isn't she clever. She thought of tonight. She quickly undressed herself completely. Just the necklace was on her neck.It was glowing.She slept over me. Every part of us overlapping each other, OH! Holy shit! What's happening to me. Wait i am not getting erect. Did i lose this stuff at 27. What is happening to me. I am listening to this curious sound of women crying sharply. But my wife is silent. How can it happen? That sound seems familiar. It seems to come towards me.It seems it is originating within me. I feel its like that of Sanu Maya. My wife is signalling at me. No, not for sex you fools. She is pointing to the right corner of our door.

I finally get my senses right.My daughter is crying. Certainly my wife can't attend her all naked. I hurried to her corner of our room. She laid in her small bed all in tears. I asked her why? She told the pin in her dress kept pinching her hard.And didn't i tell you it is the secret dress. It has secret ways of undressing. So i undressed this gift off her to make her comfortable. In the process, i saw my baby naked. My daughter turned silent, but the echoes of cry returned. I accidenlty imagined Sanu Maya being naked and raped.It wouldn't go.It just started buzzening. It deepened within me. Fuck me, i fainted.

I rise this morning. I am listening to the Japenese radio. I am tuning in for news.My wife is preparing some tea. She is acting weird after yesterday's act of mine. She blamed the brewerey but i blame something i cannot reason.I am thinking how did this sound came.The radio too continued.The newsreader declares a someone named Sanu Maya committed sucide in a police custody after being rescued.

Why should Engineers get into Politics?

Engineers are generally problem solver.

Engineers are taught a technique to deal with certain pattern of problems. Later with experience and instinct they are expected to solve problems of different kinds.  They have to keep on improvising the taught techniques so as to survive and prosper. Since, every situation is different from another an engineer always looks to learn, modify and be modest about the vast knowledge he has already accumulated. Engineering ethics believes in respecting and supporting his fellow colleagues work and idea along with constructive criticism.

The engineered product is meant to survive for longer period. Hence, an engineer must be far sighted. He has to take the responsibility of his present action up to the point in future where he himself might not exist.

How long will you apply for these type of jobs?

Engineers are brought up to be reasonable and economic. An excellent engineer separates himself from the numerous other by being cost effective for the same output. An engineer must possess social skill so as to work smoothly in the field and to understand the demand of the public.

The above mentioned qualities are required for another breed of job as well. They are politicians. They too are expected to be problem solvers. They must be willing to learn from their experience, courageous, improvising, modest, far sighted, responsible, reasonable and cost effective.

One of the few examples of such leader is our current PM Bhattarai. A career of Architect has certainly helped him not only design structures but made him full of above mentioned

characters. Although being a communist and a hard one on that he is ready to improvise. He seems to be ready to take the risk of venturing into parliamentary democracy. He knows how to win place in people’s heart and mind. Even if that is a show off to drive a Mustang and go checking hotels in the highway, it has certainly worked in his favour. He is modest with his personality though his intellectual ability boasts a commanding platform wherever he goes.

Among the advantages that an engineer has above other profession while coming into politics the major ones are being able to work in a group , knowing the grass root demands and ability to stay calm in tough situations. The humility that the former US president Jimmy Carter possesses is second to none among his colleagues. He too was an engineer. What more, the head of the Libyan interim government formed after the successful revolution that removed Gadaffi  is an engineer too. However, being an engineer you need to work up on your political thesis, enhance your dialectics and be in touch with an organization of your liking. So, people if you are an engineer who knows that chair in the office is waiting for you?

{the blogger is an engineer himself and asks for forgiveness if found guilty of being biased, but surely engineering rocks!}

TECHNOLOGY AND EQUALITY

The present day world is full with different sort of inequalities. Nepalese don't have as equal share as the EU or the Americans do. In EU, roughly an organization made to unite and equalize every nation of  Europe, Germany has a louder say than Greece. In sports, Rooney is paid more than Tendulkar.  Even among laborers, Nepalese have a minimum salary of Rs 6500 a month while the British have 5.8 pounds (roughly Rs 580) per hour.

Why is this happening? Were things planned to happen like this?

Let me take u back to the day when very first humans were born. Back then everyone must have been equal. Now we aren't.

Why?

Many have tried to answer this question. Buddha, Jesus and other religious or spiritual Gurus tried to remove such  inequality through their spiritual preaching and magical deeds. Marx tried to convince us through his theory of class struggle. Capitalism which have been running the show in the present time, has moreover served in widening the rift between  the poor and the rich. So, where have we missed the plot? Why  have we been put into a situation where we think that all of us can't be given the same privilege to survive? Why does the mere geographical location of our birthplace determine most  of our future?

The main reason of today's inequality is the unequal distribution of technologies. The reason of this is the pseudo feeling of nationality which has been developed among us. Whether it be nuclear energy or plastic toys every country wants to make its technology a secret. Within a country itself various private companies fight for the patent rights of their efficient  models.  Many provisions such as taxes, trade treaties, embargos etc have prevented the free flow of technology through out the globe. This has caused inequality among the humans.

Once we reach the tipping point of technological advances, and once we find a mechanism to spread it all over the earth we all shall be equal. Despite of our difference in attitudes,  talent ,nationality, religion we all shall be equal again. The

rate at which that particular day shall be approaching us depends on how our policy makers act. If the policies are devised  so as to provide a direct relation between the mass and the technicians, the day shall come to us soon. Otherwise, if we keep foolish politicians and bureaucrats  in between controlling our technical demands and technician's expertise, the day might not come even during the lifespan of the mighty sun.

So let us believe in ALL were EQUAL,  ALL aren't EQUAL, ALL will be EQUAL. Good luck to us.

Here is  John Lennons's Imagine. A perfect song for this article.

 

Why arent we creative?

Creativity is what makes us human. The problem is most of us lose it or are made to lose it.

It is unknown to many of us how we lose creativity while we grow up.Once, while i was a child...i asked one of my  vinajus how did the camera work? He said its too complex for me to understand.Well, his answer was very much true.  Now, when i  look  back i think i lost a bit of my creativity there.

God knows..if he just wore those golden lungis and walk  around bare chest even in winters. That is atleast what the Indian produced epic serials like Ramayana and Mahabhart showed. That is how we are made dumb. Somewhere down the line, i think, many children may be believing that God speaks in Hindi.

Well from what i have seen...i believe west is more creative than the east ( at present and forgive me for my lack of knowledge of the past). As a matter of fact its their creativity that we are riding on. I  am typing this instead of writing. You are moving the cursor from line to line....rather than moving  ur fingertips. They own this, they made this , they excelled on things and ya we just followed.

So maybe you question why arent we as creative they are? Well to be creative u need freedom. We have it now. Oh..........Do we really? Don't u remeber you asking your teacher whether to underline such and such stuff...whether to leave a line while you write...in which format to write the date? Don't you remeber ur parents making u conscious of your career when u thought of choosing a field that was of your interest?Well its like asking u to drink a cup  of tea when ur handcuffed. Even then some do it with their legs or their elbows. So dont be confused to see some among us being creative and a super one...u know..leaving even the west behind.

Well i and maybe even  u dont know why we fight between communist and capitalist,,,,,but we imported it from the west. We are made to lack  creativity and we keep on trying what flopped.Constantly  people who try to make innovation in these philosophies get turned down by mysterious forces.Madan Bhandari revived communism and made it tough enough to face elections well he was dispersed. King Birendra experimented or let say was the only dictator(atleast the one i have seen) who thought army was not the solution he neither used it against Maoists nor against the People in 1990 AD....well and he got perished.

Ladies now if u wear blouse with those threads flowing to make ur self sexy...well  u know our Chowbandi had 4 of them already and probably a sleevless version would have made the street go wild.
Neither of us realized that because...we were busy following Cyrus, Swift and Perry.

The TVs presenter try to give you details in such a way that u never heard of something as such as Prachanda, your filter comes with such manual as if u knew nothing about cleanliness.After all there's a mystery that is making us less creative. We are being efficient in the expense of creativity. We now skype each other but very few of us know how the telephone works.

well we may do this someday!can't we

Now that the world has developed we are being made dependent on each other and moreover in a dangerous way. Even in a subject lets say Civil  Engineering,you have specialist on structure, hydropower, irrigation etc. This way we are programmed to know less of the whole.The knowledge is divided and we diversify and we become easy to dominate easy to control. Universities are there to ensure that anything you learn  except that by professors( i mean what is in the book) is invalid because u will never have the certificate for it.

Well lets hope we raise our creativity ,unite and turn  things around.Hopefully we will be successful in changing the way this thing works.