Gerald D'Cunha

Pic: Aruna Anand “Apparently, there is nothing that cannot happen today.” -        Mark Twain I agree with Mark Twain. Anything can happen today. Something that I want to happen… and something that I don’t want to happen… Yes, anything can happen, today. What Mark Twain did not tell is: Nothing, in life, happens without a reason. Or, did he say that when he said, “Apparently, there is nothing that cannot happen today.”? “M eaning is different from message,” Kannan told me in our Tai Chi class, today. A few things were weighing me down while I was talking to him. I wished a couple of things hadn’t happened in my life. “How peaceful would have been my life had these things not happened!” I was trying to reason out, almost frustrated. So, I asked Kannan to explain… “I will explain,” Kannan said, “and you may get the meaning… but miss the message.” I looked at Kannan even more confuse...

Pic.: Nicole Gubin I   am very cautious whenever I go on a vacation or a tour. I am comfortable only if I have bookings, travel and stay both... But, many of my friends are adventurous… They – even when they travel with their families – just pack the bags and go… “It is fun,” they claim, “a lot of excitement and thrill when you do not know what comes next.” I love my friends’ attitude. “Wish I could do that,” I tell, often. But, then, I haven’t mustered enough bravado to follow their path… “A known devil is better than an unknown angel,” I comfort myself. Ditto whenever I go for a movie, particularly the Hollywood ones. I need the broad story-line…. What is the movie all about? Yes, I, too, do not allow anyone to reveal to me the suspense before hand and spoil the fun. But, except for a couple of movies, where I landed inside the movie hall by default – yes, rest all the movies I have gone to watch only after getting the broad story line from some sources l...

Pic.: Chetna Shetty “I s it fog or is it smog?” a lady asked me yesterday, when I said to her 'fog', pointing at the smoky morning-atmosphere outside. That’s the time I realized that ‘fog’ was different from ‘smog’. Well, I knew the difference; but, because we rarely saw this kind of morning atmosphere in the end of January, perhaps, I had forgotten about it… That was, also, the time I realized, that there are words, in English dictionary, which belong to the same lineage… like mist, haze, vog etc. I got curious to know the exact difference… And, you know how easy it is to find the difference, these days. .. It is all just a click away. And, yes, you can get it without moving from your seat! So, because it is all there for you at your finger-tip, I am not going to tell you, in this Post, how fog, smog, mist, haze and vog are different… Pease find out, if you wish to clear the fog! “I n the kingdom of the blind, the one-eyed is the kind.” S...

Pic.: Mavourneen Peters “Gerry sir, our problem is not lack of knowledge… our problem is lack of implementation.” - Manjeet Singh Khalsa L et me clarify it at the outset itself: Manjeet Singh Khalsa is not any old-age baba or any new-age guru.  He is just my friend and lives here, next-door… who loves to eat sensibly and live on his own terms… and, yes, yes… who, at 50-plus, has a belly of a baby! I am intelligent enough to ‘know’ why Manjeet has a baby-belly and I have a pot-belly. I ‘know’ how the baby-belly goes and pot-belly comes… how fat forms and what fat does! So, Manjeet Singh Khalsa, my friend, reminds me, again and again: “Gerry sir, our problem is not ‘lack of knowledge’… Our problem is ‘lack of implementation’!” Full stop!!!! I had got up early – very early – this morning. So, I happened to see an interesting post shared by my Tai-chi-class friend, Hazel. “EXCERCIES TO BURN ABDOMINAL FAT IN 14 DAYS FLAT!” ...

Pic.: Mavourneen Peters “Gerry sir, our problem is not lack of knowledge… our problem is lack of implementation.” - Manjeet Singh Khalsa L et me clarify it at the outset itself: Manjeet Singh Khalsa is not any old-age baba or any new-age guru.  He is just my friend and lives here, next-door… who loves to eat sensibly and live on his own terms… and, yes, yes… who, at 50-plus, has a belly of a baby! I am intelligent enough to ‘know’ why Manjeet has a baby-belly and I have a pot-belly. I ‘know’ how the baby-belly goes and pot-belly comes… how fat forms and what fat does! So, Manjeet Singh Khalsa, my friend, reminds me, again and again: “Gerry sir, our problem is not ‘lack of knowledge’… Our problem is ‘lack of implementation’!” Full stop!!!! I had got up early – very early – this morning. So, I happened to see an interesting post shared by my Tai-chi-class friend, Hazel. “EXCERCIES TO BURN ABDOMINAL FAT IN 14 DAYS FLAT!” ...

Pic.: Kenrick D'Cunha “Among my most prized possessions are words that I have never spoken.”   ―   Orson Scott Card O ften, I remind myself, that, what man – be it Buddha or Jesus, Rumi or Tagore – discovers ‘had been always there’. Man only wakes up to what he discovers… call it reality or truth, whatever. And, the reason why - of the billions  who come and go on this planet - only a handful become a Buddha, Jesus, Rumi or Tagore is, that most of us have never learnt to delve into the  realm of silence… Whoever has discovered whatever truth, he has done it only in the stillness of his mind. Rumi himself had said: “Silence is the language of god,   all else is poor translation.” M y 23-year-old son has just returned from a week-long trip to Jeeling (Nainital district). Of all the scenic pictures he has posted, I loved this simple one the most: The quote was hung there, prominently, on th...

Pic.: Azriel D'Souza “Inside my empty bottle, I was constructing a lighthouse while all the others were making ships.” -        Charles Simic T oday is our 67 th Republic Day. Our housing society’s 20 th . “Ours is a society of simple people… with simple aspirations,” I said, this morning, during the Fag-hoisting ceremony… “We are one big-family.” I said this as the head of this family… The Hon. Chairman. What about our nation? If I were the head of this nation, I think, I would have said the same thing, too, about all of us in this vast, beautiful nation… Are we not one big-family of simple people with simple aspirations? After the Flag-hoisting ceremony, the Youth Association of our society had organized the Finals of cricket matches… first little children, then ladies and, finally, the rough and tough youth. Mrs. Gujar, a cheerful Rajasthani lady from the losing team, took all the ladies, including my ...