The Artist

  As stated in a previous blog, humans decided to take charge of fire even though they fear it. It was that innovation that helped us progress this far. Where did it come from? How were we able to stop ourselves from flinching at the mere sight of fire? In fact, cooking is one example of human beings overcoming their instinctual fear of fire by exposing themselves to it regularly. All of this suggest that humans are the only species in this planet who can resist their instincts and act beyond them. We are not bound by our instincts. Unlike animals, we have a choice on whether or not to indulge in our instincts. We are the conquerors of instinct. But I believe that we are not species that can go beyond instincts but rather it is our instinct to desire novelty. A human is a species whose chief enemy is boredom. By some freak of nature, this species was cursed with the desire for novelty. The hands of a human will forever itch for something new. Give food, water and shelter to...

  The saddest thing about 21 st century is that art can be created without an artist. For people who value technology, this is a pinnacle of progress. You longer have to browse the internet for any photos, you can generate photos that would be owned by you alone for a small price. There are artists all over internet who take commissions and their business are being affected. Even worse, the art produced by A.I is just a blend of many artworks that are available on the internet. A short story prompt to an A.I will generate you a patchwork of short stories written by others. It’s legal plagiarism. There is no originality in A.I but I would also say that there is no originality anywhere. Originality is dead. All of our art is repetition of what has already been said. We play upon a handful of stories given to us by our ancestors. A finite number of them has the potential to produce infinite combinations of art. Our stories are a blend of our ancestor’s stories, our surroundin...

  Aside from the fact that you deserve to be loved as a person, loving yourself is important because it is the path towards completion. The day we start comparing ourselves to others is the day we stunt our growth as a person. It’s when we use the standards set by others to measure our worth life becomes miserable. Loving oneself is not narcissism. In fact, it is the opposite of it. A narcissist would abuse themselves by stubbornly believing that they are always in the right. They are not being honest with their self. It’s far from it, they are running away from themselves. Your faults and mistakes make you who you are and it is most important to admit them and be content with yourself. Loving yourself means you love yourself enough to put effort on yourself. What do we do when we love someone? We stay by their side and help them no matter how hard it is to do so. Why can’t we do the same to ourselves? We need to train ourselves and be disciplined in such a way that neither success...

  A Marxist feminist play, Top Girls, critique a world where feminism is intertwined with capitalism. It is a three act play with characters from different class, country and time. Centred around and led by women, the play questions the credibility of ‘equality’ in a capitalist controlled feminism. The play raises important questions such as who gets to benefit under such a system and who doesn’t? Those women who get benefitted what is their current state? Are they happy? Or are they convinced that they are happy? If one’s value is rewarded through equality then about what the ones with ‘no value’? Is feminism only for the bourgeoise and not for proletariat? By bringing in women from various cultural context and making them interact with each other, the play shows what it means to be a human in a capitalist society. Freedom and empowerment offered by capitalism is just an illusion. Between being overworked to being tossed out the moment one becomes ‘outdated’, the capital...

  There is a prejudice towards cats. Whether it is them being ‘familiars’ to witches or causing disruptions in people’s lives, cats have been associated with chaos. They are also seen as scheming creatures that are very cunning. In fact, the term ‘crazy cat lady’ seems to tell that women who love cats must be crazy. There must be something fundamentally wrong with the people who love them. However, there are cultures which have defended cats fiercely. For instance, there is a Danish saying that he who does not have a cat in his house is a thief. This might sound extreme but they do have a reason behind this. Cats are independent creatures. In fact, they are semi-social animals. They have their moments where they enjoy the company of their owners or other cats but they also require privacy. This means cats will not let you touch them when they don’t want to be touched. Cats are very serious about consent in this sense. Some people tend to dislike them because they believe cats d...

  One of the fondest memories I have is a memory of me putting my leg inside a pot of hot Rasam. I couldn’t be older than four when that happened. The memory is so vague now but I remember the gist of it. It went like this: I put my leg inside a pot of hot Rasam. There was a lot of screaming and crying, panicked parents, uncles and a scary doctor who had to give me a shot. These are the pieces of memory that I can recall in a vague manner. My mother gave me a clear version of this vague memory. So, this blog is about my story narrated to me by my mother. My mother said that I was walking with my eyes crossed and because of that everything must have appeared in doubles to me. She supposed that I confused the real pot with it’s double and must have put my foot inside it. I was not surprised at all. I was a crazy kid . I used to spin until I collapse. I used to ride my scooter around the house and knock off my great-grandfather’s cane, much to his annoyance. The thought of me ...

  It is very important to prepare properly for your exams but it is equally important to take proper care of your body. Stay hydrated . One of the issues this generation has is that we forget to drink water. We barely notice until the last minute. So please stay hydrated . The summer sun is merciless. While studying, it is important to take frequent breaks. In order to have this luxury of frequent breaks one must not cram. Studying overnight is detrimental to the body and your mind doesn’t process information effectively. You would perform poorly. Trust me when I say that studying in the morning is way better than cramming. You might not be able to cover a lot but whatever you cover, you’ll remember it well. I usually go by 3:4 rule when I study. I spend forty-five minutes studying and take a fifteen minute break to refresh my mind. During this time, I usually listen to music. It is also better if you write down what you have studied. I study the material once or twice, m...

  The Mahabharat is the longest poem in the world. It would take months to read it. However, reading it can expand your mind. Unlike Ramayana, Mahabharata is an epic consisting characters who are morally grey. On the surface, it might seem to be a typical war between good and evil. This is how mainstream media has portrayed it, which is a great disservice to the epic. Our people are so comfortable with binary lenses that they want nothing more than Duryodhana’s evil laugh and Yudhisthira’s righteousness. It assuages them and enforces their black and white worldview. If one were to read the text, they would find themselves facing a conundrum: Whose side should I take? Each and every character had their own justification for what they did. Of course, their actions were evil but what made them do it? It is easy to judge Kunti for what she did to Karna, but she herself had little choice. For starters, she was given a power at an age where she couldn’t take things seriously. She ...

  Let’s face it, we all grow up. What used to bring us happiness as children may not do so anymore. We become stoic, mature and disciplined. That’s completely normal and it is a part of growing up. But how many of us are happy with the way we used to be when we were kids? Not many. Most of us would look back and think about ourselves as ‘cringy’ I am no exception. Why are we being so hard on ourselves? Yes, our child version may not have been ‘cool’ but they were free. As children we lived in the moment. We wouldn’t burden our mind with anything. If we see chocolates, we would want it. If we fight with our friends, we would forget about it and play with them again. Anything can be our toy and we found happiness in little things. The mind of a child lives only in the present. The mind of an adult lives everywhere except for the present. The problem with adulthood is that, we have lost that ability. We look back at the past with the rose-coloured lenses of nostalgia and mourn...

  Teaching is hard and I have always known this. Teaching requires patience and a deep understanding of the subject. I teach English as a private tutor. It was a job I was hesitant to accept because I was not very confident about my teaching skills. There is a reason people like me struggle to teach. We have an instinctual understanding of what we teach rather than a deep understanding of it. If I look at a sentence, I will instinctually know whether it is grammatically correct or not. This is because I learnt English through a practical medium: books, movies, series, YouTube etc., If I was asked to explain why a sentence is wrong then it would take me some time to break it down and understand why it is wrong. This is because of the lack of exposure I have in theory, that is, grammatical rules. In stark contrast to this, I am well-grounded in Japanese grammar – until the intermediate level – and I can explain why the sentence is wrong even though my vocabulary is limited in...

  Prince Zuko is the antagonist in ‘Avatar: the Last Airbender’ He was introduced in season one and acted as a foil to the protagonist, Aang. Zuko was introduced as a character who is obsessed with honour. He doesn’t respect his crew and was quite rude to his uncle. Zuko was also a minor comic relief. At first glance, he appears to be a stereotypical villain who gets beaten up by the good guys. He is a stubborn, hot-headed character who adamantly chases Aang. He is an advocate for colonialism. In contrast to him, Aang is an energetic child who is respectful to people and treats all lives equally. He is a peace loving monk who is merciful even towards his enemies. However, in the episode ‘The Storm’, Zuko’s backstory was narrated by his uncle. Zuko gets banished by his father, at the age of thirteen, when he attempted to save young soldiers from being used as cannon fodder. In that same episode, Aang’s backstory was also revealed. Aang ran away from his monastery because of th...

  After watching the play ‘Banquo’s Last Laugh’ at Selaiyur Hall, my friends and I collected our ‘Mnemosyne’ T-shirts. Suddenly, we decided to have our lunch at Burgerman. It was a wonderful day to say the least. What I loved about Burgerman was that we can play games while having our food. We gave our order and while it was being prepared, we played Jenga blocks. There were seven of us so the blocks collapsed quickly. We decided to put a twist to the game and added a rule. Every time we remove a block from the edges, we need to answer a question truthfully. If we remove a block from the middle, without collapsing the tower, then we don’t have to answer a question. Some of us managed to remove the middle part and some of us answered the questions. The answers we gave to the questions were hilarious and we had a good laugh. All of us had burgers and we loved it. I am not a fan of burgers but Burgerman was really good. It tasted heavenly. I loved the meat. We also ordered a v...

  What is woobification?   The term ‘woobification’ comes from the noun ‘woobie’. A ‘woobie’ is a fictional character who is written to peddle sympathy from the reader. A woobie is a tragic character with no agency. They face misfortune after misfortune and are so helpless that they can do nothing but suffer. There are characters with tragic backstories but the key difference is that those characters overcome their suffering and achieve some sort of a reconciliation. A woobie, on the other hand, goes through no such change. This character is written to be coddled by the readers. Their whole personality is just their suffering. Woobification usually happens in fanfiction. So why do we Woobify morally grey characters? Art is a mirror of life but it is true that morality is skewered in art. Characters whom we love in art may not be very palatable to us in real life. A lot of people fail to realize this: It is completely alright to love character in art while condemning ...

  I have a younger sister and she is five years younger than me. She was born on a rainy day and she was a sickly baby. As a result of which, she was coddled at home. She and I never got along. Even as a child, she possessed the emotional intelligence which I lacked. She would cover my parents’ with a blanket when they sleep and make sure that their feet were covered so that they wouldn’t be bothered by the mosquitoes. She never did any of that for me though. I am five years older than her and I was used to living as an only child. Suddenly, there is a whole new person introduced into my life and I struggled to get used to her. My sister was attached to our mother and I was attached to my father. When I was in third standard, she and my mother visited our grandmother. Both of them stayed at our grandmother’s house for a few days before returning. When my sister came back, she was wearing sunglasses. She refused to remove it even after dusk. Why was she so stubborn? Turns ou...

  Trigger Warning: Graphic images of blood, pus and corpses. If you are still here after reading the trigger warning then I assure you, you’ll find today’s blog quite interesting. A word of caution: please eat before reading this because this blog quite unappetizing. Now that we have discussed the potential side-effects of this blog, let’s dive into today’s topic. What is Kusozu? The word Kusozu means ‘nine phase images’ and these images show the nine stages of the decomposition process. Buddhist monks contemplate on the decomposition of the corpse as a meditation process. This helps them understand the temporal nature of the body. Their contemplation on the corpses were expressed through poetry and paintings. These paintings are called ‘Kusozu’ The Kusozu typically shows the decomposition of a woman’s body rather than man’s body. Most of the Kusozu has women as it’s subject. There is a reason behind this. Whenever the monks used to have any sensual thoughts or emotions...

  Gojo Satoru is arguably one of the most popular characters in the anime Jujutsu Kaisen. He is, in fact, more popular than the protagonist of the anime. On the surface, Gojo Satoru might seem as a character who is written to be a fan favourite. He is charismatic, powerful, attractive and rebellious. These are all the qualities fans tend to look for in a ‘hero’ But this is not true. Gojo’s character is much more than that. When we consider his actions with the context of his past, then one thing is obvious: Gojo is Buddha. To understand this statement, we need to understand Mahayana Buddhism; the branch of Buddhism that is practiced in China, Japan and Korea. What does Mahayana Buddhism advocates for? Mahayana Buddhism teaches the concept called ‘Anatta’ which means ‘non-self’ ‘Non-self’ or rather 'non-perception of self', as the name suggests, rejects the perception of a Self. In religions like Hinduism or Christianity, the temporal nature of the body and the permanence ...