titanic – Borderless

By Farouk Gulsara

A few years ago, upon the insistence of an old friend, my wife and I decided to visit her new home. She and her husband had designed and built a house on a vacant piece of land that they had bought.

They showed us around their labour of love. We were later taken aback when we were told that their live-in helper was occupying the master bedroom while they occupied her quarters. This strange arrangement came about when my friend had called in another friend, a vastu[1] specialist, for a casual visit. The visitor went beyond his call of duty to give his two cents’ worth of opinion. He asserted that the location of the master bedroom is wrong in a vashtu sense and would lead to marital disharmony. So, there went the hundred man-hours of planning to reward their marital union.

Just about that time, too, I was waiting for Malaysia’s number Uno feng shui master, who was about to share his outlook[2] for the year 2020, the year of the Metal Rat in the Chinese zodiac. It was an unremarkable report with the usual plus points in some areas and caution in others. Nowhere in his or other masters’ reports was there a tiny inkling of what Malaysians were heading into. It was the years when citizens were barbed-wired, quarantined, QR-coded, children missing the funerals of their parents who were afflicted with the Covid-19 virus and had their people flying white flags pleading for food and mercy.

That is the thing that has integrated humans from time immemorial. The desire to be in charge of their destiny and to understand this rudderless journey of life has got people believing all kinds of snake oil salesmen and fake gurus while losing their life savings doing that. And we are still struggling through this, clutching at straws.

It is intriguing that after major events, be it the 2001 tsunami, 2011 9/11 or Covid-19, some smart Alec would tell us that we had everything written in the past. They would refer to the Book of Prophecies and Nostradamus’s predictions, published in 1555. Again, all these become clear after the fact, as these predictions are in cryptic poems, subject to interpretation. Why is it that no experts decipher and decode all that is written there for the betterment of mankind?

So do the Vastu practitioners and Feng Shui sifu[3] who would tell us the obvious, like one should not buy a house at a T-junction. Of course not. The owners would risk being hit by stray cars driven by incompetent drivers or having difficulty exiting their compound. After a landslide, the know-it-all will state the obvious that it is bad Feng Shui to have a house facing a very steep hill.

Another thing that caught my mind recently is the animated TV series, The Simpsons, which has aired 37 seasons and over 800 episodes since 1989. In its half-hour cartoon, it managed to cover innumerable topics that affect the average middle-class American family: politics, pop culture and science. The interesting thing is that many of its outlandish stories appear to have ‘materialised’ from real life. Conspiracy theorists insist that those who witnessed the 2021 US Capitol Riot experienced a sense of deja vu, swearing they had seen a similar[4] situation in a 1996 episode of The Simpsons. Then the iconic photograph of President Trump, Saudi King Salman and President El-Sisi of Egypt holding a glowing orb in Riyadh in 2017. Again, this was a mirror image[5] of another 2002 episode of The Simpsons.

Do the scriptwriters have some kind of crystal ball that they can foresee future events? Of course not. Some researchers (whom others call conspiracy theorists) assert that it is part of predictive planning[6]. This psychological tool is to soften the societal changes in a pre-programmed future as decided by the powers-that-be. This psychological blueprint is also seen in movies like The Truman Show, The Matrix, Black Mirror and Westworld, which all depict dystopian futures.

Devices used by characters in the famous sci-fi TV series of the late 60s, Star Trek, have slowly been making their presence in the real world since the late 20th century. Handheld communicators (Video conferencing) and translation devices (Google Translate) are no longer alien tools. Next in line would be a teleportation kit. Were the storytellers here visionary, or did this series merely spur the younger generation to work toward this end?

Jules Verne, the French ‘prophet’ of science fiction, is credited for making many valid scientific predictions. He has been credited for being the second most translated writer in the world, after Agatha Christie. At a time when submarines were dangerous contraptions, he imagined Nautilus, an electric-powered submarine in Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea (1869), which resembles present-day diesel- or nuclear-powered ones. Not to forget Captain Nemo’s underwater breathing suit, which was the nidus[7] for SCUBA (Self-Contained Underwater Breathing Apparatus).

In The Moon-Voyage (1858), Verne correctly predicted Florida as the best launchpad for a Moon Mission, a conical space capsule and even the usage of a solar sail.

Maybe it is not all hocus pocus. Even 14 years before the ‘unsinkable’ Titanic sank on its maiden voyage, in 1898, Morgan Robertson wrote about a British liner named ‘Titan’ which went down after hitting an iceberg in his book Futility. Did the shipowners mastermind the disaster and copy the storyline to seek financial gain, as conspiracy theorists claim? Is this what they mean when they say that truth is stranger than fiction?

Other authors predicted the future [8] too. George Orwell in 1984 (1949) wrote about a world under constant government surveillance. Aldous Huxley, in the Brave New World (1931), showcased a time when antidepressants were widespread. John Brunner predicted school shootings, electric cars and hookup culture in his book, Stand on Zanzibar (1969).

These people were not magicians. They merely paid attention to their surroundings, read widely and believed in valid scientific evolution.

In the meantime, the rest of the population is stuck in their comfort zone. Still struggling with their bearings, running around like headless chickens, most stare in awe of all the things around them, confused. Like an ant perched on a leaf that is floating along a river aimlessly to the whims of the wind, these futuristic writers are trying to understand the head and tails of things.

Meanwhile, the simple man finds solace in knowing what lies ahead through palmistry, numerology, and reading olai palm leaves (Olai Chuvadi), believing that his path into the future will be smooth.

[1] Vastu shastra or feng shui is the science of making the best of the home by placing objects in the right place.

[2] https://theedgemalaysia.com/article/opportunities-and-risks-year-metal-rat

[3] master

[4] https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/tv/news/the-simpsons-capitol-riots-prediction-cartoon-b1784874.html

[5] https://www.reuters.com/article/fact-check/the-simpsons-episodes-are-not-evidence-of-predictive-programing-idUSL1N2PN1VW/

[6] https://medium.com/cia-blackbook-consciousness-in-action/hollywoods-magic-mirror-predictive-programming-mass-conditioning-c07bbc2b5994

[7] https://divingmuseum.org/exhibits/20000-leagues-under-the-sea/

[8] https://thehustle.co/jules-verne-the-sci-fi-author-who-predicted-the-future

Farouk Gulsara is a daytime healer and a writer by night. After developing his left side of his brain almost half his lifetime, this johnny-come-lately decided to stimulate the non-dominant part of his remaining half. An author of two non-fiction books, Inside the twisted mind of Rifle Range Boy and Real Lessons from Reel Life, he writes regularly in his blog, Rifle Range Boy.

PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL

Click here to access Wild Winds: The Borderless Anthology of Poems

Click here to access the Borderless anthology, Monalisa No Longer Smiles

Tagore’s Cartography of the Imagination

Book review by Meenakshi Malhotra

Title: Gleanings of the Road

Author: Rabindranath Tagore Translator: Somdatta Mandal

Publisher: Niyogi Books

Travels formed an integral part of the personae and creative artist that was Rabindranath Tagore. During his travels to England and the America (1912-13 and 1920) Tagore wrote essays for publication in various Bengali journals. Rabindranath Tagore was an inveterate traveller who travelled to the furthest corners of the globe. Detailing his travels in the colloquial everyday language (also referred to as ‘chalit’ bhasha or language) during his tour of England and USA in 1912-13, he used to publish regularly in journals like Prabasi, Bharati and Tattwabodhini Patrika. As the translator-editor Somdatta Mandal informs us, Vishwa Bharati Publication Department in 1946 decided to discard Rabindranath’s own selection. They went back to the earlier formal register and included writings of the 1912 tour, irrespective of whether they were related to his travel.

The book blurb says: “In 1939, Tagore selected fourteen of these essays and an appendix containing seven letters he had written to some of the teachers in the Santiniketan ashram while he was on these trips, for publication as a volume. It was at this point that he rewrote the original essays then using the colloquial instead of the formal language; he also revised the texts substantially. Later editions altered the number of essays, sometimes digressing from Tagore’s own selection, sometimes going back to Tagore’s original formal language.”

The travelogue, if it can be called that, provides an insight into Tagore’s perception of the different facets of western life and the diverse philosophical issues that cross his mind as he journeys from one continent to another. Thus perhaps it is more appropriate that the collection is named “gleanings’’ rather than a travel account or narrative. They are philosophical ruminations where Tagore holds forth on various aspects of civilizations and cultures.

In the very first segment, Tagore’s critical observations about Indian society comes to the fore. Thus he comments on what he sees as cultural differences and civilizational clashes, in “Prelude to the Journey”: “We always comfort ourselves by saying that we are a religious and spiritual race”. He sees this as a compensatory move by Indians to cover up our own sense of inadequacy, about our “weakness” in the external world.(Tagore was acutely conscious of India’s status as a colonised country). “Many of us boast that poverty is our asset”, dwelling perhaps in a haze of pseudo-spiritualism which balks at admitting that this attitude is merely a kind of bravado.

Tagore’s essay here unpacks the notion of the binary that the West is materialistic while the East is spiritual by lauding certain aspects of Western and European culture. Thus he writes that “if we go to Europe with the aim of a pilgrimage, our journey will not be in vain”. He further explains that this is not only because of the material developments achieved by Western culture, but their spirit and attitude.

Power, according to Tagore, is more than an external manifestation; rather, it has to do with a sense of real inner strength. He goes on to cite the instance of the Titanic and people’s altruism and self-sacrifice that was in evidence at that time, to interrogate the view, held by many Indians, that the average European is self-centred and self-serving. On the other hand, Tagore also gives plenty of instances where the spiritual poverty of Indians was in evidence. Thus he writes, “I know there has been a clash between our welfare and that of Europe and because of that we are suffering deep anguish and pain. We do not trust their religion and we criticise their culture as being too materialistic.” However, he continues that there are aspects of European culture which are worthy of emulation, which we would do well to follow, without feeling that it threatens our culture. He strongly commends that the path to seek the truth is a pilgrimage on which we should proceed without being blinded by ego, prejudice and false pride.

Coupled with this contrast of cultures, are observations about people and places. Thus he talks about the women of Bombay who are visible on the beaches of Bombay and contrasts it with the city of Calcutta, which according to him, is bereft of women in public places. Tagore also muses on the vast and limitless ocean which to him offers a cornucopia of literal and symbolic meanings. The sea and the ocean signify vastness, depth, boundlessness and infinitude, as well as the lure of the unknown. In contrast, he bemoans the loss of man’s ties with nature signified to him by the colonial appropriation of the river. He reflects that the river “Ganges was once one of Calcutta’s ties with nature…It was the one window of the city from where you could look out and realize that the world was not confined to this settlement.” He bemoans the fact that the once natural strength of the Ganga had been dissipated, “it has been dressed up in such tight clothes on both its banks and its waist band has been tightened so that the Ganges seems to be the image of a liveried footman of the city”. In contrast, the “special glory of the sea is that it serves man but does so without wearing the yoke of slavery on its neck.” His evocative description brings to life the various aspects of the landscape in full measure.

Tagore’s ‘travel’ writing is not just a mapping of people and places, but shows him as the supreme cartographer of the imagination. Witness his contrast of the earth and the ocean. The earth is compared to an excessively doting mother who binds her children to her and does not allow them to venture far away; the ocean by contrast “constantly allures him to venture towards the unattainable”. He adds, “Those who responded to that call and moved out are the ones who conquered the world.” Moreover, “that race of people on this earth who have specially welcomed this ocean have also found the unceasing effort of the ocean in their character.” Travelling on the Arabian sea, glimpsing distant shores, he stresses that the union of the two — the land and the ocean — signifying stability and movement are vital to an understanding of the truth.

The urge to travel, to move forward continuously, is forever present in man. In a philosophical vein , the poet muses that the soul “always wants to travel” and that it dies if it does not do so.In a series of similes and metaphors drawn from nature, he reflects: “Let us keep moving on, like the waterfall, the waves of the ocean, the birds at dawn, the light at sunrise.” He even transcends to the next plane when he says that “even the call of death is nothing but just a call to change the dwelling place”. In almost the same breath, he compares himself to a fairy princess who is fast asleep and who cannot be woken from her slumber, except with a golden wand.

Part anthropological study– at one point, the poet reflects that the vastness of the surrounding sea would have elicited devotion among many Indians, unlike the European traveller who is intent on enjoying the comforts and varieties of entertainment on the ship-part philosophic meditation, “Gleanings” represents the quintessential Tagore. His interrogation of Indian claims to spirituality is made in the tone of a concerned father warning his children not to fall prey to false pride and vanity. Deeply patriotic as well as an internationalist, he straddled two contrasting worlds of materiality and spirituality, without succumbing to limiting binaries and stereotypes.

Ably introduced and translated by Somdatta Mandal, a renowned Tagore scholar, the translation captures the iridescent and luminous quality of Tagore’s prose and its chiaroscuro effects.

CLICK HERE TO READ THE BOOK EXCERPT

Dr Meenakshi Malhotra is Associate Professor of English Literature at Hansraj College, University of Delhi, and has been involved in teaching and curriculum development in several universities. She has edited two books on Women and Lifewriting, Representing the Self and Claiming the I, in addition to numerous published articles on gender, literature and feminist theory.

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