Peace Equation | Roasted Squash and Pecan Kebabs

I hurriedly entered home taking a deep breath. My eyes looked like they saw a dead man walking. I had rushed back from office amidst fresh terrorist attacks in south Bombay. This was my first brush with terrorism. I am from a very small place and where stray crimes were rare, a burglary and even more rare was murder. I have always lived a sheltered life and even a small disturbance creates a big imbalance to my sanity. The first time there was theft in the house my body ecology couldn’t handle the trauma and I ran a high fever for three days.

Here I am talking about people who got shot in early evening with brutal terrorist who surfaced from nowhere on Bombay soil. Even as I changed my clothes there were fresh attacks at several places across south Bombay. My extended family members had come in terms with the grave truth of living in a financial capital. Bombay was more susceptible to all sort of miscreants. I for that matter was so naive and that I couldn’t come in terms with the situation.

I sat in front of the television and didn’t move away from it for the next three days. The date was 26/11 the black day in the history of Bombay. I was living in the suburbs and the quickest was to travel to south was through the local trains. The very CST terminus where life was always bustling for people moving in and out of Bombay. The terrorists had carried out uncontrolled firing of the awaiting passengers. I have a weird way of relating to grief and fear. My imagination takes me to weaving stories on the visuals that I see in front of me.I saw luggage strewn all over the place and I kept thinking what if it had a valuable new Saree as a gift for someone travelling to his native.I saw tiny slippers and I kept saying the child is hiding somewhere and very much alive.

When the terrorists hijacked a car I wondered if the car driver could self destruct the car. They drove in front of Regal cinema.The sight which lit my eyes many a times,I yearned to watch a movie amongst the townies’. A brave officer lost his wife in defending the people. How I had wished that he had worn a bullet proof jacket.

Cafe Leopold where the respected author had zillions sittings when he penned his Shantaram. I am as feeble as many humans. My revolt moves makes less noise than the flutter of butterfly wings. I was adamant on going there after the attacks. I had my meal at the very place but it made no difference to the extremists. They managed to carry out several attacks post that at German bakery Pune, Lumbini Park Hyderabad and innumerable attacks.

The siege of Hotel Taj and Oberoi left me flabbergasted.The other attacks happened on the very day but they cross firing at these places continued for the next three days.I remained glued to the screen and followed each and every activity at both the locations. I had never lived in a Taj and till date I still nurse the dream to do so. In my mind military had dug up tunnels underneath the ground from where the ground forces could sneak into the hotels. My gorilla planning was done in my mind in order to deceive the terrorist holed up inside the hotel. But such childish fervour remains good for computer games in real life the situation is far more tenacious for the operating officers to fathom.

The city till date remains vulnerable to such attacks. But the spirit never ceases to exist. The city was back to its normal routine in the next three days amongst its insecurities. I went to Siddhivinayak temple after all the terror attacks were over. For many this remained as an unforgettable psychological scar.

At the end of three days I was emotionally drained seeing the bloodshed. The aftermath was even more heart wrenching.I realised every Bombay-ite still lives under that lurking fear. The freedom of free societies always remains questioned. It’s not about faith,religion or politics. The fact that sometimes within a simple household you could have innumerable differences between your kith and kin. All belonging to the same faith and religion. If you read the book of genesis then Abel was murdered by Cain and the underline reason being jealousy and anger. The second elements of sin while the first being temptation. And slowly the world got wrapped by sheaths of vices intermingled with virtues. Gist being water is also a constitute of blood.

The equation of peace is far more complex than the Goncharov polylogarithms. For me personally I figured my world revolves around my family and work. I am not ready to fight any war. I don’t hold the capability to design policies. I hold a bachelor of engineering degree and that’s my highest qualification. I have the power to write. I have the power to work. But no one gives me the power to instigate.This is a hypothetical formula of my thinking mind.It holds no mathematical significance.

where

e is Every individual, the base of human race

i is the insight, which satisfies 

π is rationale, the ratio of the wisdom to morals.

The above as per scientists and mathematician is the most beautiful and immensely deep equation called as the Euler’s Identity. I realised World peace is a utopian thought but I share my very personal perspective on the very topic. I interpreted it as the equation for world peace. So, if every individual exponentially multiplies his insight to his rationalism and keeps adding the result to the whole entity.The whole entity represents his universe then it would equal to a grand zero. The nullification of anarchy.

A little within leads to a bigger outside. Somehow education never reached our intellect. It remained as wisdom to invent technologies,write constitutions and fight battles. But it so minutely mingles with the morals of universal humanitarianism. We fail to exercise compassion on our own spouse leave apart the entire world. We were formally bestowed with the responsibility to nurture the seeds of human needs but we somehow failed to grow our own tree. World peace would trigger from inner development not global development.

Somehow Paris attack saddened me and moreover all the bloodshed happening in all the parts of the world. I didn’t want to reduce my words to a mere FB post but wanted to share my trauma from the Bombay days. Winter has started with cold vibes. I just wanted to bid adieu autumn with this post.Todays recipe is Roasted Squash and Pecan Kebabs.

“Every leaf speaks bliss to me, fluttering from the autumn tree.” — Emily Bronte