Footloose in the US of A

My six months long visit to the US is coming to an end and time to head home to Palampur. During this period I received lots love, care, and affection from my son Abhinav and daughter-in-law Ritu . A wonderful time that I had visiting places in their company and also in the company of my two sisters who are also in the US. This is my third visit to this country in about ten years. As always it has been a very enjoyable trip having experienced a bit of autumn, summer, and a bit to fall too. And a variety of food to eat and lovely places to see.Every time I go back I carry happy memories that last me till my next visit. What wonderful people, working hard, being honest and so law abiding. They work hard and have means to enjoy the fruit of their labour. It is not, as if, there are no poor here but they also manage to eke out some kind of living. And then there is the Social Security available to the citizens. Like in any other democracy elsewhere the law bestows rights to the people and expects them to shoulder responsibilities too. Social and civic obligations are discharged in a routine manner.

Both India and the USA are referred to as the big democracies of the world, one is the biggest and the other oldest. Let us have a look at the constitution of the two countries. The US constitution is around 30 odd pages long adopted in 1776. It has seven articles and 27 amendments to it. The first ten amendments, also known as the Bill of Rights, were adopted in 1791. These define the liberties that the citizen enjoys and are secure from infringement. Its simplicity is admirable. The First Amendment "prohibits making of any law respecting an establishment of religion, impeding the free exercise of religion, abridging the freedom of speech, infringing the freedom of press, interfering with the right of peaceful assembly , or prohibiting the petitioning for a governmental redress of grievances." The framers of the American constitution had the foresight to  adopt a constitution that is relevant even after 225 years ! The individual's life and liberty are valued and protected. Nobody, even the high and mighty are above the law. Sometimes back a US president had to resign his office because the offices of the party in opposition was broken into with his tacit approval. US coins bear the inscription "In God We Trust" and every body is free to practice his or her religion and religious practices with hindrance from any quarter, public or governmental. In comparison the Constitution of  India is the longest written constitution with 395 articles and 8 schedules. Citizens are promised liberty, freedom of speech and other such freedoms, 'Secularism' is professed. But these are observed more in violations. Dictionary defines the word Secular as 'Not concerned with or related to religion.' However, the political masters have given the word a totally different meaning. The religious feelings of various sects are played upon to garner political power or create dissension among the followers of different faiths for political gain. Many laws enacted during the colonial period still find mention, probably to be used against political opponents or to deal with inconvenient dissent. Relatives and cohorts of the political satraps are above the law. An innocuous comment referring to some political personality or event can easily bring you in conflict with the law and may result in incarceration. So much for the various freedoms that are promised. One's dietary preference, based on religious leanings, may result in death. So much for religious freedom. One can go on ad nauseam.

I digress. It is so easy to get carried away in such matters. While returning home from such sojourns one is invariably tempted to material goods that appeal to our taste or helps improve the physical comforts. These come at some cost to us and plays havoc with the free baggage allowance allowed by the airlines. It is a matter of personal choice, to each his own. Won't it be appropriate if along with the material goods and pleasant memories of the stay we also carry with us a resolve to be more respectful of our laws and better awareness about our social and civic responsibilities and discharge them with sincerity ? It is a thought !

Life in the shadow of death !

Recently I had the occasion to read a book titled 'Being Mortal' written by Dr Atul Gawande, an Indian settled in the US, and a surgeon by profession. The book is about aging, living with the complications of terminal illness and death. The narrative touched me because I lost my wife, to cancer after a prolonged illness, recently. Modern medicine has made tremendous advances in diagnostic and curative field and the physician, for whom prolonging life has always been a challenge, is better prepared to work towards this goal. However, aging and death are being treated like one more clinical problem in need of treatment. For the aging, life and health are moving along nicely and suddenly an illness or an injury strikes and shakes the existence to its very core. If, unfortunately, it is something like cancer then the very bottom falls out from underneath. We are suddenly faced with a harsh possibility. What will it be ?   A life of pain, debility and disability ? For people with serious and terminal illness other priorities become apparent besides prolonging life. Other equally important concerns include avoiding suffering, being mentally alert and not being burden on others. The treatment, some effective, others experimental, may prolong the life and suffering while shortening the value of life. How much one is willing to go through to have a shot at being alive ?

Something similar happened to my wife ! Presenting with symptoms of liver abscess, investigations revealed presence of a tumor of the small intestines with secondaries in the liver. This was a coincidental finding. For us it was like a 'knock-out' punch. The visions of an imminent and painful end flashed before my eyes. However, my wife proved to be very brave. She felt no disposition to weep or lament, rather she bore the news stoically. She submitted herself to surgery for the removal of the growth and metastasis with great courage and calm. The result of the biopsy showed a neuro-endocrine tumor, a slow growing tumor with a long survival rate. Further treatment with chemo and radiotherapy of no proven value she decided to forego it. It was time to pick up the pieces of life and move on.

A few years passed in relatively good health. Despite some loss of weight the quality of life was good. We visited our son and his family in the US twice during this period and visited some places of religious importance in various parts of our own country. But the fear of flaring up of the secondaries present in the liver was never far from my mind. I was always afraid to think of the time when we will have to face this situation. Unlike the developed countries there is no concept of care of the terminally ill patients nor does the facility of hospice in India. At least not in the small towns. True enough the secondaries started to flare up with the attending complications such as loss of weight, loss of appetite and accumulation of fluid in the abdominal cavity. In general the relatives of the patient are deluded by a fantasy of what medical science can achieve and the physician is expected to continue the efforts to prolong the life unmindful of the suffering to the patient. "Do not resuscitate" is never an option.

We landed up in the Oncology department of the hospital where it was decided to put her on an experimental hormonal therapy. Monthly injection for a period of twelve months. For us it was undertaking a monthly round trip of 500 kilometers to the hospital and back. One year passed. The treatment had no effect on the progression of the disease. Then it was decided by the oncologist to subject her to radiation therapy which she declined as she had enough of travelling during the course of the hormonal therapy. All she wanted now was to live her life in the familiar surroundings of her home among the family and the friends and not in the hospital with tubes and line sticking into her body. However, the disease progressed relentlessly. She progressively became dependent on others for her personal care which was repugnant to her. She suffered this indignity for almost a year and wished for an end to her misery. Finally the end came on the afternoon of a October day last year. Hers was a noble life and hers was a heroic fight in the face of great odds. Her end was peaceful and she would not have wanted it any other way.

The Way We Are !

For the past some time the news papers have been reporting regularly on some worthy or the other having said something which hurt some feelings. Some people have to express themselves on every matter under the sun. For them silence is not golden but stifling. This is usually the cause of 'Foot & Mouth' disease in the homo sapiens where the speaker shoots himself/herself in the foot. We have been bestowed with many , so called, qualities that we may not be aware of. It takes others to point that out to us, like Jamwant, the mythical figure, had to remind the venerable Hanuman of his powers. While searching for Sita, consort of Lord Rama, Hanuman was required to cross the sea in one jump to Lanka but got nervous and was not sure that he could do it. At that time Jamwant reminded him of his eternal strength.

Coming to the modern times, much the same way, it was an editorial in a Chinese daily that reminded us of some of our qualities. The said editorial pointed out that we are 'spoiled', 'self-centered', 'self-righteous', 'tantrum-throwers' etc. etc. We are well within our rights to differ from their assessment but there is some ring of truth how others see us. And there is another, so called quality that is part of our persona, 'Arrogance'. We talk so much of our glorious past but our present-day behavior leaves much to be desired. The typical response to the said editorial voiced by some was a call to boycott the Chinese good coming into the country. Let us admit that many of such goods are so affordable to even to the common man and the quality is not all that bad. Even the multinational corporations are having their products made in that country. Take for instance the much-coveted electronic goods including cameras, mobile phones etc. The proper response would have been a call to the industry to make better consumer goods at the same affordable  price in this country. That would be a befitting reply to our critics. We have achieved a lot in diverse fields but we can do still better.

We are not happy following rules either. Violating traffic rules, jumping queues comes easy to us. Travelling to other lands we are not comfortable following the security protocol of the host country especially at the airports and other ports of entry. We do not realize that their rules are the same for everybody, even their own citizens. But we want to be treated differently especially if he/she happens to be VIP or from the political class because that is how we are treated in this country. Here if a rule is to be applied, such as paying toll, a long list of persons exempted is the first to be put in place. You have only to go to a toll plaza to verify this. The very people who should lead by example are first to defy the rules. We see it every day.

Are we really like this ? Deciding what others can read, write, or see. What profession others can pursue or what they can or cannot eat ? An unwritten code of conduct for the less privileged ! Intolerance for for contrary views and social and religious practices ! Are we really like this or do we need to change ! Honestly we  need to sit down and do some soul searching and if we come up short we must strive to be better than this. We do not need to be the way we are.

Welcome to My Blog !

Hello friends !

Welcome to my blog "Palamvalley". I propose to share my thoughts on varied topics, mostly about my hobbies such as gardening and photography and an occasional travel. I have no claim to any literary scholarship nor any command over the language in which I write so there are bound to be a gaffe or two. To be overlooked of course. What I write is like the rumblings of an idle mind of an idle  person with time on hands. So please take it in that spirit. Even if we are only interested in pursuing our hobbies we cannot remain unaffected by the happenings around us. We need to spare a thought for them too. There are these spate of terrorist attacks around the world, especially in the European continent with loss of precious lives. No country in the world is immune from these attacks and everybody needs to be alert because eternal vigilance is the price of freedom. Then there is the upcoming presidential elections in the US, a leading economic and military power in the world. The world at large has a stake in the outcome of this election as the policies of the new incumbent is bound to affect us in some way especially those young people who have dreams of going to the US for education and a career. Nearer home the shenanigans of our political class. A government with a majority in the lower house finds itself helpless in implementing its policies in the face of impediments in the upper house where it lacks the numbers. Our democracy follows the Westminster model but with a little quirk that here the Rajyasabha does not yield to Loksabha in matters of legislation unlike the House of Lords. In this game of shadow boxing the loser are the people of India. We may be helpless spectators to all this but we can express our views on these occurrences with the pious hope that fellow citizens would wake up and take notice resulting in a cascading effect washing away the general apathy. And what better forum than a blog ! So watch out.