Turmeric:

God wouldn’t have supposed men would go astray so much and so far.

This life as we live is not in any means understandable, we are trying to get back into the pupa whence we came from. Are we not beautiful? Are we not sufficient? What is it that we lack?

Primitive – as generations may criticize it, but the road we came from is “Noble”. However, those traditions and honours attributed to my grandfather are different from the ones attributed to his grandfather. Notions that change are choking the life out of humanity.

A family now is a pair and their children, a family was about taking care of each other, backing up others, doing double or triple the work if a member is sick, cherishing the sweat, disciplined enough not to make others cry, playing together, laughing together, loving the sand and more importantly – understanding each other and living together.

What happened to that man who followed his brother to forest? What happened to that man who gave his thumb as an offering to his master? The importance of tradition needs now reminding, I would gladly bathe myself in culture rather than in a swimming pool, I would rather die hungry than consuming all the alien garbage, I would rather be in darkness than to live in this candescent brightness.

A lamp or lantern is enough to make a home visible, and that same lantern shows the integrity we lack. Without fire men would not have progressed, we carry the lantern as a reminder of that. Fire that is inside us can never burn us, but now we have taken that fire out gambling in the name of progress. People leaving places, houses, villages and their souls – working for progress – burning the fire for unknown purposes.

What has happened to the fire that the lantern has passed on? Is it not inside us! Reminding our petty mind that everything is not lost. Are we too deaf to hear our own heart? Are we too glorious and proud to model our thoughts according to popular belief? Are we dead?

Death need not be eternal sleep; death can come out of the amnesic traits which make us to forget who we are. Remember, the further we go, the farther we get from our Nation and its profundity. I may not be a patriot who feels my country is dying, but I am a patriot who can feel that this Nation needs a reminder.

“Turmeric is what symbolizes us not yellow colour.

We are a civilization, not some urban wasteland.

Our traditional inheritance is greater than any,

But our lives are becoming lenient on many cultures.”

Written:  23-August-2013

Author: Teja Basireddy