The world seems to be running on paradoxes and ironies. We lie and speak the truth at the same time; we soar and dip at the simultaneously; we change our neighborhood posters from black to white within the same season. Our heroes become horrors; our loves become our spite; our times become our enemy.
In brief, we are living boomerangs, killing and being killed by the same weapon. The logic is simple though. The world is too small to wear new colors every minute. There’s one God or a few known deities; there’s one tiny globe that at one point becomes mine and at other times yours. We share, battle and own in phases; we accept, praise and let go after a while. Once again, in brief, we repeat expectations, our dreams, disasters and ourselves. We are winners, waiting to lose at the next round of games. We are believers who wait for our own Godot to arrive at a time when we are all trapped within our own constructed walls.
And when Godot finally ditches us and never arrives, we question like Vladimir: “Well? Shall we go?” And respond like Estragon: “Yes, let’s go.” And finally Samuel Beckett’s ending line confirms the utter absurdity: They do not move.
We are truly not moving. Neither do we reconcile ourselves with our Absurd, nor are we risking our strides. Therefore, everyday, we are hit with news missiles, express our ‘oohs’ and ‘aahs,’ jump, stomp and thump our living room couches, or scream at social gatherings, write columns and critique, make ourselves be heard but in reality we all come back to our own homes, put on our old Wee-Willie-Winkie caps, run around the neighborhood, scare our own children with our lanterns in their own wallpapered rooms circled with love and hate.
Otherwise, how shall we, as a nation explain our own absurd ironies and paradoxes? It always helps to begin with a bit of a personal anecdote. So let me begin. My mother-in-law always had a thing about her birthdays not being celebrated, as there were no clear dates listed by her parents. So, we decided to pick January 1st as her day, cut cakes, light candles, send flowers, and gather around her.
That was long ago. It is reported that a naughty soul had whispered the same idea to our opposition leader’s ears and a nastier one had decided on that date. Otherwise, how can a national mourning day marked by black badges turn into red roses for a pink-sari-clad leader who is reported to be not-so-intolerant and unforgiving?
This is what’s wrong with the players of our history who place bets on the unlikeliest cards and lose out everything in the process. Today, Bangabandhu’s death anniversary rudely, irrelevantly is tagged with a national hilarity of a birth anniversary of the opposition leader.
There are many other paradoxes in this land. On Saturday, 13th August, 2011, a BNP standing committee member declared that the party would observe a general strike even during Manmohan Singh's Sept 6-7 if the Indo-Bangladesh deals and the drafts of the deals are not disclosed before his arrival.
On 14th August, the party’s general secretary announced that the BNP would be welcoming Singh’s visit. As a result, as voters, in reality, we know not what transpires in the minds of our leaders.
Look at the philosophical dichotomies this universe suffers from. Think about our Tareque Masud, Mishuk Munier who have just left us at a time when they were at their productive best. I know of many redundant souls who could have been hit by the same bus that day and none would have had cried half as much. These are ironies that we live with. Worst of all, we even read about the blame game that transpired between the two members of the Cabinet.
At the world stage, the academics have apparently hit the insanity ceiling as well. The well-acclaimed historian David Starkey had told BBC that “the whites have become black'' in a discussion on the British riots. This famous academic hit out at the black culture being ''destructive, nihilistic…'' and added “gangster” to his diction. He even went as far as to say that this “gangster culture” of the blacks had ''become the fashion.''
Couldn’t the world have reminded him about the “brown” Muslims chasing these mobsters away from their neighborhoods after they had attempted attacking their stores?
Talking of the same UK riots, the mediums as Twitter, Facebook that had actually triggered a wave of democracy in the Middle East are now being considered as a tool for creating disturbances and planning attacks. What was once being considered to be efficient is now, within months, being viewed with apprehension, suspicion and aspersion.
Where does the balance lie? Where do we finally rest and agree on the final version of the truth then?
I once interviewed Nadine Gordimer and asked her if South Africa was finally feeling free. She answered indifferently and said: “No. It is the morning after that counts.” Every country gets drunk with the spoils of victory but it is only after a day that the nation wakes up to great scales of challenges and conflicts, even within its own territories.
I recalled her comments when I yesterday read about Aung San Suu Kyi, the leader of Myanmar's democratic opposition, commenting on the apparent thawing of her relationship with the government. Her trip to Bago and Thanetpin, both towns about 50 miles north of the former capital, was viewed as her first political trip since her release from house arrest last year. The joint statement issued by her and the Labor Minister stating their common goals being the stability of Myanmar came as a surprise.
That Myanmar's government is urging pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi to officially register her National League for Democracy as a party so it can legally take part in politics, is also a surprise. If we jump to quick conclusions and call these developments assuring, we may be in for a bigger shock. The junta in Myanmar and Suu Kyi could not have had an overnight change of heart.
In a land where thousands of child soldiers are forced into training, cleaning weapons, shooting on the range, planting and destroying landmines and are still being forced to learn the names of anti-government rebel forces, in a land where mistakes made by the children lead to caning and by being sent to army jails, in a land where according to a 2008 global report by the Coalition to Stop the Use of Child Soldiers, thousands of children are recruited and used in Myanmar's Tatmadaw Kyi (state army) and in a land where Myanmar's ruling State Peace and Development Council remains the "most notable offender,” how far can Suu Kyi travel with her dreams?
It is now reported that a visit by a UN human rights envoy is pending upon whose attestation the country will probably improve its democratic ranking. Only Suu Kyi alone knows know she will finally handle the paradox of a dialogue with conscience.
Let’s move on to yet another paradox of the region. August 14 is Pakistan’s Independence Day and ironically the country was subjected to a bomb flattening a hotel in Dera Allah Yar, a town in Balochistan province, in the country’s southwest, killing at least 12 people.
The attack came hours after five rockets fired at a paramilitary training camp in the country's tribal region killed three people, a paramilitary spokesman had reported. The question is, what justifies the killing of its own people at a time when the whole country was supposed to celebrating?
These are the times when we question victory and our own achievements. We question ‘Independence’ when we read Thompson Reuters 2010 reports quoting the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan stating that almost 800 women were victims of "honor killings" and 2,900 women reported raped -- almost eight a day. Almost 2600 were raped in Punjab alone, Pakistan's most populous province, the report states.
The point is paradoxes are ruling our worlds. The demographic-economic paradox states that nations or subpopulations with higher GDP per capita are observed to have fewer children, even though they can support more children. Then why will kids in Mogadishu go hungry while the World Bank is unable to raise the $2.5 billion required to save them from death?
The second last shock of last evening was when I read that the Chinese government, which hosts the biggest counterfeit market in the world, had closed the 22 fake Apple stores in Kunming. This was an announcement from the state-run China National Radio. (Ha ha!)
And finally the last laugh hit me when I read about the Indian Congress charging the social activist Anna Hazare with corruption, an issue he is battling against for years. Anna Hazare, nevertheless is continuing with his fast on 16th August.
This truly is the time for national introspection. The time to be who we are instead of contemplating who we can become (Gestalt) has arrived. The time to depend on the diamond-water paradox and realize that water is a lot cheaper and more useful than diamond is essential now.
The hard reality of capital not flowing to struggling countries like ours---despite the fact that we have lower levels of capital per worker and have higher returns to capital---should be evident to us. The strength of rejecting prescriptions of the Bold and the Rich must be gained with small and steady strides.
This is the time to come together and understand that Tritone paradox (the auditory illusion where one hears the ascent and the other a descent of the notes) cannot hit each one of us differently, rather we must all have the same level of audibility, faith and comprehension, in order to stop our own ironies and paradoxes from dirtying the pages of our own national identities.
The writer is managing director of Mohammadi Group
No comments:
Post a Comment