Monday, August 23, 2010

"India. India ... take me to your heart" ... a John Lennon song

Thanks to YouTube, we can listen to this rare song--apparently a demo version ... that never got past the demo version; really?
I like these lines, in particular:
Reveal your ancient mysteries to me
I'm searchin' for an answer, but somewhere deep inside
I know I'll never find it here - it's already in my mind
That is a neat way to describe the complex nature of India, and why it is so goddamn hard to understand that country, even for a guy like me who was born there and has always had a serious interest that strange place.  I am glad though that I have reached a stage where I no longer fight to understand it and, instead, as my mother always says is her approach to life, I "try to float along with the currents" ... Perhaps given the centuries of history there, life has its own speed and direction, and our choice is to either go with it or simply step aside :)


The question that you, the reader, have is probably this: why this blog post out of the blue? (editor: are you talking to yourself, again?)
I came across a reference to this Lennon song while reading what Nigel Thrift had to say.  Who is Thrift?   He is a British geographer, and now a university vice-chancellor, whom I vaguely recall meeting at a graduate student gathering about twenty years ago!  I think he was the one who remarked that Southern Californians are strange that we kept saying "Santa Monica Freeway" when we could easily say "I-10" ... how strange that some trivial remarks stay with us for years, eh ...

1 comment:

Rob and Sara said...

Your mom is right. In India, you have to go with the flow. Otherwise, it's like trying to fight with a rip tide.

As I tell our students who go there on exchange, you have to let go and stop trying to control things. India is in charge, not you. This is hard for a teenager to grasp, much less accept.

But when you let go of the reins and hold onto your hat, what a ride!