Pondering on Thanksgiving eve

I am thankful for everything - for a family, friends, a house, a job, health, and all the material things – necessary or unnecessary. However, how does a child in Iraq orphaned by a stupid war thank anyone? How does a mother of a fallen young soldier thank anyone? What does a cyclone victim in Bangladesh have to be thankful for? Who should a rape victim in Saudi Arabia (further lashed 200 times by unjust law) thank? How do they thank for secret killings, unlawful torture, eviction of the poor, and so on. Yes, we should be thankful. It is easy for those who are fortunate enough not to be in the shoes of those other folks. I am thankful and I should be. Oh, how fortunate I am!

Happy Holidays

Halloween came and went. I dressed as a native American once again, greeted the little angels at my door with candies on hand on Halloween night. Now come the Thanksgiving and the Christmas. Oh, how I love this time of the year (except for the commercialization)!

The children (yes, they are adults now) come home with their boyfriends, fiancés, and so on. For some, their children’s children create a little heaven on earth. Lights, laughter, and food liven up the houses. At least temporarily we try to forget the miseries and rigors in people’s lives and focus on what’s important in life – laughing, giving, and sharing together. I wish everyday would bring joy to the world like these days. I wish for a day when we would have no stupid war to talk about, no orphans, no homeless, no hunger; only a world of joy. Joy to the world.

Family on the move

Just a couple of weeks ago I was in New Jersey, then Atlanta attending some weddings. This week I am home bound. Our older daughter has been crisscrossing the country from Chicago, IL to Dallas, TX, and Dayton, OH. She has plans to visit San Antonio, TX, Houston, TX and San Francisco, CA in the coming weeks. The younger one left for Paris, France from the Big Apple yesterday. She will be in Houston for Thanksgiving. Both daughters will be home for Christmas along with their fiancé/boy friend. My wife was at San Antonio, TX this week. She will then visit our older daughter in Chicago on the day after Thanksgiving. We also have tickets already to visit SFO in the 1^st week in December. I am not sure if we have some Bedouin blood in us. One thing for sure, we are trying hard to keep the airline companies afloat.

Band Aid approach

In spite of the opportunities, in spite of the greatness of this land, we do have problems and they are not going away easily because of our band aid approach. We have crime. So, we add more police force, build more prisons. The number of super expensive defense lawyers goes on increasing. Those who can afford one, go free. The petty criminals go to jail. Equal justice for all - huh! There is traffic jam in the city. So, you widen the highways so that more cars can pack the super highways creating more pollution. Do we ever think of the root cause of these problems? Do more police forces, more prisons, more lawyers not mean that we are heading in the wrong direction? Should a civilized society not work towards needing less police force, less prison, less lawsuits, less concrete pavement? Some fanatics fly airplanes into the twin tower. So, we take revenge by destroying that whole country and killing innocent civilians. Do we ever think of what drives someone to commit suicide by blowing him or herself up? We say our schools are failing; drop out rate, juvenile crime, school shooting, drug use is all up among kids. So, we issue bonds to build more fancy school buildings with more security police, bigger stadium. High school football takes precedence over three "R"s. Who wants to be a nerd? Does any one think about putting the resources for root cause analysis and finding a permanent solution to the problems?

Perhaps this is a global phenomenon. No one anymore wants to diagnose the disease; just reduce the fever and have a false sense of cure.