'If you have a book [or a commodity] that's been idling away for more than a year...'

Three Lovely Gifts Today | Sweet Musings ❤️

Today, I was really overjoyed to have received three gifts from three lovely people. 😊

Prof. Arun our vibrant APRO, called me up to say that, I had received a lovely little gift from Mrs. Anne Dayanandan.

I promptly and quite eagerly picked up the gift this afternoon from our Department. To my pleasant surprise, it contained Geetanjali Shree’s Tomb of Sand.

For those of us not in the know, Tomb of Sand, is the first book written in an Indian language to have been awarded the International Booker Prize. It was translated into English by Daisy Rockwell.

The little bag also had yet another pleasant surprise in store for me. It had a beautiful handwritten note from Mrs. Anne Dayanandan that I’m sure gonna treasure for life. 😊

Quite soon, Dr. David Abraham my sweet brother, brought me a courier cover that was addressed to me. 

He brought the courier gift over to me while we were all sipping a lovely cuppa coffee along with our dynamic, lovely bubbly Head of the Department Dr. Mekala Rajan. 😊

Interestingly, the sender’s vibrant daughter Ms. Benitta was our student both for her UG & PG in English, and I am so proud to note here, that she was one of the few students who had published her MA Project (under my guidance) as a book. You may want to read on Benitta and her book on our past post HERE.

Coming back, 

This courier gift was from one of the doyens of Neithal Literature, Mr. Kurumpanai C. Berlin. It contained three of his vibrant books [written in Tamil] that have been translated into English.

The titles are, Into the Deep Sea, Turbulent Tides, and Tearful Ocean respectively, and translated by Dr. E. James R. Daniel, and Dr. A. Philo Fragrance Serene, and published by New Century Book House (P) Ltd, Chennai.

Dr. James R. Daniel is a renowned bilingual writer, who has to his credit a few books, besides a couple of translation works in English. Dr. Philo Fragrance Serene is the mentee of Dr. James, and she is an acclaimed bilingual translator as well. 

Now for the third little gift that I got today. It was from Abraham, our vibrant student who came all the way to see me, to gift me a lovely box of Ferrero Rocher chocolates, from his first salary. God bless you Abraham. ❤️

I was promptly reminded of yet another lovely book gifted to me by Author Mahalakshmi Raghavan, titled, Kotravai. ❤️

This book was personally recommended to me by a vibrant reader and friend, Dr. P. Jeyappriya, HoD, English, Mother Teresa Women’s University, Kodaikanal, TN.

On an added note, Prof. Aparna [Anna Adarsh College, Chennai] also vouched to the awesomeness of Kotravai and we are just waiting for the right opportunity to discuss the book quite soon! 😊

Well, this post is not to review these five lovely books. (I hope to review each of them shortly, on our blog here).

This post is about the sharing of gifts.

Mrs. Anne Dayanandan, as most MCC-ians might have known, is the founder of our MCC Campus School (1985), which today, is one of the best-known schools in and around Tambaram vicinity. She has a lot of meritorious accomplishments to her credit.

Mrs. Anne Dayanandan is also the first archivist of Madras Christian College! (as told to me by Dr. Joshua Kalpatti, former HoD, Department of Philosophy, MCC, and author of the famous book, Life and Legacy of Madras Christian College).

Mrs. Anne has also written a wonderful article for our College Magazine that’s going to be released shortly. ❤️

Well, Mrs. Anne thought of sharing her unique gifts with the world. Be it the founding of a school, or a very lovely little act of writing an insightful article for the College Magazine, or a very small act of kindness - of writing out a beautiful note that tagged along with the lovely gift.

A gift that she resolved to share!

And that has made all the difference.

A gift that cannot move loses its gift properties,

says Hyde, Lewis Hyde, in his motivational book titled, The Gift.

[You may want to read more on The Gift on our past post HERE]

Robert Macfarlane in his book titled, The Gifts of Reading states that - 

A book was gifted to me by a man called Don, with whom I became friends in Beijing during the autumn and winter of 2000. Don and I were working as English literature teachers in a University,

which included a copy of Snyder’s Mountains and Rivers Without End, and a paperback copy of a book by Patrick Leigh Fermor titled, A Time of Gifts!

Says Macfarlane, Robert Macfarlane on the book –

A Time of Gifts is filled with gifts and acts of giving – it is a book, we might say, that is rich with generosity.

Quite surprisingly, as we all know, today, Robert Macfarlane is known the world over, for his enthralling books on landscape, language, nature, places and people.

However, it was the sweet impact of that one book gifted to him by his friend Don, that had quite turned his life for the better - for a richer and a fuller life! 

Exactly what Lewis Hyde says, about the power of the gift –

Only when the increase of gifts moves with the gift may the accumulated wealth of our spirit continue to grow among us, so that each of us may enter, and be revived by, a vitality beyond his or her solitary powers.

Yes!!!

So let me put it this way, this simple way –

Patrick Leigh Fermor was gifted the first volume of Horace: Odes and Epodes, by his mother, which acted his spontaneous spur and immediate impulse to become one of the best known travel writers from around the world.

Robert Macfarlane was gifted a book on Patrick Leigh Fermor by his friend Don, and titled, A Time of Gifts, which in turn had motivated him to develop an engaging and rewarding relationship with the landscape.

Rufus (me) 😊 was gifted these lovely books by Mrs. Anne Dayanandan, Author Kurumpanai C. Berlin and Author Mahalakshmi Raghavan.

And.... well... the gift moves on and on and on!

I always tell my dear students –

If you have a book or a commodity that’s been idling away for more than a year, please give it to somebody who can make use of it. Please! 😊 

Now to the introspective thought for today –

How have you been using/sharing your gifts?

Or

How often have you been using/sharing your gifts?

Remember, Lewis Hyde says - 

A gift that cannot move loses its gift properties!

If you are a gift yourself, how have you been sharing your gift with the world?

You may have the gift of writing gifted to you!

You may have the gift of painting gifted to you!

You may have the gift of speaking gifted to you!

You may have the gift of singing gifted to you!

You may have the gift of playing musical instruments gifted to you!

Are you using your gifts to the fullest?

Remember,

A gift that cannot move loses its gift properties!

Start sharing your gifts with the world.

Right away at that!

Before it loses it properties! 😊

Bonne chance! 😊

PS: Special congratulations to Gayathri, K for consistently sharing her beautiful gift with the world, every Friday evening for the past many months, as Friday inspirationals  on her YouTube channel, under the Community header. Many have personally told me on WhatsApp, on how valuable and useful these precious thoughts are! Keep up the good work, dear Gayathri. We are so proud of you! 

You may want to look up Gayathri’s YouTube Channel and ‘like, share, subscribe, comment’ on her vlogs and posts HERE.

"A well-educated person is not necessarily a well-skilled person!"

No One Needs Your Degree! 💥

On Skilling | Some Insights 💜

In a faculty get-together held this week in the Anderson Hall, our Principal Dr. P. Wilson highlighted on the importance of Value-Added Courses to a student’s degree programme.

Faculty were given an introduction to a slew of such value-added courses that would augment and enhance the weightage of a student’s degree programme.

Indeed, a much-needed, value-added requirement in today’s highly competitive job market that complements a student’s degree programme.

Hence, me thought of putting up a quick post that would highlight the importance of such skilling in one’s College life!

Well, as we all know, thousands of jobs remain vacant across all the key sectors in India.

And the skills gap is expanding at alarming proportions, with no easy solutions in sight!

By the way, what pray, is the skills gap?

Skills gap is the difference between an employee’s actual skills that they have on offer, and the skills that the employer requires of them, for a particular role!

So what is the reason for this skills gap?

One of the main reasons for the skills gap is that, youngsters today have a degree on them, but do not possess the required skills to add value to their degree.

Employers are not able to find workers with the right set of skills.

The job market indeed is on the watch out for degree holders with specialized certifications and skills!

The key take-away here is that,

The job market today is not dependent on a person’s college-degree alone!

I repeat…

The job market today is not dependent on a person’s college-degree alone!

A well-educated person is not necessarily a well-skilled person!

It’s time for you to become a Smarter Consumer of Education.

In a Study Abroad Seminar that we had organized this last semester in Martin Hall Auditorium, in which more than 230 students had participated, the Resource Person Mr. Anand Manohar, a veteran in the field of Overseas Education, observed that,

Our students find it a prestige to work part-time when they study in Universities abroad! However, back home in India, they are highly embarrassed to work part-time!

He then exhorted students to take up some part-time work at least on one single day during the weekends, to gain part-time work exposure, which would be an added upskilling reference for their higher studies abroad. 

You may want to read that past post HERE on our blog.

How true! Many students enroll themselves for their UG/PG Degree Programme, without having a clear-cut road map towards their future!

That’s one reason why a few of them end up being disillusioned after their Degree Programme, with no light at the end of the tunnel!

In fact, just by going to college for a degree programme is by no means a passport to a successful future for a student!

You should have this point clearly etched in your mind!

Remember! Your degree is just a bridge or a step towards your career goals and aspirations. 

College isn’t Career!

Degree isn’t Destination!

Successful completion of a Degree Programme alone isn’t an achievement in itself. 

What really matters is to cultivate and to nurture a skill-set that will complement your degree programme.

Simply put – your Degree is like your passport, and your skills are your visa – visa that gives you the needed validation for you to ‘fly’ high! 😊

The reason many students are not able to get the right job that’s on par with their degree is also because of the simple fact that, they couldn’t make optimum use of their spare time to develop and to hone their professional skills/career-oriented skills during their precious academic life!

So yes! What then is the solution?

One effective solution is to have clearly defined career-goals for oneself!

A purpose-driven education alone results in a passion-driven professional!

To sum it up –

College isn’t career.

Degree isn’t destination.

Well-educated doesn’t mean well-skilled!

It would do well to remember that, you are in college with a great purpose!

College is the place where you can develop a clear-cut Career-Development Road Map for yourself!

So yup!

Try charting out your Career-Development Road Map, for yourself, rightaway!

What then is a Career-Development Road Map?

A Career-Development Road Map is a list of your goals – both long term goals and short-term goals, that you as a student intend to set for yourself in your current duty, role and responsibility as a student that helps orient you towards your dream career path ahead!

It could also be a visual representation of your goals that you strategise and outline for yourself in your diary / year-planner [academic year planner] where you clearly chalk out your immediate, pressing, urgent commitments at hand, and how you plan to achieve them.

Make sure that your Career-Development Road Map integrates with your Academic Life in College.

In case you need guidance, please feel free to approach any of your mentors / professors! They’d sure help you draft out your Career-Development Road Map!

So yes! Let’s sum up this post with the awe-inspiring words of Swami Vivekananda -

‘…Stop not till the goal is reached!!!’

"The forest was my friend; I learnt a lot from it!"

Bravo! | Jungle Girl Juliane

‘The Forest was my Friend’

Meet the Jungle Girl Juliane Koepcke – the Amazon plane crash survivor, 1971

In today’s edition of the Malayala Manorama newspaper, I chanced upon yet another interesting parallel that connects with the four children’s ordeal in the Amazonian jungle.

It’s about the 17-year old Juliane who survived a two-mile fall and found herself alone in the Amazonian jungle!

On 24th December 1971, Juliane Koepcke was flying over the Peruvian rainforest with her mother when her plane was hit by lightning.

Says Juliane Koepcke –

My free fall is quiet. I see nothing around me. The seat belt squeezes my belly so tight that I can’t breathe. Before I feel fear, I lose consciousness.

When I come to, I’m upside down, still falling, the Peruvian rain forest spinning slowly toward me. The densely packed treetops remind me of broccoli. I see everything as if through a fog before I pass out again.

I spent my whole childhood in the forests of Peru. The forest was my friend; I learnt a lot from it. And we knew each other well. I often call myself the ‘jungle child’.

Julianne! Photo Credits: ABC

Luckily, I’d lived in the jungle long enough as a child to be acquainted with the bugs and other creatures that scurry, rustle, whistle, and snarl.

So when I met with that horrible crash and opened my eyes to the eerily silent Amazon rainforest, I didn’t feel clueless…I remembered the lessons my parents had taught me about tackling the jungle.

For more on her ordeal and her subsequent survival, you may want to read her memoir titled, When I Fell from the Sky.

PS: For more insights on ‘Forests and the Pastoral in Literature,’ you may want to read our past post HERE on the subject.

"The children had been raised by their grandmother..." ❤️

Four Children | Forty Days 💚

In the Deep, Dense and Dark Amazonian Forests 

Today’s newspapers are all agog and all aglow with the wonder-news on the four children who have miraculously survived a plane crash (that had happened on 1st May 2023) and were rescued alive after spending forty days in the deep dark and dense Amazon jungles.

Today's Edition of the Tamil Hindu

Brigadier General Pedro Sanchez who was in command of the rescue operation stated that,

This isn’t a search for a needle in a haystack, it’s a tiny flea in a vast carpet, because they keep moving…

So the men in the rescue team walked 10 metres apart.

In virgin forest, with trees 40 or 50 metres high, where the sun barely reaches the forest floor, a man can lose himself within 20 or 30 metres.

If someone is separated, the forest swallows them up,

he added.

Today's Edition of Malayala Manorama

But what mattered more is the observation of John Moreno, an Indigenous leader from the Amazon, who said that,

This is a virgin forest, thick and dangerous, and hence they would have needed to draw on ancestral knowledge, in order to survive.

Interestingly, all the four children are from an Indigenous group in southeastern Colombia – called the Huitotos!

Yesterday's Edition of the Times of India

The President of Colombia, Gustavo Petro also had special praise for the children and their relationship with the environment.

“They are children of the jungle” with vast reserves of indigenous knowledge, he said.

Yet another indigenous leader - John Moreno, from where the children were brought up, said that,

the children had been raised by their grandmother, a widely respected indigenous elder.

They used what they learned in the community, relied on their ancestral knowledge in order to survive!

Yesterday's Edition of the Indian Express

In short, bioregional consciousness or a ‘deep sense of place’ had saved them!

I’m quite reminded of a lovely poem [also displayed on a wall of the office at the Planet Drum Foundation in San Francisco] – which reads thus –

Step out onto the Planet.

Draw a circle a hundred feet round.

Inside the circle are 300 things nobody understands,

and,

maybe nobody’s ever really seen.

How many can you find?

From “Ring of Bone”, by Lew Welch (1973)

In short, ‘bioregional consciousness is more a certain kind of attention to place than a sense of identity that divides one place from another’.

PS: For an overview on Bioregional Literary Studies, you may want to look up our past post on the subject, HERE.

Historic Hat-trick @ The Oval Today ❤️

The Historic Hat-trick that Happened Today ❤️

11th June 1999

Pakistan vs Zimbabwe

ICC World Cup Match

#memoriesfromdiaries 😊

Well, this was a particularly remarkable day as regards the Cricket World Cup!

For two reasons at that!  😊

First and foremost, spectators were in for a delightful festive feast, witnessing the second ever hat-trick in Cricket World Cup!

11th June 1999, from my personal diaries

And this hat-trick had happened after a long wait of twelve years!

The honour of taking the first ever hat-trick in World Cup cricket goes to India’s Chetan Sharma, in the fourth edition of the ICC World Cup in the year 1987, against the Kiwis in Nagpur.

Coming back to this match today - 

What a treat it was, from Pakistan off-spinner Saqlain Mushtaq, who got Henry Olonga in the first ball, Huckle in the next ball, before finally pouncing on Pommie for the prized third wicket, which was the winning wicket as well! 😊

That hat-trick moment! Source: crickcountydotcom

Pakistan won convincingly, by 148 runs against Zimbabwe!

[For the record, the third hat-trick in World Cup Cricket, came only four years later, from Chaminda Vaas, Sri Lanka’s most successful pace bowler, in the year 2003 against Bangladesh!]

The second reason for the interest in this particular match is that, if Pakistan had lost out on this match, they’d have been out of the World Cup! 

But Saeed Anwar – considered one of the best opening batsmen from Pakistan, made sure he took his team to the winning side, with 103 off 144 balls.

Who can forget that mammoth score of 194, that he piled up against India at the M.A. Chidambaram Stadium, Chennai in 1997? Anwar's score of 194, still remains the highest by a Pakistan batsman ever!

[On an aside, this record score was broken only in the year 2014 by Rohit Sharma (India) against Sri Lanka at the Eden Gardens, Kolkatta. He had amassed a massive 264 runs, which remains the highest individual score in ODI till date!]