Ippo naan yenna seyya - What am i supposed to do now ??

i took a trip to the hospital today
to see where that would put me
all i got from it was an experience
i didn't want to live
a bottle of pills
poped them all at once
then some alcohol to wash it all down
a life so messed up
a life so profound
i didn't want to live anymore
maybe i was being selfish and unkind
but the pain i was feeling hurt so badly inside
now my stomach hurts
my head is throbing and it won't stop
i feel so sick
i'm losing my breath
No one really cares that much
all my friends could give a shit
about where i've been or done
they don't seem to care to much
espically when i want to give up
sure they have been there time and again
but when i really needed them
they seemed to fanish and grow dim
my family was there for me everytime when i wanted to end my life
but they wouldn't understand
all the pain i've faught every single night
they don't know the tears i've cried when i'm all alone
what i feel inside
how i've grown so cold
how i've grown alone
they woulnd't understand
cuz they can't understand me
sure they know me, but it doesn't go that deep
all my relashionships seemed to fail
and my heart broke everytime
healed then shattered
seems like it never had an end
music was an escape from all the wild insanity
that drove me to my death
or my drugs.. just another escape
another way out
a place i could go and hide
when i didn't want to figure things out
it got so late some nights
when i would just crawl into a ball and cry
thinking, what am i living for at all
then your voice came to me
like it use to do at night
you use to sing me to sleep
tell me everything would be alright
but then i have to stop
and think really hard
cuz every since you left me
everything has been so hard
so difficult to cope with
to hard to just get by
cuz every since you died
my life has been empty and deprived
so what am i to do now?
just give up, and watch myself die
leave everything i once knew to wither and dry
or am i suppose to watch myself grow older
and try to be real strong
but see i've tried that
i've tried for so long
i just can't take it anymore
i just can't take the pain
but inside, i know i'll have to live another day
so what am i suppose to do now...?

Lyrics - stairway to heaven !!!

Its not one of my poems... its the lyrics of my famous song by Led Zepplin !!!

There's a lady who's sure all that glitters is gold
And she's buying a stairway to heaven.
When she gets there she knows, if the stores are all closed
With a word she can get what she came for.
Ooh, ooh, and she's buying a stairway to heaven.

There's a sign on the wall but she wants to be sure
'Cause you know sometimes words have two meanings.
In a tree by the brook, there's a songbird who sings,
Sometimes all of our thoughts are misgiven.
Ooh, it makes me wonder,
Ooh, it makes me wonder.

There's a feeling I get when I look to the west,
And my spirit is crying for leaving.
In my thoughts I have seen rings of smoke through the trees,
And the voices of those who standing looking.
Ooh, it makes me wonder,
Ooh, it really makes me wonder.

And it's whispered that soon if we all call the tune
Then the piper will lead us to reason.
And a new day will dawn for those who stand long
And the forests will echo with laughter.

If there's a bustle in your hedgerow, don't be alarmed now,
It's just a spring clean for the May queen.
Yes, there are two paths you can go by, but in the long run
There's still time to change the road you're on.
And it makes me wonder.

Your head is humming and it won't go, in case you don't know,
The piper's calling you to join him,
Dear lady, can you hear the wind blow, and did you know
Your stairway lies on the whispering wind.

And as we wind on down the road
Our shadows taller than our soul.
There walks a lady we all know
Who shines white light and wants to show
How everything still turns to gold.
And if you listen very hard
The tune will come to you at last.
When all are one and one is all
To be a rock and not to roll.

And she's buying a stairway to heaven.

Feeling happy - Musings !!!

What does it take to make anyone feel happy ???

Not loads of money, or not lots of great things, and certainly not the pleasures we kneel for. Its more than often just small simple things that make you happy

I feel very happy and my face automatically lights up

When I see a small kid - color, creed, caste, religion definetly no bar - when it smiles its innocent smile, the whole world turns to be very bright.
When I see a dog frolicking around
When I see on stage the coparticipants smile at one another sharing some private joke - it shows how much they are part of a team
When I see a flower opening up its petal
When I feel the rain falling down on me
When I feel the wind on my face
When I see a friend
When I see a good deed done by any one
Like this I can go on, it is not something is special about me, for every one all simple matters also make them feel happy, but they dont realise that, they think and feel that only big events or great things bring out happiness.

I am blessed tobe born as what I am. I am thankful to the Lord for giving me all things I want, wanted and may be wanting and not giving me those things that I dont deserve. yes at times, I have felt that God has let me down, when what I have prayed for hasnt been granted. But is only later that I realise that God has only taken care of me. I feel very special because I am beign taken care of in a very soft manner. Even in the worst times of my life, He has handled me a delicate flower, protecting me all the time, making life bearable or giving me the strength to bear the toughest challenge and come victorious out of that situation. I am truly grateful to him for always keeping me in his palm and taking care of me in a very special way.

A News article that disturbed me !!!

Few days ago in Economic Times News paper I read an article about AP govt annoucning a scheme for christians to go to Israel on Pilgrimage. This is to be modelled on the lines of Haj Pilgrimage to Mecca. Here I dont even want to go into whether every Christian in the country wants to go to Israel or not.

It is not per se the act that is causing me this anguish, but what the government is doing for one of the religions in the country. There are several religions in the country and if for each of them, the government is going to do a similar act like this, the only thing that will happen as soon as the new government is formed is to work on the strategy for conducting such tours to Kasi, Golden Temple, Budh Gaya, etc.

What is happening in our country? Is this the right way to do the governing? Instead of concentrating on the upliftment of the society, why are we going into their religious practices? Is this what is meant by Secular state of India. For me, my religion stops just outside the door of my house, beyond which I am just an Indian. Why cant the Governemnt do the same way.

Please, let the government see the future consequences of this kind of act and scrap this before it becomes an act of the State Government.

Just for this morning - A beautiful poem written by a father to his daughter

A beautiful poem written by a father to his daughter

I dont stand for the veracity of this poem which came as a part of the email that I receive everyday. But I felt touched the spirit of this poem and I am cut pasting it from the email body. I leave it to the readers choice to do what they want. (sorry I didnt do anything that the email wanted me to do it, as in this world "believing anything and everything" has become a casualty of our times. I also get different varieties of such mail. The last para lets you know the true intention of this blog psoting.

TO MY CHILD
Just for this morning, I am going to smile when I see your face and laugh when I feel like crying.
Just for this morning, I will let you choose what you want to wear,and smile and say how perfect it is.
Just for this morning, I am going to step over the laundry and pick you up and take you to the park to play.
Just for this morning, I will leave the dishes in the sink, and let you teach me how to put that puzzle of yours together.
Just for this afternoon, I will unplug the telephone and keep the computer off, and sit with you in the backyard and blow bubbles.
Just for this afternoon, I will not yell once, not even a tiny grumble when you scream and whine for the ice cream truck, and I will buy you one if he comes by.
Just for this afternoon, I won't worry about what you are going to be when you grow up, or second guess every decision I have made where you are concerned.
Just for this afternoon, I will let you help me bake cookies, and I won't stand over you trying to fix them.
Just for this afternoon, I will take us to McDonald's and buy us both a Happy Meal so you can have both toys.
Just for this evening, I will hold you in my arms and tell you a story about how you were born and how much I love you.
Just for this evening, I will let you splash in the tub and not get angry.
Just for this evening, I will let you stay up late while we sit on the porch and count all the stars.
Just for this evening, I will snuggle beside you for hours, and miss my favourite TV shows.
Just for this evening when I run my finger through your hair as you pray, I will simply be grateful that God has given me the greatest gift ever given.

I will think about the mothers and fathers who are searching for their missing children, the mothers and fathers who are visiting their children's graves instead of their bedrooms. The mothers and fathers who are in hospital rooms watching their children suffer senselessly and screaming inside that little body And when I kiss you goodnight I will hold you a little tighter, a little longer. It is then,that I will thank God for you, and ask him for nothing, except one more day.............

Hi! I am a 29-year-old father. My wife and I have had a wonderful life together. God blessed us with a child too. Our daughter's name is Rachel and she is 10 months old. Not long ago did the doctors detect brain cancer in her little body.There is only one way to save her and that is an operation. Sadly we don't have the money for the operation. AOL and Zdnet (in Zimbabwe )have agreed to help us.The only way they can help is this: If you send this email to other people<>AOL will track this email and count how many people get it. Every person that opens this email and sends it to at least 3 people will give us 32c. (in Zimbabwe dollars) Please help us.--HAMDEALI HATIM KANTHAWALACELL:- 9821040412TEL:- 23726856 / 23753137FAX:- 23778581

My opinion is that why should we wait for a tragedy to bring out our love and affection. Why cannot we pause in our life now and then and take a deep breath and enjoy our family. Lets all do it today itself so that our children get the best of us all the times

Knowledge equation - An article by APJ in his Billion Beats.

This is the article written by him in his february edition of Billion Beats, for those who haven't read any plz visit his website...

~~~~~~~~~~

I would like to share an inspirational call from Hazrat Mohammad Sahib's Hadeeth (peace be upon him).

"When you speak, speak thetruth.
Perform what you promise.
Discharge your trust.
Withhold your hand from striking and taking,
That which is unlawful and bad."
Let us follow this path
and lead a noble life.

I would like to recall a great clarion call of indomitable spirit, which was given by Sir C. V. Raman, at the age of 82. The message is still reverberating in my mind:

"I would like to tell the young men and women before me not to lose hope and courage. Success can only come to you by courageous devotion to the task lying in front of you. "I can assert without fear of contradiction that the quality of the Indian mind is equal to the quality of any Teutonic, Nordic or Anglo-Saxon mind. What we lack is perhaps courage, what we lack is perhaps driving force, which takes one anywhere. "We have, I think, developed an inferiority complex. I think what is needed in India today is the destruction of that defeatist spirit. We need a spirit of victory, a spirit that will carry us to our rightful place under the sun, a spirit, which will recognize that we, as inheritors of a proud civilization, are entitled to a rightful place on this planet. If that indomitable spirit were to arise, nothing can hold us from achieving our rightful destiny." Hence friends, knowledge is equal to the equation: Knowledge = creativity + righteousness + courage + indomitable spirit.

The combination of these characteristics can generate enlightened citizens.

And then there was nothing !!!

When I was in high school, what seems like 100 years ago, I wrote a short story called "And Then There Was Nothing..." The "moral" of this horrifying little gem was that those who strive for perfection end up with nothing at all. The plot involved two overachieving high school students trying to do well in Chemistry accidentally inventing something that blows up the world. As was my typical style at that time, the characters were based on students I knew and particularly despised for their perfectionist tendancies.

I was 14. Give me a break.

Anyway, for some reason I'm thinking about that story today.

Very Funny

Came through mail, a funny one but worth reading...

A little boy wanted Rs.50 very badly and prayed for weeks, but nothing happened. Finally he decided to write God a letter requesting the Rs.50.When the postal authorities received the letter addressed to God, INDIA, they decided to forward it to the President of the India as a joke. The President was so amused, that he instructed his secretary to send the little boy Rs.20. The President thought this would appear to be a lot of money to a little boy, and he did not want to spoil the kid. The little boy was delighted with Rs.20, and decided to write a thank you note to God, which read: "Dear God: Thank you very much for sending the money. However, I noticed that you sent it through the Rashtrapati Bhavan in New Delhi, and those donkeys deducted Rs.30 in taxes.

101 Atheist Quotes

101 Atheist Quotes

The following 101 quotes are some that I have stumbled upon on the web, or seen in books / popular culture. Each quote was either written by an atheist, or is about atheism in general.

1. The fact that a believer is happier than a sceptic is no more to the point than the fact that a drunken man is happier than a sober one. The happiness of credulity is a cheap and dangerous quality. - George Bernard Shaw
2. Faith means not wanting to know what is true. - Friedrich Nietzsche
3. I believe in God, only I spell it Nature. - Frank Lloyd Wright
4. We must question the story logic of having an all-knowing all-powerful God, who creates faulty Humans, and then blames them for his own mistakes. - Gene Roddenberry
5. To surrender to ignorance and call it God has always been premature, and it remains premature today. - Isaac Asimov
6. A man is accepted into a church for what he believes and he is turned out for what he knows. - Samuel Clemens (Mark Twain)
7. Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by the rulers as useful. - Seneca the Younger
8. Philosophy is questions that may never be answered. Religion is answers that may never be questioned. - Anonymous
9. Not only is there no god, but try getting a plumber on weekends. - Woody Allen
10. If I were not an atheist, I would believe in a God who would choose to save people on the basis of the totality of their lives and not the pattern of their words. I think he would prefer an honest and righteous atheist to a TV preacher whose every word is God, God, God, and whose every deed is foul, foul, foul. - Isaac Asimov

11. Belief in the supernatural reflects a failure of the imagination. - Edward Abbey
12. With or without religion, you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion. - Steven Weinberg
13. I still say a church steeple with a lightning rod on top shows a lack of confidence. - Doug McLeod
14. The world holds two classes of men - intelligent men without religion, and religious men without intelligence. - Abu'l‐Ala al Ma'arri
15. Since the Bible and the church are obviously mistaken in telling us where we came from, how can we trust them to tell us where we are going? - Anonymous
16. I distrust those people who know so well what God wants them to do because I notice it always coincides with their own desires. - Susan B. Anthony
17. The invisible and the non-existent look very much alike. - Delos B. McKown
18. Two hands working can do more than a thousand clasped in prayer. - Anonymous
19. Atheism leaves a man to sense, to philosophy, to natural piety, to laws, to reputation; all of which may be guides to an outward moral virtue, even if religion vanished; but religious superstition dismounts all these and erects an absolute monarchy in the minds of men. - Francis Bacon
20. The God of the Old Testament is arguably the most unpleasant character in all fiction: jealous and proud of it; a petty, unjust, unforgiving control-freak; a vindictive, bloodthirsty ethnic cleanser; a misogynistic, homophobic, racist, infanticidal, genocidal, filicidal, pestilential, megalomaniacal, sadomasochistic, capriciously malevolent bully. - Richard Dawkins
21. A God who kept tinkering with the universe was absurd; a God who interfered with human freedom and creativity was tyrant. If God is seen as a self in a world of his own, an ego that relates to a thought, a cause separate from its effect. he becomes a being, not Being itself. An omnipotent, all‐knowing tyrant is not so different from earthly dictators who make everything and everybody mere cogs in the machine which they controlled. An atheism that rejects such a God is amply justified. - Karen Armstrong
22. It is not as in the Bible, that God created man in his own image. But, on the contrary, man created God in his own image. - Ludwig Feuerbach
23. People ask me what I think about that woman priest thing. What, a woman priest? Women priests. Great, great. Now there's priests of both sexes I don't listen to. - Bill Hicks
24. All the biblical miracles will at last disappear with the progress of science. - Matthew Arnold
25. Blind faith is an ironic gift to return to the Creator of human intelligence. - Anonymous
26. Be thankful that you have a life, and forsake your vain and presumptuous desire for a second one. - Richard Dawkins
27. What can be asserted without proof can be dismissed without proof. - Christopher Hitchens
28. In Christianity neither morality nor religion come into contact with reality at any point. - Friedrich Nietzsche
29. It will yet be the proud boast of women that they never contributed a line to the Bible. - George W. Foote
30. On the first day, man created God. - Anonymous
31. I contend that we are both atheists. I just believe in one fewer god than you do. When you understand why you dismiss all the other possible gods, you will understand why I dismiss yours. - Stephen Roberts
32. You do not need the Bible to justify love, but no better tool has been invented to justify hate. - Richard A. Weatherwax
33. What's "God"? Well, you know, when you want something really bad and you close your eyes and you wish for it? God's the guy that ignores you. - Steve Buscemi (From the movie "The Island")
34. As far as I can tell from studying the scriptures, all you do in heaven is pretty much just sit around all day and praise the Lord. I don't know about you, but I think that after the first, oh, I don't know, 50,000,000 years of that I'd start to get a little bored. - Rick Reynolds
35. Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day; teach a man to fish and he will eat for a lifetime; give a man religion and he will die praying for a fish. - Anonymous
36. Calling Atheism a religion is like calling bald a hair color. - Don Hirschberg
37. God should be executed for crimes against humanity. - Bryan Emmanuel Gutierrez
38. To say that atheism requires faith is as dim-witted as saying that disbelief in pixies or leprechauns takes faith. Even if Einstein himself told me there was an elf on my shoulder, I would still ask for proof and I wouldn't be wrong to ask. - Geoff Mather
39. I do not fear death. I had been dead for billions and billions of years before I was born, and had not suffered the slightest inconvenience from it. - Mark Twain
40. Of all religions the Christian is without doubt the one which should inspire tolerance most, although up to now the Christians have been the most intolerant of all men. - Voltaire
41. And if there were a God, I think it very unlikely that He would have such an uneasy vanity as to be offended by those who doubt His existence. - Bertrand Russell
42. Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God? - Epicurus
43. I'm a polyatheist - there are many gods I don't believe in. - Dan Fouts
44. If it turns out that there is a God, I don't think that he's evil. But the worst that you can say about him is that basically he's an underachiever. - Woody Allen
45. A lie is a lie even if everyone believes it. The truth is the truth even if nobody believes it. - David Stevens
46. Men rarely (if ever) manage to dream up a God superior to themselves. Most Gods have the manners and morals of a spoiled child. - Robert A Heinlein
47. I refuse to prove that I exist," says God, "for proof denies faith, and without faith I am nothing. - Douglas Adams
48. It ain't the parts of the Bible that I can't understand that bother me, it is the parts that I do understand. - Mark Twain
49. He that will not reason is a bigot; he that cannot reason is a fool; he that dares not reason is a slave. - William Drummond
50. Remember, Jesus would rather constantly shame gays than let orphans have a family. - Steven Colbert
51. Which is it, is man one of God's blunders or is God one of man's? - Friedrich Nietzsche
52. Religion does three things quite effectively: Divides people, Controls people, Deludes people. - Carlespie Mary Alice McKinney
53. Religion has caused more misery to all of mankind in every stage of human history than any other single idea. - Anonymous
54. When a man is freed of religion, he has a better chance to live a normal and wholesome life. - Sigmund Freud
55. They felt that science would be corrosive to religious belief and they were worried about it. Damn it, I think they were right. It is corrosive to religious belief and it's a good thing. - Steven Weinberg
56. Take from the church the miraculous, the supernatural, the incomprehensible, the unreasonable, the impossible, the unknowable, the absurd, and nothing but a vacuum remains. - Robert G. Ingersoll
57. History teaches us that no other cause has brought more death than the word of god. - Giulian Buzila
58. Atheism is a non-prophet organization. - George Carlin
59. We are all atheists about most of the gods that societies have ever believed in. Some of us just go one god further. - Richard Dawkins
60. A believer states everything must have a creator but fail to say how he was created. - Anonymous
61. "There are no atheists in foxholes" isn't an argument against atheism, it's an argument against foxholes. - James Morrow
62. People will then often say, 'But surely it's better to remain an Agnostic just in case?' This, to me, suggests such a level of silliness and muddle that I usually edge out of the conversation rather than get sucked into it. (If it turns out that I've been wrong all along, and there is in fact a god, and if it further turned out that this kind of legalistic, cross-your-fingers-behind-your-back, Clintonian hair-splitting impressed him, then I think I would choose not to worship him anyway.) - Douglas Adams
63. Properly read, the bible is the most potent force for Atheism ever conceived. - Isaac Asimov
64. If all the Christians who have called other Christians "not really a Christian" were to vanish, there'd be no Christians left. - Anonymous
65. An atheist is a man who has no invisible means of support. - John Buchan
66. Gods dont kill people. People with Gods kill people. - David Viaene
67. If God were suddenly condemned to live the life which He has inflicted upon men, He would kill Himself. - Alexandre Dumas
68. Atheism is nothing more than the noises reasonable people make when in the presence of religious dogma. - Sam Harris
69. I don't believe in God because I don't believe in Mother Goose - Clarence Darrow
70. No philosophy, no religion, has ever brought so glad a message to the world as this good news of Atheism. - Annie Wood Besant
71. I refuse to believe in a god who is the primary cause of conflict in the world, preaches racism, sexism, homophobia, and ignorance, and then sends me to hell if I'm 'bad'. - Mike Fuhrman
72. Faith does not give you the answers, it just stops you asking the questions. - Frater Ravus
73. Believing there is no God gives me more room for belief in family, people, love, truth, beauty, sex, Jell-o, and all the other things I can prove and that make this life the best life I will ever have. - Penn Jillette
74. Absolute faith corrupts as absolutely as absolute power but absolute power is corrupt only in the hands of the absolutely faithful. - Anonymous
75. Gods are fragile things; they may be killed by a whiff of science or a dose of common sense. - Chapman Cohen
76. The inspiration of the bible depends on the ignorance of the person who reads it. - Robert G. Ingersoll
77. When one person suffers from a delusion, it is called insanity. When many people suffer from a delusion it is called religion. - Robert Pirsig
78. I wonder who got the shit job of scouring the planet for the 15000 species of butterfly or the 8800 species of ant they eventually took on board Noah's Ark. But at least we got that magical rainbow for all their trouble. - Azura Skye
79. I have no need for religion, I have a conscience. - Anonymous
80. Man has always required an explanation for all of those things in the world he did not understand. If an explanation was not available, he created one. - Jim Crawford
81. I am against religion because it teaches us to be satisfied with not understanding the world. - Richard Dawkins
82. What has been Christianity's fruits? Superstition, Bigotry and Persecution. - James Madison
83. The characters and events depicted in the damn bible are fictitious. Any similarity to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental. - Penn and Teller
84. If god is the alpha and the omega. The begining and the end, knows what has passed and what is to come, like it states in the bible, why do people pray and think it will make any difference. - Mark Fairclough
85. The finality of death is the coldest truth one must face. Religion makes the perfect distraction. - Anonymous
86. Religion is the opiate of the masses. - Karl Marx
87. If God created the world, then who created god? and who created whoever created god? So somewhere along the line something had to just be there. So why can't we just skip the idea of god and go straight to earth? - Ryan Hanson
88. If we expect God to subscribe to one religion at the exclusion of all the others, then we should expect damnation as a matter of chance. This should give Christians pause when expounding their religious beliefs, but it does not. - Sam Harris
89. Atheists will celebrate life, while you're in church celebrating death. - Anonymous
90. Animals do not have gods, they are smarter than that. - Ronnie Snow
91. I have observed that the world has suffered far less from ignorance than from pretensions to knowledge. It is not skeptics or explorers but fanatics and ideologues who menace decency and progress. No agnostic ever burned anyone at the stake or tortured a pagan, a heretic, or an unbeliever. - Daniel Boorstin
92. I have never seen the slightest scientific proof of the religious ideas of heaven and hell, of future life for individuals, or of a personal God. So far as religion of the day is concerned, it is a damned fake… Religion is all bunk. - Thomas Edison
93. Fundamentalism, of any type, due to its prerequisite lack of intelligent thought, could prove to be the worst weapon of mass destruction, of all. - David J. Constable
94. To really be free, You need to be free in the mind. - Alexander Loutsis
95. Most religions prophecy the end of the world and then consistently work together to ensure that these prophecies come true. - Anonymous
96. Jesus hardly made the greatest sacrifice. He knew he would be resurrected anyway. - Anonymous
97. Religion is like a virus that affects the behaviour of its host in such a way as to propagate itself further. - Jack Pritchard
98. Religions are like pills, which must be swallowed whole without chewing. - Thomas Hobbs
99. Today's religion will be the future's mythology. Both believed at one time by many; but proved wrong by the clever. - Steven Crocker
100. The Bible - A Fairytale book of rules brainwashing millions. Obliviously used to help create war, kill, hate, judge and discriminate. - Anonymous
101. Isn't it enough to see that a garden is beautiful without having to believe that there are fairies at the bottom of it too? - Douglas Adams

Please feel free to comment on these quotes, and inform me of the authors of any I have misquoted or marked as "Anonymous". There are so many sources for these quotes it's hard to keep track of who really said what!

Subramania Bharati - The jewel of stars.

I was influenced by poet Percy Bysshe Shelley.
This is how he sang of Mother Bharat at the dawn of the independence movement: "She has thirty crores of faces, but her heart is one; she speaks eighteen languages, yet her mind is one"; he is considered to be the father of modern style in Tamil literature so much so that creative writing in Tamil during the last seven decades owes its existence to his revolutionary style of transforming spoken rhythms to a written format; he was one of the foremost poets to compose and sing songs on India as one entity; his powerful prose and poetry emphasized the urgent need for national integration and shun parochial mentality; he envisioned a glorious future for India, a nation united on the common grounds of shared culture and history; and his vision marks the dawn of India's national unity movement during [the] freedom struggle, and was aptly referred to as the national poet - Subramanya Bharati (1882-1921).

The jewel of stars.
Moonlight, the stars and the wind,

By placing them in front

And drinking the honey thereof-

A poetic frenzy seizes us;

That atomic thing called Mind-

We shall let it roam free.

Should one wonder at the bee

that sings While imbedded in a tasty fruit?

Oh, Mind! Go hence to join The jewel of stars.

Worth of Milk

Kindness Pays...

One day, a poor boy who was selling goods from door to door to pay hisway through school, found he had only one thin dime left, and he was hungry. He decided he would ask for a meal at the next house. However, he lost his nerve when a lovely young woman opened the door.

Instead of a meal he asked for a drink of water. She thought he looked hungry, so she brought him a large glass of milk. He drank it slowly, and then asked, "How much do I owe you?""You don't owe me anything," she replied "Mother has taught us never to accept payment for a kindness."

He said... "Then I thank you from my heart."

As he left that house, he not only felt stronger physically,but his faith in God and man was strong also.

Years later that young woman became critically ill. The local doctors were baffled. They finally sent her to the big city, where they called in specialists to study her rare disease. Dr.Howard Kelly was called in for the consultation. When he heard the name of the town she came from, a strange light filled his eyes. Immediately he rose and went down the hall of the hospital to her room.Dressed in his doctor's gown he went in to see her.

He went back to the consultation room determined to do his best to save her life. From that day he gave special attention to the case.After a long struggle, the battle was won. Dr. Kelly requested the business office to pass the final bill to him for approval.

He looked at it, then wrote something on the edge and the bill was sent to her room.She feared to open it, for she was sure it would take the rest of her life to pay for it all. Finally, she looked, and something caught ; her attention on the side as she read these words..... "Paid in full with one glass of milk." (Signed) Dr.Howard Kelly.Tears of joy flooded her eyes as her happy heart prayed: "Thank You, GOD, that Your love has spread through human hearts and hands."

Whatz Subprime crisis and Subprime pain: Who lost how much

The United States' subprime crisis has turned out to be bigger than previously thought and has the potential to drag the world's largest economy into a recession.

And although there are varying opinions on whether the US could slip into a recession or not, most economists do feel that despite the US Federal Reserve's rate cuts and the Bush administration's $161-billion economic aid plan, chances of a recession are high.

Be that as it may, one thing is for certain: the losses from the subprime that financial majors have incurred will take a long time to get over.

Given below, in the table, are the estimated losses that some of the world's largest banks have suffered on account of home loan defaults in the US. The total figure adds up to over $76 billion and does not take into account losses suffered by many other financial majors that had an exposure to the crisis.

Four Indian banks -- State Bank of India, ICICI Bank, Bank of Baroda, and Bank of India too have big exposure to credit derivatives, with the spreads on these widening since international lenders turned risk-averse following the crisis in the US subprime (or high-risk home loan) market.

Credit derivatives are instruments for which the underlying asset is a loan or a bond. Marking to market means valuing a portfolio based on the prevailing market price.
Subprime losses till date

Bank - Losses -

Citigroup - $18.0 billion
UBS - $13.5 billion
Morgan Stanley - $9.4 billion
Merrill Lynch - $8.0 billion
HSBC - $3.4 billion
Bear Stearns - $3.2 billion
Deutsche Bank - $3.2 billion
Bank of America - $3.0 billion
Barclays - $2.6 billion
Royal Bank of Scotland - $2.6 billion

IKB - $2.6 billion
Societe Generale - $2.0 billion
Freddie Mac - $2.0 billion
Wachovia - $1.1 billion
Credit Suisse - $1.0 billion

ICICI Bank has the highest exposure of $1.5 billion. SBI has an estimated exposure of $1 billion, BoI of $300 million, and BoB of $150 million. About 5-10 per cent of this figure could be the losses that these banks could incur.

Understanding the subprime crisis

Just what is the subprime crisis? And why is it having such a decisive impact on the Indian stock market?

Let's understand it. Take, for example, an American who seeks a home loan, but does not have a very good credit rating. That essentially means that banks may not extend him a home loan. Enter, another American with stellar credit rating and the willingness to take on some risk. Given his good credit rating, banks are willing to give him a loan at a certain rate of interest.

This individual the divides the loan into small lots and gives them out as home loans to lots of Americans, who do not have very good credit rating and cannot get a home loan from any bank. He gives out the home loan at a rate of interest higher than it is paying to the bank it borrowed money from.

This higher rate is referred to as the subprime rate and this home loan market is referred to as the subprime home loan market.

By giving out a home loan to lots of individuals, the individual ensures that even if a few of them default, his overall position is not affected much. But the individual giving out loans in the subprime market does not stop here. He does not wait for the principal and the interest on the subprime home loans to be repaid, so that he can repay his loan to the bank, which has given him the loan.

He goes ahead and securitizes these loans. Securitization involves converting these home loans into financial securities, which promise to pay a certain rate of interest.

These financial securities are then sold to big institutional investors. The interest and the principal that is repaid by the subprime borrowers through equated monthly installments is passed onto these institutional investors.

The individual giving out the subprime loans, takes the money that he gets from selling the financial securities and passes it on to the bank, he had taken the loan from, thereby repaying the loan.

A neat plan. But then things went horribly wrong. The subprime home loans were given out as floating rate home loans. So as interest rates increased, the rates on floating home loans too went up, and so did the monthly installments needed to service these loans.

These high installments hit the subprime borrowers with the terrible force. Many, given their poor credit rating to begin with, defaulted. Once, more and more subprime borrowers started defaulting, payments to the institutional investors who had bought the financial securities stopped, leading to huge losses.

So how did that effect stock markets in India? Institutional investors who had invested in securitized paper from the subprime home loan market, saw their investments turning into losses. Most big investors have a certain fixed proportion of their total investments invested in various parts of the world.

Once investments in the US turned bad, more money had to be invested in the US, to maintain that fixed proportion. In order to invest more money in the US, money had to come in from somewhere. And this money came in from emerging markets like India, where their investments have been doing well.

These big institutional investors, to make good of their losses on the subprime market, have been selling their investments in India and other emerging markets. Since the amount of selling in the market far overweighs the amount of buying, Indian stock prices have been falling.
Additional inputs: Business Standard

Subprime crisis: Worst may be yet to come

Much has been written on the subprime crisis and the impact it will have on the world, in general, and on India in particular. However, the worst might be yet to come.

So what is the subprime home loan market? It is aggregation of those individuals in the United States to whom, normal banks do not lend, for the simple reason that their credit histories are not good. Hence, there is a greater chance of the individual taking the loan defaulting. And no bank likes to take on customers who are likely to default.

Here is where institutions which have a good credit rating and are willing to take some amount of risk, come in. They borrow money from banks and lend it to the Americans who have a bad credit rating. They divide this loan, into a lot of small tranches and give it out as home loans to Americans who do not have a good credit rating and to whom the bank will not give a home loan directly.

They give out the loan at a rate of interest, which is obviously higher than the rate at which they had borrowed from the bank. This higher rate is referred to as the subprime rate and this home loan market is referred to as the subprime home loan market.

The loans given out in the subprime market are largely adjustable rate mortgages(ARMs). These mortgages are somewhat similar to the floating rate home loans given in India, where as the interest rates vary, the equated monthly installment (EMI) of the floating rate home loan also varies. But there is more to the ARMs than that.

The two most popular adjustable rate mortgages are the interest-only ARMs and payment-option ARMs.

Interest-only ARMs, as the name suggests, involves paying only the interest on the loan for the first few years. This can typically vary anywhere from 3 years to 10 years. After that the principal repayment kicks in. What this does is that during the initial few years of repaying the loan, it keeps the EMI low. Once the principal repayment kicks in, the EMI starts increasing substantially.

Under the payment-option ARM, the interest rate for the first year is very low. After that, the interest rate is the same as other mortgage loans. But the low interest rate comes with a cost attached. The unpaid interest, essentially the difference between the offered interest rate and the real interest rate that is being charged on other mortgages, gets added to the overall loan and the overall loan keeps increasing.

There are certain dates on which these loans are reset. When these loans are reset, the EMI on these loans changes. The largest resets are expected to happen in the first six months of next year.

In 2007, around $197 billion of subprime loans have been reset. Estimates suggest that in the first six months of 2008, around $521 billion of resets are expected. Of this resets nearly 30% will be on interest-only ARMs and payment-option ARMs.

What this means is that the EMI of the subprime borrowers, who have either an interest-option ARM or a payment-option ARM, is expected to go up, as and when these resets happen. Once this happens, whether the subprime borrowers will continue to pay their EMIs is not very certain.

As we have seen in the earlier articles, the institution giving out the home loans in the subprime market does not keep the loans on its books. It does not wait for the principal and the interest on the subprime home loans to be repaid. It goes ahead and securitises these loans. Securitisation essentially involves, converting these home loans into financial securities, which promise to pay a certain rate of interest. These financial securities are then sold to big institutional investors.
The interest and the principal that is repaid by the subprime borrowers through EMI is passed onto these institutional investors who buy these financial securities.

Now once the EMIs go up, there is a great chance that subprime borrowers may not be able to pay them. If these EMIs are not paid, then investors who had bought the securitised paper will not get paid and hence suffer losses.

To cover their losses they may have to sell their investments in emerging markets like India, where there investments have been generating return.

And when they sell their investments in emerging markets, the markets are likely to fall, if there is less buying at that point of time.

Subprime crisis: Worst may be yet to come

Much has been written on the subprime crisis and the impact it will have on the world, in general, and on India in particular. However, the worst might be yet to come.

So what is the subprime home loan market? It is aggregation of those individuals in the United States to whom, normal banks do not lend, for the simple reason that their credit histories are not good. Hence, there is a greater chance of the individual taking the loan defaulting. And no bank likes to take on customers who are likely to default.

Here is where institutions which have a good credit rating and are willing to take some amount of risk, come in. They borrow money from banks and lend it to the Americans who have a bad credit rating. They divide this loan, into a lot of small tranches and give it out as home loans to Americans who do not have a good credit rating and to whom the bank will not give a home loan directly.

They give out the loan at a rate of interest, which is obviously higher than the rate at which they had borrowed from the bank. This higher rate is referred to as the subprime rate and this home loan market is referred to as the subprime home loan market.

The loans given out in the subprime market are largely adjustable rate mortgages(ARMs). These mortgages are somewhat similar to the floating rate home loans given in India, where as the interest rates vary, the equated monthly installment (EMI) of the floating rate home loan also varies. But there is more to the ARMs than that.

The two most popular adjustable rate mortgages are the interest-only ARMs and payment-option ARMs.

Interest-only ARMs, as the name suggests, involves paying only the interest on the loan for the first few years. This can typically vary anywhere from 3 years to 10 years. After that the principal repayment kicks in. What this does is that during the initial few years of repaying the loan, it keeps the EMI low. Once the principal repayment kicks in, the EMI starts increasing substantially.

Under the payment-option ARM, the interest rate for the first year is very low. After that, the interest rate is the same as other mortgage loans. But the low interest rate comes with a cost attached. The unpaid interest, essentially the difference between the offered interest rate and the real interest rate that is being charged on other mortgages, gets added to the overall loan and the overall loan keeps increasing.

There are certain dates on which these loans are reset. When these loans are reset, the EMI on these loans changes. The largest resets are expected to happen in the first six months of next year.

In 2007, around $197 billion of subprime loans have been reset. Estimates suggest that in the first six months of 2008, around $521 billion of resets are expected. Of this resets nearly 30% will be on interest-only ARMs and payment-option ARMs.

What this means is that the EMI of the subprime borrowers, who have either an interest-option ARM or a payment-option ARM, is expected to go up, as and when these resets happen. Once this happens, whether the subprime borrowers will continue to pay their EMIs is not very certain.

As we have seen in the earlier articles, the institution giving out the home loans in the subprime market does not keep the loans on its books. It does not wait for the principal and the interest on the subprime home loans to be repaid. It goes ahead and securitises these loans. Securitisation essentially involves, converting these home loans into financial securities, which promise to pay a certain rate of interest. These financial securities are then sold to big institutional investors.
The interest and the principal that is repaid by the subprime borrowers through EMI is passed onto these institutional investors who buy these financial securities.

Now once the EMIs go up, there is a great chance that subprime borrowers may not be able to pay them. If these EMIs are not paid, then investors who had bought the securitised paper will not get paid and hence suffer losses.

To cover their losses they may have to sell their investments in emerging markets like India, where there investments have been generating return.

And when they sell their investments in emerging markets, the markets are likely to fall, if there is less buying at that point of time.

Insane - Yet Again....

Cant tell what you wont grasp
Cant show what you wont see
For my world is a notion to you
A Reality meant only for me

Bother not, if you fail to know
Worry not if I refuse to clarify
For my world lives in me
In me must It also die

If I appear insane, so be it
Its true, the way you know
I care less, what you see
Who I am, I alone know

Champagne Supernova - Oasis (One of my Favourite song)

How many special people change?
How many lives are living strange?
Where were you while we were getting high?
Slowly walking down the hall
Faster than a cannonball
Where were you while we were getting high?
Someday you will find me
Caught beneath the landslide
In a champagne supernova in the sky
Someday you will find me
Caught beneath the landslide
In a champagne supernova
A champagne supernova in the sky
Wake up the dawn and ask her why
A dreamer dreams, she never dies
Wipe that tear away now from your eye
Slowly walking down the hall
Faster than a cannonball
Where were you while we were getting high?
Someday you will find me
Caught beneath the landslide
In a champagne supernova in the sky
Someday you will find me
Caught beneath the landslide
In a champagne supernova
A champagne supernova
'Cuz we don't believe
That they're gonna get away from the summer
But you and I will never die
The world's still spinning around we don't know why
Why-why-why-why-i-i
(guitar solo)
How many special people change?
How many lives are living strange?
Where were you while we were getting high?
Slowly walking down the hall
Faster than a cannonball
Where were you while we were getting high?
Someday you will find me
Caught beneath the landslide
In a champagne supernova in the sky
Someday you will find me
Caught beneath the landslide
In a champagne supernova
A champagne supernova
'Cuz we don't believe
That they're gonna get away from the summer
But you and I will never die
The world's still spinning around we don't know why
Why-why-why-why-i-i
(a really long guitar solo)
(background - sounds like a bunch of "No"'s)
(birds chirping)
(more guitar)
How many special people change?
How many lives are living strange?
Where were you while we were getting high?
We were getting high <-- 9 times, background "Oooh-oooh"
(Fades out 7th-9th times to just one "Oooh-oooh")
(Song gets really quiet, fades to a peaceful guitar solo.)

The Hollow Earth - Agharta, The Subterranean World

I dont recall exactly who sent this to me.. but still a wonderful article on Hollow Earth ( A follow through for my old post...)

By: Dr. R. W. Bernard, B.A., M.A., Ph.D. - Chapter 7.2:

The word "Agharta" is of Buddhist origin. It refers to the Subterranean World or Empire in whose existence all true Buddhists fervently believe. They also believe that this Subterranean World has millions of inhabitants and many cities, all under the supreme domination of the subterranean world capital, Shamballah, where dwells the Supreme Ruler of this Empire, known in the Orient as the King of the World. It is believed that he gave his orders to the Dalai Lama of Tibet, who was his terrestrial representative, his messages being transmitted through certain secret tunnels connecting the Subterranean World with Tibet.

Similar mysterious tunnels honeycomb Brazil. Brazil in the West and Tibet in the East seem to be the two parts of the Earth where contact between the Subterranean World and the surface world may be most easily achieved, due to the existence of these tunnels.

The famous Russian artist, philosopher and explorer, Nicholas Roerich, who traveled extensively in the Far East, claimed that Lhasa, capital of Tibet, was connected by a tunnel with Shamballah, capital of the subterranean empire of Agharta. The entrance of this tunnel was guarded by lamas who were sworn to keep its actual whereabouts a secret from outsiders, by order of the Dalai Lama. A similar tunnel was believed to connect the secret chambers at the base of the Pyramid of Gizeh with the Subterranean World, by which the Pharaohs established contact with the gods or supermen of the underworld.

The various gigantic statues of early Egyptian gods and kings, as those of Buddha found throughout the Orient, represent subterranean supermen who came to the surface to help the human race. They are generally represented as sexless. They were emissaries of Agharta, the subterranean paradise which it is the goal of all true Buddhists to reach.

Buddhist traditions state that Agharta was first colonized many thousands of years ago when a holy man led a tribe which disappeared underground. The gypsies are supposed to come from Agharta, which explains their restlessness on the Earth's surface and their continual travels to regain their lost home. This reminds one of Noah, who was really an Atlantean, who saved a worthy group prior to the coming of the flood that submerged Atlantis. It is believed that he brought his group to the high plateau of Brazil where they settled in subterranean cities, connected with the surface by tunnels, in order to escape from poisoning by the radioactive fallout produced by the nuclear war the Atlanteans fought, which brought on the flood that submerged their continent.

The aubterranean civilization oi Agharta is believed to represent a continuation of Atlantean civilization, which, having learned the lesson of the futility of war, remained in a state of peace ever since, making stupendous scientific progress uninterrupted by the setbacks of recurrent wars, as our surface civilization has been. Their civilization is many thousands of years old (Atlantls sank about 11,500 years ago), while ours is very young, only a few centuries old.

Subterranean scientists are able to wield forces of nature we know nothing about, as demonstrated by their flying saucers, which are operated by a new, unknown source of energy, more subtle than atomic energy. Ossendowski claims that the Empire of Agharta consists of a network of subterranean cities connected with each other by tunnels through which vehicles pass at tremendous speed, both under land and under the ocean.

These people live under the benign reign of a government headed by the King of the World. They represent descendants of the lost continents of Lemuria and Atlantis, as well as the original perfect race of Hyperboreans, the race of gods.

During various epochs in history, the Aghartan supermen or gods came to the surface to teach the human race and save it from wars, catastrophies and destruction. The coming of the flying saucers soon after the first atomic explosion in Hiroshima represents another such visitation, but thls time the gods themselves did not appear among men, but they sent their emissaries.

The Indian epic, "Ramayana" describes Rama as such an emissary from Agharta coming on an aerial vehicle, which was probably a flying saucer. A Chinese tradition speaks of divine teachers coming on aerial vehicles. Similarly, the founder ot the Inca dynasty, Manco Copac, came the same way.

One of the greatest of Aghartan teachers in America was Quetzalcoatl, the great prophet of the Mayas and Aztecs and of the Indians of the Americas in general, both in South and North America. That he was a stranger among them, coming from a different race (Atlantean) is indicated by his being fair, while they were dark; his being tall, while they were short; his being bearded, while they were beardless. He was reverenced as a savior by the Indians of Mexico, Yucatan and Guatemala long before the coming of the white man. The Aztecs called him "God of Abundance" and the "Morning Star." His name Quetzalcoatl means "Feathered Serpent," meaning a teacher of wisdom (symbolized by the serpent) who flies. He was given this name because he came on an aerial vehicle, which appears to have been a flying saucer. He probably came from the Subterranean World, because after he remained some time with the Indians, he mysteriously vanished the same way as he came; and was believed to have returned to the Subterranean World from which he came.

Quetzalcoatl is described as having been "a man of good appearance and grave countenance, with a white skin and beard, and dressed in a long flowing white garment. He was also called Huemac, because of his great goodness and continence. He taught the Indians the way of virtue and tried to save them from vice by giving them laws and counsel to restrain them from lust and to practice chastity. He taught pacifism and condemned violence in all forms. He instituted a vegetarian diet, with corn as a principal food, and taught fasting and body hygiene. According to the South American archeologist, Harold Wilkins, Quetzalcoatl was also the spiritual teacher of the ancient inhabitants of Brazil.

After remaining some time with the Indians, and seeing how little they cared to follow his teachings, except his recommendation to plant and eat corn as a basic food in place of meat, Quetzalcoatl departed, telling them that some day he would return. That this "visitor from Heaven" left the same way in which he came - on a flying saucer - is indicated by the following facts. When Cortez invaded Mexico, the emperor Montezuma believed that the predicted "return of Quetzalcoatl" had occurred, because a fireball then gyrated over Mexico City, making the people wail and scream, setting the temple of the war god on fire. This fireball was believed to have been the flying saucer on which Quetzalcoatl traveled.

Osiris was another such subterranean god. According to Donnelly, in his book, "Atlantis the Antediluvian World," the gods of the ancients were the rulers of Atlantis and members of a superhuman race which governed the human race. Before the destruction of their continent, which they foresaw, they traveled by flying saucer through the polar opening to the Subterranean World in the hollow interior of the earth, where they continued to live ever since.

"The Empire of Agharta," wrote Ossendowski in his book "Beasts, Men and Gods," "extends through subterranean tunnels to all parts of the world." In this book he speaks of a vast network of tunnels constructed by a prehistoric race of remotest antiquity, which passed under both oceans and continents, through which swift-moving vehicles traveled. The empire of which Ossendowski speaks and concerning which he learned about from lamas in the Far East, during his travels in Mongolia, obviously consists of subterranean cities inside the earth's crust, which should be differentiated from those existing in its hollow center. Thus there are two subterranean worlds, one more superficial and one in the center of the earth.

Huguenin, whose book on flying saucers and the subterranean world we previously mentioned, believes that there exist many subterranean cities at various depths, between the earth's crust and its hollow interior. Concerning the inhabitants of these subterranean cities, he writes:

"This other humanity has reached an elevated grade of civilization, economic and social organization and cultural and scientific progress, in comparison with which the humanity which lives on the earth's surface are a race of barbarians."

In his book, Huguenin shows a diagram of the earth's interior, showing various subterranean cities at various depths, connected with each other by tunnels. He describes these cities as existing in immense cavities in the earth. The city of Shamballah, the capital of the subterranean empire, he portrays as existing at the center of the earth, in its hollow interior, rather than inside its solid crust. Ossendowski writes:

"All the subterranean caverns of America are inhabited by an ancient people who disappeared from the world. These people and the subterranean regions where they dwell are under the supreme authority of the King of the World. Both the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans were once the home of vast continents which later became submerged; and their inhabitants found refuge in the Subterranean World. The profounder caverns are illuminated by a resplendent light which permits the growing of cereals and other vegetables, and gives the inhabitants a long life-span free from disease. In this world exists a large population and many tribes."

In his book, "The Coming Race," Bulwer Lytton describes a subterranean civilization far in advance of our own, which existed in a large cavity in the earth, connected with the surface by a tunnel. This immense cavity was illuminated by a strange light which did not require lamps to produce it, but appeared to result from an electrification of the atmosphere. This light supported plant life and enabled the subterranean people to grow their foods. The inhabitants of the Utopia, described by Lytton were vegetarians. They had certain apparatuses by which, instead of walking, they flew. They were free from disease and had a perfect social organization so that each received what he needed, without exploitation of one by another.

It is claimed that the earth's crust is honeycombed by a network of tunnels passing under the ocean from continent to continent and leading to subterranean cities in large cavities in the earth. These tunnels are especially abundant in South America, especially under Brazil, which was the chief center of Atlantean colonization; and we may believe they were constructed by the Atlanteans. Most famous of these tunnels is the "Roadway of the Incas" which stretches for several hundred miles south of Lima, Peru, and passes under Cuzco, Tiahuanaco and the Three Peaks, proceeding to the Atacambo Desert. Another branch opens in Arica, Chile, visited by Madame Blavatsky.

It is claimed that the Incas used these tunnels to escape from the Spanish conquerors and the Inquisition, when entire armies entered them, carrying with them their gold and treasures on the backs of llamas, which they did when the Spanish Conquerors first came. Their mysterious disappearance at this time, leaving only the race of Quechua Indians behind, is also explained by their entering these tunnels. It is claimed that when Atahualpa, the last of the Inca kings, who was brutally murdered by Pizarro, the gold that was being carried to his ransom on a train of 11,000 pack llamas, found refuge in these tunnels. It is claimed that these tunnels had a form of artificial lighting and were built by the race that had constructed Tiahuanco long before the first Inca appeared in Peru.

Since the Incas who entered these tunnels to escape from the Spaniards were never seen since and disappeared from the earth's surface, it is probable that they continued to live in illuminated subterranean cities to which these tunnels led.

These mysterious tunnels, an enigma to archeologists, exist in greatest number under Brazil, where they open on the surface in various places. The most famous is in the Roncador Mountains of northeast Matto Grosso to where Colonel Fawcett was heading when last seen. It is claimed that the Atlantean city for which he searched was not the ruins of a dead city on the surface but a subterranean city with still living Atlanteans as its inhabitants; and that he and his son Jack reached this city and are still living therein. This is the belief of Professor de Souza, Commander Strauss and O. C. Huguenin, whom we have mentioned before.

The Roncador tunnel opening is guarded by fierce Chavantes Indians who kill anyone who dares to enter uninvited and who might molest the subterranean dwellers whom they respect and reverence. The Murcego Indians also guard these secret tunnel openings leading to subterranean cities in the Roncador Mountain region of Matto Grosso. We quote a letter to the author from an American, named Carl Huni, who lived many years in Matto Grosso and made a special study of this subject:

"The entrance to the caverns is guarded by Murcego Indians, who are a dark-skinned, undersized race of great physical strength. Their sense of smell is more developed than that of the best bloodhounds. Even if they approve of you and let you enter the caverns, I am afraid that you will be lost to the present world, because they guard the secret very carefully and may not let those who enter leave. (This may have happened to Colonel Fawcett and his son Jack, who are believed to have entered a tunnel leading to a subterranean city in the Roncador Mountains, never to return.)

"The Murcego Indians live in caverns and go out at night into the surrounding jungles, but they have no contact with the subterranean dwellers below, inhabiting a subterranean city in which they form a seli-contained community and have a considerable population. It is believed that the subterranean cities they inhabit were first constructed by the Atlanteans. One thing is certain, that no radioactive fallout can reach them. No one knows whether those who live in these ancient Atlantean subterranean cities are Atlanteans themselves or others who settled there after their origlnal builders were gone.

"The name of the mountain range where these Atlantean subterranean cities exist is Roncador in northeast Matto Grosso. If you go in quest of these subterranean cities, take your life in your own hands as you may never be heard of again, like Colonel Fawcett.

"When I was in Brazil I heard a lot about the underground caverns and subterranean cities. They are, however, a long way from Cuiaba. They are near the Rio Araguaya, which empties into the Amazon. They are to the northeast of Cuiaba at the foot of the tremendously long mountain range named Roncador. I desisted to investigate further because I heard that the Murcego Indians jealously guard the entrance to the tunnels from people who are not sufficiently developed, because they do not want trouble. In the first place, they do not want anyone who is still enmeshed in commercialism and who has a desire for money.

"There are also caverns in Asia and Tibetan travelers mention them. But as far as I know, in Brazil are the biggest ones and they exist at three different levels. I am sure I would get permission if I wanted to join them and they would accept me as one of theirs. I know they use no money at all, and their society is organized on a strictly democratic basis. People do not become aged and live in everlasting harmony."

This subterranean Utopia mentioned by Mr Huni (now residing in New York) seems to resemble greatly the one described by Bulwer Lytton in his book, "The Coming Race." Lytton was a Rosicrucian and probably based his novel on occult information concerning existing subterranean cities.

The ruins of a number of Atlantean cities were found in northern Matto Grosso and the Amazon territory, indicating that Atlanteans once colonized this country. Some years ago an English schoolteacher, hearing rumors of a lost Atlantean city on a high plateau in this region went to find it. He did, but the hardships of the journey cost his life. Before he died he sent by carrier pigeon a note describing a magnificent city he discovered whose streets were lined by high gold statues.

If the Atlanteans once colonized Brazil and constructed cities in Matto Grosso on its surface, why did they build subterranean cities there? It could not have been to escape the deluge that submerged Atlantis and outlying areas, because Matto Grosso is a high plateau where floodwaters could not have reached. The South American archeologist, Harold Wilkins, offers another theory: that the subterranean cities were built to escape the radioactive fallout resulting from a nuclear war the Atlanteans fought. This seems to be a very reasonable explanation, or otherwise here would be no reason to undergo the great labor of excavating the earth and constructing subterranean cities when the Atlanteans already had magnificent cities on the earth's surface.

If and when we are endangered by a nuclear war, we, too, will have to find refuge inside the earth and dwell there in illuminated subterranean cities and produce our foods under this light. It would of course be much easier to join existing subterranean cities constructed by the Atlanteans thousands of years ago, who vastly surpassed us in engineering skill, than to construct our own. If friendly contact with subterranean dwellers could be established, when war came, or even before, when radioactive fallout increases beyond the danger point and menaces our survival, ft would be to our advantage to contact these subterranean cities and, if we are admitted, to establish residence in them.

There is no old age in Agharta and no death. It is a society in which everyone is young looking, even if many centuries or even thousands of years of age. This seems incredible to surface dwellers exposed to the harmful effects of solar radiation and the autointoxication of food poisoning from a wrong diet. The symptoms of old age are not the natural result of the passage of time nor an assumed aging process, but to adverse biological conditions and habits. Senility is a disease; and since Aghartans are free from disease, they do not grow old.

The superior scientitic culture of the subterranean people, of which their flying saucers are an evident example, is the result of superior brain development and more energetic brains. This is due to the fact that their vital energies flow up to their brain, rather than being dissipated through the sexual channel as among so-called "civilized" surtace races. In fact, sex indulgence is completely out of their lives, because of their fruit diet, their endocrines are in a state of perfect balance and harmonious functioning, as in little children, and are not stimulated to abnormal activity by metabolic toxins, as produced by such foods as meat, fowl, fish and eggs and by such aphrodisiacs as salt, pepper, coffee, tobacco and alcohol. By keeping their blood-stream pure and free from toxins, the subterranean people are able to live in complete continence, conserving all vital energies and converting them into superior brain power. Their superior scientific achievements result from the fact that their brains are superior to ours in intellectual development.

Concerning Agharta, Professor Henrique J. de Souza, President of the Brazilian Theosophical Society and a leading authority on the Subterranean World, in his magazine, published an article he wrote, "Does Shangri-la Exist?" from which we quote:

"Among all races of mankind, back to the dawn of time, there existed a tradition concerning the existence of a Sacred Land or Terrestrial Paradise, where the highest ideals of humanity were living realities. This concept is found in the most ancient writings and traditions of the peoples of Europe, Asia Minor, China, India, Egypt and the Americas. This Sacred Land, it is said, can be known only to persons who are worthy, pure and innocent, for which reason it constitutes the central theme of the dreams of childhood.

"The road that leads to this Blessed Land, this Invisible World, this Esoteric and Occult Domain, constitutes the central quest and master key of all mystery teachings and systems of initiation in the past, present and future. This magic key is the `Open Sesame' that unlocks the door to a new and marvelous world. The old Rosicrucians designated it by the French word VITRIOL, which is a combination of the first letters of the sentence: `VISTA INTERIORA TERRAE RECTIFICANDO INYENES OMNIA LAPIDEM,' to indicate that `in the interior of the earth is hidden the true MYSTERY ' The path that leads to this Hidden World is the Way of Initiation.

"In ancient Greece, in the Mysteries of Delphos and Eleusis, this Heavenly Land was referred to as Mount Olympus and the Elysian Fields. Also in the earliest Vedic times, it was called by various names, such as Ratnasanu (peak of the precious stone), Hermadri (mountain of gold) and Mount Meru (home of the gods and Olympus of the Hindus). Symbolically, the peak of this sacred mountain is in the sky, its middle portion on the earth and its base in the Subterranean World.

"The Scandinavian Eddas also mention this celestial city, which was in the subterranean land of Asar of the peoples of Mesopotamia. It was the Land of Amenti of the Sacred Book of the Dead of the ancient Egyptians. It was the city of Seven Petals o! Vishnu, and the City of the Seven Kings of Edom or Eden of Judaic tradition. In other words, it was the Terrestrial Paradise.

"In all Asia Minor, not only in the past but also today, there exists a belief in the existence of a City of Mystery full of marvels, which is known as SHAMBALLAH (Shamb-Allah), where is the Temple of the Gods. It is also the Erdamf of the Tibetans and Mongols.

"The Persians call it Alberdi or Aryana, land of their ancestors. The Hebrews called it Canaan and the Mexicans Tula or Tolan, while the Aztecs called it Maya-Pan. The Spanish Conquerors who came to America believed in the existance of such a city and organized many expeditions to find it, calling it E1 Dorado, or City of Gold. They probably learned about it from the aborigines who called it by the name of Manoa or City Whose King Wears Clothing of Gold.

"By the Celts, this holy land was known as "Land of the Mysteries" - Duat or Dananda. A Chinese tradition speaks of Land of Chivin or the City of a Dozen Serpents. It is the Subterranean World, which lies at the roots of heaven. It is the Land of Calcas, Calcis or Kalki, the famous Colchida for which the Argonauts sought when they set out in search of the Golden Fleece.

"In the Middle Ages, it was referred to as the Isle of Avalon, where the Knights of the Round Table, under the leadership of King Arthur and under the guidance of the Magician Merlin, went in search of the Holy Grail, symbol of obedience, justice and immortality. When King Arthur was seriously wounded in a battle, he requested his companion Belvedere to depart on a boat to the confines of the earth, with the following words: `Farewell, my friend and companion Belvedere, and to the land where it never rains, where there fs no sickness and where nobody dies.' This is the Land of Immortality or Agharta, the Subterranean World.

This land is the Walhalla of the Germans, the Monte Salvat of the Knights of the Holy Grail, the Utopia of Thomas More, the City of the Sun of Campanella, the Shangri-la of Tibet and the Agharta of the Buddhist world."

*******

Entropy

The branches and leaves
They twist the wind
to hushed swirl tire
And many a forest
animal a fire
their shrill trill.
[But they only endow the silence
with an unworried entropy.]

Wake up to early morning
breakfast cereal digestion
Eyes skitting the time
Unworried, unwary?
But the taste is forgotten
In quandries potential and lost.
Until the 8 starts juices flowing
And Head, a Bustle-Fuddling TIME.

The pages slip away, away...
Across torrential darkness
Through a void of weariness
Whipping up a taste for nervousness
Erosion to a lovely apathy.
Distilled to a turgid clay-mess.

Will it all fall away
The rude mould made?