Playing God

I'm not gonna talk about genetic engineering and gene therapy or about the politics and law makers invading our privacy and peace. I save you that trouble. This is something about the game I play . Some call it as people watching and I'm not gonna take the credit from them but I have my own rules for this game. I love this game and I wish everybody would play it. Its very simple and easy . All you need is a group of people . People you have never met before makes it a lot more interesting. You will be the GOD to these total strangers. Play it any where you want . My favourite place and time is during my metro train rides. Rules are very strict but again are very simple. Like every other game there are some DO's and DONT's . Let start with DONT's . In this game god is not allowed to judge neither pass judgements. No stereotypes based on color, community , language or caste. Watching, Listening , Predicting , Assuming and Imagining are allowed. Every individual has to be treated uniquely. And yes you have to have a very pleasant and smiling face during the course of game otherwise your creations may think you are psycho for staring them at a train and psycho is not a very popular vernacular for GOD though quite a few people would agree with it .

OK now before anybody thinks or rather judge me as a psycho I would tell you what made me play this game. It was few years back when I lost the connection with GOD. I come from a country where 33 million native gods and some foreign gods are getting along more or less peacefully ruling 10 billion people. But during my travel to Middle east, South east Asia, Europe and America where there are very few gods and comparatively very less people having all sorts of problems. The core of the problem is not GOD but his/her religion. When a religion is gaining power over GOD even GOD becomes helpless. I see people who believed in GOD don't believe in themselves . I like the word faith over religion and faith is belief and if one doesn't believe in himself what else he/she could believe ? I made the judgement that there is no one called The ONE. Undoubtedly I was wrong . I was just searching at the wrong place.

Playing GOD helped me to find The ONE in every one. Now I could understand how unique am I and that every one else is. I used to be very afraid of people now I can connect to my people. They are my creation why should I be afraid. I try my best to be honest to the rules what I made . I don't need a religion . All I needed was a train ride , myself and few of my creations.

My Namesake

First of all I'm not writing a review about the movie "The Namesake". Most of you saw the movie while few of us read the book. But there are similarities between Gogol Ganguly of "The namesake" and myself . I believe some of us go through some trouble due to our names . I had my share of trouble just for the namesake . To start , If you have a last name of 33 characters you are in deep deep trouble. How do I know ? Well keep reading and you will find out yourself. No computer in any airport of the world are equipped to handle a last name with 33 characters.

It all started while I was in third grade. My brother was getting admitted into a new school in eleventh grade . Unfortunately there was a student with the the same name as my brother. My parents had to add one more initial to my brothers name and eventually the same initial was added to my name as well . From K . Ramesh , I became V.K.Ramesh . I fancied my new name . In school and college I was popularly known between my unpopular friends as Vee Kay Aar. I loved it . I felt a rhythm in my name . Rough pages of my school notes were filled with various designs of my new name . It was like a new avatar . My parents told me that people with three names end up very popular . M K Gandhi, M G Ramachandran , N T Ramarao and then there was V K Ramesh. I was sure that I'm not gonna end up as a politician but may be , one day I'll be know as D J Vee Kay. Good times .

Well now to the most funny part . How many of you has your last name given by a travel agent ? If you are one of them post a comment I would love to hear from you . I was 17 years old when I went to a travel agent to apply for my passport . I got lazy to fill up the application and asked my travel agent to do it. He asked me only two questions. what my initials V and K stands for . I answered . I don't have anybody else to blame apart from myself . He did his job and thats how I got my last name. From V K Ramesh or Vee Kay Aar I took a new avatar.

Given name : Ramesh
Surname : Vasudenvan Pillai Karthikeyan Nair

Do the math with the spaces its 33 characters . For the very first name I hated my name . I never wanted the caste as part of my name . Now I have two castes in my last name . I asked my dad . Are we Pillai's or Nair's ? He didnt have an answer . He had no clue how the Pillai in my grandfather's name changed to Nair in his name. Apparently I found out whats the difference but that was not important. I had faced carrier and financial loses due to my name. I had a lot of funny moments .

Its been 12 years now , Things have changed and so is my last name . My last name has shrunken to four characters . As I said good bye to 29 characters I said good bye to my grandfather's and dad's name . I bet they must be floating somewhere in the chaos of this universe wishing to catch up with me as a bad karma for that one lazy minute when I let the travel agent to fill up my passport application. I knew this time for sure its just for "My Namesake". My Name is Ramesh Nair.