A brand new year!

Happy new year to all of you...while everyday could be a new start, a new year does give us the feel of a fresh start doesn't it?:).....just for the record I was sound asleep on the train from Kolkata to Hyderabad as the new year dawned in India. While the journey from Hyd-Kolkata by train is a bit tiring it is worth every bit of it for the awesome views as the train passes through Orissa and West Bengal lush green fields, the amazingly huge (but dry) Mahanadi river, and on the return journey some different views of Orissa, a lake just about a km away from the train extending into the infinite blue sky...reminded me of a song from a Maniratnam movie...great views.

As for other news, just before new year we had to witness the hanging of a dictator. Though the mind tells us that this fellow has committed so many crimes that make us shudder just to think of them...still seeing the frail old man getting the noose around his neck and the look on his face..the shiver on imagining what must be going through the man's mind those very moments, it is indeed difficult to come to terms with one human's right to end the life of another. Still my mother's final statement on the issue settled things right for me-"Vaikunda egadasi annikku thookula pottirukka da...nera sorgathukku thaan poga poraan paru:)." ("He has been hanged on Vaikunda Egadasi-day of opening of heaven's doors in Indian mythology-definitely he is on his way to heaven."