BOOKED

today i made a call to one of my indian colleagues in mumbai to say how sorry i am at what happened on 26 11. i feel truly sad at this senseless killings at the taj mahal hotel , trident oberoi and a few other places around the city. and it's a very close call to many of my colleagues. the taj mahal is a preferred company hotel for many of us coming to mumbai for business. at the last count almost 200 innocent people died. early reports indicated that muslim 'terrorists' wanted to kill as many ' infidels' as possible; preferably the americans and the british and jews.

this last week of november has been a particularly crazy month. at the same time of mumbai massacre, hundreds of muslims have been senselessly killed in nigeria by christians and animist tribes in the tribal and religious clash in jos..at the last count almost 400 muslims killed. suicide bombings in iraq afghanistan and pakistan continue as usual but they now sound almost like normal road accidents. what happened in mumbai makes thailand tom yam cow boys swarming key airports look funny in comparison.

whenever anything truly bad, astoundingly tragic things happen, one of the most natural thing for humans to do is to ask WHY?
but when it comes to politics this is not the case. and so yet again, when this terrible mayhem in mumbai occurred, we very quickly get the explanations on the who, how , what, and when...but not the whys. the whys will only be asked and eventually given a spin in all kinds of directions that the truth will never be fully uncovered or worse yet, the spin will start and become another justification to spark the next round of tragedy.

when 9 11 occured, robert fisk tried to ask the whys and he was villified for that. and so, i'm sure anyone who will try to ask the whys of mumbai 26 11 will not be listened to. or won't be taken seriously. everybody is busy with other important things. countermeasures, for example. or revenge by other name. but william dalrymple tried.and there's a good discussion and comments to his view. i think he's on to something. people ought to listen and you can read it here.

as for me, i have long given up trying to understand the nature of human beings. i take solace in this quote from ingersoll.

In nature there are neither rewards nor punishments; there are consequences.