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I respect the need to provide details in a headline but this kind is uncalled for and might scare my parents:
Goa police find a couple hanging from the ceiling of a hotel room. It’s not your typical suicide story:
The single-page suicide note, addressed to “whom it may concern”, states, “We have lived a very eventful and happy life together. We’ve travelled the world, lived in different countries, made more money than we ever thought possible, and enjoyed spending as much of it as we could on things that brought us joy and satisfaction. We believe in the philosophy that our life belongs to us and only us, and we have the right to choose to die as much as we have the right to live.”
The note further mentions that the couple leaves no liabilities or debts behind. There is a list of their properties, including a jointly-owned flat, attached to the suicide note. “They have also kept their last will and testament with respect to their belongings, duly signed by them,” sources said.
I wondered why no one who was happy committed suicide. To me it makes perfect sense. For doing that, I respect the above couple.
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Some of you will disagree with their hedonism: They could’ve done so much charity, helped so many people, used their money for many good causes instead of just their own happiness. All fine causes and if you believe in these causes, you should very much do that. There is nothing we are meant to do on this planet. We can however do whatever it is that makes us happy and keeps us occupied till we die. For the above couple, it was being happy and then moving on from life.
I also suspect they might have done more good for the planet by taking their lives than living on for decades — just like one does more good for the planet by not having children. Every new and existing life on this planet, every single day, utilizes more resources than it gives back. This imbalance has started showing its effects.
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I like conspiracy theories as much as the next guy (who I think is a secret agent) but I don’t think they were murdered. I’d be surprised if a murderer wrote that profound suicide note.
Segue of the day goes to CNN-IBN, in a story covering Chetan Bhagat’s book release:
“I am an English language author, after all…and to find a place in any way in a mass market movie like ‘Rascals’, which would reach so many people, is fascinating. An English author getting such popularity in India was unheard of some years back, but really, it is fascinating and very flattering,” said the writer, who is deeply saddened by the death of Steve Jobs on Wednesday.
[Source]
The Union rural development ministry along with states will organize a month-long campaign from October 2, the birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi, to create awareness for its flagship scheme of Total Sanitation Campaign.
According to a UNICEF survey, 58% of the world’s population practicing open defecation lives in India while China and Indonesia come a distant second by accounting for just 5% of the world numbers. Pakistan is down to third with 4.5%, tied with Ethiopia.
We beat Pakistan so badly that they’re down with Ethiopia. High five!
This is why we love Aakar Patel. He starts a piece with:
Sonia Gandhi, who has led India’s largest political party since 1998, is in a New York hospital after being operated on for cancer.
and shortly follows it up with:
We do not really know how serious the illness is, which organ is affected or even whether or not it is in fact cancer.
The piece is here but you must not reward such writing with hits.
I don’t find cannibalism strange, I have no problems with incest, but for some reason I find this icky. We are a strange species indeed.
To carry forward the family lineage, many fathers-in-law donate sperms if their son is infertile. In some instances, the brother-in-law has donated his sperm. While most want it to be a discreet donation to avoid emotional family drama, there are many cases where the families discuss the issue openly.
Bal Thackeray had this to say on Narendra Modi’s fast:
“Hindu ramsevaks were killed in Godhra riots (train burning) and that’s why Hindus were inflammed. Do not kill them by giving them dose of the poison of secularism.”
Secularism is poison. Senility or characteristic douchebaggery?
Neither, of course. I kinda like living in Maharashtra.
[Source]
The CPI-Maoist, in an unusual move, has admitted that it had committed a “mistake” by executing one Niyamat Ansari and “apologized” for it.
I suppose I can see why one would call Maoists Gandhis, but with guns. Gandhi never hesitated to apologize for his mistakes either.
Subramanian Swamy appeared on Devil’s Advocate to defend his DNA piece. More annoying than Swamy’s reiteration of suspect statements is Karan Thapar latching on to inferences Swamy did not make, giving Swamy the upper hand.
Back to Swamy’s point that Muslims of India (and I suppose Pakistan) were converted from Hindus and that they should wear this fact proudly. Let’s say this is true. To give some perspective, the Indian land mass came into being some 55 million years ago. The earliest accounts of Hinduism are 3500 years ago — even though if many Hindus I know were asked to take a guess how old Hinduism was, the answer you’ll get is millions of years if not billions of years.
Does that give you an idea of how ridiculous an argument this sounds to me?
Besides being a form of ‘my penis is larger than yours’, asking Muslims to acknowledge their ancestry is as worthwhile as asking Hindus to proudly state they descended from apes.
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Uh .. and speaking of penis sizes, the average length in Pakistan is anyway 2 cms more than in India. If Muslims in Pakistan did descend from Indian Hindus, where and how did they get those extra 2cms? And just to complete the circle, given a choice between solving terrorism and a larger penis I wonder what most Hindus would prefer in anonymity.
