The Alchemist

I've just finished the Alchemist by Paulo Coelho. It was an enjoyable tale, the English translation being very simple & easy to read and it certainly deserves the praise it has got. I had heard a lot about the Alchemist, both the raves and the rants; however, after reading it, I would never rate it as the classic it is made out to be. The Alchemist is a nice little story with a bit of magic and a surprise ending but to call it inspirational and try to look for answers to our life's mundane problems in such a book is a sad reflection of the stressful times that we live in. Alchemist is at best a modern-day fairy-tale and as with most fairy tales, one can deduce a moral of following ones dreams and believing in ones destiny. The book is full of clichés many of which are repeated over and over (I just realized that that’s the reason they are called clichés) and the protagonist Santiago’s search for “Hidden Treasure” is as good a cliché as any and to make it worse, the treasure at the end turns out to be of the material variety which makes it a sort of anti-climax, though it may be argued that the lessons of life that Santiago learns in the course of his search are the genuine treasures.

Does the Alchemist need to be mulled over? Not if you are of a sound mind. Then why is the book hailed as an inspirational oeuvre? Why is so much being made of following ones dreams and knowing ones destiny? I would put it down to the modern day mentality of looking for spiritual keys to combat the dreariness of life so much so that they are willing to overlook logic in a book which claims that it is possible to formulate any metal into gold by rubbing it against a stone. I wonder if those people who claim a life-changing inspiration from this book go around trying to deduce the meanings of the various omens or change tracks to follow the career of their dreams. What kind of lesson does one learn from a book that has the main character leave the love of his life and go in search of a treasure that he himself is not sure exists? There were a lot of religious undercurrents in the story as well, Santiago being a shepherd and the omens that are interpreted as well as an undertone of anti-Islamic sentiments, with the Arabs shown as forever being at war.

I have a name for the quest to find a spiritual meaning in everything. I call it the “Bible Mindset”. It is akin to find a meaning in every verse of the Bible and every parable of Jesus. The Alchemist is no different than a parable or a fable and just as every one of Jesus’ parables is supposed to have a meaning sometimes hidden and it is a pity that the spiritually deprived western culture has to try and find meanings in ordinary tales such as the Alchemist.

Is Kerala hyped up?

Is God's Own Country hyped up as a tourist destination?

My experiences in Kochi have certainly led me to believe that it might be. Kerala has definitely been blessed with a lot of natural beauty and Kerala was listed among the top ten tourist destinations in the world, but, it definitely is some skillful marketing that has made it more famous than it has deserved to be. Coming to Kerala, after visiting Rajasthan, where the tourist is treated like royalty, the lack of professionalism in the hospitality industry is glaringly evident. Kochi, inspite of being the economic capital of the state, amazingly, has only a few places of interest for tourists and even these were hyped up.

Other than the natural beauty of the state, there isn’t much man-made beauty around. The Jewish Synagogue, St. Francis church, the Dutch palace & the Chinese fishing nets all turned out to be disappointments. The Jewish Synagogue was a small building in the old Kochi area and except for its historical significance, there wasn't anything there for either a Jew or a non-Jew to see. St. Francis church, India's oldest church, is famous for what was there for about 14 years many centuries ago - Vasco da Gama's buried body. The Chinese fishing nets near the remnants of Fort Kochi stink literally and inspite of being plugged as a wonder, there weren’t much of a wonder. The Dutch palace at Mattancherry, though the paintings are rather poorly preserved, is really worth seeing. Photography is not allowed inside and they don't sell pictures or any literature about the place. The Kerala Tourism counter in the entrance of the palace, instead had books about Agra, Delhi & Fatehpur Sikri. When I asked for a book about the monuments of Kerala that was listed, I was told that it was out of print. Even the guides at the palace gave a skewed up version of the Ramayana while explaining various paintings to the tourists.

The renowned Kerala Ayurvedic massage, wasn't so great even though I had it at a place approved by the Kerala Tourism Board. The masseur couldn't speak English and was keen to get me to write my comments in the guest register.

Cherai beach near Kochi was touted as the cleanest beach in India. One walk down its short stretch was enough to prove otherwise. Cherai is clean but not as clean as some of the beaches in Karnataka and Maharashtra.

The most pejorative was usually the discussions I overheard at the breakfast tables of my fellow hotel guests and the tourists I met at various places. Most of them were disgruntled of the hard sell that they had been subjected to. They talked about the generally bad experiences they had, the auto drivers and taxi drivers who robbed them blind and the not-so-great massages. Kerala may attract many more tourists with ad-blitz and suave promotions but it needs to do a lot more if the tourists are to keep coming back.

The Wedding Bells Toll

As 2008 rolls in, I look forward to a lot of changes in my life too but the change I'm expectantly dreading is the one that'll change my status from single to married.

After all the nagging I received from home & well-meaning relatives at not being competant enough to find a life-partner myself, I had to give in and let them try to arrange a match for me. However, little did I know what an ordeal it would turn out to be. I had to agree to quite a few silly rituals like having my horoscope prepared and distributed around to various relatives and creating a profile on one of the popular wedding portals on the net.

There were some mundane initial responses to the profile, of course, but, I had over-estimated my worth in the marriage market. After about a week, and numerous rejections later, realisation dawned that the entire process wasn't a walk in the park. It took me a couple of weeks to realise that honesty may not be the best policy in this case. So, I edited my profile to make it more appealing to the average brahmin father of a girl still hanging on to his middle-class values or trying to find a match for his daughter better than the one his wife found over two decades before. After some vital changes to the profile, the number of acceptances to my "expressions of interest" did significantly increase but I wasn't making any further progress, the principle reason being that I wasn't a premium member of the matrimonial website. Not being a paid member meant that I could only send across "expressions of interests" hoping that the other party was a premium member who had paid so that they could contact me. After about six replies to my "expressions of interests", the wedding portal informed me that I could no longer send any more unless I paid to become a premium member.

Four thousand rupees later I got the privileges of personalised "expressions of interest" and a twenty-four word advertisement in a leading south-Indian newspaper. The only difference it made was the number of rejections I got increased though a couple of profiles looked promising.

The first one was from a Bangalore-based girl, whom I'll call AA. I had received a e-mail from her mother asking me to view her profile. Her profile showed her to be a typical South-Indian brahmin girl & with all the values associated with being one. She was into finance & earned over Rs. Six lakhs per annum. I mailed her asking her the password for her photos. She gave it to me also giving me a few more of her personal details like her having one twin sister who was married, the name of the company where she worked etc. I remembered that I had seen the company on one of my friend's list of communities on Orkut. So, I logged on to Orkut, wondering if AA was on Orkut. I found her easy enough and her profile had something interesting too. Her photos on Orkut showed her to be quite different from the photos she had sent me the password to in that she wore glasses, was a bit overweight and her orkut profile had her height a bit shorter too not to mention her drinking habits as a social drinker as opposed to the teetotaller she had mentioned she was in her matrimonial profile. I don't consider myself shallow but somehow the whole thing starting out like this on a basis of deception put me off and I politely declined her proposal.

The second proposal was the girl's mother calling up my mom at home & giving my mom the girl's matrimonial profile no. The girl, VS, was a software engineer working for Infosys in Chennai. She was the first of three sisters. I found her too on the Infosys community in Orkut. Though she didn't have any photos of hers uploaded, the testimonies of her orkut friends & her sister (calling her lazy, a spendthrift etc.) and her choices of communities provided me a great deal of insight into her personality. I didn't bother to mail her any further.

These two incidents made me remove all my personal data from my Orkut profile. I even spruced down the no. of communities I was member of, since, learning from others' mistakes is the best way to learn. Social Networking sites are great to keep in touch with old friends but I also discovered, albeit by chance, that posting of personal data on these sites, might just not be a prudent idea especially if you are not being totally honest in your profile on matrimonial sites.