If we believe in God, must we believe in the Devil too?

PHYSICS 101 (Rule # 1):

Each force has its equal and opposite.

Right!?! So that means that if the Bible is true then Satan must be real; agar bhagwan hai toh shaitaan bhi hoga!?!

What might happen if a few bad things outside of our daily reckoning were actually possible?

You find yourself taking extra precautions, or leaving on a few more lights, because some rumors/thoughts/ facts(?) put that little whisper in your ear that maybe there are things - bad things - out there that you never really thought possible.

But who can be sure?

Which brings me to a movie I watched recently: The Exorcism of Emily Rose.

Here is the background of the movie:

Anneliese Michel (Emily Rose) (September 21, 1952 - July 1, 1976) was a German college student who died during an exorcism. Her parents and the priests who carried out the exorcism were later convicted of manslaughter.

From her birth on the 21st of September, 1952, Anneliese Michel enjoyed the life of a normal, religiously nurtured young girl. Without warning, her life changed on a day in 1968 when she began shaking and found she was unable to control her body. She could not call out for her parents or any of her 3 sisters. A neurologist at the Psychiatric Clinic Wurzburg diagnosed her with ‘Grand Mal’ epilepsy. Because of the strength of the epileptic fits, and the severity of the depression that followed, Anneliese was admitted for treatment at the hospital.

Soon after the attacks began, Anneliese started seeing devilish grimaces during her daily praying. It was the fall of 1970, and while the young people of the world were enjoying the liberal freedoms of the time, Anneliese was battling with the belief that she was possessed. It seemed there was no other explanation for the appearance of devilish visions during her prayers. Voices also began following her, saying Anneliese will "stew in hell." She mentioned the "demons" to the doctors only once, explaining that they have started to give her orders. The doctors seem unable to help, and Anneliese lost hope that medicine was going to be able to cure her.

In the summer of 1973, her parents visited different pastors to request an exorcism. Their requests were rejected and they were given recommendations that the now 20 year old Anneliese should continue with medication and treatment. It was explained that the process by which the Church proves a possession (Infestatio) is strictly defined, and until all the criteria are met, a bishop can not approve an exorcism. The requirements, to name a few, include an aversion to religious objects, speaking in a language the person has never learned, and supernatural powers.

In 1974, after supervising Anneliese for some time, Pastor Ernst Alt requested a permit to perform the exorcism from the Bishop of Wurzburg. The request was rejected, and a recommendation soon followed saying that Anneliese should live even more of a religious lifestyle in order to find peace. The attacks did not diminish, and her behavior become more erratic. At her parents house in Klingenberg, she insulted, beat, and began biting the other members of her family. She refused to eat because the demons would not allow it. Anneliese slept on the stone floor, ate spiders, flies, and coal, and even began drinking her own urine. She could be heard screaming throughout the house for hours while breaking crucifixes, destroying paintings of Jesus, and pulling apart rosaries. Anneliese began committing acts of self-mutilation at this time, and the act of tearing off her clothes and urinating on the floor became commonplace.

In September 1975, the Bishop of Wurzburg, assigned Father Arnold Renz and Pastor Ernst Alt with the order to perform "The Great Exorcism" on Anneliese Michel. It was determined that Anneliese must be saved from the possession by several demons, including Lucifer, Judas Iscariot, Nero, Cain, Hitler, and Fleischmann, a disgraced Frankish Priest from the 16th century, and some other damned souls which had manifested through her. From September '75 until July '76, one or two exorcism sessions were held each week. Anneliese's attacks were sometimes so strong that she would have to be held down by 3 men, or even chained up.

The attacks, however, did not stop. In fact, she would more often find herself paralyzed and falling unconscious than before. The exorcism continued over many months, always with the same prayers and incantations. Sometimes family members would be present during the rituals. For several weeks, Anneliese denied all food. Her knees ruptured due to the 600 genuflections she performed obsessively during the daily exorcism. The process was recorded on over 40 audio tapes, in order to preserve the details.

The last day of the Exorcism Rite was on June 30th, 1976, and Anneliese was suffering at this point from Pneumonia. She was also totally emaciated, and running a high fever. Exhausted and unable to physically perform the genuflections herself, her parents stood in and helped carry her through the motions. "Beg for Absolution" was the last statement Anneliese made to the exorcists. To her mother, she said, "Mother, I'm afraid." Anna Michel recorded the death of her daughter on the following day, July 1st, 1976, and at noon, Pastor Ernst Alt informed the authorities in Aschaffenburg. The senior prosecutor began investigating immediately.

A short time before these final events unfolded, William Friedkin's "The Exorcist" (1974) came to the cinemas in Germany, bringing with it a wave of paranormal hysteria that flooded the nation. Psychiatrists all over Europe reported an increase of obsessive ideas among their patients. Prosecutors took more than 2 years to to take Annaliese's case to court, using that time to sort through the bizarre facts. Anneliese's parents and the two exorcists were accused of negligent homocide. The "Klingenberg Case" would be decided upon two questions: What caused the death of Anneliese Michel, and who was responsible?

According the forensic evidence, Anneliese starved to death. Specialists claimed that if the accused would have begun with forced feeding one week before her death, Anneliese's life would have been saved. One sister told the court that Anneliese did not want to go to a mental home where she would be sedated and forced to eat. The exorcists tried to prove the presence of the demons, playing taped recordings of strange dialogues like that of two demons arguing about which one of them would have to leave Anneliese's body first. One of the demons called himself Hitler, and spoke with a Frankish accent (Hitler was born in Austria). Not one of those present during the exorcism ever had a doubt about the authenticity of the presence of these demons.

The psychiatrists, whom had been ordered to testify by the court, spoke about the "Doctrinaire Induction." They said that the priests had provided Anneliese with the contents of her psychotic behavior. Consequentially, they claimed, she later accepted her behavior as a form of demonic possession. They also offered that Anneliese's unsettled sexual development, along with her diagnosed Temporal Lobe Epilepsy, had influenced the psychosis.

The verdict was considered by many to be not as harsh as they expected. Anneliese's parents, as well as the exorcists, were found guilty of manslaughter resulting from negligence and omitting first aid. They were sentenced to 6 months in jail and probation.

AB-Ash?! No way...

rumors say that my indian G2, AB Jr., is wooing Ash, the fakester...aaaahhhhhh, what's with him?!!!!!!!

Less is more

A new club, Association at Webster for Advancing Rights & rights Education (AWARE), was formed on January 24^th, 2006 during the general WTSC meeting. The goals of AWARE are to “promote, monitor and advance student rights and assist students with the realization of those rights. The organization shall achieve its goals through the creation of Focus Groups, which will collectively support, enquire and ensure that the Students Rights, according to the student rights instruments, are upheld and thus creating and maintaining a supportive learning environment at WUT”.

Being in WUT since Fall 1 2004, I was used to the idea of students coming here and complaining and rather than doing anything about the concerned issue. So when I heard that a club such as AWARE was being formed, I was relieved. At least, now students care about issues in WUT. and on top of that, they r willing to do the work it requires. The prime root cause of various issues at WUT is the low student population. Is it really a fact of reality or has it been overused to the point that it sounds like an excuse?

The answer to that is student spirit.

Just because WUT has low student population, it doesn't mean that there has to low student spirit.

Extra-curriculum activities offered at any university can be used as a tool of measurement for student spirit. Sadly, but truly; WTSC was, till now, the most active organization, but with the introduction of AWARE, things do look different. In terms of sports, things looks way better than six months back; there are regular football matches, a basketball and badminton tournaments were organized.

I feel that this is not enough. Pardon me for the cliché, but its true: WUT’s diversity seems to be hindering more than helping. Large communities such as Vietnam, Burma and the rest, hardly interact with the others and vice versa. The only time enthusiasm is seen when competitive events such as COC or Food Fair are organized. If students want things to get better at WUT, then the first step has to come from them, they have to start participating in activities outside of classrooms. Less is more.

It’s time WUT illustrates some student spirit.

"Life is not the number of breaths you take; it’s the moments that take your breath away.”

Drop in Ocean

Drop in the ocean

My first conversations with new students coming to Webster University Thailand:

-XYZ: “So how long have you been in Thailand?”
-V: “Umm…more than 10 years.”
-XYZ: “Really?”
-V: Yah. Well, you see, I was born in India but brought up here. I’ve done my entire schooling at an international school in Bangkok.”
-XYZ: “So you know how to speak Thai.”
-V (face turning tomato red with embarrassment): “Umm…not really, I mean, I can understand but my verbal Thai is not very good.”
-XYZ: “Really, I guessed 10+ years would be enough for one to learn a language.”

And there I stand, embarrassed to death. And then come the questions haunting me: Should I really be embarrassed, after all, I studied at an international school, and live in what can be best described as ‘little India’ away from India; my parents can, to a certain extend, converse in Thai. But what does that have to do with me, I am what I am, and therefore should know how to speak in Thai by now. And now my memory goes down to the lane of RIS, where I remember just a couple of years back, there were rumors that RIS is going to turn completely into a Thai school, but the reality was that the school administration was starting to practice a law (which was compulsory and should have implemented since the start) that they were ignoring till now which was: all international schools had to have Beginner’s Thai classes for foreign students. Makes sense, and now I just wish that they had done that before, it would save me so much of embarrassment. Well, I’m an NRI, ’int it. And that brings me to the next big issue, that of NRIs.

NRI: Non-Resident Indian or is it really, Non-Returning Indian? Call me what you want, I’m more proud to be an Indian than a NRI. NRI has become more of a social status-symbol than anything else. ‘O! You are a NRI; then you must have the ‘name-fame-and hari patti’. Must we? After having a opportunity to study abroad, live abroad, isn’t it our duty; I repeat, not what we should do, but our duty to in some manner or the other go back to our ‘Mother India’ and give back to the community we come from.

Our colony can be mistaken for any other colony in Indore, Chennai, Kolkotta, or any other developed city in India. With the recently build Laxmi-Narayan Mandir, it doesn’t even feel that we are living outside India. But don’t the kids, aunties and to a certain extent even the uncles (who are in their own worlds of peroxide, sulfur and fiber) get excited at the thought of going to India for the summer vacation. And don’t our eyes get moist just at the thought of thinking of our homes and relatives back in India? You might say that it all looks good from here, but once reality strikes, well, ‘jhor ka jaatka, dhere se lage’. With our comfortable lifestyles here; maids who help mummys keep the house clean; no exact electricity and water bills; AC cars; when we return to India, life sometimes gets hard.

“With all the pollution, dirty roads, poverty, heat, corruption, who would want to go back and live when we have a better life here?” True, why should we go through the trouble that the common Indian man lives everyday; we are NRIs, aren’t we?

Hmm..can India give us everything that our Residential colony has over here? Of course, why not. The only hitch in that is that people have to go back and do the work. I know that it is not easy, but life is not easy. If life gives you lemons, go ahead and make lemonade. If even a small percentage of NRIs go back to India and just TRY to make a difference, a lot can happen. Not just in monetary donations when some natural disaster hits India, but in the actual forming a better India, in helping INDIA SHINNING. I don’t know about the others but I definitely am going to try and go back and settle down in India. I might not succeed but at least I can say that I tried.

A drop in the ocean might be small, but the ripples run far.

Sa Re Ga Ma Pa Challenge 2005

coming soon...