WHY?

This was going to be a jolly little blog tonight after the selfish outpourings of the last few. As I was writing my friend Pia messaged me and told me to look at the news. A terrible natural disaster had taken place in Ladakh. We all know the Pakistan has had terrible events in the last few days as that monsoon that is so longed for came with a violence unlooked for and unwelcome

I write about mountains and buddhism and Tibet and his Holiness and I get angry with the people who take countries and destroy their way of living. That even in reading the news coverage as I googled to see what had happened Ladakh was referred to as a state that is part of the Jammu and Kashmir region. It certainly is in the region. As certainly as Kashmir is in the region of Northern India. As certainly as Tibet was in the region of China, as indeed is Burma now.

We all know the story of the man who watched as the soldiers came for  the jews and said nothing, they came for the old and he said nothing, they came for the gypsies and the homosexuals and he said nothing. And then they came for him and there was no-one left to speak.

I am really, really not trying to make a political point of a terrible, senseless an natural disaster. I don't think China or India or Pakistan created the weather or its awful retribution on the people of the mountains. But I do think that we all should know that these are individual cultures and cannot as any cannot be bundled into Indian,Pakistani, English, Welsh and God knows the Cornish are that first last and always. The places we live, where we raise our children and bury our dead; these are our homes and people many thousands of miles away deciding that political expediency dictates our nationality and our place in their culture makes our homes somehow violated.

I am sure that the Indian Government gave many assurances of help  and progress to a land where time had stood still for so long. Roads were built and tourists came with dollars. And where there was once a kingdom now is a sub state of bitterly disputed region.

So now where will the help come from for the people of Leh? India, Kashmir, the UK? Maybe. Here in the Uk 2.5 million pounds was raised in day for Pakistan.We know where Pakistan is; we probably have had our corner shop run by someone form Pakistan, or sat on the local with someone from Pakistan. British Asians are, like the Cornish, British whether they like it or not. Part of the community. I saw an old lady pop ten pounds across the Post Office counter after the terrible earthquake of a couple of years ago. Not a British Asian nmulticultural city dweller but an 85 year old from a small village in Hampshire. Her father had fought up there in the war," and it was bloody cold he said, forgive the language dear, but he lost two of his toes to frostbite and that was how he put it."

Well great, I have Pakistani friends, I have a friend in Shrinagar and so on Monday I was off to put my bit in - but who will do that for the people of a kingdom that has no king,  a nation without a national voice and with a spiritual leader who  must 'show caution' when he visits lest the Chinese think the Indian Government is favouring him. A man with no passport, whose very day to day living is utterly dependent on "the kindness of strangers."

So on Monday, lets go to the bank or the post office and show our support in a small way to help the people of Ladakh rebuild their new lives. And then before they come for you and me let us all speak up on any or all of these.

• The Gaza blockade
• The Chinese 'advisors' in Burma
• The Chinese occupation of Tibet
• Why must Kashmir be Indian
• Why is Sikkim no longer a sovereign state
• Why must British and American forces be in Afghanistan
• Why is Russia allowed to bully Georgia

?

"For as long as space endure and for as long as living beings remain
Until then may I too abide to dispel the misery of the world"

by Shantideva

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Politics and Poetry

Image via Wikipedia

I would argue that the most powerful weapon man has is his ability to craft words. They can win wars in ways that guns cannot; they can move the most obstinate of believers to take a new stance.



The Dalai Lama knows this: for years he has used words to wage his battle against his aggressors. If he was not succeeding one has to wonder why China find it necessary to censor his words, his images and those of his followers. Jihad is a word - holy war. To some it is a call to heaven to others the knell of a death bell.
In Alice in Wonderland Tweedledum said that he could make words mean whatever he wanted them to. Post modernist criticism has taken that view to the point where words themselves cease to have any real resonance because they can be proven to mean so much and so little.



We argue about the Bible, the Koran, the words of this prophet and that. And then we take up guns, and tanks, and planes, and bombs and land mines and we no longer bother to speak for who would listen? The words that are understood now are finance, economy, globalisation. Where in those dialogues is there a place for the poor, the lost, the starving and the dispossessed. William Hague said that a dialogue with China was necessary for the global market. Then he mentioned the rather bad reputation China had on human rights in Tibet. They occupied a country - committed genocide and mass repopulation - attempted to destroy a culture unchanged for centuries. These are the words that should have been used, along with the statement that there is no place in our global economy for those who take greedily what is not theirs.

So words can matter, can be powerful. Look at the great figures of history and how they used words to move people to impossible achievements. "I have a dream", "Ask not what your country can do for you but what you can do for your country", "Forgive us our sins as we forgive others",  " We will fight them on the beaches..." and so many more. Words that made a difference to our lives today.

We all have voices, we use them to swear, and call out and talk of trivia but how often do you or I  use them to make a difference. Let's start. Let's use the example of the Dalai Lama, and speak for change, ask for change  and make ourselves heard. Ten voices can be heard across a field. Ten thousand  more   heard across continents and seas. If something is wrong say so! Say it again and again until you are heard.

A poet that I love, went for a walk one night and came home and wrote this

THE WORLD. by Henry Vaughan  I SAW Eternity the other night, Like a great ring of pure and endless light,               All calm, as it was bright ; And round beneath it, Time in hours, days, years                       Driv'n by the spheres                                    5 Like a vast shadow mov'd ; in which the world                       And all her train were hurl'd. The doting lover in his quaintest strain                       Did there complain ; Near him, his lute, his fancy, and his flights,                         10                       Wit's sour delights ; With gloves, and knots, the silly snares of pleasure,                       Yet his dear treasure, All scatter'd lay, while he his eyes did pour                       Upon a flow'r.                                             15 2.                The darksome statesman, hung with weights and woe, Like a thick midnight-fog, mov'd there so slow,               He did nor stay, nor go ; Condemning thoughts—like sad eclipses—scowl                       Upon his soul,                                                  20 And clouds of crying witnesses without               Pursued him with one shout. Yet digg'd the mole, and lest his ways be found,                       Work'd under ground, Where he did clutch his prey ; but one did see                     25                       That policy : Churches and altars fed him ; perjuries                       Were gnats and flies ; It rain'd about him blood and tears, but he                       Drank them as free.                                    30 3.                The fearful miser on a heap of rust Sate pining all his life there, did scarce trust               His own hands with the dust, Yet would not place one piece above, but lives                       In fear of thieves.                                        30 Thousands there were as frantic as himself,               And hugg'd each one his pelf ;* The downright epicure plac'd heav'n in sense,                       And scorn'd pretence ; While others, slipp'd into a wide excess                               35                       Said little less ; The weaker sort slight, trivial wares enslave,                       Who think them brave ; And poor, despisèd Truth sate counting by                       Their victory.                                              40 4.                Yet some, who all this while did weep and sing, And sing, and weep, soar'd up into the ring ;               But most would use no wing. O fools—said I—thus to prefer dark night                       Before true light !                                        45 To live in grots and caves, and hate the day               Because it shows the way ; The way, which from this dead and dark abode                       Leads up to God ; A way where you might tread the sun, and be                     50                       More bright than he ! But as I did their madness so discuss,                       One whisper'd thus, “This ring the Bridegroom did for none provide,                       But for His bride.”                                      55 JOHN, CAP. 2. VER. 16, 17.                     All that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world.     And the world passeth away, and the lusts thereof ; but he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever.        60 [* Money (AJ Note)] Source: Vaughan, Henry. The Poems of Henry Vaughan, Silurist E. K. Chambers, Ed. London, Lawrence & Bullen Ltd., 1896. 150-152.

This he wrote in the late seventeenth century when such an image was unimaginable - yet here it is. Eternity. You see words do have power to move and inspire and to make us dream of impossibilities.

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