Lost in the illusion - It's a wonderful world

We are often told that our planet is rapidly loosing languages. As the world becomes flatter and more global  and smaller communities seek to integrate into the larger warp and weft of this planet, an unfortunate consequence is the loss of smaller languages in the world. Of the 7000 odd languages that exist today it is said that by AD 2100, 90 % of them would be lost. I think it is very sad.. It's not just the loss of the language per se but the loss in cultural and intellectual diversity that one feeds sadder about. It's the loss of a way of thinking, expressing thoughts, of a world view that defined a community. Visually it's akin to the 'loss of clothing styles' in the world. From the vibrant, colorful clothes, vibrant patterns that many of our ancestors wore, we move on to the greys and blacks and monotones that are the output of an industrial age where the speed of the mechanical looms killed the patterns and designs and standardized things. A few random w...

Do we really know the people that are around us? Apart from the (narrow) prism of the role in which we interact with them - Do we really know them? Perhaps it is not really practical to know, Do you really care about the life story of the Barista at the coffee shop that you buy your coffee from everyday? Or the person you 'meet' in the subway everyday? Sometimes I cannot but wonder at the miracles of the stories that each of us have and the coincidences, chances in time and space that get us to be or get us together ... First, about a Japanese man i sat next to at an office dinner. We struck a conversation, and i was telling him about how much i loved the movie "Jiro dreams of Sushi' and we started talking about Japan. I told him that I  always wanted to visit Tokyo and Kyoto. He told me about how beautiful Kyoto is and how the Allied forces spared Kyoto during the second world war. It turned out I knew the reason why the Allied forces had spared Kyoto that surprise...