THE JUDAS TREE by AJ CRONIN - BOOK REVIEW

THE JUDAS TREE  by AJ CRONIN - BOOK REVIEW

'The Judas Tree' by AJ Cronin (1896-1981) published in 1961 is an absolute classic novel.

I chanced to lay my hands on it amongst the significant collection of non-medical books at home. It was meant to be a 'time-pass ' on my return from Bengaluru.

'The Judas Tree' and my sister's carefully packed Pongal lunch and dinner made me firmly glued to my seat 75 in C3U of Uday!

I had read 'The Citadel' by the famous man in 1977. It had left a lasting memory in me! The physician turned novelist had a flair for words, candor for scenery and could spin a mean plot for several generations of characters! 

You taste the flavour of the events horizontally and smell a whiff of the plot vertically as it descends down the subsequent generations! As always, there is a twist in the tail, with an unforeseen ending!

Dr David Murray top of his class, falls in love with Mary Douglas. Love is portrayed, as it generally is for the middle class man! One feels the dedication of a struggling, but brilliant medical student with the singular motto of brilliant academics!

But forces conspire him to marry unhappily Doris, a rich woman for money in conniving circumstances! He gets separated from her after a brief petiod to be a rich man! The scenes are set in rich, expensive circumstances of the bourgeois living in Switzerland!

Trying to make amends for the deceipt of his earlier lover, he succumbs to fall in love with Mary's daughter, Kathy. The vigour of a focussed, unspoiled young woman in her dedication to the poor and the deprived society is well painted!

Only to fall a prey to a much older Frida, a mentally strong (?too strong) woman! Her firm actions are blatantly direct and honest!

Which tells you too much honesty too fast may not be the best policy! (as most politicians can vouch for!!😉)

One wonders why and how the author is able to write fluently about the incidents horizontally and vertically down the generations! Has the experience of being a physician seeing generations of families, helped him to weave a thread of imaginary events so lucidly? Not only in this, but also his other novels too! ..... I guess so!

Reading this novel gives you a sad feeling! But the writing makes his characters and surroundings come alive !

A welcome break from the mobile for a while!

Also the reading keeps your mind from wandering off, from why Uday Express is called a Super Fast Train. The modern train keeps travelling super fast only to be stopped in the outer part of Coimbatore junction for a long long time! It is certainly a Super Stop for a Super Train!

And one wonders if the railway officers should be trained by air controllers, so that they will learn to keep the trains moving all the time except in the stations!😂

DO OUR ‘HEROES’ HAVE THE MORAL FIBRE?

DO OUR ‘HEROES’ HAVE THE MORAL FIBRE?

'Hero' is a person who is admired for courage,outstanding achievement or noble quality! In mythology, it is a person of superhuman strength and semi divine origin.

Hero also is a champion, great man, man of the hour, conquerer in war, a man of great physique!

Hero may be found in a book, story, play, history or film with good qualities.

WHAT WE TELL OUR CHILDREN:

We teach our children to be like some hero, when they grow up. After we grow, we long to be that hero! This is natural. All of us do this all the time!

It is only the concept of hero worship that I question.  I do not wish to upset people by dropping names of some of the heroes! Our concept of hero or role model may be like some particular superstar in Tamil or Hindi movies. Or to be rich and live luxuriously like the Ambanis. We may dream of our kids to become the most famous politicians of the country (whoever they may be).

There is no doubt that we wish our children to have great qualities such as punctuality, honesty, integrity, valour, leadership, great courage, magnanimity in victory, grace in defeat, curtsy, patience, tolerance, politeness, good health!

We keep telling our children to be like the first ranker in class while we ourselves as adults dream of achieving the status of some of our own heroes.

THE TRUTH:

But I am certain that the people we allude these characteristics to, may be totally be lacking in some, if not many of these qualities.

For instance, people with political nexus may accumulate surplus money, influence and acquire popularity in no time, set up large factories, multiple businesses or health industries!  We know the kind of ‘wheeling and dealing’ that goes on to achieve these ends!

Recently a couple of famous, young cricketers were dropped from the national team for want of decency about women. Remember, they were ‘heroes’ till 5 days ago! I have no doubt that they will get back to their ratings given time. 

We have had a sample ‘sneak shot’ of our real heroes in this instance in real life! Heroes in real life seldom expose their weakness in public!!

FAULTY SHIFT IN FOCUS:

Would you like your child to achieve greatness, but lose his moral fibre as he ascends up in life?

We have always retained the knack of teaching our children great qualities , but have wrongly shifted the focus to follow heroes who are presumed to have these qualities. 

Despite good parenthood,  the children may have also got mixed signals from films, television channels about the rich and famous! So they tend to look upto ‘actual real heroes’ rather than ‘hypothetical heroes’ with such qualities.

‘If my hero can cheat, smoke, womanise, kill, why not me’ would be the logic of such a child! This  leads to crime not only in adulthood but also in the teens!

RESULTANT SCENERIO:

Such a behaviour results in

• lying,
• stealing,
• copying in exams for better marks,
• cheating in real life to win at any cost,
• poor choice of friends,
• disrespect to parents ,law and property
• alcoholism,
• drinking,
• cruelty,(in beating up the father for film money to see your hero in the silver screen at the first show, the first day!) 
• in writing unprintable responses in social media on items of politics, events, occurrences, 
• in poor quality debates almost every night on television - with crass, gross, loud, argumentative, abusive language, ( when they grow up !)
• in murders for revenge on opinions of people with contrary belief to our own!

It is time for us to turn away from reel personalities for qualities to fairy tales personalities with ideal qualities! Let us continue to teach our kids great qualities of life, but keep the ‘real heroes’ at bay!

IN SUMMARY:

In general,

• don’t compare your child to other children in class or school!
• don’t dream want to be like someone in real life!
• instead, teach them to long for the qualities in such a hero-person !
• teach them every hero has a good side and mediocre side! Just follow the good side!
• don’t put heroes on too high a pedestal!
• higher they stand, greater the heroes fall!
• be aware that an ordinary citizen may become a hero with an extraordinary action!
• lead  your life with satisfaction, you are better than many!
• set an example with your own life! &
• spend more time with family so that children get the flavour of how to behave!

And last of all, it is high time that our dictionaries and story books stopped referring to the hero as ’man’! The ladies are equally good (or bad)!

'JUDGING OTHERS IS WRONG!'…. OH, REALLY?!

'JUDGING OTHERS IS WRONG!'…. OH, REALLY?!

Most written materials say that we should not judge others!

Religious leaders say 'Don't judge people! Everyone is God's creation!' Others say 'You cannot judge my choices without understanding my reason'

At the outset, I want to differentiate this blog from being judgemental. It is NOT about being judgemental. Judgemental means 'having an overtly critical point of view'. This blog is about judging others around you when it comes to relationship with you!

We learn to judge at a very early date in life. Infant does not cry with the mother as it judges her to be loving. 

My 2 year old grandson does not hesitate to yell for me when he is denied chocolates by his mom / grandma, as he already has me figured out for a sucker who readily yields to his demands!

When you reach your teens, who do you tell your secrets to? Not to a blabber mouth! But only to a friend who can keep your confidence. See, you are already judging others while in school!

If you want a badminton partner in college from a pool of players, you would choose the one whom you judge to be a strong player, wouldn't you? Not the weak one! Ha, you are judging subconsciously!

So when the gurus tell you not to judge, it is impossible to comply! It doesn’t make sense to me!

Most of life's experiences when it involves other people, are based on good or lousy judgements!

HOW DO YOU BASE YOUR JUDGEMENTS? ON WHAT?

1) FIRST IMPRESSIONS; First thing that comes to my mind is the saying 'First impressions make the best impression’. Indeed! 

For a superficial, short time, nothing like a first impression! 

When I visited Raymonds for a suit, I went to the best dressed salesman among many others, to the guy who spoke good English and the best polished manners! So, for a minimal contact with the world, the best appearances, the best manners, the best way of speaking matter!

2) QUALITY ADVERTISEMENTS: Best Adverts on FB, Instagram, TV, newspapers exploit this trick very well! Advertisements with heavy branding and great visuals tend to bias you! It works for toothpaste, hotels, hospitals, holiday travel agencies, cosmetics and what not!

Take for instance, you'd choose a hotel based only on the best advertisement for a holiday, or a hospital which advertises a new gadget for treatment! This can be a powerful tool! You base your judgement not consulting with a previous customer, but purely on a well orchestrated advertisement!

3) PAST EXPERIENCES:Now we are making more sense! When you visit the hotel, you may have great or mediocre experiences; you form your own judgement about whether it was good or not so good! 

This judgement based on previous experience is more balanced ! Your remember the painful cramps and the runs in the morning after eating for a long time... enough to avoid going there ever again! 

4) BEST DEALS IN TOWN:I needed a housing loan many decades ago for my flat. I went to a posh private bank , sat in an plush leather sofa and took it from a manager with the best tailored suit! 

Nearly two scores of years later, I am now helping my son with a loan application for his flat. I have footed three different banks with nice managers, but I focus on only the interest rates, the processing fees and the foreclosure penalty! I have also consulted my friend in another bank for a final unbiased opinion before finalising!

Years of experience would teach you to judge deals appropriately! What really matters are the figures on the table and this is so vital when it concerns the relationship with the bank in repaying the loan for many years!

5) BEST BEHAVIOUR: Even when you have reached your 5/6 decades,  even when you have many friends and associates, you still need to keep judging people judiciously. 

A very good friend of mine in his seventies has his needs ,he approached only 3 of his many friends for support. You need excellent judgement to choose who is a good friend, keep your confidence and still be willing to help you!

6) PROFESSIONAL JUDGEMENT:I have not even touched upon the judgement of teachers,  professionals, military leaders, sports captains, team coaches who keep judging others all the time! These people however have the advantage of being trained professionally to judge, assess people and situations! 

Finally judging others is not at all bad! In fact judging others around you all the time prevents you from making mistakes in action, decisions and money! 

However it is important to know, when you judge people, you need to be aware that with time, things change! So don't become 'judgmental'

Because

• people change over time,
• situations change all the time,
• they would have their own experiences to learn from.
• 
  

For people to judge you well, do all the 1-5 things we have discussed already

• Make a first impression! Always be ready. Opportunity knocks only once!
• Let your employees speak well of you! Be a good, kind, reasonable boss!
• Give people the best experiences with you! Alway do your best! Be honest!
• Give your best deals! Be reasonable! Be kind to the needy and poor!
• Be on your best behaviour! Perform well, keep confidences, communicate!

(All pictures are from internet)

IS YOUR SMART PHONE SPYING ON YOU?

Is your smart phone spying on You? 

( Image downloaded from internet)

Some of what I am going to tell you looks like fiction, but believe me, it is all true! I have looked up several references to write these facts; strange but true. 

These are written to help people who are hounded by the blackmailers, the women who are stalked by the creeps.

The 'smart' (but gullible) folks, meaning the majority of people like you and me, may not have the time to learn these facts! 

They become an unsuspecting prey to the so called 'smart' phones and 'smart' mobile applications! Which after all may not be a smart idea! 

These are certainly not written to aid the fugitives who run away from justice! 

As always , these secretive methods are also employed by the commercial firms to compete with each other, to sell to the highest bidders namely the companies vying with each other to sell their consumers more products. They are also employed by various governments including foreign ones to steal information, industrial secrets and also before various meetings to influence our leaders' opinions to suit their own selfish needs! I expect a lot of it may be used for military purposes.

'Spy' is defined as "a person who secretly collects information about and reports about activities of a person or organisation to another country government or another organisation"

We lock up our car, secure our house, bolt our doors and go to bed at night to prevent anyone coming in and stealing our secrets. Apparently under the false assumption that everything is safe!

But little do we know that we are keeping a spy with us all the time who is, without our knowledge transmitting or at least is capable of passing on all our secrets to the whole world!?

That spy is the mobile phone which we constantly carry with us . 

So let us look at what spies in general do, and apply them to the mobile phones we carry.

1. Is your mobile phone tracking your movement and recording it without your knowledge?

2. Is your mobile phone listening to your conversation without your knowledge, recording and reporting it to someone else?

3. Is your mobile phone watching you without your knowledge and sending the video to someone else?

Let us look at them in more detail!

1. Is your mobile phone tracking your movement and recording it without our your knowledge? 

(Image downloaded from internet)

Yes, most certainly you can be tracked with the help of a smart mobile phone even without a sim card or even when the phone is switched off.

How is this possible? Smart phone has an embedded GPS function. This can be traced by the sim card; when phone is off, it can be traced by the embedded mobile chip! 

(Ref Wall Street Journal)

This type of tracking of your movements is done 

-without your consent

-a record of it is kept for many days

-Since the servers are in the West, the data can be stored and used by foreign security services.

We know this already anyway! When we travel from TN to Kerala, the smart phone says 'Welcome to Kerala', even when we have not made a single call. How is this possible? Many ways -

1.Phone tracking without the owner's knowledge is done with ' Cocospy'

2.When you say 'Yes' to an app that asks your for location without a reason, stop and think. Your are authorising it to access and sell your data

3.Dozens of companies track your location and serve advertisements based on them. The data collected by from the phone is compiled to form a full report and is chopped into market segments. The data is then sold to the companies.  For instance, if you google 'shirts', next time you open Facebook, you see adverts of shirt companies. So you know this is a commercial fact already anyway!

4.Every time you open WiFi spot anywhere, you are freely broadcasting your new address as you go! Even the stores you visit are traced by the WiFi spots and the 'artificial intelligence' gives you the list of other alternate stores nearby.

In all fairness, there may never be a breach of location enough , but private hackers and government security agencies can track our leaders, scientists , researchers, even us?! for their own nefarious purposes. Remember, the servers are stored in the West and are accessible to their security services!

Ref: Wall Street Journal

2. Is your mobile phone listening to your conversation without your knowledge and reporting it to someone else? 3. Is your mobile phone watching you without your knowledge and reporting it to someone else?

(Image downloaded from internet)

We can consider the 'eavesdropping' and the 'video-sneaking' of your movements together! 

FBI director James Comey in 2016 had taped his webcam camera in the laptop! So you can imagine the amount of truth and paranoia in what I say!

Even apps such as WhatsApp, FB, Instagram, Snap Chat, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc which most of us use do it are not so innocuous!  When you let the app access your camera phone, it does the following:

• accesses your front and back camers
• records you anytime 
• takes pictures and vides without telling you
• uploads the pictures and videos without telling you
• uploads the pictures and videos it takes immediately
• real- time face recognition of people on the video and the pictures
• live streams the web camera real time to the net
• detects by facial recognition of you or whoever uses the phone, video
• detects if you are alone or with someone else, even identifies the other person!
• uploads the random frames of the video stream to your web service and creates a 3D model.

Some of the examples are

a) If you used ' Find my Phone App' this program follows the phone thief without his knowledge with video and audio. It naturally, means that the same thing applies to the owner of the phone too!

b) Snowden revealed the western security program called 'Optic Nerves' . Webcam images every 15 minutes were taken from yahoo users with video chats, recorded without their knowledge and stored for future use!

c) Government agencies including the ones abroad can access your devices thorough inbuilt backdoor! They listen to your phone calls, read your messages, capture your pictures, stream your videos, read your mails and steal your files'!

d) Hackers also purposefully gain with was via the Apps, PDF files, multimedia messages ( pictures which we download easily), and even emojis (smilieys)!!

Once you open the PDF file, the hacker 

• installs any software or App
• uses key goggle to gain your password
• steals your documents
• takes your pictures/ videos and also
• captures your past and live audios!!

Precautions to take:

1) Be careful with your digital usage

2) Be cautious and careful on the internet

3) Install adequate, appropriate antivirus program

4) Tape your camera both in front and back ( at least when appropriate)

5) Think!! - When an App asks for permission for your camera ( LinkedIn - really,Why ?!!; Twitter - Why access your microphone ?!!) check out the reviews and prevent self harm, instead of blindly typing 'yes' to rush with your consent!

6) Cover your web camera in laptop with tape like the FBI director

7) Plug your microphone even when not using it!!

Ref:(Dylan Curran in Guardian 6 April,2018 )

In general, one can use several precautions:

1) Smart phones have embedded GPS signalling, and so they can be tracked even when switched off ( identified by the unique number on the handset!). 

But non-smart phones cannot be tracked unless they have GPS embedded in addition!... So the smart phone users may not be so smart; on the other hand, the non-smart phone users are really the smart ones - ha ha !

(Image downloaded from internet)

2) When there is a confidential conversation taking place, switch off your phone completely and even remove the batteries. 'Malware' can recording  conversations while surreptitiously showing you a blank screen on the mobile!

3) Or leave all your phones in another room ( like in the IT firms, or like in the TN hospital recently looking after a VIP) , while reporting for confidential talks, confidential work. Confidential conversation should be held in another room where it cannot be overheard!  

(Image downloaded from internet)

4) Phone Burners- These are guys who keep discarding their phones immediately after using them. This method is followed by fugitives (Like Matt Damon in Bourne Identity!)

Ref: Surveillance Self Defence 10, Oct 2018

5) If you change your sim but still keep the old smart phone, tracking is easily done by network by the unique number on the handset!

6) So use a lot of 'common sense' while using mobile phones! 

All that glitters in not gold! If you do not want to be stalked or tracked, be smart and use a non-smart phone!

DO YOU HATE BEING ALONE?

DO YOU HATE BEING ALONE?

I walked into a room and found my 2 year old grandson playing with some toys all by himself! His eyes lit up when he saw me. He chatted away happily in his own way, smiling, pointing this and that to me.  And after a while when I left the room, he went back playing with his toys.

I was thinking that we have to learn a lot of things to learn from children!

Over a lifetime, one meets extroverts who spend too much time in the company of others, dominate the show and tell all of us how great they are. Conversely, there are introverts who always under rate themselves, speak less and shy away from public. Both in the extremes are not desirable.

When I see boredom in teenagers, their standard repartee is their friends are away! Modern life appears as shown in TV advertisements to be glamorous and enjoyable, only while being with friends drinking, eating, dancing, lying in the sun or swimming in the water!

One needs to know that being alone and spending time of your own is still manly (or womanly!) Maintaining silence and your own company at times is great. Hermits do it, scholars do it, scientists do it, leaders so it!

I am not saying one should be alone all the time! That would be wrong!

All I am saying is that one should not be unhappy to be alone some of the time; in fact one should love being alone some of the time !

Signs you are not spending time on yourself alone, but becoming dependent on others for happiness:

• ·         You become bored when lonely.
• ·         You long to meet any friend to chat or spend time.
• ·         You find yourself looking at the mobile too many times checking face book, whatsApp, instagram, etc when alone.
• ·         You find life miserable while without mobile and TV (and no one else is around!)
• ·         You keep looking at the time repeatedly and wondering why it is taking so much time till the next meal!

One should learn to spend time by oneself for several reasons.

• ·         You can be silent and don’t have to please anyone.
• ·         You can reassess some of your past actions, improve your own performance.
• ·         You can continue your hobby - photography, gardening, painting, etc or develop a new one
• ·         You can read. Reading widens knowledge and makes a ready man.
• ·         You can step out of your comfort zone and take a travel somewhere.
• ·         You can plan your events for the day especially early in the morning.
• ·         Meditation helps focus and clarity of mind
• ·         Exercise, either walking/ jogging or hitting the gym/ pool is good. Enhances endorphins and you feel good. 
•       It is character building time depending on your reflection!
• ·         If you still feel too sad, lonely and depressed, it is time to consider help.
  
  

It is true we came into the world alone and we are going to leave alone. So being alone for a while does  not matter, in fact it is good for you!

DO YOU SAY ‘YES’, WHEN YOU MEAN ‘NO’?

  

My wife keeps telling me, “Why can’t you say ‘no’ to people instead of palming them off to me?!”

A lot of truth in that! She was brought up in the Air Force style, not taking any nonsense from anyone!

I find it difficult to say ‘no’ to many requests! The closer the person is to me, the more difficult it is! 

My 2 year old grandson knows this best and makes it count! (though he is only learning to count!!)

When was the last time you said “Yes”, when you were screaming inside to say “NO”?

I’m sure it is true of most of you as well!

In that case, THE TRUTH IS:

• ·         You pretend to agree with everyone!
• ·         You want to please everyone!
• ·         You want to be everywhere all the time!
• ·         You want to be liked by everyone!All the time!(consider self worth– love yourself most of all)
• ·         You want to act just like all the people around you in whatever they do! (dangerous)
• ·         You go to any extent to avoid a controversy, even when it puts you to immense inconvenience!
• ·         You are uncomfortable stating an opinion contrary to the other person!
• ·         You do favors for others, but do not enjoy them at all!

In that case, WHAT YOU DO TO YOURSELF:

• ·         You put yourself below others!
• ·         You love yourself &your loved ones less!(wasting your time,when you should be with family)
• ·         You become unpopular and unreliable! (people know you are a sucker to fall for any plan)
• ·         You develop less confidence in yourself! (waving like the straw in the wind)
• ·         You hate the things you do, when you are aware you should be doing better things!
• ·         You fail to please the people who love you!This is of importance when you're the family head!

WHAT IS THE ‘CURE’?

Say “NO”! Stand up for yourself, your time, your principles, your loved ones!

But be gentle, courteous and reasonable in saying “NO”!

Be aware that people who want to like you, will like you any way!

Be aware that people who don’t want to like you, won’t anyway! Their loss, totally – ha ha!

Once people accept the new you, they will respect you!

People become aware of your stand in issues and need you less!

You have more time in your life to do the enjoyable things which matter!!

And stop putting 'thumbs up' on whatsApp groups when you don't actually agree, just to belong to the majority!