Dilip Simeon's blog

The sun was starting to set over Skara Brae, a prehistoric stone village on the Orkney Islands, an archipelago off the most northerly tip of Scotland.  A lone figure stood alone among the 3,000 year-old stone buildings, cradling a cup of tea in the waning light.  Rachael was a history graduate in her early 20s. As a child growing up near the Scottish city of Glasgow, her imagination was captured by history classes on the Neolithic archaeological sites of Orkney. Working as a tour guide at Skara Brae was a dream come true. In the height of summer, Rachael would show lines of tourists around the UNESCO World Heritage Site. But on this day, in March 2013, there were no visitors. Instead, Rachael was gazing out across the vast expanse of blue ocean, enjoying the calm. The standing stones of Stenness in Orkney. White Fox/AGF/Universal Images Group/Getty Images) "I can remember looking at the sky, across the sea and the cliffs, and it just going that beautiful kind of lilac-y, sort ...

Dr  Gabor Maté is a renowned speaker and bestselling author; sought after for his expertise on drug addiction, stress and childhood development. Here is his speech on interpersonal relationships and health Dr. Gabor Maté on The Connection Between Stress and Disease Gabor Maté: In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts #GaborMaté #ToxicCulture CREDIT: Speaker: Dr Gabor Maté Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCsRF... Website: https://drgabormate.com/ ******************************************* Tanya Gold - How materialism makes us sad Leon Fink - Socialized Love in the Face of Pandemic // Why the coronavirus could be the tipping point in reshaping the global economy The good news Enemies in Love Ravik Bhattacharya: Bengal Imam who lost son to communal clashes calls for peace // Students Across India Rise Up To Protest Citizenship Act And Police Brutality ‘Sometimes angels do walk among us’: Teacher shares tale of stranger’s act of kindness 'Homage to Humanity' Pravaa...

What can an interfaith love story from an India in another time teach us today? That, in order to get married, it is enough to be in love; that families might not only not object but welcome such a union; that far from being a hurdle to this type of marriage, the state can actually be an enabler. If all of these seem self-evident, consider the quickness and frequency with which the term “love jihad” is invoked in the context of interfaith romances today. Consider also the speed with which states around the country are passing laws that - in effect, if not in actual words - render interfaith marriages impossible.  And then consider the marriage at the heart of Seema Chishti’s Sumitra and Anees: Tales and Recipes from a Khichdi Family, where a man and woman - despite the gulf of religion and culture between them- chose to spend the rest of their lives together.... https://indianexpress.com/article/books-and-literature/seema-chishti-new-book-sumitra-and-anees-tales-and-recipes-from-...

Sondeghar is a small village in Ratnagiri district of Maharashtra. The place the inhabitants is barely one thousand. Folks of all castes and religions stay collectively on this village. The village has unanimously taken a historic resolution in order that there needs to be no spiritual or communal dispute. Folks of all religions collectively within the village have made an settlement of 100 years to keep up communal concord. When incidents of communal rigidity are coming to the fore in some components of the nation, a call of Sondeghar village is being extremely appreciated. Why did the village settle?  Abdullah Nandgaonkar, a instructor from the village says, “Sane Guruji used to cross the river on this village on his approach from Palgad to AG Excessive College in Dapoli. Later he gave a message that spreading love on the earth is the true faith. We’re his. We’re transferring ahead with the assistance of the given inspiration. The villagers say that they’ve made this unity settle...

Just as every grief narrative is a reckoning with loss, every love story is a chronicle of finding,” writes Kathryn Schulz in her eloquent and tender memoir,  Lost & Found . “And so, much as my father’s death made me wonder about the relationship between large losses and smaller ones, falling for someone made me think about what finding love has in common with the broader act of finding anything at all.” This is the deceptively simple premise of this slim book: losing and finding are such seemingly unremarkable elements of everyday life that we rarely pause to think about their significance, until, of course, it comes to losing and finding people, experiences that are among the most profound of our lives and that go to the heart of what it means to be human. Living through these life-changing moments in quick succession – she met her partner shortly before her father died – means Schulz is ideally placed to consider, through the prism of her own experience, the various ways p...

“Reading excerpts from the Quran is a tradition but this year, there was a confusion as the temple authorities had initially issued a notice barring Muslim traders from setting up stalls. However, the endowment department took the suggestion of various priests and decided to go ahead with the tradition,” an official from the Endowment department told The Indian Express. According to the tradition, a maulvi reads out excerpts from the Quran to mark the beginning of the celebrations at the Chennakeshava temple. Recently, as the spectre of communal tension loomed large over Karnataka, Right-wing activists had urged the district administration and temple authorities to bar Muslim traders from taking part in the festival. However, the state endowment department had directed the temple administration not to bar any non-Hindu traders and allowed them to set up stalls and participate in the celebrations, according to senior officials of the department. “Accordingly, around 15 Muslim trader...

Amidst the gloom of the  coronavirus  pandemic, one thing that has kept people going are random acts of kindness. One such act of kindness by a stranger was recently shared by a US teacher. Maria Iorlano, an educator from Brooklyn, New York was on her way to school with “arms full of classroom supplies and doughnuts” for her students. Suddenly, she was stopped on the road by a person, whom she assumed had approached her probably looking for directions. However, the man’s query left her pleasantly surprised. He asked Iorlano if she was a teacher and when she answered in the affirmative, the kind man “proceeded to place a $50 bill on top of the doughnut boxes in my arms”, she wrote on Twitter. “He said he wanted to pay for the kid’s treats…and then he thanked me,” Iorlano added calling the encounter a “miracle”… https://indianexpress.com/article/trending/trending-globally/us-teacher-shares-tale-of-stranger-paying-for-doughnuts-7748543/   The kindest thing I ever saw ... T...

Deep and lasting connection comes in many forms: we need a new vocabulary to talk about love.   The 20th-century novelist and philosopher Iris Murdoch had a  profound love  for her closest friend, the philosopher, Philippa Foot. The two women first met when they were students taking classes in philosophy at Somerville College, Oxford. They remained friends for over six decades. From the 1940s to the 1990s, Murdoch wrote over 250 letters to Foot, some of which were  recently published . The relationship between Murdoch and Foot gave shape and meaning to both of their lives. Murdoch referred to Foot as “essential you” and said that Foot was “a constant figure” in her “mental world”. During a period of estrangement, Murdoch wrote: “Losing you, and losing you in that way, was one of the worst things that ever happened to me. I hope very much that we can now recapture something.” After a reconciliation she wrote, “Pippa, you know without my telling you that my lo...

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