Wanted: Immigration to New Zealand

**This post is more rambling than usual**

I'm sick - sick of living in a country which is repeatedly attacked and still remains completely ineffectual in either preventing or dealing with a tragedy of this magnitude. What amazes me is that time and time again, we are hit in places of immense strategic importance to this city - the trains (7/2006), The Stock Exchnage (6/1993), VT station (11/2008) and the political platforms people choose are regional! Instead of focusing on security, we encourage violence and disunity. I feel it more coz as a Roman Catholic, we have witnessed ugly acts of violations and not a thing has been done about it by any politician - too scared to upset their vote banks! I really don't want to be like the Jews in Germany - thinking it will never happen to me and then be herded to a gas chamber. It may not be so extreme I admit but I think maybe, there is a writing on the wall and I should take some steps to read it!

The sad thing is, I never wanted to leave - sure like everybody else, I considered the studying abroad but dismissed it realising was quite happy to stay here and do regular Indian degrees since had no plan to move anywhere. In the last year, after visits to the cousin in Hong Kong thought would be nice to work there but again, never took the trouble to actually search. But now, I am so motivated - I feel persecuted and now I feel violated coz these are places we hang out at - I pass Leopolds all the time between the walk from Mondegar to Theobroma [I never enter since I'm a little paranoid after reading 'Shantaram' about the types that hang out there but still...]. We were staying at the Taj 2 weeks ago with family - the only place I have not been in the last 5 years is VT station!! and all these places have been attacked and it's not so far away. An aunt lives next to Nariman house, a friend's friend family was killed - with her in hospital, nobody can go to work - the misery is overwhelming.

And all through it, noone does or says anything of value. I agree, it's brave to lead from the front but the thought is also foolhardy - when you go down, who will take charge? The prime minister makes a speech practically 24 hours after the nightmare begins, the politician whose name and aggressive thoughts have taken up so much news space and time, has nothing to say on the marathi manoos being attacked, the military needs to be mobilised from the capital since there is obviously nothing of value in this city to station troops over here and worst of all, we don't have the sense to impose curfew on the city so there are scores of people on the streets, all ready targets for machine guns fired from the hands of mad men.

At the end of the day, it is insanity - that people can be brainwashed into killing indiscriminately, that too with salvation dangled at the end of it. I ask you, which God will reward you for taking life?

As I finally finish this post to publish, it appears all houses and hotels have been stormed, the terrorists have been laid to rest and now all that remains is for me to wait till they decide to visit my home!

Hi! My name is Curly and I am an addict.

It's true - I have a substance abuse problem as 'Carrie' says, except mine is nice smelling cosmetics and not footwear. I do have a mega collection of footwear as well but I don't think that's unhealthy - ok lets focus on one problem at a time here, shall we?
Back to my junkie status - I own more than a kilo of make up which is a lot for a girl who hardly wears any on a daily basis - I more than make up for that when I go 'partay' but....on a daily basis, I'm lucky if I get some kajal on. Then why on earth do I have 5 different eye liners, 6 shadow palettes, mascaras, lipsticks - one item of make up that I never wear as well as the many different powders and glitters and what not? and this is not even taking into account my obsession with lipglosses. However these are minor trangressions compared with the mother of my problems - creams, lotions and moisturisers (CLM for future reference). I have excessively dry skin - the kind that scales if left to it's own devices - thus I don't and smother it instead in every variety of CLM's I can find.
In the recent past, this has included:

• Johnson's Baby Lotion
• Baby oil
• Biotique massage oil
• Jergen's Summer Glow moisturiser
• Almond Oil
• Vaseline Intensive Care lotion with Cocoa butter
• Bath and Body Works Sweet pea cream
• Nivea
• Efaderm & Emoderm - these were dermatologist recommended
• Freeman's Caramel and Vanilla body lotion
• Freeman's Peppermint foot lotion
• Free Man Raspberry Hand Lotion

And there are different face and under eye creams - Yes! I need to use undereye creams!
This post was actually inspired after S commented that my christmas list has more creams than anything else and those creams were all recommended on the beautyaddict blog which is a site I'm raving about. I just wish I earned in dollars so I could buy half the things she talks about - I've never even heard of half the brands she talks about or half the uses of the products! It makes me wonder how shallow I am that the fact that Sephora has some special deal on excites me more that Barrack Obama winning the presidency!

The Gospel Truth....

According to The American Heritage Dictionary, 'Gospel' is from Middle English gospel, from Old English godspell, meaning "good news", translating the Latin evangelium, which itself was borrowed from Greek euangelion.

As defined by the online site freedictionary,

gos·pel
n.
1. often Gospel The proclamation of the redemption preached by Jesus and the Apostles, which is the central content of Christian revelation.
2. a. Gospel Bible One of the first four New Testament books, describing the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus and recording his teaching.
b. A similar narrative.
3. often Gospel A lection from any of the first four New Testament books included as part of a religious service.
4. A teaching or doctrine of a religious teacher.
5. Music Gospel music.
6. Something, such as an idea or principle, accepted as unquestionably true.....

which makes it all the more shocking that the very basis for the title phrase may not be as hard and fast as we would like to believe. If half of what I read [Fiction novels, I admit] is true, then what the original words of Christ were and what we practice today are poles apart in some ways - if not all.

Everybody knows that the religion was adapted as a majority religion in the 4th Century - thats practically 400 years after Christ - and at this time, did the Gospel as we know it appeared - where the best texts were selected out of the many that were written at the time of Christ or just after. It's also a well know fact that some elements of the different religion were also amalgamated into Christianity to make the change more palatable to the citizens [I'm practically quoting Dan Brown and the DaVinci code here,I know!!]. But what I sometimes wonder is.... was the essence of the religion changed as well to make it acceptable to power and the people?

I've heard the stories of the Ethiopian bibles being burnt and the Portugese burning the Syrian Christians ones in India because the versions were so different - the Ethiopians were one of the first conversts apparently and the Syrian Christians were converted by St. Thomas - an original apostle so they would really have versions of the time what would be the most correct and so radically different from what the portugese believed in the 16th century that they were deemed heretical and all the copies were burnt.

When you know all these things and then I read what I term Christian Fiction books where the story revolves around find a relic of Jesus Christ, I am convinced I am being targeted by a viral marketing campaign that wants to spread the word that there is truth out there to be found and we should not blindly follow without asking questions. I agree in some ways with catholocism that some things need to function on faith but there is no need for blanket rule!