Life and times

There are certain movies that leave an invisible mark in your mind that you, even without realizing your mind keep going back to things that struck you when you first saw the movie and possibly over repeat watches as well.

2012, Final destination are two such movies that have literally scared the wits out of me and even though the scenes are quite familiar, they keep haunting the mind, whenever i come across any news or event that are remotely related. When 2012 was launched, the doomsday-end of the world-apocalypse news items were quite popular and that December was supposed to be the end of the world as predicted or left unmentioned per Mayan calendar. In the movie, even though the graphics are quite low level as compared to what we have now and what we had even then, the tsunamis that engulf the regions, the violent land slides and volcanic explosions and earth quakes all scared me with nightmares for several months to follow. I often get dreams about me surrounded by flood water and drowning under tidal waves and possibly the only survivor or the last one. That movie actually depicted such scenarios as vividly as possible. The scene where the water flows over the himalayas with some monk ringing the bell still stays fresh in mind. Ditto for Day after tomorrow movie with white house going under water with so many people standing outside and sudden winter engulfing the planet are all scenes that haunt the mind every time when i read such news. The pictures of Himalayan tsunami with the shiva idol submerging in water still sends shivers down the spine.

In last couple of years, i closely follow land slide related news. Be it South America or Africa and especially India (up north) are happening so frequently that, people have started posting those videos for fun!!! Just like how controlled demolition of building videos, with the explosives causing it to collapse inwards, used to be a fad, land slides videos are as viral if not more. Even two days before, a mainstream news channel posted a video of people shouting, possibly in fear rather than excitement i guess, watching a huge boulder crashing down right in the middle of a mountain road. There are several other news of people getting buried alive across several land slides across the world. Videos of muddy water flowing across streets, unseasonal and unnatural rains causing flash floods across cities are happening more frequently. Every time i go the beach, it feels like the sandy portions keep decreasing and the sea seems to be much closer than ever before!! Could be paranoia could be global warming. But it takes me much less time to walk across the sandy shore to the sea than ever before and i walk quite slow on best of places.

It all begs only one question - how much longer? the ancients may not have given a hard due date but nature definitely seems to be working with a target in mind. The way we keep abusing and exploiting the only habitable place currently available across the entire universe, wonder if 2032 was mistyped as 2012!!