Perceptions

We're crazy, we humans, aren't we? We value some things so much, and yet for some things we just don't have enough respect. We are renowned to view a particular thing through various angles. And we call it, "perception".

Take the Summer season for instance. A period of 2-3 months where the sun belts down all of its heat on to us. One Earth, and we have but one sun to share. And that single sun in the Summer with all its mighty warmth is experienced in so many different ways by people around the world.

For some, it is a season full of outdoor time:

- It's the time to go surfing - the sun, sand and surf, remember?

- It shoos the chilly winter away, although half of the credit should go to Spring and not Summer!

- The days are nearly perfect for playing cricket, or a game of football.

And for some, it is a matter of survival:

- Droughts and famines are rampant in this season.

- Sun stroke casualties are not uncommon too.

If you live in a country like India, where everything extreme, climatically, can be found - you get used to such news, both good and bad. If you can afford it, you flick on the AC - if you can't, you take your clothes off and jump into the local river for a quick dip.

But what I heard on the news this morning disturbed me. People in a village in Madhya Pradesh, India actually killed one another over water. Three members of a family were reportedly dead, and the reason was shortage of water which led to a quarrel at their local water pipeline (some rural villages in India still share a single water source where the entire village queues up to fill their share of water). This kind of killing was something I had never heard of before. "Chilling" is the word that would best describe my reaction to the news.

Compare to this the thunderstorm that took place in Bangalore last evening. It literally shook the city to its roots. Floods everywhere, trees uprooted, traffic at a standstill. All because of water - the one cause for which the family in Madhya Pradesh had to die. And the one cause which Bangalore had more than it asked for.

The Summer Sun was what Bangalore needed to dry up the excess of water everywhere.

The Rushing Rains was what the people in Madhya Pradesh needed to beat the Summer Sun.

Same season, same country. Same forces of nature. One longed for, the other in excess.

Perceptions? I don't think so.

The news I watched was being shown on CNN-IBN, India's leading English news channel, on their morning show "Breakfast with India". The news has been posted to a lot of websites as I found out, one of them such as this.