Archive for October, 2003
Jelaluddin Rumi - the mystic poet
When we are dead, seek not our tomb in the earth, but find it in the hearts of men.
Jelaluddin Rumi was a persian poet who lived in the thirteenth century. I have often come across Rumi’s poems in books on Middle East. Rumi was raised in a deeply religious family. Later in his life he started drifting to mysticism. And with that came beautiful verses like these…
Come, come again, whoever you are, come!
Heathen, fire worshipper or idolatrous, come!
Come even if you broke your penitence a hundred times,
Ours is the portal of hope, come as you are .
I hold no religion or creed,
an neither Eastern nor Western,
Muslim or Infidel,
Zorastrian, Christian, Jew or Gentile.
I come from neither land nor sea,
am not related to those above or below,
was not born nearby or far away,
do not live either in Paradise or this Earth,
claim descent not from Adam and Eve or the Angels above.
I transcend body and soul,
My home is beyond place and name.
It is with the beloved, in a space beyond space.
I embrace all and am part of all.
ONCE a beloved asked her lover: “Friend,
You have seen many places in the world!
Now - which of all these cities was the best?
He said: “The city where my sweetheart lives!”
Seek knowledge which unravels mysteries
Before your life comes to close
Give up that non-existence which looks like existence,
Seek that Existence which looks like non-existence!
Archaeological find??
The island of Java , with its location was a melting pot of many influences. The old Javanese scripts were based on some of the south Indian scripts. You can immediately spot the curving characters similar to modern day Burmese, Khmer, Laotian, Thai and the extinct Cham script. I was surprised to find a statue inscribed in Devnagri script. Devnagri is used to write some languages like Hindi. I can read the words but I don’t know the meanings. I suspect it is Sanskrit. I am still investigating.
the statue with the inscription in devnagri script.
I was actually able to read this. it spells “yankuran”.
this reads “dvalyu”
“kuti”
Into the pirate land
I was reading some of Conrad’s old stories set in South East Asia - mostly about the brave sailors and evil pirates. A hundred years on and there are pirates of a different kind here. The software pirates.
We were in a shopping mall in KL and we spotted several pirate stalls selling all the very latest software and DVDs. I got talking to one of the pirates. He was friendly enough. I asked him if was was concerned about the authorities cracking down on his business. He said they were doing it for the fake DVDs but he was pretty sure that it won’t happen for software.
A good name for a company selling imitation phone covers and accessories.
A shop was selling some old national geographic (50s thru 80s) , was very tempted to get it. But have no home, where to keep it.
Pirate shop, full house.
Lindows is a low cost linux based OS. The Pirates have not even spared Lindows.
Big time gaming. Game companies have figured out how to make money in-spite of the pirates.