Friday, September 18, 2009

The Brownie Sizzles ???

If you are expecting an ice cream recipe, you would be terribly disappointed !!
But you would not be very unhappy if you appreciate what is called the "Sizzling Brownie"...

It all starts with an era when there were only two colours - Black and White. Time passed by and some more time passed by. A new colour emerged - Brown. This could not relate to any of the categories and hence created a niche of its own. As a result of this, a new culture came to the surface - 'The Brown Culture'.

Passengers are being screened at the Munich Airport and suddenly one of them is taken to a corner for further questioning. Some more passengers pass by and one more is sidelined. Some more passengers pass by and again somebody is sidelined. There is one common factor among all these sidelined characters - their skin colour- 'Brown'

A "Brownie" goes to an Indian restaurant in one of the coolest(Cool, either ways!!) cities in Canada. There are some empty seats upstairs, so he wants to be seated upstairs. He is politely refused as it is booked for a private party. Having no other option, he sits on the ground floor in one of the seats where he is not so comfortable but somehow adjusts. A "Ice cream" colored guy enters the scene, is granted a seat upstairs. "Brownie" thinks he might be part of the private party. One more goes upstairs.. and some more pass by. There is no private party...

Well, these are some isolated events and may not imply anything serious in a larger context. However, when an individual goes through even one of these, he/she feels terribly upset for being discriminated for no reason. Color does matter in some cases...

We live in a world where each culture has severe dependency on other cultures for its trade,economy and so on.. We talk a lot about globalisation and about a flat world. There are loads and loads of articles on interdependency between economies and globalisation etc - Are they meant only for theory??? We need to answer some questions...

Each one of us, at some or the other time in our lives, is faced with a situation where we have an interface with cultures which are drastically different than ours..

These are actually very enriching experiences which make you learn some really important things in life. Some of these experiences are really pleasant like the one where
- You keep nodding for a "Yes" at the coffee shop and the other guy takes it as "No".. And you keep nodding and the guy in front keeps waiting for you to leave. And both keep wondering what went wrong !!!

And...

There are some unpleasant ones like the ones mentioned above.

All they do to you is expand your level of thinking to an altogether different sphere. A sphere where everything is determined by merit and talent an individual possesses... And then all of a sudden, you feel proud of being part of this mix of cultures.

Even now, as i type this article, and i look at the keyboard, i am using a keyboard with black coloured keys with white imprints. It cannot be complete without either.

Now back to our "Sizzling brownie"...

A sizzling brownie contains 'white' ice cream, 'almost black' chocolate, a hot pan and is called a Brownie.. And it can never sizzle without even one of the components..

Today's world is very much like the sizzling brownie and none of the cultures can exist without the other.

Is the Brownie sizzling????

It is for each one of us to answer !!!


Food for thought:
“No culture can live, if it attempts to be exclusive.” - Mahatma Gandhi

NOTE: "Brownie" has been used interchangeably between the 'Brown Culture' and the 'Globalised world' - "Brown culture" cannot exist without its diversity and neither can this 'globalised world' exist without its mix of cultures...

4 comments:

Shobana said...

Brillant parity of the globalised world to a sizzling brownie... wonderful article :)

nutnandu said...

a brownie in a white country is not the same as a whitie in a brown country :)
what does such a brownie do? get exasperated after some time and return back? to brown land?

Brijesh said...

Brown, black, purple, maroon, white or off white. None of the groups have mastered the art even to co-exist within thier clan.

Whats interesting is the fact that H.Sapiens evolution from the genus homo traces all present humans to apes and apes themselves live in small clans fighting ferociously whenever then interact with a similar clan of their kind.


So peaceful co-existance seems a long shot as we are expecting to curb more than 2 million years of instincts which have only grown and strengthened with evolution.

and while i am on the topic i am curious as to who added the prefix "homo" to the sapiens clan putting a perinial question mark on the orientation of all fellow beings.

Extraordinary precognition on his / her part i must say.

Bhuvan said...

Brownie Sizzles - good title..

The discrimination prevails amongst brownies in their own brown land. It is under the banner of something called UC-community, BC-community, FC etc.

So with the experience that goes of how young I am & with what we face day in day ou, we have learnt to take with smile.

One man cannot cure it, so endure it. Just have to be intelligent and smart to handle these people. This will come out of experience. I know that you know how to tackle this kind of situation. What to do mate...that is life, world & we have to co exist.