Tuesday, April 14, 2009

What if there was no money at all?

Have you ever given a thought to this concept? What if there was no money at all? Well well, long long time ago in the past u'l say there was no money at all. But, there were other forms of currency if you recollect your history books in the secondary school. We did have something called as the "Barter System" something like i exchange part of my rice stock with 5 of your earthen pots. sounds familiar? Also if you could recollect the golden coins which had some faces on it, dating back to the kings and princes. So lets take a look at how life would be, according to me. You might have some different opinions about this, but i will try to put down all that i feel here...

We all say, eat to live, not live to eat. But, can we stay alive without eating? even for a day? No, we can't. So basically all the robberies happen because we all need some livelihood. but what if food is freely available and is not an issue at all. Only condition is, you need to do some kind of work on this earth. If you do so, you are entitled to take all that you want to, to cook for a week. Let me start with some examples....

Lets start with a bright sunny morning... The milk boy comes to your door, rings the bell. You get up, collect the milk bags, give him a nice good morning smile without paying anything. He smiles and greets you and leaves. He stops a passing auto, gets into it and reaches the destination. Thanks the Auto fella and starts delivering packets to some other household. This is his schedule early in the morning. The same Auto fellow goes to the supermarket, collects all the things he thinks he will need for himself to cook for say a week, thanks the counter boy who is present only to keep the store organised and leaves.

You boil the milk, of course you don't have to pay for the gas person and the electricity that you use in the house. The electricians are present only to see that the system is working fine and there are no breakdowns in the service. He too just goes to the super market, takes all that he might require for a week and leaves without paying, but yes ... with that now-so-familiar smile.

Lets see the education part of it. Since food is no longer a concern, we can all think of going for some education, the one which are heart yearns for, and not governed by "social status related education". I think i want to be a potter, i pursue my dream. I make pots and sell them for free. I have all the basic elementary school education so that i will be called a "literate" person. Since i like to work with my hands and make different kinds of pots and utensils and want to try my hands at shaping them, I become a potter.

Say I am very much interested in making Rockets, I go to the proper college which gives me proper knowledge without asking for any fees. and i come out graduated as a rocket scientist. I Like farming, i form a group with other people who like farming and we take turns to plough the fields, which are of course not our own, but we do it, jus to get personal satisfaction for us. I want to be a goldsmith. I go the miners who mine Gold and ask them for a supply. Gold is no longer that expensive metal, but now available free of cost. I make all those designs which i feel will look good on people and keep it on my shop. Well, a lady comes, looks at the designs, selects one and leaves, giving me a nice smile.

So how will it be? I want to travel to the Rain forests or the Deserts of Sahara or the sail in the Atlantic ocean, I can do so freely. I will be provided free transport, free food etc, only condition i have to put some efforts in rendering some service to the society. I want o invent some instrument so that i can think of using it to communicate with someone, so i make the telephone, but i get all ther necessary equipments and apparatus from the person who makes them out of his own interest. I don't pay him anything, but i dont take any money either for making a couple of them and giving it to someone...

Sounds interesting? Well, you will feel that, in such a case, people would like to do only those jobs which they can consider as white collar jobs. They would not like to do something which can be considered as hard labour jobs. So so what then? simple, there will be some people who will really be interested such kind of jobs, they will get together and give the necessary service. Also, since machines will be available free of cost and on service basis, everyone, rich or poor will be bale to use them.

Imagine how creative the world will be... equal opportunities to all without any regional, language barriers. If each person thinks of a unique way he wants to build his house, we will have so many different types of houses. The only condition here, we will need to acquire the bare minimal skill set required to accomplish it.

Imagine, there will no longer be any poverty. Because, the main reason "hunger" being taken away people will be able to pursue their dreams. It is said that many of the terrorists who take to guns, do it because they co me from poor illiterate families and they want to come out of it. so they get brainwashed so easily. Now, if everyone is self sufficient, and can get a meal if they do some kind of work.

All will be able to follow their own faith and no one will compel anyone to change their faith or whatsoever. The world will be a better place to live. We will not require any political leader or any policeman since we will be mutually dependent and will have better things to take care of...

But what about the other human traits. What about those people who are always so lazy and do not feel like working anyways... I don't have answer to that :( !!
Can there be a way out of it? Is there anything else that i have missed out while thinking about this "No currency" style of living?
Well i just don't know whether this will be successful or no, but 1 thing is for sure, we will not have as many problems as we are facing today. Money is the reason for all problems... literally thats what i feel. So if we put an end to this nuisance, will we be in a better world?

Thursday, April 09, 2009

My Ferry boat ride to Office

I am blessed with a unique road to office. And that is by means of a ferry boat. It's not always that i take this route, but yeah... now it has become almost 2-3 times a week every week. My office is about an hour and a half travel one way daily if I take my company transport. But company transport has its drawbacks, we need to adhere to its strict timings. If we miss it, it becomes so difficult to travel to office since my office is located in an industrial area which is not easily accessible by public transport. And the lazy bone in me always makes sure that i miss my bus. So the alternative that Sriman has is this Boat ride, an enjoyable and pleasurable trip to me... Read on to experience my Ferry boat ride...


I mostly take the morning 8.30 ferry. Since this is the shortest possible route to work for most of the population in the nearby villages too, at this time there is a huge rush in the boat. The ferry has about 6 wooden benches, 3 on each side and its so nice to occupy a seat on those... I normally am the quickest to rush and get a seat and enjoy the treat to my eyes...

Well, first of all, there are many who don't know the concept of a ferry boat.

A ferry boat, as can be seen from the picture, is a boat which is used to transport people, vehicles etc from one river bank to another. The vehicles range from cycles, to cars to even trucks and pickup vans. Its so convenient to use the water way. Its a huge saving of petrol and also precious time while guaranteeing a clean pollution free and peaceful ride to office. I just love this ride and the sights which it offers on the way.

The most remarkable things that i notice along are the schools of Fish. So many of them swimming together, rather jumping in and out together. I wonder how these small fish have the energy to continually jump for so long, also they do it in perfect unison, as if doing it in musical rhythm. All of them jumping in and out together. Occasionally, you c an find some single fish doing the jumping acts. As if performing solo. You will always find the small fish together and the slight big ones swimming alone.

Then we can see the poles which extend into the river, which are put up by fisher folks to plant nets to get a good catch. And sitting majestically on top of each of these pole is a white crane. Looks like there are sitting for some conference over there, a round table conference. They look to be in a perfect harmony unlike the normal board room conferences of ours. Once in a while you can see one of them getting up, swooping over the river and catching a fish for a meal. But most of the time they are on the poles. There is a nearby uninhabited isle. We can only say its not inhabited by humans. There are cranes here which continually stand in the water with one leg just to catch fish...

Then we can see the black fishing canoes with one or two fisherman on each. They row their boats and when they fill there is a good catch, they pull out the net, looks like they need a lot of effort to do so... They sing and hum merrily while doing their job. Then across the horizon where it is difficult to make out the difference between the sky and sea, you see a lot of ships sailing across. They are so many of them, but so very far.
Then comes the small motor boats with tourists in them. The locals have made this as a business to give tourists a ride in the river with these motor boats, though there are just about 2 or 3. The tourists wave at you in their ecstasy and you feel like returning their hello with one of your hand waving to them. Also passes along is the other ferry boat commuting people in the opposite direction.

The blades of the fan beneath the boat disturb the water tearing out a way for the boat. It is a nice scene to see the water getting back to normalcy once torn part, giving us a message of unity. Even though we are one, sometimes there are incidents which tear us down, but ultimately we have to become united some or the other day.
The water, so very serene... the green salty non polluted water of the Zuari... sometimes some fallen leaves are carried along with the water or even sometimes there is a small trace of oil left behind in the otherwise clean water...

Surrounding the river in most of the places is the green mountains and land. You can sometimes see some plantation on the hills, or some factory emitting smoke. You can also see some 3-4 churches all standing magnificently, each telling a century old Goan Life story. and at some places, we can just see the vast river and the horizon where the sky touches the river and we can only see the faraway ships.


The Zuari has 2 parallel bridges on it. One for the Road vehicles and one for the Konkan Railway. The one for the road vehicles is a busy one, Buses, bikes, cars etc ply on it busily.


The konkan railway bridge is beautifully built and is not so busy. sometimes you can be lucky enough to see the train passing over. It looks so beautiful. Sometimes you can see Goods train crossing over...

The Dabolim airport is close to the Zuari river, so you can many a times see an airplane passing by. you can also sometimes hear the loud sound of a jet speeding.
Sometimes in the late evening you can see a flock of birds passing by...
Late Evenings is the best time to travel. Various lights start coming up and the rives looks really enchanting. There is a soft breeze which blows and the sky color too is very inviting.

My travel time is approximately 30 minutes. These 30 minutes is a lot of time to do something which you like. Be it listening to music, playing a mobile game, or chatting with friends or just preferably enjoying the Zuari and the nature and doing some self introspection...
Well this is how my travel by the ferry is, a lively experience. Hopefully it will continue to enchant me for more time to come.Everyone should some or the other time take this experience...