THE BOOK AND THE BOY

It was a Kolkata summer evening in the third week of April, 35 years back, when I'd got caught in a blinding dust storm aided by strong gusty Norwesters, that preceded a heavy downpour. I remember everything getting flooded quickly in the low lying pocket of the South Calcutta neighborhood I'd grown up in.

I'd taken shelter, deeply inhaling the smell of moist earth, under the portico of the grandest house in the neighborhood, and one of the oldest too. It belonged to a family one of whose members had the word 'Lord' prefixed to his name -- something that used to puzzle me more often than not because the school version of the word didn't agree at all with what I used to observe while coming back from school 5 days a week.

Minutes later a known face peeped out from the 1st floor balcony, calling out my name. A boy of the same age as mine, Shunu (Shaunak in the school register) came from the grand family (he felt grand about it too, and visibly so). Shunu had an enviable collection of books that were kept neatly stacked in his own room, and very often he used to gift me 10-12 minutes of 'book-gazing' with royal indulgence, when I used to go to the grand house in excited anticipation, a couple of days a week, during the dusky hours.

He told me to come upstairs, and I was in his room in a flash, instantly prepared for yet another gratifying set of ten minutes that was perhaps awaiting my arrival. That day he took out a book and let me feel the cover, for the first time ever (which was incidentally the last). Almost choking on my rapidheart-beats, with goosebumps all over, I touched the hard bound cover, 'feeling' it deeply, my fingers wandering over one of the most beautiful stormy sea-scapes I'd ever seen, that adorned the cover. I knew the famous name, and was thrilled to hear that the 'Lord' had gifted it to Shunu, on his grand-nephew's birthday.

At that moment I wanted to turn over the hard cover so badly, I really really wanted to..but the indulgent prince ruled that my 'book-gazing time' was over for the day.

At the age of eight, I was pretty much one of those archetypal quie, meek, unconvincingly gawky types, non-demandingly content with whatever gifts my parents got for me on a regularly biannual basis - birthdays and the Durga Puja. But that night I did ask my father, for the first time in my life, whether he would buy the book for me.

I wouldn't copy his answer word by word here because I might get biased if I try to qualify  paternal care and advice, but he did convince me quite sternly that it wasn't a good trend t all to 'ask' for gifts, leave alone such "expensive" ones, which were not supposed to exist in rented one and a half room flats, like the one we lived in.

Somehow the entire episode around that book stuck to my memories, that rainy dusk when I'd touched it, and that quiet night that felt so still after I learnt yet another truth -- I don't know why, because the episode doesn't have too many spoken words.

I've moved on from that rainy evening. I've traversed quite a distance over uncertain terrains to rech this very moment that finds me typing these insignificant pronouns and articles. And the book disappeared too from the conscious mind, being replaced by a variety of its lot, more illuminous lot.

Well, that was till thirty five years later. I was roaming around in a newly opened mall not very far away from my house in Mumbai. As I passed by a bookshop, I 'eyed' its interiors as usual (an old habit that has become a reflex). And I stopped still. In one of the racks close to the entry glass-door, under a template that read "Children Fiction : Adventure", there it was.. the name in prominent print, the letters reading from up downwards, oriented horizontally with a mild slope, as the book leaned lazily on its less illustrious neighbour with an air of dismissive royalty. Or so I felt at that moment.

I slowed down to let my family move ahead, and quietly pushed in through the glass door.

You know how it feels -- memories crashing down on you like the breakers on a lonely beach -- everything else in the universe stands quiet while the sound of the sea breaking upon the shore rules your senses completely with its eternal unrest. The damp moist smell, the dusty gale, the fading lights of that stormy evening came crashing upon me, and every single moment of that evening rushed past, of that silent night, right up to that last moment just before I had fallen asleep. As I stood before the cash counter to pay, I eyed the cover of my glorious purchase. The beautiful stormy sea-scape didn't fail to fascinate me one more time.

It happens. It happens to all of us -- Life is strange. Of course it is, and that adds to its charm big time. Yet some events, as a matter-of-factly, perfectly normal events, just happen, when you expect them the least. They churn your senses inside out, briefly before things get back to normal. But the 'strange' tag somehow gets attached to normal events. I find that more stranger than what intellectually gifted minds qualify life as, over vague, philosophical musings (much to my awe and empty-headed admiration).

As I said before ; It happens -- nothing remarkable about it. The night before last, as I proceeded to take the book from its row, I wanted to enjoy it, the spoils of my final conquest. But I stopped. I felt so afraid....

What if everything turns out to be a big disappointment? Shall everything be worth it -- every memory, every emotion I soaked in? And I've been thinking since..

I am not afraid at the moment. But I won't read the book. I'm sure that the magic that lies inside it is the same, it hasn't changed one bit. It is me who isn't the same anymore. That eight year old boy that I used to be once, who deserves the magic of the book, and whom the magic of the book richly deserves is no more.

The book doesn't deserve me anymore. And I don't want to disappoint it. Surely there shall be someone who shall be the deserving one. Let its magic wait. I'm sure it would want to.

ABOUT HEARTBREAKS

Dear Reader,
A break up
Is painful, needless, cruel. 
Modern technology makes sure 
We see every little detail, 
Of the aftermath, 
In cold words on a monitor. 

Dear Reader,
A secret break up, 
Is almost unbearable. 
Sarcastic digs made on Facebook, 
That only you'll understand, 
Because all you ever were Was a lie. 

Dear Reader,
A break up, 
With messages long since forgotten. 
It's not an inbox anymore, 
it's a thread of 'I love you baby', 'I miss you baby', 
'You are everything to me', 
Slowly turning into a kiss-less need to know messages. 
'I'll be home at 6', 'chicken for dinner'. 

Dear Reader,
A break up, 
That only valued close friends know about. 
But don't have the guts to admit to them, 
That they were right. 
That it didn't last, 
That it didn't work. 

And me and my bloody ideals. 
Nobody can make anybody 100% happy, 
But a commitment is a commitment, 
And I will work on it. 
And I won't give up on it, 
And I'll never walk away from something that makes me safe. 

Dear Reader,
A break up, 
Because of humanoid problems. 
Stupid Internet has ruined it all for me. 
Nude pictures, soppy emails. 
I'd rather be ignorant and happy, 
Than going through a break up.

Dear Reader, 
Don't break hearts. 
Don't.
Just don't do it.

[this is, on request, for a 22 year old man and a 20 year old lady (a couple which reads my blog). One of them sent me an email, wee bit unexpectedly as they usually send me a considerable chunk of my daily/weekly quota of brickbats. I hope this smells like a complimentary bouquet for the two, and maybe for their generation. I used to be twenty too. And twenty two ; but that is prehistory]

TRIVIA : AUTHOURS AND LIVES

Now that I'm thinking about stories at this very moment for a rather modestly small but new reason I came across a while ago, I remember what they say about you and me, that "isn't Life a story itself"? A grand story of many stories that we all carry, each his own....

And we go on weaving the story anew every single day as the moments that are to greet us, unfold before us. Words and thoughts add to the script that unravel the mystery of destiny as we come across each other living our own lives. Sad and happy, small and big - with these we give our story an entity that becomes its own, adding to every new page pictures and feelings - of Colours pale and bright, sounds in melody and in silence, happy smiles and sad tears.

The new pages never stop to unfold, with Hope for the 'morrow, yet desolate when sadness clouds your warm core of faith and fondness. We just go on scripting our own lives with what we are, what we did and what we will never be. It's actually in our own hands. Perhaps we all will accept that some day. It's all about waiting. We do. You and me.

DARKER SHADES

Only yesterday I was doing some extensive commentaries on the Vedas and the Upanishads in a social networking site. It's another matter that my comments got mired in an avoidable slinging exercise between the rights of two religions. Those who understood me shall always will. A couple of those who didn't, didn't want to understand perhaps. I do not believe in organized religion so it is meaningless to persevere in conversations where my comments are percieved as personal bias to a specific religion and antagonistic towards another. However it's when I feel perspectives are being imposed on independent voices, I become vociferous in protest.

While I never impose my perspective even on my own shadow, I respect others having their own perspectives because I believe in man's intellectual freedom and his right to exercise it at any point of time. Personalizing a quote of Voltaire here I say that while I may not agree with one's point of view, I shall defend to my last breathe, his/her right to have it and express it.

Yesterday late night I went back to the very texts that I had referred to hours before. It is always exhilarating to re read quality literature because every time I go back to revising it, I learn something new, yet another fresh concept arises out of the pages.

The Upanishads are summarizingly called "Vedantas" as they are, in a way, a unique structure of comments on the Vedas, a set of philosophical discourses on what the Srutis reveal to express. The fact that they do not represent thoughts constrained within a specific era of evolving consciousness of the human mind and society at large, uphold the validation of the timelessness of this literature. They have been written over centuries by brilliant philosophers of yore, as they have strived to philosophize their discernment in their own ways, each being a brilliant analysis of the knowledge gathered and its application to put the essence in relevance to contemporary times.

Yesterday I referred to it as a work of brilliant philosophy on humanism - how it comments on the spiritual evolution of man and how that results in making life better for one and all. It makes me realize the actual value of human life, and what should be the essential goal of life. In the same capacity I find the Vedantas to be a wonderful reference when human relationships are comtemplated upon. While nowhere it is specifically written to be so, one does reach conclusions about its message in a broader, holistic reference frame - the reason why the relevance of these scriptures is timeless.

Talking about human relationship, it makes me stress on the absolution of Detachment if happiness and elegance are chosen to be sustained in any meaningful relationship. The Vedantas identifies Attachment as the primary factor when clashes and conflicts disturbs the harmony of a valuable relationship. Overt attachment arises out of emotional insecurity. Doubts on the strength of bonding between two human beings arise when one feels threatened by the presence of others in another's life and emotions. Spontaneous interactions appear to be antagonistic and they appear to threaten one's presence and place in the other's life. The sanctity of mutual trust and its privacy is disturbed when that happens. And naturally one begins to get misunderstood, perceptions of his entity change not only in the mind of the other one but ofor  those whose presence in the other's life started the entire process. At the end the relationship breaks down as one is shunned by the other. What a waste.

Looking back at my own life, I wouldn't clarify whose part I played in relationships - one who started feeling insecure, one who shunned/had to shun at the end or one whose presence in one's life became the unintentional cause of a breakdown. But this study of relationships is very, very meaningful to me as a person without a sibling, one who lost a parent to a rather inglorious death, one who fell out with the other parent because of conflict of principles, one who got widowed, one who got divorced, and one who lost a little daughter to that divorce. Though it was never really an active participation on my side that these relationships of varying depth of emotional involvement got destroyed, they got destroyed all the same. And it's never futile to look back and analyze and learn.

The Vedantas tell me that the way out of human misery in such situations is detachment. In a way it is love/affection in a more primal, uncomplicated form. One should love the other as the person he/she is, to accept the reality of the person. The moment you bring in expectations and demands, you start restricting the other person. It is a happy story if the other person doesn't feel restricted by emotional expectations (and I personally don't see why there should be any difficulty if the intent and fondness is truly genuine), but that is not the way it plays out in reality.

Keeping yourself devoid of any expectations and emotional needs to be voiced out can ensure that the love or affection you get back in return is mostly undiluted and spontaneous. A few years back I would have percieved a dichotomy here ; is love with a hidden sense of detachment true? Does it agree with the actual character of the emotion called Love? The years that have elapsed since teaches me the futility of such a perception.

What I write here is my story, my realization. There's no need to generalize when it comes to the usual or the normal, or the common. But it takes all sorts of stories - happy and tragic, complete and incomplete, successful and otherwise, to write down the Script of Life. And with time the ego called 'I' and the needs called 'My Needs' get obliterated as the mind strives to achieve higher states of consciousness. I am awaiting my turn if there is any.

ANATOMY OF REMINISCENCE

Sometimes those evenings come when you keep thinking about songs and you keep painting pictures in your mind with the melody and words, one after another. And you suddenly stop painting in your mind because you just don't want to proceed even if it is a half finished eccentric jamboree of colours - the notes of melody impress upon you, not exactly in harmony. Yet you stop right there, upon an incomplete, imperfect, ill - comprehended drop of impatient emotions. And the imperfect 'nothing' seems to be agreeing to whatever you speak to your own self silently.

I have observed it in private solitude and tried to get to the root of it - a kind of deja vu that doesn't disappear but drags along,  lasts for more than half an hour. To get to the root of the seductive mystery you have to move retrograde. When I indulge in starting a long trek, I see a path, unreal and rarely trodden, but with vibes so powerful. It's like a thread that runs through beads of memories- sweet or sour, happy or forgettable, placed in near perfect chronology.

I don't agree with the established explanations in psychology books, that qualify modes of reminiscence as linear and retrograde. It might be explained via mathematical equations, perfect and solved. But man himself  is imperfect, his attitude and approach are imperfect so memories have to be imperfect too.They do not always orient themselves in a nature which is chronological. It is us who place them one after the other so that in times of dire necessity, falling back might find us in a much welcome harmony. So when we reminisce, we do not loose objectivity and sanity.I find memories scattered randomly, and at times merged with each other to an extent, even recent and old ones.It is an irregular cluster of the ecent and the old that tells us that a continuous thread does run to our roots. And when one stops, leaving a half painted picture, it means you have chanced upon such a string which goes long back, not four weeks or months, or four years.

Memories stream by. One moves back and back, and it's a question that motivates you, something like those half-hearted silent nothings you mutter to yourself ending with a question-mark each time, once again.

If I was asked why 'once' 'again', I still don't know. I mean, I might come out with a signing off sentence, but I know that I am still ignorant about 'once', just as I am about 'again'. Still it makes sense if I plead ignorance putting 'once' and 'again' together, despite me being aware that it's not an answer. And I am weary now.

I've been living all alone since a long time. There used to be more signs of life around me then, and nothing ever suggested that a time like this might come. It helps you, keeps you motivated to look towards tomorrow with something in mind. I am not pondering over right or wrong, it's just looking back over the 'presents' and the 'absents'.

Why do I feel like putting up a response then? It just adds to a list of questions, and that doesn't do people like me any good - people who seem to be all over the place all the time and it is hard not to notice the jamboree and the elaborate vacuum that actually sounds so empty.

But that always makes a sound for you. It's a sound alright. It's the part of the real life. At times that sound tells me that I've taken a long time to accept a fact, and I have erred. All this while, I have been searching for an answer without understanding the question.

I realize that with time the question has changed into a fact of life somewhere out there, and I didn't notice when. It's not about answers as to why. The fact is - there won't be any answer ever for me, because the question has ceased to exist in its primal state, and so it is thus best to keep them where they are and move on.

As I have written -- once again. 

I am a happy man now, eager to dream.... the dreams seem  eager to be dreamt too.. And doesn't that make every single day my day? It does!

And my signature line, which Frank Sinatra crooned over a Sunday afternoon Phlips radio to a 7 year old me and gave me goose-bumps as i choked on "Wow, that's a dreaming croone!" whisper, shall not change. And I dream too, as I write - WHATEVER I DID, I DID IT MY WAY..

MY DIGITALIZED NONSENSE

As I, the archetypal couch-potato that I am, continue to watch on TV and the internet, the recent massively spontaneous mass protests over ageless abuse of women, gender inequality and moral policing of unwanted social fringes over new age cultural pursuits by young artists, I wonder in awe about the Collective Strength of us, Common Men and Women. It is a calming reassurance for cynical minds : Yes, It Can Be Done. Circumstances can be overcome.

I'm sure that against the backdrop of the internet 'renaissance', the eager anthropologist and the social observer didn't miss to neglect this definitive pattern in human behaviour that had been theorized by scholars decades ago, but was not believed in entirety.
This is because an ever- accelerating process of technological evolution (and thus enabling technological advancement) in the late 20th century had ensured one definitive sociological phenomenon -- our society got segmented into smaller (in size, not necessarily so in relevance or importance) institutions -- small and essentially Isolated, that allowed the same basic diurnal activities of the human species to be carried out. We call them Families, which provide the stage for the same 'acts and activities' to be carried out, to this day, to this very moment. (Well, the 'modes and modalities' in which the activities are carried out are quite different, but that, being a subtle variation, is not relevant to the present issue at hand.)

This 'isolation', in the context of quality or quantity, subjectivity or objectivity, shall always continue to vary, sometimes drastically. Though neosociologists claim that these  trends seem to indicate that this concept of 'isolation' shall wipe itself out, I have a point here to argue about and disbelieve it for good reasons.

I feel that the 'neo--sociological isolation' shall perennially continue to exist over turning pages (or e-pages) of geography and across slides (or pps) on demography, well at least till geography and demography shall cease to exist themselves.

I do agree fully that technological evolution did lead to the present social structure where glaring differences within mass or collective actions of human behaviour are much less prominent or directly observable in any given situation because the homogeneity of mass perception prevails over the heterogeneity of individual behavioral patterns (which dominate to affect our senses on any single day, anytime and anywhere at family levels). Yet I find it a paradox that it is technological advancement that is throwing exploring lights on community behaviour at the moment. We just cannot ignore the role of the internet in all the recent changes the world has witnessed.

There seems to be a new air of hope all around. One barely expected to witness the way people changed systems in the Middle East, from Tunisia to Egypt, where freedom of expression had been usurped almost as a historical tradition. Man shall continue to dream and new ideas will always flow in, as they had done over the last 50 years. What clearly stands out is Absolute Intent and the way people used it, the practical execution to bring down everything that is stagnant and decadent.

One of the strongest factors behind this is the Internet -- the way people have used it for healthy communication, in e-forums and social networking sites as they fought to dream and thus to fight on. Awareness has spread all over the world rapidly in its most unadulterated form. I think India's fairytale is a very strong pointer about how we should proceed tomorrow, to qualify governance and administration at any level and in any office being amongst the foremost priorities of them all..

The Egyptian revolution and the 'mould' its socio-politics chose to be impressed by, are not Causes. They are the Results (which I choose to perceive as unavoidable) of the Collective Consciousness of a group of people present in every cross-section of society, driven to secure unison by a variety of factors that they felt to prioritize in the same bracket. We all heard the barely audible pitch of voices accelerating to a crescendo, causing audible cracks in the glass that shattered away noisily in the palaces of the feudal elite. It was this Collective Emotion that spread digitally and was shared all over the world at the speed of light that hastened and strengthened the movement.

The prominent context which I'm trying to point out is the 'form' in which informations were dispatched and received. Almost a century ago, a similar need to spread and share valuable information had become absolutely imperative in European battle-fields where the First World War was being fought. Spread they did, in a hitherto relatively unknown technology which constituted of a manual exercise that printed a meaningful sequence of 'dots' and 'dashes' on a piece of paper, in a remarkably simple way that allowed transfer of information in incredible speed, zipping to and fro across continents and oceans, from one station to another in forms of electromagnetic quanta.

While the SPEED of 'actual' transfer (the physicality of the process) has remained almost the same, the time taken for the information to reach the recipient's brain and get registered to be comprehended in its fullest form has come down drastically. More important is the FORMAT. Through the world-wide-web, ideas are shared in virtual audio-visual forms which incorporate the factor of 'EMOTION' (which I believe you are fitter than yours truly to attempt to conceptualize) to the data -- and that affects the result in an entirely different scale, the parameters of which are not digitally controlled in concrete digit units - a factor which man dreams to control with more authoritative volition some day,

And THAT is exactly why the process cannot be withdrawn by itself or be self-controlled. Dreams and passions are shared now in the most elemental forms, the question of when or where exists no longer a question, and the echoes continue to reverberate to be manifested later, someday and somewhere else. So we have to Got to Continue to speak, listen to, learn, share and adapt to one and all, NOT ONLY TO SURVIVE. BUT TO LIVE .

But again, That is what Life is all about, isn't it? I shall be keen to know what YOU say...

Note : **(the concepts of androids, humanoids, avatars are beyond the current issue. Though it would be interesting to observe when overzealous fertile brains shall tinker about anti-corruptoids, fanaticoids, or nihilistoids, agnosticoids, even jihaditoids, over super-conductor receptacles containing hybrid consummables of siliconised caffeinoids)!!!**

PYAASA - PATRIOTISM

Days back, during a casual online hit chat, I and my recently introduced lady friend came to the extremely relevant to our contemporary times, now oft-trodden pasture of Patriotism. I am an Indian and live in Mumbai,(my dear friend resides in a foreign land) and so it wasn't long before Bollywood movies were invited into the virtual dialogue.I'm still feeling bad because I guess I startled her big time by replying, "Pyaasa", when she asked what were my favourite movies on Patriotism.

During any interaction of mine about country, pride, patriotism, idealism. (etc..you know the drill) elements of loud (and empty) rhetoric and jingoism frequently rush in fast which soon make it center-stage, pushing the actual topic off it. I'm trying hard and am hopeful that soon I'll fully realize the futility, the futility of playing host to vices like these,) and grandstanding should follow Content, and not precede it.

I'm disappointed that I couldn't succeed at least this time as the nonsuspectingly poor lady showed strong expressions, of shock and disbelief. Since then I am trying hard and since morning I've been doing that only. It's a tedious job - making a refreshed list which should contain national flags, wars and sacrifices and soldiers and firepower and bazookas and car pert-bombings..
Certainly not "Pyaasa'.

Old habits die hard. I am a bit disconcerted, so here I am once again having a problem in problematic times, searching an answer. Pleading for Help as always. This problem compels me to go back in time so that I remember a few things.

I was 9 years old. Our recently purchased television was in a wooden cabinet, which had a wooden double-door entry. Movies shown on Door Darshan on Saturday afternoon, had a crowd of curious audience, overawed and revelling in the magic monochrome melody that came out pof it..

One Saturday afternoon, it was 'Pyaasa'. Ma was visibly excited and happy, ready to watch an old favourite, and songs that perhaps used to make her reminisce of her emotions during her teen years...(she was frank about that trait with me in privacy). I didn't feel very deep though. But yes, what classics used to be composed in Hindi movies! The gems were immortalized - as we see around us today. Sometime during the movie, I went out to answer nature's loud call. On my way back, nature silenced for now, I was still outside the room when I heard a song coming out of the TV.   
It was Mohammed Raft's voice, lipped by Guru Dutt, his soulful eyes and his thin yet prominent and deep furrows that looked over frowned brows, eyes that were fatigued and sad, trying to hide an intense fire that raged on till his death. still don't know. At that age I could understand Hindi to an extent that could cover day to day demands of survival. I hadn't  understood many sequences in the movie, particularly why sad expressions persisted even after the saddening causes were taken care of (I was completely ignorant about complexities of the human mind, of  things fine and nuanced, if unchecked would  result in complications.) 

" KAHA HAIN,
JISSE NAAZ HAIN HIND PAR,
WOH KAHA HAIN,
KAHA HAIN
KAHA HAIN.......?....."

I still have goosebumps. It was an overwhelming wave of previously unthinkable courage, of Hope  that told me that there are many things of interest outside the world of books, paint brushes, cricket and school. It told me that one day I have to think deeply which shall direct the script of every day of the life I'll live.

Patriotism is not meant to be instilled in times of war and bloodshed. It is already there during Creation, it is there when a child is born, so that it can identify it as an intended suggestion already put so that no war and bloodshed take place. 

LETTERS TO MY DAUGHTER

"She tiptoed for sometime, then found out that it's a better option to let each of her entire foot carry her weight way. That way she found it easier to sway and twirl in rhythm to the beats she seemed to be listening to keenly. She was completely oblivious of what lay outside the little bridge where her feet follow in rhythm, to beats coming out of nowhere.

That day as she turned 2 years 6 months 10 days, did she try to dance? I don't know.

As I watched my daughter finding rhythm even in a blast of beats, I remembered that just the other day I'd found her discovering melody in a barrage of noisy notes that blasted out from those ever-enthusiastic amplifiers, ready to jump the gun on any festive day."

Dear Daughter,

Now that you read these words, I ask you : Do you love to dance? Do you feel the Freedom in Dance? Do you hum tunes still? You used to, you know..You were discovering the Feeling when Art reaches out to touch.

Go out and find your Belief. I might not there, but these words will be there with you forever.

Be good to people. Be good to life.. But never "too good" so as not to speak out your heart and mind, if you Believe : no matter who-what-where-how ever.

That is one Freedom everybody has as a Nature's child, which not even Nature can take away from you. Remember, you are a Free soul. Believe in your Freedom.

MAN THE CARNIVORE

Man is the only animal who kills his prey for reasons other than survival or rather to procure food for survival, where other animals hunt to eat.

What an irony! Right from childhood, one's perception about carnivores is marked with deep impressions of graphic visualisation of a lion stalking its prey, straight out of the pictures of jungle adventure stories. We really do not see ourselves belonging to the realm of carnivores.

Why? Is a child's mind biased or wired to give one aspect of predation most of the space? 

I don't think so. It's how we are taught by adults who tell us tales of beasts stalking beasts in a particular way. We don't give the 'carnivorous' aspect much attention, predators sans the carnivorous element. Wild animals, chasing their prey, killing them ruthlessly - upto here a child's mind is over saturated, so he doesn't feel any urge to follow a hunt to the 't'. And that we learn as information alright but not in the proper balance. 

What if he thinks suddenly : "Was George Bush hungry whilegoing after Bin Laden?"
WOW hold it right there!
The perception of "danger" (relevant to killing, eating and living - in that order) is strangely constructed, - a denial of sorts. When a parent reads out a story to a young child, a story of hunters and jungles and of course, carnivores, we hate to think beyond that. Because at the end, while a lion is helping himself to a freshly hunted buck or deer, Man still stands, appetite satiated - yet he has a gun in his hand and a vicious mind, ready to hunt down a fellow human being.

To justify whenever man gives in to "Kill the Enemy" order, he has to be ruthless and cruel. But we justify genocide by fighting a war, where his country eggs him on to kill 'for honour', with medals and stripes and crosses. So he shoots a fellow human being carrying a flag of colours alien to him. Back from the battle-field, we rinse our minds off the traces of suppressed guilt and make war movies, where predators are heroes, taking part in genocide, so what if he speaks in an unknown tongue.

I wonder how we percieve, define, and express in our own personalised form, the concept of "Danger". Let's ask the first man we see tomorrow during the morning jog, "which species is the most dangerous?" . He will say anything but "Us".
One day perhaps we will learn the lesson. Someone from us only? And to him I say these words when I read in my private mind, something called "WAR APPEASED" : 

"The Hating Hearts shall weep before you,
The Gore and Bloodshed,
Each kill mocking you, 
Of Embodied Hatred.

A Child shall know --
A Dawn when Angels awaken,
In Silence, of Peace spoken,
To Embrace Forgiveness again,
As the widow and the orphan weep,
Your words shall softly sweep,
Cleansing the Bloodied Trail,
Loving rose-hearts blooming forever to prevail --
before you Hating Hearts shall bow.
Everything the Child shall see
Just like it was all meant to be. "