The World as I see it or A Catalogue of Death

ow oortaOr the world as I want you to see it. Both statements, according to me, are the same. You might disagree. Which is important. But not to me. Or maybe it is. Or it remains to be seen, as most print/electronic reports say in conclusion.


Traversing across the world of information, news and reports, one come's across more appalling phrases than the one mentioned above, and even worse, there are details of death and destruction. Anywhere you look, there is a calamity waiting to be noticed.

Hurricane Ike, that battered Central American Countries, is now on a rampage in coastal states of America. Rescue teams had found 500 corpses, while another 1 million have been left homeless. Cuba has also been ravaged, and so are smaller Islands in the Carribean.

The mayor of Turks and Calicos island says more than 80% of the houses have been destroyed. Yes, we have never heard of the two islands, but we can still imagine how it would be like when 80% of homes in a locality are destroyed.

Feel the shiver when you are inside a multi-storey house which is shaken from its roots, knowing this isn't the end of your misery, and you can't get out unless prepared and able to raft or wade across shoulder-deep waters.

While in the U.S., evacuation saved thousands from premature death. But nature showed how little consideration it gives to differences of real-politiks. The Gulf Coast suffered equally devastating destruction; floods wiped across with as much gusto across Haiti as across Texas.

But this is just nature reminding mortals of it's powers which dwarf all else. Human follies too play their part - resulting in more death and more misery..



This picture is not from the Gulf of Mexico, but from Indonesia, where stampede during a Zakat ceremony resulted in the death of 21 people.


Soon one will be reported from your city, if not your neighbourhood.

One occurs each year, caused not by pious hunger, but by the piously hungry; at Mecca, as they run helter-skelter during the Stoning of the Devil.


Another stampede, another 13 killed, this time at a soccer match in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

The goalkeeper of one of the teams tried to use Witchcraft to influence the outcome of the game.




Another 88 people perished in a Russian jet crash in the Ural mountains. Just like the Talibans are spread criss-cross across the mountainous Pak-Afghan border, the Ural mountains had Imam Shamyl and his brigade of asetic followers; fighting the mighty Russian Empire. But they, too, perished, one after the other.

Meanwhile, in good old homeland of Pakistan, hundreds are slaughtered each day. The altar differs, though. Sometimes its for national security, sometimes to establish the writ of the state, sometimes because the US-led forces want to, sometimes to establish the writ of the militants, but never in anyway to benefit the residents of the Federally Administered Tribal Areas or the once scenic Swat valley.

While there are conflicting reports on the number of the dead, this report catalogues the number of casualties in Pakistan.

A staggering 2900 casualties since March, 2008 alone.

Another report puts the number of security personnel killed in combat since Pakistan's alliance with the U.S. in the War Against Terror at 730 - discounting the injured and the maimed.

Every day a headline stares you in the face citing a number, usually in double figures, that are killed. For an entire week, everyday 10-15 civilian casualties were reported only from U.S. airstrikes within Pakistan. Thousands others have become collateral damage in the war of attrition that rages on in Pakistan's once-scenic-now-rugged mountainous north.

Suspected Al-Qaeda militants are not confined to Pakistan, though. According to this report, Al-Qaeda suspects were behind the killing of eleven members of the Mauritanian Army. Mauritania is a small country in North Africa which had its democratically elected leader removed in a coup. One wonder's if Al-Qaeda wants to kill an African dictator, what love he had for the Pakistani one for so long. Tacit support, I reckon.

And then there's the Battle of Baghdad and the Killing in Kabul, which goes on all-year round. Also, numerous others, one-off deaths or in small groups, anonymous victims of hit-and-run, albeit on a much smallter stage, but of the same (in)consequence.

But I will come back again, cataloguing more.....lives as often as deaths.