Wednesday, April 29, 2009

Germ

the 1918 spanish flu virus, wikipedia

an invincible april - splendid weather, william shakespeare's 400th birthday, london marathon - was checked in its golden tracks by news of the piggy virus. people on the metro who glean all wisdom from free tabloids learn of a Possible Pandemic. soon a sneezing person will be given hostility, not tissue paper. soon we will jump out of our skins like scaredy cats until the media medusa chooses to distract us with the next lascivious tidbit.

they play with us every now and then, do microbes. whittle away at our numbers and at our cockiness, remind us that we are a colony of cohabiting cells. the spaniards' smallpox unravelled the Incas faster than their swords ever could. but guerrilla microbes have surely strengthened civilisations as well. when you move into my town, you bring along your life, belongings, skills, memories, and microbes with you. when i move into your town, i eat off your land, i share of my being, i increase your immunity. each to the other is possibly life, possibly learning, possibly nothing, possibly a pandemic.

2 comments:

Alka and Arun said...

A thoroughly novel and thought-provoking way of looking at the swine-flue scare.The media these days creates a scare instead of awareness because thats what will sell paper.
I remember our visit to Malaysia few years ago when the papers were full of news & photos of people wearing masks due smoke coming from a major fire in jungles of some island. WE almost cancelled the trip till a relative staying there called to say its OK.On the trip, we did not see a trace of smoke. It is more of blowing a bit of worthwhile news out of proportion.

arun

P said...

I agree... these viruses and their mutations certainly scare ppl...sometimes with their morbidity rate while sometimes their mere name is enuf to cause panic...
And now a days they breed fear with the aftermath of poorly made sci-fi movies we are made to endure!