Hope is a good thing

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Remember Red, hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies. - The Shawshank Redemption

This is one of the most memorable quotes from one of the most memorable Hollywood movies. The movie is long and the pace is slow; signifying the pace of time in a prison. Things don't move fast, yet over a period of time, the small things done by Andy created a whole new world for himself outside and a way to get to it.

Rich or poor, we all live with the hope of something, looking forward to something. And I think to be able to do that is the right of everyone and to be able to enable that for someone else is our privilege. There are a lot of children in our country who don't know hope so well, because it is hard when you are hungry. What they need is, a sign, a ray of hope, that things can get better and that hope lies with people like us. And trust me it won't be hard to do.

What I am trying to tell you here is basically two things - hope and the power of small contributions done by many over time.

When trying to do something you feel right about, don't go by how big or significant it is, but how soon you can do it. I am sure there were times in life when you promised to do something for underprivileged. Here is a chance for you to feed a child for one full year and all it will cost you is a little over 500 bucks. I am sure most of you will be able to make that contribution without changing any significant digit in your bank balance. "Akshay Patra" is trying to ensure that no child goes hungry. You can make your contribution by clicking this (And believe me this is not going to my account, not this time :)

Make sure you don't belittle your contribution by weighing it in terms of the amount of money. Its not just the money, what you are giving is - Hope.


Subversion at will

1
There is a lot of uproar about wikileaks and I don't think I have taken a side yet, or at least clearly so. If I have to lean, I will follow the diktat, when in doubt more is good and support the leaks over censorship. However, what struck me while reading one of the articles was the following excerpt (courtesy rediff)


A group of hackers took down the sites of Internet payment service Paypal and Mastercard and Visa after they froze the flow of funds to Assange's accounts


Looking at the tone of the comment, it looks (and I am sure they did) as if they could do it at will without a long process of planning and execution. And that is the scary part given so much of business and life is moving online. If there is a group of people around us capable enough to cause severe damage, and the scarier part, without jeopardizing their identity (mostly) and with possibly nothing but their moral rectitude stopping them from doing it.