Perhaps I’ll Stay with the Mountains

I struggled greatly with this sixth and final blog entry. It seems—to no surprise of mine—that my area of authority scarcely borders on music of any type, Indian music perhaps least of all. I find myself trekking uncharted territory. Coincidentally—should that be taken in a literal sense—it would put me quite at home. However, trapped in the realms of the figurative, I probe with all the grace of a blind man trying to summit one of the peaks whose coarse and rocky faces are all but memorized by me. I suppose we all started somewhere.

It’s odd how difficult it seems to be to describe the effects of something that inherently should evoke emotion. Perhaps the issue lay not in the evoking but rather in the describing, but I doubt it. For if I was asked to convey my ponderings and considerations when I stood, alone, atop some barren and snowy crag, the only sounds the whipping wind and my pounding heart, my thoughts would brim and spill out as words onto paper. Here; however, I am left to ramble: so distant off topic that I couldn’t be found with a map. Meanwhile the nine odd minutes of classical Indian instrumental I have chosen plays on repeat in the background, if only to remind me that I am nine minutes nearer the deadline.

A sombre, haunting flute dominates. Drums—seemingly struck only by hand—provide a continual background presence that speed and slow at the request of the flute. Occasionally it is supplemented by the delicate plucking of a stringed instrument that’s name I do not know and likely could not pronounce if I did. It’s something like what I imagine might be played at base camp before an attempt at Kangchenjunga, arguably the most difficult summit anywhere on Earth.

I chose this piece, I suppose, because its instrumental nature permitted me to focus—however futile my focus was—on what it was trying to convey, while not having to consider the aspects of both vocal and instrumental contribution. With the video only displaying the occasional still of the revered musician who played this piece, my mind is left to concentrate on the music without diluted attention. My thoughts again diverge, pausing on images of fluttering prayer flags and blowing snow. Between the wind gusts, the bustle of anxious preparation and a dozen strange languages sound off. Meanwhile an Indian guide, his face aged by the unending wind and the frying of high altitude sun, completes his morning prayers and plays his flute in the hopes that The Five Treasures of the High Snow will pardon his intrusion and spare his life once more in the coming days.

The Music

Hiding in Plain Sight: The Billionaires of India

In a country where the average per capita income is just $1209, over a hundred individuals each possess more than one million times that. Truthfully, India: a country marred by widespread and extreme poverty, houses the sixth largest number of billionaires of any nation. Effectively, these individuals each could give every man, woman and child in India a crisp greenback and still have more money than most of us could ever fathom. This is the reality of a massive wealth disparity, not good, nor bad, but invariably and undeniably true.

Whereas the existence of billionaires in India may not be particularly surprising—let’s face it, where there is money to be made there will be someone who makes it—the origin and distribution of these individuals is certainly thought provoking. Standing out sharply against world-wide trends, the majority of Indian billionaires are both self-made and residing in India (60% and 95%, respectively). It seems—even if an impression is merely that—that billionaires in India are more likely to be what one might call ‘truly Indian’.
In an exclusive club that sees most of its members moving swiftly to places with sunny beaches and lax (if sometimes shady) tax laws, India has built a culture of super-rich that are more inclined to remain with their roots. This comments broadly on the connection and loyalty that Indian citizens feel to their country, and perhaps—depending on your degree of cynicism—on the ease of having tax workers make typos on their assessments. Regardless, something more than a desire to create an empire in India is keeping those who do firmly planted. As the socio-cultural factors that influence this are likely far more intricately complex than a first year bio-sci is willing to speculate on, I will suggest only that a billion dollars could make even Svalbard a pleasant place to live.

That being stated, India, to these individuals is home. Be that choice strategic, personal or a matter of convenience it is true. In the grand scheme of all things, they will breeze, in this home, under the radar: little attention paid because little attention is needed. They will ultimately go unnoticed by the world, and I will venture a guess that such an oversight need not concern them at all.

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