Holiday 01.10.2026

An eight o’clock start, the day began with sleeping in. Then some chi building and meditation and a leisurely breakfast listening to the songs of the great and late Lata Mangeshkar.

After this, I set out to Valentine’s Park with my trusty pair of binoculars and a microscope. I pottered about by myself observing the birds, the trees and also scrutinising the flowers and plants with the microscope. I wandered in the walled gardens and by the stream. I met up with my friend who came down on his cycle and we walked circuits of the park talking about life. He told me that I had made his day by meeting up. We banged into a lady that he knew from the park run just before we headed back home.

Waiting for me was a lunch prepared by my mother which was hot boiled egg sandwiches which I washed down with water.

I headed off afterwards to the Olympic Swimming Pool Gym in Stratford where I did some heavy weights. It was a good workout. Then I called up my girlfriend.

I popped into work for a quick meeting about a project I was passionate in getting involved in even though it was my day off and then I headed out for some bouldering. It is only the second time that I have done it in my life. I managed to get in a running jump catch which impressed everyone and the video of it has already got 1.5K views on Instagram and many likes.

Bouldering was hard on the fingers but quite enjoyable. I’m always up for a challenge, physical or mental. And this was both because you had to work out the route and the possibilities too, as well as making sure your body could do it.

I called my girlfriend up again coming home and arranged to meet her and my friend later in the week.

Thanks to my mother, I had a dinner of chicken curry on the bone, chapattis and a salad waiting for me at home. Afterwards, on the spur of the moment, I decided to watch the Hindi film ‘Alpha’. It was a slick production with some excellent action scenes for the most part. I thought it was an interesting story, although there were many cliches about war and warfare, those kinds of films. The actress Alia Bhatt is a nepo baby that I have never liked but she has given two really great performances in the last two films that I have watched, this one and ‘Jigra’. Both of them flopped. Why? Because they apparently can’t stomach a female action heroine in India. But I can. We worship The Mother Goddess. She is the epitome of the warrior. We from the warrior culture model ourselves and our world upon her. These films were made for me. The teaching has penetrated deeply. Even when I played ‘Street Fighter’ when I was a kid, my favourite was Chun Li.

waiting for life

01.10.2026

Once upon a time, I was a young student. Naive and inexperienced. At home, my mother did not speak English and was locked into the Punjabi community. My father was always working. At school, the teachers would lie that the outside world was a meritocracy. That it was fair. You can tell how much of outside reality was penetrating into this mind and soul. In this existence, I studied and worked part time. There were no women. I was alone most of the time outside of the family. In this existence, I was waiting for life.

What was it that I was waiting for? I was waiting for a job that would take into account that I was one of the most intelligent and imaginative people in the world. A creative and satisfying, well paid and structured career with recognition for myself and the community of The Oppressed, the Dalits, the low castes. I was waiting for a salon. A circle of intellectuals, artists, musicians and writers all around me. We would speak of cultured things. Live an unconventional life. And above all, what was this watcher of Indian films and their romances waiting the most for? It was love. It was The Woman.

And now? I am still waiting for all of those things. I am still waiting for life.

But that is not to say that I have not tried to make all of those things that I wanted from life.

I have been working in arts and culture for about four and a half years. I have made a significant contribution to the institutions that I have worked for, in both employment and in volunteering. I have been the initiator of a tours project, I have been a curator, I have managed events and people in the cultural industries, I have worked to enhance visitor experience. What has been missing here is the recognition and the reward. And that is an ongoing project.

What about the salon? My friends are teachers, psychologists, architects, scholars in Art History, leaders in charities, and doctors. I have cultured friends that come to me to art galleries, that discuss literature with me. That I can have deep conversations with. And the artists, intellectuals and writers? There, friendship has not worked. I have made the effort but they have not wanted to be friends. And that is an ongoing project.

What about love? The one thing that I waited and longed for so many years and sleepless nights? That is an ongoing project. Privacy permits me to say no more. There are some lines from an Indian film, one of my favourite songs ‘Har Funn Maula’ (Jack of all Trades):

Itni haseeno pe kitni dafa yeh dola

He has fallen for many beautiful women

Phir bhi fakeeron ka pehne huye hai chola

But still he’s dressed like a faqir (holy man in rags that has renounced the material world)

In India, they say that the fruit of patience is sweet. This patience has lasted for a lifetime so the fruit should be the sweetest of all. One waits for life. It is the man’s lot. He waits for this woman. Where is she? Rouging her cheeks and lips, scrutinising her loveliness in a mirror, flowing perfume upon her beautiful form. The man waits at the door. He saunters in front of the house. He even tries to walk up and down the block a bit. His life and his love is there and he is here. She is here and he is there. He waits for his life. And she? She is always elsewhere. Always somewhere else. But despite that, the dreamer and the poet tries to make her appear. He dreams of his reunion with life, this life that he imagined. Through work and service, he lives in his dream. This is what it means to wait for life.

independent thought and the lack of an institution

26.09.2026

All my life I wanted to be a writer. But not like this.

To many, what it means to be a professional writer is to be validated by publication and the publishers. That is what writing has meant in the past.

I have received this validation. I have been published as an academic author with a book and articles in top journals. I have been published as a poet in a poetry magazine. I have written for many websites. On top of this, I’ve written tour scripts for cultural attractions.

However, despite all of this, I do not have an overarching institution which supports my independent thought and academic output. The academic book and journals were written off my own back. There was no money supporting these projects. To get the articles done, I relied on an academic friend lending me a book and for the editors and reviewers from the journals and publishers to make constructive comments in the submission process, rather than having any readers I could turn to.

No resources. No network. No stimulating conversations with anyone about any of these topics.

What independence in thought has meant is absolute loneliness and self reliance. What it has meant to be a writer is nothingness. Nothingness all around me. And others? They have everything all around them. They have the institution. They have resources, conversations, a network. When you are not part of their agenda, you have to forge your own path in life.

What has been my response to this nothingness? I have not given up. Almost every day, I write something in my blog. I have created this blog with my own publishing outfit, THE MEHMI PRESS. I self published a small book entitled ‘Solomon and the Monstrosity of Legal Culture’ just a few days ago (see the ‘About’ page in my blog). With nothing, I create something.

This is not what I thought a writer was. This is not what I thought writing was. But the virtue of isolation and loneliness is that I have truly independent thought. No one can control or censor what I write, my contribution to the world of thought. I embody the freedom of expression which is one of the highest values in this society. And, after all, isn’t this what we prize in the writer? Isn’t it freedom that we prize the most? So, perhaps in this sense, I am writing how I think a writer should write. With absolute freedom. And with the cost of freedom and independence. Nothingness around me.

body dreams

25.09.2026

Whatever anyone’s concept of an ideal body looks like, and whatever other people think, there is certainly a template that I desire for my own body. Which is ironic. Because I have been known for my body and looks since I was a kid. My nickname at home is ‘Sonu’ which is handsome. And at school, I was known as ‘the beast’ because I was so strong and muscular.

I would never get any cosmetic surgery on my body. I am against it in principle. It annoys me when people are getting their teeth straightened instead of leaving them natural. I believe everyone should be happy with what they have.

But the mind is contradictory. The daydream goes like this. An alien brings me up to their spaceship. And then they fix my body. Without any operations. With their wonder technology. What is it that they ‘fix’?

There is a big list. Here it is in order:

– My hair is thinning. They bring all the hair on my head back. With the brown colour it had when I was a kid.

– I’m five foot six. Although I’ve never worried about my height, I know potential partners care about it. So they make me tall.

– Making me lose my short sightedness.

– They make my body and face completely symmetrical.

– Losing weight.

– Making my muscles bigger and more toned. Making my shoulders wider.

– Straightening teeth.

– Getting rid of wrinkles.

Whatever these fantasies of the body in these uncontrollable daydreams, I am secure in myself. After all, I’ve gotten through almost forty four years of life being told I’m handsome and super fit. And in any case, I weight train regularly. I have been sculpting my body since I was sixteen years old.

It just shows you that an accepted ideal of beauty works away at the unconscious trying to do away with the body that you actually have. You want to lose the real you in an imagination and fantasy of the body. Whatever you might think about it with your conscious mind.

the illusions of free will, independence, choice and self determination

24.09.2026

Did you choose your own life? Whatever anyone says, what actually happens is completely different.

In my life, it has been rejection and constraint that has shaped the possibilities of what has happened. And also, the insistence by all, that I am Indian. Nothing else. In other words, it is the opinions and actions of others that determine what I can do and what I have done.

Your background determines your future. Social mobility in the UK is low for the working class and ethnic minorities. If, like myself, you aim at the bastions of privilege, then it is literally impossible to get in.

Independence? You have to work your whole life, usually for someone else. Someone else in a career determines your fate. Not you. It is them that interview you, them that keep you, them that promote you. Based on what they decide and find valuable. You have to play along with them.

There are no such things as free will, independence, choice and self determination.

How can you call it choice when you don’t get your first choices in life? This is a lie.

How can you call it free will, when you have to get permission to do what you want to do in terms of a career?

How can you call it independence when everything relies on other people? When you depend upon other people?

How can you call it self determination when everything is determined by the resource allocation of other people, determined by history, determined by culture and society and your upbringing?

Life is heavily compromised because of the asymmetries of power in this society. But is this the same for everyone in this life? No. Because if you had resources, then you have more free will, independence, choice and self determination.

Even myself, because I am financially secure and because I live with my family, I can choose work that suits me more. I can study degrees with the Open University. I can spend a lot of time in museums and art galleries. I can pursue my hobbies. The resources of the family have altered what would have been the compromised reality.

The sad conclusion is that it is resources that determine our freedom. And who controls those resources. When freedom is compromised by resource and power, how sincerely can you call it freedom?

But one hopes that despite this compromise, there is some resistance. That little spark that we can cultivate into a flame. Out of all possibilities of being, one hopes there is one possibility of being the authentic self. Because outside of the material domain, there is the domain of the thought and the imagination. And that is the one place where the seeker of truth can be truly free. It is Jesus that said it: the truth shall set you free. That there is a spiritual kingdom that is not of this world. It is not heaven. It is education.

a bounty of kindnesses

23.09.2026

How often does the universe conspire in its acts to unify an expression of emotion, to orchestrate and lure a particular response? Unexpectedly, this happened today.

After having been beat up by this existence, as is often the case in the lesser of the three worlds, I received the first kindness in the morning. I sent my self-published book on ‘King Solomon and the Monstrosity of the Law’ to a reader and a mentor and he boosted me up. He encouraged me to write more. He stroked the mane and the spirit of the writer.

And then, when I was writing to thank him for what he did for me, telling him that I had finally submitted my Art History dissertation to a journal because of his encouragement to stay in the game, thinking about his words to me, the second kindness was showered on my head. More praise. The recognition of achievement.

Kind words from those who have always been kind. Kind words from those that we look up to, from those that have looked after us.

They do say a truth, which is that you never know what the effect of your kindness will be on someone. What they might be going through and what a difference it can make to have a few kind words. To know that someone cares about you, however separated in time and circumstance they might be from you.

Inside kindness, there is a giant of strength and power. In this hard world, with its inner core of ice, with its splinters and thorns, there are sparks of kindness which offer warmth and light. Few and far between the deserted plains and barren distances, we find these sparks that point the way in life. They tell us that what we did was worthwhile. What we do is worthwhile. What we will do is worthwhile. They tell us that we are worthwhile. That we matter.

If only we could let everyone in this world know that they mattered. If only this world was kind. If only life was valued in this world. If only kindness was valued in this world. But it is because the world is what it is that kindness carries its golden aura with it, because the contrast and the exception is what gives the act its splendour and nobility:

to have a kindness is to meet god in hell

what is bad becomes better

and what is sad becomes well

reflecting on an unsettled life

23.09.2026

While I was born and raised in England, my family in India are poor. So, my whole life, I have been hearing about poverty. I have been hearing about the insecurity and precarity that comes with an unsettled life.

My family in India, they believe that when they get to a developed Western country, their life will be settled. The lives of their children will be settled. This is what my grandfather believed when he came to this country. That’s the future that he imagined for his children and his grandchildren.

But my life has never been settled. I have had to struggle. Just like they dream of a settled life, so I have had to dream of a settled life.

The difference between the ones from India and the ones from here is that they have arranged marriages and they have their own unified community. So they fit in and they get hitched. They’re willing to work in whatever job they find because it is better than being unemployed in India or working for peanuts.

Here, if you are Indian and choose not to get an arranged marriage, try meeting someone. Try starting a family. Try getting the jobs that you are qualified for doing and would excel in. It all hitches on someone giving you a chance or an opportunity. When they cannot. Because of the racism in this country.

So, just like the origin of my poor family in India in the caste of the Dalits and Untouchables has clouded their whole life and made it a struggle, making their lives unsettled, so has my ethnic origin as an Indian person.

But still, I have refused to give up my Indian culture. I have refused to accept the conformity in this country or pander to the unjust expectations that we must all follow convention. Is it worth it? It has come at a great personal cost. The greatest personal cost. Yet if it was easy and convenient to be authentic and true to oneself, then the world would not be what it is.

The virtue of an unsettled life is that this is a life that I have created for myself despite everyone else. Despite the insane pressure from the Indian and the British community, I have forged my own way through life. I have done what I thought is right. I have made my own choices. I have thought out life in my own way.

The reward is isolation, uncertainty, the lack of a resolution or a happy ending. No love. The achievement? Dignity and self respect. We come from the honour culture. It is the greatest prize.

an unsettled life

22.09.2026

When I was a young man, the focus was on getting settled in life. So I studied hard. I did 6 ‘A’ Levels and got the best results in sixth form. I went to a top university, the London School of Economics, in the hardest subject to get into, Law. I graduated in the top 10% of the year. I volunteered in the law courts, I wrote in the university newspaper. I worked in Pizza Hut. I had work experience as well as education. I worked really hard.

All I wanted was to get settled. Get a good stable and satisfying job. Raise a family and children. Have my own house.

Flash forward in time. I am almost forty four years old and I am still not settled in life. Everything is up in the air. How did I cope all of these years, twenty six years, in an unsettled life?

The main thing is that I did not blame myself. I blamed other people. And I was justified. Not only had I worked harder than everyone else, but I was naturally intelligent and I could do anything. The fact that I could not get the work I wanted was not because I did anything wrong. I passed the interviews. And even when I did so, they would put me on the reserve list. You would ask for feedback and they would say that you did not do anything wrong. I knew I was being discriminated against.

Without the work, there was also no love. This was the world that I was in.

And the loneliness? I coped by learning. Learning and learning and learning. Because after all, you would always have books. You would always find fulfilment in learning and reading. I had the capacity for complete loneliness with my books. This what got me through five degrees including a PhD.

What created this resilience then? It was ego first. The ego of knowing how great I was. I never lost the sense of my own value. The brilliance of my mind. When I was faced with disappointment after disappointment, when I saw those that were not as talented as me getting ahead, I depended on my ego, self-belief and self-valuation to get me through things. And then, it was the love of learning which would nurture and nourish, when the world is cold, hostile and stupid.

My parents supported me. In my culture, this is my right. But still, it was them that supported me.

So even though I have been unsettled throughout my whole adult life, still I have survived and prospered. I live in a beautiful home which is because of my hard work. I have a brilliant and erudite mind and can enjoy my own company because I have invested in learning. I have been working in jobs that I find a lot of fun for the past few years. And I have the grace to accept that I can only control my own performance and that I cannot change the injustice, immorality and the unfairness of this world.

That’s right. I still blame everyone else and not myself. I see myself as a victim and them as the oppressors. And I have never given up hope. I might have lived my whole adult life in an unsettled way but I still look forward to being settled one day. I give myself the same advice that I give to everyone else that is struggling: Faust got to heaven because he strove for it. Like Goethe, I am a genius. And I accept the words and the lesson of a genius. We are fellow spirits, although his early disappointments in love which influenced his work were adequately compensated because he found a relationship later in life. Goethe’s philosophy is my philosophy. This is the philosophy of the unsettled.

Salman Khan’s Fury at Body Shaming and The Indian Defence of the Mother

21.09.2026

Recently on a reality TV show, the Indian film star Salman Khan called out the trolls that were body shaming him and his loved ones. The trolls had made remarks about Katrina Kaif and her weight after she had delivered a baby. They had criticised the looks of Salman’s brother Sohail and they had criticised Salman Khan for being fat too. There were other actors mentioned that were trolled.

After calling out the trolls, Salman Khan had taken off his top and stood there, inviting the trolls to criticise his body.

Here, we have the Indian philosophy of the defence of the mother. The whole game exposed.

First, they criticised Katrina Kaif, The Mother. She was once the lover of Salman Khan. They had attacked The Mother of the son lover, Salman Khan. Remember that India is a culture that worships the Mother Queen, The Mother with the Tiger, The Invincible, Durga. The bhakti of the son lover is what infiltrates and creates Indian culture.

Salman Khan becomes one with The Mother in his protest. They criticised The Mother for being fat. They criticised Salman Khan for being fat. It is this oneness with The Mother that is the condition of bhakti. It is the protection of The Mother that is the duty of the son and the lover. Protection of her becomes protection of the self, of bhakti.

Salman includes his brother in his defence against the trolls. He includes actors like Varun Dhawan. So, the whole community is now protected. Protection of The Mother is protection of the whole community.

Finally, look at Salman Khan’s protest. He literally becomes The Mother. He becomes the other form of Durga, the Mother Queen. He becomes the Dark Mother, Kali. She who is naked. She who wars naked. This is the ultimate expression of The Mother’s anger.

Proving that the son lover models his entire being and action on The Mother. Because this is what love means. This is what it means to protect.

the teaching of hunger

19.09.2026

How do you teach someone hunger?

If social media news items are to be believed, Cristiano Ronaldo said, when he watched his son enter the sphere of professional football, he said that the hunger was the most difficult thing to achieve, to learn. Because his son had been raised in a soft life of luxury. Because his son had not lived through poverty and hardship with only the hunger to raise him above it.

And I? I have been taught this hunger.

Where did I learn this hunger? True enough, I was raised in a council house estate. With a bedroom I shared with my brothers. School dinners were too expensive to buy so we had packed lunches. I wore hand me downs. We had to work from the earliest age that we could as we didn’t get much pocket money. So that is where I learnt this hunger.

But above and beyond that, I was raised by the very poor. My grandfather lived in absolute poverty in India because his father had deserted the family. My grandfather and his brothers went blind because of malnutrition. So that is where I learnt this hunger.

Where did I learn this hunger? From birth. When I was born, the nurses said that I kept on drinking and drinking the milk. I have been hungry from birth.

And this mind, this mind is hunger. The mind consumes the most energy in the body and my mind keeps on working and working and working. I am hungry almost all of the time yet I never put on any weight. This super fast mind means that I have a super fast metabolism. So that is where I learnt this hunger.

And where does this hunger go? It has gone on five degrees, six ‘A’ Levels and eleven GCSEs. All with top grades. It has gone on writing a book, articles in top journals, writing after writing in websites, newspapers, newsletters. Going after experience after experience to develop and see. The insatiable hunger to be a scholar. A writer. A man of the truth. Reading book after book after book, article after article, chasing knowledge after knowledge. Because there is a difference between wanting to learn and having to learn.

I am all hunger. There is no one that is more ambitious and more driven. I have learnt this hunger. In hunger, none can match me.