Monsoonami 2

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Dear M

Do you believe in dragons? 

I know many people who doesn't. Because they are grown-ups, and it is not fashionable for grown-ups to think about dragons.

But I would like to believe that they are real. At least as real as the things we believe in. For that matter, we call investors dragons in some countries - in Britain, start-ups go to the Dragons' Den - while the other countries have Sharks (India) or Tigers (Bangladesh) for that. The investors changing the world for better as real a story as my having a dragon which can fly me from one country to another, coming to my rescue when bad guys really corner me.

You would say that is literally not possible. I would say - cliché but true - that literal is a metaphor. Language creates the world we live in, in our minds: That indeed the only world which matters to us, the only one we can ever know. In reality, there could be other worlds - one where dragons fly around, for example - but we live in our own literal bubbles, where such beautiful creatures turn into nasty, dishonest men (mostly men) who flaunt their imaginary power, derived from an imagined thing - money - on us, because we let them.

Yes I am guilty as charged - of mixing metaphors! But I warned you - I shall now let things go! I have and the dragons came to me. In their vast, floating shapes, breathing a kind of cold fire that burns the inside but keeps the outside intact, with their fiery teeth and kind eyes - as if to complain their misclassification! I did tell them to away, as they are only just stories, not suitable for over 18s - but they wanted to be in it! They pointed out to me this idea of alternative universes and they claimed that we have our own stories that are just as unbelievable.

Such as - well, all the fables about entrepreneurship that we believe in! It is the greatest story ever told - the imperial magnificence of American civilisation morphed into a tale of triumph against adversity! All those misfits who went to expensive schools and leafy suburbs and selective universities, who stumbled upon the right time and right place, who accidentally spoke in American English and serendipitously met their billionaire neighbour - those tales of toil and resilience that we believe in! That great idea of hustle, that all the rich people tell poor people to do, as long as they don't enter the rich-only neighbourhoods, look for whites-only jobs or compete for real political offices - is such a beautiful tale! As real as the kind eyes and cold fire, vast mass floating effortlessly, dragon, my dragon!

Trust me, I said, I want to believe. The greatest loss in growing up is that the stories must become more simple. I have lost my ability to imagine. I got so deep in my world that the alternative universes that I encountered sometimes can't be seen any more. I must now make boring stories. I therefore, make start-ups rather than flying around in dragons.

As I grow older, I need even simpler stories. The dragons demurred - go for God, they said! That's too simple, but I am senile too. 

I would like to know what you think.

S.


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