Ravana

"Would you know what this is?" asked Steve, holding a small round seed. "I went to Singapore recently - got friendly with an Indian there - a priest of some sort - nice chap bless him - and he gave me this - said I was the good man."

Of course - most people from India would know what that is. It is the Rudraksh - given to the King of Sri Lanka - Ravana, by the Hindu God Shiva - as a symbol, a present if you like.

"A gift - what for..." asked Steve.

Well, Ravana did some great things in his lifetime - one of them was to discover the technology to mutate human beings to another life form.

"Really" said Steve, "that's mind blowing."

It is indeed - too much for the 'scientific world' of the west to digest. The western world has always ridiculed and scoffed at the achievements of other civilizations while subscribing and confirming to unsophisticated narrow-minded patterns of thought themselves.

"What else has he done," asked Steve, choosing to ignore my observations.

At one time, he was the emperor of the world, having single handedly vanquished thousands of kings across the entire continent. The residue of Ravana's culture, can be felt even today when one visits different countries across the world and looks beneath the surface.

He was also a scholar of immense intelligence and a devoted husband of one of India's traditional five perfect women, Mandodari. His capital Lankapuri was made of gold - literally. Tradition tells us that his devotion to Shiva was so intense that he created the Indian raga/melody system so that he could sing Shiva's praises.

Ravana is said to have composed the magnificent Shiva Tandava Stotra - describing the beauty and power of Shiva. Towards the end of the stotra, Ravana refers to himself as "dashavaktra" - meaning "the ten headed", signifying that he had knowledge spanning all the ten directions.

A compelling and complex personality - Ravana is to many Indians an achiever, a great hero.

"But isn't he a symbol of evil - as well," mused Steve.

Yes - according to Ramayana, the epic of 24000 verses - Rama who killed him in battle, ordered that the funeral arrangements of Ravana be those befitting his grandeur, knowing perhaps that he had nearly met his match in Ravana, who was a Brahmin by birth, well versed in the Vedas, and prolific in his knowledge of Sanskrit.

"Time for lunch - lets go."