• Please use real names.

    Greetings to all who have registered to OPF and those guests taking a look around. Please use real names. Registrations with fictitious names will not be processed. REAL NAMES ONLY will be processed

    Firstname Lastname

    Register

    We are a courteous and supportive community. No need to hide behind an alia. If you have a genuine need for privacy/secrecy then let me know!
  • Welcome to the new site. Here's a thread about the update where you can post your feedback, ask questions or spot those nasty bugs!

My World: What world shall you inherit child?

fahim mohammed

Well-known member
p929572121.jpg

What world shall you leave for me, said the face to the stranger.
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
p929572121.jpg

What world shall you leave for me, said the face to the stranger.

Well, Fahim,

This picture is a fine challenge to us. We need being reminded of our heavy feet!

She may be far better off than one might think. This girl is already cared for by people that value her life now and her future. I have a sense that they know how to make things from nature and their people have not been distanced from animals and plants on which they depend. Likely as not, she does not need our inheritance and largesse for her future. Rather she must not have her world destroyed by invasions, wars and kidnapping. I have far more hope for her than many other children growing up in the inner city of Los Angeles or the slums of Mexico or Cairo.

The title really expresses your own concern and conscience. After all, you, a few others here and I have likely seen far greater a spread of privilege and hardship than most. So we are ourselves burdened by the very fact of our own success and cannot help feeling discomfort at the sight of children with no obvious path out of poverty.

Still, looking around, I do not believe that children here in our "advanced societies" are really better off than village kids in rural Nigeria, where tribal values and kinship are respected and important. Of course our offspring will end up, likely as not, driving fine cars and consuming more fuel and buying more goods from Asia. But what inheritance is that?

Ultimately, the inheritance kids need is respect, nurturing by strangers, love, a future job, self-worth and security, not material things. Putting aside, for the moment smog and polluted rivers, China has done miracles in the economic sphere but at a cost of carving the compassion out of city folks. 20 people pass a child run over twice by vehicles and do not lift a finger to help her! That is the greatest damning finger against her so called "progress" or "Great Leap forward". No child would be left for a moment in a road in Tel Aviv, Riyadh, Athens or Rome. Why? Because the values of compassion are still part of the essential fabric of these disparate societies. When communism excises that, as in the Cultural Revolution in China or the Khmir Rouge in Cambodia, we become worse than barbaric apes.

So, it turns out, that the greatest inheritance for this child are the values, skills, resources and traditions of her community, not our own! We have to be very careful before we try to "help", educate or convert others, when we ourselves are walking in bubbles of delusion, arrogance and narcissism.

As I think you imply, Fahim, we, the great consumers, so educated and knowledgable, are also culpable in potentially poisoning the waters of the planet by our consumerism high maintenance lifestyles so disconnected the fragility of animal and plant life that we impact.

Asher
 

fahim mohammed

Well-known member
Mark, an impulsive response would be to agree with you. But I take pause.

There is good. Albeit in a much smaller number across the world. That shall see us through.

I am an optimist..but a realist.

Asher..Honestly, I have time to think, a lot of time nowadays. Many many things. I think of

my childhood. I see my life flash past me. Whence before I had little time to pause..now I have

the luxury to stop.

Too many thoughts..contradictory at times. I get discouraged often. But then

I am uplifted by something I see or read.

I think we have forgotten to take a second, pause and think about the world around us.

But I also realize that that might be hard to do when one is busy trying to just survive..make ends

meet.

I know we shall pull through. But it shall be a close call. Wishes and Prayers are not enough.

Thank you both for stopping by
 

Jerome Marot

Well-known member
Since you asked a question, may I voiced an answer in the form of a parable?

Jean de la Fontaine: Le Vieillard et les trois jeunes Hommes
(English translation follows)

Un octogénaire plantait.
« Passe encore de bâtir ; mais planter à cet âge ! »
Disaient trois jouvenceaux, enfants du voisinage ;
Assurément il radotait.
«Car, au nom des dieux, je vous prie,
Quel fruit de ce labeur pouvez-vous recueillir ?
Autant qu'un patriarche il vous faudrait vieillir.
A quoi bon charger votre vie
Des soins d'un avenir qui n'est pas fait pour vous ?
Ne songez désormais qu'à vos erreurs passées ;
Quittez le long espoir et les vastes pensées ;
Tout cela ne convient qu'à nous.

- Il ne convient pas à vous-même,
Repartit le vieillard. Tout établissement
Vient tard, et dure peu. La main des Parques blêmes
De vos jours et des miens se joue également.
Nos termes sont pareils par leur courte durée.
Qui de nous des clartés de la voûte azurée
Doit jouir le dernier ? Est-il aucun moment
Qui vous puisse assurer d'un second seulement ?
Mes arrière-neveux me devront cet ombrage
Eh bien! Défendez-vous au sage
De se donner des soins pour le plaisir d'autrui ?
Cela même est un fruit que je goûte aujourd'hui
J'en puis jouir demain, et quelques jours encore ;
Je puis enfin compter l'aurore
Plus d'une fois sur vos tombeaux.»

Le vieillard eut raison l'un des trois jouvenceaux
Se noya dès le port, allant à l'Amérique ;
L'autre, afin de monter aux grandes dignités,
Dans les emplois de Mars servant la République,
Par un coup imprévu vit ses jours emportés ;
Le troisième tomba d'un arbre
Que lui-même il voulut enter;
Et pleurés du vieillard, il grava sur leur marbre
Ce que je viens de raconter.




The Old Man And The Three Young Ones

A man was planting at fourscore.

Three striplings, who their satchels wore,

'In building,' cried, 'the sense were more;

But then to plant young trees at that age!

The man is surely in his dotage.

Pray, in the name of common sense,

What fruit can he expect to gather

Of all this labour and expense?

Why, he must live like Lamech's father!

What use for thee, grey-headed man,

To load the remnant of thy span

With care for days that never can be thine?

Thyself to thought of errors past resign.

Long-growing hope, and lofty plan,

Leave thou to us, to whom such things belong.'


'To you!' replied the old man, hale and strong;

'I dare pronounce you altogether wrong.

The settled part of man's estate

Is very brief, and comes full late.

To those pale, gaming sisters trine,

Your lives are stakes as well as mine.

While so uncertain is the sequel,

Our terms of future life are equal;

For none can tell who last shall close his eyes

Upon the glories of these azure skies;

Nor any moment give us, ere it flies,

Assurance that another such shall rise,

But my descendants, whosoe'er they be,

Shall owe these cooling fruits and shades to me.

Do you acquit yourselves, in wisdom's sight,

From ministering to other hearts delight?

Why, boys, this is the fruit I gather now;

And sweeter never blush'd on bended bough.

Of this, to-morrow, I may take my fill;

Indeed, I may enjoy its sweetness till

I see full many mornings chase the glooms

From off the marble of your youthful tombs.'


The grey-beard man was right. One of the three,

Embarking, foreign lands to see,

Was drown'd within the very port.

In quest of dignity at court,

Another met his country's foe,

And perish'd by a random blow.

The third was kill'd by falling from a tree

Which he himself would graft. The three

Were mourn'd by him of hoary head,

Who chisel'd on each monument--

On doing good intent--

The things which we have said.




To your question "what world should the children inherit?", I would therefore answer that I do not know what world the children you presented shall inherit. But I know about my children and the land passed to me by my father and grandfathers. That tree was planted three years ago:


Nice children pictures you posted. I gather that the last child is particularly dear to you.
 

Mark Hampton

New member
Mark, an impulsive response would be to agree with you. But I take pause.

There is good. Albeit in a much smaller number across the world. That shall see us through.

I am an optimist..but a realist.

Fahim - we see what we want to see - and I do find it diffucult to move out of my own world view - but time does change things - and that can be for the better...

i enjoy traveling with you.

cheers
 

fahim mohammed

Well-known member
Fahim - we see what we want to see - and I do find it diffucult to move out of my own world view - but time does change things - and that can be for the better...

i enjoy traveling with you.

cheers

Mark, thank you. It is a privilege to have you along with us.

Regards.
 

fahim mohammed

Well-known member
Since you asked a question, may I voiced an answer in the form of a parable?



To your question "what world should the children inherit?", I would therefore answer that I do not know what world the children you presented shall inherit. But I know about my children and the land passed to me by my father and grandfathers. That tree was planted three years ago:


Nice children pictures you posted. I gather that the last child is particularly dear to you.

A wonderful and poignant parable indeed, Jerome. Thank you for posting it. I shall return to it many times just to savor it.

May your tree grow good and strong for generations to come, my friend.

Indeed, the last image is of one of my grandsons.

best regards.
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Fahim,

I women of the world would climb mountains like Aisha does, despite customs otherwise, and men would have open hearts to other folks children like you have, (despite thoughts and justifications otherwise), then we'd have hope for not only our children but ourselves too.

Asher
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
p530430894-4.jpg


p268493854.jpg

Fahim,

This is the duality we have to deal with. The gap between the past, present and future of the children here is immense. So how do we deal with this? There's both pain and relief here and a lot of hope and prayer too.

Of course, I like the compositions too. But when the pictures speak so well, I forget about the structural underpinnings, being so taken by the dilemma of approaching the dichotomy you present. The only way to move on is to say to oneself that the unadvantaged kids don't know and are not in pain, at least not now. Then we can give some charity.

Asher
 

fahim mohammed

Well-known member
Some are already lost. Forgotten. Not even a statistic.

While we were busy thinking.

p562402784.jpg

To my way of thinking, they do not need our charity.

They need their right.
 

fahim mohammed

Well-known member
Ruben, Asher, Helene, Asher..

I am very grateful that you liked the images I posted.

Thank you all very much.

Best regards.
 
Top