http://audioboo.fm/boos/1501870-am-i-that-old

ALEXANDER - The Great's Last 3 Wishes (from an e-mail)
Alexander, after conquering many kingdoms, was returning home. On the way, he
fell ill and it took him to his death bed. With death staring him in his face, Alexander
realized how his conquests, his great army, his sharp sword and all his wealth were of no consequence.
He now longed to reach home to see his mother's face and bid her his last adieu. But, he had to accept the fact that his sinking health would not permit him to reach his distant homeland.
So, the mighty conqueror lay prostrate and pale, helplessly waiting to breathe his last.
He called his generals and said, "I will depart from this world soon, I have three wishes, please carry them out without fail."
With tears flowing down their cheeks, the generals agreed to abide by their king's last
wishes.1) "My first desire is that", said Alexander, "My physicians alone must" carry
my coffin." 2) After a pause, he continued, "Secondly, I desire that when my coffin is
being carried to the grave, the path leading to the graveyard be strewn with gold, silver and precious stones which I have collected in my treasury".3) The king felt exhausted after saying this. He took a minute's rest and continued. "My third and last wish is that both my hands be kept dangling out of my coffin".
The people who had gathered there wondered at the king's strange wishes. But no one
dared bring the question to their lips.. Alexander's favorite general kissed his hand and
pressed them to his heart. "O king, we assure you that all your wishes will be fulfilled.
But tell us why do you make such strange wishes?"
At this Alexander took a deep breath and said: "I would like the world to know of the
three lessons I have just learnt.
Lessons to be learnt from last 3 wishes of King Alexander...I want my physicians to carry my coffin because people should realize that no doctor on this earth can really cure any body. They are powerless and cannot save a person from the clutches of death.So let not people take life for granted.
The second wish of strewing gold, silver and other riches on the path to the graveyard is to tell People that not even a fraction of gold will come with me. I spent all my life Greed of Power, earning riches but cannot take anything with me.
Let people realize that it is a sheer waste of time to chase wealth.
And about my third wish of having my hands dangling out of the coffin, I wish people
to know that I came empty handed into this world and empty handed I go out of this
world".
With these words, the king closed his eyes.
Soon he let death conquer him and breathed his last. . . .
LESSON TO LEARN:
Remember, your Health is in your own hands, look after it.
Wealth is only meaningful if you can share and also enjoy
while you are still alive, kicking & healthy.
What you do for yourself, dies with you.
But what you do for others will live for ever.
Leave the “Legacy” behind.

LEARN ENGLISH – 20

Khaliqur Rahman

We’ve learnt quite a lot so far. Let’s take a stock of what we’ve learnt up to now. We’ve learnt how to make State Verb Sentences, Modal Verb Sentences and Plus-Action Sentences from the five Tables. In all we now know how to make 7 different types of sentences. We also know how to make negative and interrogative sentences. We’ve also learnt the grammar of Questions. Now we can ask questions of various types. We can ask formal and informal questions. We can also ask polite and more polite questions.

What are the functions that we can perform with the help of the language tools that we possess now. We can introduce and describe people and places. We can also talk about events with the help of the 5 Tables.

For revision, can I introduce and describe two persons together and ask you to let me know if you know who is who.

He is 74 and he is 79. He is not very tall and he is not very tall, either. He has a Gandhi topee and he has a turban. He has specs and he has specs, too. He has a dhoti and he has Aligarhi pyjamas. He has a kurta. He, too, has a kurta with sleeves and cuffs. And, he has a waist coat (Sadri or Nehru bandi).

He is 74 and has a large and healthy heart. He is 79 and has a ‘surgical’ and ‘heavy’ heart. He can reach heights of humanity. He can reach depths of our unruly Parliament. He can fast and run. Can he? He has no security around. He has the security of gunmen. He can handle thousands in the crowd. Can he control the Parliament?

He has a room in a temple. He has a sarkari residence. He has no car. He has sarkari cars. He is PM and he is PM, too: People’s Man.

Here, I wish to tell and remind the learners that now we have simple but very effective tools  to express ourselves and talk about events. Let me now try to write down the events in the recent past that have affected me most. Here I go.

I was lucky. I switched on my television set. It was 15 August 2011. Anna Hazare! He was a perfect picture of meditation. He was sitting at Rajghat. They said he would sit for half an hour. But he sat for more than an hour. Did he get engaged in heart to heart talk with the Father of the Nation? The very sight overwhelmed me when Anna broke down in tears.

The next morning they arrested him from his residence. They put him in jail. The men in power made the Police and the judge to take wrong steps. But they realised their mistakes. They issued release orders. Anna didn’t acceptt!

Anna’s supporters gathered in front of Tihar in large numbers. Supporters gathered in the country, in the US, in Britain, in Canada and in Australia.

Ramlila Maidan got only half ready. Anna came out, out in the open without security! It began to rain. The crowd got wet but did not leave. At Rajghat he sprinted!

Ramlila Maidan was a perfect example of Local Self Government. It presented a perfect picture of peace and non-violence and self discipline.

After ten long and difficult days of determination, patience and perseverance, Anna Hazare and the People of India triumphed! It is Manmohan Singh’s victory over the PM! From now onwards, let’s hope Parliament is People and People is Parliament!

Well, Readers of this column and Learners at school, I’ve tried to narrate the events in simple sentences from one of the five Tables.

I would like the Learners to send in their versions in simple sentences, seven types. I would also like Central Chronicle to get sponsors to give away prizes.

LEARN ENGLISH 5

Khaliqur Rahman

In the earlier lessons we’ve seen that quite a few rules of English grammar depend on the Sounds of English (44) rather than on Letters. We must therefore learn the Sounds of English and learn to see them and the Letters of English in separate compartments.

Unfortunately, teaching of English in India generally starts with the letters. This has a very strong negative influence on most of us. In trying to pronounce an English word we are most often guided by its spelling. The result is spelling pronunciation, which in most cases is not the accepted standard pronunciation.

In Written English, we add –s  or  –es  to singular nouns to get their regular plurals. We add –s or –es  again to VbI (Verb in the first form) so that it agrees with singular subjects (except I and singular you).

Most of us, therefore, pronounce the following words with a sa- sound to mark plurality of nouns or agreement of verbs with subjects and say: cats dogs* churches* stands* hisses*. These are spelling pronunciations and far from the accepted standards.

The standard pronunciations of these words are.

Cats   dogz   churchiz   standz   hissiz

Look at the following words-

caps  bats  kicks  puffs  sheaths

These words end in voiceless consonants. There are only 9 voiceless consonants in English: pa  ta  ka  fa  tha  sa  sha   ha and cha .The –s in spelling in all cases is pronounced as  sa .

Look at these words now-

Nibs  pens  pads  bags  beams  bills  gives  booths  seas  cows  blows

These words end in voiced sounds (except the 9 voiceless consonants stated above all the other consonants and the vowels are voiced) and the –s in spelling in all cases is pronounced as za.

Look at these words too-

Misses   doses   dishes   garages   marches   judges

These words end in one of the sa za sha zha cha ja sounds and the –es in spelling in all cases is pronounced as  iz.

When you pronounce a voiceless sound you don’t vibrate your vocal cords, but when you pronounce a voiced sound you do vibrate your vocal cords, and I must tell you here that all vowel sounds are voiced and sa za sha zha cha ja  are  sibilants.

There’s another interesting pattern in pronunciation and this concerns the addition of –ed (in the written form) to the first form of the regular verbs to get their second and third forms. Here again, you’ll notice that the voiceless sounds behave in one way and the voiced sounds in another and in the spoken form, just like sa  za  iz,  ta  da  id  are added to the VbI whereas in the written form you add –ed. 

If you’ve followed the pattern, you should be able to tell me how you’ll pronounce asked  begged  wanted  and  added.

Well, if the verb ends in a voiceless sound, you’ll add ta. If the verb ends in a voiced sound, you’ll add da and, if the verb ends in ta or da, you’ll add  id.

So, you’ll hear a ta sound after ask, a da sound after beg and  id after want or land.

Aren’t you pleasantly surprised after you’ve come to know about these regular patterns in pronunciation? But do you think the English child who acquires English (its mother tongue) has to learn these rules? No! These rules are the head ache for the Second Language Teachers and can be of great help and perhaps a source of motivation for the Second Language Learners!

People say Spoken English has no grammar. Will you go by them now?

LEARN ENGLISH – 4

Khaliqur Rahman

The Learners in general are not familiar with the Sounds of English as in most schools in India, they start with the Alphabet. We, therefore, introduce the sounds with the help of audios and now with the British Council phonemic chart and ask the Learners to keep learning them with patience and practice.

It is easier for them to discover that an goes with a vowel sound and a with a consonant sound. There are no exceptions to this rule anymore! Moreover, they discover and learn the whole pattern: that along with an, to is tu, r is r and the is thi before a vowel sound, but before a consonant sound, along with a, r is silent, to is ta and the is tha

They do like the statements of the rule that has examples of the rule:

r is pronounced only before a vowel         aarizpranaunstaunlibifooravaual

r’s are pronounced only before vowels     aazapranaunstaunlibifoovaualz

Let’s now come back to Articles. A and an generally mean one (any one). Therefore, a or an goes with a countable noun in singular.The nouns: stars, coins, notes are countless but countable. That is why you say: 7 stars, 10 ten paise coins and 100 one-rupee-notes.

In order to make good use of this powerful rule you have to keep in mind that English has forty four sounds, like Hindi has 52. Hindi is written with the help of 52 letters. Therefore, each letter in Hindi denotes one sound. In English, it is not so. Forty four sounds are denoted by twenty six letters. That is why in English we have the problem of spelling and pronunciation. Out of the forty four sounds of English, twenty are vowel sounds and twenty four consonant sounds. Therefore, the indefinite article a can come before any of the twenty four consonant sounds. And, the indefinite article an can similarly come before any of the twenty vowel sounds. The key to phonetic symbols in Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary of Current English or Longman’s Dictionary of Contemporary English explains each sound in English with symbols and examples of words in which they occur. The entries in the dictionary inside tell you if the word in question is a noun; if it is a noun, whether it is countable or uncountable.

If  you come through this way, I am sure, you will never be troubled with questions like whether it is : a year or an year*, a hotel or an hotel,  a humble man or an humble man, a university or an university*, a European student or an European student*.

The dictionary will quickly tell you that year starts with a consonant sound as it is in yes or yellow and so do the words: university and European. Therefore, it is: a year, a university and a European student.

A hotel and a humble man are correct, if hotel and humble are pronounced with an h-sound. An hotel and an humble man are correct if hotel and humble are pronounced without the h-sound, in which case they start with a vowel sound. But this is old-fashioned. Similarly, it is: a money order but an MO.

It is possible for an adjective to come in between the indefinite article and the countable noun in singular:

a boy    a good boy   an intelligent boy

a cow  a black cow  an Indian cow

It is also possible for an adverb to come in between the indefinite article and the adjective:

a good boy                             an intelligent boy

a very good boy                    a very intelligent boy

an extremely good boy         an extremely intelligent boy

WHEN I RECEDE FROM THEE

Khaliqur Rahman

The riotous waves of sea, with what uproar,

With passions what, with what tumultuous surge,

They dash against the passive shores and soar,

In smoke and foam, so higher in their urge.

The cosy clouds, to what fallible heights,

With what expectant hopes, they waft, they swell,

To puffed up skies, so stately in their flights,

And heavy with many a pearly jewel.

Oh! For the not-responding skies, they weep,

They weep and moan and cry their life away;

Oh! For the not-requiting shores, they creep,

They creep, rippling retreat around dismay.

A weeping cloud, a rippling wave, with me,

A secret have, when I recede from thee.

A sonnet written in 1965 summer after the Masters exam.

OF DOGS AND DOG-SENSE

Khaliqur Rahman

I can't, for the life of me, understand why after all some people should be so much hell bent upon directing their over-flowing love on dogs. Have all other human beings died? And, why pray, should they be choosing only Dobermann Pinchers or Alsatians or Boxers or Bulldogs or Grey hounds or Bull-terriers or Poodless or Pekinese to shower the so called surfeit of their love on.

The very sight of a lady -- I doubt if that's' the right word -- and the lap-dog boils my blood, and, I tell you, in the fit of my ungovernable temper I lose sight of what is what and I can never ever tell you which one is the woman and which one is the dog and which one is more bitchy.

What right, I ask, do they have to chain this beautiful animal? Having trained them to perform certain feats like taking a high jump or retrieving a tennis ball or a hidden object, they take extreme pride in talking about them to make conversation in their drawing rooms. What is worse, they take this conversation unashamedly to other peoples’ drawing rooms, too.

My evening yesterday was spoilt thus. We had gone to our in-laws'. And I tell you, my in-laws are all honourably lovable and human beings, except perhaps when my FIL chooses to turn to his majestic Alsatian. His fads at the age of seventy-plus are cricket, religion and dogs. And I consider myself to be most extremely lucky to have two-thirds of the area of his interest overlapping with mine. You can talk on cricket and religion almost endlessly and I nearly always managed to play within the safe limits.

But yesterday evening all the elements combined to conspire against me. One of my friends who I must say is extremely good and lovably honourable visited our empty house with his wife and children. Not finding us there they made a successful chase to our in-laws'.

They were greeted with nimbupani and FIL. After a brief phatic communion I just do not know how my friend and FIL established themselves into talking about their dogs. They were ably assisted by my friend's smart younger son who seemed to have read everything available on this earth on dogs.

I came to know that FIL once possessed two really great ones. One was called “Major Sa'b” and the other "Colonel Sa'b”. And, whenever FIL sat in his garden in the evenings with his family, there used to be a special chair for "Major Sa'b" who according to him was more egoistic than the "Colonel". If there wasn't one for him, he would quietly make a survey, go to the smallest child and push him out of the chair by his right paw and sit there.

I don't remember, whatever all, my good friend said about his Pincher and Alsatian who they call Phantom and Devil. I don't know how often, in my unbearable malaise I threw on them God knows how many of my nasty wintry smiles. All of them went afloor.

They were talking of dogs and dog-sense!

LEARN ENGLISH – 3

Khaliqur Rahman

I’ve taught English for about five decades. During this period I’ve learnt a lot, as well. I have been able to develop a Pedagogic Grammar and we’ve found it to be very effective in bringing home a grammar point in the minds of the Learners.

They are made to understand that Grammar is the sum total of Core Grammar and Peripheral Grammar. Core Grammar is nothing but what goes with what and what replaces what and Peripheral Grammar is how, when and where. Also, making a sentence is like choosing clothes and dressing up, taking care of what goes with what, what replaces what and then the finishing touch of how, when and where.

Here, I’d like to share with you one of our lessons in the use of Articles. Through examples on the blackboard, interaction and recall, we manage to get from the Learners statements like:

Articles are words that go with nouns that are naming words. The Indefinite Article goes with a noun that is countable and singular. The Definite Article can go with all the three categories of a noun: countable singular, countable plural and uncountable. Sometimes, we have to make a statement ourselves when we know it is beyond them, particularly with our deft-nitions. For example: Articles are noun-focussing words. They bring nouns into focus. The definite article the, pronounced ðɪ or ðə, brings nouns into fine focus. The indefinite articles a and an bring a noun, countable, singular into broad focus.

Grammar Rules, thus, are discovered by the Learners themselves, of course with the minimum-maximum pushing and prodding by the Teacher.

TECHNICAL TERMS vs PLAIN LANGUAGE

We use what goes with what for syntagmatic relationship and what replaces what for paradigmatic relationship. For mid-level Learners, we use chain relationship and choice relationship, for syntagmatic relationship and paradigmatic relationship, respectively.

FOCUSSING WORDS

This is our attempt to take care of the use of the generic/specific dichotomies in Quirk’s Grammar and replace the terms generic/specific with the concept of focussing. Let’s look at these instances of language use:

What do you do? I am a teacher. Oh, well, one of you here has won the President’s award! O yes, I am happy to tell you, I am the teacher!

When he says I am a teacher. He is asking you to focus your mind on teachers and not on lawyers or doctors or engineers and he is one of teachers not engineers, etc. The noun teacher is thus brought into broad focus.

When he says I am the teacher, he is asking you to change your broad focus on teachers to fine focus on one teacher.

If someone says The first three teachers have won prizes, again, the speaker wants fine focus on the first three from the broad focus on all the teachers.

When you say Bring me the water in the fridge, you mean not any water but that water in that fridge. Fine focus.

In most school textbooks, the rule is : words beginning with a e i o u take an, by which it should be possible to say an after*, an eat*, an it*, an often*, and an under*. The asterisk * shows that these are ungrammatical.

Our rule, Indefinite Article ( A or An ) goes with noun countable singular, not only clinches the issue but also motivates them to learn more rules like this.

Learners in general are not familiar with the Sounds of English as in most schools in India, they start with the Alphabet. We’ll deal with the Sounds of English next week and improve upon our rule for Indefinite Articles further.

THE DICE OF TOGETHERNESS

Khaliqur Rahman

The dice of togetherness then was cast.

Life was suddenly warm cosy sublime.

Intense, hectic, priceless but fleeting fast

Were the honey-sweetened moments of Time.

The tide rose, the tide fell, all over soon

For us to remember what is no more.

Memory is both a curse and a boon.

It does bring some pearly jewels ashore.

Our world this is a seething boiling pot

And we are specks agitated in it.

We know not wherefrom whereto we are shot

Or perchance approximated a bit.

For those great little moments we owe so much

To That Greatest Hand and Its Generous Touch.

A disjointed sonnet written in bewilderment of pleasure and pain, loss and gain, but in memory of your visit to your native land. 1979

PURITY OF LIFE

Khaliqur Rahman

Man is a queer admixture of the animal, the human and the divine. A simpler way of looking at Man is to see Man as body mind and soul. Freud sees Man as id , ego and super ego.

Then, there are the dichotomies: physical – ethereal, impure – pure and mortal – immortal .

God is one of the two opposites: ethereal, pure and immortal .

Ghalib in one of his couplets has said that the Pure cannot manifest itself without what is Impure. The glass needs a layer of mercury to reflect the seer’s image. You are able to perceive the spring breeze by looking at the spring blossoms that in effect mirror the spring breeze.

I was initiated by my Peer-o-murshid in 1972. He used to say: murshid Allah ,Allah murshid naheen and  I used to get rattled as I was not able to swallow the statement: Guru is God…God is not Guru. But I never asked him to explain. Instead, I prayed for a purer mind so that I could understand  what he meant. I took 10 years to understand that Ghalib’s couplet and his statement  were, in fact, the same. God as such will never come to show the path. He comes in the garb of a Guru. The Pure has to put on the Impure. The Nirakaar has to attain  aakaar  for the benefit  of our sense receptacles.

The Niraakaar is Pure. The Saakaar is Impure. Only He, the Pure, the Niraakaar, is Permanent. The Creator is Permanent, the created is not.

We, the created, have a life to live, before death unifies us with the non-physical. We attain purity in death – the death of the physical. Then, what is purity of life?

We have been told at school Cleanliness is next to Godliness. I believe, the cleanlier we get, the nearer we are to God. In other words getting cleanlier is getting purer.

How can we get cleanlier?  The journey starts in the mind. In the mind one says: I have to get cleanlier every day. The very idea is a Godsend. Sheer Grace of God it is. The mind tells you to take care of the body because you learnt at school: sound mind in a sound body. You begin to do everything to keep your body fit and fine so that you can keep it cleanlier everyday on your own. Soon, you begin to perceive, this body, in fact, is the temple or the church or the mosque in which your God resides. You are the caretaker of His Residence.

To keep the residence clean, you do everything that is necessary. In order for your body to be fit you do all possible physical exercises. Your body looks good. But does it look good inside? Only you can see! That’s where honesty, the inside cleanser joins in and you begin all the necessary mental and religious exercises. Exercises need nutrition – the right kind of food that suits your system, not just your palate.

You can choose from meat or vegetables or both.

Meat comes from the animal world. The animals move around in search of food. Their movement is on the horizontal plane. Vegetables and fruits come from plants and trees. Their movement is in the vertical plane. They get their food from the earth beneath and the environment above.

Look at the meat eaters. They have, like animals, moved all over the world. They are the imperialists. Look at the vegetable eaters. They haven’t crossed seas. They are the spiritualists. The conclusion is: for worldly progress, eat meat; for spiritual progress, vegetables. What about Christian and Muslim saints? A careful study reveals they have reduced or even stopped eating meat in their advanced stages of spiritual pursuit.

Cleanlier food generates cleanlier thoughts. You begin to eat less but maintain a sound body and a sound mind.

As you get cleanlier, the impurities decrease and the purities increase. The animal in you leaves. The id is out .You are left with a few traces of ego and the super ego. If you are now blessed by the Grace of God and those few traces of ego, too, recede into nothingness, you are Super Ego! That, I believe, is the ultimate in the purity of life.

Please pray for me to get cleanlier.

A POEM ON SPELLING & PRONUNCIATION

Author not known

I take it you already know

Of TOUGH and BOUGH and COUGH and DOUGH.

Others may stumble but not you

On HICCOUGH, THOROUGH, LOUGH and THROUGH

Well done! And now you wish, perhaps,

To learn of less familiar traps.

Beware of HEARD, a dreadful word

That looks like BEARD and sounds like BIRD

And DEAD – it’s said like BED, not BEAD.

For goodness sake, don’t call it DEED!

Watch out for MEAT and GREAT and THREAT:

They rhyme with SUITE and STRAIGHT and DEBT.

A MOTH is not a MOTH in MOTHER,

Nor BOTH in BOTHER, BROTH in BROTHER

And HERE is not a match for THERE,

Nor DEAR and FEAR for PEAR and BEAR

And then, there’s DOSE and ROSE and LOSE –

Just look them up – and GOOSE and CHOOSE

And CORK and WORK and CARD and WARD

And FONT and FRONT and WORD and SWORD

And DO and GO, then THWART and CART.

Come, come, I’ve hardly made a start.

A dreadful language? Man alive,

I’d mastered it when I was five!