ink'd on

There's been a lot of talk about alien life out yonder with books, movies & documentaries, all three feeding our wild imagination. I cannot quite get around to accepting the distinct possibility that there are other like us out there. If so, wouldn't 'they' have found us already? What's taking 'them' so long? Perhaps their ship is trying to find the location of Earth, very much like in the SciFI show, Battlestar Galactica. And if one were to consider the possibility that there may just be another world out there, would they be as diverse, as colourful or as cultural as we are?

For that matter, how did we get so colourful? I ask you, the evolutionist, should we not be darker & hairier, like the primates (whom you consider our ancestors). On the flip side, I've often wondered why we aren't the same tone like our original parents, Adam & Eve. Could it be that the Old Testament incident of the Tower of Babel that split us all into various groups by the casting of different tongues of speech, also had God bringing out His paint brush & performing a little Michelangelo act on us all. Perhaps along with colour, culture was born, eventually evolving into a varied mix that now makes us so rich & unique. We're an art, one to be appreciated. There's so many cultures to explore & indulge in, that sometimes it's very hard to choose. But what is it that attracts us to one culture over another? How do you choose from East vs West, from European vs South American? Well, why choose at all?

I was the post office last week mailing off a letter to India. After a few minutes the young girl behind the screen asks if I can write her name out in Indian. As I was in the mode of translating, she told me she wanted to get it tattooed on the inside of her right wrist. In Indian! (Her request reminded me of the soccer player, David Beckham, who has his wife's name tattooed in Hindi on his wrist). Oh, so of course the pressure was really on, leaving no room for error in translation. It's going to be translated into a tattoo for Pete's sake! The horror of another Indian person who knows how to read Hindi looking at her wrist & telling her it's all wrong. Well, just to be safe, I got her contact info & told her I'd email it once I was 100% sure. She was then elated & excited asking if I could translate her kids names too! Sigh! Suddenly I felt like I was not the right person for the job.