...
"Meet my son Hemant Hariyani"
"Good evening sir"
"Good evening Hemant. Pleased to meet you. Tell me more about yourself."
"I work as a Software Engineer with XYZ company" and blah......
"Hemant is also studying Astronomy"
"That is amazing Hemant. I do not know too many people who do that. Great work boy. Can you read my palm and tell me what’s written on it?"
Crash...... A thousand answers rushed to my mind - most of them being unsuitable for being given as an answer or being mentioned here.
"Sorry Sir, I am not into palmistry"
"Ah... I am sorry for being so ignorant. So you read horoscopes?"
Crash...... A thousand answers rushed to my mind - most of them being unsuitable for being given as an answer or being mentioned here.
I am sure that I am not the only astronomer this has heppened to. And it happens a lot of times. Some ask me to read their palms, while others think I am an astrologer. I used to get irritated earlier, but now I beleive I am used to it. In fact I even offer to read a palm if it belongs to a pretty lady. It is fun to see them agree to a lot of things I say.
I have always beleived that astrology cannot have anything to do with my life - and I could not have been farther from truth. I realized that when astrologers changed my life in last three months.
It all started when I proposed to a girl. She told me that her parents are a lot into matching horoscopes and blah. I agreed after brief initial reluctance. I gave her all the data that astrologers need – where, when and why I was born. A few days later I found out that it was a perfect match. Some 35 out of 36 somethings matched. I was happy about the fact that I will not have to get into one of those “why astrology is not what it looks like” arguments. We celebrated the occasion and started discussing about our engagement. I got engaged on 28th of June 2007 and all went smooth.
We were all sitting together when the obvious question came up.
“Chintu (my pet name), we need to finalize on the date of wedding”
“Hmm…. I believe the solar eclipse of 2009 would be ideal”
Silence….
“What happened? Is there a problem with that?”
Silence…. Everyone’s expression reading “Ridiculous”.
“How can you even think about that? You cannot get married on a solar eclipse day. Besides, it is way too long before that happens.”
I realized that 2009 was far away and I decided to get married between 1st of December 2007 and 10th of January 2008 because that is the time I would be relatively free and besides, a lot of people would be able to attend my wedding. My sister would be able to make it too.
“December would be ideal. Second half of the December would be the best.”
“But you cannot get married between 15th of December and 14th of January (Makar Sankranti, Uttarayana)”
“So that we could prepare for flying kites? Why do we need one month for that?"
"Be serious Chintu"
"And besides, it would be nice to combine my honeymoon with my vacation. Moreover, it is not the correct day for winter solstice anymore. I believe that it used to be so some 5000 years back. But taking precession of earth’s rotational axis into account……”
“What??? It is better not to argue on this. You will not understand certain things.”
“Okay, let us see. How about December 8th? My birthday is on December 7th, papa’s birthday on December 9th, bhaiya’s anniversary is on December 13th, That would be ideal wouldn’t it? We can all celebrate together and have a great time every year. And since we are Gujaratis, it is our birth right to think about saving money. There is no better way of doing that. Celebrate one occasion instead of four. 75% savings.”
“That would have been ideal. But 8th December is not a shubh (auspicious) day”
“Who said that?”
“Panditji (astrologer)”
“!#%!#!!”
“WHAT???”
“Ahem… nothing… but do we have to consult the panditji? I mean things could be really simple and convenient. What do you think papa?”
“I agree and I will try to put it across to others. I will try my best but I sincerely believe that it is not gonna work out” … “It did not. They said 2nd December is the only date in December. Is that okay with you?”
“I am sick of this. Fine, 2nd December it is. Can you confirm that?”
“One problem – someone else in their family is getting married on 30th November. 2nd December will not be possible”
“How about next December?”
“Be serious.”
“What are my options?”
“26th of January and 10th of February”
“That’s it??!! Just two days in three months? And besides, none of them is good for me. My semester will start, people will get busy with their schedules after a vacation, most of the people including my sister will not be able to make it and I am definitely not okay with that.”
“I understand but there really is no choice. They have discussed this with panditji a lot of times”
“!#%!#!!”
“WHAT???”
“Ahem… nothing…..give me some time to think about this”
I thought about it a lot. I definitely did not want to spoil the occasion for my convenience. I did not want to sound rude or to push too hard. I finally agreed on 10th of February and everybody is happy about it. But I cannot stop thinking about it. I cannot stop blaming astrologers for all this in my mind. I cannot stop thinking that things would have been a lot better had it been December. Things moved on.
I had been planning to buy a flat. I have been living in a rented flat for a long time and I really like that place. It is a very nice apartment complex - pretty close the city and very close to my office, it is cheaper than other apartments, and my parents like it a lot too. We have always been discussing about how nice it would be if the landlord sold it to us. Then one day my landlord came to my place.
“Hemant, we are thinking about selling this place. If you know someone, who is interested in buying, do let us know”
“That someone is right in front of you sir. I had been looking forward to this and I am sure thay my parents would be really happy to hear that.”
My parents were delighted and were planning to come down to Bangalore to discuss it further and finalize it as soon as possible. The discussion went on for a few days and one day I got this SMS.
“An astrologer has advised my wife against getting involved in any property trades for next one year. We have postponed our decision to sell the flat.”
I can’t even describe my feelings. I would have been perfectly okay if the decision was based on any other thing. But this was just too much. I could not resist myself from getting into endless arguments about why this should not happen.
“Who are they to tell me when to do what? Who are they to take decisions for me?”
I started thinking about arguments against astrology, palmistry and everything related. I also happened to ask these questions to a lot of people who believe in astrology. This is what happened:
“Do we take physical characteristics of planets into account? Even if planets do affect our lives, they have to do it in proportion to something.”
“The origin of universe is also unknown. The day we find that astrology will be proven”
“But we know that universe started from what we know today as The Big Bang”
“But what happened before that?”
“Nobody can answer that question today”
“See…. You do not know that. They day that truth is uncovered astrology will be proven. Besides, many scientists across the world are working towards proving astrology”
I realized that this argument was not going anywhere. But I kept on arguing with different people.
“We all know that we are just lucky to be humans and nature does not care about that fact. How does astrology work for plants, animals and other creatures? If we talk about a timeline of 20 years, it might not even apply to a lot of creatures.”
“I don’t know. Astrology must be taking care of scaling timelines and talking about percentage of lifetime.”
“Fine, acceptable. Can someone give details of how that scaling happens in terms of orbital periods of planets etc?”
“Hmm… I am sure they are related. I do not know the details though. I haven’t heard of anyone analyzing horoscopes of animals.”
“Twins should be really identical and they should lead their lives in a very similar manner. They should also die at approximately the same age. I have enough evidence to prove that this does not happen”
“Stars do not exactly decide your life for you. There are a lot of other things involved.”
“Stars! Did you say stars?? I thought only planets were supposed to make a difference”
“That is what I meant. Getting late now. Gotta go.”
“If lines on your palm also affect your life as much, twins should have identical palms too”
“What??!! Ha ha … good joke”
“How does palmistry apply to cows and other animals? Nature does not care if we are humans.”
“Did you hear that? Man, this guy is out of his mind. You really have nothing better to do.”
“Rahu and Ketu are two shadow planets which cause eclipses. Now that we know exactly how eclipses happen, these two demons still continue to rule our horoscopes. How do they affect us?”
“They are shadows and shadows are very powerful. They bring dark energy to your life.”
“Do you really know what dark energy is about? Anyways forget about that - what we have been taught is darkness is just absence of light. How can it be powerful?”
“Yes, precisely they stop light from reaching you. Light is good for you”
“Thanks”
Some astrologers justify astrology using this argument – “Moon causes tides in oceans. Imagine what all the planets can do to our lives”. I do not even want to discuss this with anyone.
I have realized that astrology is popular mainly because of fear. We do not want to take any chances. We do not want to risk anything in life even if we are perfectly aware of the risk or the lack thereof.
I wonder if astrology issue will ever get resolved – one way or the other. But till then, I have resolved to do good things on astrologically inauspicious occasions. At least I will help proving something – one way or the other.
I never thought I would get affected by astrology. But that hasn't been the case.