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In my previous blog post, I promised that I would be making a major announcement about my friend, novelist Ashwin Sanghi's first novel The Rozabal Line, and my reconnection with him after several decades.

So here goes:

For the last several months, I have been developing a feature-length screenplay based on the novel. I have collaborated with the novelist, Ashwin, on this project, in an attempt to capture his authorial vision as authentically as possible in the cinematic medium and language of screenwriting. If you happen to have followed the news in India, you might even have read a news article in the Indian newspapers in which Ashwin made press statement to this effect.

If you have read The Rozabal Line, you would have noticed that, in spite of being a pretty brief novel, it is extremely dense and complex--packing more ideas into its two hundred or so pages than most novels do in twice as many. As such, adapting the novel into a screenplay, with its interweaving plot-lines and its non-sequential structure, was particularly challenging. However, I am proud to say that I think we have succeeded in developing a really engaging and enjoyable fast-paced thriller screenplay that is currently undergoing its final edits and should be complete very soon.

If you are familiar with this novel and the content of the story, it would be pretty apparent to you that it is very controversial in its subject matter. It is the sort of story that challenges all your assumptions and dares to take you to places you might never have imagined before. Truly, the story is about challenging and engaging you at every level, daring you to question your belief system and ask yourself some pretty tough questions, such as, "Why do I believe what I do? Am I accurate in my beliefs and assumptions?" and so forth.

This story is not and never has been about undermining anyone's faith or beliefs. However, I realize that when one asks difficult questions or addresses sensitive issues, such as religion, one will inevitably provoke a hostile response from some quarters. In an attempt to anticipate and preempt any such misinformed or ill-informed assessment of this screenplay, I am going to attempt to clarify some points here and, hopefully, prevent the kind of uproar generated by novels like The DaVinci Code, which, in fact, treads on similar territory as The Rozabal Line, though the two novels are completely different in most other respects, such as theme, style and structure.

Firstly, this is a work of speculative fiction. Spelling out what that means--it is a story, a narrative, meant to entertain you, the audience, while, hopefully, broadening your horizons at the same time. So in no way should this story be regarded as factual or journalistic, though it contains many factual and historical elements embedded within its narrative thread. Basically, it is intended to be a fun exercise in which one speculates on certain possibilities and, in doing so, one comes to a deeper understanding of the way things are by asking oneself some tough questions through the process of suspension of disbelief.

Secondly, this story is not intended to preach any kind of doctrine to you or dogma at you. I fully understand that there are people out there who don't get what this means and who perceive any sort of narrative as some sort of religious tract or testament of faith. That's not what this is! Rather, it is designed to challenge and encourage you to think critically! "The medium is the message," to quote Marshall McLuhan. There is no explicit message here other than the challenge to ask difficult questions! If you pay close attention, you will notice that the story undermines itself at every level. This is by design--it is about challenging you, the audience, to play the detective and dig up the clues to what's really going on here!

Finally, as I suggested earlier, this story should not be regarded as a statement of our personal belief systems. The words and ideas expressed by any of the characters in the story cannot and should not be ascribed to the novelist and/or screenwriter themselves! Personally, I consider myself to be a moderate Christian (who believes in the tolerance of all religions, philosophies and belief systems--even ones I may disagree with or object to--as long as they don't violate the law or human rights). And as for Ashwin Sanghi, I believe he is a practising Hindu, who shares many of my own points of view on matters of tolerance and human rights.

One of the central themes in this story is the distortion of words and ideas, and how a nuanced, accurate view of history and current events is essential to promoting peace and understanding across the world. I can only hope that the same principles apply to my words and those of Ashwin Sanghi! The reality is that we live in an age of mass media, and in this echo chamber, distortion and oversimplification are inescapable! I can only hope that when people realize the true consequences of distortions and inaccuracies, they will make a greater attempt to discover the truth!

That said, I hope to get this movie made in Hollywood, once the screenplay is completed. Stay tuned for further announcements!

Meanwhile, please feel free to check out Horizon Cybermedia's website, http://www.explorationtheseries.com, for our ongoing video series, Exploration with Uday Gunjikar. A new episode is currently in the editing room and should be online pretty soon.

Wishing you the very best,

Uday Gunjikar
Founder and CEO,
Horizon Cybermedia, Inc.

It's been a long time since I have updated my blog, mainly because I have been busy with other projects and have not found the time to post anything here. However, with the recent episode in the news involving WikiLeaks and the worldwide Interpol manhunt for Julian Assange, the founder of the WikiLeaks, I felt compelled to exercise my constitutional right to freedom of expression and post a comment or two about this situation.

First of all, this episode involves the leaking of classified government documents, which involves breaking the law. To that extent, I do not endorse any of this—in no way do I support or endorse breaking the law, even if it involves a perceived higher cause. That's just plain wrong. The ends do not ever justify the means.

However, that said, I have to say that I personally think it is completely inappropriate to cast Julian Assange as some sort of mysterious Bond villain operating out of a secret hideout in Europe and intent on the destruction of the United States. That sort of caricaturization of someone who appears to be motivated primarily by hostility towards the corruption in the political system only serves to validate Assange's position. The heavy-handed response on the part of authorities—characterizing Assange as a terrorist or malefactor—is downright Orwellian and only lends credence to Assange's position. What's all the more creepy is that within days of the WikiLeaks' public disclosure of classified documents, Interpol announced that he is on their "most wanted" list in connection with rape and molestation charges arising out of Sweden. All this theatrics, in my mind, only serves to garner public sympathy for Assange.

The bottom line is that we live in a world in which access to information and self-expression has become a whole lot easier than, say, 10 years ago, thanks to enormous, ongoing leaps in communications technology. That, in my mind, is a good thing. Add to that, the fact that now power-brokers and figures of authority are that much more accountable to the public for their actions and find it harder to get away with corrupt practices. It's unfortunate that this freedom is abused by people who break the law and engage in questionable practices. On the other hand, by the same token, I also do believe that if Hillary Clinton instructed diplomats to spy on their colleagues, then she should be made to answer to those charges! I don't think she should be allowed to get away with that sort of abuse of power any less than I think Julian Assange should be made to answer for the laws that he has broken!

Freedom of expression is a right that we don't fully appreciate until we stand to lose it! However, it also requires responsibility on our part—we have to play by the rules, just as driving on the freeway requires us to stay in our lanes and not disrupt traffic by making sudden lane changes. On the other hand, if the police are corrupt and not themselves playing by the rules, the public has the right to know!

I started Horizon Cybermedia to produce and promote high quality media content, using the latest communications technology to aid in my production and distribution efforts. I see this technology as an invaluable adjunct to my creative endeavors and in my attempts at producing and promoting high quality cultural artifacts. I think it is unfortunate when these tools are abused by others, thereby disrupting an environment of free and open communication and self-expression. However, I also believe that corrupt figures of authority and corporate interests are no less culpable in undermining freedom and goodwill in mainstream society!

Do visit our website at http://www.explorationtheseries.com for high quality media content from Horizon Cybermedia, including our ongoing film series, Exploration with Uday Gunjikar. The current episode visits Big Bear Lake, CA, and the next episode takes you to the rock-cut Buddhist temples at the Kanheri caves in the Borivli National Park near the city of Mumbai, India.

Location:Los Angeles, CA

Most of us assume that Jesus of Nazareth, the founder of the Christian faith, was an orthodox Jew and that Christianity as a distinct religion was really founded by his followers, the Apostles. But is that really the truth? Could it be that Jesus was, in fact, a member of an obscure Jewish sect known as the Essenes or the Nazarenes—that he was, in fact, "Jesus the Nazarene" rather than "Jesus of Nazareth?" And could it be that his membership in this sect, which apparently had its foundations in Buddhist philosophy, and its origins in the doctrines of Buddhist missionaries from the court of the Buddhist Indian emperor Asoka, was the source of his conflict with the orthodox priesthood in Jerusalem? A tension between orthodox Jews and the Essene sect which contributed directly to Jesus being crucified by the Romans for religious heresy?

These are just some of the possibilities entertained by author and historian Ashwin Sanghi in his gripping and highly entertaining thriller, The Rozabal Line. The novel is an engaging tapestry of startling scope and complexity, brilliantly weaving together themes and ideas, characters and situations, historical events and future speculation into a gripping drama spanning space and time with style and aplomb. The novel centers around Vincent Sinclair, a devout Roman Catholic minister, who is plagued by horrifying visions brought on by traumatic experiences he undergoes in the course of his life. In his attempt to find answers, he takes a sabbatical to visit his aunt, to whom he is very close, and embarks on a world-spanning journey that takes him from London, England to Mumbai, India; from the sparkling beaches and resorts of Goa on the western coast of India to the picturesque Himalayan state of Kashmir in northern India. Through hypnotherapy and "past-life regression," he "travels" to the past, where he witnesses such events as the crucifixion of Christ, the carnage of the French Revolution and social upheaval in medieval India and, by projecting his consciousness into the future, a vision of Armageddon in Tel Megiddo, Israel.

His journey takes him on a quest for a mysterious text supposedly discovered in 1787 by Alphonso de Castro, a Portuguese Jesuit missionary, during the Portuguese occupation of Goa beginning in the late 15^th and early 16^th centuries and continuing to the mid-20^th century—an occupation that included a ruthless and bloody inquisition by the Catholic church, leading to the forced conversions, torture and executions of thousands of Hindus, Muslims and Syrian Christians (Christians who had been converted by the Apostle Thomas' mission to India in the 1^st century A.D.). This text is, supposedly, an authoritative text of mysterious origins that is, apparently, so controversial and threatening to the Catholic church that they are prepared to kill indiscriminately to keep it from being discovered. The document, about which I will not reveal any more so as not to ruin the story for readers, apparently resolves the issue of Jesus' true fate and life history—an issue which is the controversial centerpiece of the novel. The novel suggests that Jesus had visited India during his formative years and actually survived the crucifixion and returned to India, where he spent his remaining days in the region of Kashmir. The novel suggests that the tomb of the Jewish mystic Yuz Asaf in the city of Srinagar in Kashmir, a tomb that dates back to A.D. 112, is, in fact, the tomb of Jesus Christ Himself.

The novel describes a world of intrigue and danger, of numerous intersecting plotlines involving a diverse cast of vividly rendered characters. It describes a world of mind-boggling mystery, with literally dozens of secret societies and fringe religious organizations, each with their fanatical agendas for world domination and Armageddon. The narrative relates how the murderous agendas of such fanatical religious societies as Opus Dei, the conservative Catholic society featured in Dan Brown's novel, The DaVinci Code, intersect with those of the Taliban and Al Quaeda. Not to be outdone by Dan Brown, Sanghi brings the Illuminati, Skull and Bones, the Rhodes Scholars, the Lashkar-e-Toiba and the Aum Shinrikyo into the mix, as well as inventing some new secret societies such as the Crux Decussata Permuta, an ultra-orthodox Christian organization with Islamist connections, and the Lashkar-e-Talatashar, a hidden wing of the Islamic militant group Lashkar-e-Toiba, with a secret Apocalyptic agenda involving a nuclear catastrophe of tragic dimensions.

At the core of this dizzying panorama involving dozens of hidden organizations with intersecting political and religious agendas is an alternative version of history purportedly suppressed by the Catholic church through inquisition, intimidation and banned documents concealed from public view in the Vatican secret archives. According to this version of historical events, Jesus, in fact, had a deep spiritual and cultural connection with India, survived the crucifixion and raised a family with Mary Magdalene, his descendants surviving to the present day (as also suggested by Dan Brown's novel The DaVinci Code). According to The Rozabal Line, not only was Jesus educated in India in the Essene and Buddhist traditions, he also retired to India with his family and settled down in Kashmir for the remainder of his days under the pseudonym of "Yuz Asaf." In fact, he is venerated to this day as an Islamic saint by the Islamic population of parts of Kashmir, while Hindu texts, such as the Bhavishya Mahapurana authored by the poet Sutta in A.D. 115, supposedly describes an encounter between Jesus and the Hindu ruler Shalivahana in the mountains of the Himalayas decades after Jesus' crucifixion in Jerusalem.

These ideas might seem controversial to the conservative Christian mindset, but regardless of one's opinion about them, one has to wonder what controversial, potentially mind-boggling documents and artifacts must be concealed from public view in that vast, hidden repository of historical relics known as the Vatican secret archives. Who knows what potentially earth-shaking discoveries lie waiting in there, permanently inaccessible to the unsuspecting public. After all, one must keep in mind that the version of Christianity that survives to this day is, in fact, a heavily edited version that dates to the First Council of Nicaea, convened in A.D. 325 in the city of Nice, France, by the Roman emperor Constantine, primarily for political reasons—as the precursor to the adoption of Roman Catholicism as the state religion of the Roman Empire. Who knows what documents and doctrines were, since that time, dismissed as heresies by the Roman Catholic church over centuries of religious inquisitions. Who knows what value they might have and what Christianity might originally have been like as a nascent religion during the years immediately following the crucifixion and resurrection of Christ. Ashwin Sanghi's novel dares to suggest that the truth is, in fact, startlingly different from the "official version" of the events handed down to us by the Church as a Christian religious institution and the state religion of the Roman Empire. He suggests that Christianity in its raw, essential form is truer to eastern mysticism than to western orthodoxy or fundamentalism—that the Church as a political and religious institution has suppressed the true form of Christianity and the true identity of Jesus over the ages in order to prop up its own religious and political agendas.

The truth is never what you expect. It is, in fact, a cliché to suggest that truth is stranger than fiction. But even so, the truth would have to be pretty remarkable indeed to outdo the standards set by Ashwin Sanghi's mind-bending, thoroughly entertaining and enormously informative novel, The Rozabal Line.

Horizon Cybermedia continues in its aspirations to produce quality media content for the discerning public. Do visit our website at http://www.explorationtheseries.com for the latest episodes in our ongoing film series, Exploration with Uday Gunjikar. Stay tuned for the next episode in the series, coming soon, which visits the marvelous rock-cut Buddhist temples of the Kanheri Caves on the outskirts of the city of Mumbai, India. As always, I look forward to the pleasure of your company on these and future explorations through the film series.

Wishing you the very best,

Uday Gunjikar
Founder and CEO,
Horizon Cybermedia, Inc.

Note: The current revised edition of Ashwin Sanghi's novel, The Rozabal Line, as pictured on Mr. Sanghi's wikipedia page is now available on Amazon.com in print and Kindle editions. My critique of the the novel is based on this edition, which Ashwin Sanghi graciously presented to me as a gift.

It's been way too long since I last updated my blog, so I figured it was about time I posted something—even if it's just filler material, pending the next major project that I'm currently working on for Horizon Cybermedia. A quick update on what's to come—I recently started editing the next film in my Exploration series, which will visit the outstanding rock-cut Kanheri Buddhist cave temples located in the Borivli National Park near Mumbai, India. At the same time, I plan to post a review of a fascinating novel I have been reading, written by a friend I have known since childhood. The novel is The Rozabal Line by Ashwin Sanghi. It is a remarkable work of speculative fiction that delves into the deepest, hidden recesses of the human psyche and dares to address one of the most controversial, difficult subjects of all—religion! The novel ties in very neatly with my film, as Buddhism plays a crucial role in the story—one that I will address in greater depth when I am ready to publish my review.

As it happens, I have also been reading another very interesting book on the subject of comparative religion, namely God is Not One by Stephen Prothero, in which the author does a comparative analysis of the eight major world religions, emphasizing their differences. He suggests how unlikely and even dangerous it is to assume that it is at all possible to envision a world in which all the world's major religions could be unified into some sort of harmonious whole or molded into a global world religion. He strikes many interesting chords, and I am inclined to agree with his point of view in many respects.

However, I think he neglects to address what I believe to be some basic truths—namely, that, in the end, all religions, however diverse they may be, are essentially the product of the human psyche, which is fundamentally similar. So at the core of all religions are some very fundamental, universal truths and these truths, I think, could be a foundation to establish some sort of common ground between religious systems—not so much in an attempt to promote a "global world religion" as to promote understanding, peace and fellowship among human beings of all creeds, backgrounds or ethnic origins. As a Christian myself, I interpret Christ's message to be this very theme—after all, wasn't Jesus Christ most critical of doctrinal orthodoxy and dogma to the exclusion of basic humanity and human decency? Would not Christ, if He was with us right now, be sharply critical of so-called religious authoritarians, whatever their credo, who use doctrinal orthodoxy to justify or rationalize a basic lack of decency, humanity and compassion? Correct me if I am wrong, but I think that the whole point of the Christian message is to move away from the head and towards the heart—away from petty doctrinal divisiveness and towards basic humanity and compassion.

Interestingly, another project I am currently working on, quite independent from anything to do with Horizon Cybermedia, is a novel based on a screenplay I had written a couple of years ago. This novel is more about science than religion—it tackles the other great subject of our age. It brings to my mind how fundamental this dichotomy between science and religion is—the more so in this 21^st century, when science and technology continue to advance at an ever increasing pace. For some reason, nevertheless, religion is proving to be no less relevant even in this era of supposed enlightenment—an enlightenment to be inspired, in part, at least, by scientific and technological advancement. So where will it all lead us? What does the future hold? The end of religion, in a world where scientific knowledge reigns supreme and abolishes the superstitions of the past? Or will religion make a dramatic comeback and have the final say? After all, in a world in which "Scientology" is itself a religion, one cannot—one dare not—underestimate the power of religion over the human psyche! Truly religion is a force to be reckoned with, but even so, does it have a place in a progressive, technologically advanced society, and if so, what is it's role?

These are some of the questions I hope to address in future blog posts. Consider this one to be a starter—a foretaste or foreshadowing of blog entries to come!

Meanwhile, I welcome your feedback. If you happen to be reading this blog entry or following this blog, I welcome you to reflect on these weighty issues and post a comment or two with your insights. Religion is a sensitive subject and is liable to provoke a passionate response from some quarters, so I urge you to measure your words carefully before posting them. Of course, I will be moderating all comments to ensure that nothing offensive or inflammatory gets posted on my blog so that the spirit of congenial dialog is in no way compromised!

I look forward to hearing from you! Meanwhile, do keep on the lookout for the next film in the Exploration series, coming soon, and, of course, my review of Ashwin Sanghi's brilliant novel, The Rozabal Line and even, possibly, of Stephen Prothero's book God is Not One. Meanwhile, do continue to visit http://www.explorationtheseries.com and check out the current and archived videos in the film series Exploration with Uday Gunjikar, which takes you to fascinating sites around the world right from your armchair by the fire at home!

Wishing you the very best,

Uday Gunjikar
Founder and CEO,
Horizon Cybermedia, Inc.

In a blog entry dated Saturday, September 27, 2008, I announced the release of a special edition DVD of the first film in my Exploration with Uday Gunjikar series—a re-edited version of the film entitled Exploring Elephanta that I had originally produced for complimentary distribution in the film festival circuit.

I currently have 9 brand new copies of this exclusively produced limited edition DVD which I would like to auction off on Ebay and donate all the proceeds to charity. To enhance the collectible value of the DVDs, I will personally hand-sign the casing of each DVD.

I would like to point out that these limited-edition hand-signed DVDs are guaranteed to appreciate in value over time, perhaps dramatically. Imagine yourself in possession of one of these DVDs ten years or so in the future, when Horizon Cybermedia has gained recognition in the world of digital media and has established itself as a major producer of digital media content. A hand-signed DVD like this is guaranteed to fetch a considerable sum as a collectible.

So I encourage you, the reader, to exercise some foresight and imagination and place a bid on one of the DVDs right away! All proceeds will benefit major charitable causes, donated directly through Ebay. Do check out the auctions as listed on Ebay here and here.

If either of these DVDs fetches a decent bid on Ebay, I will proceed to list the remaining DVDs for auction as well, again solely to benefit major charities. So please do take the opportunity to pick up some prime investments and donate to charity at the same time! The initial auctions will benefit the American Red Cross and the Clinton Bush Haiti Fund.

Thank you for your time and here's looking forward to your ongoing support of Horizon Cybermedia and our continuing endeavor to produce and distribute high quality digital media content.

Recently, I was watching a History Channel documentary about the Dark Ages on TV. At first glance, it looked like a bullet-proof, extremely convincing historical account that told a very clearly mapped-out story of the collapse of the western Roman Empire and civilization and the onset of a millennium of chaos and turmoil in western Europe, known as the Dark Ages. Backed up by a series of historical re-enactments to corroborate the claims made by the academics, the case they made seemed to be irrefutable on the surface.

Still, thinking back on it, what strikes me now is how flimsy and full of holes the case really is and how biased, speculative and propagandist this History Channel documentary, as a whole, was. Genuine academic scholarship or a deliberate campaign at misinformation and propaganda? You be the judge as I systematically dismember . . . I mean analyze . . . the documentary and the claims it makes.

For one thing, the documentary presents us with a series of supposed scholars or academics making various claims—presenting us with their interpretation of historical events, their examination of the repercussions of these events, their assessments of key historical personalities, etc. The scholars—who may very easily be pseudo-academics, for all we know—all had such obscure credentials that their claims could not really be taken seriously. Who were these characters—really? What publications could they attach their names to? How legitimate are their claims, as such?

Even if their claims can be corroborated or attached to authentic academic publications with true scholarly merit, what they are not telling you is that their version of reality, as expressed by them in the documentary, is really only one version among several competing versions, each having equal, if not greater, academic merit. All they are doing is presenting their interpretation of the facts as the authoritative truth—backed up by historical re-enactments to create the false impression that the viewer is actually observing history "as it happens" so to speak.

And furthermore, even if the version of history they give you is conclusively established as the only acceptable version, academically speaking, what they are not revealing to you is how much of the story is purely speculative and how much is based on hard evidence. Typically, what they do is take tiny shreds of fragmentary evidence of very dubious authenticity and then construct an elaborate hypothesis out of it. It remains unclear how much of the hypothesis is inferential and how much is pure fabrication based upon invalid assumptions or extrapolations from personal experience or even deliberately contrived to promote a socio-political agenda or justify a private opinion. For example, I saw another documentary in which a scholar made a pretty far-fetched claim—that he had uncovered evidence that centuries pre-dating Christ, another Jewish Messiah had lived, died and been resurrected in Jerusalem, so that Jesus was merely an imitator. However, the evidence he presented to corroborate his claim was so flimsy—a partially eroded rock-cut slab with some of the key text wiped out—that it became pretty evident that he was distorting the evidence to fit his claims.

Furthermore, even if the version of history that these so-called historians present to you is undeniably the only possible inference that could logically be drawn from the available sources, they do not reveal just how authentic or believable the sources are in the first place. Are they fragmentary archaeological remains acquired from the black-market? Or are they long surviving historical accounts where the original text has long since been lost to history and all that survives is a fragmentary copy that has, itself, been copied and recopied by hand countless times and may include any number of editorial errors or distortions?

So, if you analyze it carefully, it becomes pretty self-evident that what appeared, at first, to be an irrefutable case is actually so fabricated, contrived and full of holes that it can only be classified as pseudo-scholarship. It is actually propaganda—not history at all—and the historical re-enactments only underscore that idea. It is propaganda designed either to reinforce existing societal prejudices or to promote a socio-political agenda or to justify the actions of present-day politicians by claiming a historical precedent (of dubious authenticity). The irony is that any serious academic would be aware of this and how history itself is full of such attempts at propaganda and myth-making—which is why many supposedly ironclad historical accounts are themselves suspect and of dubious authenticity.

And, so, one has to wonder what is the hidden agenda that such propagandists are attempting to promote. Is it anything like, for example, the racist, racially supremacist agenda of Nazi pseudo-scholars? Or the left-wing, naïvely pluralistic social agenda of more liberal academics? Or is it an attempt, by some, to justify certain modes of criminal behavior by presenting us with a dubious historical precedent—suggesting, for example, that because xenophobia, polygamy, genocide and sodomy were acceptable practices in ancient civilizations such as Greece, Rome and Judea, they should be excusable in the present day as well?

Horizon Cybermedia is about questioning such attempts at propaganda and eyewash by mainstream media sources. In this "Information Age," in which social media are becoming increasingly prevalent and more and more people have access to revolutionary modern media technology, one has to wonder just how valid and accurate the information is . . . and how much of it are distortions or dishonest attempts at misinformation and propaganda.

The last thing we need is for universal access to media technology to create a "Misinformation Age" of widespread questionable information. However, it should also be noted that thanks to the universality of modern media technology, it is now easier to question universally-held assumptions and prejudices and the authenticity of so-called authoritative sources of information.

Please do check out our ongoing film series Exploration with Uday Gunjikar at our website http://www.explorationtheseries.com. The current film is a visual tour of some of the key sites in the city of Calcutta, India. Future episodes visit the ski resorts of Big Bear Lake, CA and the rock-cut Buddhist temples of the Kanheri Caves near Mumbai, India. We look forward to your continued support, entertainment and information.

The latest episode of my Exploration film series was shot entirely in the city of Calcutta, India around New Year's Day, 2008. I was visiting family and friends around that time and had an opportunity to tour the city and capture a number of fascinating locations on film. In fact, I ended up with so much footage of various historical sites in Calcutta that, ultimately, only a tiny fraction made the cut into the film. The vast majority of the footage is still waiting for another film possibly at a future date.

In addition, I must mention that at a couple of the sites I visited, videography and still photography were not permitted. So I wasn't able to capture on film the images I witnessed firsthand. The most striking example of this is the Marble Palace in Calcutta, which is filled with spectacular art treasures dating to the days of the East India Company. Unfortunately, I was only able to capture fleeting glimpses of the external façade of the building.

In the end, I needed a theme on which to base my film. As I delved through the footage, cataloging it and cleaning it up prior to my editing process, what captured my imagination were some images of a painting of The Last Supper that I had had the opportunity of filming in St. John's Church, Calcutta. Apparently, this was a pretty controversial painting, as the painter, a colonial Englishman, had modeled the figure of Judas in the painting after the local (English) chief of police and the figure of John after his girlfriend. I immediately thought of Dan Brown's book The DaVinci Code and the Ron Howard film based on it—what struck me was how the figure of John in the painting was really a secret representation of Mary Magdalene in disguise, so to speak.

Then it occurred to me that Dan Brown's latest novel, The Lost Symbol, was due out in October. And so the theme of the film fell into place, and the film became a sort of unofficial tribute to the literary works of Dan Brown, specifically, the Robert Langdon novels.

The film begins with the Victoria Memorial, the pre-eminent, iconic monument to the British Empire in India (Calcutta being the capital city of that empire). What struck me was the uncanny resemblance the marble-domed building bears to the US Capitol building, which features prominently in Brown's latest book, The Lost Symbol.

It's also striking that at the pinnacle of the marble dome of the Victoria Memorial is perched the mysterious figure of a graceful angel. This provided a segue to the second phase of the film, which echoes Dan Brown's first Robert Langdon novel, Angels and Demons, in which Langdon visits the churches of Rome, following clues provided by statues of angels in the city to lead him to the secret hideaway of the Illuminati, the secret society that features prominently in the novel. Similarly, my film recounts my own visit to a couple of the major Anglican churches in the city of Calcutta, with images of angels (in effigy, sculpture, carving and painting) figuring prominently at each of the sites.

My film arrives at its climactic moment with the shot of the painting of The Last Supper in St. John's Church, bringing to mind Dan Brown's most famous and successful novel, The DaVinci Code.

I then round out the film with shots of a few monuments in the vicinity of St. John's Church. The first is the so-called "Black Hole" monument—an obelisk-like edifice featuring the image of an angel on its dedicatory plaque. The monument commemorates a tragic event in colonial history, in which the Islamic Nawab (ruler) of Bengal supposedly incarcerated British and Anglo-Indian prisoners of war under such brutal conditions that a majority of them died from suffocation, heat exhaustion and crushing. This event subsequently was used as a major item of propaganda by the British Empire to justify its continued presence and its own brutally repressive practices in India.

The film ends with images of the mausoleum to Job Charnock, the founder of modern Calcutta, and the Rohila War monument, both also at the site of St. John's Church.

After completing an edited cut of the film to my satisfaction, I began work on the soundtrack. After scouring through any number of potential musical scores, I settled on an excerpt from Antonin Dvořák's Symphony No. 8 as the musical backdrop to the Victoria Memorial segment, as it truly captures the nostalgic old-world flavor of the bygone days of the British Empire. I then excerpted segments from Handel's Messiah and some haunting Gregorian Chants performed by the Benedictine Monks of St. Michael's for the remainder of my film. All the symphonic pieces were performed by the Peabody Concert Orchestra. All music used in the film is in the public domain.

I had a pretty interesting experience making this film and I hope that the subtleties are not lost to the viewer! Inspired by the symbolism of the Dan Brown novels, I have included a number of visual puzzles in the film to enhance the viewing experience and make the films a bit more interesting and entertaining to watch. I was also pretty awestruck by the way the Gregorian Chants so effectively and beautifully captured the solemnity of the ambiance inside the churches and the way the third segment from Handel's Messiah so brilliantly complements the scene in which one of the church's junior ushers turns on the lights at the altar of St. John's church, illuminating the magnificent frescoes on the wall behind the altar.

Horizon Cybermedia sincerely hopes that the film provides an enriching cultural experience to the viewer, both in terms of strengthening one's Christian faith (if you happen, like myself, to be a Christian) as well as exploring the cultural diversity of the multifaceted nation of India. Check back soon for the next film in our Exploration series which visits the ski resorts of Big Bear Lake, CA in the mountains of the San Bernadino National Forest. Meanwhile, do check out the current film on Calcutta at our website, http://www.explorationtheseries.com.

I've been watching the news lately and shaking my head in disbelief. How did the US go from being the most advanced nation on earth to the levels of absurdity we see in the news these days in a matter of a few short years?

Then it occurs to me—the War on Terror is what happened to us. It has become an excuse for the most outrageous madness ever conceived by man on an ongoing basis.

If you have any intelligence at all, you have got to wonder, "who are those terrorist extremists and where did they come from?" By the same token, one wonders, "who are those bureaucrats who are constantly raising terrorist threat levels and waging war against the terrorists, and where did they come from?" Who are these fruitcakes and, more significantly, why do we give them so much importance in our day-to-day lives?

The reality is that they are two opposite sides of the exact same coin—two facets of the same brain-dead mentality. In fact, one might even wonder whether the whole war on terror is some sort of mutually agreed-upon strategy amongst all the brain-dead, unimaginative authoritarians in the world, on different sides of the aisle, to hold all the creative, imaginative, productive members of society hostage to their inane agendas.

Basically, think about it—the average terrorist is a brain-dead lowlife who is encouraged not to think for themselves and blindly to obey and follow the (insane) dictates of their superiors. Similarly, the average bureaucrat is also a mindless authoritarian, lacking in imagination or the capacity for creative thinking, and encouraged blindly to obey the authorities and follow the orders of their superiors. Frankly, I would not be surprised if, when peace finally does come to Iraq and Afghanistan, the very same people who were once terrorists for Al Quaeda and the Taliban will get hired as bureaucrats in the emerging political systems in those countries. And they will probably do just great at their new jobs—because both professions require pretty much the same mindset and mentality, namely, brain-dead lack of imagination and total subservience to figures of authority.

So the question on my mind is: "When will the rest of us finally wise up to this con game being perpetrated on us? When will the productive members of society—the truly creative, imaginative thinkers and doers—finally hold the brain-dead, unimaginative, authoritarian crowd accountable for the crimes that they have perpetrated and continue to perpetrate on the rest of us? Or do we just sit back and allow this shameful con game to continue indefinitely—terrorism on the one hand and human rights violations on the other hand?"

Horizon Cybermedia is dedicated to expanding our minds through art and culture—to awakening us from the stupor that is, apparently, sucking us into a never-ending, mindless cycle of retributive violence—and enabling us to appreciate the finer things in life.

Check out our website at http://www.explorationtheseries.com for our ongoing film series, Exploration with Uday Gunjikar. The current episode visits the Wine Country of Sonoma, CA and the next episode visits the Christian monuments in the city of Calcutta, India.

President George H.W. Bush coined the phrase "voodoo economics" to refer to Reaganomics during his initial Presidential run. By the same token, would it be fair to refer to the Obama Healthcare Plan as "voodoo medicine?" The difference is that I don't mean this figuratively—I mean it literally!

Normally, I never talk about political issues in my blog—I prefer to keep it clean of politics. However, this time it's personal—this time I make an exception.

For the past 3-4 days, I have been pretty much immobilized by a mysterious stabbing pain in my right side, around the hip region—almost as though some voodoo practitioner or witchdoctor somewhere were sticking a pin into an effigy of me on their dresser. Only the other day, I was doing fine—working out at the gym and doing my best to stay in shape. Then suddenly, out of nowhere, comes this mysterious, agonizingly painful stabbing pain.

Now, sure, I don't have any hard evidence to substantiate my claim and it may well come across as a facetious or ludicrous charge to make. But not so when it feels like a massive pin is sticking into your side!

Consider the timing—this is the big weekend when President Obama launches his media blitz to drum up support for his healthcare plan. What better way to ensure support than by using voodoo rituals to create phantom ailments amongst the unsuspecting members of the public?

Also, a recent Fox News exposé by a junior correspondent posing as a pimp revealed some pretty unsavory practices engaged by Acorn, the voter registration group affiliated with the Obama administration. This only proves that the Obama White House is connected with some extremely unsavory, low-life characters. Who's to say that there isn't some secret cabal of voodoo practioners and witchdoctors using voodoo or other blood rituals to promote the Obama agenda?

Now normally, I am a pretty rational guy with a scientific mode of thinking. But it's hard to be rational or scientific when you have this massive stabbing pain in your side! I don't know much about voodoo or demonic rituals—but I have heard some pretty bizarre stories in my time! It is never my aim to promote superstition, but, then again, who knows?

So, in short, I do not believe that the ends justify the means. Whatever the merits of Obamacare might be, I personally draw the line at the use of voodoo to promote political agendas (if it can be proven as such). There needs to be an ethics investigation into the practices of the Obama administration and their supporters in order to determine how far these people are willing to go to support their political agendas.

On that note, I hope I never have to discuss politics in my blog ever again!

Meanwhile, do check out my website http://www.explorationtheseries.com for my ongoing film series, Exploration with Uday Gunjikar. The latest episode visits the Wine Country of Sonoma, CA, and the next episode visits the Christian monuments of the city of Calcutta, India.

In many ways, the internet is like the American Wild West—a world of amazing possibilities and the alluring promise of overnight wealth and success. On the other hand, the West was notorious for its lynch mobs and rough justice. It was a dangerously unpredictable and unstable world in which, typically, only the most ruthless survived and innocent lives were, only too often, brutally trampled upon and destroyed.

The intoxicating freedom of information exchange and communication afforded by the internet has only brought mob rule and demagoguery to the 21^st Century—the very problems that all democratic societies have tried to combat since time immemorial through the creation of democratic institutions that seek to ensure freedom and justice to the citizens of a democratic republic, while curtailing mass hysteria and overreaction and the tendency towards demagoguery and despotism.

In the internet age, however, the reality is, all-too-often, pretty harsh, and the seamy, ugly side of life—the side that would otherwise be buried and hidden away—is given a means of access to the mainstream and emerges to the surface. It is a world of networked mob rule, which implies networked lynch mobs, networked witch hunts and networked secret societies and organizations with hidden socio-political agendas. In that sense, it is a reflection of the dangerous real world—but what makes it so terrifying is that the ease and immediacy of online communications invite us to confront the grim realities of life on a daily basis even in the intimate, secure surroundings of our homes. The same ease of access and communication that offers everyone the egalitarian promise of a voice in a networked world and age, also provides the means for the truly dangerous and evil elements of our society to gain access to the mainstream and to create a dangerous, unstable environment for all. It is an environment in which the distortion and misrepresentation of information is only too often the norm and in which minor errors and misstatements can often provoke a disastrous cascading effect that ruins innocent lives. To say nothing of the prevalence of gambling and porn sites online.

The cliché is that the internet is "self-regulating"—but the internet is a reflection of the real world, and "self-regulation" in the real world essentially means mob rule. The question is, what is the tradeoff between the freedom of ease-of-access made possible by networked technologies and the dangerous, unstable environment that it often brings about? I guess the only answer is that the internet needs to create its own institutions to ensure safety and validity of information while still enabling freedom and ease of access.

Horizon Cybermedia was started with the aspiration of becoming one such media institution on the internet frontier. We are about creating quality digital media content that does not pander to the lowest common denominator of taste and standards but, instead, aspires to quality and the highest of standards.

Check us out online at http://www.explorationtheseries.com for our ongoing film series, Exploration with Uday Gunjikar. The next episode takes the viewer to the city of Calcutta, India and to a tour of the amazing Christian monuments of the city.

In a prior blog post, I talked about demythologizing Hindu iconography in an attempt to try to get to the core of what the symbols or icons of the culture represent and, thereby, to clarify their originary meaning. This deserves further explanation, so here goes:

My ideas as stated here would probably be considered controversial in the world of Hindu academia, but I'm not going to make any attempt to address any such potential controversy. Also, I'm speaking pretty much as a layman in the field of cultural anthropology, so I make no claims to expertise or qualifications in the field—I'm only stating my ideas as I see them purely from a layman's perspective.

Basically, looking back at the last several centuries of Hindu culture, I think that the original sense of what the iconography and mythology represented has been lost, perhaps even distorted and corrupted, by thousands of years of cultural aggregation and, possibly, miscommunication. So icons representing certain ideas originally have very possibly been distorted over time to represent something completely different thousands of years later. Myths, originally conveyed via an archaic oral tradition, were probably only first written down several centuries following their original composition, so that the original stories constituting the myths were probably distorted over time and came to include several additional fables and folklore that were missing from the original work. It would probably be an academic exercise in and of itself to attempt to extract the original mythology from the subsequent add-ons, and I'm not about to take on that enterprise given my own limited expertise in the field!

However, the point I made in the prior post was about the Hindu icon of the "third eye" and what it came to represent over time as opposed to my interpretation of what it probably signified originally. The point I made was that in present-day Hindu philosophy, the "third eye" represents clairvoyance or psychic abilities or the mind-expanding effect of hallucinogenic substances and narcotics. However, I think that this meaning is a corruption of what it probably originally signified, way back in the beginning of Vedic Indian history.

"Reverse-engineering" backwards to what might originally have been the Vedic culture in whose milieu the war of Kurukshetra was probably fought and, subsequently, recounted in Sanskrit verse, I think that the symbology of the "third eye" and the tilak or mark on the forehead probably represented something closer to simple foresight on the battlefield. One has to keep in mind that the philosophy articulated in the epic poem The Mahabharata was linked with a martial context—a philosophy of the battlefield, in which the mentor tries to motivate his pupil into war. So it seems to me to make sense that the iconography of the "third eye" should fit into this context—rather than referring to mysticism or clairvoyance, as a superficial reading might suggest, it seems to make more sense to me that it refers to the ability to foresee or anticipate the enemy's moves on the battlefield and react accordingly, as a product of years of intensive skill and training.

Think of a Grandmaster chess player and their ability almost to read their opponent's mind and foresee their moves several moves in advance, strategizing their own game accordingly. Or think of the expert swordsman or fencer, and their ability to foresee and foreshadow their opponent's moves ahead of time and react almost instantaneously, even preemptively, on occasion. Or think of the highly skilled and experienced matador, and their ability to foresee and anticipate the brutish movements of the bull and react accordingly before zeroing in for the kill. Or think of the highly trained and experienced athlete and their ability to anticipate and out-think their opponent on the field or court. Again, this ability comes from expertise in one's skill and from years of training and experience. It's not really a psychic ability, but, rather, the ability to view circumstances holistically and to respond proactively based on an unconscious extrapolation into the future (I hope that makes sense).

I think that that's closer to what the iconography of the "third eye" probably represented in its original form and it became corrupted over time into representing something quite different, namely clairvoyance or mysticism. However, if one strips away the distortions that have accrued over centuries and returns to original core of the mythology, I think the context reveals the original meaning of the myths and icons much more vividly and clearly. However, I must note, that this is all hypothetical—in no way do I have the academic credentials in the field to back up my statements! All I can say is that such a reading of the myths and icons makes sense to me!

Myths and icons are a fascinating subject in and of themselves, and the puzzle of getting to their originary meanings is a worthy subject of study, because they meant so much to the cultures they sprang from, and continue to mean a lot to the society of the present day. I guess it is a worthwhile effort trying to understand exactly what they represented back when they were originally conceived and how their meaning might have changed or transformed over time.

Horizon Cybermedia, as a part of our ongoing film-making project, attempts to make sense of the mass of cultural icons that have come down to us over the ages from bygone cultures and civilizations. Rather than dismiss them offhand, I think it is a worthwhile effort to try and understand them and the histories associated with them. Meanwhile, do check out our website at http://www.explorationtheseries.com for our ongoing film series, Exploration with Uday Gunjikar.

In his revolutionary book, Thus Spake Zarathustra, the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche argued the case for a form of radical, heroic self-reliance centering around a figure that he called the Übermensch—the "Overman" or "Superman." He articulates some powerful and extremely virile ideas rooted in a radical departure from the bourgeois Christianity of his day, which he considered to be steeped in complacency. Instead, he argued for complete individualism to a radical degree.

Now these are some powerful ideas and, I will not deny, that they are profound in their implications. The concept of radical individualism is appealing—almost hypnotically so—especially in the context of the Classical Greek mythology and philosophy by which it is largely inspired. I am the first to submit that Nietzsche, in his works, presents us with some powerful ideas, inspiring us to question all that we usually take for granted and come up with new values, new ideas and a new mode of thinking as a departure from stale conventionalism.

In fact, Nietzsche's thinking goes to the extreme of advocating total atheism in the context of its credo of self-reliance and individualism. "God is dead," he declares, in the person of his fictional prophet, Zarathustra—which is to say, forget about Divine intervention—do it yourself and be the self-reliant individualist. Again, this thinking is especially appealing to the individualists among us, myself included, who aim to be fiercely independent and self-reliant in our attitude.

But, in the end, sooner or later, one has to confront reality. The reality that, as human beings, we are pretty insignificant creatures in the face of the forces of nature. Even the strongest and greatest among us is, ultimately, no match for the blind forces of nature, in their unbelievable, arbitrary destructive power.

Forget about total self-reliance—it is a myth. In the face of the blind forces of nature, what one truly discovers is how fragile the human condition really is and our need for one another and total dependence on the grace of God. As seen in the movie Deliverance, nature humbles us into acknowledging our need for God—to be unaware of that fact is to be self-deceived. The depth of our reliance upon God is absolute—we cannot exist apart from the will of God. This is the credo of Biblical Christianity and it is up to each of us to discover for ourselves whether or not it is factual.

All I can say is that, in the course of my life, at any given stage, any number of things could go wrong. The idea that any of us have any significant degree of control over our destinies is a myth. It is only too easy for some calamity to claim any of our lives, whether it happens to be a natural disaster like a Tsunami in south-east Asia; a man-made disaster like the flooding in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, or a financial disaster like the recent collapse of Wall Street. Our lives are so fragile, in retrospect, that apart from Divine intervention, none of us really stands a chance! Our only hope is total reliance on God in the person of Jesus Christ—anything else is, ultimately, self-deception.

This may sound insensitive to someone who is facing financial ruin or the loss of a home caused by one of any number of calamities we face every day worldwide—but I have come to believe that it is the only reality in the end. Our lives as human beings are so fragile that apart from Divine intervention, none of us stands a chance! In that sense, self-reliance is, ultimately, a myth—no one can truly be totally self-reliant—we are, as human beings, dependent upon one another for our survival and co-existence and, ultimately, dependent on God for every breath of air that we breathe.

Horizon Cybermedia humbly and gratefully acknowledges our total dependence on the grace of God, in the person of Jesus Christ, for our continued existence as a new media company and we can only hope that our success is blessed by Divine agency. We invite you to share in our ongoing adventures across the world that we hope to continue to bring to you. Check http://www.explorationtheseries.com, our website, for the latest film in our Exploration series on the stunning vistas of the Wine Country of Sonoma County, Ca., and check back again soon for the next film in our series on the magnificent Christian monuments in the city of Calcutta, India.

The iconography of the Hindu culture and religion can be pretty bizarre and terrifying. Having grown up in India, I have found parts of it to be downright confusing, personally. Take, for example, the concept of the "third eye." In Hinduism, supposedly, the "third eye" is considered to be a symbol of clairvoyance, enlightenment or a higher level of consciousness or awareness. In the Vedic Indian tradition, ascetics were supposed to spend years of solitude in the wilderness meditating in silence, until they achieved this so-called "heightened consciousness" or "heightened awareness." In fact, some scholars read this as referring to the "mind-expanding" or "mind-altering" effect of hallucinogens and narcotics such as soma, whose use is referred to in the Hindu text, the Rig Veda.

In the Hindu tradition, as a matter of fact, many devoted Hindus wear a mark on the forehead called a tilak to symbolize the "third eye"—and this is especially true of weatherbeaten Hindu ascetics, who wear an especially pronounced tilak on the forehead. Here is an image of actor Harrison Ford wearing a tilak on his forehead in the 1984 film Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, a film which, incidentally, distorts Indian culture to the point of caricaturing, parodying and demonizing it pretty severely.

Now these interpretations of the concept of the "third eye" may well be true—I don't consider myself to be a scholar of Sanskrit texts or an expert on the Hindu tradition. I guess my understanding of the culture and tradition of my homeland is, in that sense, pretty limited and superficial. Having been educated primarily in the western tradition, I guess my thinking is far more pragmatic. I personally see that as a good thing in some ways because it enables me to view the iconography of the culture with a more holistic, dispassionate eye rather than get lost in its symbolism, which is only too easy to do. This can lead to confusion and misinterpretation and even, ultimately, to confused hostility towards the culture and tradition.

So thinking about it pragmatically, what does the iconography of the "third eye" refer to? I was reflecting on this concept recently, along with the concept of the illusory and transient nature of reality as described in the epic poem, the Mahabharata, with an eye towards demythologizing and clarifying these ideas so as to try to get to the core of what they represent.

Then it occurred to me that in his epic poem, the Odyssey, Homer relates a sequence wherein Odysseus (or Ulysses, in Latin) lands upon an island in the course of his voyages and is taken hostage, along with many of his men, by a gigantic cannibalistic Cyclops named Polyphemus. They are only able to escape with their lives secretly by blinding the one-eyed creature—which is to say, rendering the creature completely blind, whereas previously, its vision was already pretty limited, as it had only one eye.

So it got me thinking—what was Homer talking about here, in the metaphorical language of mythology? What does it mean to have only one eye as opposed to two eyes? The answer is pretty obvious when you think about it—if you have only one eye, you have no depth perception. You see the world as flat and two-dimensional. We have depth perception because we have stereoscopic vision—two eyes. It is the difference between watching a movie on a flat screen and watching the same movie in 3D—a huge difference. So, with no eyes, we are completely blind and cannot see the world at all. With one eye, we see the world as two-dimensional. With a second eye, we can perceive three dimensions—we have depth perception.

So what about the metaphorical, figurative "third eye" of Hindu mythology? If we go strictly by the logic of progression, it must mean being able to see the world as four-dimensional—to being able to discern the fourth dimension, i.e. time—to be able to view the space-time continuum as a continuum.

Basically, it seems to me to refer to foresight and insight—not necessarily to clairvoyance but, rather, to the ability to see through and beyond the illusory surfaces of the world—to see beyond superficiality—and to discern hidden trends and deeper meaning. So maybe we're not talking about something as esoteric as clairvoyance or mysticism so much as a heightened ability for interpretive, deductive reasoning—to be able to discern clues and patterns in the world around us and, thereby, to extrapolate into the future and see beyond the immediacy of present experience (which is inherently illusory and transient).

In A. Conan Doyle's novel A Study in Scarlet, Sherlock Holmes is described as having an almost intuitive ability to arrive instantaneously at deductions based on the evidence presented to him—viewing a set of clues holistically and almost instantaneously arriving at a conclusion. His abilities are described as being almost clairvoyant or supernatural to the casual observer. In one sequence in the novel, Dr. Watson reads a newspaper article written, unknown to him, by Sherlock Holmes:

The writer claimed by a momentary expression, a twitch of a muscle or a glance of an eye, to fathom a man's inmost thoughts. Deceit, according to him, was an impossibility in the case of one trained to observation and analysis. His conclusions were as infallible as so many propositions of Euclid. So startling would his results appear to the uninitiated that until they learned the processes by which he had arrived at them they might well consider him as a necromancer.

"From a drop of water," said the writer, "a logician could infer the possibility of an Atlantic or a Niagara without having seen or heard of one or the other. So all life is a great chain, the nature of which is known whenever we are shown a single link of it. Like all other arts, the Science of Deduction and Analysis is one which can only be acquired by long and patient study nor is life long enough to allow any mortal to attain the highest possible perfection in it.

In the Rudolph Valentino film, The Young Rajah, in a dramatization of the battle of Kurukshetra, the film depicts Krishna applying a mark on Arjuna's forehead, which supposedly gives Arjuna the power of "second sight." This power is carried down to his descendant, Amos Judd (Valentino's character), who carries a birthmark on his forehead and possesses the uncanny ability to see into the future—to foresee events. This ties in neatly with Hindu tradition—the mark or "tilak" on the forehead worn by Hindus as a symbol or iconic representation of the mysterious "third eye."

But far from the esoteric, mystical connotations of this iconography, I think it is far more valuable and informative to think of this as representing simple foresight—being a visionary thinker—being able to see beyond surfaces and superficiality and discern hidden meaning from clues through interpretive, deductive reasoning. I think it makes much more sense, from a purely pragmatic standpoint, to interpret this iconography as such, especially in the context of the epic poem, the Mahabharata. Perhaps if more people in our world had foresight and the ability to see beyond surfaces and the immediate present, our world might be a happier place to live in and we might be wiser as individuals and collectively.

Perhaps this ability could be developed through training and exercise until it achieved the level of clarity and sophistication demonstrated by Sherlock Holmes in the literary works by Conan Doyle—approaching a level that, to the untutored eye, might appear to be mystical clairvoyance.

Horizon Cybermedia aims, as part of our agenda, to decipher and demythologize arcane ideas and iconography in order to make them comprehensible and pragmatic (though running the risk of oversimplification), in an attempt to promote understanding, acceptance and tolerance between cultures and populations. Hopefully, our efforts will yield positive results! Meanwhile, check out our website, http://www.explorationtheseries.com for our ongoing film series, Exploration with Uday Gunjikar. The current episode takes the viewer to the Wine Country of Sonoma, CA and future episodes will visit Calcutta, India and other locations worldwide!

Having grown up in India, the stories from the ancient Sanskrit epic, The Mahabharata, are a critical part of my cultural heritage. Immersed in its folklore from a very young age, the themes, characters and situations from the epic poem are as familiar to me as, perhaps, the myths and fables of the Homeric tradition would be to a child growing up in the Western world.

But, to be honest with you, it wasn't until I viewed the expanded, 5 hour film version of the epic directed by the acclaimed British stage and film personality, Peter Brook, renowned internationally for his brilliant productions of The Lord of the Flies based on the novel by William Golding and of Shakespeare's King Lear, that I gained a renewed appreciation for the true genius behind the Sanskrit literary work.

Filmed in lushly evocative sepia tones, with an international cast of highly talented players, the film is truly refreshing and eye-opening in its interpretation and rendition of the archaic Vedic Indian culture from which the epic stems. Brutally honest and resonant in its imagery, the film truly captures the zeitgeist of Vedic India, marked by its factional, territorial power struggles and its lofty, arcane philosophical ideas. All told, the film is a powerfully nihilistic, apocalyptic vision that is profoundly relevant to our present day 21st Century world. Like the Homeric myths, it stands the test of time and reveals itself to be a profoundly modern, relevant literary work.

Believed to have been composed around 3000 years ago by the poet Vyasa, the plot centers around the factional struggles of the rival clans, the Pandava and the Kaurava. It details the years of factional strife between the clans, culminating in the devastating war of Kurukshetra. Though the story is told in the elevated, hyperbolic, metaphorical style of epic and myth, historians and scholars of ancient Sanskrit literature believe that the war was actually fought in northern India between 1000 - 800 B.C.E. between rival factions of the Kuru clan.

The main themes of the work are the importance of Dharma, the Hindu concept of honor, duty, ethics and morality, along with its associations with social order; and the deceptive, illusory and transitory nature of reality as we experience it. It skillfully weaves mythical, historical and folklore elements into a vivid tapestry that forces one to challenge one's assumptions and prejudices and, indeed, to question the nature of the very fabric of reality itself. What echoes through my mind while viewing the film is the following quote from Albert Einstein:

Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.

and one wonders whether Einstein was in any way influenced by Sanskrit literature or the Mahabharata in his revolutionary thinking. Indeed, it is a fact that J. Robert Oppenheimer, the supervising scientist of the Manhattan project, cited the Mahabharata upon the first successful test of the atomic bomb, which underscores the profoundly modern and apocalyptic vision of the work.

The main plot begins, like many a James Bond novel, with a high stakes gambling match—a game of dice. In the course of the match, the Pandava clan lose all their possessions, including their own liberty, to the scheming, devious Kaurava, and are ultimately forced into an extended exile in the wilderness. The image is profoundly resonant with current events, as seen in recent election results in Iran and Afghanistan, which many believe to have been rigged or contrived. This event turns out to be a critical turning point in the story, as it marks the point where a friendly rivalry between the clans devolves into a bitter, divisive enmity.

The next thirteen years recount something of a cold war and arms race between the clans, as each side forges alliances and acquires so-called "sacred weapons" in the relentless buildup towards the apocalyptic final confrontation at Kurukshetra. Again, the work reveals itself to be profoundly modern and relevant when, in one haunting sequence, Arjuna, the elite warrior of the Pandava clan, confronts the Hindu deity Shiva and asks him for the secret of Pasupata—"the ultimate weapon that can destroy the world." It is chillingly evocative of the modern quest for superiority in nuclear arms in the course of the Cold War and beyond and, perhaps, is one of the themes evoked by Oppenheimer in his famous allusion to the epic. Even as Arjuna acquires the doomsday weapon from Shiva, Karna, his rival in the Kaurava clan, sets off to acquire it for himself as well, which he does by deceiving a hermit into revealing to him the "secret formula" of Pasupata—again, echoing Einstein's groundbreaking mass-energy equivalence equation, which was the harbinger of the atomic and nuclear age.

The final apocalyptic confrontation between the two factions at Kurukshetra begins with the armies confronting each other on the battlefield and establishing the ground-rules for war in accordance with the principles of Dharma, i.e. honor, duty and ethics. This event echoes such modern-day treaties as the Treaty of Versailles and the Geneva Conventions, which establish what qualifies as acceptable conduct during wartime, as opposed to what qualifies as a war crime or a violation of human rights.

As the two armies are about to charge into war, Arjuna, the elite Pandava archer and swordsman, suddenly loses confidence and collapses to his knees. Unable to bring himself to do battle with his own kinfolk and mentors, he confesses his fears to Krishna, his closest friend, confidante and charioteer. This is followed by one of the best known sequences in the epic, the Bhagavadgita, wherein Krishna gives Arjuna an extended motivational pep talk, which essentially summarizes the core concepts of the Hindu philosophy of the Vedic Age in India. Possibly the reason this sequence is so well known is that it was first dramatized on film in the Rudolph Valentino film, The Young Rajah, in which Valentino's character, Amos Judd, claims descent from Arjuna. The central theme in Krishna's discourse to Arjuna is that all of humanity is "born into illusion" and that illusion is all-pervasive in our all-too-brief lives. Therefore, in order to seek truth, one must achieve a form of stoic detachment in one's attitude and actions. These ideas are strikingly resonant of Buddhism, which developed much later in ancient India, though without the Buddhist emphasis on pacifism and non-violence. As such, Krishna's ideology is, contextually, a profoundly martial ethic.

Motivated and ready to launch into battle, Arjuna signals his attack, and the war proceeds. What ensues is a tragic recountal of the horrors of war, made all the more moving and profound by its emphasis on the human dimension of the conflict and on the kinship ties of the primary players. Every value of Dharma that the culture holds dear—every value of honor, duty and ethical conduct—is brutally violated and overturned in the course of warfare, so much so that at one stage, Yudhishthira, the leader of the Pandava clan, wonders out loud whether they are actually defending the ideals of Dharma through their actions in the course of the war. This theme is, again, profoundly resonant and relevant to modern times, echoing the ethical challenges we face during the course of the recent U.S. military incursions in Iraq and Afghanistan, and whether the ends justify the means in the course of warfare or anything else, for that matter.

The Pandava clan emerges victorious from the war, but the film retains its bleak, nihilistic, apocalyptic vision in its recountal of the ultimate demise of each of the core characters. This culminates with the honor-bound, dutiful Yudhishthira finally arriving at the gates of Paradise in his old age, after all his brothers and Draupadi, their collective wife, have fallen into the abyss. What follows is the final dénouement in the story, which I will not reveal, but which, in effect, turns the entire story on its head and challenges one to question all one's preconceptions in life. In essence, it stunningly underscores and emphasizes the dual themes of personal honor, integrity and morality (Dharma) versus the transitory, illusory nature of the world and of reality.

The film is brilliantly and powerfully directed by Peter Brook and adapted for stage and screen by Peter Brook, Jean-Claude Carrière and Marie-Hélène Estienne. It features some truly breathtaking and profoundly moving performances by the international cast of players including Georges Corraface as Duryodhana, the villainous, but ultimately sympathetic leader of the Kaurava clan; Vittorio Mezzogiorno as Arjuna, the elite warrior of the Pandava clan; Bruce Myers as Krishna, Arjuna's friend, confidante and spiritual guide; Jeffrey Kissoon as Karna, the estranged eldest Pandava brother and friend of Duryodhana; Andrzej Seweryn as Yudhishthira, the head of the Pandava clan; Mamadou Dioumé as Bhima, the Pandava strongman, and Mallika Sarabhai as the princess Draupadi, the wife of the Pandava brothers. The soundtrack is richly evocative of a distant, bygone era, with resounding instrumentals interspersed with periods of deafening silence. The subtlety in the richly textured imagery of the film, along with its superbly choreographed action sequences and innovative set design, make the film almost hypnotically memorable. Its dreamlike, mythic quality is accentuated by its use of sound, imagery and sepia-drenched color, at the hands of a truly original auteur of contemporary stage and film. All in all, this film is a truly moving and memorable viewing experience and I highly recommend it to everyone.

Horizon Cybermedia is about creating inspired works of artistic creativity which, like Peter Brook's film of The Mahabharata, resonate with modern audiences while evoking the rich texture of myth and legend. We are currently in the midst of editing the third film in our series, Exploration with Uday Gunjikar, on the remarkable historical monuments of the city of Calcutta, India. Do check back soon at our website http://www.explorationtheseries.com for further updates.

In times of personal crisis, I have a recurring dream or nightmare or image that sticks in my mind. I see myself standing, essentially, before the throne of God, with the finger of God pointing down at me in accusation and judgment.

It may sound clichéd, but I assure you, it is a very real experience. In times when I feel as if everything in life is going against me, I can vividly visualize myself standing before the most ominous, awe-inspiring, terrifying seat of judgment imaginable. Think of the most intimidating figure of authority you have ever been confronted by in your life and then imagine what the authority over them might be like—the authority figure that holds them accountable—infinitely more ominous and intimidating.

I see myself standing in abject awe and mortal terror as a massive finger points down at me from the remote reaches of that throne of judgment. I hear a rumbling voice thundering in the distance, asking me, "What do you have to say for yourself?"

What this experience brings home to me is that the universe is not blind causality—that beyond space and time, beyond everything, there is an ultimate force of authority—an authority that no one can escape, that everyone must confront, sooner or later, whether it may be in this life or beyond.

In response to this inquisition from on high, I find myself thinking of all the things that I could possibly say to justify my existence—and I find myself reflecting that nothing I could possibly say about my life could measure up to the awful finality of the judgment of God. I find myself feeling as though I were indicted by the tribunal of the Reign of Terror, sentenced to be beheaded at the guillotine—or by the Spanish Inquisition, condemned to rot in some abysmal dungeon for eternity.

I reflect that even the greatest humanitarian or wealthiest emperor who ever lived would be as nothing more than some miserable worm writhing in futility before this awesome throne of accusation and indictment. That it is inevitable and inescapable for every one of us—that no human soul can ever possibly escape the inevitability of confronting this seat of ultimate, final judgment.

And, furthermore, I reflect that nothing that anyone could possibly say or do can in any way justify oneself before the throne of God. One might be the most powerful, wealthiest, strongest, greatest human being who ever lived, but before the throne of God, none of it means anything. One is no more than a worm before the majesty of God and there is nothing one can say or do to justify oneself before the awe-inspiring perfection and impossible standards of God.

And then, in sheer desperation, I admit that I am a sinner, guilty of any number of errors, failings and shortcomings—only too human in my mind, but impossible to justify all the same.

Finally, at a loss over what to say or do, I quote the Bible—that in the name of Jesus Christ, my savior, the Son of God, I have the assurance of salvation. It is a last ditch attempt on my part—maybe this will work, if nothing else will.

And, after a moment's pause—a moment that seems like an eternity—I feel the awful weight of accusation and condemnation let up. I feel a sense of relief and release and sense that way up on high, God is smiling and nodding. I see the finger of accusation retract, transforming into a gigantic thumbs-up sign.

The ominous voice rumbles again. "You are free to go! You have answered correctly." And I feel the light of renewed life shine down into my life once again. I feel as though the awful certainty of condemnation has been lifted and I have been released once again to experience a renewal of life.

I then begin to reflect that this is the essence of my Christian faith. This is the key to salvation, to eternal life—that when one is confronted by the inevitable finality of judgment, the only escape is to testify to one's faith in Jesus Christ and experience the mercy and grace of God. Everything else in life is merely human philosophy or culture or art or mythology. The only reality, in the face of ultimate judgment from on high, is to testify to one's faith in Christ.

What strikes me about this whole experience is how real it is to me. It is not some sort of psychological contrivance concocted by my subconscious as a dramatization of the conflict of guilt vs. redemption. Rather, it strikes me as being a real experience with very real, tangible consequences in my life.

All I can say is that if you ever find yourself in a similar situation, there is only one escape that I know of—and that is to testify honestly to one's faith in Jesus Christ upon admission of one's personal fallen, sinful human nature. That is the only assurance one has of appealing to the grace and mercy of God in the face of judgment. You are welcome to try some other course of action if you think it might fare better, but I wish you good luck! The only sure, certain way I know of finding deliverance in the face of ultimate judgment is by calling upon the name of Jesus Christ and the assurance of personal salvation.

To be sure, all this sounds trite and clichéd—who hasn't heard all of this a thousand times before? That old story about judgment and redemption that any number of Bible-thumping evangelists have preached to our deafened ears over the years. And yet—it is not until one actually "experiences" what this really means—that is to say, in one's imagination or mind's eye, at least—that one can fully appreciate the meaning of this truism.

So take this as a helpful hint from someone who is letting you in on a secret that some day might well save your soul—when you face the throne of final judgment, whether literally or figuratively or in your imagination, appeal for mercy in the name of Jesus Christ. Nothing else can save you from that ultimate judgment!

Take a look around you—the symptoms are undeniable. The U.S. appears to be going the way of the U.S.S.R. Just as the Soviet Union, exhausted by years of combat in Afghanistan, finally collapsed under the weight of its own clunky, slow-witted, unmanageable bureaucracy, it appears that the U.S., in the wake of its own wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, is headed in a similar direction.

Now before you denounce me as some sort of "enemy of the state"—which you might well do if you happen to be infected by the Orwellian paranoia and mass hysteria that appears to be gripping our nation—I ask you to hear me out.

From the very beginning, the American economy has been fueled by ideas and ingenuity, imagination and innovation. It has only been thanks to ambitious entrepreneurs who have been willing to take the risk of funding creative ideas that our society has been able to advance from the era of horse-drawn carriages to that of space flight and the internet in the space of barely one century. It has been the radical visionaries of our age—the Edisons, the Einsteins, the Marconis—who have truly been responsible for advancing our society and economy into the modern age and away from the feudal past, enabling science to triumph over primitive superstition and ignorance.

What we are seeing in our society right now—the "New Deal" of the Obama administration—is, perhaps, important to keep the economy from bleeding to death. However, it is a patch fix at best—a short-term measure to keep the U.S. from going the way of the Soviet Union, which was total disintegration.

Moving forward—in order truly to stimulate the economy and bring about true economic growth, along with jobs and opportunities—in order to restore the failing heartbeat of our society—what is needed is radical action similar to applying an AED to a heart-attack victim.

In other words, what is needed is for entrepreneurs and financiers to start valuing radical ideas and visions and to start actively funding them at an unprecedented scale.

Sure, not all of them will succeed—but if even a fraction of all genuinely creative, imaginative ideas bears fruition, the rewards to the economy as well as to investors and creative innovators alike, is bound to be significant. It is only by taking risks with big ideas and encouraging creative and imaginative thinking in our society that we can reverse the trend towards gradual degeneration, in the direction of social disintegration and/or totalitarianism, as taken by the former Soviet Union, that we currently appear to be on.

In a prior weblog post, I compared my nascent media company, Horizon Cybermedia, to the Apollo 11 moon mission and the moon landing. Admittedly, the comparison is somewhat far-fetched, but, nevertheless, I continue to argue that the parallels that I drew do stand. I honestly believe that my vision of what a media company can be in our modern Information Age deserves serious consideration and the opportunity to succeed—if only I could inspire an investor to believe in my vision and provide the necessary financial backing!

But continuing on the subject of the Apollo 11 mission, I believe that there is a true visionary affiliated with that mission who deserves serious consideration by our society and especially by the current administration. I am referring to the astronaut and MIT Ph.D., Dr. Edwin (Buzz) Aldrin—surely a man who knows what he is talking about if there ever was one. His vision of a NASA funded project to take the era of space exploration beyond the moon—to Mars and beyond—thereby helping to jump-start the economy with a massive enterprise in technological innovation, one that would also promote the virtues of creativity and hard work, is a project that we all need to take very seriously if human society is to advance to the next phase of our cultural evolution—namely as a culture that looks beyond our terrestrial habitation to the heavens and stars.

This would be a massive investment in terms of new technology and innovation—but if the government can invest billions of taxpayer dollars in deficit spending as a cash incentive for people to trade in their gas-guzzling clunkers for more fuel-efficient vehicles as part of the so-called "Cash for Clunkers" program, then surely they can spare a few billion dollars to fund genuine technological creativity and innovation. After all, NASA has been at the forefront of technological innovation for decades past and in terms of ROI, it boasts a remarkable record, to say nothing of the contributions that NASA innovation has made to the world of consumer products.

Ultimately, all I can say is that if enterprising financiers displayed true far-sightedness by taking risks on projects that involve genuine technological innovation and imaginative creativity, I would venture to suggest that the odds of a healthy ROI are far greater than if they were to invest in shady financial dealings or risky ventures involving overseas capital!

Horizon Cybermedia is about taking media production forward into the Cyber Age—in a healthy, progressive direction and with attention to quality and high standards. All we need, at this stage, is for investors who are willing to believe in us and our vision—to take the risk of funding us in the second phase of our growth and expansion!

We look foward to hearing from you. You may contact us by email or via the contact form on our website. We also accept financial contributions via PayPal, and you may contribute securely by clicking on the "Donate" button to the right or on the contact page on our website.

Currently, we are in the middle of editing the next episode in our film series, Exploration with Uday Gunjikar, which will soon be available for viewing at our website, http://www.explorationtheseries.com.

This is it! Horizon Cybermedia, Inc. finally reaches its first anniversary! As you might know already, the company and website, http://www.explorationtheseries.com were launched on July 29, 2008—a modest media company with titanic ambitions! Founded on the premise that raw talent, skill and ability are the cornerstones of success on the universal platform of the internet, as opposed to political connections or the influence of self-appointed cultural gatekeepers, Horizon Cybermedia is steadily growing into a media company in its own right.

It has been an exciting and eventful first year, with Horizon Cybermedia making strong and steady progress towards our stated goals:

• We have launched the first two episodes of the Exploration Film Series, with several more episodes still to come. The episodes, The Elephanta Caves and The Wine Country are currently online at our website http://www.explorationtheseries.com.


• Horizon Cybermedia has a YouTube channel featuring promotional videos for our films in HD.


• Horizon Cybermedia is also currently podcasting on iTunes.


• Horizon Cybermedia has a channel on Blip.tv.


• Horizon Cybermedia's promotional videos are also available on many other video-sharing sites on the web, such as Revver, DailyMotion, Yahoo, MySpace, MetaCafé, Veoh, Viddler, Vimeo, Sevenload, i2TV and others.


• Horizon Cybermedia has been regularly updating our blog with fresh, relevant, topical content for your reading pleasure and interest. Articles from the blog have been posted across the web at numerous article publishing and ezine sites.


• Horizon Cybermedia has also produced a DVD of a special version of our first film under the title Exploring Elephanta. The DVD was originally created for complimentary distribution in the film festival circuit. It will soon be available for purchase as a collector's item.

However, the past is prologue. Horizon Cybermedia has only one direction it plans to move—onward and upward. Check back regularly with us at our website and blog for plenty of fresh, new media content to come. Some of the projects currently in the works include:

• Several more episodes in the ongoing film series, Exploration with Uday Gunjikar. We have already completed principal photography for films on such venues as Calcutta, India; Big Bear Lake, CA; the Buddhist Kanheri Caves near Mumbai, India; Half Moon Bay, CA, and other fascinating locations.


• Also in the works is a DVD release of the entire first season of the film series, Exploration with Uday Gunjikar, which will be on sale soon.


• We also have plans to release a print edition of selected articles from our blog. This project, however, will probably be several more years in the making. Expect the book to be released probably on our fifth anniversary (if not sooner).


• We are also working on several script ideas (in primary stages) and we plan, in the future, to expand our production scope to plot-driven short and feature-length film projects. We will also continue to produce high quality documentaries. Expect the rate and scope of our production efforts to grow dramatically as we continue to expand.

Horizon Cybermedia's ambitious media production agenda is, ultimately, dependent on you, the viewer, for support. Our motivation has always been to produce high quality media content for your consumption—media content that respects your intelligence and appeals to your highest instincts to elevate your spirit. We aspire to produce quality art and media that holds to our mission statement:

To be a positive voice in the media space;
to put artistic integrity above mercenary interests;
to make a truthful, meaningful artistic statement.

To this end, we are dependent on you to support our operation. If our vision and ideals and the quality of our produced media content appeal to you, then please do continue to support us. You can do this in many ways:

• Spread the word about us amongst your friends and family. Encourage them regularly to check out the website and blog and to spread the word about us even further.


• If you are truly inspired by our mission statement and our efforts, perhaps you might be interested in making a direct contribution to support Horizon Cybermedia. You may do so securely and anonymously through Paypal by clicking on the Donate button to the right or on the contact form on our website.


• You might also be interested in investing in Horizon Cybermedia, Inc., to further contribute to our growth and expansion. For more information, feel free to contact Horizon Cybermedia either through the contact form on our website or directly via email.

Here's looking forward to the coming year and the dramatic growth and expansion in our operation that it is sure to bring! Thank you for supporting us in the past year and we look forward to you joining us in many more adventures to come—exploring new horizons and journeying to ever more exciting venues.

On this day, July 20, 1969, man first landed on the moon. The Apollo 11 Moon Mission, commanded by Neil Armstrong and backed up by Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins successfully made the historic journey to the lunar surface and back, forever going down in history as the first human beings to stand upon another world and look upon the earth as a distant planetary sphere in the sky.

It is, perhaps, something of a cliché to harp on about the Apollo 11 mission, even though it is, arguably, the most important historical event of the 20^th Century. But I do so, at the risk of trivializing the event, for another reason—possibly a little more self-serving. Because while July 20, 2009 marks the 40^th anniversary of the moon landing, it also comes very close to marking the first anniversary of the launch of Horizon Cybermedia, Inc. and the website http://www.explorationtheseries.com. Actually, the website was launched on July 29, 2008. I remember pretty well what I was doing on this day, a year ago—I had probably just completed editing the first film of my Exploration series and was probably recording the soundtrack at the time.

But the parallels don't end there!

Again, I say this at the risk of trivializing a tremendously important historical event and incurring the wrath of the astronauts of the mission, so I hope they won't be offended when I note that I say this in a lighter vein.

First of all, the Apollo mission and the moon landing were originally inspired by a speech given by President John F. Kennedy to a joint session of Congress on May 25, 1961:

"I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to the Earth."

Similarly, Horizon Cybermedia was also, in part, inspired by another quote from John F. Kennedy, namely:

"We must never forget that art is not a form of propaganda; it is a form of truth."

Secondly, just as the Apollo 11 moon mission was conceived as a humanitarian mission with a message of peace to all nations, to the backdrop of the disastrous Vietnam War, similarly, Horizon Cybermedia was also launched with a humanitarian mission and a message of peace and world exploration to all nations, to the backdrop of the catastrophic wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Thirdly, as the moon mission represents the pinnacle of the Homeric spirit of exploration and adventure from the Odyssey, so also Horizon Cybermedia is, in many ways, inspired by the Homeric tradition of the Odyssey. In fact, in some respects, I believe that Horizon Cybermedia comes closer to the true Homeric spirit of the Odyssey, because while the Apollo 11 mission was a massive, state-funded (through NASA), public sector enterprise in space exploration, Horizon Cybermedia, on the other hand, is a small, private sector enterprise in terrestrial exploration and independent film-making. However, our status as a small, independent film producer gives us an edge because we are able to remain true to our independent vision.

Finally, the Apollo 11 moon mission, while being a landmark in so many other ways, was also a landmark in film-making history with the first video footage actually filmed on the surface of the moon (which is pretty amazing if you really think about it). So also, Horizon Cybermedia hopes, in all humility, that 40 years from now, we will also be considered something of a landmark in film-making history! Who knows, maybe some day, we will film an episode of our Exploration series on the surface of the moon! In fact, you never know, that day may well arrive sooner than we expect!

Anyway, having exhausted my resources with my admittedly somewhat shameless attempts at self-promotion, I now turn to the main event of the hour: the 40^th anniversary of the Apollo 11 mission to the moon!

My heartfelt congratulations to astronauts Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins on this anniversary of their history-making, ground-breaking lunar expedition and the message of universal peace and hope it brings to all of mankind!

Best wishes from Horizon Cybermedia, Inc. and http://www.explorationtheseries.com!

One of the greatest things about living in America is enjoying the enormous privilege of witnessing first-hand the extra-ordinary greatness of the accomplishments of heroic individuals—human beings who, ultimately, are no different than you or me in that they are mortal beings, not superhuman or gods. And yet, their achievements are so mind-blowing in the eyes of the rest of us that they achieve a status that is greater than us—we salute, respect and look up to them as the embodiments of the heroic ideals that we aspire to achieve ourselves.

On July 20^th 2009, we celebrate the 40^th anniversary of what is probably the seminal event of the 20^th century—the Apollo 11 mission—man landing on the surface of the moon. It is impossible to trivialize the significance of this event. The heroic individuals who first stepped onto the moon—Armstrong and Aldrin—are revered globally as the representatives of one of the pinnacles of human achievement. In the Homeric tradition of the Odyssey, they are:

. . . those few who have sailed past the point of the map where dragons be and come back home to tell the rest of us what they saw.
- Moon Walkers, Jeffrey Kluger, Time magazine, July 27, 2009

Their's is the accomplishment of true heroic individualism—of a few courageous explorers who were undaunted by what might seem to the rest us to be impossible odds. It always blows my mind to revisit the (newly restored) archival footage of man first landing on an alien world—the moon. As Aldrin referred to it, a "magnificent desolation"—like nothing else anywhere on the surface of the earth.

Living in America, one is continually reminded of the extra-ordinary, mind-blowing achievements of heroic individuals such as these—so much so that one often runs the risk of trivializing them and taking them for granted. Only recently, the world bore witness to the passing of one of the architects of modern TV news media—Walter Cronkite, designated "the most trusted man in America" by his peers. The story of Cronkite's passing is the number one news story of the moment—but what really strikes me about him is a point made by Susan Zirinsky, one of Cronkite's producers, on the CNN news show, AC 360:

. . . what was so striking about the time was the impact a single voice could have . . . those of us that grew up in that era saw the impact that this single man had . . . he was about the core value of the news.

Also striking are legendary newsman and Cronkite's successor as CBS news anchor, Dan Rather's words about his mentor, spoken on the Rachel Maddow Show on MSNBC:

. . . as a television news anchor, . . . he set the standard . . . by expanding the public's understanding and connection to big stories . . . . As a sole anchor . . . he connected.

The profusion of heroic individualism in America is something many of us take for granted. It is, indeed, an amazing thing that American culture encourages, venerates and admires heroic individuals who go against the grain, challenge the status quo and achieve the impossible. That has always been the foundation of American culture.

In fact, one has to look no further than last year's Presidential elections to witness first-hand the value that American's place on heroic individualism. It is no coincidence that Barack Obama, the current U.S. President, is a testament to the American fascination with and admiration of individualists, as the Obama Presidential campaign had all the hallmarks of a heroic individualist who challenged the status quo and overcame impossible odds—all the while in deference to another heroic individualist, namely, Rev. Martin Luther King, the great civil rights activist. And, indeed, it is no coincidence that the Republican nominee for President was another famed "maverick" and heroic individualist in his own right, the Vietnam War veteran, Sen. John McCain.

In sports, too, Americans admire the legendary accomplishments of individuals who go beyond and achieve what the rest of us cannot even fathom. Even as we speak, Lance Armstrong is making an historic comeback in the Tour-de-France, while Tiger Woods is also returning to the international golf circuit.

This respect and healthy admiration for individual accomplishment is undoubtedly one of the central features that makes America great. I can only hope that we in the U.S. do not forget that. To lose a culture that encourages and promotes heroic individuals who go against the grain and challenge the status quo, who, in the Homeric tradition of Ulysses, transgress and transcend the boundaries and limitations that the rest of us impose on ourselves by virtue of our fears and our herd-mentality—to lose that would be to lose the very heroic spirit that makes America great. To become a nation of conformists who are too afraid to question authority or challenge the odds would be to lose the American Spirit—the heroic pioneer spirit responsible for the very foundation of this frontier nation.

Horizon Cybermedia is a modest attempt to take on the challenges of the 21^st century in the sphere of new media. By no means do we consider ourselves to be a news media organization in the vein of CNN or Fox News. We are, rather, a small digital media shop that aspires to produce quality digital media content to meet a growing demand on the internet. We are a modest operation that aspires to operate by adherence to a code of ethics and a principle of integrity and honesty.

Please continue to support our operation. Visit us at http://www.explorationtheseries.com, where you can view continually updating episodes of our flagship film series, Exploration with Uday Gunjikar. Here's looking forward to the rest of the century (and beyond?) as we continue to grow and change to meet the challenges that confront us!

In George Orwell's novel Nineteen Eighty-Four, the State brainwashes the public with slogans such as:

WAR IS PEACE
FREEDOM IS SLAVERY
IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH

To that, might we add the following lines:

HOPE IS DESPAIR
CHANGE IS MORE OF THE SAME?

The government apparatus is described in the novel in the following terms:

They were the homes of the four Ministries between which the entire apparatus of government was divided. The Ministry of Truth, which concerned itself with news, entertainment, education, and the fine arts. The Ministry of Peace, which concerned itself with war. The Ministry of Love, which maintained law and order. And the Ministry of Plenty, which was responsible for economic affairs.
- George Orwell, 1984, Part 1, Chap. 1

This is an example, in Orwell's novel, of how words are used to signify the opposite of what they mean in normal conversation. The words are redefined to mean their opposites. This is what I refer to as Orwellian rhetoric—the deceptive use of language to conceal the true agenda of those who speak the words.

In his essay Politics and the English Language, Orwell describes the current state of English prose, especially with reference to politics, as follows:

Each of these passages has faults of its own, but quite apart from avoidable ugliness, two qualities are common to all of them. The first is staleness of imagery; the other is lack of precision. The writer either has a meaning and cannot express it, or he inadvertently says something else, or he is almost indifferent as to whether his words mean anything or not. This mixture of vagueness and sheer incompetence is the most marked characteristic of modern English prose, and especially of any kind of political writing. As soon as certain topics are raised, the concrete melts into the abstract and no one seems able to think of turns of speech that are not hackneyed: prose consists less and less of WORDS chosen for the sake of their meaning, and more and more of PHRASES tacked together like the sections of a prefabricated hen-house.

Orwell goes on to talk about semantics as follows:

Many political words are similarly abused. The word FASCISM has now no meaning except in so far as it signifies "something not desirable." The words DEMOCRACY, SOCIALISM, FREEDOM, PATRIOTIC, REALISTIC, JUSTICE, have each of them several different meanings which cannot be reconciled with one another.
. . .
Words of this kind are often used in a consciously dishonest way. That is, the person who uses them has his own private definition, but allows his hearer to think he means something quite different. Statements like [these] . . . are almost always made with intent to deceive. Other words used in variable meanings, in most cases more or less dishonestly, are: CLASS, TOTALITARIAN, SCIENCE, PROGRESSIVE, REACTIONARY BOURGEOIS, EQUALITY.
- George Orwell, Politics and the English Language

To that list of words, I cannot help but tack on "HOPE" and "CHANGE"—the watchwords of the Obama administration.

The main reason that these words appeal to us is that they represent a departure from the disastrous policies of the Bush White House. But one has to wonder—are these words being used honestly? Are the definitions of these words in the public perception really equivalent to the private definitions determined by the Obama camp? Or are the words being used to conceal a private political agenda that, if disclosed to the public, might not be quite so agreeable as the words "HOPE" and "CHANGE" and the phrase "CHANGE WE CAN BELIEVE IN"?

In short, when will the public demand that the Obama administration clearly define what they mean by the words "HOPE" and "CHANGE"? And when will it become apparent that the Obama administration's embrace of many of the policies of the Bush administration, such as government secrecy, federal surveillance, marginalization of dissent, etc., hardly qualifies as "HOPE" or "CHANGE" and really looks like "MORE OF THE SAME"?

Horizon Cybermedia is about embracing the truth in the medium of art and cinema. When we talk about "TRUTH," in no way do we intend it in the deceptive vein of Orwellian rhetoric. Rather, we mean it in the sense of the dictionary meaning of the word, namely:

1 a archaic : FIDELITY, CONSTANCY b : sincerity in action, character, and utterance
2 a (1): the state of being the case : FACT (2) : the body of real things, events, and facts : ACTUALITY (3) often capitalized : a transcendent fundamental or spiritual reality b : a judgment, proposition, or idea that is true or accepted as true <truths of thermodynamics> c : the body of true statements and propositions
3 a : the property (as of a statement) of being in accord with fact or reality b chiefly British : true 2 c : fidelity to an original or to a standard
4 capitalized Christian Science : GOD
— in truth : in accordance with fact : ACTUALLY
- Merriam-Webster Dictionary

One of the quotations that inspires our operation is the following quote from John F. Kennedy:

We must never forget that art is not a form of propaganda; it is a form of truth.

Check out our ongoing film series, Exploration with Uday Gunjikar at our website http://www.explorationtheseries.com and please feel free to invite your friends and family to check it out as well. The current episode explores the Wine Country region of Sonoma County, CA. Future episodes will take you to Calcutta, India; to Half Moon Bay, CA, and to many other fascinating destinations.

After 8 years of disastrous policy decisions effected by the near-totalitarian Bush administration—policy decisions that have resulted in such outrages as the delayed and incompetent federal response to Hurricane Katrina, the detention and torture of terror suspects in Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay, the warrantless wiretapping of U.S. citizens, the collapse of Wall Street and the global economic system, etc.—what concerns me now is whether we are about to see, in the next 8 years, a replay of the exact same events—the left-wing, liberal version of the exact same disastrous policy decisions effected by the right-wing Bush administration.

Already, we are beginning to see subtle hints of the groundwork being laid by the Obama administration, which seem to suggest trends pertaining to the direction in which the nation is headed.

Like the Bush administration, specifically, as decreed by V.P. Dick Cheney, we are beginning to see the Obama administration adopt an elitist, cliquish, secretive mentality and attitude, in many ways like the operations of some secret society out of a Dan Brown novel. Obama already approves of government surveillance operations and even voted in favor of a federal surveillance law while still a senator. Furthermore, Obama's decision to withhold critical information from the public on numerous occasions echoes the secretive policies and practices of the Bush administration. Examples include the Obama administration's use of the Bush/Cheney states secrets doctrine and a new claim of sovereign immunity to protect the Bush administration from prosecution on charges of illegal surveillance operations on U.S. citizens.

Another trend appears to be the subtle resurgence of a new nationalism and an appeal to mass paranoia, xenophobia and hysteria in order to justify the policies and positions of the state on the part of the Obama administration. While it is hard to pinpoint any specific examples of this trend, it seems to be an attitude bubbling underneath the surface of several policy decisions adopted by the Obama administration. It is an attitude that seems to be reflected in the kinds of things that Obama supporters say on occasion and the way they say it—subtle hints that are impossible to pinpoint in the light of day. Again, these are echoes of the nationalism, xenophobia and mass hysteria broadly exploited by the Bush administration—but they might well be the vestigial remains of eight years of Bush ultra-nationalism rather than the hints of a new Obama ultra-nationalism. It is hard to say. However, it should be noted that V.P. Joe Biden already has a history of making ethnically insensitive comments.

A third trend appears to be the Obama administration's subtle marginalization and intolerance of dissent and criticism. Recent comments by V.P. Joe Biden to silence opposition criticism, which seemed to include a subtle hint that any criticism of the Obama administration is un-American, lend themselves to the interpretation that they are faint echoes of the Bush administration's attitude of "You are either with us or against us." Let's keep in mind that questioning the government and questioning authority are what democracy is all about—the very basis and fabric of democratic society lies in the opposition's right to question government policies. Attempts at silencing the opposition—especially when the administration enjoys sizable majorities in both houses of Congress as well as executive power in the Presidency—sounds a bit like the totalitarian policies adopted by the Bush administration when they enjoyed the same sort of advantage in terms of executive power and parliamentary majority.

So while it may still be way too early to tell, it concerns me that the next eight years will turn out to be a left-wing, liberal replay of the last eight years—that, at the end of eight years of the Obama administration, we might end up with the same sort of scandals that we have witnessed in the Bush administration—scandals such as an illegal federal surveillance program; the silencing and marginalization of dissent and criticism; the scapegoating of foreign nations along with preemptive, invasive military operations; a highly secretive, behind-the-scenes government operation (similar to Cheney's shadow government), and, ultimately, more economic disaster for the American people at large resulting from an overbearing public sector and the complete dissolution of the private sector, especially of small businesses. In short, the hallmarks of an Orwellian dystopia.

These are the trends that appear to be surfacing, gradually, in the Obama administration today. Granted, this is a worst case scenario, but, nevertheless, it is a real possibility and remains a viable concern of mine. I love America for its freedom and its opportunity and it concerns me that in a few years, America might have neither freedom nor opportunity.

Horizon Cybermedia is committed to celebrating the values of freedom and opportunity—especially the freedom and opportunity to express oneself artistically and to travel the world and witness amazing sights. We encourage asking tough questions about the circumstances we find ourselves in and never taking the status quo for granted.

Check out our ongoing film series, Exploration with Uday Gunjikar at our website http://www.explorationtheseries.com and stay tuned for more fresh, exciting media content to come in the near future.

If there is anything that the last 8 years of the Bush administration might have taught us, it is that in order for our society to function as the healthy democracy envisioned by the Founding Fathers, we need more people to question authority and fewer people blindly to obey authority.

Let me say, first and foremost, that in no way is this an advocacy for any form of violent or illegal activity that might cause harm to innocent lives or the destruction of public or private property.

What I am suggesting is that conscientious members of society need to be driven by their conscience and good sense into questioning the actions and motivations of public officials and holding them publicly accountable. That is the basis and crux of any functioning democracy and is necessary for our society to remain free and equal, as opposed to allowing our civil liberties to be compromised or unscrupulous opportunists to amass wealth and power at the expense of the naïve public who fail to call their actions and agendas into question.

Public officials—even the President of the United States—are not kings or dictators or gods. They are politicians elected to office by the will of the electorate. As such, they are obligated and accountable to the public. Which means that they must never be blindly obeyed, as they would be in some authoritarian regime under martial law, as, for example, in the Ahmadinejad regime in Iran or the North Korean regime of Kim Jong-Il. Rather, they must be questioned and held accountable, especially when they appeal to public paranoia or mass hysteria or xenophobia to further their political agendas, as we have seen during the Bush administration and as we increasingly appear to be seeing in the current Obama administration, in subtle, but unmistakable ways.

Following the 9/11 attacks, it is a matter of historical record and indisputable fact that the Bush administration pretty blatantly exploited public paranoia and mass hysteria associated with the potential for future terrorist attacks to further a political agenda that has since been exposed as shockingly immoral and depraved—an agenda that included such policies as preemptive military invasion, detention and incarceration of terrorist suspects without charges or a trial, torture and warrantless wiretapping of U.S. citizens—the quintessence of what might well be described as a reign of terror of Orwellian dimensions.

However, the simple fact remains that the only reason that the Bush administration was able to get away with what they did so blatantly, leaving the rest of us, retrospectively, to gnash our teeth in futility, was that no one in the opposition had the guts or spine to question the authority of the Bush White House. Everyone was scared into submission. In spite of street protests against the Iraq War, which appear to have had limited impact on the Bush administration's policy-making other than to justify their authoritarian stance even further, no one in the corridors of power or the press or media had the guts to question authority at the appropriate time.

Of course, now the press and media are full of scandalous exposés concerning the corruption of the Bush administration, but what good is that, after the damage has already been done and countless lives have been destroyed? It's too late and is of little consequence in retrospect. Hindsight is always 20/20, but it appears that foresight is completely lacking. All that we have is the delayed response of a gutless oppostion.

And what is the solution that the electorate apparently prescribes to the errors and excesses of the near-totalitarian Bush administration? To bestow totalitarian-like powers of unquestioned power and authority to the Obama administration, thereby repeating the cycle of unquestioned authoritarianism resulting from unchecked political power, followed by the teeth-gnashing and recriminations that are invariably too late.

What is required, rather, is for tough, conscientious individuals to question authority at the right time and not to wait until after the deed has been done. Public officials should be held accountable for their policies as an ongoing part of the democratic process rather than after they have abused their unchecked, unquestioned powers to such a degree that the only option appears to be popular revolt or widespread insurrection, as in Iran recently. Rather, when conscientious individuals question authority as a part of the democratic process, that precludes the possibility of mass insurrection, because authority is always kept in check and held accountable.

Let's keep in mind that the number one excuse cited by Nazi war criminals indicted during the Nuremberg trials was that they were blindly following orders—obeying the authorities without question. One wonders, if enough members of Hitler's National Socialist Party had the cojones to question authority by following their conscience, whether Nazism might have been as successful as it was in its path to conquest and genocide.

The bottom line is that questioning authority is not only a good thing for the body politic and for the health of the democracy, it is good for the mind and soul of those who regularly question authority—because it means both following the promptings of one's conscience as well as actively thinking creatively and out-of-the-box. The other option, essentially, is to succumb to the brain-dead, vegetative state of blind obedience to authority—to turn into a soulless, brainless permanent fixture of the establishment like so many of the gutless, soulless, spineless elected officials who fail to act when action is called for and whom the rest of us—the average citizenry—can thank for such recent catastrophes as Hurricane Katrina, the collapse of Wall Street and the economy and the scandals of the Bush White House.

Horizon Cybermedia is about encouraging one to think creatively and out-of-the-box through the medium of art and cinema. While in no way do we seek to promote or encourage any sort of violent or illegal activity, we do believe that questioning authority is both healthy and necessary for a functioning democratic society to flourish and grow, as opposed to stagnate and die through blind submission to the often-erroneous decrees of elected public officials. We believe that it is important to penetrate the Orwellian rhetoric of political opportunists and to question the agendas of politicians in order to keep society free and alive and to enable the individual to stay quick-witted and sharp-minded.

Do check out our ongoing film series, Exploration with Uday Gunjikar, at our website, http://www.explorationtheseries.com, which is continually updated with exciting, fresh media content. Currently showing is a film on my recent excursion to the Wine Country—Sonoma County, CA—and coming soon is a film about the intriguing city of Calcutta, India.