Vinay Kumaran

I must admit I have trouble understanding the appeal of religions. When I was a child, I was told the tales of Hindu religion. The stories were enormously entertaining.  Hindu Gods were like the Avengers or the X-Men. Different Gods had different superpowers. Ram and Arjun were great shots with the bow and arrow. Bhim was like ' The Thing' from the Fantastic Four, immensely strong but not very intelligent.  Hanuman was like Superman, he could fly and lift mountains and swallow the sun accidentally. However, it soon became evident that the world of the Gods was a fantasy world. In the real world, people were good or bad on a spectrum and there were not necessarily consequences to either being good or being bad. Good people and even children not yet old enough to decide whether to be good or bad could suffer and die. Bad people could prosper and enjoy the fruits of their evil through long luxurious lives and nothing supernatural ever happened. Prayer, no matter how sincere, (a...

I had a layover of about 4 hours in Istanbul on my way back from Pittsburgh to Mumbai. There were other Indians connecting to the Mumbai flight from various points in Europe. We were looking at the display trying to figure out which gate our flight would be leaving from. A rather nervous looking middle-aged gentleman greeted me as an obvious fellow Indian and suggested we find our way to the gate together. I agreed. The gate was quite far away but there were signs pointing the way and I wasn't worried about getting there well on time. He, on the other hand, seemed to be in the grip of the chronic anxiety that seems to seize many Indians in unfamiliar surroundings. He was walking much faster than I was inclined to and I let him go at his own pace. He would pull ahead, look around and find himself alone, get into a mild panic and then come back to find me. He had a constant fear of losing his way. He kept saying 'are you sure this is the way?' How do you know?' 'Sh...