I had posted an article in my Tamizh blog. On Adengappa's suggestion, I am posting this on this blog as well..
SUN TV runs a seial called "Chidambara Ragasiyam" based on the "Naadi" astrology method. "Chidambara Ragasiyam" means "The secret from Chidambaram" and "Naadi" literally means "moment of time" !
Just to give you folks an idea of what this "Naadi" Astrology is all about, there are 3000 -5000 year old Palm leaves which have been preserved in a south Indian temple which have generic verses (poems) written in them. They describe in great detail events happening in time for people with various traits. Considering that the Tamizh calendar has 60 years which go on rotation and follow the lunar system, these could technically describe people every 60 years. One can go to these temples and wait in line (sometimes for days) to see if you can find your designated palm leaf !! You can go in person with your horoscope or with just your right thumb print !! They pick a catalog of leaves which pertain to a certain type of thumb print and then ask a few preliminary questions and once they find that the details match yours truly, they go on to read the leaves. There are some special people who are trained to read the leaf since it is written in ancient tamizh and there needs to be some translation to current Tamizh.
Flash back to 1996 : I am in the process of finishing up my studies. I call my parents in India with a calling card from my Lab. As usual (for those times) we started arguing over the phone ! My parents were insisting that I send them my thumb print. At that point in time, I had a healthy hatred for Astrology, Horoscope matching and Astrologers in general, not to mention the arranged marriage since the arranging process was totally stacked up against me (at least in my opinion). I felt at that point that the astrologers were totally incompetent nincompoops who were taking too long to find that girl who was destined for me !!
Just then my Professor walked into the lab. She must have heard me screaming. She is American but, knew a lot about India, Indian culture and Me ! and was(is) a very practical lady. She said, "If it is just a fingerprint, just send it. Why bother arguing with them?"
Which one do they want ? she asks. I am zapped. I am in a daze because I am embarrased about my phone fight going public. I said "I dont know". She says "Well I am glad you only have two thumbs.." She took the ink pad in my Lab, put my thumbprints on a piece of paper, made me write my address on the envelope.
"I will mail this on my way home, now go back to work!!" she said, and disappeared. An important lesson I learnt that day "Do not argue over silly things" and "Never fight with your parents in front of your boss"!!
I did not even bother to check if the fingerprints reached India or not. Almost ten months later I went to India. The trip was abnormally peaceful with no significant progress on the marriage front. When my trip was coming to a close and I was packing for my trip back to the US, I asked my parents "Did you ever get those fingerprints?" .My dad promptly went and got an audio cassette and said "Do you want to hear this?" It was something along the lines of Jack Nicholson saying "you want the truth.. you cant handle the truth!".
To this day, I have never forgotten those 25 minutes in that dark room with my parents, brother and sister where I was sitting speechless. Just that booming voice on the tape, telling me in such vivid detail, my life story, all from my thumb print!! The voice went on to read verse after verse and in translation gave my name, my parents name, number of siblings, number of maternal uncles, my parents occupation, my educational background (metallugy is not your run of the mill guessable degree, mind you. The old tamil word in the verse actually meant blacksmithy, but the translator used the term metallurgy!), my current lifes events, my ideas on marriage, etc., etc.. it was mind boggling! There was even a verse which recreated my entire horoscope with the exact position of the sun, moon and all the major planets at the precise time of my birth!!
The most amazing thing was the statement "Not everyone is blessed with getting to know their destiny! The leaf actually tells you when exactly you get to meet your leaf !! Although, you have found your sons leaf now, he will not realize the contents until he crosses his 25th birthday!" . I had turned 25 a few months before hearing the tape but my parents had heard it almost 7 months back.
Up untill today, nothing on the tape has turned out to be false. I could have said "everything has turned out to be true" but there are some things which are still open ended, so I choose my words carefully.
I do not think about this tape much unless there is some major event in my life or when I watch movies like "Men in Black" or "Matrix".
How is this possible ? Am I just going through the motions of a predetermined sequence of events? I have not been silly enough to try and disprove the tape either because the tape mostly says good things about me or the really bad stuff doesnt start to happen till I am forty!!
Scientifically, this just baffles me. Just truly amazing!! An Indian guy who was raised with a traditional bent of mind, having embrazed the western idealogy of science and scientific discovery, this truly puts things in the twilight zone for me...