PEACE VS WAR

“Where am I??”

Julie shouted in a rage of horror on reaching this unfamiliar land. She didn’t know how she reached here, but only thing she knew that she had never seen this place before.

It was a kind of valley, full of green grasses and huge mountains. The sky was clear blue with no clouds on it. Flowers, butterflies, bees and birds covered the valley. It looked similar to the scenery of Mother Earth, but here the birds have four wings instead of two and the mountains had square peaks instead of conical ones.

This twelve year old girl walked through the tall grasses to have someone to talk to, one from whom she can gather some information about this place. After walking for awhile, she saw a girl playing a flute.

Julie approached the girl and closely observed her. That girl was the same age as Julie and two plaits covered her back. She had worn a yellow frock and only a few stripes of grass covered her feet.

When the girl saw Julie, she exclaimed, “Hello! Will you come and play with me?” She can speak English, so this must be Earth then, thought Julie. She answered, “Oh! Thank You, but I have never been to this place before. "Which country is this?” “Country!! What do you mean by this? I have never heard this word before,” she said giving her an amused look. “Well, this is not a ‘country’ as you think. It’s EARTH, a beautiful place to live in. By the way, I am Anna, who are you?”

Julie was totally confused. This girl tells this is Earth, but there are no countries? Is she mad or am I an idiot , Julie thought. She thought for a moment, and then said, “I am Julie. Nice to meet you. Can you tell me the name of this place?”

Anna’s white cheeks now glowed up a little. She thought her to be a mad person. She shouted to Julie the name, ‘EARTH’!!

Now, Julie had a bad temper. She wanted to shout at her, but she remained calm and told her that she is new to the place and not familiar with anything. But she said that her motherland is also called ‘EARTH’.

Anna was bewildered now. She called Julie to her home for lunch, for this mystery can be solved by her grandfather only. He had spent all his years studying about Earth and its whereabouts.

Julie was observing this unknown place. It looked just similar to her planet! Maybe this is Earth’s twin planet, she thought.

Anna’s home was similar to houses she used to see while going to school. It was a bungalow, and Anna’s grandfather was sitting on an arm-chair in the garden. Julie saw the surprised expression on his face, when the grandfather had a close look on her.

But Anna’s parents welcomed her warmly. They thought her to be inhabitants of their planet and Anna’s friend. After finishing the dinner, Anna took Julie to Grandfather’s study room.

The study room is what you would find in every house of ‘‘Julie’s Earth’’. The shelves were full of books and the table was covered with lots of maps. Anna’s grandfather was sitting on a stool and chewing the end of the pen.

The Grandfather was old, but strong-looking. He used to wear a white dhoti and spectacles on his black eyes. He lowered his glasses to observe Julie, then said, “Answer me everything but be honest and you should answer in a low voice. Is it clear?”Julie nodded her head in affirmative. She was little frightened by the grandfather’s firm and serious tone.After a few seconds, he asked,

“Are you from Earth?”

“Yes. Is there anything wrong?”

“Don’t worry; think of it as a small questionnaire. Tell me how you got here?”

“I don’t know.”

“Speak the truth.”

“I am speaking the TRUTH only.”

“Alright, tell me about your planet.”

“Well, it’s similar to your planet, but the only thing is that the mountains and the birds are a little peculiar.

“Do you still have countries and other divisions there?”

“Yes, but Anna told me that you all don’t have countries. Is it true? Also, why are you so interested in Earth?”

“She is right. Now tell me, do you still have wars and killing and fighting still now?”

“Yes, sort of, but…”

Just then, Anna interrupted, “What are wars? Are they endangered animals that don’t exist on our planet?”Grandfather was irritated by this interruption. Then he said, “My dear girls, let me tell you a small story then.Long, long ago, there was only one Earth, one continent and one ocean. People lived peacefully with each other and worshipped Nature together. But, after some time, humans were bored by the Peace. They started to invent machines, developed Science and had no respect for humans. But we still remained the same, connected with peace and nature. To test their weapons, they sent the missiles at us. They disrespected our environment by polluting it. Thousands of innocent people were killed. There was no mercy at all. Our ancestors then prayed to Nature, then pleaded to Life to protect us, but we never wanted to leave our motherland.So, she carved out a small Earth out of the original and sent us to a million miles away from our original land.” Grandfather was weeping when he was telling the story.” I remember my father being killed by a chemical attack. My great-grandfather saved me. You know, at that time humans lived up to 200 years.”

Julie was totally puzzled. She never had imagined that the Earth was divided into two parts. Then Grandfather continued," I tried o study about you all several times. I found that you all are now tech-savvy. Am I right?”

“So you are”, answered Julie. Grandfather called Anna and then whispered something in her ears. Anna pulled her out of the room and invited her for a walk. Julie accepted it promptly, for she wanted to explore more about this planet.

“Tell me about your people, Anna .I find this planet interesting,”asked Julie. But Anna replied back, “First you tell me the meanings of the words that you and grandpa used-the words like wars, co….untries,ki..ll..ed and what not. I never knew that these type of words existed.” “Hmm…These are words that have a negative impact on society. But don’t tell me that you don’t know about the word ‘negative’”, said Julie while licking the vanilla ice-cream which Anna bought her. Anna said she knows the meaning, but her teacher told her that this word is no longer used.

Anna tried to explain about the culture of ‘her Earth’. Unlike here, they worshipped Life everyday. On specific days, they prayed to Nature. They didn’t have festivals like Diwali, Eid etc.In fact, their one and only festival is PNU-Peace, Nature and Us. They always loved peace and till now kept peace in their soul. They had never killed any single creature that existed on Earth.

The most interesting part was that the dinosaurs were roaming around freely. But they never killed anyone.

Julie then told about her Earth and the listener was horrified to hear it all.There was no love for no one, not even for a human being!!

Just then, the two girls heard the sound of the trumpet. Anna took Julie to a park, which was decorated like a Christmas tree..Then she invited the newcomer that it is time for prayers to Life. Julie saw lakhs of people gathered at the park for the same. She sat quietly beside Anna and heard the prayer:-

‘I thank you Life for loving me

I thank you Nature for caring for me

And this Life will only stay with you

When you think of it in a wise view….

After singing it a number of times, everyone stood and greeted “Good Evening” to whomever they could find.

It was really a magical land, a land full of love and no hatred feeling……….but a little boring.

Anna invited her to stay at her home, for grandpa wanted to know more about his original land. Her Grandfather was disappointed to hear that the humans didn’t change, so he warned her, ‘You shall be repenting for your deeds, deeds of few people of yours…”

However, Julie didn’t value his warning.

It was eleven ‘o’clock when Julie entered Anna’s room. She was waiting for her new friend in her night dress, and gave her a pair to change. When the girls were on the bed, Anna invited her if she would like to live in this planet.However, Julie rejected, and she couldn’t leave her family and Science.

But then she heard a boom and woke up from her dream. She felt as if she was on a hot stove.

Then she saw the magical land in front of her closed eyes. She immediately opened it to see herself in a hospital. Julie then moved her head to other side to see trees and animals and buildings caught up in flames.

Julie was a girl from Hiroshima, Japan, and was living there with her parents. She was sleeping in her bedroom and dreaming about the magical land when the U.S dropped an atomic bomb on her city. She suffered severe burns and fell prey to blood cancer. She was the last one of her family who was fighting with death.

Perhaps, at the end of her life, the warning of the grandfather would have been ringing in her ears, or she would have been repenting for not accepting Anna’s offer.

REMEMBER: LIFE IS A PLEASURE, AND NATURE IS A TREASURE, ONLY IF WE RESPECT IT.