JagsawSingh

4 times? are we talking about he same Gurbaksh Singh here because I'm only aware of this being his second fast?

Oh so 2 times a quitter is obviously not enough. Does this mean we're gonna let this man get to number 4 before we say enough is enough.

I think you'd all do well to read my last message on the previous page. In it I state how I am merely articulating how much of the wider sangat is feeling but afraid to say out loud......so you would do well to pay heed to it.

The suit business is quite funny

The suit business is mostly funny because we men are an insignificant afterthought. A suit and a shirt are given together. The suit will be a £200 or £300 beautiful latest design / latest fashion suit. The man's shirt laying on top of this lovely suit will be a Van Haussen £3.99 1970's fashion outdated rubbish cheap shirt.

Now, my theory is that they deliberately ensure the shirt is extra rubbish to ensure all's attention is drawn to the extravagence expense gone into the suit beneath it.

Jagsaw fancy showing bhai sahib how a real man does it?

No its not about me Garch and thats the point: Because me and you know we can't go through with a hunger strike we don't embarrass ourself and our community by starting one that we know we're not mentally strong enough to finish. Gurbaksh Singh, however, has now done this 3 or 4 times. Its time to stop. Its making us all look weak and silly.

And....I am merely articulating the thoughts of many people I heard this weak, so it would do all of you some good to hear what the wider sangat is thinking but sometimes afraid to say out loud.

Along with money the giving of suits for women and shirt/jacket for men. I never understood why this was done.

On the positive side, we're doing our bit for the economy and medium sized businesses.

After all, we as a community, are single-handedly responsible for ensuring the economic survival of the 'Van Haussen rubbish old fashioned shirt in a box' industry.

If not us for our lainha denha, who else buys those rubbish shirts ?

This Gurbaksh Singh Khalsa 'hunger strike' business has run its course and frankly, its getting silly now.

3 previous 'hunger strikes to the death' led only to him giving up and eating again so what made anyone think this one was going to be any different ?

All I heard at the Gurdwara the other day was the women talkin about Gurbaksh Sigh saying how dissapointed they feel with the 'timid and weak minded men' we Sikhs have who can't seem to do anything properly these days.

4 times now. 4 times now this man has started this and then given up. He is a serial quitter. He's making the whole Sikh community look like quitters who can't make the kind of sacrifices our forefathers made.

When Gurbaksh Singh, in a few months, announces yet again that he's going on yet another hunger strike I hope all the Sikhs of the world will stop him. Not because of his health but for the sake of protecting the reputation of the rest of us.

To be fair, how many other animated feature films were made in India last year ?

Not knocking it, because myself and family absolutely adored the movie, but if there was an annual 'Jagsaw Singh of the Year' award I would win it and you lot would say well done for winning it but it wouldn't mean I was brilliant or indeed any good at all. It would simply mean in a competition where I was the only one on the shortlist I would be the logical winner.

I don't see too much wrong with it. 'Temple' indicates a place of worship and thats essentialy what it officialy is, in terms of charity status, taxes etc.

In early Sikhism, the word Gurdwara didn't really exist and what we today call Gurdwaras were called Dharmshalllas. So, one could argue if the word dharmsala was good enough for our Gurus should we have such a great problem with the word Temple when the signage is in the English language ?

Whenever any 'thing' in Punjab is done....whether that 'thing' is a political speech, a free eye clinic, criminals being arrested, a donation or indeed any other 'thing' such as a car and a car battery as per the photo above......why is it that a minimum of 100 people have to be in the photo standing beside that 'thing'. Is there a Law in Punjab that says a 'thing' does not qualify as a 'thing' unless every single person even remotely involved in that 'thing' is present in the photo opportunity ?

I say 'Punjab Law' but I know this 'law' has transported itself to the UK and Italy too. For example the Sikh Channel. Whenever a Gurdwara in either Italy or the UK is having an upcoming programme and they are advertising it on the Sikh Channel, one person from that Gurdwara does the talking but every single person that has ever visited that Gurdwara in their entire life is standing next to that person for that camera shot.

Why ? Why this inherent need to be on camera ? Will the upcoming programme in the Gurdwara not count as a sucessful 'thing' unless 100 people are standing still next to the person telling us about it?

And this thing goes on and on, now with the adverts Punjabis put in Punjabi newspapers and magaznes. Whether the business is a lawyer, truck hire, wedding caterer, building contractors or skip hire the Punjabi owner of the business feels it is not complete unless he puts his convict style passport photo in the advert too, as if we're going to look at his terrible, unsmiling black & white passport photo and say "Yes....THATS the man I want to hire a skip from".

I am trying to keep to topic i.e. what they are doing which is not desirable in a sikh, what does not make them sikh . Sure you can do yoga , bhangra, gidda etc as you can play martial arts etc but that is not SIKHI related but is presented as necessary to know ...

you want positives

1. they make dastars visible and more commonplace

2. they break cultural expectations i.e. sikhs are only indians

3. They have translated Guru ji's bani to spanish (quality of translation I'm not sure of maybe someone can elaborate)

4. They know how to tie a dastar properly and when they keep kesh they do it fully not trimmed beards etc like some desi guys

5. There is a high proportion who try to learn and perform kirtan comparitively to average sikh population

6. More likely to immerse fully into Sikhi if gets proper exposure

7. Like to promote themselves and the sikh lifestyle

8. Laid back and not testostrone driven mostly

Excellent positives and, excellent attributes to have as human beings I'm sure you'll agree.

The thing about it is, virtually all of them are extremely happy, content,positive, fit and healthy and immersed in Bani.....the embodiment of chardi kala sikhs. Surely we have much to learn from them ?.....as well as much to teach them (given what this thread is about)

eat maas

Do they though ? Its just that all the ones I've ever heard of and even met are strict vegetarians.

do gidda bhangra

I think there's alot to be said of the fact that virtualy every single one of them...even the very very old ones....are super fit and healthy, whilst most of we Punjabi Sikhs...especially our old ones...are in very very bad physical shape. So, from that respect one does find it hard to argue with their common assertion that there is nothing wrong with dancing bhangra (in a proper setting) as a form of exercise as long as it doesn't involve the dark elements such as sharab and lust etc.

do yoga

?? :wow: And how exactly is keeping the body in wonderful shape against Sikh principles ?

This is what frustrates me about the plaudits given to that organisation , they are promoting a corruption of true sikhi in the western world and very few people will realise that . they are manipulating our image to make money for themselves which is not ploughed back into sikhi but siphoned off into a few individuals pockets while those who are at the lower levels of those organisations giving their all and then daswand to 3HO are getting disillusioned with what they perceived to be sikhi , and leave then start badmouthing sikhs in general.

Agreed. They are parisites and vampires in that respect. But is it really they're fault that we are either too lazy or too uneducated to see the wonderful things at our fingertips and in our history and understand how western minds have such a hunger for such knowledge etc ?

I gave an example a few months ago on this forum in a thread about superfoods. I mentioned Alsi. I mentioned how alsi (flaxseed) was the main part of the diet of our Sikh forefathers and how those forefathers of ours were stronger, bigger and taller than we are today. (Fauja Singh credits it as his secret for health). I mentioned how, since then, we Sikhs have taken it out of our kitchen and put it in the barn instead to feed the cows with to fatten them up (to work in the fields). Is it really the fault of 3HO that, being generally cleverer than Punjabi Sikhs, they knew this aspect of our history and marketed Alsi as an amazing superfood via Hollywood celebrities and have since got rich as it started a worldwide craze for it ?

So yes, they are doing well at our expense but we have to admit alot of it is to due to our own ignorance and general trepidation of knowldege.

Its a good job Roy Hodgson wasn't allowed to vote. There's no doubt he would have voted for Javier Mascherano as Sikh of the Year. But seriously, what a truly deserving winner we have in Ravinder Singh. Really well deserved.

Those people (in Punjab) can't even look after and safeguard their language (maa boli). We can hardly expect such idiots to be able to to look after antiquities.

the singh's name is GuruGanesha Singh

Is he that really awesome Sitar player ?

His sitar piece on one of Snatnam Kaur's tracks (I can't remember which, I think it might be 'celebration') is one of the most beautiful things I've ever heard.

But, that aside, he's still a d**k.

I sometimes really don't know what to make of 3HO. There's no doubt they have single handedly brought more worldwide Sikhs into the Sikh fold than all the Sikh organisations put together. On the other hand, they've done and continue to do much harm.

Dont know what my friend means with monkety nuts and eating spinach ? on this occassion , thats really news !!!!!!

You serious ? :omg: Have you never been to rural Punjab on Lohri ?

But...you don't really have to go to rural Punjab on Lohri to understand what happens. Next year (on Lohri) stand outside any south Asian Grocery store in Southall, Vancouver or Toronto and watch as car loads of Sikhs arrive all day and fill their shopping carts with spinach and monkey nuts. Thats what we Punjabi (rural) Sikhs do.

Question is, how does a 'Punjabi' Sikh get to the adult stage of his life and still not know how we eat copious amounts of Saag and monkey nuts on lohri ?

Wow. People do love copy and pasting here.

You can research history till you're blue in the face when the only thing that matters is the present. In the present, as I mentioned above, the only 3 things that Lohri signifies to 99% of all of Punjab's Sikhs, is:

1. The changing of the weather (for the good)
2. The eating of spinach
3. the asking for / the receiving and the eating of : Monkey Nuts.

Wouldn't it be nice if someone could copy and then paste a long detailed explanation for those 3 things. They won't though, because it is human nature to copy and paste the easiest thing to find on the internet. For the things that really matter you really gotta put your research face on.

Oh sorry. I seem to have wandered onto the wrong thread. I was looking for the one that had an intellient discussion going about charlie hebdo. It seems, judging by 'sikhkosh' and 'sheikhyerbooty's posts, I have mistakingly found the British National Party / Ku Klux Klan facism and racism appreciation thread by mistake. My bad.

interesting info. In Punjab I've heard many people call Christian church as "GirjaGhar". Maybe Girja must mean Church in Punjabi

Not so much Punjabi per se, you see its important to remember who actually introduced Christianity to the Indian sub-continent. It wasn't the English....It was in fact the Portuguese. This, in many ways, also explains why the vast majority of Indian Christians (remember there are more Christians in India than there are Sikhs) are Catholic rather than any of the British protestant denominations.

Anyway, the point I was going to make was that the Portuguese word for 'church' is IGREJA, and thats why people in Punjab and all over India use the word 'girja'.

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religion_in_Nigeria 50% Muslim, 40% Christian, 10% Traditional.

Is that what we're reduced to now ?.......Quoting Wikipedia as a reliable source ? :biggrin2:

Let me get this straight.....you find 10 sources on the internet giving the figures for the religious split in Nigeria. 9 of those 10 state there are more Christians than Muslims but you decide to go with the 1 that says there are more Muslims ?

ummm.....interesting.

Why name church? Church is used for Christians.

No, you don't seem to understand fully. The word isn't merely 'used' for and by Christians. It is, in actual fact, a word invented by Christians specifically to signify a CHRISTIAN place or worship. The word itself is then part and parcel of Christianity. The word belongs to them. The ironic thing here, very pertinent o the title of this thread, is that the King James version actually specified that Christians moved from using the word 'temple' to 'church' specifically to highlight it's Christianity.

This has to go all the way back to the Crusades, because Nigeria is mostly a Muslim country they won't care. France is a Christian country, which is why it's sympathized for.

When you say "Nigeria is mostly a Muslim country" do you mean in the same way that Italy is mostly a Buddhist country ? :blink2:

to drink and eat meat and get drunk @ thats for my family sucks

Thats a funny family you got there. :omg: You might wanna get a genuine Punjabi to give them a step by step guide of how to celebrate Lohri. There's no drink or meat involved, its all about Monkey Nuts and Saag.

I've spent many a Lohri in rural Punjab. You gotta remember rural Punjabis are very different to urban Punjabis. In rural Punjab we all go to sleep around 8 in the evening at the latest and all wake up before dawn. In the towns and cities they don't sleep till late and all wake up late. Those urban lot have brought bhangra and partying into it when really they don't even understand the importance of the changing of the season, especially in terms of farmimg and livelihood.

So basically, this is what we do on Lohri. I go into town and try and get the best deals possible on giant sacks of monkey Nuts. Then, back in the village, the family's follow their children around as they knock on different house's doors asking for gifts of monkey nuts. Kids are excited and happy. Then in the evening, we, as family units, after the traditional Lohri meal of giant portions of Saag and maki di roti, sit around a bonfire (don't forget it is absolutely freezing in Punjab at this time of year) and we all have a nice chat whilst we eat monkey nuts and throw the nut shells into the fire. End of. We then go to sleep (fairly early) as everyone in rural Punjab does....and we wake up early the next day, as always. And thats genuine Lohri for genuine Punjabis. Thats how we do it.

If you like though, you might be inclined to look at what the town and city folk do. The weather means nothng to their livliehood. The seasons mean nothing to them. Going to sleep early means little and waking up early means even less. Haven't got a clue how they celebrate it but I wouldn't be surprised if parties and bhangra have something to do with it. But who cares ? 80% of Punjab's Sikhs are rural and for us Saag and monkey nuts pretty much sum up Lohri.

Looks like we're back to that thing about the definition of the word 'Burger' and how Punjabis seem to suffer from a severe lack of a decent education.....i.e NOT very good at understanding what words mean in the English language.

The word 'Church', in the English language, by very definition, means a CHRISTIAN place of worship. The word itself is part of Chrstianity.

There are plenty of wealthy, well educated Muslim youth that get radicalised as well. Plenty of radicalisation going on in university campuses as well.Let's not use poverty and deprivation as the only reason for this.

Not just 'plenty' Ranjeet, MOST radical extremist Muslims in the west are highly educated. In fact, one of the things that sticks in my mind the most is the media aftermath after the London subway bombings. British and international news crews were, en masse, up in Leeds in the 'Asian' areas doing live broadcasts from the streets and they were talking about 'poverty' and 'no education' of the local muslim youth. On one particular live broadcast the presenter was talking about 'uneducation' totally oblivious to the grafitti on the wall in the distance behind him. The grafitti, written by the local Muslims said "I am, therefore I Kill".

I was watching the live broadcast and I thought to myself how stupid are the elite (powers) in my nation when my government, highly paid news anchors, highly paid news cameramen and highly paid news editors don't have the education to understand whats been written behind them and yet supposedly 'badly educated' and deprived Muslim youths could have been so well read they were able to distort the philosophical writings of Descartes so cleverly.

So no, its not about education. My original point was merely about the endemic problems Paris faces in terms of a very restless non-white majority. There is no other way to describe it other than urban apartheid. The 'suburbs' they have created have not been created in the same way as our suburbs in English speaking countries, where they are places for hard-working people to work hard and buy houses etc. No, in Paris the suburbs are more akin to south african townships : A place to place your non-French, where they can do what they want, kill and rob who they want, deal and take drugs all they want. Remember now, this is a country where it is as good as impossible to bring a race discrimination case because French Law does not 'officialy' recognise any race other than French (i.e white, black and brown...as long as you embrace french values)

Good....as long as they don't bring any of it into white Paris.

But, by very definition, pressure cookers will explode once the pressure gets too much. Thats why Paris regularly burns every now and then, more so than any other western city. But when it burns, just as London did in 2011, due process...the hallmark of a democracy...goes out the window. They (the government and their lackeys in the media) justify their actions and their response in the name of democracy knowing that you (the public) are too stupid to notice that it is in actual fact your govt (and their lackeys in the media) that have shat upon the very essence of democracy : Due Process.

Thats why, in London for example, thousands of people could have been arrested, brought before a judge, judged and be given 6 month prison sentences for stealing a £1 bottle of water from the £ store....all in the space of 24 hours.

But we don't question it. We don't question it because we let them manipulate our minds. And we're letting them manipulate our minds today. They're saying "are you on the side of democracy or terrorism". We, the public, of course say democracy. And they say, well, you must be je suis charlie. You're either je suis charlie or you're a terrorist sympathiser....acording to our governments and our media.

So where does that leave us Sikhs...who stand for the truth ?

I'll tell you where I stand. My heart lies with the loved ones of the terrorist attack in Paris. I grieve for them and I stand with them as fellow humans who have suffered. But I am NOT je suis charlie.

Je Sikh. Je non suis charlie. Je suis VERITE !!

But thats not enough is it ?

No. 99% of us don't live in any of of those 3 alpha cities that set and control the universe.

I do.....but most of us live in cities that hope and pray, one day, to be up there with the 3 alpha cities of this uniiverse : Paris, London and New York.

Scores of poeple die in an earthquake/ tornado inn Idaho or Alberta and it means nothing.

Man sneezes and loses his hankie in London, Paris and New York and as a result of this gold and oil prices rise in the rest of the world.

At the end of the day we Sikhs have a duty to rise above everything and everyone else and stand for truth. For that reason, we stand with the fallen victims and we also understand the hurt felt by Muslims.

But we go one step further.....we rise above our governments, our media etc who try and manipulate our minds and tell us what to think and how to think it.

On the very same day as the Paris attack 37 seven innocent people in Yemen were murdered in a terrorist attack by islamic extremists.

http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/officials-suicide-bomber-kills-15-yemen-28046604

Where's Obama's statement of sorrow about them ?

Where's David Cameron's statement of solidarity with them ?

Why aren't our flags being lowered in their memory ?

Why aren't Scotland Yard holding ceremonies in rememberance for them ?

Why is our media hardly mentioning it ?

2 bloody terrorist attacks on the same day. One claims 12 lives and the other claims 37 dark brown lives.

When you see how little value is placed on those brown lives remember to look in the mirror and see what category you fall into. That way you'll know if yours, and your children's lives have the same value as the europeans.