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Our Legacy - I Wonder - Do You?

Discussion in 'Snippets of Life (Non-Fiction)' started by Rihana, Mar 10, 2016.

  1. Rihana

    Rihana Moderator Staff Member IL Hall of Fame

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    Thursday is like the middle child of the family. Steady, there, not pesky, not needy. It has no Monday blues, and no Friday TGIF's.

    So, this Thursday, the mind turns to essentially useless but kind of deep thoughts. What physically palpable legacy are we leaving for the future generations?

    Tangible, touchable, steppable upon, legacies.

    We have ancient temples, forts, historic sights, architectural splendor, statues, lesser known things like stepwells. These get included in our sightseeing itineraries, we cringe and pretend to be less like the other tourists, but still take pictures against the backdrop of the Taj Mahal, Eiffel Tower, and other recognizable monuments.

    We have the Pyramids, Stonehenge, Ajanta, Ellora.

    What are we leaving for the future generations? What will their itinerary include? A better world, more cures, lesser global temperatures, wildlife sanctuaries, lesser rates of species extinction, space travel possibilities.. commendable, but what physical legacy are we leaving - the kind that can be visited and written about in a travel blog?

    Did the past generations leave us many gifts, and we are leaving only gift-cards for the future generations?

    Deep question, no? Blame it on Thursday. :)
     
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  2. Viswamitra

    Viswamitra IL Hall of Fame

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    Dear Rihana,

    When the mind at rest not worried about Monday blues and Thank God it's Friday attitude is when we can think clearly. Probably generations back, the forefather's led by example demonstrating morals and told stories that are invaluable from the Epics and taught some invaluable lessons from scriptures. They taught life lessons how to be righteous and conduct well with the fellow beings. As the days progressed, the parents were struggling to make a living and hence only fed the children to keep them healthy and gave them secular education for them to survive in the modern world.

    Looking into future, the parents have neither enough knowledge about the human values nor have the wherewithal to educate the children well to make a living as the cost of secular education is skyrocketing.

    In my view, what we leave in them is much more important than what we leave for them including the ancient places, advanced science including ability to travel to space, advanced healthcare, wealth, etc. If we make our children feel invaluable inside, we have done our job. If they learn the human values, how to integrate well with the nature, socialize well with the fellow beings, help each other, learn to respect to leave the five elements around us in the same condition we found them without polluting them, we have done our job.

    Viswa
     
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  3. Srama

    Srama Finest Post Winner

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    Dear Rihana,

    Why, why why? Why should Thursdays do this to you and why do you do this to us. This is a good question and one that is discussed in our house once a week. Dang it! Now I need to see if that happens on Thursdays :biggrin2: My DH is like you asking the big questions which I don't understand. I almost always go legacy what legacy? But in my opinion, the legacy we can leave is us - just based on how we lived our lives. You will understand if I say we now at this stage in our lives look back that it is because of what they did to us. And believe it or not, I have been contemplating on "Suddenly all my ancestors are behind me. "Be still" they say. "Watch and listen. You are the result of the love of thousands". If we can leave this, do we need to leave more tell me?
     
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  4. Rihana

    Rihana Moderator Staff Member IL Hall of Fame

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    Hmmm... making good citizens out of the next generation.. nice. What we leave in them is more important than what we leave for them.. OK.

    My ponder was more basic.. when we build new universities, stadiums, museums, etc, can be aim for some grandeur that will invite awe from future generations.
     
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  5. kaniths

    kaniths IL Hall of Fame

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    Yes! Some of us who are in to design, can appreciate the thought behind every urban architecture built these days! It marvels us how the designer could come up with such unique out of box concepts & believe the future gen z will get it too! There is creativity & innovation which will always be admired for! I don't know how it works elsewhere but in Dubai, Burj Khalifa & Burj Al Arab are built in this century which amazes world tourists & architects simultaneously for its beauty, architecture and design techniques! :)

    Btb Thursdays are not mid-days everywhere, middle east suffer TGIT syndrome, because Friday here is the weekend with some exception countries! :)
     
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  6. Gauri03

    Gauri03 Moderator Staff Member IL Hall of Fame

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    Sidestepping the debate on what should constitute our legacy, I'm answering the question as asked.

    Won't our bridges and dams, industries and megacities, millions of miles of transportation networks count as legacies? They might not seem as grand as the monuments the ancients built, but that's because they're ubiquitous. Though they are equally, if not more, magnificent and awe-inspiring. What's better is that they actually serve a purpose! They are living monuments. If at all our future generations are inclined to make pilgrimages to the artifacts of our time, then the choices are numerous. Personally I think cities are our greatest architectural accomplishments. The Manhattan Skyline, the view of the Chicago downtown from the lake, SFO -- the city and the bridges from Golden Gate park, London, Shanghai, Tokyo, Moscow, even parts of Mumbai are breathtaking sights. Who knows? The International Space Station, tranquility base (the site where Neil Armstrong set foot on the moon), or the locations where Spirit and Opportunity rest on Mars, might become summer vacation favorites of a space-faring humanity. Ancient monuments do inspire admiration, but we have enough of ours to spark awe and reverence.
     
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  7. kaniths

    kaniths IL Hall of Fame

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    You know? With the amount of pollution in the air, the dust that settles on this age buildings will soon make them all look ancient before the century ends! :tongue 'Breathtaking' indeed only in a different way! ;-)
     
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  8. suryakala

    suryakala IL Hall of Fame

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    Dear @Rihana,

    A beautiful futuristic thought on Guruwar! ( who is the Guru, who makes you think like this on Guruwar? Dad, Mom, DH or...who?).

    I think we are in a time when Humans are creating structures that change the face of Earth for ever. Every city, every national high way, every bridge, every skyscraper, every rocket launch facility, every airport, huge port terminals, the gigantic cruise ships, the oil and other mines 4km below the surface, the tube rails all will be monuments! As per the great futurologist- scientist- scif writer- Issac Assimov, our future generations would travel in time and space just with the power of mind (like our Rishis did!).

    For those descendants of us, we will be 'awe' considering we had limitations of space, time, energy and travel and all our structures will point to our ceaseless efforts to win space and time!

    Yes, there will be infinite number of the 'Digital Age' (like Stone Age, Iron Age, Copper Age, Ice Age etc,), relics which will be archaeological marvels!

    Of course, thanks to our concept of rebirth, we can expect to be to part of that'awe's' unless we seek 'Mukthi' in between.

    Happy Guruwar! (And pray our planet should not be destroyed by a nuclear war!).
     
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  9. Agatha83

    Agatha83 IL Hall of Fame

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    Dear Rihana,

    For me There is no Thursday, Friday or Sunday because I am enjoying my retired life. The only things I have to remember is the appointments I have with the Doctors for arthritis, rheumatism etc and doing all the exercises prescribed by the therapists to remain in good shape.
    In today's dog eat dog world where there is ruthless competition, it is doubtful whether the present generation could survive with the morals we preach. Greedy exploitation of natural resources will put a great burden upon the future generation. Technologically we may be miles ahead but humanity will be at its lowest ebb.

    Agatha83
     
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  10. Cheeniya

    Cheeniya Super Moderator Staff Member IL Hall of Fame

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    Dear Rihana
    A good question besides being a deep one! I always endeavour to answer questions for which I have no answers. A couple of months back, I was travelling by the Satabdi Express to Bangalore and there was a blown up photograph of a highly wrinkled man with a toothless grin. I was just wondering if this man would have been photographed and displayed in a prestigious train in the prime of his youth. Most certainly not! Who is he in any case? What is his speciality? His age, of course! He is probably a centenarian of the Himalayas. There are plenty there! So an ordinary man who was probably eking out his livelihood by tilling his land or whatever in his youth becomes a legacy for us to ogle at merely because he has crossed a landmark chronologically.

    Every edifice on the face of the earth will eventually become a landmark, a legacy fit enough to be used as a back-drop in a selfie. Some dilapidated buildings in Chennai are zealously guarded by the 'legacy protectors' merely because they had sheltered some club or a department store predominantly used by the English in the pre-Independence days! It is like a copper coin of Alexander declared as a precious item in Sotheby's! Add years to anything, it becomes a legacy eventually!

    Nobody leaves anything with the hope that the posterity will remember him by it. Some thousand years down the line, everything that was part of our life will be remembered avidly by future generations. Not because they will be of any value but because they are a thousand years old!
    Sri
     
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