Endless Supply of Termites

 

Endless Supply of Termites

These termites are of a special type. They do not lunch on wood; their manna from heaven is the cells in the brain of a Tamil Brahmin (TamBrahm, a sub-species of the regulation termites). These carry a generic name: rituals; each also carries a special name.

There are 365 days in a year (ignore the additional approximately quarter of a day), 1,440 minutes in a day (or, 60 நாழி, each one lasting 24 minutes), 12 zodiac signs and 27 named stars associated with the zodiac signs (each zodiac sign carries three or four stars or fractions in between), 12 months, and the distinct waxing and waning phases of the moon. Therefore, 26,280, let us say, 26,000 combinations are available for the astrologer. Therefore, there can be as many as 26,000 rituals in a year, in the life of a TamBrahm!

There is also a specific TV channel that, early in the morning, lays out the astral predictions for the day on what could happen on that day for people born under a zodiac sign and/or a star. There are 12 Houses in a TamBrahm’s horoscope and assume the TamBrahm population around the world outside Tamil Nadu is a million and a half. That is, the global TamBrahm population could not be significantly greater than three and a half million. Also assume that this population is distributed equally in all the zodiac signs. For reach zodiac sign, then, the population of the prediction of what could be expected is 300,000. Keep this number in mind.

Then, on each day, the predictions of the astrologer must hold good for around 300,000 people. In effect, 300,000 could win a lottery; for those employed,  could be promoted in their jobs; for those of marriageable age, could get a suitable bride or a groom and wedding is imminent; for those trying for a first child, a male child could be on the cards (there is a problem here, the planet maybe smiling benevolently on the woman and not so on her husband; in which case, it could be a baby girl, as the male determines the sex of the baby), or among the stars, and so on.

In addition, you do have the annual (indeed, it must be monthly for those who adhere strictly to what TamBrahm scriptures say) “memorial service” to the dear departed of the previous three generations (parent, each parent’s mother and father). For all of the above, a combination of planets has exercised their powers in the cause of the individual.

There are also two other channels that have programmed their offerings so that they do not time-wise overlap the others. Termites from the three mounds are time-coordinated and come out in sequence, and not even two of them concurrently. I have done an unscientific study of all the three channels. What I have found is−as tentative as this might be−none of them make any definitive prediction, always the slimy “could” as opposed to the less slimy “would”.  What I do know is that even some Tamil non-Brahmins follow the almanac and the rituals necessitating a Brahmin intermediary, a sacerdotalist (a neologism, coined by me). That is, the money−making opportunity goes through the roof.

The above analysis is exclusively mine: A lapsed termite, a TamBrahm.

 Raghuram Ekambaram