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I have never believed in looking back. Not because I could lay claim to not having made any serious errors in judgement over the years, but precisely because. Wounds will take time to heal, and we have often travelled too far down the other road. Who I was and how I saw things then would have hardly led me to a different direction, and very few things could have been done differently. Regrets take away valuable time. Where we stand is a sum total of our decisions, some good and a few bad.

Yet, after having downed a few stiff ones since the evening, i feel a sudden impulse to look back over the year that was. Would I have the heart to face everything that 2008 brought along, or would i forego everything i witnessed over the year in exchange for an unknown list of 2009 offerings. Given the power to permanently wipe out all the good and the many bad things in the year, that changed the way we live, love and lead - would i exercise that option?

The coverflow of "Images 2008" appears expansive, as i try to compress the three hundred and sixty six days. In closing the calendar and springing forth a brand new set of three hundred and sixty five , point two five - i struggle to put the year in a box. Where do I start, in the knowledge that the question of the end game is probably premature.

A year of Mega losses for the many in the glitzy world of complex financial instruments, credit default swaps and intrigueing instruments involving the second integral. Lost hopes and shattered dreams for thousands - with the gloom hiting home with family and friends. On the other hand, a year that closed with new hope for a few billion people who were yet again able to put food on the table for their malnourished children. Nothing in the world is absolute, they say - and somewhere it does seem like a zero sum game.

A year of an emerging dragon in another part of the world. In cleaning up the Bejing haze, almost as if by prevailing over mother nature, and in showcasing a blitzkreig -China announced to the world that impossible is nothing. Long before Obama popularized the now iconic "Yes we can", a sleeping dragon and a billion people had executed on the promise. A lanky american created history at the same event, swimming to a glorious victory of humankind over the other element of nature. There are six billion of us, and there are about six millions ways viewpoints to account for. But it is truly beautiful to see the unanmimous applause for the purity of the human spirit, and in celebration of six glittering medals.

But alas,the human drama played out beyond the sports stadium and took its toll. In the streets of Georgia, Gaza, Guantanamo and Mumbai - as human life was reduced to a mere bystander in a dramatic dance of isms, ideals and talking points. Beamed live to a different set of people who flipped their universal remotes to a different channel and tucked their children to bed, only hoping for a better tomorrow. Also hoping that someone else was going to ensure tomorrow is indeed, better.

The restlessness of youth took on the old guard and defied odds in the Americas , and a smart daughter of a martyred general takes charge in Bangladesh. That poor nation of hungry people unseated those that stood for fanaticizing their faith. Dont pray in my school, and i won't think in your church.

Years from now, i will remember exactly where i was when the young man spoke in a park in Chicago, and when a thousand men beat their drums to a rousing crescendo as the world watched in awe.

Some good men left us, but better men may have been born. Dont give up yet, go change the world - and you will see it changing for you. It may be better, or worse, but it will never be the same.

Happy New Year.