shit changes you

Over the weekend I went through two types of life changing events. Ok – too much drama. But they were experiences that would allow me to think through on issue sthat could potential change my thinking for a long time to come.

I took a few of my colleagues to design yatra. I am sure I would have blogged about this crazy amazing conference in the past. This is a place where I am a pretender in a place full of crazy designers and artists, I am a stand out stupid guy. I have no talents in this and I hope at best to at least appreciate the fact that there is beauty in what people do and value in art for art sake in whatever we do.

I am in the middle of being wooed by multiple people to join them. And I am thinking, should I leave, should I join something new, should I build on something I already have. Money is important but only so much. After a point its not about money but a chance to create something new and beautiful. Over the last few years I have come to the conclusion that marketing is a wasted field. What the world needs for now is product supremacy. It’s the product that needs to succeed. Product necessarily flow from great design. In our finance world where we don’t sell anything real or tangible (money is such an abstract concept). We need a serious reason for people to love our product. This is where design comes into place.

I have been thinking that wherever I go, as a next jump or wherever, whenever I am able to create my own little ecosystem, it will definitely be a place where I would want to build my team, have freedom to work, interact, get in amazing talent; fire idiots dragging the system and build a good place to work. If take up one more job at one more place, I would be building more of the same shit. New place, same shit, just a little more money. I want a lot more money but a chance to build something of real value.

Where I go they would want me to start asap, start showing results immideiately, and get cracking. Reality – it would take me a year to understand the product / problem and build a team that would then begin to start delivering. Then it would take me another year before we actually start to show results. Everyone wants an overnight sensation, not knowing how long it took to build it. Most overnight sensations are ten years in the making. Ten years.

So the design festival helped me realize and reinforce in my head my ideas of how great companies are actually built. By building great products that people want in the end. Today most of the big success stories that we see, and what most miss is that the products that were delivered were finger licking good. When they diverge from great design, shit creeps in and then all hell breaks loose. It’s funny that my company, group wide, has a marketing review, business reviews etc but no real product review. No really good well designed, lickable product customer interfaces and reviews. My super boss understands money but I am sure, he doesn’t understand what is meant by good looking and great interface products. The question for me is where do I build this expertise as decide my future course of action.

Cut to Mumbai. I fly in from Goa early morning to attend an AGM for Matunga Gymkhana. It was public lynching at its best. We haven’t learnt from history that democracy can give rise to the worst of dictators. Hitler was a democratically elected despot.  In an AGM the person who can shout the loudest and incite crowds can sway the opinion. In a democracy there is the tyranny of the majority which can be used to suppress a saner but quieter opinion. That is exactly what happened. Logic and anything be damned. Louder voices ruled.

I was wondering what happened. I was quiet throughout, unlike my natural self. I only spoke once and I thought I made sense and I spoke for the greater good. People understood and the stupid conversation and fighting stopped on that one point. But then the asst. secretary opened his mouth, once again and then all hell broke loose. Every time he opened his mouth the meeting would extend by another 40 minutes.

But today after good introspection, I realized that even silence has a role. If I had opened my mouth and be drawn into these issues I wouldn’t have been able to see this game. I wouldn’t have been able to see how the few manipulate the large. It is a well thought of strategy relying on rhetoric and oratory. It is mind numbing how the majority are swayed by this. I too have been guilty of this in the past. I have been swayed without the understanding of consequences.

Real life is difficult, complicated and not without consequences. Most of which are unintended. The process of democracy is slow and painful and we must protect it at all costs.

I wanted to resign, I drafted the mail and sent it to my friend. I haven’t yet sent it to the gymkhana. But I think… should I or should I not be the lone voice of sanity and be there and grind it out or should I get out and focus on new things. The learnings are tremendous but I have to hold in my natural instincts and reign in initial response. I would need to be measured and studied. That is the right way to play the game. Let me think.

Who knew that a weekend in variety would prove to be enough food for thought, my friend.

crowning glory

It always nice to be proven wrong. To have a change of heart or head. To hold a notion or long and then to have compelling evidence to change it. For long we never had cable at home. That was the big pound thing and looking at us a few friends of ours also followed suit and it did make for an enriching life. What is that cable can add to our life. It was a wonderful life with Jispa as she grew up withour cable.

In the new house, we bought a new TV but we still did not want cable. We just simply connected it to the internet and through Prime and Hotstar I thought we had it pretty much licked. I wasn’t so kicked about Netflix. I was not a TV series kind of guy. Why would I need Netflix. Then a friend came home and just logged me onto his plan. He had one extra login free. Ok fair.

For the last few months I simply watched a few movies on Netflix and I hated the experience. How many movie titles do you need to browse through to choose the one you like? Jasmine hated me for it. I tried one series in the House of cards, but I just couldn’t handle it for long. I get bored. And I hated series even more. Why would I invest 10s of hours when you can get story in 3 and be done with?

This went on till on a lark I just tried a series on Netflix called The Crown and I was hooked. It is a terrific series which perfectly sits with my sensibility. A well-produced drama based on history. It tries to get behind the story of the Queen of England.  Their approach is brilliant and in every episode they try and get behind the character and help you understand their issues, motivations, fears and pride. And since they have Churchill featured very prominently in the first ten episodes, I was completely hooked. It brought alive the character of the man after the war as an old and ageing politician fighting to stay with his glory of winning the world war. The dialogues are brilliant and Jispa and I keep clapping whenever he has his sharp wit at play.

Now I understand why people are hooked to series. One friend had told me – a series works as he found it a waste to invest time in a movie. A series the return is over a longer period. With The Crown, I would agree. Now I am invested in the characters and their inner travails. I will appreciate it much more over a period of time. And the fact that it makes for family viewing. We all are hooked. I am now right now binge watching the live episodes and I guess we will wait after we are done for the new episodes.

Of course the binge watching is not anywhere like what the millennials watch. At best we can take in about 4 to 5 episodes in a day. The millennials do the full series in one sitting, one night. It’s a killer. In any case whatever little I binge is also possible just because I have a banged up knee and I am forced to stay at home. My bloody bum is hurting from all the sitting I am doing. It is painful. But I am so looking forward to my surgery.

My hope is that once the surgery is done, I will be fully rehabilitated and I will be able to run a like a mad man again. I want to run fast and hard and I want to take part in an obstacle course or something like that. I know now I can be fit and fast. It’s crazy for me to be this way at 43 but I am loving it. I never knew that I could grow older and fitter. Wah wah.

But I like that at 43 I am learning new things as a person, as a binge watcher, as a sportsperson and as a human. Its lovely man!

does the box belong to Pandora or Schrodinger

Over a period of time, one changes. Someone was asking me about people and how we change. My belief is that typically people don’t change themselves too much. They change and many times it looks big, but most of the time, it is a representation of something that was there in them from the start. An avatar of it, comes out. So essentially you are the same person but just a different manifestation of yourself comes out. People and circumstances do that to you. How long can you go about being beaten and getting jammed by the world, before you put your foot down and change.

The new friend in office is the HR lady. She is sweet and we seem to get along. Possibly she is one of the older recruits we have had and this brings a certain sense of stability to her behavior vis a vis the rest of the jokers. She was saying that she can’t make out what I am. She is understanding a new perspective about me every time. Ah well. She said that sometimes I am damn tough and sometimes, I am a softy. I was telling her that as a kid, a young recruit, I was pretty naïve and simple. I was innocent, loyal and straight forward. I believed in what people said. Soon enough, I became hardened and you can’t just take me for a ride every time. Shit happened and kept on happening with me in my life and you change. I would to be the 21-year-old me. I loved myself then. I really was a sweet kid. Now I am an asshole. I have changed.

So here, I have changed but not as much as it seems. I still care, I am still more trusting than suspicious, I still like to give stuff rather than receive and fundamentally, I just try and be the person I would like to interact with. That’s how I have become.

Yesterday I was telling Jasmine – I don’t know how, but this weird part of me has come out. In sense that I can love and give and give and love till a point – and then, if you still don’t get it, I simply just shut off. I am done. And once I am done – it’s over. I can be there but it’s over. It happened with Mom. I loved her and gave a lot to her. I was loyal and by her side. I tried to keep her happy and manage her expectations for many years. I asked Jasmine to manage and I exacted greater sacrifices from them. Till a point that Jispa was born. I remember that it was about the point that I just gave up. I kept quiet. That was a snapping point. Till that point I was the sweet kid who could do anything, and when break point happened, it was so quick and fast that it seemed like I just flipped a switch. I would be very worried when I keep quiet and I try not to. Because once that happens, it always dangerous. Getting me back is not that difficult, but it will never be the same.

It happened to people at work as well. One kid I taught, he was drifting away and I gave him a nice job with me. He was okay at his work. I kept him going till appoint came when he decided to leave. Sure, you must leave, I try my best to ensure that people who work for me find new havens elsewhere. But this kid hid his job search from me, which I understand and then he never told me which firm he is about to join. That was bad and something that I did not accept. You cannot be that secretive from me, especially if you hold me in any regard. That was it, I rarely did speak to him afterwards.

I see this turning off behavior many times when I deal with people. I just choose to keep quiet or not tell. If it’s not going to help then it’s not worth it. My life gets selective. Old colleagues who bitch about me, get this as well. You have to decide what you want from me and what you are going to give me. If you want good friendship then you go the whole hog. If you want camaraderie then that’s what you are going to get and if you want a good colleague then that’s that. It’s the confusion in your mind that will get my goose. I don’t abandon friends no matter how bad they may have been to me. I am there, just the avatar that they are used to, changes. This is something they don’t understand.

This is something about me that I fight a lot with myself when it comes to my family. I know that the off switch is very very difficult to turn back on and hence I try and stay away from it at all times. Jispa is dangerously flirting with the off switch in some aspects.

I have always maintained a system in which I talk and discuss a lot of things and try and impart learnings. All my life, I have learnt, not for just expanding my knowledge but in a large part so as to expand it to those around me. Talk to people, let them learn from your experience and knowledge. This is the way for knowledge to expand and further gain roots in your own head. It gives the greatest joy. Jispa gets the best from this as I explain various different things to her. But these days as she changes and as she grows up, she has little time and little patience to give me. Just yesterday itself, I had an interesting conversation with a swim parent and this one was someone who I was trying to explain on the role of government and how it is becoming a ‘Big Brother’ in our lives. While we were discussing this, I explained that how today we have so much control over our children’s life. We watch over them and we know what they are doing in their lives. My parents hardly knew anything about us compared to what we know about our child. That I keep telling Jasmine to back off is another matter for a later conversation. But that we have an overhang over their lives is a crazy thing. We are there and they know we are there. The parents have whatsapp groups that talk to each other, corroborating stories and chatting with each other. My mom knew no other mom from school. None. We parents, practically know every other one. This is influencing their behavior in many ways I argue. At a fundamental level, the kid knows about this overhang and hence his behavior is attuned to this. He will change his behavior and choices knowing our likes and dislikes and approval. So, in effect in many ways we have made these choices for them. While we were growing up, the biggest choice I think was the choice of girlfriend and the choices of our families, in many ways shaped the choice of partners we had. Some rebelled but most stayed within the norms. Today we know so much more and we therefore choose much more and therefore, what we approve or disapprove in many ways in shaping our child’s choices even before they make their choice. My friend to whom I was talking to, got it and said, Schrodinger’s cat. Yes – much like the cat, the fact that you are going to open the box and look inside has made the decision for the cat. In fact, the fact that you have the choice to opened the box and look inside has collapsed the probability and influenced the life of the cat. We make our choices for our kids even by not making them, but by the very fact that we can choose to make them. Oh bloody hell. But well it was interesting conversation and I started talking about it at the dinner table, when Jispa got up for something, and then she got up as she finished the dinner and then was sitting elsewhere on the sofa in the living room. I looked at Jasmine and said “I was telling her something”. Jamsine looked at me and called out to Jispa and said “your dad was talking”.

I told Jispa to let it be. I dint want to talk anymore. I then whispered to Jasmine “I think she has its easy. Ever since she was a kid, she got me and whatever I could offer on a platter. I don’t think she values it as much.” And then I murmured something to the effect that outside people come to conferences once they see my name on the speaker panel and I have a lot to offer to so many people and students. I guess at home it’s not as valuable as it could be. Jasmine understood this. She knows what I have gone through or what I go through.

I study and read so much and learn so as to teach. Of all the students of mine, Jispa is my special one. It will be heart breaking when she will do this. But I don’t grudge her for this. This is what kids will do. They will not value whats in front of them. Possibly down the line, she may value what I bring to the table. I jokingly (possibly half-jokingly) told Jasmine that I am dying to meet her boyfriend. Possibly then she will know what her dad is worth. I know that weird people like me are less available, what are the chances that Jispa will meet two in her life.

But still, yesterday I was a little surprised with myself. I normally try not to switch off when it comes to family. I know how dangerous I can get with this. It can get pretty unnerving for the other side. I don’t wish it on people, but this is a simple response mechanism.

Because I read so much, I learn so much and I tech so much, I try and explain it to various people; and that is the exact reason I just shut up if I don’t find interest on the other side. There is no point pushing where nothing can be helped. So many people in day to day life, don’t know learnings from their freaking elbow, if they see it. So many don’t want to and are too preoccupied to or are just plain too arrogant to really want to know anything. Hence it better to switch off. But this works (actually really does not) with the rest of the world but is a zero-sum game with the family. You end up losing as much as anyone else. I don’t let that happen. This little blogpost is a reminder to me to say that I shouldn’t let it happen.

There are enough idiots in the world who piss me off and I don’t need them again in my life. Some have managed to be family, I can’t handle any more. This mustn’t happen. Today as I type this I realise that I have to resist this. Shutting off is not an option at home. I think this response is a means to not belittle what I have to say and not insult all that I have read. It is a way of preserving my sanity and desire to learn more. I see many kids every year. Some have an innate desire to learn and some don’t care about anything. It would kill me to see Jispa move away from learning. But then – see I have just done a Schrodinger’s on her.

I think we have influenced our kid’s reality in many more ways than we care to think.  This blog can serve so many purposes. It’s not meant to be a blog to help her understand and shape her behavior or be grateful towards us parents. It was meant to be a source of soup for her. A kind of soup you want on a rainy day, that makes you reflect and take heart in whatever issue you have. Soup, or perhaps coffee with some chocolate dust sprinkled on it. Warm. On a cold day.

Some day she will have to deal with kids, possibly her own. This will be awesome fun at the time.

Parenting is alike a freaking rollercoaster that just doesn’t stop, it slows down and when it does, its typically when its creaking upwards, making a weird sound to let you know that it’s going to just take you over the edge and give you the scare of your life; and when you are done with it, you should go back happy thinking that was a swell ride. Ya sure. I wouldn’t wish it on anyone. Of all, not on Jispa for sure.

Fun fact – I can handle roller coasters of all types, I find the humble tea cup ride a crazy nightmare. I can handle anything that goes round and round. Conversations included ;)

You never know which lesson will come handy.

“May you live in interesting times”. Said to be (probably apocryphal) a Chinese curse. Times of peace and tranquility and boredom are possibly best for quality of life. Life without issues, innovation, pressure is a boring lovely simple life. Hah! That is a 41 year old talking. The same thing as a 14 year old would be a life with nothing new to look forward to. How is a life, sans pressure and change worth living is it? Wouldn’t we all want to live in interesting times. Where productivity is constantly increasing and change is helping us lead more meaningful and sweetly ripe lives. Ya, I for now like to live in interesting times as things change around me, as I understand this change and get a ring side view of the changes and their impact on people and interplay of the characters. I was lucky to have been born in 1975. Which meant I was the one who entered college when liberalization started and exited when its impact was in full flow. Today I am seeing the impact of internet and mobile penetration in the country and how its changing the landscape. It an era that looks like massive change is coming and it’s going to sweep everyone off.

Many years ago, I read a book by John Nasbitt called Mindset. It was quite an interesting book and it talks about predicting the future from current news, science and trends. I don’t remember most of the book (like always) but one lesson stuck tight in the head. Most of the trends that really matter to us over the long term are hidden in the inside pages of a newspaper and never on the front page. Yes, I agree. Change happens in small increments and over a long period of time. Suddenly the tipping point comes in and it looks like a rapid sudden change. The internet first wave came in the year 2000 and I rode that wave for some time and worked in a few start-ups. I saw that internet was changing the world and that crazy things would happen, but the advent of the mobile internet and apps put the dam thing on steroids. The most interesting disruption that affected a lot of our lives was the advent of App based taxi servces, especially Uber.

Every commuter, including me hailed Uber as the solution to all issues. This was the best thing ever. In Mumbai we were victims of the taxi mafia, that had a few things to do with regulation and a few thanks to lack of competition (of course both are interconnected). You wouldn’t be able to get a taxi when you wanted and whenever you got one, he would first ask where you wanted to go and then refuse to go in that direction. The cars were in horrible condition, the government refused to allow AC to be run in the taxis. For AC taxis they gave out separate permits. These were called cool cabs. These were the ultimate jokes. These taxis only plied from the airport and were stationed near the five star hotels. They also invariably refused small fares and were typically employed by either shopping seduced NRIS or foreign nationals. The meters of these were completely rigged and would show some random price, which was up to 3 x of the real rate. The humble black and yellow taxis also tended to have rigged meters and whenever I used to take one from the airport, I would get an inflated price after which I would fight and pay only the normal fare and walk away. Taxis were so broken down that they could be considered dilapidated. You could see the road down from a few holes in the floor of the cabs. Serious. They were that bad.

On the side lines, the government had given permission to launch AC call cab services. Here you could call and book your cab in advance. These cars were decent looking and maintained and theoretically they could be flagged down anywhere on the roads. Slowly these too gravitated towards airport pickups and drops and five star hotels. You could call for a cab and book in advance only to be told later that there was no cab to be found at your appointed hour. Even at the airport one had to wait in a line before one could book the cab. It was a great step forward but it still wasn’t enough.

So, when Uber launched in Mumbai, it was a crazy dream for the commuters. Good, new cars were on the road. You could load the wallet with money and then order a car from app. You could see that the pricing was competitive and that you could get the taxi confirmed without telling him in advance where you wanted to go. You simply booked and sat. The app became so good, that you could book your car on the phone and reach your destination without ever speaking to the driver. The location was prefixed and the wallet was loaded. No need to speak to anyone. You could see your taxi in real time and it was supposedly the safe and best way to ride.

It broke the back of the normal black and yellow cabs. Being subsidized (read predatory pricing), the rates were awesome and people rushed to download the app. Usage went through the roof. Airport pick up and drop was a breeze. People were happy and could show the middle finger to all normal taxis. I remember going to Hyderabad a year and a half ago and being completely independent of the completely fraudulent rickshaw drivers. I roamed around in Hyderabad in a taxi at the same cost of a metered rickshaw. Of course no rickshaw would go on meter and invariably you have to haggle your way everywhere. The world had just become a little smaller.

The promise of unbridled capitalism had benefited the common man. But like all unbridled capitalism, there were consequences to be had. The party on free flow of funds had to stop sometime. The crazy demand had created crazy supply. Uber and their Indian rival Ola, went all out to woo the Indian drivers. They wanted more and more taxis on the road. Drivers at the start were making unheard figures of 90 thousand or so a month. More and more drivers came in form villages and started driving their cabs. Some smart ones, expanded their fleet. On the back of robust income streams these drivers started having robust credit scores and the credit poured in. Fueled by a small upfront investment and a seemingly unending source of business cash flow, you could become a driver owner at worst or a fleet owner at best. Adam Smith’s invisible hand started to play havoc. The demand for drivers meant that driver salaries went up. In the last two year’s I would reckon that the salary went up by 1.5X at the minimum. Slowly more and more cabs started coming on the streets. To ensure enough cars everywhere, Uber had a surge pricing system where if there was demand and not enough supply, they would increase the pricing (surge pricing) to tempt more cars to reach the areas that are underserviced. The consumers had a chance to book or wait till more cabs hit and reduce the surge in the area. This caused dissonance with the users who thought that it was unfair.

Taxis also were being pressed into service which were actually tourist taxis and were on the fine line of the law, if they could be considered as everyday call taxis.

Of course a lot of good things happened, economy wise. First of all, a large part of the business became legit. Taxi drivers were till now an all cash business. They would earn all their income in cash and possibly never ever filed a tax return. Being outside of the system, they would be ineligible for credit and therefore were forced to be on the fringes of society. Uber allowed them the opportunity to legalise their entire business model and therefore access finance and grow.

With more and more taxis hitting the street, different sets of issues started cropping up. These guys were so many in number that civic planning became chaotic. With access to cheap cabs more people started to use it to commute to work. Traffic was full of Uber cars choking the road. While the consumers demanded it, at a fundamental level, the playing field was lopsided in favour of the app cabs. They could charge free fares which the black and yellow taxis couldn’t. So, they could benefit from surge. Second - parking spots for black and yellows were designated. That’s where they could park and wait for customers. These Uber taxis could wait anywhere, and they did. They would invariably wait around the roads causing jams. An Uber waiting or wanting to search for a customer would keep moving slowly till he found his customer, fundamentally slowly down the traffic for the rest on the road.

In the middle, an Uber driver raped a girl in Delhi and the world realized that these drivers need proper verification as the alleged rapist was a known criminal on the loose. Just because you can track someone doesn’t mean you can’t be harmed from them.

The point of all this history isn’t to document this but to learn interesting lessons from this. When regulations happen they invariably choke the system and give consumers a shitty service, but when capitalism is left unchecked, equally great ills can be unleashed in the form of unintended consequences. False predatory pricing brought a lot of credit fuels cars on the road, but when the pricing stops as it nears it real value, these drivers will be held to a lower income stream and a mountain of debt. Its already started happening. Now an Uber driver will tell you that today he receives only 4 to 5 trips a day compared to the 10, 11 earlier. He hardly got any surge pricing benefits now days as you see Uber cars everywhere. Debt servicing is going to be an issue.

The government has woken up to this service and is now trying to regulate it. It is trying to put in pricing curbs and some other rules like regulating car color.

This is interesting. The swings are happening real time. The consequences of market forces coming together and partying are causing hangovers. Suddenly, you will have lesser cars in response to lesser demand thanks to increase in price. What will happen to the drivers? What will happen to these excess cars? What will happen to roads, parking and commute?

Fun things I assume. In many countries, private drivers can work their cars as Uber cars during their spare time. That is another level of complication being built into the economics of car ownership and commute.

The point here is simple. There are two sides of the coin. If the government interferes then it’s an issue; if it lets the private enterprise go unchecked, the issues are of another scale. This is not simply a government versus non-government issue. It is an issue of intervention. Any intervention, big or small has consequences, intended or unintended. Things move crazy after a small change in initial condition. I think it’s called the chaos theory. Here large changes in final outcome can be attributed to small changes in initial conditions. We argue and argue on so many small and big issues. We seem to understand all the issues and then we give our opinions on it. Life has taught me that issues are not straightforward. They have choices and choices and thenthe decision tree rapidly multiplies and assumptions start taking over. SO much so that after a point guessing is worse than tossing a coin.

All of what is happening at Uber is simple and possibly one could have explained it, with the benefit of hindsight. But it’s almost impossible to figure it as foresight. We get lost in the waves of optimism around us. All will be well. We argue (me included) that private enterprise is good and must be free. Sure – it must be free’er’ than where it is today but it cannot simply be unchecked. Then the problem is who is to check it? The authority in any case doesn’t understand it. None of us – including the authority or the entrepreneur knows the game more than two steps ahead. In such a scenario, how can you plan so far in advance. And when you do plan in advance, you will invariably start glossing over small details that will make significant impacts over a period of time.

When the Uber frenzy was happening and drivers were earning 90k a month and above, I too felt like getting into the bandwagon. Whats wrong with this? One car costs around six hundred thousand. That’s at best 8 months for profit to keep rolling in. And people like me have good credit history and with a good balance sheet, I can leverage and expand like crazy. It’s a story that too good to be true. I knew one thing – if anything is true good to be true – it isn’t.  there is always something up. If there is free money then there will be a flock of vultures making a cacophony attracting other vultures. Soon enough there won’t be any meat left for any of the vultures. There can’t be free money for long. Especially if it is capitalist money. Government money can be free for much longer. Corruption, lethargy and smoke can ensure you have a sweet spot for a longtime to come. But definitely not open market money. It comes with risk. For me the biggest risk was simple – government. Here I knew that the government would get involved and at worst – ban it all and at best – regulate it to a jam. It cannot grow thus for long. I never reached the free money fallacy on this deal in advance. I never got there. I think I too was swayed by it all.

This is the fun bit when you live in interesting times. You see economics 1.0 being played out over your life. It is the greatest lesson that you can learn. Free! You just have to look around and make mental models of what’s happening.  Life has enough to teach you. That’s why it’s amazing to have a conversation with an older experienced person who is able to retain his /her memory and give you the benefit of their life. Simple stories make a huge learning experience. My favorite one is how one friend running a premium saree shop explained that the Ahmedabad airport opening up reduced his sales in Mumbai as the gujju NRI’s simply took the direct flight there and skipped Mumbai altogether.

Parenting is also complex. Here only time will tell how much of a effect does chaos theory have on the child. Small decisions like schooling, neighborhood, choice of sport, movies etc have an impact on the child as it grows into an adult. Who knows what the consequences are. That’s why parents who like to have a greater control over their child’s future will sweat hard over agonizingly simple decisions. Long term decisions with limited data. A simple act of choosing our child’s play dates can have different consequences than what we can imagine. Yet we have no choice but to choose.

It’s the classical Keynesian versus Hayekian model for economics. Should I or the government interfere or should it be free to grow. Left free, over a period of time, the people find amazing things to do and innovate. But in the long run, we are all dead. And the actions affect us or the people we love. Can we but not interfere and try and guide it to the place we want it to sit. Can we simply just sit back and say – lets see where it goes. If it gets too ugly, I can always get in. It’s not so simple. Like in the Uber case – you don’t know how ugly is ugly. Suppose Uber folds shop world over, my assumption is that an app based taxi concept will remain. Someone else will come in but the demand may not be that much. What happens to all the taxis drivers. All the credit guys who put in the money. How do they make good? It takes a few taxi drivers to commit harakiri – a strike (which we have seen), violent protests, immolation and suicide. What gives then? Who is to answer. The commuter enjoyed his ride in an AC cab for cheap. The irritating black and yellow cab driver got shown his place, and the driver too enjoyed higher wages and a chance to be the boss himself. When the party is over, the hangover hurts.

Jispa is growing up now. Its good fun. She is close to us, we enjoy hugging her and we like her close. We like that thanks to our protection (read the alst post) she remained safe and happy – ok – not happy completely but atleast no real bad things happened. But then what are the long term consequences. I don’t know. Plus, I have only one kid. I can’t even learn and improve on this. What to do.

That’s why I like economics. At the base level its simple. And it helps understand life. I wish Jispa reads a lot of my books and a million more of hers as well. You never know which lesson will come handy.