top 1%

This weekend was a day spent almost entirely at home. I think I needed all the time to rest and recuperate from the hectic week I had. Saturday morning was spent watching Finding Dory – the second part of the crazy hit Finding Nemo. Finding Nemo was a lovely movie that we had watched years ago when it was released. Our favorite story is that when Jispa was very small we made her watch Finding Nemo and she was terrified. She cried through the movie and we just couldn’t understand why would a kid cry in a Disney movie. I guess the basic premise is very scary – Nemo is a baby fish that ends up being separated from his dad. That is a very scary proposition and I think it’s enough to give nightmares to young kids. When adults make these movies in animation, its possibly impossible to understand the effect it has on younger minds. How scary can it get? Jispa refused to watch so many animated movies till she was much older. We kept taking her in the hope that she would like at least one. I think in Ratatouille she scolded me in the scene where the main guy is taking the rat down to the sewers to throw it there.

Now I think I am done with animation movies. There are very few movies that are clear lovely movies that appeal to all without being preachy. I think the last ‘adult’ animation movie was Inside Out. It was a movie that was lovely to watch and understand and it beautifully depicted the mind of a person and how it can work. I think they had very highly regarded psychologists advising on the script of the movie. It was one cracker of a movie idea, far beyond the realms of average people. It came and went in India without even causing a flutter. Hardly anyone saw it or knew of it. By comparison the movie Jungle Book in its new avatar did very well. I thought it had a really bad story line and hardly any great emotional moments or camaraderie between its protagonists. It was surely a visual extravaganza with the jungle coming alive in realism animation. The trailers were magnificent and very tightly edited. It was meant for an Imax 3D experience. The Hindi version was also awesome with some awesome actors dubbing the lines, but still –the story and the interplay between the characters left me very cold. It did not recreate the magic of the original Jungle Book in my head.

Finding Dory was also similarly cold. Dory was a great character who brought a lot of stupidness to the mission of the original movie. A father is in search of his son and there is a stupid fish with short term memory loss. The whole contrast in the desperate situation made for a memorable story. Here the whole thing just died out and too many leaps of faith had to be made with the fish moving from one place to another, across land forms. I think this movie was a miss.

On Sunday, it was time to simply vegetate at home. In the evening, the city saw the monsoon setting it and the climate became lovely. I tried convincing Jispa to play something with me. Anything. Any game. We tried playing one round of battle ship which we quickly abandoned as it was quite boring. Then I convinced her to come with me for a walk. She only agreed if we went for a walk to crosswords the book shop near our house. I agreed. Down I pushed her to walk along the longer route via the garden. I am desperate to have longer walks with her. While walking we started talking. She is easier to talk to when we walk. At home she answers in monosyllables but while walking a conversation can ensue. We spoke about the upcoming kabaddi tournament and how I get damn frustrated when dealing with individuals. I told her that people just don’t like to change and they can innovate. You have to first say yes, it’s possible and then think new. I was speaking about the stadium experience and how we must enhance it. In India we stop everything from being taken inside a stadium. You can’t take anything inside, no food, no music instruments, nothing. I was telling her that we should have a carnival inside and outside the stadium, have lots of face painting artists free inside the stadium with only your team colors. People should have fun and talk about eth stadium experience. Jispa then remarked, that yes, exactly – otherwise people will slowly stop coming. Yes., Jispa  - you said something that 99% of India and especially the sport operators just don’t get. You need to allow people to take photos, share selfies, post online, get families and have a great time. I think and I have been screaming hoarse – we must get the women and the children, if they come in then the families are in. If you attract men, you sell one ticket if you attract the families then you sell four tickets. This is an air-conditioned auditorium, with the best setting to get the best crowd, but we end up screwing things up. We should have very fair priced snacks at the stadium and in fact have many more hospitality seats that allow for seat delivery of food. Simple snacks and peanuts must be allowed. Plus allow for players to meet the fans after the game. The experience must be awesome, enough parking and enough food and enough experience enhancing gimmicks. A well thought out plan. And then there is the in stadium experience. Encourage the crowd to get in early, have a flash mob, have a band playing and have people in the crowd with trumpets to cheer the team. I was telling Jispa that many years ago, I had watched a cricket game in Wankhede stadium. It was West Indies versus India. I don’t remember the game  or the score or who actually won. All I remember is that suddenly in the crowd one Parsi looking gentleman would stand up randomly in the middle of the game and play a particular tune on the trumpet. It was a simple 5 tone tune and he would play it and the crowd without any encouragement or prodding would simply shout “hey” at the end of the tune. He would emerge suddenly and he would then go somewhere else in a different part of the stadium and play his tune. He would come and go as he pleased. This was extremely entertaining and that’s what I remember. Why can’t we do that? We will have a lion (our Pune kabaddi team mascot) roaming around, but the mascot is not told what to do, he probably does not even know how the game is, he has no signature moves and he like an idiot only moves in the VIP areas. He should be the CROWD where there are hundreds of people not in the VIP area where you seat a few. He should be running up and down the aisles, dancing and prancing around, cheering the team.

But I guess we only know how to milk the cow, not create an experience. The great Indian sport tamasha is the IPL. This was invented by a marketing genius in London who with the help of research brought innovation to the game. Of course he made it 20 overs but he also brought in a few innovations like cheerleaders and the dugout. The dug out makes the team sit out in the field in one corner and not in the dressing room, it brings the players out in the open giving the fans more time to see them. Simple innovations bring about a greater joy to the sport. If you don’t have the crowds in the stadium it makes for a bad TV experience as well. People want to live the stadium experience on TV!

This is the simple truth about sports that people don’t get. You are fighting for entertainment money and every time you will listen to organizers talking about – the core audience, the kabaddi clubs and they rue that the crowd is not the same. How will it be – what have YOU done to create your fan base? What have you given them to love you as a team, how have you helped them enjoy and support the team. You just show up during the tournament and expect magic to happen. Where are your camps, meet and greet sessions, coaching programs etc?

It’s easy to skimp on all these costs and then wonder – WTF? People don’t support the sport.

You need to have loyal raving fans who take the game to the others and bring about a ‘Junoon’ in the stadium. These are the guys who will cry and scream for the team. They will follow the team across the country and create a noise and a cheer that will spur your team. But It requires effort and care.

Jispa and I were discussing all this and she added to the discussion and she got it. She also said that you must enjoy the stadium and you must do all the exciting stuff. She can’t understand why the organizers don’t get it. I was telling her that this is the most frustrating part of the work. Working with people who just don’t get it. I was telling her that she has a good brain and she has the ability to think. It puts her in the 1% of Indian population. She did not believe me. She thought at least 50% should be good thinkers to which I corrected her – no way – only 1% will be good thinkers. It is impossible to get more than this.

I explained to her about me being a secretary at Matunga Gym. In spite of all my ideas and all my efforts I could hardly get a few wins. There are so many egos and other issues at play. People just don’t think clearly and what you have is just a slightly better pool. I wanted to change the bathrooms and get the women to have the bigger bathrooms with better facilities but I couldn’t do so. People have issues with everything but if I wanted to change stuff, it would take a whole lot of time and dedication at my end and I would need to get involved with the politics of it all. So then Jispa asked – in your new job here, you can do what you want nah! “nopes” I can’t do what I want. Of course I have far more power here than what I had in my earlier job, but its still not an autocracy, I still have people that I have to work with, people that piss me off and dumb ass guys who just don’t get the point. I have to manage them and its not like I can fire anyone at will.

I don’t think even an entrepreneur can do this. You can try and surround yourself with the best minds you find, but then you cant really grow. When you grow and scale you will have to take calls and get stupid dumb people on board. They will fill your system. Else the other option, run a consulting service with exactly 4 employees. But here to get anything done you will require to deal with clients who are dumber and you have ass lick and get your payment. After all if he were so smart why would he need a consultant. So the real real option is to work where you find the least amount of these jokers in your life. Accept that these jokers are a reality. People will not understand odds and people will refuse to accept mistakes and admit failures and repent. People will do stupid things all the time. Understanding that and living and making some amount of peace with it is critical to sanity.

Stupidity is just one angle to it. Insecurity mixed with stupidity is a Molotov cocktail. But that is another angle for another rant for another time.

Till then just live with the stupidity around you and try to reduce it. Very few people read, very few listen and very few change. Try to read, listen and change. Believe that you are wrong when you start the conversation then only can you change and then only will you improve and then only will you remain less stupid. DO IT!