across the spectrum

Sports a great thing. but understanding sports is an even greater experience. I have been lucky in that my dad was always encouraging us to play sports. We had a club membership in Dubai and when I was of age (and of wage) I invested in a membership that is paying me huge dividends. Now we have Jispa, who is bringing another angle to the sports discussion in the family.

While I have been playing sports for long, I first started understanding the mental aspects of sports only much recently. I guess it all started when I started playing in the team as a captain. I forced to think about the game and not only of my game. It made me aware of my game as well. It helped me think completely different about sport in general. Post which I have tried to understand and bring the brain into other sports as well. I have played cricket, squash, swam, run and a lot of badminton these days. The more I understand any sport the better is the understanding of sport in general. Over a period of time one understands different sports but is able to draw a set of lines going across all sports.

For example let’s take the head. The head position is so critical in sport. As a general rule, the head position must be as stable in sport. The head position maintains the balance and posture. It helps you see better and your hand eye work great. You don’t fall over while playing and you play with a firm balance. It also helps you recover better. I have seen this is batting, bowling, fielding, badminton, squash, billiards, TT… everything. Natural athletes typically don’t move their head too much. It’s only the eye that follows a moving object. Very little of head movement is done. Swimming is also similar. You keep your head stable as much as possible and you only turn enough to breathe. As little movement as possible. While I was being coached for swimming I realized that the head position is also critical for maintaining a position that keeps your body afloat. You don’t look ahead; you don’t look down – you look at an angle that is roughly 45 degrees ahead. This keeps you afloat.

Recently Jispa attended a swim camp organized by Rehan Poncha. Rehan was one of the Indian swimmers at the Beijing Olympics. He is now running camps and trying to fund his golfing career. He is very good with the kids and he basically is giving tips on land training, stretching, followed by swimming drills and then a talk on nutrition, mental preparation etc. one of the things he explained was to have loose muscles. Keep your body loose then they move faster. Hands if kept loose move faster than if they are tight. That’s an interesting thing. It works well with what my coach was trying to show me to do while swimming as well.

Now one of the things that I can’t do in badminton is smash hard. As in – I can but I don’t do it consistently enough and I only do it from far. If I am close to the net I try to rely on placements and not on power. But that’s not enough to kill a point. I am always worried that I will hit the net and so to avoid an unforced error I tap the shuttle. This then extends further and then I stop smashing altogether as I realized today. I just refused to smash. My partner then looked at me and begged – Smash kar yaar. I do have a decent smash when I pull it off. Then I just out of the blue decided to loosen my muscles and try. I remembered what Rehan said. Keep them loose. And then boom boom bang.  A flurry of smashes later my friend exclaimed – Your smash is back. We won five points in a row with my smashes. Just keep them loose and let it go.

Cross sport understanding is a great thing. You have to keep the basics simple. Its always the case. Placing is important in squash and the similar principals work in badminton. Head position is crucial, less movement, more balance.

Such is also in life. You learn from everywhere and anything. You have to understand and know a lot of stuff. This helps you think clearly and apply lessons learnt from one to another. Of course it obvious that to apply you have to exposed to a lot. That’s what I always try for. As many exposures as possible. I try and expose Jispa to various experiences and I try and expose myself as well. Anything new – worth doing once or twice. At worst – the worst experience will tell you what you don’t like about the experience. The principal is simple – if you have enough exposures you will have enough learnings. You must be curious at all points of times. We had a management meet recently with some psychometric tests thrown in. I went off the scale on the curiosity parameter – and the shrink was telling me that I have a practically insatiable appetite for learning. Yes of course. Insatiable. Constant and always on. I will try and learn every second and form anyone and from everything. It drives me crazy but it’s the only thing that keeps me sane. Hah. After a long time – opposites reconciling.

Why so serious?

Nah… if you see this I don’t like you to think of it as inspirational. Nopes. It doesn’t inspire me. It’s not that if you have cerebral palsy or any such thing you can still defeat the odds and come out trumps. That is something I take for granted. You can defeat all odds and come out trumps. The question is simply what sacrifices you want to make and how much will power you have.

The big thing in this I see is simply a little bit of me. This chic doesn’t need your sympathy or special treatment; she has accepted what wrong and moved on. She accepted what’s not there and moved on in life. It’s a freaking joke. Have fun. Now can you move on?

I have sick many numbers of times. I have been a sickly kid all my childhood. I would fall sick every year and most of the time more than three times a year. I was pretty frustrated. All my college life I was weighing around 58 kgs. I would look at weighing scale and hope it inches upwards. In variably there was a pattern – I move up to 60 and boom – I would fall sick. Back to eth dreaded 58. So when people tell me that today I look lean – I wonder – I am 73 kgs now. imagine me with 15 kgs less! Wow. That is LEAN. But I have always been sick so being sick is pretty cool with me. I moved on from being sick and grumpy to being sick and funny. I mean who the hell cares – its fun. I don’t want to be seen as a dumb grumpy guy with an issue. I want to be as a fun guy who is fun not because he is healthy but is fun because he is. Sick or not.

Today I live with two big issues. The first one is my right knee. It simply dislocates time and again. Ya. Any side strain on it and – pop, it dislocates. I have learnt to play with the issue. No extra stress on the right knee. Short steps and less long strides that put outward pressure. And when it pops, I go through some pain – straighten it till it pops back in. those around me go “oh shit, I heard the click when it popped in”. So there. It popped back in and I stand up and say, come on, lets continue. And I SMILE. I never fail to smile. Hopefully I crack a joke or two at myself. Good fun.

The second affliction I now have to live with my entire life – lactose intolerant. That too is fun. Jopke about it and move on. What’s the big deal. Move on.

Surely I don’t have anything as severe as this lady has. She obviously has fought much more. But I am only inspired not by what she has achieved. People who work hard will achieve, but I am inspired by her being able to joke at it. I too want to go on a lactose intolerant stand-up comedy show and talk about the various shit I face when I talk about being lactose intolerant. I went to Punjab recently and people there wondered if I had lost it completely and what kind of quack I must have met. Who the hell doesn’t have lassi or butter? I already have decent ammo for this. I think in some time I will be a stand up comic joking about lactose intolerance. My best retort is simply – well – all humans are lactose intolerant but a lot of us have developed a mutation that helps us manage and digest lactose. Don’t believe me? Well you are a mutant according to Wikipedia : “Most mammals normally cease to produce lactase, becoming lactose intolerant, after weaning, but some human populations have developed lactase persistence, in which lactase production continues into adulthood. It is estimated that 75% of adults worldwide show some decrease in lactase activity during adulthood. The frequency of decreased lactase activity ranges from 5% in northern Europe through 71% for Sicily to more than 90% in some African and Asian countries. This distribution is now thought to have been caused by recent natural selection favoring lactase-persistent individuals in cultures in which dairy products are available as a food source. While it was first thought that this would mean that populations in Europe, India, Arabia and Africa had high frequencies of lactase persistence because of a particular mutation, it was later shown that lactase persistence is caused by several independently occurring mutations”

So you are the mutant Ninja turtle, not me. See your pic…

Ok ok… I guess you prefer Wolverine:

See you wished for super powers – you did not know it but you were actually part of the Mutant project and soon enough you will be called to join the mutant force to protect Planet Earth.

Ok fine – it sounds much more funnier when I say it than when I write it. But you get the drift. I surely hope that I don’t go through much more pain in life. But I surely don’t want to be the guy who would sulk over it. I want to be the fun guy who went down laughing – laughing my gut out. Why so serious?

wake up

Today morning was rare day. I normally don’t like waking Jispa up and she senses my weakness to let her sleep. She wants me to huddle up with her and keep sleeping. I like waking her up and taking a long time to do so. But then when she needs to wake up on time and I go in, she still tries to sleep for some time, irritating Jasmine. That’s when both of us get a scolding. So I tell Jispa to wake up and get going or else Mom will scold us. Then one sharp shout from Jasmine and we are all awake.

So when we have to go swimming I hate waking her up. Jasmine’s strategy is simple, before Jispa comes into her senses, while asleep – just pick her up and put her on her feet and guide her to the bathroom. Jispa will then wake up while brushing. She may create a slight fuss but she will in the end wake up and have a slow start to her day. Today for the first time she told me that she didn’t want to go swimming. She was too tired. Now that is a tough thing to say to dad. It’s a complete bummer.  I’d like her to sleep. Sleep for more time dude if you are tired. But at the same time, you are tired because of your sets and the only way out for an athlete is to get up and swim again.

At this stage as a dad, I am discouraging Jispa from swimming. I see very little future for her in India. There isn’t much you can do as a swimmer. The coaches are bums, the system sucks and the whole environment won’t let you do anything of note. The only thing that is there is studies and college led growth. But still that’s not the whole thing. Jispa swims morning and evening. That’s great for her but I would also love her to play badminton or TT or Tennis or Squash. Play another game. Get your hand eye coordination going. Do more. Swimming is sucking away her entire childhood and my fatherhood.

I like her swimming but I really think it’s way too much sacrifice for nothing much. She should play, read and chill out in addition to swimming. But there isn’t enough time. I want to play badminton with her. That should be good fun. A good game where she beats the shit out of me. I can play a bit with her, practice, sweat it out – but hell – swimming is it. Her school vacations are also bad news. They have a June July vacation that matches with eth English Summer. So she misses out on all the summer camps that get organized. So practically she wastes her summer as well.

So I want her to sleep more. But since she is swimming and she made that choice – I have no option as well. Sorry kid but you have to wake up. If you are tired, skip the evening practice. Do the difficult thing but then you can go easy on the easy bit. That is what an athlete is. Without pain you can’t really go the distance. And I have to be the harbinger of that pain in the morning. I have to ensure you get it but I will also ensure you get a massage form me at the end of the day. I am sorry, but you forced me to do this.

So that’s the cross we have to bear. There are no shortcuts. These sacrifices you make build you. You wonder to what end goal or point. That is not given to you for now. I wonder if what we do is good. We started swimming only to get you to learn to swim, but we ended up being the fish. Today jasmine started swimming regularly, I am swimming; the whole family is getting fitter as a result, but…. I still wonder. After ten years – don’t blame me, I was just doing what I thought was best.

laughter bring you together

That was just something Jispa and I share. We love the minions and their idioticity.  I did not go to watch the Despicable Me part 2 as I think it was in 3D. I am not a great fan or 3D and typically it cause me to get a headache. Jispa loved it and saw it and wanted me to see it. I got the chance to see it on a flight to Shanghai. I remember seeing it and laughing to myself. I was trying not to look silly like I see the others do it. You get these guys who watch some funnies on the flight and laugh out loudly. It funny to see individuals break up into laughter on their own with the headphones on. I guess its ok when the gang is laughing with you and everyone finds it funny. But laughing all to your own is something extremely odd. Some guys laugh more than others. Like this time when kingfisher started showing videos of the Laughter challenge with comedians all vying for a few guffaws. I never found them all that funny, but it was ok. You would always find one or two characters who would laugh uncontrollably. And finally when I saw Despicable me 2, I was controlling not to laugh out loud like them. The minions are extremely funny.

Jispa laughs uncontrollably at times. She can go on and on like I would have when I was her age. I found it extremely difficult to control laughter till I was I think around 22 or 23. I would laugh hysterically till my stomach hurt like hell and that would also barely help in bringing sanity back. I remember trying my best to stop laughing in serious situations. NCC drills were a few instances where I would have to control and end up not laughing. Somebody does something funny and your drill commander would insist on maintaining decorum and I would be the one not able to control and would be singled out for some more punishment to stop my laughter. Oh dam it.

Now life is slightly more in control but it’s still amazing to see something with Jispa. Her giggling and laughing is great fun. We get together and can laugh all the way and Jasmine will not understand what’s so funny. She will look at us and we will start laughing all over again. Jasmine wont find amusing at all. In fact we have a term for it “Mom is not amused” or she has this “I am not amused” expression. Just saying this to each other will make us laugh all over again.

It should be fun when Jispa grows a little bit older. Then we could be watching some movies together. That would be fun. Movies like Delhi belly and others would be funnier with her. In a few years movies like Angoor or some others like the sort may be equally funny to both of us, or the Mahabharata scene from jaane bhi do yaaron. Currently we are stuck at Khichadi – the movie. Ya ya. I see you judging us :)

Laughter is a great way to bond and none better than going together and enjoying a few jokes. Jasmine laughs much lesser but she does find a few things really funny. It was my specialty that I could make Jasmine laugh at will when I was in college. Slowly she seems to have been immune to my antics. She possibly finds it more boring now. Bah! I was telling Jispa about it and then telling her that now she finds me funny and all, but wait till she gets older. She will find me irritating or simple “not funny”. I have to keep inventing so many things to have fun with her. I am scared that I will run out of stuff by the time she grows up. Opps. That will be one tough time.

jalebi

Lactose intolerant.

You see a multiple level of disclaimers on chocolates and other snacks. Peanut allergy, gluten free, lactose free – whatever. I always wondered. These seemed to my mind a fad for rich countries. The Americans were in any case pretty crazy with all kind of weird alien diseases and mental allergies. Come on man, what kind of shit is peanut allergy. It’s an allergy that was designed for the villain in a Hollywood movie to have – so that he accidentally swallowed one peanut and his face instantly erupted. Normal people don’t have these allergies and why would you be so bothered about a factory that manufactured these products, as long as your food doesn’t have it.

I had a tummy issue for the last three years. My tummy would just bloat up and I would take my medicines and it would come back in place. So much so that I had two sets of pants – 2-3 inches apart. I was confident that my ayurvedic doctor would solve it. But for some reason, things would move forward and then relapse. It was pretty painful. Not painful in a physical sense but more bloody mental. Gas is a bloody irritating thing. And especially when you are active and keep playing a lot and then you look at your tummy and feel like a piece of shit. Of all things – I don’t especially work towards an Adonis body. I don’t like the big muscle look. For me it was always the lean sportsman that I admired. Lean, fast and light. And then I look at my tummy and wonder. I actually thought I was fat around the tummy.

Then it got really bad. Whenever the medicine effect lapsed, any physical activity would have triggered a massive debilitating headache that made me go completely numb. It was so irritating that I would not be able to remain patient with anything. It took a lot of effort to not get angry and irritated at any one even madly irritating. That was the final straw and I was then referred to a gastro specialist. I was convinced that I had germs in my tummy. Because I could eat and eat and all I wanted to do was eat to neutralize the acid build up in the tummy.

When I went to the doc, I was prepared for an endoscopy to figure what’s inside. She patiently heard me and then she asked me if I wanted an endoscopy done. I shrugged. A few more questions later she said – before you do the procedure – do one thing. Go off lactose for ten days and see. She thought I could be simply lactose intolerant. I was ready to give it a shot. Who knows?

The effect – in just 10 hours – all gone. Wow. This was a magic pill. I have been lactose free since the last month or so and then it’s been all great. Play as much as you want, no migraine. Yes the dreaded M word. I refused to call it migraine. But that’s what she called it and poof – it’s gone. I used to try to cure it with acidity pills. So there – I had this Lactose intolerance.

This is such a difficult diet for India. We don’t understand Vegan. We can’t understand how to remove lactose from our food. No lactose means no milk, no butter, no ghee, no cheese, no curd and no buttermilk – nothing. No cheesy pasta, no Indian sweets, no chocolates, no pizza, no dal makhani, no paneer food, no butter on bread, no biscuits, no cake, no ice cream  – it eliminates almost anything that is unhealthy, fattening and sinful.  I am going crazy while travelling and eating outside. You can’t tell the waiter about serving Vegan food. He doesn’t understand it at all. So you have to explain no milk, no cream, no ghee no butter. He looks at you and is confused. He is normally accustomed to no oil. A few of them are dumb struck and a few of them are far more cooperative. They rush in and ask the chef and come back with clear information.  I drive them up the wall and they drive me up the wall. Why is it so difficult for Indians to understand dietary requirements? Oh dam you. I think the only thing we have learnt thanks to our obscenely high heart attack rate is – No OIL. Everything else remains a mystery with them.

But hell, As of now – I am enjoying it. It’s a great way to get healthy. Get allergic from the bad stuff. I can actually go to various parts of the country and come back fit. I can’t have almost anything. The saving grace is that Samosas and other fried stuff seem largely ok. But more than me it’s my co travelers and those around me that feel amazing sympathy for me. They feel bad. They wonder what they should eat. Oh go on. I don’t care. The fun ones try and make me jealous. Oh go on, I don’t care.

Food was never one of my big desires. I never did really be tempted by the palette. I am happy eating simple stuff. Do I really miss anything for now? For now, none. I am happy. It’s a big change for my eating habits but no real change for me. Of course from now on every place we go out to eat with someone I will first have a 10 minute conversation explaining my intolerance and then looking at their faces wondering – how the hell will I survive. Then simple eating will start. It will be a fun ride.

And the invariable question – how long? Well this is supposed to be on for every. Let’s see. Forever on – I will live without eating even one chocolate or a cake or a jalebi? Sounds like fun.

On the topic – see this ad – it’s a classic – Dhaara.

square peg square hole

H“This is a very good report. But if you were in the seventh standard you would have got the highest and the topmost A star. But since you are in the fifth I am giving you only an A”
A couple of months ago Jasmine told me that there is a school project designed for me. It was on research and to get eth sphere of influence of the school on the students in class. Jispa had to take administer a survey on the students and present the findings. If anything I know research. So I sat with Jispa and figured a lot of things. I think I have blogged about this in the past.  So I sat with her and we listed down questions to which we could get answers that we could analyze. Post which we sat and made a tally sheet to collate the answers and then we made the graphs. We did graphs that made sense and we let Jispa make them. These were stacked bar graphs and other graphs. We did maps with circles of various radiuses. We let Jispa do a lot of the thinking with our help. Jispa understood a whole lot. The end result was a nice presentation with findings. I sat and beautified it with her. It was a complete team effort.
After all that, I saw the presentation returned yesterday with an ‘A’. Oh dam it. “This is a very good report. But if you were in the seventh standard you would have got the highest and the topmost ‘A’ star. But since you are in the fifth I am giving you only an A”. Now that’s not done. Sure parents helped a lot in making the presentation and report but please ask Jispa on her understanding of the report. You can’t just say – that’s too advanced. This is exactly the problem with the schooling today. You brow beat them into conformity to this extent. All outliers are just beaten out and you are rewarded for being the middle of the standard normal curve. I thought home work is meant to explore and understand with the help of parents. The question was – did Jispa understand what she did or did the parents do the project for her. We insisted that Jispa do a  majority of work. I took pains to let Jispa take the lead in designing questions. I taught her to think and dream of situations. To think through on the graphs while I suggested different graph styles. We did the graphs together by hand.
So no – the idea is simple. You have to have a standard assembly line for the workforce. People who get rewarded for being within the assembly set up. People who can see the square hole and mold themselves to it. I think it was George Bernard Shaw who said ‘progress depends upon the unreasonable man’. It’s the same thing when Jispa comes home to complain “the teachers tell us at the start to ask questions and when we do during the year, they tell us to shut up”.
WE have too much rigidity and structure in the school. A syllabus to finish, an exam to administer and a result to declare. Who has the time and the inclination for outliers? The dam exam gives us enough stress and now if we push the boundaries of the project – that’s going to give us stress as well. Today morning I was taking up history for Jispa and I realized that she did not understand History the way it must be understood. Why was civil disobedience organized thus – why not any other way. How was the INC formed? The answers are all there in the text book but the connection and the logic between the turn of historical events is sadly missing from the pie.
Jasmine and I realize that now we have to be a greater part of Jispa’s education. From two aspects – one from a daily schedule perspective. Regular studies and taking up will ensure no last moment stress for her. That would a lot of work from my side as well. The second aspect – I will need to see the questions and answers and explain to her the answers so that she need not mug up but answer from a deeper understanding of the situation. That is pretty clear. Yesterday Jasmine and I were talking about this and we knew that our honey moon is over. The fun is over and the studies have started in earnest in school. Now it’s good bye to a lot of fun and games and a huge hello to focused studies. All this becomes critical if we have to maintain her swimming schedule and her studies. Both cannot suffer. They need to work regularly to coexist. Else one will cannibalize the other.
Dam it. Look at the unintended consequences of a simple membership that I convinced Jasmine to pick up. I also convinced Jasmine that we should put her in swimming so that she learns to swim. I have never imagined a competitive environment for her swimming. That was supposed to be a fun thing to do with dad on Sundays. Bah! The law of unintended consequences.

teach her, to be free?

What the hell man. It doesn’t take long for parents to grow horns. The devil inside of us is lurking and shows up at the opportune moment.

When Jispa was born my mindset was vastly different from where it is today. One the things I was happy with a girl was – she doesn’t really need to study. No – I was not being sexist but I knew that the world wouldn’t accept a guy who is a failure. While I was growing up the guy thing was clear. You are a guy and hence you have to study and make your life and earn money and be successful. If you are a girl – you figure what you want. Jasmine wasn’t forced in to studying well and graduating. I think it was just a happy thing to do. When Jasmine after studying decided not to come with me into MBA – she had done enough of studying and exams – she wasn’t questioned. When she was at home doing almost nothing – no one bothered. She was settled in and was in many ways engaged to me – the big question was – was I earning enough. Does my financial future look good enough?

So when Jispa was born I was so happy. I will not push her to study and she would be free to do what she wanted to. She would play, lean an art, draw, cook, swim, kick ass – anything. We wanted her to be free. All this resulted in a great childhood – till she hit the 4^th or more recently the 5^th standard. Now we are assholes after her life. We want her to study. We ensure she studies. Till last year Jasmine would take up her studies, but this year on – Jasmine had decided that she will study on her own. Just ensure she sits to study and that’s all. Her grades were ok so far. Now exams are on our head and Jasmine this weekend decided to just check up on her and decided to take up her Hindi. ALL HELL BROKE LOOSE. She wasn’t that prepared for the Hindi test and she needed a lot of help.

I found this similar to the situation that I was in when I was her age. I remember my mom leaving me to study and once just on a lark deciding to take up and BOOM.  I knew nothing and wasn’t ready for the exam. SO now we are after her. We are making her study every day. Exams start this week – Thursday with Hindi. So there it is. We are pushing her to study, we are taking up stuff, today I woke up early and woke her up as well and did history with her. Wow. I sacrificed my badminton and got ready with her and sat to study. Basically I became the father that I never wanted to be. Never. Goddam it!

What do I do? I keep thinking? On one side I have to be the father who is fun all the time and on the other side I have this niggling doubt – if my mom would have pushed me and made me study; not by simply making me sit, but being after me – taking up, setting goals, pushing me – I would have been able to study better, earn better and make a better career for myself. So what do I do?

I spoke about Freedom in one old post. When you want the freedom to choose some freedom must be taken away from you. In effect we are taking some freedom away from Jispa. We are taking away her freedom to choose her childhood time so that we give her the freedom to choose when the time comes to choose her career. If she does well in in her studies can she have the freedom to pursue whatever field she wants to. That is the truth of our system. Exams are not attest of knowledge – they are a test of time. What all you know in that period of time – not your understanding and what you retain over a longer period – but what you know at that time. This TIME creates the pressure. SO as we teach Jispa – we are cramming into the brain something that will help her for this time. Like Hindi – dam shit – I cant understand why you need to be able to write Q&A in Hindi. I struggle to teach Jispa Hindi and there are a lot of words that I have no idea of. Swachand! WTF! I understand the need to know how to read and write Hindi. I believe it’s critical but not this way. You have to inculcate the love of the language – teach them how to talk in Hindi and not cram in Hindi. Get conversations flowing and then get the questions and answers flowing. Jispa is simply cramming the answers of the chapter. There are no discussions. A little bit that I do is allow her to express the answers in her own words. Jasmine is a bit stricter in this respect – but this I am happy to fight for. As long as the answer is written to the point – it does not matter if it is by rote. Therefore I allow for a bit of leniency but that is still no excuse – it still is a big F*&^*^ mug up.

So yes – I have sold my soul – once again. Hopefully – it’s for the right reason. Isn’t that the last refuge of the thief? The right reason. I don’t know. I try to be different and try to commit a different set of mistakes, but in the end – I feel so helpless. When I lose my cool while studying I feel really miserable. I don’t think Jispa will have too many happy memories of me teaching her school stuff. I am really bad at it and my frustration shows. I am jumpy and irritable and I tend to snap at Jasmine and Jispa. I am sorry. I try my best to then regain cool and ensure it doesn’t last too long. So far my only redeeming feature is that I haven't ever scolded her for bad results. That's the outcome. I rather focus on the input. I hope to never stoop that low. I am equally responsible for a result as she is. But i have also learnt never to say never when talking about the future. that word is only good for the past. Lets See.

But hell – grow horns – chop them off  - that’s parenting 101 for you. For me. 

Now you understood the need of the comma in the title?

with a song on my lip and a stroke in her head

https://soundcloud.com/shraddha-radio/rave-lutionised-sheila-ki

Listen to this

I asked Jispa whether there was a song stuck in her hjead this time around. She said ‘no’. normally she hates me singing and especially before a swim. She says that the song gets stuck in the head and she finds it extremely irritating. And if I sing it then it gets stuck in my ugly tune. So she hates hates it. Normally I like to irritate her and continue to sing till she gets really upset but this time I didn’t dare to try. This time my baby was participating in the ultimate swim marathon. This is the third or fourth year that she has had the chance to take part. The last three years, something or the other had always come up. A cousin’s function, school sports day… something. This time she was it.

But since she has had a shoulder injury she hasn’t been training as intensively as before. So no morning swimming and a lighter workout. Around ten days back while I was discussing with the coach he had told me that he is sending Jispa for the marathon. That’s cool by me. I did not think much of it. I assumed Jasmine knew and I thought it was some time away. Jasmine came to know only a couple of days earlier and she was quite hyper. A MARATHON and I don’t even know she is participating. She went into overdrive, read all she could and tried to be ready for it.

For me the holy grail of all sports is not the sprint but it’s the marathon. A test of brute will power. The ability to keep fighting yourself, your muscles and your mind. A lot of things that keeps telling you to stop and something that keeps telling you to go on. I have run a few long distance runs especially thanks to the NCC training I got. The longer the distance the greater the will power needed. You are essentially running yourself. There is hardly any competition that you see. I had told Jispa that to my mind this is the best race for me. I will be by your side. We were held up in traffic and we missed the first time trial and we caught the second one. Jispa very easily lapped her nearest competitor. Then the girl in the lane next to her tried keeping pace with Jispa even though she was 50 meters down compared to Jispa.

Jispa started very well, she paced herself and took easy strokes and at a pace she thought she could sustain. I spoke to her coach and we agreed that it was sign of a strong mental makeup. Normally I don’t cheer, but this was a long race. 160 laps of a 25 meter pool. She went on and on. I saw that she saw me looking at her and I tried cheering her, egging her on. Before the race I had told her that I would be busy playing temple run. If you see me waving my phone at you then it means I am playing temple run while you kill yourself in the pool. Good natured laughing and ribbing later, while she walked to the starting block, she told Jasmine to tell me not to make her laugh. So when I was cheering her with a phone in my hand, I saw her laughing. Her coach told me ‘she is laughing’. “ya, that is at me. There are many pressures already on her. At least I removed the one that a father puts. We are having our private joke’.

It’s a fine line putting pressure and asking / pushing your child to perform. I told her it’s important to race this one, don’t worry. I was sure she could do it but at the same time I explained to her “see, if it pains think a little. If your muscles are paining, then carry on, that’s a good thing to fight. But if your shoulder injury acts up then stop immediately. You don’t want to injure your shoulder. Its ok.” but I wanted her to compete and wanted her to finish. So we kept cheering her on. She kept looking at me and I kept walking along the sides, making actions, urging her, asking her to stretch. In the middle she was telling something to Jasmine. I went to one end and she shouted out to me – its cold. Winter in Mumbai and we had unseasonal rain that day. The weather was cold and the Khar swim pool where this was held is on the third floor, near the sea line. This is known to be the coldest pool in Mumbai. I kept saying, its ok, fight it, it’s worth it. I not sure how much of my shouting she registered but she surely could see me encouraging her.

She and the girl in the lane adjacent kept pace with each other. Both trying to shake the other one out, pushing each other. It was a fine battle to be seen. But thanks to her start she was 50 meters ahead and it stayed that way till the end. So in the second time trial she finished well ahead of the pack. If we had made it in time she would swam with her seeds and would have had a better timing. She finished fourth overall with a time of around 63 minutes. Wow. I know guys in my office (and chicks) who just wouldn’t be able to even walk that much in that time.

But what struck me is that the other parents put so much pressure on the kids. Some of the other medal winning kids were sitting glum. Because their parents were unhappy with their timing. WHAT. I wanted to shove them into the freezing pool and check their reactions. After Jispa came out she said she couldn’t feel her arms. Her arms from shoulder to wrist were frozen and she said in the middle of the swim she couldn’t feel them so she was jerking and throwing them to wake them up. Now that builds character. She got out and we rushed her to the changing room for her to relax under the hot shower. In such circumstances can you say anything to your kid? I don’t know. I can’t say thing else but ‘awesome job’. I cant understand, after completing a swim like this shouldn’t you be basking and soaking it all in. After all you just swam four kilometers in an hour.

I am sure if she had swum in the first time trail she would have finished amongst the medal tally. But freaking cares that much? It’s ok. I am happy. Possibly this was a blessing. This was good. At that level these kids start pushing each other and the undercurrent of competitiveness comes out and who know – an injury! So we are especially happy parents.

I told Jispa “really well swum. And I don’t normally say it, but yes, you swam really nice.”. She also said “ya, I know you normally don’t say it. Thanks. You really liked my swim”. “yes”. Awesome.

I asked her afterwards if she did see us. Yes. And she took encouragement from us. she laughed as she thought I was teasing her with the cell in my hand. Well I wasn’t, but hell, did the laughing helped? Ya. And the walking up and down as well. That was like a pace clock. So that’s good. She couldn’t hear anything but she knew I was encouraging her. Was that good – yes it was perfect. Thanks. And at the end – was there a song stuck in your head. No. then what were you thinking? I had told her to think of a marathon as a meditation exercise. Keep trying to correct your position. See your arms, body legs. Keep swimming and try to be technically correct. Get your rhythm going. She said “I kept thinking about my strokes and kept trying to keep them going good”. What more can I ask for.

this is how you do the tumble turn. The fun is when you have to do it 160 times and every 45 seconds. You have to blow hard when you turn over else the water goes in your nose. So you cant be out of breath during the entire 4 kms.

This one is just for kicks!

Kuch naya ho jaaye.

This is just the video you want to watch and then want to buy your own GoPro camera. It allows you to catch stuff that you always wanted to while freeing your hands and minds. You go do the exploring and the camera will do the capturing. Isn’t that the ultimate fantasy. Being alone with your adventure and then being able to share it with the world and of course yourself. I am sure the next killer app they would want to promote is the video maker that takes your footage and makes a lovely video out of it. Easy cutting, editing and music addition to make a complete video. The music of course is the key to all this… a range of customized sequences like – high action, low intensity, romantic, etc. Now put that in a simple app and le.. go pro on your head to sharing it in a minute.

These are amazing videos and you can search for the complete range of them online. Underwater, in air, land, sand – forest everywhere. I love the spirit of adventure. I love that Jispa is now an accomplished swimmer and now has the freedom to do a lot of this stuff. I learnt to swim properly and now I got Jasmine to learn as well. The only way I shook her off her inertia was to enroll her without asking her. Now she is learning well and is to my opinion proud of what she has already accomplished. That’s nice. I want to snorkeling with the family at some point of time. Hopefully sooner than later.

Along with Jispa’s swimming, she is learning to run. We had to choose one more sport for Jispa to give her a complete range of exercise. A land training schedule was increasingly becoming important. So we just decided to try out running. We got this teacher who does running coaching. Since it was early morning and at mahalaxmi race course, which is fair distance from home, I enrolled along with her. The running is fine. There is great joy in running with Jispa and I think at her pace she doesn’t stretch me but it’s a nice workout. But the best part is not the run. I learnt the importance of stretching well before and after the run. It’s a 15 minute routine before and after. Sometimes the workout after the run is more tiring than before. I think, that itself is worth all the effort. I think Jispa is also benefiting a lot from it. Her swimming coach is unable to dedicate time for stretching in a way the running coach is focused on it. This ensures the muscles are properly stretched. I think this is helping her as of now and I think this suddenly becomes the central point in the workout that Jispa is enjoying. And along with that I am learning to stretch before and after any workout.

Even as I play badminton, I don’t go on court before stretching and spend some times on court after the game. I try my best to tell my friends to stretch. They simply don’t. They make some few conciliatory movements and off they go. All they want to do is hit a few smashes and then possibly run off. Stretching is not that easy. It needs to be an essential part of the routine but it is most ignored. Possibly because it’s boring and the results are hidden. I think the running coach tries her best to give new types of exercises to keep the interest going. You have to keep the interest going and the fun element happening.

I remember this fun element as a critical thing in a work out. Once I had the chance to meet the legendary Anil Kumble. We were talking and he said, when he was captain they had introduced a lot of new regimes. He told me that as cricketers it’s not that they can practice on a day in day out basis. You just can’t come out and hit the same balls on a daily basis. Its gets boring. So they introduced the concept where every day there would be a new captain for the workouts. At first they would do everything that is needed to be done and as mandated by the coach. Then they would look to the captain of the day who would do some regimes and make the entire squad do it along with them. So if someone wanted to do fielding practice as that was what excited them, then the whole squad would follow suit.

That’s the first time I understood that even the best of the best can get bored doing what they do best. You have to bring excitement and change from routine. In fact if I were to reverse it - the best of the best NEED a constant change from routine – a new challenge. A new opportunity.

For me that’s why the running is far more exciting than the badminton as of now. But I try and bring in a fresh perspective to my game. I try and hit new shots and play different strategy. Something different from what I may have done before. This is what I also try in office all the time. Do something new. That keeps me going. I would hate to do the same old thing again and again. Kuch naya ho jaaye.

who would have guessed?

Right now elections are on our head. with the General elections coming up to decide the prime minister of the country the imagination of the nation is fired up. On one side the incumbent Congress ruled by the family and a seemingly inept young candidate – Rahul, is pitted against the big man from Gujarat with a massive PR blitz – Modi. Its fun to watch the two in action. The congress seems to be commiting one blunder after and another and Modi can seem to do no wrong. He has tall claims and promises and promises a lot. The young scion bumbles and struggles to take grand and prefers the boring grass roots approach. Good intentions in my book, but good intentions can’t do much for PR.

But the fun bit is that I love to see the way Indians are divided along these lines. It’s stupid. They have this amazing love for the right wing fascist dictator who simply claims and promises without really doing anything. And the young Turk gives plenty of guffaws to his detractors that even the diehard loyalist finds it difficult to support him. But people don’t understand the cause, the lies and the commonsense around the entire thing. The economy is not that easy to run. It has a mind of its own and is affected by global factors and things far beyond its control.  And blindly supporting one against other is an act of stupidity. Then comes the AAP party. Built on the anti-corruption stand, this party has tasted success in Delhi only to do even more fun and entertaining stuff. Their chief minister Kejriwal, another seemingly well intentioned guy is prone to protesting even while being in power. Surrounded by a string of leftists he tries to restore the power to the people. He probably never read the book ‘animal farm’.

No no… I don’t have any solution. I am not the stupid devil’s advocate who swings both ways. I have my views and I am going to vote selfishly, in my favor. The world be dammed. That is if I vote at all. But the pressure is pretty strong. I can’t be seen without a mark on my finger after Election Day. In a world of self-righteous people trying to uphold dharma, I would be a complete misfit. In any case these days if I open my mouth I am a conversation ender. The other day in the car while I was dropping some the kids to the station on the way home, somebody spoke about Rahul’s speech and Modi. I opened my mouth and there in three minutes I achieved absolute silence. WTF. When you simply question belief and ask tough questions people are forced to think twice. And that’s the first time they do it and hence the silence. But I have learnt to keep my comments to myself over these years. Keep quiet and let the party flow. Don’t kill it.

Forces of economics and collective human nature are not easy to fight. The trick is to manage the situation and push for small bits of change. You must have your philosophy in place and then slowly work towards it. Small bits of change will push the policy over a period of time and thence the population. Very rarely would big change be effected in a small period of time and rarely in the way that you would have envisaged. Being nimble and smart and taking small steps towards a direction is what gets you anywhere. That is the advice of an older man, I guess.

Also I came across this video which sums up the entire equation. Here is a bunch of comedians who figured out that this all tamasha is a bunch of crap and designed to have divisive opinions where no underlying exists. It’s a house of cards. A fuc*&INg Ponzi scheme.

That is the role of free speech in life. The ability for people to bluntly say what they want, poking fun at anything they wish to criticize. It’s so bloody important. I have tried my best to keep that in the house. One must poke fun openly and bluntly and one must have the grace to accept it and also have a retort. Most of the time we are impervious to such blatant humor at our expense. I try and be open to it. While in a position of power in the office in my team, I am naturally the big guy who crack jokes at anyone. But then there are some in the team who cock a snook at my position and decide that I am fair bait as well. They are the young and the irreverent and they keep me on my toes. These are few and far in between and I keep them very close to my heart. They keep me in check.

At home I am fair game for Jispa to also similarly be made fun of. She can take my case anytime. Sometimes I do have to check her and tell her she is being rude but most of the time I hope I am fair game. Such fun ribbed criticism is what keeps us in check. The ability to say openly and to accept while having a retort is what keeps the lubrication of a family going. Jasmine is slightly more sensitive to this. She gets upset and that time I tell Jispa or make a sign to stop. Not everyone can handle it easily, with a sleight of hand. But not having it altogether is a crime I do not want to commit.

It’s not been an easy journey for me to be happy about such comments. It has taken time and effort and bit of wisdom and self-belief topped by oodles of self-deprecation for me to reach here. I had two elder siblings who would push me to the edge with their brand of humor. Then I had NCC where the atmosphere is pretty unforgiving. Then was office. You learn over a period of time. Sometimes I give Jispa a hard time and Jasmine tells me to stop irritating her. But I told Jasmine ‘you Jispa doesn’t have siblings. She is not going to be picked up on by anyone at home. I give her a bit of a hard time sometimes just to fill in the gap. She should learn to be picked up on and learn to deal with it in a smart way’. My siblings were pretty tough on me. Pretty tough, especially for someone who kept loyalty and love as the primary standard. So it was a bit of a letdown. I am not doing the same to Jispa, just a few gentle nudges towards what having a set of irritable siblings mean.

Who would have guessed  - the health of a democracy can be gauged at its ability to laugh!

shant gadhadhari bheem, shant

Everyone gets used to everything. Once I met a Chinese lady who was on a study trip here. We got talking at a mutual friends place and I asked her, “how is it possible for the Chinese to live without real freedom”. How can the government control everything and the Chinese become used to it without revolt?” She said “its just the way of life and you get used to it. Without meaning disrespect, but in India there is a tribe which pushes one of its own daughters into prostitution. It’s just it. Over a period of time you don’t know what else”. I guess it’s true to some extent. People are great at adapting to surroundings and get used to it. I always wonder. Like in some regimes like North Korea, how could a mad cap dictator survive with the kind of atrocities committed by him? Don’t the people revolt, know that it’s stupid and this cant work like this? I guess not.

Many years ago I had a long and memorable chat with my dad. It was when I was in school. I argued that non violence was the best means. We were so many of us. All we needed was one Indian to kill one British and we were done. We outnumbered them by a large margin. It doesn’t work that way. I think George Bernad Shaw said ‘Progress depends on the unreasonable man’. He is right as well. People prefer status quo but status quo must be challenged. I want change but I am also part of people. So what am I? an unreasonable man or a status quo man?

I think a lot depends on age. When I was much younger I was impatient. Time was running out. I would hop jobs and go for the best offer, the best job and flirt with many. As age progressed, I found myself ready to play the waiting game. Waiting waiting waiting.  So did cobwebs grow under my back side. Have I lost the fire I once had? Well yes and no.

Oh yes the bland rage that I had is gone. I am no longer the angry young man I once was. Ready to change the world and refusing to see logic and patience. But I guess you can’t ever continue with that rage. It burns you and those around you. You learn to shimmer and crouch and learn to direct it. Not hitting every ball and waiting for the right ball is also aggression. Dour defense is as aggressive as flashy stroke play. It’s how you define aggression.

I was and still will always be extremely aggressive. But the manifestation has changed. It comes out differently. I miss the idiot I once was but I am also thankful that I am no longer the idiot I once was. One realizes that the world can’t be changed in one day. It takes time and patience. Also one acknowledges that the world’s priorities are different from yours and it’s definitely not true that yours are the most important priorities alive. So this kind of patience is critical to the living and adapting to the environment around you. Especially, if you are the aggressive sorts. Aggression is a means to an end.

I have also learnt that naturally aggressive people and toppers and people in high places can’t just tone down that easily. If some has reached somewhere they have reached there by aiming and working towards it. And if you think they are not aggressive. I think you must think again. Its only that their priorities or world wisdom tells them something that you don’t know. When I was much younger I would be eager to criticize and complain. Now I hold my horses.  It’s important to understand the context and put yourself in their shoes. Now figure, are you really that sure of the situation. Are you jumping to conclusions without assigning probabilities? Like today at the gymkhana I overheard some conversation where the person said ‘that is the solution. That’s the only way to solve it.’ It struck me hard. I have learnt to say more often than not “that SEEMS to me as the solution to the problem”. Because you never know.

Recently Rahul Gandhi got screwed in the media for the interview he had on a news channel. He answered randomly to questions asked. No matter what he was asked, his answers were something else. Woah. Easily one of the worst possible interviews. He lost a lot of his urban English speaking fans. But hell, I am not ready to haul him over coals yet. He is definitely not stupid. I always like to look at the other side. Why did he say thus? What was on his mind? What would have been the strategic reasoning behind it? Was he that naïve? I don’t believe that the truth is that simple as it is made out to be. Yes it sounded bad, but was there another game that was being played?

Restraining aggression is easily one of the most difficult things to do. Rather let me reword that one  - Redirecting aggression is easily one of the most difficult things to do. Curbing your natural instinct while honing it so that you don’t lose your mojo is just a bloody difficult thing to do.

I am reminded of my boss who used to say “shant gadhadhari bheem, shant”. If you are born after 1980 you won’t really get the reference. This was from the epic serialised version of the Mahabharat, wherein the eldest of the Pandavs continuously held back the biggest of the Pandavs, namely Bheem. Shant – Peace. Peace.

And talking of being used to something. I love my desk in the mornings and I am so used to it. I will really miss this when I leave. As and when I leave.

China Diary

In the middle of the work mess that I am coping with, I forget to note in this blog that I went to China. Ah china. I was always fascinated with China. Especially in the last decade or so. I wanted to see China once. The economic miracle that is China. Where there is money and opportunity, the country that will rule the world, the country that exports tons of stuff and the country that India should look forward to emulate. I have been only to Hong Kong (and schenzen) if you call that China. But never to the proper mainland. China is not a place that I think I might go with family. I don’t think it’s a backpacker’s delight. It has interest from me merely as a professional and not as a tourist. I would like to visit China on work not on tourism.

Every year one firm likes to call us for a jaunt. It kept selecting Bangkok as a location. The first time I sent someone from my team; the second time they wanted me but I politely told them – of all places, I am not coming to that place. I don’t intent to have Bangkok fun and I definitely don’t want to go there and get everybody to sneer at me. I have been there once before and that’s no place for me to go. So this time they came into tell me that they have noted my suggestion and this time they have selected Shanghai as the place. Shanghai…. Hmmm.. not bad. Shanghai to China is what Mumbai is to India.  An erstwhile trading port becoming the center of finance of a country. Mumbai should emulate Shanghai is what everybody says. So I accepted the invitation.

So what’s my impression? Not that I have too many impressions. Of the three and a half days, one day was spent in the plane, one and a half in a conference room and one for sightseeing and two hours of shopping. Bah!

I have  few impressions – ofcourse no one of them speak English. For a modern city of the future, not speaking English is a big no no. I think the Chinese need to correct that. That is stopping them from taking over the world completely right now. But the other view is that – the world will learn Chinese.

The other – no Facebook. Hahaha. Yes to instagram and no to facebook. But you knew that – didn’t you.

Big city – yes. Really huge, built for scale. Tons of flyovers, freeways and these are built one on top of the other. They are five highways on top of each other. At some point you look outside the window to get – a tenth floor of a building. Wow. Scale. The Chinese know what scale is. Everywhere there are flyovers trying to move the traffic. The result – traffic jams. Yup. Not as bad as let’s say Bangkok, but yes there are jams. Contrast this with the London model, where I hardly saw any flyover megaliths. The British are very clear – you want to move – here is the public transport. What’s your excuse to take the car. Mumbai following Shanghai is stupid. The model is London. Get enough of public transport and you can move cities with less pollution and greater efficiency. You can’t build enough flyovers and have enough parking. There is no such thing.

The other bit – They managed to teach the Chinese to be clean. The city is largely very clean (not Singapore) but clean enough. I think it was as clean as London or possibly cleaner. But the Chinese can shit without a smoke. Yup. They smoke like crazy. My hotel room smelt like a smoking corner everytime I entered it. And so the public loos. At the five star hotel – I entered the loo only to run out. I spoke to the manager and he apologized. He says – he spends the whole day trying to get the Chinese to smoke outside the hotel. But he can do jack about the loos. They smoke in loos all the time. In fact there is nothing anyone in China can do about it. I told him to simply install smoke detectors; and he replied that installing them would mean stopping all banqueting business. Oh dear. Every loo I visited in China was reasonably clean but the men in the loos would simply light up and have a go. You can’t just shit in the public pots in China. And with people with severe distaste for smoking like me – nothing I could do. Malls, hotels, public loos, restaurant loos, temple loos… everywhere. They simply light up and to go.

Shanghai, China – yes it a mega city. They definitely build to ego and size. Completely phallic. But I am not to judge. I did not get any more insights on poverty (not seen), hunger (ditto); some insights on religion (largely atheist), and just simply strengthened my belief in mass rapid transit. It’s a cold country for outsiders. I did not really like it. And yes – like all places – there is one shop that the guide insists you got to to shop for pearls. They have a stopover there for sure. Crap tourist commission place that mixes some education on pearls before selling you the same. Screw you. I used the time to go out and roam around. It was cold and the drink I had was some variation of a hot lemon juice. That was pretty cool.

That’s my simple China blog. Not much but enough to be sure not to include it in my places to go with Family. But yes, at least it’s off my list. This was the easiest way to get it off. I am happy.

Ah – one more thing I checked off – in the evening, opposite the place we had dinner some of the guys noticed an exotic toy shop. Hahaha. That was one hell of a shop. But they sold it with all seriousness. Some of the exhibits were displayed like a museum. Very clean and nothing sleazy about it. that was impressive. Sales girls in formal attire selling and explaining some of the stuff, very seriously. there – one more retail format visited. Now to see Walmart and Ikea.

Folding priviledge

A huge eventful event happened in Jasmine’s life. I guess she must have mulled over it for the longest. One day she tells me that she has decided to keep a servant for the morning. One hour. “She will come for one hour and help me do all the house work”. “sure. Go ahead”. I was pretty surprised and pleasantly so. Our income has obviously grown in the last ten years, enough to have one more servant at a thousand bucks a month.

When Jispa was born we were probably the only couple that did not have a full time maid. A full time maid is seen as a necessary thing when you have growing up kids. She takes care of the kid and runs behind the kid with water, food, diapers everything. That’s the objective of the maid. The kid in charge. We resisted this. Jasmine is a work horse. She likes to work. She likes doing stuff around the house and saw no real reason to have a maid. I too loved being with my child and whenever we went out I would be happy to be the tiffin box carrier. In fact when Jispa was a baby the cargo pants were in fashion and I loved them. One packet would be her food and the other would be her water bottle and so on. They were full of stuff that I needed as a daddy on the go. This do-it-yourself worked well. We only had one evening servant who came in to wash vessels and clean the floor. So I was pretty surprised when Jasmine decided to have an extra hand for an hour. I have never questioned her on the expenses of the house and frankly I haven’t a clue. She knows how much money we have and that’s that, it’s up to her to manage the household. And so we have an extra help. It’s been an interesting journey so far. Jasmine is figuring out work for the one hour that we have her. And also when the bell rang on Saturday and Sunday morning Jasmine got up cursing – ‘I will have to tell her not to come early on weekends’. Hah, I love this.

While Jasmine outsources the jobs to the new one, she tries to get eth boring jobs done. One of the boring jobs is folding the clothes after they are washed. I can vouch for the fact that it’s a might boring job to do. You sit and you surround yourself with a pile of clothes and get it done one by one. So the new lady gets to do it. With one problem – she doesn’t know how to fold clothes. Yup. I never knew there was such a thing like not knowing how to fold clothes. When I saw my t shirts, they were pretty badly folded. Not that the lady is a lazy worker. In fact to the contrary, she is a diligent and hard worker who does the cleaning job dam well. She just doesn’t know how to fold clothes. Jasmine then taught her how to fold clothes but then still, over the weekend I had to unfold my t-shirts and then fold them back again. Nicely. I like neatly folded clothes. For some reason I hate folding the clothes badly. Especially the handkerchiefs. I hate badly folded handkerchiefs. I like to join them correctly from edge to edge, the smoothen out the cloth and fold them over and over till they are nice and flat, almost ironed.

But really – it set me thinking. Why would someone not know how to fold clothes? Is it a skill we take for granted? People who have adequate clothes and adequate space to put them only know about folding them, and folding them well. With a person of meager possessions, folding clothes the right way is a big ask I assume. Poverty is a trap that is difficult to get out from. One barely understands the entire range of privileges we have. The privilege of keeping ones possessions neatly. Who would have known that to be one. My other servant also keeps her valuable stuff with us. I learnt that she had just a few suitcases as a store of her worldly possessions.

So I told Jasmine – just get her to fold the t shirts a bit more narrowly. I will manage after that. Afterall I am in Mumbai. In Mumbai there is no Space. Our cupboards are narrow, we can’t fold our clothes broad. Most of us don’t have walk in wardrobes to hand clothes and a few hangers to cling on to. Those from smaller towns will see that folding clothes right so that they are very compact is something we learnt well. They probably have the privilege not to fold clothes nice and compact. Oh dear we are so poor.

a moral compass

Religion divides more than it unites. It gives a sense of identity but at the same time it also uses the identity to group and pit one against the other. I am sick and tired of religion and culture being used as benchmarks for anything. I have learnt to abhor religion but funnily not yet abhor God. Also my belief has been to look inward and seek strength than to ask God for help. Hoping that God will somehow materialize and work his mircales is something I have learnt not to trust. Put faith in your hands and your thoughts and your deeds.

Oops – what with the sudden burst of philosophy. Well nothing really. Today I heard a podcast that spoke about the pope and how he was not too happy with this unchecked market economy of sorts.

When I was growing up I was a curious mix of a religious guy and a leftist. Poverty and hunger were essentially state subjects and could be solved by taking the money from the rich and redistributing it to the poor. Why should there be poverty. Can the state just simply redistribute it? Over the years I moved from left to a free market believer. And at the same time I moved from being a religious person to an agnostic. The transformation was complete. But at heart I remained a person still moved by problems of the world. I refused to accept the simple notion that people are poor because they have taken those choices in life. I would agree that in Mumbai city no one can really be poor and a complete destitute.  They is no reason to beg on the road. There is enough work in Mumbai for people who are ready to work hard. But that is a simplistic view. While they may be marginalized, there is no reason for letting them come out. The idea – in words of Jeffery Sachs is to give them a ladder. Then it is up to to them to climb out of it. I don’t believe in dole but I do believe in an infrastructure whether it is social or economic or even physical (roads rail etc). and these cannot be dictated by free market but by the power of common good.

I keep thinking. I don’t give money away to charity. I don’t trust any of these characters. I don’t believe in them. So what do I do. I know that I want to give my time and attention at the end ot something meaningful but I guess my form of charity is simply teaching those around me. Guiding them, talking to them and trying to build a happier planet – one person, one interaction at a time.

So, I believe in what I think the point the Pope is trying to tell. Free markets with no moral compass is a dangerous thing. where Only the fittest survive, we don’t give a chance or care a dam about the others. In the long run – it will create an oligopoly and the concentration of the haves will lord over the have nots in an unfettered sort of way.

Bah! But why is all this so important? Why am I thinking about it. I have always wondered where my moral compass has come from? I believe that a lot of it may have come from religion driven ethics and morals. I don’t think would have been a vegetarian if not for the fact that I was born in a Jain household. That’s the simplest example. So while I can have a source of morality (whatever form or manner), I wonder what happens to Jispa when she grows up. Even the Buddhists sects realized that a simple idea of Buddha understood as a thought and not a figure was tough and then migrated to an image of Him and in many ways worshipped him. Same so with Jainism. The god Mahavir verus The God Mahavir has been an undercurrent theme that I see in those around me. We deify a saint more than take home his principals. But then would I have been able to understand those teachings without the accompanying rituals. It’s a question I may never be able to answer.

But with Jispa we will know when she grows up. She knows no prayer and she knows almost no God. We have no image of him at home and we don’t pray not believe in rituals. We silently stay out of rituals that we are called for. So when she grows up she will have to have a moral compass that is her own. That is possibly from her parents and surroundings – school, peers etc. it will not be out of fear of God or for greater good in the next life. She will be what she is because she will choose it for herself.

Well it does sound good when I write it down like this. but the risk of not having a moral compass just because your parents were too anal about religion is a bit of a bummer. But yes. Jasmine and I still have faith in this approach. Be yourself. Be what you want to be not because of dogmas but because of your choices and your decisions. Let the wisdom passé don from centuries only be your reference for learning and listening. But do your own bit. And least of all – religion is meant to liberate not restrict. Liberate? – once it gives you a moral compass – you then free to do what you wish. Like I once blogged in the past. When you restrict a certain opportunity to yourself you are in effect giving yourself the freedom to do what you want to. The only question is where is that moral compass coming from and how seriously are you taking it. It is only a liberator not a restrictor. If it restricting – then throw it.

Just for the record – the Freaknomics podcast  - though I never figured that I may agree with the Pope (or least see his point of view - in some angular sort of way. though this Pope Francis seems to be an interesting character.

you can get his EVANGELII GAUDIUM here: though to make sense of it you may want to read some other sources.  http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/francesco/apost_exhortations/documents/papa-francesco_esortazione-ap_20131124_evangelii-gaudium_en.html

read here http://world.time.com/2013/11/26/pope-francis-denounces-idolatry-of-money-and-tyranny-of-capitalism/

what a load of stuff

Teens are a crazy age. Jispa is a pre-teen and these kids are possibly growing older faster than what we did at the time. I guess it’s the exposure and the fact that their parents probably talk to them much more than what our parents did. And then the parents fret that they are all grown up.

Jispa is now rapidly using her brains. Using it for good thinking and analysis but then also to rebel. She can now choose to rebel and it is going to get pretty tough on us. I remember when the first time she used her brain. That was when she was two. I clearly remember that time. She would just want to decide her pants and tops combination. She would want to wear the blue ant on an orange top and no amount of convincing would change her mind. Dam. It was crazy. How do you convince a two year old.

Now is another time. she wants to decide what to wear and when. She wants to decide and what she says is pretty much final. We don’t go shopping for her. If she isn't around Jasmine and me don’t buy anything. We get frustrated. We simply offer our humble opinion on various things. A very very difficult person to shop for. Then even after she buys it there is no guarantee that she will wear it. which is a dam interesting decision for me to make as a father. Normally I don’t push her too much on clothes. You don’t like something too much you throw it. But this time there was the sticky question of two denims that she had gotten made. Now these were made after asking her. She gave the measurements and she decided on the fit and color and wash and everything else. So we are trying our best to get her to wear her jeans. She has her favorite shorts that she keeps wearing all the time. Its shorts or tracks. So I stood up to her and told her “dude, normally I don’t get involved in all these decisions. You don’t like your jeans; ideally you shouldn't be wearing them. But if I allow you to do this then I teaching you something wrong. It’s not that we don’t have the money. Sure you can throw it. But you are responsible for your decisions. You are going to wear your jeans. They look good and as of now they look new. So I know you are going to hate me for this but – you are wearing your jeans. I would be failing as a father if I taught you to throw stuff just because we have the money to throw it” . Well obviously she is upset about the whole thing.

The other thing is that Jispa is growing taller pretty fast. Stuff that we bought six months ago is getting small. So we insist that she wears them off before we throw them. So that’s another layer. I told her – don’t worry too much about party clothes or simple clothes; just wear them off. While she was trying on the clothes for figuring the ones that fit, Jasmine and I struck on a new idea. Suppose we just don’t wash her clothes. She has enough clothes to last her three weeks. Great – now her wash cycle will be set at three weeks. I know I know. We are such mean parents. Beat that. If your fav shorts are in the laundry you probably got to wear something else.

Sorry Jispa. I know you are going to read this when you grow older but do realize you were on tough girl. Especially when we wanted to deal with you without either crushing or flaming your rebellion.

These days I try not to fight or scold her. I use the cold heat treatment. Have a strong chat with her. To dos and not to dos are clearly laid out with consequences. The flip – she hates its – she prefers the blow hot anger any day. Fights with her mother are another funny one. There is drama and action. And the inevitable – you guys don’t understand me. Yes. I was waiting for the time that ame. She is almost a teen. Every teen has the fundamental right to believe that they have been misunderstood, misjudged, mishandled, misquoted and mistaken. Jispa is reaching there. I remember feeling that all the time. I remember feeling alone and helpless. Of course today I realize that was over reacting on my side. So I try my best to not let her remain in that. Yesterday I explained to her how much we appreciate it “but you never tell me”. “oh dear, we do. Point taken- we don’t tell you enough of it but we do. And more likely right now you are in a negative state so you are likely to only remember the negative ones.” So I then work on it and explain how it’s tough but we do appreciate her a lot. We love her a lot and we do a lot for her. Not that we are asking for gratitude in return (I always hated my parents asking me to be grateful). So don’t thank us. We too enjoyed and did our duty. You dint ask for it, but you shouldn't think that we are being mean and that we don’t really care. We do. So here is our version.

I also never try and let her go without making up. And it ends to start another day.

Parenting is so bloody irritating. No matter how many mistakes you avoid, you only make fresh new ones. You constantly balance stuff. And who knew that the way to get your daughter to wear her clothes was to manage the washing loads. Shit man. This is so dam weird.

watch it

They re-released Sholay on the big screen after 38 years. It was released around a month before I was born and it’s been there in our conscience ever since. Such was the impact of the movie. To my mind and also for a million others – it was the defining movie for Indian cinema.

Growing up, I funnily never got the chance to watch it. Probably  because my parents must have watched it well before I was in my senses. But the dialogues were firmly etched in my memory. This was thanks to the songs and dialogues of Sholay cassette that we had at home. I read much later that, the film was declared a flop in its first few weeks and picked up much later. Even after the movie became a hit the records did not move. It seems the movie was so powerful that the songs never registered in the people’s psyche. Only after Polydor released the ‘Songs and dialogues version’ did the sales shoot up. Rightly so – the movie is all about the story and dialogues. There is one scene after the other full of characters mouthing one repeatable dialogue after the other. At home we used to listen to the cassette and knew the dialogues by heart.

Later on when satellite TV reached our households, I would have seen the movie in bits and pieces many times, but never together in totality. It was only much later that I bought the DVD or something and watched it end to end.

So when the news was that the movie is releasing again – I asked Jispa if she wanted to see it. She wasn’t too keen. Then I had to sell it to her. You know Gabbar is in this movie. You know Jai and Viru are also from this movie. Dialogues such as Tere naam kya hai basanti, kitne aadmi the, tera kya hogo kaaliya, chal dhanno, etc… Jispa was amazed. All this is from this movie? Yup. It’s all here. Now that it was appropriately sold, she was game for the movie. Jispa is such a twerp. She is very very irritatingly choosy on if she wants to watch a movie or not. But then….

So we went and watched the movie. It had released in the 2D and the 3D version but we went for the 2D version at Regal theatre. If you see it then you must see it on the big screen, the traditional way. And we hate the 3D specs as it gives us a headache. And I wasn’t disappointed. DVD is a poor cousin for this movie. This is great movie. After all these years and after knowing the story and the dialogues, you are still glued on. The fun bit is knowing which dialogue is going to come in and saying it just as it is being delivered. You are then a part of the movie yourself. You end up interacting with it yourself. What a movie. To my mind there are no wasted shots and movie moves forward at an amazing pace. At best one can fault the action – the scenes where the bad guys get shot and jump from their horses or pedestals..aaaaaaaaaaaaaaa. That seemed hackneyed by today’s standard. But the rest was good enough to keep Jispa happy. She enjoyed the movie as well.

After the movie we went home and I dug out the book I had on the making of the movie and gave it to Jispa to read. Now that you enjoyed the movie, do read how much fun it was to make.

Talking about movies – we caught an interesting movie on DVD. We saw Lootera. While it had two actors I wouldn’t care of, I figured from some interviews given that it was a different movie. I was amazed by the movie. It truly was a nice movie. It was a bit slow but a few things happened that has never happened in the history of Hindi movies. One – there are so many scenes that don’t have any dialogue and secondly – there are scenes where the actors whisper to each other. In Bollywood, there are no whispers. People shout out their secrets to each other. Nothing is understated or subtle. It’s over the top. All the time. Go see the movie – it’s different. I liked it, but yes it’s a bit extra on emotion, but it’s nice still.

here - the bonus title track of sholay. I love it. Jispa and I have been listening to it and we love the part where the strumming and the whistling takes off

I click therefore I am

There you are. My instagram feed is on the left of the blog. Blogging was a big thing at one time and then facebook came in and stole the thunder from ever one. On facebook for the most – I am a by standing voyeur. I don’t post much, don’t write much and simply like or comment on interesting stuff. It’s also an interesting place to catch other articles or videos gone viral. Then one day I heard about how facebook acquired instagram. Like a typical corporate guy – I was interested only after the economics got my attention. Once I got my instagram account – I was sold. It’s a dam cool software. With the touch to focus (the rest gets a little blurred) and a choice or predefined filters it makes photography so lovely.

I have been fiddling with it now for some time. It is pretty cool. Over a period of time I have evolved to have a style and language of my own. Many years ago V-nu and I had gone to the ardh kumb mela at Allahabad. We met a guy taking photos. We dint realize it at the time but the guy, Ben Lowy was a crazy celebrated photographer. He has been to conflict zones across the world and has been taking photos. Later on he had started his photo feed which was a series of photos that he would take from his iphone. I would always wonder how he would get the effect on the iphone. Once I started fiddling with Instagram I realized how he did it. Now I regularly follow my instagram feeds. It is a lovely liberating experience. I was always interested in photography but I found the camera very limiting. Who will carry a bulk load of equipment and worry about it all the time. V-nu would carry his equipment and then sit and change lenses etc, and I hated the whole thing. its too messy for me. Then you are always worried about equipment and worse – you stop living the moment. Once in Jaisalmer, I tried my best at capturing the perfect sunset and I realized that in that bit, I had failed to experience it. I had given up completely on photography after that. No camera for me.

The cell phone Instagram has helped me regain the photography mojo back. It’s nice to be able to click and most importantly – share your pics with people. I mainly do it when I am on vacation. I take pictures of the different experiences. I try and take unconventional ones. Interesting stories. Then I also learnt to write something interesting around it.  A picture with a context has far more to it than by itself. This too I picked up from another celebrated photojournalist that I was following. The things I have learnt is that – its ok to cheat with the phone on the picture. Cropping is ok – playing around and fiddling with the focus is ok, using filters is ok. No manually erasing stuff but everything else is par for course. These have helped me connect to people and helped people connect to me.

Very interestingly, there is this one chic from office. She sits in one of the branches and she hardly ever meets me. I would have never talked to her anything more than basic pleasantries. But she catches me on FB a lot and my photo feeds. I met her at a coffee shop the other day. I was with Jasmine and Jispa. She immediately was warm to Jasmine and wanted to meet Jispa and was warm to her as well. This is possibly the power of the media. The ability to stay connected in a new sort of way. Jasmine’s millions of cousins in the US are now connected to us and share the holidays with us. I try not to spam the feed. I try and make it relevant and interesting. After all you don’t need to know that I ate a chocolate cake yesterday and that it was YUM. I guess I use it for what I feel are more interesting interactions and my thoughts. It’s a language that’s mine and mine alone.

WE have not allowed Jispa on any social network site, but I relented on Instagram. Her feeds are private and by invitation alone and she needs permission before she posts. I was explaining to her the other day how one could look at a story while clicking a photo and how the focal blur can help in telling a story. The eye follows the focus and that the story you want to tell. We experimented with two simple coffee cups on a table to tell different stories.

This is a good skill to learn I guess. She has a camera which we bought recently 0 but that useless. She doesn’t use it at all. She uses the ipod touch for now, but her camera there is pretty much useless. I guess I may buy her a better itouch but I too worried about the kids using the itouch to be out of touch with the environment around them. So it’s a bit of a bummer. Lets see.

duniya dekh tamasha dekh

The last week we went to Aurangabad for a vacation. Now its funny to me that people were actually wondering why I would go to Aurangabad for a vacation. I wonder if it isn’t obvious that Aurangabad is the home base for Ajanta and Ellora caves. But I guess the general level of common knowledge isn’t so high as one would expect it to be. Also it is finally a tourist destination and most people I know don’t really know too much about tourism,. It just passes them by on the interest level. Goa and Bangkok is where the buck stops.

I have been to Ajanta and Ellora twice before but that doesn’t stop me from going again. I first went there as a dumb ass teen and then I went around 10 years ago when I had no clue on how to see or appreciate anything historical. So going again with Jispa aged 11 was great fun. This time around we added Daulatabad and local Aurangabad to the platter. Daulatabad is a really wild underrated fort. With its crazy defense systems it probably was built by a highly insecure king. And locally Aurangabad is home to Bibi ka Maqbara. This monument is highly highly inspired by the Taj. I realized it later that with this monument I have completed three of the monuments of similar structures and inspiration. First came the Humayun’s tomb, followed by the Taj and finally this one. Once you see all three only will you realize what is so special about the proportions of the Taj. After completing the troika of sorts I also realize that I have one important missing piece to complete the quartet – the Safdarjung tomb. The next time I am in Delhi, I am sure to make some time available to visit this place. It is also referred to by historians as the “last flicker in the lamp of Mughal architecture”.

So back to Aurangabad. Nice lovely week spent. People finish off the trip in two days but since we went for 6 nights we had a blast and could devote time to whatever we thought was interesting. At Ellora we were lucky to have this amazing guide who answered almost every query of mine on various facets of Hinduism and boy was he knowledgeable. I wonder what he was doing as a simple guide in that place. With a little bit of spit and polish he should be addressing conferences. Serious. Ten minutes into the tour and told him – you don’t bother about time and I will not bother about money. We will see everything at my own pace and we will ask you all the questions in the world. He agreed. So in the end the 90 minute tour lasted more than two and a half hour and I happily paid him double. So next time you are in Ellora, look up for Madhu at 9890632629. Guides in India seem to have really improved, from the idiot out to fleece you to the characters who really help you learn. This one was like reading a book in 3 hours. I cannot recommend him less. He is up there with the best I have been with.

We got lucky with this one. When we first reached all the guides were hired. I was very angry with Jispa as she is extremely cranky when we wake her up. She takes a lot of time to get up. So this time too we were late thanks to her. And then afterwards when we got this guide Jispa was getting cheeky an d she was like ‘ say thanks to me’. And I was – you are very very lucky today. There is really no point in seeing the place without the guide. There is nothing you can understand. It’s almost boring. You can’t make out Shiva from Vishnu in some depictions or Buddha from Mahavir. So Jispa was very lucky, as we got him while we just about turning about to come back the next day.

Jispa has really become a big kid now. Since we had a lot of time, we also went to the only mall in Aurangabad. At the Westside there Jispa picked up something she liked. She put it in her shopping basket and roamed around with me when she suddenly exclaimed ‘oh, the kiddie section is here’. “yes” I answered her. “So I picked up my t shirts from….” “The adult section” I completed her sentence. Yup Jispa has suddenly grown mentally and physically. While we can handle the size bit, Jasmine and I are learning how to cope with her mental bit. She fights differently, argues differently, get upset in a different way. The last few vacations have really seen her grow and I think now we are bonding at a different level. We are understanding each other in a way that is completely new to me.

Vacations are all about this. Growing up, exposing yourself to various things, doing new things, doing old things and more importantly knowing each other a little better. For a relatively young family like ours – possibly the greatest gift is the latter.

a clear mind is blank

After all these years of working and meeting people and problems, one leans to cope with issues and unexpected hurdles quite differently.  I now tend to maintain (at least attempt to maintain most of the time) a sense of equanimity while meeting potential issues.

There was a guy who had a stall at the local Shakari Bhandar. He was sweet guy who loved puzzles. He would try and teach how to solve puzzles. He had mastered the Rubik’s cube. As a kid I loved the puzzles as well. I would try to solve puzzles and it would be hours of fun in the vacation. He befriended me and he would give me tons of puzzles to play with. He also sold books and games and toys. So when Jispa was born we bought quite a bit of stuff from him. Once he needed to relocate to a new shop and needed money he asked Jasmine for 5 grand as a loan. I told Jasmine to happily lend him the money. This man gave me countless hours of fun. Also a lot of his puzzles were with me unreturned. In effect I had ‘stolen’ them. So don’t bother. He then ran a shop elsewhere. Jasmine and her friend were regular customers. Then one day he got a chance and immigrated to the United States. He left the shop to his man Friday to run. After making some money he instructed his man to pay back the money. The man contacted Jasmine but wouldn’t show up. One day he disappeared. We lost touch with the puzzle man and all.

On Sunday out of the blue he contacted Jasmine. He wanted to meet Jasmine and her friend. Both of them were a little circumspect. More money perhaps? What we do, how do we tell no… I drove them there. A little thought ran into my head – why think the worst. Its ok. lets meet. Possibly he is just meeting because he  has come back. I still love the guy and I think he is a great guy. I told them don’t worry. If an awkward thing crops up – you can always revert later. You need not answer then and there. Jasmine came back after the meeting. ”You know why he wanted to meet us? He brought gifts and puzzles for us and he immediately wanted to return the 5 grand”. Well well well what do you know.

That’s what I told Jasmine. It was in my mind but I didn’t tell you guys. Sometimes you go out and meet with a blank face and mind. You take it as it comes. Earlier on I would worry – what’s the issue – why does he want to meet – why is he calling – what would I say – how should I talk. Etc etc. now I meet in a far more stable state. You don’t know anything. You should keep two three back up plans that this is my worst case and then meet without a real plan. Everyone deserves a meeting, a chance.

I have met so many people and been through so many situations. Jasmine told me that she too will learn. I said nopes. I learnt a lot of this from you. Jasmine would normally meet without thinking too much about the consequences. She was the one who taught me equanimity. No Jasmine – I learnt this form you. Mil lo. Don’t think too much. Ah things happen.

So that was an interesting lesson. You meet anything that comes your way and you have a backup plan. That’s about it I guess. You can’t predict the world but you surely can manage your space in it without too much thinking. Clarity of thought also means thinking less. Aila – that was high philosophy. I surprise myself at times.