world war in a bottle!

I am sitting outside in office these days and I have a new best friend. The youngest member of the team is a guy born in 1992. Wow. That is young. To put things in perspective – he was born after Manmohan Singh started liberalizing the country and born a good one year after I started college. That also makes him born after I met Jasmine. Age - after a  point of time is very funny. We are old. I am Uncle. When some entrepreneur friend talks to me – I think it’s my experience that he is after.

So this boy here is right now soaking everything I say like a sponge. I explain stuff to him and he tries to understand it. He googles stuff, learns and then thinks. He tries to ask questions and I am more than happy to teach. I can teach forever. Just yesterday I had gone to the supermarket near my house and bought a lovely French jam (the pack says preserve). Whatever. When Jispa was much younger we tried buying the normal Indian main stream jam that was available. Soon Jispa stopped eating it and we had to finally throw or give it all away. This kid hated jam. But I then later realized that it wasn’t her fault. Our jam is crap. There is no fruit in it. It basically sugar, pectin, color and flavor. Just to call it fruit jam they put some fruit pulp in it. It is crap. So we now buy these jams which have at least 50 percent fruit content in it. It tasty and nice and flavorful.

So when I bought this bottle yesterday, my young neighbor asked me what it is that I have bought. I explained to him that this is World War 2 in a bottle. The second world war was fought outside of eth Americas. I think only one Japanese bomber managed to bomb the mainland (Nobuo Fujita). Fujita later made several goodwill visits to the place of his bombings and was later declared an honorary citizen of the area in US. Really a lovely story. http://www.nytimes.com/1997/10/03/world/nobuo-fujita-85-is-dead-only-foe-to-bomb-america.html Though it seems there have been a total of five attacks on US in WW2 read this interesting link, http://www.history.com/news/history-lists/5-attacks-on-u-s-soil-during-world-war-ii . The most curious of them all is the fire balloons. Ww2 is full of interesting history and the limit (or lack of thereof) of the human mind in the face of crisis. The fire balloons were thought of by the Japanese. The idea being simple. The Japanese realized while flying that there was a current of air flowing towards American mainland at high altitude from Japan known as the jet stream. So someone thought of putting bombs on balloons that would be carried away by the current and drop on the mainland. It required some clever science and engineering as the day temperature and the night temperature would be different and the hydrogen balloon would need to be at a constant altitude to reach across the ocean. So they put in place altitude meters that would drop the sand bags to gain altitude and a valve to release hydrogen to loose altitude, and finally a mechanism to release the bomb in roughly three days by which time it should have been roughly over the mainland. Very very cute and clever. They released 900 of them with the expectation that 900 of them will reach America.  Around 300 of them were spotted and the rest seemed to have landed in the vast open areas causing no damage. Only one incident has been reported where 6 people were killed thanks to the balloon. They were largely ineffective. The funniest part was that the Japanese made the balloons from a paper made from mulberry bushes and they had to be glued together using edible glue called konnyaku. The poor and hungry Japanese workers used to eat the paste while making the balloons. Hehehe. This is the reason I love WW2. It’s full of interesting anecdotes and insights into the craziness of human mind in the face of severe hardship and stress.

So largely the mainland America was unaffected by the war. The war for them was fought on a different front altogether. They had to cross the seas, thousands of miles away and fight. Their supply chains extended across continents. Unlike the Europeans. These guys fought the war in and around the home land. They fought the war in their backyards and in their cities. They fought in in their farms. So the US industry grew around making canned products which essentially were soft and reduced to a calorie and taste devoid of all texture. The Europeans retained the texture in their food as they did not have an industry set to mass produce canned products.

As Indian poor grew a little richer they began to have demand. This demand was essentially fulfilled by big firms trying to give a ton of calories at the lowest possible cost. They turn to the American model. Reduce anything to the lowest common denominator, remove all semblance of texture and make it easy to swallow. I have written about this – the favorite foods are Maggie noodles, pasta, margarita thin crust pizzas and cream biscuits. Nothing with texture.

So when I was asked about this preserve bottle, I was actually explaining about WW2. After such an explanation there was no way I was going to get home without opening the bottle and sharing with everybody. So I ordered for bread  from the pantry (sadly it was the simple white sliced soft loaf) and gave jam sandwich to all. I asked them to feel the texture. The berries, the seeds, the rough edges to the jam. They all loved it. I was amazed that all of them very so surprised to taste it and they did not realize what crap they were eating all this while. I then got the normal kissan jam bottle from the pantry and opened it and asked them to smell that. Yuckkk… I think I permanently spoiled normal jam for them. Good for them. I am introducing the play of texture for them in their mind even for while eating a humble jam.

Here – who would have known that between these two bottles lies the history of war conflict and countless suffering. Just dig in and enjoy the smell, the texture and the taste.

travel woes

Off days and on days. Today morning was an off day. Yesterday I did a morning evening Delhi trip. Obviously I was off color at the badminton court today. I hate flights and I hate travelling. I find travelling in flights very very depressing. I can’t think of a worse thing than a lonely flight. And to add to all this – the cumbersome checking in process and the entire experience. First thing is that you have to reach one hour in advance. Then you have to get your security check done. Why is that there is always a line for the security check. Why can’t airports build for scale  and capacity? I think boarding a flight must be done as painlessless as possible. I book online and then I get my seat online and then I just simply walk in to get zero lines. All check-ins must be open across airlines. Why do you need dedicated counters. This is an absolute waste of space and resources. Just let the airport authorities check you in on their systems. No line and a 30 second check in. Then you proceed to security which is another 30 second check in and then board the plane. The plan has strict door open and door close timings. Suppose I have RFID tags for my luggage and on me, then I don’t even need tickets or check in information. These tags will allow me everything. Entry / exit everything. Simple. Then you just reach the airport and, boom you board in 10 minutes max.

Of course the airports have really improved over the years. Now you have nothing short of a five star experience in most airports. The loos are those you can go in, even for the big stuff. I remember five years ago, I was coming from Delhi and suddenly I had a really bad bout of diarrhea and vomiting. Really really bad. I went to the airport loo at least 4 to 5 times. Extremely tough. I remember thinking only one thing – wow – at least these loos are really clean. It was so bad that I puked just before boarding and then once on the flight. Thank god for air sickness bags and then once just as I landed, I ran into the loo for one final time. Crazy crazy time. Also the number of loos have gone up. Otherwise  there was invariably a line whenever you get off the plane. Now most airports are large and lovely. At the Mumbai Airport I even noticed a family bathroom. A larger room with enough space for a small family. Perfect if you have babies and you need help with both parents doing their bit. Also the airports have enough seating, wifi, shops and eating places. Some airports have a better array of shopping than others. I think shopping and eating are important entertaining points for travelers. Of course along with TVs. With sports and news being broadcast 24x7 there is never a shortage of entertainment. I think now they should install large screens beaming sports. That would be one huge plus for travelers. The other point where the travelers would rate you highly -  keep a large section for discounted brand outlets. People will go crazy. For some reason people think that airline travelers have tons of money and therefore everything is highly priced. You only get expensive brands. My view is the opposite. These travelers are completely bored and need some entertainment. Cheap prices will induce them to binge beyond what they would have normally wanted to and boom – you will have people coming in and carrying off cartloads of stuff. Pile them high and sell them cheap. The first guy who gets this will make tons of money. And brands can always have a sale at airports as people don’t travel so often to airports. It’s not on a call for most people, except idiotic business travelers who do a morning evening to a city.

But still nothing can be done about the stupid airline seats. We want them cheap and the only way seems to be packing us like cattle into the aircraft. What a pain. And when you take flights from Delhi and you have an idiot who just likes to take more arm space than is legitimately his. Why does that always happen on Delhi flights? I hate the hand sticking and hence when I travel by flight I ensure I am wearing a full sleeves shirt. At least you don’t feel iky pushing the a-holes hand back into his seat. I pity the women travelers here.

If I am ever rich or in a position to dictate, one thing is for sure – I will strive for business class for travel. It makes the travel much more bearable. Good seats on flights are a huge thing. Vistara has just started for the first time in India the concept of premium economy. I have to get around to checking out how this works. They seem promising at least in the leg space provided. I think it costs around 30% more. I genuinely believe that if an employee comes back same day then its only humane to offer that choice to the employee. But then… I think moment I become a position of authority I think I will get all completely corrupt in the head and see only cost. Benefits be dammed. I don’t know why this happens. I think the best of intentions go crazy when one is in power. I struggle every day to remain reasonably stable in dealing with my band. To keep saying that these kids are good and you have to trust them. People will behave funnily and in ways you don’t want them to. I have noticed that when I am in office till late, invariably the band is in office till late. When I am gone early, the band has left early. Is it that I keep them late, is it my doing, or is it a psychological response. I don’t know. We corporate types are designed to be complete jerks.

But nevertheless – travelling is a pain. Especially alone. If there is someone alongside it makes for much better journeys. I realized it especially when I was travelling to London. With my family next to me even the arduous 8 hour flight was completely bearable. Alone is impossible. That’s why Kolkata is never on the radar! And with airports being so far away from the city it is another one hour of travel to be added at the bear minimum. So catching a morning Kolkata flight is the greatest torture known to travelkind. And if by mistake you are travelling to Bangalore then you better budget for traffic jams at peak hours. Oh dear oh dear… I so hate travelling alone. I abhor it. I hate it, I don’t like it, I don’t want to do it. But….

why the age of ultron is the age of Jispa

I remember when Jispa was little, she hated violent movies. She would cry if there were movies in which there was fighting or had cars blowing up. Her movies had to be very very clean. She cried in Finding Nemo and she hated me and hit me in the middle of the movie for taking her to watch Ratatouille. She only wanted happiness everywhere.

My big memory was of her waking up in the theatre while I was watching Die Hard 4 and she hated me for taking her. She refused to understand that I was only taking her as it was a late night movie and I was expecting her to sleep through it.

Then she grew a little more when she could watch these Disney movies with dragons and fire and everything else. Whew. I could finally watch a few movies. Recently I was so happy when this little kid got started on to the Superhero series.

I had first tried to get her interested in SpidermanI wanted to see the Spider man and to convince her that it was pretty cool, I got one of the Spidey movies home. It was the one with Tobey in it and was a largely cute version of the movie. Not so dark and but quite happy. She was ok and then when we went for the movie I realized that it was a new interpretation and there was enough conflict in the movie. It was dark and full of crazy violence. Spiderman comes home all bruised and hurt. She was not happy with me.

Suddenly in the last year or so she took up to watching the Avengers! Was it her cousin brother or was it the kids at school or what it was no one knows. But I am not complaining. I am enjoying this. She is now hooked on to the X men series as well. So now when the new Avengers movie is getting released, we have started a countdown to it. She is excited. Jasmine traditionally has been damp water on all these efforts of mine. She doesn’t care two shit about the super hero movies and she would only just about see it because I wanted to.

Hopefully this weekend I would be watching the movie with Jispa. Jasmine is pretty much optional on this one! Today Jispa seemed interested in watching sci fi movies as well. Now what more can a father ask for. There are tears in my eyes as I finally see my daughter grow up and enjoy the simple pleasures in life with her daddy!. Yahoo…

Watch this clip. If you feel the goosegumps you are it and if you don’t… well

growing growing ...

There is a lot of bull shit and child pschyology everywhere. I too believed in a lot of bull shit. There is only one truth. No one really knows anything. I have two three very close kids that I have seen up close and personal. Both these boys according to me have had not so great parenting. They should have been better read, better exposed and made to have sweat a little more. At least that was my egoistic view point. Both these boys have grown up to be amazing people. One nephew has become a boy that I like to talk with. I can converse, he understands and responds. Another boy took a job as a sales guy and by sheer hard work and persistence is climbing up the sales ladder. He takes charge of things in his hand and then attacks the work and gets it done. I like his drive and his dedication. I am impressed. Another hero grows up and reads and learns and grows well. Things change and they change fast.

I am now less and less worried about the real long term implications that we think are caused by our minute bits of parenting. I am sure  parenting makes a difference. Of course. A lot of fundamentals can get ingrained. Some dos and don’t get implanted but… they are also giving more importance than is due. So many kids fight their way on their own and mold their own destiny. I was asking Jasmine – “you know me since I was 15, haven’t I changed a lot?” Jasmine looked at me, thought for a bit and said “yes, you have”. People change. Circumstances force people to change. There are many ways to respond to change and in many ways ‘stressfull change’. Change is stressful and people don’t do it willingly, but people change. How many times can you get slapped for something? Life will keep slapping you again and again. After a point you stop making some mistakes, you grow up, you meet the Buddha in you and boom.. growing happens.

I love to able to talk to these kids. They teach me stuff I never knew. I understand much better when I chat with them and when I discuss with them. There is so much to learn. I understand their issues (I hope to), I get their perspective (again hope to) and I learn. Learning is forever constant and the best learnings are from those much younger to you or much older to you. The youth have so much to share and the old have so much to learn from.

But one thing is clear – I am learning form these guys only one thing. That no matter how much I know, I don’t know a thing. Things are different. Things change and people change. Possibly their cores remain constant. But you never know what the nuance of that core is. The way they exhibit some of that to you changes. And it could be just that little bit that changed it all as far as you are concerned. And when that happens – god only knows.

omnidigi

I don’t think people still get it. I have been trying to shout on the top of rooftops and to everyone I meet. Digital is going to eat your lunch and you don’t even know it. You idiot! There is digital everywhere and in meetings and interviews I stand out like an anarchist. In fact there were two such instances. Once at an important meeting with the super boss Uday, he turned around and asked us what is the future and how do we compete with our rivals. He swung around and asked me first. I think I destroyed the conversation soon by explaining to him that I didn’t care about our known competition. The broking industry is a shitty highly unimaginative and boring space. It’s easy to beat the shit out of your competition because here the people are boring unimaginative and highly lackadaisical. We sit on our laurels and reminiscence on the past days. Knowing that when the market turns the people have no choice but to come to us and invest. Bing bong… here comes the money.

So I looked around, my bosses, egged me on and told me to speak my mind. And I did. I told the gathering that the competition is going to come from some upstart app that will reach out and get the eyeballs and then suddenly one day it will put a buy sell button and we are all doomed.

At another forum, actually it was an interview with a large insurance firm, they ask me about my digital antecedents and boom – I get them all riled up with my ‘digital is all in’ theory. You can’t have half measures in digital. You have to be all in. You have to commit to it completely. Having one stupid digital product guy or having one digital marketing guy is not it. Digital is the mandate of the CEO. He has to commit to it knowing that there is no choice. It’s all in. only a fool would waste money on traditional activities. I look around me at all these other idiots and wonder what on earth is going on. Why cant people see the truth. And then I speak to all these guys from the digital industry, all these startups who are doing some great stuff and showing some real traction. They are loving this and the fact that the older entrenched guys are sitting on their heads and wondering what on earth is going on.

Look around me right now. I was explaining to Jispa that how the taxi business has changed completely. At first we had the simple black and yellows. We would always haggle with them, we would wonder where to flag them down and we would wonder how dirty they were and would wonder if we would get any in the morning. Then came the radio taxis. They came and challenged the status quo. You could book them in advance for a particular time. they came with airconditioning, uniformed drivers and were generally on time and reliable. Most of these guy’s revenues came from airport pick up and drop. I guess the guys who go to airports like the AC and want to keep their travel as airconditioned as possible. And then comes Uber service. No radio calling, no number, no office and hell… no taxis they own. They simply own the app on which you can check on the taxis nearby. No you cant book in advance. you simply start the app and  request for a cab. Strategy is often saying NO. they refuse to take cash. They only take a direct charge on your card. So you jump in and out of cabs without touching your wallet. When the RBI got in and said that’s not allowed… you need a double authentication at the time of payment, they simply tied up with an e-wallet and started doing what they do best. Get a ride without touching your wallet.

Look at all the side effects, the happy stuff. Now people will pay with digi money. All that money leaves a trail. And when you have a trail you can charge taxes. Taxes help people  come into the white and into the economy. Balance sheets get made and balance sheets mean access to credit, means means for growth and leverage. Leverage means more stuff can be consumed and hence produced. Its good for growth!

Digital is good. It Makes the economy more efficient and productive. It allows for boundaries of exit and entry to be removed. It allows for goods and services to reach all corners of society. I genuinely believe that digital will allow more people to grow out of their current situation. Its great.

Here is one type of example

It gives these people a shot at fame and success! They have an equal chance of grabbing your eyeball as Salman Khan. What more an equalizer do you want?

Here a bonus video once we talk about Salman Khan

an old boy's tale

My brother put his lovely old parsi cupboard in my garage. Well actually half of it is his garage and he kept it for ‘safe keeping’. Since both the garages are connected and in front of the building, the building idiots often take our garage for their community dinners. This time they took the cupboard and put it behind in a corner of the building. When my sis in law came to take it, she was shocked and so were we. Somebody had painted it white! Jasmine was sure someone was trying to flick the cupboard by painting it white. We raised a stink with the supervisor and he promised to get to the root of it.

I remember as kids we used to play in front of the garage space in the buildings. The garage that we were playing in front of was abandoned and in a mess.  Then one day on a mission – you know how kids are – we cleaned up the entire garage and threw the mess. It was awesome. Now we could play properly. Some idiot then promptly parked his car. So we bought some paint and wrote on the wall that parking your car is not allowed in here. Now that was something. We did not know whose garage it was and whose car it was… we just took charge. After a few weeks, the actual owner came in and then got inspired to put a gate there and was about to stop us from playing in front of his garage. Only timely intervention by his neighbor and a friend of ours who told him that we cleaned it in the first place allowed us to continue playing. It’s pretty stupid.

Back to the present. We later came to know that the kids painted the cupboard white. One of them apologized to me. I let him be. Kids… vandals…. Yesterday as I was parking my car when I saw this kid who came in and was opening the door of this cupboard. I asked him what he was doing. He said it was his cupboard. I argues with him that it was ours. He said ‘it is ours. We even painted it’. oh dear. This was a throw back  to the garage days. We just took ownership of the garage and took charge and cleaned it. these kids were doing the same  to our cupboard. They did not mean to vandalize. They meant to clean it. Oh dear.

It good that I remember my childhood. Of course I did not shout at them. But I did give them a smallish but cute lecture. I don’t want them in my garage. They scratch the cars… but its good that I remember J

Here is the legendary cupboard. they did try their best!

this too shall pass

No matter what. This too will pass.

Many years ago in my firm we had an ass who joined in who did not care too much about others and was just throwing his weight around. He believed that everyone reported to him and wanted to control everything. We had a few run in’s with him and my reportee had a dotted line reporting to this idiot. Dotted line reporting… that is the stupidest thing in the world. These corporates have these matrix structures. Made popular by the multinational companies, in which you have no clue who is really reporting to whom. So as the marketing head of the business you have a ‘hard line’ reporting to the business head but a ‘dotted line’ reporting to the marketing head of the group. Or in many cases it can be vice versa. No real boss who is responsible for you. With so many bosses and so complex structures, the challenge is to ask the question – who will take care and be responsible for you and your career. The answer – go figure. I think they cause too many issues than they really solve. I hope that someday when I can change the system or if I can put in a system, I will put in a clean and simple system.

But coming back. So that was a real ass and I remember that my colleague was completely stresses and then we complained to the boss. The boss was very understanding and told us that he would take care of it, but at the same time he told us that ‘ no matter how big the problem seems now, in a few years as time passes by the problem will seem very small. Then you will wonder what it was about the problem that looked so big at the time”. Those were wise words indeed. It’s really true. When you face issues they look huge and look insurmountable but over a period of time, they end up looking so small and insignificant. You wonder why you took so much stress in resolving the issues. Another boss told me a fable of a general who was suddenly in the bad books of the king and was about to be put to death. When eth king visited him the general was crying. He told the king that his only regret was not being able to teach the kings horse to fly. The king said that there was no such thing. The general assured him that in a year the horse would fly. The king gave him a grace of one year failing which he would be put to death again. When eth general went home, his wife confronted him saying that she knew that he was fibbing. At which the general said – relax my dear – one year is a long time. In one year – I might die, the king might die or the horse might die. One year is a long time.

That’s so right. one year is a long time. when shit hits the roof for me, I sit back and think a bit. What is it that I need to survive the next few minutes, hours or days. Relax. What’s the worst that can happen. Then I sit back and think through the steps and breathe. The complex decision tree gets done in my head till I reach a point that I know that my decision is this and then I have to wait and see. Then I sleep. Sometimes stress can disturb your sleep beyond imagination. I remember that as an idiot who did not really prepare for his exams in the final year of college, I had nightmares of getting a bad result. The worry was simple, I had a girlfriend whose family I had convinced that I was a super stud. And failing was a real no no. So I had convinced myself that if I fail then the pass percentage of the entire board would be 30 percent. So that was not happening. Then came the next mountain. I needed at least 50% in the aggregate so as to be eligible for the MBA  studies that I had sold to the world that I was going to do. That was crazy. I remember waking up and then calculating what is the bear minimum marks that I thought I would get in each subject and inputting those on the calculator to get the final score. I convinced myself that I would be there! I ended up with 62% - a first class!

Problems are around us every day and they create such a mess and get our BP high, they rob us of our appetite and our sleep. But the truth is simple dear lad – this too shall pass. This too shall pass. After all – one year is a long time J

worth its while

In life a public service post is extremely critical for a whole rounded experience. A not for profit, free charitable public service post. That is the toughest thing to do.

My friend and I got involved with the swimming department at the gymkhana a little over a couple of years ago. The pain is immense. If I thought that the idiots at eth office were a bit, these guys at the gymkhana are to be seen to be believed. Everyone and his grand dad would have an opinion and most of the time they are not controlled or driven by facts. Most of these guys come from business backgrounds and used to running their businesses in their own way. Controls, processes and scale is something alien to them. Most of them haven’t run retail customer centric business and have no clue on anything. These guys then get elected to various posts and then all hell breaks loose.

They don’t understand service, the ability to keep your audience first and they definitely are alien to marketing concepts. All the bums are a legacy of the Nehruvian era where the man who controls the resources is hell bent on preserving his control over them and believes in the scarcity of resources. Anything is looked upon as a privilege that is given to the members. Hence they will put barricades everywhere. They will first put in rules that don’t allow stuff to happen. They will never bother about the demand side of the equation. Creating a  demand is alien to them. In fact in many ways it is an anathema. They are those people who have bought membership cheap and then want to extract the maximum benefits exclusively for themselves. They like their empty pools, empty courts an dempty spaces. Buzz? … that is an alien concept to them. Attracting youngsters to the club? OMG that is the greatest sin on this world. Guests – let’s stop the members from getting them. Let’s charge higher! What will you give for that in return… oops that’s another bad question! The next thing we know – they ban shorts in the restaurant… hell knows why! I got thrown out of the restaurant. They tightened the rules about guests along with raising the fees… and boom – now the restaurant is empty. Now sit and enjoy eating in a ghost town. The quality of food will suffer, the service will suffer and the menu will slowly shrink. Who will bother about that.

They started redesigning the restaurant.. and no one is bothered about redesigning the menu. So whats the experience going to be? What is the theme of the place? What is the average serving size and the number of people per table that we are talking? Is there going to be a peak and a non peak time… how are we going to maximize revenues and have bar nights with live music or match screenings. Is the place designed for that? Nothing. If we have larger tables should we also have a few larger portion plates? Should we have enough starters and do we have enough on follow-throughs. Are we using light to generally zone out the place? Wow… I told them all this and they didn’t have a clue.

Then on pricing… they wanted to increase the pricing for using the general facilities. The club has a reverse problem. we have a large corpus that’s sitting and doing nothing. Just… a large corpus. So we DON’T need the money. And in any case, from all the monies collected to run the place on a daily use basis doesn’t pay for the maintainence. This comes from the interest on the corpus. So your biggest revenue is not this stupid yearly fees but new members who have to be suckered into coming in and joining. In fact you need more BUZZ in the gymkhana. More use of pool, more use of restaurant, more use of bar and then more use of all the sports. You must have training programs that attract the bets talent that attract the best money from people who want access to this talent for their kids and themselves. So you problem is different. In fact I was arguing that reduce the fees, reduce it drastically so that more and more people are tempted to pay off and believe that they will use it. and get people to use it… You need a problem of plenty and not scarcity. And this is the only option. If you believe that you should build walls around your scarce resources then these resources will only deteriorate and will eventually die. You lose in the long run.

But alas.. I am tired of these jack idiots. But I also learnt that this is the Indian Democratic system. Nothing moves. There is a log jam everywhere. And there is merit in it. I mean, I am the secretary of the pool but I report into the Chairman who reports into the general Secretary who really has no powers over the swimming pool directly but can stop us from doing a lot, who reports into the managing Committee which consists of all the chairmen, which in turn reports into the trustees who really don’t really do anything. So who is in charge… really… no one. So it does take a lot to move the system and precedence is king. So if you have done something in the past then its ok. Doing new or changing it is a problem. That’s why in legal and democratic systems past precedence is a great thing. This reduces the new thing you can do but also stops all the shit that can possibly create havoc. Its difficult (not impossible) to create dictators, its difficult to have idiots blowing up money, and every risk is answerable to almost anyone who asks a question. But I have also learnt to game the system… you can keep asking questions and as long as I am replying them and following due course, you cant do jack. And there is no limit to the number of replies I can give to the number of question you ask. And to add -  I can keep whining on in the replies and it can go on forever. Plus there is no real time frame in which we have to reply. In fact there is no real compulsion in which I have to reply. I can always defer and defer and just let matters sleep.

But at the end, it’s been frustrating and enriching. I know exactly why the system is designed so and I know how it works and its loopholes. And I leant to deal with more nitwits! And not lose cool…Worth its while :)

man... statesman!

Lee Kuan Yew. The great statesman and the father of Singapore passed away yesterday. Singapore was the second country that I went abroad as an independent adult. It was a part of an offsite that we were going to. I was just inducted in the international division of the firm and there was an offsite planned in Singapore. I thought that was so cool. And I remember the day when the secretary just asked me for my passport. I heard it from her that we were going to Singapore. I think it was for two or three days. I promptly bought the Lonely Planet and read all I could about the city. I asked around as well… and yes… you are Indian so you will have to stop at the mecca of Singapore – the Mustafa shopping centre. And to cater to tourists who enjoy the city during the day – the dam store stays open 24 hours!. Wow that is super cool.

From the first experience that I received while landing – at the Changi airport – I was dazzled by the city. Clean, orderly, and everything works to the clock. People walk on the amazing pavements, travel by the metro or the MRT as they call it. The busses are air conditioned and the malls are amazing and the people and service is great. I remember one instance where at the crossing, I was letting the car by but the car stopped and allowed me to cross first. It was absolutely a city in order. And then in the free time I went around the city. We were staying at the Sentosa island which itself had tons of fun things to do. The first thing I did was see the aquarium and the first thing at the aquarium – the touching tank! OMG. In India we are used to seeing barricades that stop us from going anywhere near the exhibits or animals or anything. But here we are free to  - of all things touch the fish. These were the Ray fish that we were experiencing. Then I roamed around the city and saw tons of things. I was a crazy wide eyes tourist with a mission to soak in as much of the city as possible. Mind boggling.

As an adult my first international visit was Bangkok and then this. This was my first experience of what a modern city feels like. I remember walking along their main road which was Orchard Street and not feeling any pollution at all. I swore to take my family along the next time. And sure enough, with the next bonus I was in Singapore again with Jasmine and Jispa. What a city! Organized and orderly and great living standards. How this happen? Who made it happen? Is this really true? The amazing Bird Park, the zoo, the island, the beach, the airport. How they make it happen? That’s when a friend of mine told me about the Man himself – Lee Kuan Yew. I read about him and then chanced upon his two books. One is about the way at 35… only 35… he led his city country to merge with Malaysia to only cede within a short time due to race issues. This book is ‘My Singapore Story’. It’s a bit boring but you get a sense of the resolve of the guy. The next book is an absolute mind bender. “from third world to first”. This book talks about the various issues he faced and the various challenges he resolved while he transformed his island country. My god. That man at 35 had an amazing vision. He resolved race conflicts, understood Singapore’s geo strategic positioning and built a modern efficient city. He ruling with a  strong arm but with a benevolence of a father, an incorruptible man of the highest integrity… he transformed Singapore in the magical city that we see it today. And he started at 35.

What an inspiration he is to all. The ability to fight off opposition, impose a fair just society and build the highest living standards for all. He talks about how at the start, Indians tried giving him a planner to help him and how he quickly realized how useless it was. He use of corporal punishment and banning of chewing gum was felt as suppressive to the world but you need to just look at the pavements of London to understand the impact. Every pavement of main street London has black spots that bear testimony to the ugliness of spat out chewing gum! Banning Chewing gum is good! though the real reason he banned it was the MRT. It would jam the doors.

The tourist magnets that are available for sale mock Singapore’s fine culture by calling it a Singapore -  a Fine City. Fines for smoking in public, spitting, not flushing etc etc…

But you can’t take away anything from this great guy. Lee Kuan Yew. Amongst those that lived while I was alive – to me he ranks up there with Nelson Mandela. I don’t think that for their people they were any less than great founding fathers! I salute you guys! You guys were awesome and to rephrase the words of great in memory of another great – generations to come will scarcely believe that a man such as this walked in flesh and blood on this earth!

We will soon deride them as our memories fall short as we do for Gandhi and Nehru. But what leaders of men these were. I need to someday think about what’s common in all of these? Possibly Lincoln as well. That makes me think. Time to read up on George Washigton!

random musings of a disturbed mind

This is the first time in a long time that I don’t really want to write anything and I am really forcing myself to pen down my thoughts. I find myself very very shallow. All my thoughts seem to be shallow. There seems to be little meaning in what I am writing.

I think it’s just a question of getting into the mindset and writing. Writing has helped me think, has helped me learn and has helped me clear my head. Why on earth can’t I write then. Why should I give up. Jispa got her report card a couple of days ago. I told her that I want her to focus on only two things. Math tables and writing essays. She needs to write essays. Essays help you think, help youw rite, help you weave a story, force you to think, force you to be creative. It helps yes it does. You can talk for hours on end but if you don’t write you are nothing.

I must teach myself exactly what I taught Jispa. Right now work is also pretty much uninspiring. I remember in the 2008 financial crisis, I had virtually no work. I used the time every day to read and think. I think it was 2009 when I wrote a blog for every single day at work. First thing write and then read… read read till lunch and then work some little and go home. I spent so much time thinking and reading that it helped me for years to come. Right now the mindset is missing. Am I growing old? Am I losing the edge that I have or should I say had? Of course my ego won’t allow me to admit that same or even I think not allow me to deteriorate that much,. all I need is a little nudge knowing that I am probably not as good as someone else in one specific aspect and then… boom… I will go for the kill. But now I am not even being challenged as much I think I need to be. But then as you grow older you realize that challenge comes with its own share of issues. No challenge comes without its fair share of risk. And the older you get risk changes in meaning. When you are younger the biggest risk is that of being embarrassed. You are insecure and you are always wondering what is it that will make you feel funny. But as you grow older, at least as grew older, I changed a fair deal. Now embarrassment doesn’t really bother you. I know how to deal with it, how to have a sleight of hand, how to laugh at yourself, live with it, pick up and move on!

That’s amongst the best learning I have had. Relax, deal with the barbs being thrown at you. Swing it, move it, duck and laugh. Also important is that fact that you realize that moods are transient. They flip, they change, they swing. You learn to deal with them and you learn to manage them and you learn to just let them be without thinking too much about them. Jispa is now 13… almost. She is a big girl. This time we went on a vacation to Diu and Gir, she was an adult on her own. She knew what she wanted to do, and she knows how to talk and how to get by. She is in a dam cute phase right now. She is a child, a lovely child and she is also a young adult. She feels bad, she doesn’t like being told and she doesn’t like ‘taplis’. She gives it back. She also needs to realize that she has moods and swings and she will also learn that her mommy and daddy have these moods. Yesterday night she got a scolding form me but when she went to sleep, I went and made her smile. She is quite an adult but I shudder to think that one day she wouldn’t smile that easily back at me. She will get angry and genuinely so and then not want to talk to me for a few days, a few months… a few years as well. God knows who will have how much ego at that point… Hope it doesn’t happen. Hope we remain adults.

yo skeptic

Ever since the Modi government has been sworn in, there is some great euphoria in the market. Everyone is speaking optimistically and the promises and hopes of the people are crazy. In this melee any sane voice is obviously hastily pushed aside. I too supported Modi over the choice we had. On one hand we had a congress rule for ten years which by the end of their second term was like a stand up’s comedians dream come true. We had a lovely and great former finance minister who became possibly only non-politician PM and served two full terms! He was just unable to stem the rot in the system and ended up being silent and ‘status quoist’. Fingers were raised at the all-powerful party president who it seemed controlled all the strings. Then there was the scion of the dynasty, with Rahul who promised so much till he went on an interview with Times Now and then he looked like a duck, with nothing to offer.

Sure I supported Modi but I also warned of the dangers of a right wing PM. He won with an absolute majority and swept into power. I worry and I worry. People were (are) going mad in supporting the man. He talks big, he has these broadcasts across schools and colleges and is winning the state elections like none other. Seemingly smart and intelligent people are being swept by the public relations spin tsunami that is being generated. It makes me worry a whole lot.

I have been interested in world war 2 history and after reading up a bit on Hitler’s rise to power and his madness that led a country into war, I see the parallels between his machinery and our PM’s. It unnerves me. Both talk loud and full of rhetoric. They have concentration of power, big grandiose schemes, talk tough and have huge PR machineries to support them. It scares me. I see no action but lots of talk. Of course they also have another issue – the Congress controls the upper house and refuses to pass the bills creating another sort of mess, so one must need to balance that view as well.

 So in many casual meetings I sit in one side and ask polite questions to all the Modi bhakts. Empty rhetoric must meet cold hard questions and reasoning. People who don’t tolerate criticisms must not face criticism but questions. Questions that stem from their rock hard support and shake their foundations. So surely, is support him compared to the lame duck but questions must be asked. This is a democracy and the greatest value in it is the skeptic. The loyalists has little value in a democratic set up.

In all that the same voice is that of the RBI Governor. He writes about how economic politics interplay for growth. He talks about the four pillars – Rule of Law, Democratic Accountability, Strong governance along with free markets play such an important role in a countries prosperity. And he talks about Hitler. I am been trying to explain the Hitler example to so many people. I keep making the same point, hitler was a tin pot dictator but he was elected democratically and then suspended elections and then became a force onto himself. He enjoyed the unwavering support of his people. People were ready to die for him – in millions! You would want to read the entire text of Raghuram’s speech here http://www.rbi.org.in/scripts/BS_SpeechesView.aspx?id=941. He explains how having one pillar less destabilizes the entire process and puts a country into peril. Economics and politics are completely intertwined.

Yo man! I love the skeptics. The Yo Skeptics. People who are skeptic but move ahead. They realize that whole hearted support may be stupid but you surely require whole hearted action. I love his ending paras as well.

“An important difference from the historical experience of other countries is that elsewhere typically strong government has emerged there first, and it is then restrained by rule of law and democratic accountability. In India, we have the opposite situation today, with strong institutions like the judiciary, opposition parties, the free press, and NGOs, whose aim is to check government excess. However, necessary government function is sometimes hard to distinguish from excess. We will have to strengthen government (and regulatory) capability resisting the temptation to implant layers and layers of checks and balances even before capacity has taken root. We must choose a happy medium between giving the administration unchecked power and creating complete paralysis, recognizing that our task is different from the one that confronted the West when it developed, or even the task faced by other Asian economies.

For instance, a business approval process that mandates numerous government surveys in remote areas should also consider our administrative capacity to do those surveys well and on time. If it does not provide for that capacity, it ensures there will be no movement forward. Similarly, if we create a multiple appellate process against government or regulatory action that is slow and undiscriminating, we contain government excess but also risk halting necessary government actions. If the government or regulator is less effective in preparing its case than private parties, we ensure that the appellate process largely biases justice towards those who have the resources to use it, rather than rectifying a miscarriage of justice. So in thinking through reforms, we may want to move from the theoretical ideal of how a system might work in a country with enormous administrative capacity, to how it would work in the actual Indian situation. Let me emphasize, we need “checks and balance”, but we should ensure a balance of checks. We cannot have escaped from the License Permit Raj only to end up in the Appellate Raj!”

I tried to explain some part of the speech to Jispa yesterday, and we were having a decent conversation on this when Jasmine ticked us off and told us to sleep. We have a skeptic at home as well :)

cobbling up some knowledge

I hate going down alone. I like to take someone with me for a short walk and possibly eat something or finish some work or something. This time I wanted to go down for getting my shoe laces replaced. They had frayed and I was worried that one day they would just snap. I took Dixi along and at the cobblers, he asked me which ones he wanted me to put  - the cotton ones or the nylon ones. This was all the invitation I needed to get as much information on them as possible. The cotton ones are the ones that look a little old and not shiney. They have a dull matt finish about them. The nylon ones look cool and shiney and you can clearly see the weave pattern on them. But the cotton ones are the ones that you want as they have the necessary friction to hold your boots together. The nylon ones keep opening up as they are too smooth. Hmmm. And everyone goes for the nylon ones as they are the ones that look good. He sells 10 times more nylon than cotton! Ah. I too would have chosen the nylon one without thinking. The cotton ones do look very old worldly.

Then I got him to polish my shoes as well. I was in the NCC since I started college and thanks to that I learnt the art of polishing shoes. We used to have a routine that was passed on. Every Sunday was parade and hence every Saturday evening was the ritual. You sit down with a  brush and a tin of polish and you start polishing your shoes. You polish and polish away. Then you take nylon cloth and then shine your shoes. And if that’s not enough, the rule was to then use liquid polish and put a layer on top of that! Wow that was colossal use or waste of polish, depending on the way you see it. It was a similar routine for all the brass that was there on the uniform. There were brass buttons on the cap, brass buckle for the belts and brass on the shoulder insignias. Here also I had brasso liquid and a cloth dedicated to this. A full 40 minute ritual every Saturday night. I think that’s a good discipline for a 16 year old boy. Some of that NCC discipline stayed on for a long time.

Now I find the process very messy and hence I just step down the office for a quick polish every time. So when the guy picked his nylon cloth to give the shoe a shine, I was wondering why the squeaky noise was missing. He said – it depends, sometime you get it and sometimes you don’t.  Stations in Mumbai were famous for having shoe shine boys. I sure that would a legacy of the British in India. These guys are officially there in every station. Left to our own we wouldn’t have ever thought of having them here. It’s the marriage of the British love for trains and shiny shoes. I told the cobbler that the train guys make a huge squeaky noise when they use the cloth. He said they use a different cloth. I wondered that possibly those guys would have a special secret on the type of cloth to be used that made the sound.

I told Dixi that the noise is a call to action, like a ice cream cart bell. It tells people that come an dget your shoes polished. IN any case, Dixi was reeling under the amount of information that we got while getting a simple shoe lace. One should always ask. These kids call me Jugal… who is Jugal – brother of Google. Because I seem to know so much on so many things. I told Dixi that you guys call me Jugal, but the answer is here. It’s just that I am curious on everything and I ask and hence I know. So next time a topic on shoe laces comes up I will know, how a cotton shoelace is better than a nylon one.

Everyone has something to give as value to someone else. If someone spends time doing something as a profession it’s obvious that they will be knowing some angle of it better than anyone else.  The key is to ask the right questions. And their inner secrets will be exposed to you. ASK

look inside to sell outside

What are job interviews? How difficult they are when you are just starting off?

I remember my first job interviews. It always work when you are confident and you get into the room thinking I don’t really care what happens after this interview. That’s the way you max your interview. You simply tell yourself you don’t need this. but there is a caveat. In the middle of my career I was so high on this that I went into interviews and possibly came across as an arrogant prick. Who wants an arrogant prick?

The key to an interview is not all this – but simply being earnest and sincere. You have to go in confident about yourself. Of course you can’t behave that you want the job, cause that will turn the other guy into an ‘employer’. You want him to turn into a position where he believes that you can actually change his business for him. That’s what I think worked the best for me. I stumbled upon this by chance one day. I was interviewing because I thought I could use a higher pay but not because I wanted the job. So I went and then in the middle of the interview, I asked him about his issues and then tried to explain to him why it won’t work with his current approach and how he could improve. That was the first interview that I think I did exceedingly well. Now I try and convert my interviews into meetings. Friendly meetings where I am trying to genuinely learn about the interviewer and his business. Hopefully we can depart after having an intelligent conversation. That is the best thing to be gained from an interview.

Of course you lose the ones that you have pricks on the other side who think they know it all and wouldn’t be less bothered if their business plan bombed in their face. You don’t want to work with them at all. I like to say a simple thing like you try and play to your strengths because if you do get the job you like to get a job that rewards your strengths. This is actually the best strategy. But try telling that to someone who needs a job change desperately. That one wants to be all the interviewer wants him to be. Then it’s the simple thing of being a great sales man.

I remember some lectures / professors from school. Sometimes you don’t know what made an impact in your life. It takes so much time to know what was the best advice you ever received or the best lecture you ever attended. This one I am referring to my sales professor in b school. It’s a pity that I don’t remember his name.  He started his lecture with a  simple truth – he asked us – what is the most thing that motivates a sales man. After ten minutes of answers that we farted out – the answer came from Cherian – who said – money. I remember the prof calling him and shaking hands with him. That’s it – Money. The other one thing he taught me was that amongst the best thing that a sales man will have is motor mimicry. I am not sure if I get this term right but basically – he talks about the sales man to imitate the prospect. He copies the body language and tonality and almost every mannerism.

On Saturday I was teaching some of this stuff to the kids at college and I distilled my experience in to two words that I thought was very cool. Enthusiasm and Empathy. He first needs to be enthu about his product that he is selling and that has to be translated to the prospect. Only if he is enthusiastic about the product then only is he able to transfer his enthusiasm, because so many times what are we buying? Everything is so similar to each other and there is little differentiation between products and services. And this is especially important if there isn’t a packaged product that we are buying. So we just go by the basic feel of the sales man we are talking to. His enthusiasm is what sells.

Empathy is the foundation of the mimicry that he does. A good sales man is one who feels deeply about his prospect. While he is genuinely enthu about his product, he is also concerned about the prospects life and his needs and his deep unstated / stated desires. This is what makes him want to understand the prospect and then on this understanding is where the enthu builds and BAM… Sales.

This is the same technique in an interview. Genuine enthusiasm about your product or service (Self-confidence) meets Deep empathy (right banter). This is an unstoppable force. I think in many ways Malcolm Gladwell also agrees with me. See below

Free bonus video, the wordings of which are possibly apt for the blog I wrote. It’s a weird connection. I am not saying be selfish but be matlabi in a nice way. There is a niceness inherent in you that you have to harness to get your sales pitch right!

Matlabi, ho zhara matlabi…. I love the song in any case… its got a lovely ring to it!

the futility of a pig wrestle

I guess we just don’t understand what collateral damage is. Or what the value of peace is. We discount what we don’t have and hence we are not hesitant to drum up strife. Our friend from France is here and recently France saw a gruesome terror attack and murder.  The targets were popular cartoonists who ridiculed all religious dogmas including the Muslims. It was sad. Killing cartoonists is taking things a little too far. It just shows how sensitive we are to being ridiculed. Hmmm. After this we had the normal people who of course want action to be taken against a community as a counter measure. Sigh.

Today while I was driving from work, I heard a podcast about vaccination. When the CIA tried to ascertain if Osama Bin Laden was actually inside the compound at Abbotabad, in Pakistan, they recruited a doctor whose was told to go in and collect DNA samples in the guise of a vaccination campaign. After the news leaked out, vaccinations sponsored programs especially by foreign countries took a hit. It seems, vaccinations were banned enmasse by the Taliban, more 65 health officials killed and Pakistan saw a reemergence of Polio with more than 200 infections. Uff.

Was the CIA right in doing what it did? At the time I read the news and thought nothing of it. I would have said sure. If its mission is to kill a national fugitive then its it, go for it. but when you think of the collateral damage it has on society, on children who will suffer from it, and the generations that will pay… you want to think again. I am sure the argument is not that simple. People will make choices given their immediate goal. Who knew what the consequences would be. Surely there would be more killed if the man wasn’t taken out. These are complex questions to which we don’t know how much impact our current actions will have on future lives. Things are fast evolving and changing. Perspectives are changing and nothing is really straight and simple. What to do in such circumstances?

I am visualizing a  Hollywood movie where the polio emergence in Pakistan thanks to this action of the CIA creates a new mutated virus that enters USA and that everyone stops Americans from travelling anywhere and large walls are built around the country. Trust the Hollywood writers to think of any thing outlandish.

I am not for once, preaching inaction. A man has got to do what a man has got to do. But sitting in the confines of safety it is easy to preach war. What we know of its effects and after effects. Israel is still fighting over the land it fought over many years. Who started it, who felt wronged and who is to blame.

See this video and tell me:

Sometimes it is just best to live and let bygones be bygones. Kill, Finish, attack, nip in the bud, these are terms we bandy about loosely. We whip up sentiment and forget lessons from history. I have no clue why can’t just let it be. Why is it so difficult to be a pacifist, why do we need to take action, especially on moral grounds? Today’s newspapers talk about a Goa minister trying to set up a rehabilitation centre for gays and lesbians. What on earth is that? It wasn’t too long ago when Alan Turing was the hero of England for helping them decode the Enigma code used by German communications. Later he was arrested for homosexuality and then ‘treated’ for it. Today we again call him a great hero and apologise for our moral uprightness.

Stop this morality. I love the simple thing of the declaration of human rights – Man is born free and shall remain free. He is free to do what he wants as long as he does not harm others. That’s it. How difficult is it for the courts to acknowledge this?

BTW – Jispa got chosen for the scholarship interview on the basis of this essay she wrote – the greatest invention was that of the declaration of Human Rights!

BLAH! But thing I have learnt in all this. to laugh off when someone tries to rile you on your views. To not get pulled into an argument. As I always tell – when you wrestle with a  pig, he loves it and you get dirty.

Jump jump!

A  few years ago … and I have blogged about this… I used to teach Jispa elocution and then she nominated herself into a singing competition. She thought, it would be simple, dad will teach me. Of course she did not even qualify, with me as her teacher.  This time it was sports day! Her school is actually quite a small school. In sense – that there are only two divisions in her standard – so that 60 kids per year and that too is divided into girls and boys. So in a sports day competition – there is hardly any competition. At best you have to beat 120 girls as the age groups span two years. For sports within girls that a dumb ass number. That is no number. Three fourths in any case don’t know how to run or jump. And from the remaining there will hardly be anyone who does serious training.

So this time Jispa had to choose her track and field events. Go for the long jump and the high jump. I told her. She had no clue what a high jump was. She was wondering how they would judge who jumps the highest. She thought it was like how you jump while standing up, jumping high. Haha. Jispa is so underexposed at times. But I explained how it’s done and left it at that. Yesterday morning I come to know that the trials were on for that day. Ok. How do you explain what to do to jump high? First, one had to explain how high jump actually works. So while going to school in the car, I just simply got her to switch on youtube and search for high jump. There… now you understood. Now she understood what high jump really was. Then I told her that that will not work as that Olympic technique of jumping from your back is next to impossible without serious…. Really serious training. So I told her to search or the straddle style for high jump. She searched for it and understood. I said that’s the way you do it. She got it and then in the evening I got the message that she got a bronze. It was a stupid thing in the end. I had told her a few things that I thought were technique – don’t jump of two legs (I don’t think that’s allowed) and approach the jump from an angle. I told her to throw her upper body when she jumps. I had no clue what advise I was giving her, but it seemed to make sense for me. She then told me that she got the hang of it after a few jumps. They kept raising the bar; till one girl cleared the bar and the other three were left trying. At the end – all three trying for the second and third place couldn’t clear so when it was close to finishing time, the sir just declared from whatever he saw – one girl as the silver medalist and Jispa as the bronze medalist. Whatever. So great. Youtube meets Jispa meets Bronze. That too with Jispa being the youngest amongst them all.

But what I found most interesting is that I pulled out the word straddle style from some deep corner of my memory. I remember reading about this if I am not mistaken in a book we had at home when I was Jispa’s age. It was the Guinness book of world records, in which there was a mention of the high jump record with a photo of one guy with a caption that said, that he was the guy who jumped the highest with the older straddle style of jumping. After 30 years, I came to use that little bit of information to help my daughter do well.

You should always read and it’s doesn’t matter what you remember – you never know what is going to come your way. What is it that you will retain and use and at which time. I used a word after 30 years and it helped explain and mean something to someone I love. What more can you ask for?

So what exactly is straddle style?

And If I had the time I would have possibly discussed this link with her in detail. That would have been fun. Key thing I missed – get your other leg high… but hell. There is only so much you can do with swimming taking away all the time we have.

guide to the future and past

I have on my left hand something that also tells me the time. I bought the Moto 360. It is basically a smart watch. On a lot of the mobile revolution I was wrong or caught napping. When mobiles first came out, I thought they were hardly of any use. Then when Black Berrys made a lot of noise, I was late onto the market. I couldn’t understand what the fuss was all about. What do you get by checking your phone regularly for email? Why would you need that? And of course all those investment bankers in their suits in the lifts, spending eth valuable 30 seconds to see their mail as opposed to simply saying hi, or at the least acknowledging the presence of another human being. So when the iPhone first came out, I too was unimpressed. What use could it possibly have in my life.

The touch screen sensation missed me. I had just upgraded myself to the Black berry and used it for a good three years before one day; the BB gave up on me. I came back from a vacation and it refused to spring back to life. Now I recently saw a friend using the smart watch and I was hooked. My first reaction was what my measured reaction is – I am not spending that kind of money. No way. Why should I spend this money? I am a bit of a gujju here. Does it really add that much value to my life? Do I really need something like this? What use is it actually? I kept thinking about it and I realized that I am what I am because I understand technology very well. I am constantly ahead of the curve in technology, I read technology, I use technology then I can’t let the iPhone mistake to happen again. I must be there in the middle of it all. I must be the early adopter and I must see how it works and evolves. Today I claim to understand Google and what it does for me because I have seen it evolve from what it origins were. I see it as a human. If I understand its soul at its core it will bare it to me, with all its mysteries. So when the android wear 1.0 has launched, I should be stupid not to adapt to it first up. I must.

Coming back to the soul. Technology is nothing but the manifestation of the human mind. It tries to do what a mind has taught it to do. The inventor has a belief and a philosophy. What is that philosophy? We must understand it and we must internalize it. Once you understand this core, you will be in a position to leverage it for you.  Mathematics can do everything; it can twist the universe and bend it. It proves that the world is far more than what we can see. In fact it predicted what you cannot see and hence you have to look out for what you cannot see and then find it – aha – the black holes. But at the end of it, it also has a philosophy, that of its writer. So if you understand the writer then you understand his philosophy and then you can understand its core. Whenever I try t understand some math guy or some algo, I try and decipher its core philosophy. Once that’s done – you can understand where its come from. That’s why history is so interesting. Once you understand where you come from you can predict where you will go… atleast it will give you probabilities.

Here is one – you are what you eat

Researchers have found that people from rice-growing southern China are more interdependent and holistic thinkers, while those from the wheat-growing north are more independent and analytical.

The researchers call it “rice theory”, and they believe the psychological differences of southern and northern Chinese stem from their ancestors’ subsistence techniques – rice farming needs co-operation and planning; wheat farming requires less co-operation between neighbours.

…The last experiment assessed the nepotism, or group loyalty, of the participants. Students were given hypothetical scenarios and asked how they would treat friends and strangers in reaction to helpful or harmful actions. A defining characteristic of holistic culture is that people draw sharp contrasts between friend and stranger.

“The data suggests that legacies of farming are continuing to affect people,” Thomas Talhelm, of the University of Virginia and lead author of the research, said. “It has resulted in two distinct cultural psychologies that mirror the differences between East Asia and the West.”

Talhelm and his team concluded that the co-operative nature of rice-growing has cultivated a culture of interdependence, while wheat-growing has cultivated independence.

“I think the rice theory provides some insight to why the rice-growing regions of East Asia are less individualistic than the Western world or northern China, even with their wealth and modernisation,” Talhelm said.

We went to Elephanta recently and I had read up on it before hand. I had a book that I had bought many years ago but we never did manage to go to Elephanta island. Here we took a local guide but I soon asked him to keep quiet. He got his facts wrong. I started off explaining to the kids what each statue was and the significance of the story behind it. Each one is a picture that tells a moral much like Aesop’s fables. It was lovely. I also did not know how much I knew. Now I plan to read more and more and then I want to be a guide at least to Elephant. I want to explore the island and go often enough. I want understand it more. This is near home, it is exquisite and then let me see if I can do guiding to Elephanta for certain tourists on weekends. I would love to be a guide. Today I know more and I can explain more than most guides on the island. I know the stories and the mythology behind it. The significance of Shiva murals and the other gods in it. Just a little more research and I could be in business. What say? I want to be a guide that says – come along – really low or free to join and work completely on tips. If you like you pay, else it’s up to you. Just like teaching – money can’t be the motivator. In teaching you don’t get or want tips, but here that is critical. If I am able to make it fun and happy for all, who knows, this could be a great source of self-fulfillment. Teaching helps me learn so much, being a guide will also help me. I want to be a guide. Elephant is the perfect starting block.

I was speaking o Jispa about Elephanta and was asking her about the trip. She then remarked that if I loved history and mythology so much, why I didn’t pick it up as a career or something. What to do… in school, I hated history which was nothing but a bunch of dates to remember. I remember asking mom – what use is history to us? Hmmm.. today I try and explain the importance of these subjects to Jispa. They are important. Yesterday I was explaining why civics is important. And I explained how she wouldn’t appreciate it now, it’s almost impossible to appreciate it as a young kid but it is extremely important to understand how we are governed… by ourselves and how the structure is critical to be understood by every citizen. I have to teach her civics one of these days… I hope I can teach it without boring the crap out of her.

driving home a point

Movies like PK and OMG are on one side and movies like Ship of Theseus are on the other side. PK and OMG have taken a stand. God men are really not what they seem. Blind faith is WRONG. You are getting fooled and in many ways you need a misfit to question them all. Both these movies question god men on supposedly logical grounds but unabashedly believe in God. I find the stand a bit illogical. On a premise of cold rationale and logic and science – belief in God itself to my mind is questionable. But let’s not start that debate … not yet at least. But they take a stand and once you take a stand you tend to preach and once you tend to preach you tend to be the same as what you oppose – a preacher. Can you oppose a preacher by preaching? Hmmm…

That’s what I think is wrong with the films. They preach. On the other hand, I believe a film like Ship Of Theseus tries to also take a stand but not by preaching but by discourse, by question. It lays open a situation (rather 3 situations) and doe smore to spread religious belief and further society by question than by decision. But therein also lies a problem. The number of people who have seen Ship… versus PK is starkly different. By a matter of hundreds I would guess.

Tipping Point is alovely book by Malcolm Gladwell. I started reading it but thought at first that it was ok ok, and then my Guru – Dharen Chadha starting reading it one evening and by next day morning he had a strategy presentation to be made out of it. I felt so dam embarrassed and he showed me how to read a book. The book argues that for a fire to start you need a tipping point. To get there you don’t need to sell to everyone. Just the right people – the mavens. Who are mavens? – “A maven (also mavin) is a trusted expert in a particular field, who seeks to pass knowledge on to others. The word maven comes from Hebrew, meaning "one who understands", based on an accumulation of knowledge.” It is these people who need to be touched and then the message is to be passed on. Therefore then Ship is doing a far better job of spreading a question than possibly PK would be. PK would try and spread a message by strong use of media. It tells to believe just so… But if I challenge you to think and then if I challenge you to see other sides of a question, if I plant just a seed in your head, it’s enough. I think a seed is far more powerful than a tree transplanted.

A slow movie in that sense is like a book. A book allows you to reflect, set your pace, reflect, pick up and read on. A slow movie possibly also does that. It continues to grip you but at the same time allows you to question, think and reflect. It allows for a seed to firm implanted. A big bang commercial movie is like a tree that is trying to be implanted in loose soil. It may hold for some time but a strong gust of wind might just blow it over.

Over the years in my teaching style as well, I have moved from trees to seeds. I question, I push, I ask. I keep thinking and urge the kids to think as well. I try to throw seeds in the tilled soil. Earlier I used to throw a conept at them every lecture. Teach and move on. Now I have changed a lot of my style. I have many lectures, all different examples but try and firmly put in one seed. One common seed through many different ways. Who knows which one will sprout, where, when. The idea is to keep hammering one idea… hard. And also I think it’s amazing if subjects in each year can essentially be driven around one idea… one central idea. The rockbed of what you can actually take away from the topic. That would be pretty cool, and usefull. Suddenly subjects can have so much more meaning. Hehehehe… to have more meaning reduce the idea… opposites reconciling anyone?

lies, dammed lies and even more dammed truth

The internet is dead. Long live the internet. Recently I have had this epiphany. Well it’s not that sudden as an epiphany might denote, but it’s come off late. In the last ten years of reading stuff, I have learnt that nothing is the truth. Nothing is the whole truth, the complete truth and nothing but the truth. Everything is questionable. Everything has a bias and everything is subjective. My guru Dharen, said something once. He said – there is science and then there is truth. He spoke about his experience with Parachute hair oil. He said there is science that hair oil doesn’t permeate the scalp more than a certain level and has possibly no effect on the brain function… but there is also the truth that during exam time, my mom puts oil in my hair and then I study and what all I study goes through in the brain. There is science and then there is truth. See – this is the truth – there is no real complete truth. We search for truth everywhere in our lives and place such a premium on it. But in effect there isn’t any! Everything becomes exciting when it offers to tell the truth but then slowly slowly it starts lying. But if there is no truth there can’t be lies as well. But surely there is obfuscation and theories that come from either side as either side use the new propaganda to convince the world of their side of the equation.

Basically I have become a skeptic of everything. Earlier newspapers were the upholders of truth. Today only a fool will believe whatever a newspaper will tell you. But as I see around me – there are tons of fools. A book I read many years ago – called ‘mindset’ by john nasbitt – in which he said –I turn to eth sports page as I know that is the only bit of truth in the newspapers. The score is the score. Today when I came to office I picked up the Bombay time – the tabloid edition of the daily newspaper. A young kid in the team asked me – is that the first thing I read. No – I replied. I read the paper today at home. The first thing I read is the sports page of the Times of India. Then I read some other pages, then I read the first article of the Mumbai Mirror. The Mumbai mirror on the first page will generally take up some expose of something that is ailing Mumbai – some civic or social issue. I like that article. And then to get insights into what the world is veering towards in terms of attitudes and expectations I look at the Bombay times. So first fact, then interpretation and then fiction… as a marketer – all three are important in different circumstances – I would even veer towards saying it’s in the wrong order. Fiction is extremely important for marketers… movies (read: popculture) tell us the most about ourselves…

So newspapers also lie. Then came the internet. The internet with its promise of democratizing information gave so much of it to all and sundry. Now people were not and will be not judged by what they know but how well they will search. This was told to me by a very intelligent man – one of my first mentors – Aditya Shastri. This was in 1997 when I first saw the internet in his office. It was pretty cool. His words have become prophetic. With internet now reaching mobile phones, information has exploded in terms of what is available in the palm of your hand and everywhere you are. So conversations in parties that talk about certain data used tobe done from memory and now if some contentious point comes out – the internet comes to the rescue and closes all conversation. I hope with this getting more and more omnipresent people will be more circumspect in what they talk. They will possibly learn to use words like ’from my memory’, ‘possibly’, ‘likely’, ‘mostly’, ‘I believe’ etc… cause anything said will and can be verified by a quick mobile search.

So I loved that google would be able to help us a lot on spreading knowledge and information. It truly allows us to do tons of research and helps us find the ‘truth’.  I used to joke that whats the internet to believe anything. Tomorrow I would write something and if it ranks on google then would that make it true? Today google has become the answer for what you want as the answer. Whatever you want you will get google to answer that for you. You want to know how microwave is bad for you – there will be billions of links – ditto for why this is all a sham. Just because its forwarded or on a link that looks nice, doesn’t make it true. So many people believe any shit that they see. In the middle there was a video of a lion roaming around in thane… people believed it to be true… er… one question – Which is the LAST refuge of the Asiatic lion? THE LAST REFUGE? You idiot. You don’t get lions outside Gir in India.

So the omnipresence of google is going to be used for both parties – the for and the against. Its up to you to analyse the data presented. The past possibly belonged to the believer – the future with so much data will belong to the skeptic. Everything is but a probability. You play probabilities. You read everything, listen everything, trust nothing and build your beliefs, values and judgment. That’s all.

Inshallah!

Sometimes it becomes so difficult to get the racist out from inside of us. On Sunday was one example – I was standing by the road waiting for Jasmine to pick me up. On the side of the road was a car standing. Oddly – as parking isn’t allowed there. There was no one in the car and I saw that one of the tyres had a flat. On the Back of the car were the words – Insah Allah. I wasn’t  going to stand anywhere near this car.

Many years ago, when I was in 12^th standard, Mumbai faced the most devastating terrorist bombing ever. Some 13 bomb blasts were set off in a span of less than a few hours. That was the first time that Mumbai was hit thus and everyone now understood what RDX (the explosive used) was. I passed through two of those spots just in the morning. I was trying to learn magic with a local magician at Shivaji Park. So I passed Sena Bhavan and Plaza Cinema that morning and the blasts were at around the afternoon. It was a lucky miss I guess. One explosion was setoff at the Bombay Stock Exchange. It seems that in a freak case, one person called up home to say he was safe after the Exchange blast and that he was coming home, and he was caught in the second blast at Worli. That was especially sad.

Mumbai has faced more attacks designed to cause terror since. Once there were a series of train bombings. A friend of mine told me that he was in the very compartment that was bombed. I felt that too as I used the train network to travel to work and home. Then there was the really infamous attacks by armed intruders on the Taj and CST station and The Oberoi hotel amongst others. My office was in the building right opposite the Oberoi hotel and from there I travelled to CST station to come home. That day I left at 6 sharp from work. It seems the attackers were planning to reach CST at 6 pm to cause maximum impact. They were stuck in traffic and reached by around 7.30. I missed those as well by a whisker.

In hindsight, if I was around, and hopefully safe, it would have been an interesting grandfather tale for the kids. Growing up in Mumbai and witnessing these attacks as well as riots of 1991, a Mumbai man is possibly hardened compared to most other cities. It hurts less and life goes on as normal faster than what it possibly would to another. I grew up in interesting times – riots, bomb blasts, attack and gangsters. Of course – the eighties were when the gangsters rules. There was an interesting story in the papers or a shootout or something or the other happening. Things are pretty much silent these days. I think it was a Chinese Curse that said “may you live in interesting times”.  Boring is good!

When I grew up I grew in charged times – the poor Muslim was an obvious target of religious discrimination. The same way a black male in US would face suspicion any Muslim male in India would face similar discrimination. It was us peace loving Hindus versus the fanatical Muslims. It has been a tough and long journey to conquer this racism and rise above. Its definitely not easy.  I try my best to tell myself whenever I see myself behaving stupidly – DON’T DON’T . We can’t be propagating it.

But when I see a car seemingly abandoned in the middle of the road (especially worli) and it’s got allah written on it in bold. I would like to wait a little further away. Nicely behind a tree. Ami being safe… Am I being racist… am !?

bouncing back

Recently an international aussie cricketer got hit on the head while batting. It was freak shot and he sadly went into coma and passed away. The cricket ball is a really potent weapon in the right / wrong hands. I played my entire cricket in the dust bowls of Mumbai. Here when the bowler bowled most of the time he wasn’t that fast – we played corporate cricket – old misfits playing the game. Some would be genuinely quick but the dust bowls of India would not let the ball come anywhere higher than the waist. So when I went into bat I would have minimum padding on. Good gloves are essential as the ball has a knack for variable bounce and pads are of course important. In variably the low bounce would mean being rapped on the pads near the shin area. That was more than enough. No need of helmet or an arm guard. Of course no one ever made the silly mistake of going without a groin guard. That was extremely essential :). I remember the humble groin guard. When Jispa first saw it lying around in my kit she was putting in around her knee. She thought it was a knee guard. Err… yes sure. Only when I went opening or higher up the order I would use the thigh pad. There is no point using the thigh pad after ten overs. The ball stopped doing anything  - no swing, no bounce, it would just sit up there and wait to be hit. In Mumbai with the afternoon heat – even in winters – you are sweating like crazy and hence you want to carry as less padding as possible. The padding would just sit there and absorb the sweat and become heavy. It would become tough to run in them. I remember being hit when I first starting playing on the thigh. After that I don’t really remember being hit at all.

The bowlers would occasionally bowl the bouncer but most of the time it would really be a beamer that slipped out of the hand and that is the easy one to duck out of. I always ducked, never hooked, why do bravado when you get a no ball for it? Once or twice I have been at the receiving end of a well directed bouncer. A well-directed bouncer is bowled to intimidate the batsman and push him on the back foot. In Mumbai grounds, you generally take your guard a step ahead; this negates most of the late swing movement and almost certainly rules out most LBWs. If you stand ahead there is always reasonable doubt that the ball is going to hit the stumps and then you are saved. My captain Arun Solanki always taught me stay in front and out of the crease. And ensure that the umpire sees you come up. Then it’s the wicket keeprs job. The only way to get you back should be that wicket keeper comes up to the crease to keep wickets and then you as a batsman want to come back or risk getting stumped. That’s the way I always played my cricket. Step up and hit. I hardly got an LBW decision against me.

I remember the one time when a bouncer was intentionally directed at me. I had just driven the bowler on the front foot back behind him and got a boundary. The next ball was a awesome bouncer directed at my nose. I jumped and swerved out of it and avoided it. The umpire gave a no ball and warned the bowler. The next ball I still came on the front foot and again drove him. Sorry dude – it takes more than a bouncer to put me on the back foot. After I took a single the umpire told me that the bouncer was well directed and I did well to move out of the line. He said I did it well because I did not get my eyes off from the ball and hence I could adjust till the end and got my head off the trajectory. See the bouncer below. The one near the 1 min and 24 second mark was similar to the way I moved  - a jump and a swerve.

In Mumbai grounds the biggest danger of getting hit is while fielding. With the pitches so densely packed, you have to worry about the other match where you may be standing right where the batsman is looking at an empty spot from his perspective. One strong pull could put you out of action for some time.

Cricket is an aggressive game. Not playing a shot or ducking from a bouncer is an act of aggression. You know the rules; you have to play that to your advantage. Sledging or over hitting aggressively is not necessarily the aggression you want to show.

Here is a bonus video. Not directly related but it’s there – reason. Use cold and hard reason and you should be good. There would be no reason to do bravado when reason will tell you to just be smarter.