try em, dry em

Economic slowdown does throw up some funny insights into human behavior. Let me explain one such… the admin fellows were set upon cost cutting in all possible ways. One of the holy cows that they decided was not so holy was tissues in the bathroom. Well the tissue rolls nest to the pot were definitely holy cow but the paper napkins next to the basin were obvious manifestations of sin. So precise excel sheet calculations showed that these alone cost the company more than 3 lakhs a year. Off they go. The gloomy external environment ensured the silence. And the dam hairdryer was there since inception in case you wanted to dry your hands.
I for now was completely for it. I grew up without it and I though it was a colossal waste. The hand dryer was there and so was the humble roomal (napkin) in your pocket. Didn’t your mother ensure you always went with one? It was pinned to your shirt in kindergarten, so that you don’t lick your runny nose outflows. Whenever I saw the dustbin full of used crumpled tissues, I felt that the culture had gotten a bit too far. Especially when people use more tissues when one should be enough.
So there, in place of the tissue dispenser, there remained two screws as a mute testimony to what had been.
But here is the interesting part. I now see people in front of the dryer…well.. drying. Nothing interesting till you see what they are drying – it’s the humble napkin that their momma (or wife) put in their pockets! I assume they wash their hands, take out the napkin, wipe their hands and then hold out the napkin in front of the dryer and dry their napkins. It is true. If only my cell camera worked I would shown you the picture. And this is not an isolated incident. I have seen multiple people so this. Stand in front of the dryer for some time (they dry that fast) holding them by the edges, turning the dam thing over. I wonder what this would have done to the electricity bill, though! Its fun to watch them. What must be the reason for this behavior? Would an economist theorize?

On another note when was the last time an ad made you get goose bumps?
Watch this one…



I dont about you but I felt something

pop...she goes

Jispa wanted to stay up till late one fine day. Jasmine told her, sure you can. But you need to then get up on your own, get ready on your own and have your breakfast on your own. When you sleep late we have a tough time getting you ready for school. So do this for a month (prove you can) and you can stay late. This was the deal jasmine cut with her. Since I was the one waking and bathing her (and enjoying it), I felt cut off from the deal. Yesterday she woke up, had her bath got ready… all on her own. We just told her the alarm is ringing wake UP. So I was feeling a bit sad that she has finally grown up and I would not be required… for now…
Today when we woke her up, we told her… come on… get up and do your stuff on your own.. she replied “aaaa…ummm…I bunking that today…” pop she went back…

Well good times don’t last do they?

Completely unrelated - I came across this awesome quote:
I have found the best way to give advice to your children is to find out what they want and then advise them to do it.

what does angel know

While the house work is on we are staying at our brother’s place. The highlight of the stay is obviously his dog Angel. Its great fun to come home and get greeted by Angel. She is so loving and adorable. I do need to thank Angel for helping overcome some mind block. Getting kissed by a dog is one. Especially if you consider that a dog kiss is actually a dog lick. I take my lips in and put my face close to her when I come home. Awesome. In the morning its also fun to get greeted by Angel as she comes out from my brother’s room. Jispa and I await her.
Quetsion of the day was posed to me today morning by Jispa as she was playing with Angel. “Does a dog know it is a dog?” Err….. “Ask her”. “PAPA!”… “ok… ok.. I don’t know” I answer. Then she goes “does a dog know she is running, sitting, rolling over. does she know?”.
Actually I haven’t a clue. It is a good question Jispa, is all I can think of. I have no clue if a dog knows she is a dog. I guess the domesticated ones kind of live human lives but I sure know that many humans don’t know they live a dog’s life.

let no one tell you...

My blackberry camera has gone on the blink and I do feel quite handicapped without it. Its so much fun to spot something, capture and blog it. But I guess I will have to do something else till such time.
But the of the loss of the camera is replaced by the joy of discovering something awesome. http://www.ted.com/ . It is an awesome site where they put up talks of some amazing people for viewing. The best part is that talks are timed for about 16 minutes forcing people to talk on only what is absolutely relevant and important. It’s just about the time that human brain can focus.
Today I came across (serendipitous) a talk by Ben Saunders. I just love experts talking about their … err…“expertise”. Sports persons especially so. I guess it’s the visible triumph of human achievement. Cracking the genetic code might be of greater consequence or difficulty but a sports person’s achievement has more empathy as we all have felt our own limitations at our arena.
Coming back to Ben Saunders. In 2004, Ben Saunders became the youngest person ever to ski solo to the North Pole. An absolute triumph of human achievement. But the most striking part about the talk is the last bit when he talks about his school report card as a 13 year old. The report card is a telling on the understanding our education system. He says he has framed it and it lies on his wall. It says:

"Ben lacks sufficient impetus to achieve anything worthwhile"

Ben’s response to it:

“No one else is the authority on you potential. You are the only who decides how far you go and what you are capable of”

Well said Ben. Well said.

his talk...

further Ben reading...

please my I disappear? NO, shut up and sit down.

V-inu calls me and wishes me. Then he calls me later in the day saying – he read my post and wants to take back his wishes. Gladly… then he says have you heard Time by Pink Floyd. We search it up and the lines he wants me to read –
And you run and you run to catch up with the sun, but it's sinkingRacing around to come up behind you again The sun is the same in a relative way, but you're olderShorter of breath and one day closer to death
This is what he tells everyone when they come and wishs him. You bloody morose sadist. Then dear V gets our third part of the triumvirate Dee-nesh to read my last post. So Dee-nesh calls up and says I am not wishing you because I read the blog. Ok thank you. How thoughtful of you. He gives me gyan on the improbability of disappearing on this wonderful day. Thank you again for bearing with me. What are friends for after all…
So I am signing off with my disappearance wish highly unfulfilled. I am such a complainer. almost v-inuesque. Actually i am unfair to him. its not that he complains but he is actually angry with the world. Why? Ithink he loves it but hates the fact that he loves it. SOmething like that... nahhh... I am just being mean. He's a good guy. I'll vouch for that. Dee-nesh? Oh, he always was...

who's got the blues?

I remember as a kid counting the days till my birthday. I even remember once counting up to 60 or was it 90 odd days. While we were in Dubai till the 3rd standard my birthday used to fall in the summer vacations so I was mighty excited to shift to Mumbai. I would finally get to wear colored clothes and distribute sweets. Be the centre of attention… ya.. That was good. I liked it. Surely did. Slowly it moved to college where I wanted ot get gifts, cut cakes and again be a star for that day. Cut to office… the fun of celebrating with office guys, cutting cakes etc…. cut to now…..I want to disappear. I have no reason why I am so unexcited by my birthday. I almost forgot I, I didn’t realize it was this week and I gave strict instructions to my gang in office that I will not accept any gifts this year.
I did not bargain on social networking sites publishing the information to all … today I got a few wishes in advance and a few calls asking me my plans.
I really wished for this birthday to be invisible. I wanted no one to wish me, no one to gift me anything, and no one to hug me for sure. Jispa and Jasmine – you are excluded. Angel – you are ok too… I love your kisses any time.
Its not being depressed and morose… it’s just that I feel like being alone, away and reflective. More than being celebratory. I dunno… Actually I just wanted to forget it. But that’s not going to happen. So sit back and enjoy it while it lasts. Thank god its just one day. And like most other things in life... this too shall pass.

fast blow

Yesterday was my tryst with an unmitigated disaster. Jainism has this 8 days of fasting. And am really not the religious types. But since the last couple of years I have been doing a day fast. Basically surviving on water through the day. It’s my way of experiencing hunger or getting my self a detox. Full TP.
So this year I tried one fast yesterday. It went off well through the day – drinking tons of water. Evening the head started hurting and the weakness began to set in. I guess it was the loss of sugar or something. Also contributing was the fact that we have been staying at our in laws ever since the renovation work has been happening at our house – so that means generally sleeping later than usual. So I was sleep deprived. Then in the evening we happened to walk into a theatre and watch Kamine. A dark film with a dozen gangsters thrown in. That was the limit. At interval I stroll out with my head reeling and spinning very fast – I pop in a gelato ice cream and corn cheese nuggets. Later after the movie I drink juice and eat a pear before collapsing in the bed.
Either I was too tired to fast or too old. In any case it dealt my self esteem a decently large blow.

whose head is it in anyway?

I took Jispa to the Queer Parade yesterday. It ended up being quite a non event as far as Jispa was concerned. Before I took her I explained to her that you know who man can love women. “ya’. Man can also love man and women can also love women. “ya”. Ok. Ok. So that was that. A matter of fact for her and a revelation for mankind.

There I was showing her the transgenders and explaining that they are actually men who think they are women and therefore dress as women. “ohh .. ok”. We reached the parade at 3 sharp. Crowd was just about gathering and did not really go anywhere. The heat and the humidity were irritating. Soon enough we left there and headed back home. I guess the parade needs a bit of colorful characters to make it really loud and hence more noticeable. That would get the word flowing and the crowd going. One thing for sure was that I think Jispa was the only child there. So there. One step taken. I don’t know if the step was Jispa’s or mine.

return of the raj

In the era of cost savings I would be pretty sacred to requisition a duster for my white board. So while I have a whiteboard I don’t have a duster. But hell, this is India and labor is ridiculously cheap. In fact it is so cheap that if I have to use my white board, I use it and scribble away as much as possible. Then to erase it I simply call housekeeping. They have a guy on every floor. He comes in with his magic spray and cleans the board. Sometimes I tell him to lean it completely and sometimes I tell him to leave a part of it. I wonder if getting black boards or cheaper than buying your own duster (and helps spread employment) we should soon start this as an outsourcing activity. Don’t wipe it – Bangalore it…
I am not fibbing here. This actually happened. Here … it’s a good thing I have my handy cell phone camera, else you guys just wouldn’t believe me. Would you? I could get used to this. Isn’t this remnant of the raj?

open up

These days I have been reading about the kahp panchyat and how these administrative groups believe in regressive methods and are equally notorious as the Taliban. Any of these right wingers really get my goat. After all these ears we still remain enemies of love. The khap panchayat send out lynch orders for those marrying within the ‘gothra’ (sub sect). They try and control so many elements of life. It is so completely anal. But if I were to think a bit more, just about 15 years ago I had to face resistance from my would be in laws while getting married. Not that it was in any way so severe. They are pretty sweet and they were pretty willing to listen but the fact that they had to be convinced to start with is the point of contention. I am not so sure if my side of the family would have been as amiable if Jasmine had been a Muslim or a Christian. I duuno why would you have issues on this to start with? Why would love marriage be such a dam taboo? In fact one of the things that I am planning to do is go for the queer march on 16th august. I want jispa to know pretty early that she can choose her life partner and it surely can be any sect or sex. I would want her to know that love is truly blind.
The fun would happen in parenting if she gets a doper or a complete nincompoop home. Now that’s going to be one test for me as a father. Rest I am pretty ok with.
I guess the thing is to be a bit open in life. Its tricky but necessary to isolate the cause form the symptom. Yesterday was on case in point. Jasmine’s borther comes home from a prayer meet for a 4 teenagers who died while picnicking at one of Mumbai’s beaches. They had just about gone into the water (knee deep) when they were pulled by the currents. He came in exclaiming “I have decided, no more going to the beach. It is too dangerous”. As he looked at me I knew it would be slightly controversial but I had to reply “more people die in swimming pools than off beaches!” I remembered reading something in freakonomics on more people in US die of swimming pools in homes than guns kept at home (or something like that). My next line was also my favorite line which I use all the time “more people die crossing the road than while on a picnic”. He looked at me. A few invaluable moments of silence and reflection. “beaches are not any more dangerous than roads, but the problem is going in the water in monsoon. The currents are dangerous and are likely to sweep you off. So don’t stop living. Enjoy your beaches but exercise caution and use your brains. It is visibly rough in the monsoon. Stay clear. In calm waters, enjoy”. Tinggg….The score reads one nil.
On right wing fundamentalism – I also read that thanks to their male fixations the sex ratio is getting adversely affected. Wow. There is no better way to finish a race than to somehow produce only males. I could not have given them a better path to self annihilation. The words of Master Oogway from the movie Kung fu panda come to mind “One often meets his destiny on the road he takes to avoid it”

Yes. Master Oogway is one of favorite characters ever. Here is a snapshot of his immense wisdom.

Salt and pepper

There are fine dine restaurants and the then there are those which are not. How do you know one from the pretenders? Simple. Look at the salt and pepper bottles. The udipis and the fast food restaurant are the ones who have always got them wrong. There is no consistency in the bottles so as to indicate which is which. Is the ones with fewer holes the salt or is it the other way around. Or is it something to do with the size of the holes. I have seen innumerable diners including myself, completely confused as to which is which. We invariably test one and wonder what comes out. White – now take the other – wow…black… now we know. Sometimes you get two whites or two blacks. I think the best designs here are the transparent containers where there is no mistaking what’s inside. I don’t even trust the ones with the markings P and S on them. I can read but there is no guarantee that the lowest common denominator at the restaurant can. Add to that the sticky Mumbai weather which ensures that salt does not flow and what have you? A complete customer experience. Yesterday we were at this restaurant and when we asked for the salt and pepper. This is what they gave us. So how do you know which is which. Look closer….

The only way to know for sure is to tilt it and see what falls! or else you can smell it and hope the first one is not pepper.

While on the subject. How do you know if your lassi (thick butter milk) is really a thick lassi with malai (cream) in it. You do the spoon buoyancy test. See below. If it floats, it passes, if it sinks, then that’s exactly where it belongs – in the sink. Forgive the absolutely inelegant use of the pun.

make cars to improve life

Every book is interesting. Over the weekend I happened to come across ‘the Toyota way’ by Jeffrey Liker. The art and power of selective reading helped me finish it over the weekend. Don’t go by the book name. it might be primarily about the factory floor but as it was written on the cover – the Toyota way is much about the sate of mind as it is a car company. Very true. If I ever have to head a function that is high on process then the Toyota way will become an interesting book companion. The wikipedia has a comprehensive piece on the same.
While in college I was always enamored by the principle of kaizen meaning constant improvement. Little did I realize the importance of Hansei in Kaizen. The book talks about Americans being unable to really understand Hansei and my guess is that that is the reason why Kaizen does not show up on spell check while hansei does.
The obligatory pat on the back – I had been practicing a form (less intense I guess) of hansei through the last few years.
What is hansei? Hansei ("self-reflection") is a central idea in Japanese culture. Its meaning is to acknowledge your own mistake and to pledge improvement. In Japanese companies it's common practice that a manager expects hansei from his subordinates in case of mistakes. The manager takes the blame in public, whereas the department works on solving the problem. Hansei also means greeting success with modesty and humility. To stop hansei means to stop learning. With hansei one never becomes so convinced of one's own superiority that there is no more room or need for further improvement.
Many Americans have a very difficult time with the constant critiques and focus on the negative (opportunities for improvement). Andy Lund, a Program Manager at Toyota, explains it this way; “people who have not been to Japan may not understand that the objective is not to hurt that individual but to help that individual improve – not to hurt the program but to show flaws to improve the next program. If you understand that deeply, you can get through that constructive criticism. No matter how good a program or a presentation someone makes, we believe there is always something that can be improved, so we feel it is our obligation. It is not an ‘obligatory negative’ but an obligatory opportunity to improve – it is the heart of kaizen”
link1, link 2
I am reminded of the hindi lines uttered by Jasmine’s father “galti karo, sau baar karo, karte raho… par ek galti dubara mut karo” translation – make mistakes a hundred times, keep making them, but never repeat the same mistake.

The trick in life is not 'not to make mistakes'. But to make a lot of them and learning from them and to not repeat them. I have made my fair share and am continuing to make more than fair share of new ones. You can learn from other’s mistakes as well. That is a pretty cool short circuit process as well.
While the concept is easy to understand it is not so easy to implement. It requires one to be open to the fact that one is making mistakes. It requires deep introspection of the mistakes so as to never repeat them. A few years back I was into organizing large format events for our company. My subordinates used to call me ‘ravan’. I will come with my ten heads and think of new angles not visualized. Even after a highly successful event I would make time for introspection and the ‘obligatory negative / opportunity’. In events success can pretty much go to your head. I would try and guard against it. Yes it was a great event, but I am paid to do that. What is important is that we have lowered the probability of shit happening by thinking through and working hard. A 1% probability of anything happening then it means that in a hundred events that thing will definitely happen. With its occurrence will be the termination of my job. So after every event I would focus on the job, what went wrong, what could have gone wrong but didn’t, what went wrong but was controlled. I am generally less effusive in the praise unless I see something truly extraordinary. I don’t know if I should change that part of me though. Probably people deserve a bit of praise but I find it dishonest to give praise unless it truly deserves.
If one is reflective in success and failure then one understands the reason behind it and is able to better handle it. Both require handling and introspection…. Hansei

Another interesting concept is the Genchi Genbutsu. Go and see for yourself to thoroughly understand the situation. This is something I recently blogged about. Get off your high horse and outside your ivory tower and see for yourself what is going on. Extremely important for any function. I can vouch for that in marketing for sure.

A post script on the concept of praising:-
There is strategy involved in giving and interpreting compliments. Let’s say you hear someone play a difficult –but not too difficult– piece on the piano, and she plays it well. Is it a compliment if you tell her she played it beautifully?
That depends. You would not be impressed by the not-so-difficult piece if you knew that she was an outstanding pianist. So if you tell her you are impressed, then you are telling her that you don’t think she is an outstanding pianist. And if she is, or aspires to be, an outstanding pianist, then your attempted compliment is in fact an insult.
This means that, in most cases, the best way to compliment the highly accomplished is not to offer any compliment at all. This conveys that all of her fine accomplishments are exactly what you expected of her. But, do wait for when she really outdoes herself and then tell her so. You don’t want her to think that you are someone who just never gives compliments. Once that is taken care of, she will know how to properly interpret your usual silence.
source: http://www.marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2009/08/via-youknowwho.html

unemployment and a tooth

On Saturday my wife asked me to help her with making the theplas. Theplas is a type of gujju roti. So her job was to give me the dough all ready and in the right shape and I was to cook it on the stove. I had done this in the past before so I was pretty comfortable. As she churned out the raw material faster and faster the pressure was on me to keep the stuff going. Then Wifey comes out with one more pan and starts two at a time. On one pan the theplas get heated, then they get transferred to the other pan where I oil them on one side, cook a bit, then oil them on the other, cook a bit and throw them onto a pile. I was feeling pretty happy helping her finish the work fast. My servant also looked surprised to see me helping with the theplas. I was trying to do my part of the deal faster and was completely stressed out.
Then suddenly it struck me. I asked Jasmine “me helping is not really helping you do it faster is it? I think you would do all this without me at the same speed… isn’t it?” jasmine says “ya, I do all of this together at the same speed”
Hmmm… I remembered this theory of economics that we had learnt at college. I think it was in the first year. Suppose there is an acre of farm land that the farmer is tending to for years. After he has a couple of sons they to join in the farming as extra hands. So now we would have three heads employed, but if the productivity of the farm land has not gone up in the same ratio then we have what is called ‘disguised unemployment’. It just looks as if more are employed while the net effect is actually negative.
You get the drift….
Disguised unemployment at work.

One more tooth in the life of Jispa and her tooth fairy. Here is the long and shot of it. The ‘OK’ with the circle is her response to the entire episode. The no5 in the top corner is my wife clarifying which tooth number this is.

is it still big?

Conferences are done by various agencies. Some big some small. They have varying formats and objectives. But one thing remains the same. They are all extremely boring. I got one invite from a retail consulting firm and I just passed it on to the kids as there was an interesting element in the invite. I improve by copying enough! The kids instead looked and said – “please can we all go, PLEASE!” “What shit… I am not going to this shit. Its pathetic. But then they were all senti.. They thought just because I had seen it all I was refusing them the chance to be there. So I say fine... We go. Today was the day. I went in the morning and sat for one panel discussion. I saw no point in sitting further. I attended some other meeting in town and got back to office. But like every thing this too had a silver lining – we had Bhasker the MD of Titan talking. He is clearly way above the rest of the world. He has a fine marketing and business brain. Now I know why Jasmine’s brother goes gaga over the guy and company. He is truly quite a remarkable guy. He knows the difference between opinion, fact and feeling, and talks accordingly.
But the rest are still good old boring. The kids attended the entire thing. Now at least they will believe it when I say all conferences are boring. Conference jaane ka bhoot uthar gayeja. Speaker after boring speaker, power point fatigue and no insight. It’s amazing to see so many people with so little to do and that too from the top. I think its one these elephant bumping sessions… just making sure and reinforcing that your elephantine arse is still as big as ever.

what do you think about it?

"The new identity builds on and expands the foundation of investment expertise that we have created over decades. It has been crafted in line with the organization’s philosophy and endeavor to continuously unearth value and create a brand association in line with changing consumer paradigms. Against the backdrop of the global financial crisis, which completely altered the way financial institutions across the globe will function, we have recognized the shift in the Indian consumer's mood, orientation and mindset."

This is something I came across in my random surfing. What does it say… probably nothing. This is something we marketers put inside a press release and send it out to newspapers that end up carrying it. Most of the time they just paste it as is. No insight, no analysis. Monkey food. Look at the quote closely. It is about a brand with a new tag line. Does it help the brand? Does it give any insight into the reason for the change in line? You could take that paragraph and put it into any dam press release and no one would know. No one. I promise you. Whose fault is it? The PR person who drafted the release or the boss who had nothing to say? Both I guess. To use an old hindi one – taali donno haath se bajti hai. You need two hands to clap.

I many times see the insular nature of people as they move to the top. I had a bit of time to reflect on this as I was getting my shoes polished. The cobbler under the building take s around ten minutes to polish your shoes. He charges ten bucks but he keeps scrubbing your shoes. I realized that he would take quite some time soon enough. He had a decently clean shack and so I sat on seat made by the stones, next to him. Some peons of my office came to get their shoes repaired and were quite amused to see me happily sitting there. As the guys get senior they have access to peons and the workforce to do things for them. They come in AC cars, fly in planes, drink in five star joints and sit inside their cabins. They eat on their own and work on their own. Not too many guys venture outside their comfort zone. It’s funny how insular we can get. We then lose track of reality and how the world actually is…no wonder our insights are so bloody insular. The functional heads don’t meet customers, don’t really listen, don’t ask questions and generally give a miss to research happening around. I have seen this happen in every organization and at all levels. Even marketing managers commission research and then leave it to the agency to figure and present the findings in an air conditioned meeting room with butter biscuits. I have never understood why commercials are shown on a big screen in a darkened room with superior sound. Is that how most of your clients / customers going to see it? Their rooms are likely to have enough ambient noise and lighting. Simulate a home with the given distractions and show it on a 21 inch non flat TV. Now please tell what you think about it? Feedback please

daddy dearest

It is easily the most thankless job in the world. It ranks higher than sewer cleaners and marketing managers at financial firms. It is the job of waking up your kid for school. I can’t think of any job that is more necessary but is more despised by the beneficiary than this. As kids get older this gets tougher. They want to sleep more and more. They get even more lazy in the morning and even more ‘frowny’. But hell it’s a dog’s… oops a dad’s life and someone’s got to do it.
Wakey wakey wakey….
I too hated being made to get up and we were three kids. I don’t really blame my mother for screaming…. GET UP… mothers tend to be busy, hassled and on a short fuse in the morning. Jasmine so far has been quite patient. But I guess that’s because every day waking Jispa every day has been my job. I want to see Jasmine patient if she has to wake up Jispa every morning. It can be testing.

image-ination

Jispa was unwell and upset at having to miss school. I was taking her photo and she was avoiding getting shot. This is what we get...

Today is friendship day or something. Jispa's bus friend (as pictured) ties me a friendship band, 'uncle, I got a band for you as well' she said after tying one to Jispa. Gee thanks...

Coffee with cream. So sinful and so tasty. good thing my metabolism allows me these sins.

The Landmark store at pune. Landmark sure has an awesoem collection of books. Interestingly the giftwrapping is done by the security lady. A tough lady with deft hands. She wraps pretty neat. Even my wife was impressed. Jasmine does have very high standards.

Me and Dinesh. I couldnt have posed any more filmy!

awwww......

whew, that was close

Today I was in an office of ours in the morning. That office was in the process of moving as well. So there were boxes everywhere getting packed. As usual like everyone else, this too was a time for spring cleaning. An essential part of spring cleaning is shredding. You tend to accumulate papers by the kilo till you have to move on and then you are inclined them. While I was roaming around one office peon was assigned to shred tons of paper in one of the conference rooms. Nothing unsual. But suddenly something on his table caught my eye. There were two books – Search by John Battelle and Leadership by the Book by Ken Blanchard. I asked him what these were for. To shred he said. My eyes popped out and my heart skipped a beat. SHRED THESE? The Search is easily amongst the best book on search engines there is today. It well written, analysed and informative. It made me think and changed by outlook towards search. It is easily amongst the top books I have read. Ken Blanchard is a prolific writer. Normally I shun away from such books. I kind of like to call these self help for dummies who don’t know commonsense. But I have a read a few of Ken’s books and I found them to be good. I was surprised my self and it did take some amount of ego eating to say – they are actually good. Rare for a management book to be commonsense, basic, easy and good. Ken has that art. He does talk sense. So I asked the peon if he was sure he had to shred these. He said he had already shred one. Oh god! No matter how bad the book I would never be able to shred one. Even Snowball is still lying in my cupboard. The worst of all - give it to someone else. Let someone else figure what to do with it. Give it for free at eth nearest signal to the book seller. He might figure out a way to sell it to someone else. How can you shred a book? How? The book was not even opened. It’s a good thing I rescued those babies from imminent danger. Just in time.

school blues

Jispa had been a bit under the weather on Monday. Jasmine was called into school to take Jispa back as she had fever. As she realized that she was going to miss more than one day at school, Jispa was in tears. She loves going to school every day. We always dread when she gets unwell as we don’t know how we are going to get her to stay back at home. Wow. I wish I had her schooling. I went to what was at the time a decent school. It surely had a large play ground. But I guess I never did very well adjust to schooling. We satyed in Dubai till third standard and then moved into Mumbai post the fourth. It was quite a cultural shock. Dubai being Dubai was rich, opulent and full of all eth lovely things in the world such as Pepsi, Chewing gum and amazing chocolates. India was a poor country in 1984. With only Doordarshan channel one, Bata shoes, kissme toffee bars and Cadbury chocolates. It was far too disturbing for us kids than we could handle. 1984 was no where near what we have today.
Whenever we came in from Dubai for a vacation to India, we were royalty. We were aliens wearing foreign clothe eating foreign goods. It was amazing that India was so insular at the time. Every Indian would stare at us looking at all the stuff denied to him. There was practically nothing available here for any kind of consumption. Our shoes and jackets were objects of desire. The only chips I remember eating here was something called Simba chipnicks which were packed in flimsy transparent plastic pouches. Coming back to stay in India was one hell of a cultural shock.
From a school (Indian high School) which had 30 students in a classroom with two air conditioners and four fans to a school (Don Bosco) that had 60 plus students with four fans, no air-conditioning and a very wet monsoon to herald the new year. Yes it was tough adjusting. We siblings shifted in 84 with our parents coming in a year later after winding up our home there. We got in tons of goods in what was popularly known as TR (transfer of residence). In this scheme you could get in tons of foreign goodies into India, including tape recorders, foodstuff, a car, clothes, assorted electronics etc. I remember mom and dad tying to the get the consignment passed at the customs. We sold some and kept some.
So we were still living the foreign dream for a few years after (till stocks last or you outgrow them). We did not lose anything to obsolescence. Partly because things weren’t improving at a fast pace and what we had was so bloody modern by India’s standards that it took a while for India to catch up to that level. So we lived in the shadow of Dubai being no land’s children.
My dad was awesome. I never seen him complain or make a fuss about it. We never felt him to be unhappy about the shift. In Dubai he drove around a Toyota crown, in India he was happy to roam around in our brand new Bajaj Chetak scooter with a side car attached. That he had got delivery of the much in demand scooter by paying foreign exchange. Else you get it after an obscene waiting time. I think it was a year or two for a scooter and up to 5 to 7 years for a car. Chetak was not even given out easily I think. You could only buy the humble Bajaj Super. I think Bajaj might have been doing a public service or charity of sorts by advertising. With a wait list like that who needs advertising.
Schooling was stressful for me for sure. Every monsoon I would fall ill and I never did adjust to the change in weather. This continued well into college where I finally developed some resistance of any sort. The favorite illness was sore throat.
Add to that the really irritating bunch of teachers who didn’t care too much for the students. It’s unfair to say all were bad. Some were awesome and really stood apart from the crowd. I remember Ms Beatrice, Ms Marina, Ms Clare being really sweet and some nasty ones that did not think twice before slapping us. The slap was bad. That was humiliating and irritating. It created more anger than anything else. Patel sir, the PT sir once got the whole class to stand still while he went about given one whack on the bum to each and everyone of us with a hockey stick. I remember that hurting a lot but I remember that as fun. It’s the slap that was hit that hurt. The hockey stick was for some reason bearable. Years after while I was doing my summers I met a senior guy who was from my school as well. He too remembered the teachers slapping and hated it.
I was telling Jispa that my teachers used to hit us and slap us. She was listening in all amazement. She has been living a fairy tale for now.
All in all school was not happening for me. I finally figured it around the 9th and 10th standard. I guess by then we were truly Indians in all sense. We might have run out of our Dubai security blankets/ blings and I think I was getting some of my confidence back. Hell in 10th standard I was even made monitor of the class. But my crowning moment was actually in the 9th when I won the ‘second best actor award’. I knew I was good at acting and I did not mind losing first place as I believed it was partiality at play. Who knows who cares? I loved it and my play was a really funny play titled ‘the watermelon cure’. I used to take part in all extra-curriculars as it meant bunking class for practice. Awesome!
But today as I look back, I don’t really miss school nor do I blame them. That was the best school around at the time. Just that we hadn’t as a nation removed our blinkers and opened ourselves to the changes happening around. We too were guilty of being in a time warp. I am happy that I was baler to balance the equation before I hit college. Hence actually between the school and college, for some reason I prefer my college life. That I met my life there and went through five years with her by my side must have been an important factor. That was an era of India opening up. 91 to 96… but then that is another story or should I say another blog entry.

give up on it

A ha… an issue which I have pondered on many times before. When do you realize that the book is a lost cause. When you do realize it what do you do? At what point do you give up? I came across this article that hopes to point some direction to my predicament.
An interesting thumb rule propounded:
The "Deduct Your Age from 100 and Read That Many Pages before Giving Up on a Book" rule. The older you get, the less inclined you are to waste your time on something that doesn't grab you.
Some other stuff that caught my eye wherein a former teacher muses, "I often wonder if people who are turned off by being forced to read books they do not like then become nonreaders later on." A no less august reader than Samuel Johnson declared, as Mr. Cowen quotes in his book, "A man ought to read just as inclination leads him; for what he reads as a task will do him little good."
Very true. I think I could never read certain books, especially if they are expected of me to read them as a text book. “The pressure of reading is so detrimental to the process of reading it”… there I go again making clever sounding isms. But at least now I know why took to reading so late in my life. I really started reading regularly in the last five odd years. But now it’s an unshakeable habit.
One particular book which was a mammoth tomb was Snowball. It is an autobiography of Warren Buffet. Really really sad book. There was no insight into the man’s brain. When you have an investor who became the richest man in the world and is known for his wit and incisive wisdom, the book come across frigid. Absolutely no insight in the man’s wisdom and really very boring. Unauthorized analysis of his wisdom in the many books that have been produced contain much more. The book goes on and on. At some points I had to simply skim through the pages while simply turning a large amount. Horrible. I think this is one book that deserves to be thrown out of the window as one good deed for the day. Though my philosophy has always been – even the worst book in the world can teach you something – you will at least know what you hated about it
On another note, I don’t know how reading will evolve over the next few years. There are tons of blogs and sites out there that one would like to constantly read and be updated through. While I was surfing I came across an interesting quotation. “The first half of our lives is ruined by our parents, and the second half by our children” -Clarence Darrow. Hahhaha. Sorry mom dad and Jispa. But I really find this one funny.
And on another note I found an interesting question - what would happen to the demand for tea if there was a health scare regarding coffee? It is not that easy to answer. Think about it.