but you love me daddy

For the interschool elocution she has to get an inspirational poem, an inspirational story or extract of an inspirational speech. Two minutes long… oh god. For a 7 year old! I can’t think of anything … I always believed that these competitions must allow for humor more than anything else. But now it’s an inspirational talk… I guess it’s not the school’s fault, the organizer must have ordained so. Searching the works of Shel I came across this poem… is it inspirational (I hope so)? The problem is inspirational versus morals… the net has tons of inspirational stuff that’s got God in it. Both Jasmine and I hate having inspirational stuff with the omnipresent hand. You don’t need God to get inspired. Can anyone help me get a cute nice inspirational talk/ poem for a seven year old? Though the school has also promised that if we don’t get it they will give us one. but I still think the lester one would do.

On another note – yesterday we were at a fun and fair organized by the preschool organization that one of Jispa’s friends goes to. It was a nicely done thing, with stalls on various games and activities. Jispa was enjoying on her own, hanging around, trying stuff. She came to me saying she wants coupons. I directed her to Jasmine. I then realized that Jasmine had bought 500 bucks worth of coupons for jispa to enjoy. Wow. 500 bucks. That included everything including food and drink. But I remember going to my school fair and having exactly 20 bucks or 50 bucks of coupons to utilize. I am not arguing for inflation. What I know was that they were definitely not enough to play what ever game I wanted and I had to pick and choose to maximize my fun. I had a clear trade off and marginal utility problem to solve. Jispa just went and played everything that caught her fancy. Now 500 bucks for family fun is not a large budget. Silly movies at a multiplex cost much more. But I didn’t know how to reconcile my need to ensure she has fun without too much chindigiri, while teaching her truth of finite resources. I don’t know…
One stall was a photographer getting you to pose inside a box for interesting angles. Jispa came to me and asked if she could go. I was like “it might be expensive and more so, I am a decent photographer. So why don’t you find out how expensive it might be, then we decide.”. She ran there and came back a minute later, “dad, bad news… it costs 250 rupees”. Happily she ran away. I guess we got the balance right.

We reached home and we got to do some dressing on the boil that’s come up. That’s a second one she’s got back to back. This one needed to be burst open. We take an implement and douse it in Savlon to prick it. Jispa was crying a bit purely on the thought of it. I let her attempt to prick it herself. She realized that her boild was a piece of dead skin with no sensation. She then let me gently prick with and had the puss oozing out. a nice bit of growing up.
While we were squeezing it, Jispa suggested I keep talking to keep her distracted. So I went about talking about… you know…mommy faced a pain that was a hundred thousand times more than what you are facing. This was when she gave birth to you. She held my hand very tight and she was hungry and thirsty but she had to deliver on an empty stomach. But we were there for each other. Etc etc….
She then asked. Why did we decide to have a baby. So that you can have fun the baby? I replied that ‘ much more… we wanted a baby to take care of, we wanted be bring a baby into this world, we wanted to play with it, we wanted a baby so that it would hold my hand and cross the road, …” suddenly she curled her lower lip and cried loudly…. Huh... what happened, did it hurt, did I press to hard. What on earth happened? “No, I am just crying because it’s a very nice story. You said very nice things” she replied. Huh? I and Jasmine just looked at each other. We didn’t know how to react. Jispa is a sensitive kid but I guess the boil hurting and the crying that was already happening did affect her a bit. She said even in school she heard a lovely story that moved her a bit in the western music class. It was this one…

Your five year old face is a dirty disgrace(but you love me Daddy)You scatter your toys and you make too much noise(but you love me Daddy)You know little lad you can be pretty bad(but you love me Daddy)You wake me at dawn when i want to sleep on(but you love me Daddy)Now you eat the cookies when i tell you no(But you love me daddy cause you tell me so)you're so hard to scold cause you're my five year old(and cause you love me Daddy)When i dress you up you go play with the pup(but you love me Daddy)When i use the phone you wont leave me alone(but you love me Daddy)You make sister wail pulling her ponytail (But you love me Daddy)You scratch up the floor and you write on the door(But you love me Daddy)You ask foolish questions now you know thats true(But you love me Daddy and you know you do)Your so hard to scold cause you're my five year old (And cause you love me Daddy)

Yup… I love you, kiddy…

STOP PRESS

Jispa got chosen in her standard to represent the school in inter school elocution competition.

I just lived my childhood dream

thank you Shel, sorry dentist.

??

sleep woes

Its amazing how children and associate problems are the same around the world. We had issues with Jispa coming in to sleep with us all of a sudden some time back. She gets these bursts now and then… for a few weeks she is all ok sleeping alone and then suddenly she comes in every night for a few nights with some excuse or the other. About two weeks back she came in with something and I didn’t even listen to her and just opened the blanket for her to come inside. It’s always me that she targets. She didn’t sleep too well that night. I asked her the reason in the morning and she said that I was constantly moving and that’s the reason she couldn’t sleep. Ten why did she come in to sleep with us, I countered. She said that she just came to tell me something and that I without listening to her just put her to sleep next to me. Oh ok… now it’s my fault. Blame daddy!
But yes, coming back to the ‘same around the world topic’ – I came across some really interesting stuff that really captured what the entire world is facing with young children.
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Accompanying text:
“Next up: a visitor from the kids’ room. They start all sweet and cuddly, but their little bodies become more brazen by the minute.”

This exactly the problem we face with Jispa, she is obviously soft and cuddly to start with and then she stretches open, but in the wrong orientation… then both Jasmine and I get whacked.
-----------

Accompanying text:
“To make things worse, our kids always insist on sleeping ON TOP of our blanket, creating a whole new set of problems”

There has to be some science of kids not feeling as cold as us while asleep. Jispa gets on top of the blanket and then instead of being nice and cuddly warm it gets quite a task to pull out enough blanket to keep you warm.
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Accompanying text:
“After weeks of sweet-talking, serenading and heartbreaking Ferberizing, we think we have reclaimed our bed. Until a short trip or a quick flu undoes everything again.”

Exactly….

john & chai

Whenever I get into Jaihind College to teach, I still behave like a student. I hang around the campus if I am early rather than sitting in the staff room. I still see my teachers there and am unable to sit at ease in front of them. I make a dash for the canteen and hang around there. We still have the waiters from my time there. Thirteen years on and not much seems to have changed. They got new tables and chairs but everything else remains the same. The menu is the same as well.
One of the waiters is Madan. Madan is an interesting character who always will hunker around for a tip. He would take his sweet time returning the change and you had to ask him to give it to you. The other guy Prakash was the sweet heart. I remember him trying to get us a table when the canteen was full. He would make some juniors get up just because Jasmine and I walked in. being the secretary of some club I guess helped. We weren’t goons by any stretch of imagination but the aura surely helped.
These days when I go in to canteen I still enjoy the same chana samosa. Only difference is that I can now afford the same. college life was a lesson in poverty. We always had less money and it was upto Jasmine to finance food, movies, picnics everything. She took tuitions and that was a great help.
This time around I was with a few students who were having chana samosa. The canteen gives a weird looking green chutnee along with some onions. I remember taking a few months of trepidation before I really enjoyed wolfing it down. The students were also not touching it. I said go on have it, I have been eating it since 1991 and I haven’t been worse for it. one of them looked up and said “1991, that was like since… I was born”. Huh. “you guys were born in 1991?” “yup”. Hahahahah… that’s was the year I joined college. Hehehe. I am sooo old!
Prakash these days still gets me a place to sit. I always over tip both, Madan and Prakash. Probably as a guilt alleviation mechanism. Prakash these days is called John by the college, for good reason. He is a big John Abraham fan. John was from my college. He was one batch senior to me and I guess he knew me then, or I knew him them. A lanky guy with arms all over the place and a pimple attack. He always sweet though and had no enemies. A few girls secretly liked him then as well. While no body would have ever predicted a career in movies for him for sure. He definitely had a presence in the college though. Suddenly he burst into modeling and then into movies. He’s done well especially considering I see him as the only non star family heir who has made it in recent memory. Kuduos. Coming back to Prakash. He talks about John being a student of the college all the time. When he served me chana samosa, he said that this was the same chana samosa that john had when he was in college. He keeps taking about John all the time. No wonder the kids call him John and he responds amiably. I guess if I ever came face to face with John, I’ll probably tell him about Prakash and request him to pay Prakash a visit. Not that I am likely to come across John to start with, but I no probs, I have my John and I love him.
Here is a toast to the canteen join. I ordered this as this is something V-inu used to have all the time while in college. I wonder why he couldn’t have normal tea then. But he was evolved as always… He also loved the stuff black with a slice of lime. See I told you he was evolved. I think he had lime more than milk, but still this remains an ode to old time sake. Not anything has changed, not the glass, the steel, the ceramic, nothing… one day I will flick the ensemble and take it home with me. Sitting by the window, watching the monsoon and sipping dip chai with milk.

its really wierd how I get all nostalgic about college. I really came into my own in college... but that is another story...

coming of age

Jispa had a puss boil in her leg and like all puss boils, it got quite painful. Adding to the whole thing was the ayurvedic stuff we generally use. It’s a vicious black paste that brings the puss out. It makes the dam thing throb like crazy. It hurts like hell. Poor thing went all over the place on Tuesday night. She missed school on Wednesday thanks to the bad sleep and the mild fever. Slowly she came to terms with it. She really hated me for pushing the puss out of the boil. It is very painful. But on Friday night she decided that since she has to remove the puss and papa is not the right guy to do it, she will do it herself. Wow... that’s a big one. She actually squeezed the puss out from the boil herself with some egging on from us. She overcame her pain and the grossness. She squeezed out a lot of it… it was in many ways a coming of age, a step in the hero’s journey. If there was proof that our girl was growing up, had grown up… it was there for us to see. On a lark, I shot the thing on the handycam. It was a bit gross to do so but it will be a good coming of age video. Admittedly one cannot expect wholesome family entertainment in that video, hehehe…

An update on her elocution performance – we don’t know… the results are not announced at an individual level. Marks are given and aggregated at a house level with the house being declared winners. Politically correct I guess. But Jispa and I had a truckload of fun preparing for it.. Especially irritating Jasmine by reciting the poem again and again. it is fun reciting it with her.

crossing over to the dark side

I understand dark chocolates. I normally love them and people get for me dark stuff that no one but me can eat. 75% and 80%, but the latest Lindt on my table is something else…. Its 99% dark chocolate. It is so dark that it comes with a disclaimer on the inside packaging… on the golden foil it says…

“EXCELLENCE 99% is a unique chocolate that reveals all the strength and richness of cocoa beans. To fully appreciate all its flavors, we recommend that you progressively develop your palate through our range of high cocoa content chocolate bars, starting with Excellence 70%, then 85% and finally 99%.
The best way to experience ECELLENCE 99% cocoa is to break off a small piece and allow it to melt slowly in your mouth.
To taste the full bouquet of cocoa aromas, try accompanying your tasting with some coffee.

In other words – grow up kid…
It’s a good thing you see the disclaimer only when you tear off the outer pack. You can’t read this stuff and still want to buy the slab, would you?

The dam thing is so dark that while eating it I feel like Lord Voldemort. Uuuuuu. That was a bad joke, please excuse, but I just couldn’t resist. Hehe.

Jispa Speak

Jispa has been chosen for the final day final round in the elocution competition. She is quite an expressive child and this is a perfect outlet for the drama in her. The poem we chose (wrote about it earlier) has enough play for different tones and voices. It will be different from the other poems that go in a monotone… dada dada … dada dada … dada dada da. This will go slow, loud, pause, surprise… I asked her on the phone today if she remembered anyone else’s poem. She said there one poem about the pig by Roald Dahl. Its about a pig with a over sized brain it knew everything but “but in the end One question drove him round the bend: He simply couldn't puzzle out, What LIFE was really all about."
I quickly googled it as i was on the phone and read it out to her. I then asked her… see… how do I know the entire poem. She just spelt out “G…O…O…G…L…E”. hmmm, how did you know that, I asked her. She said that she too has an over sized brain like the piggy in question. Ok … you win.

On Sunday while I was taking a lecture at college, Jispa and Jasmine had planned to come in once they finished at the park. They came in at the last ten minutes of the lecture. I was my usual loud self. Jasmine remarked to Jispa – does your teacher shout like this? After the lecture as we were walking out she asked me in all earnest, “dad, when I go grow will you teach me as well?” “sure, Jispa. I am always teaching you. I am teaching you now as well.” “no, will you teach me these things that you were teaching them.” “of course, I will”. She was happy. “when you are bigger, Jispa, all you have to do is ask”.

Later another thing she told me that “papa, you are less strict than my teacher. In school if anyone talks my teacher makes them stand under the clock.” Heheh. I sure am. I didn’t tell her that if I do that my class will shift to the clock in under five minutes.

hail nation

India sent a mission to the moon - Chandrayaan. One of the payloads it carried was NASA’s Moon Mineralogy Mapper. That tongue twister detected evidence of water. No doubt a significant discovery if we are to make colonize the moon. The times of India was at its euphoric best screaming “One Big step for India, a giant leap for mankind”. The geologist in US who analyzed the data from the NASA probe acknowledged India role. I expect a whole lot of India to get drawn into this euphoria and embrace these findings… I would not be surprised if people make presentations using this as an example of Indian super prowess. Textbooks will be written tom-toming this ‘indian’ achievement. Many people will say that India discovered that moon has water.
I am reminded of a fable I read as a kid. To cut the story short, a unique twist of circumstances ensured that a lame man sits on the shoulders of a blind man who carries him around the world in a symbiotic relationship. They happen to be chosen by the royal elephant as ‘the groom’ for the princess. After they go around the ceremonial fire with the princess, a row erupts between them as to who actually married the princess. A wise sage is called to deliver the verdict. He says that the lame man is husband as the blind man is akin to the horse on which the groom may sit.
While many proud Indians will tell you in quiz that the only Indian to win the Mr. Universe title was Premchand Degra, but not a soul will tell you was the runner up. This is a trick question. There was only one entry in the category he competed.

PS: After I published this post someone sent me a mail to the effect that – our Mr. Degra won the World Amateur Championships (80 kgs) beating other contestants (Todd Roberts came in second) to claim the Mr. World title. I can’t find Mr. Universe on his wikipedia page or any Google searchs though.
But somehow I so clearly remember the Times of India story on the front page – saying he won the Mr. Universe and that there were no other contestants in his category. I remember it as clear as day… I also remember talking about it to my other cousins about the absurdity of the title.

inspiration

Some times, many times one comes across people who are inspirational by who they are and what they do… not by their need to inspire you. It is not set out as an intended consequence of their action. It inspiring to see them working against the odds just to make it work. They could choose not to but they choose to… they choose to see all the shit around them and say.. ok.. lets make this work.

The first one is my teacher from college Prof Hasina. She is associated with the commerce department. Since I keep going to college for teaching I have remained in touch with her. She is now the head of commerce association and I love the way she is pushing the association to do new events and programs. She could have decided not to do it and say commerce is a university course, what could we do? But I love her passion and her commitment to the job and she is ready to make things happen.
Prof Saxena was another such person who ran the BMS course when it was introduced. She made sure it rocked, brought direction, vision and execution to the course. Dynamic. Absolute dynamic.

Over the years I have seen that such teachers are slowly not coming in to teach anymore. I guess they join the corporate world. The new breed of teachers instills no confidence.

Here is another gem of a story of William Kamkwamba who decided against the grain to do something. He started not by trying to inspire but to do something. He dropped out of school due to a failed crop, went to a library and somehow figured out how to make a windmill and made it. Crazy considering he did not really understand the English inside the library books that well. Simple to him. An amazing story for everyone else.
BTW his mom thought he was crazy!
Now queues of people line up outside his home to charge their mobile phones.

Listen to his story; it’s only 5 minutes long…
He wants people to listen to his story on the internet and in his words “trust yourself and belief, whatever happened… don’t give it up”

melamine

In office we have melamine plates to have our food in. Most guys get their dabbas and empty the food in the melamine plates and bowls and heat them in the microwaves.
Now it somehow felt wrong to heat the food in melamine plates. On a lark I googled this stuff and found out that; you cannot heat melamine plates/bowls in a microwave, because that’s where the melamine can break down and leach toxins
Melamine resin is known as a thermoset plastic, because the plastic is fixed after molding. If exposed to enough heat, melamine will decompose. For this reason, melamine dishware should not be exposed to high temperatures like those in the oven and microwave.

Now what to do with the info. Some guy must have ordered the stuff without knowing that this can happen. All he had to do was ask his wife who might have told him that you can’t put the stuff in the micro. But the deed has already been done. So we have the plates. Typically in the office since the deed has been done, admitting ignorance might make you look silly. So you do the next best thing, you cry ‘chicken’. All this is ok in small quantities and it does really matter that much.

I am reminded of something I have blogged about in the past - Hermann Wilhelm Göring –Nazi party Leader. While the statement does not quite match the basic principle is the same. you can always twist it any way you wish. He said - “Oh, that is all well and good, but, voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger”

So I really don’t expect the melamine plates to go away. I don’t expect people to stop using them but I hope people realize the power of google or even common sense. I have seen the pantry guys heating the food to quite a temperature and then picking the plates up with a napkin as the plates got really hot. I have seen them heating rotis on the melamine and having them stuck to the plates. I have seen melamine plates being twisted and distorted due to the heat.

God know what all goes in our stomachs. Many years ago (at least 15 yrs) I had read that an American senator was confronted by some protestors who were against dumping thrash to the third world for recycling, as recycling some of these plastics can cause cancers. He replied that in third world countries it does not matter, as these cancers typically hit after the age of 70 and the life expectancy is lower than that by a margin.

Since corporate male life expectancy is even lower thanks to the entire artery clogging lifestyle, I guess, melamine toxins come way down on the value chain.

Which animal buries its head in the ground? Is it the ostrich?

magical weekened

Watch the movie “UP” for the cutest love story in less than 15 minutes. It’s at the start and it was so beautiful and cute and would make you go… awwwwwwwwwww…
The movie was quite cool with my kid enjoying it. We happened to be in VT area where we had gone to gorge on McDonalds breakfast menu.
The stuff was quite good with the muffin being steamed one! Wonder of wonders. Something at McDonalds is not fried?! I also opted for the hot chocolate and liked that one as well. I guess the coffee and the chocolate are the underrated items on the menu with the burgers and the shakes getting all the attention.
We happened to be at Mc when we were wondering where to take the kids after a morning at the park. We took them to the breach candy park (someone Mahindra garden) early morning yesterday and they enjoyed to their hearts content. Jispa is a natural at all these parks that require what I understand as gross motor skills. She can climb anywhere, everywhere and is one with the boys at all these games. I think she beats them as well. Seeing a boy jump from one of the ropes on the Cororcords Jispa wanted to attempt the same. Jasmine at the start wasn’t too enthused but I saw the jump and gave my go ahead. Woppie… she goes.. bham on the sand she falls. Gets up and tries again.. whoopieee…. I think the height was around ten feet. Awesomeposume. We had gone with a few of her friends and they seemed to be no match for her when it comes to the spirit of adventure. Jasmine fears a broken bone, I guess it’s the cost of growing u, or should I say the rite of growing up. As my dad said looking at Krish Srikkant’s batting – fortune favors the brave.
We went there early morning as the evening before we landed there to see a huge crowd. It still could take loads of kids and still function. I have no complaints on that. It was good fun but I thought it might be nice for Jispa to play with the stuff with a little less crowd. We had gone in with a friend who had come in from Dubai. As soon as he entered the place with his kid he remarked “which country are we in?” he loved the place and more importantly – his 4 year old loved it. On the ropes while he was having eth time of his life, he slipped a bit and caught a very very mild bruise on his forehead. His dad carried him one side and as he came in the poor kid was crying. I took him aside and looked at it – it was nothing… so I told him “hold on… don’t cry .. wait… do you want me to use some magic for your head. It will make it all go away. but you have to stop crying for that.” He looked at him half wondering, half belief and half disbelief. Yup I know that totals upto more than one… you have never seen kid expressions have you? Coming back… he stopped crying a bit. His father and also my wife were wondering what I was upto. Me too. So I just pulled out my wallet and thought I would pull out something.. that’s the only thing I had to pull out. A magician has to pull out something?!? Everyone was looking at me… what would come next. I opened my wallet and I remembered that I had some soap strips hidden away. I showed it to the boy, tore a small part of the soap strip and told him “see this magic paper, I ill put it on your head and the pain will all go away… see…” I stuck the dam thing on his forehead. “has it gone away?”. He nodded… good.. Keep it one for sometime. His father remarked that it was lucky I had some magic strip on me. Yup… I was lucky as well. As long the magic works it’s wonderful… this thing … magic….

Here are a few images from the fun

Pretty self explanatory

I taught her that move. Cool nah! it was my signature move. I also taught her the flip.
X marks the spot from she jumps. If you think thats not high.. try it.

The magic paper in action ... keep it handy. It works.

This one is cute…. It made entirely of tires.. look closely.

wake up jis

Wakening up on your own is a coming of age ritual. Something I am trying to find a balance with for Jispa. How do you wake up a 7 year old for school? Especially in the winter. This happens every year when the sun is in its southern sojourn. As winter solstice returns and the mornings are darker than before Jispa opens her eyes and asks irritatingly / angrily, why did you wake me up so early. Two years back it was difficult to make her understand, but its improved then on. last year I taught her the solstices and today it came to my aid. I told her… its winter now, you remember the winter solstice, nah? … huhhh… yaaa… hmmmm… ok. Then please wake up it is 6:15.
Yesterday much as I am at loathe to give it up I finally did (I think). I pulled my muscle back a bit while lifting her after the shower. So now on she is on her own after she wakes up. My job ends after wake up time.
I remember my growing up moment when I first used an alarm clock to wake me up. I remember it very clearly. I must have been 7th or 8th standard. My marathi tuition teacher had called us for extra class at 7 in the morning and I had to wake up at 6. I told mom and dad to set an alarm for me so that I can get up on my own. While mom gave me an alarm clock set to 7. Dad told me another trick. He said to bang my head on the pillow as many times as the time I wanted to wake up. I looked at him in disbelief. He said it works try it. so I banged my head on the pillow 7 times and went to sleep. Warning: children if you re reading this: do not try this at home without adult supervision.
Well I did wake up on time but the story is not about waking up. Thanks to all the excitement of growing up and the fear associated with missing the alarm I got some really horrible sleep. I kept waking up all through the night, checking the time and going back. It was a bad night that ended in relief when the alarm actually rang.
I have gone on to miss many alarms then on and catch many as well. Poor Jasmine who have to wait at the station for me early in the morning while I happily slept through the alarm. Snooze was not a popular feature on the alarms I had then I guess. I remember hearing the phone ring… oh shit… its Jasmine. This was the family land line days and not individual cell phones…get up.. rush.. Wait jasmine. I will leave now. I remember brushing, bathing, getting ready and reaching Kings Circle station in 15 minutes flat. That was fast. I used to run full speed to the station and catch the next train itself. Wow. I could run in those days. This was peak NCC days where I could just run like hell everywhere and anywhere and for whatever the distance. I practically invented parkour. Jumping over obstacles, across over bridges, across roads, vendors whatever. (kids: please read warning again). I loved running.
Jasmine even gave me an alarm clock that looked like a monkey playing the drums for a birthday. She really tried hard.

it does exist

To add to the list of worlds “do these jobs actually exist” is the job I came across in my office while I fired a print.
While there is the color printer which is exactly 1 foot away from where I sit, the default printer is the Xerox machine at the other corner. Being the marketing head I have access to the color printer but it has the premium papers in the trays and hence it’s easier to fire the print 30 feet away than the one foot away printer. Well technically one can have different and cheaper paper in the different trays of the printer but let’s not get there. There is too much IQ at stake here.
So I fire this print out and walk to the machine. As I reach there a petit woman sitting next to it gets up, picks up the paper and hands it over to me. Thank you. Then next time I fire a couple more… the same thing. The lady gets up and picks the paper and hands them over to me as I walk to the machine. Yup…That’s her job.
Lets break it up > Sit down till you see someone walk to the printer > then get up, take printout in your hand > hand it over to the one who has walked right up to the printer > sit down. Notice it – no walking involved.…
Her core job is to stand up and hand over print out to the people who fire the printouts when they come to collect it. Nopes the tray is not at ground level, I don’t have to bend if she was not there…nothing…
Ok... I admit… there is one more job she does… if you have anything to photocopy, you go there, give it to her and she lifts the lid, places the paper and presses copy. Yup that’s it… well… sometimes she also loads paper, presses a number for multiple copies and… and… I can’t think of anything more… But there she is… her name is Swati I think. A petit 5 foot girl. Very sweet with a ready smile at all times. Taking paper from the printer has never been more… err…sweet?

Reminiscences - 1

Going through old visiting cards is as nostalgic as going through old photo graphs. Yesterday as Jasmine was cleaning the cards file she came across quite a few of my really really old cards. I don’t think I would be able to talk about all of them today but let’s take the oldest of the lot.
My first job. This was a summer job that I did while in college. V-inu asked me if I wanted to join and I was all game. The company was called Lawandes Direct Marketing. Run by an enterprising guy named Bhusan Lawande (I hope I get the name right). 7 o clock had launched the disposable razor called Presto and were trying to market the same. We were called in for that. Later on we realized that our job was actually to sell 7 o’ clock PII blades at the defense canteen at Navy Nagar. V-inu got one canteen at the start, I got the big ‘gol’ canteen and one other guy got the officers canteen. The idea was to give out a santoor soap free with two packets of P II blades. Pretty straight forward. There used to be a line at the counters with the navy guys getting lists and awaiting their turn. I just sat at the counter just before and spoke to everyone. I remember selling around 30-40 twin packs. That was better than expected. And I could only manage one counter well, the other two I had to leave. But I still sold enough. In the next round I got the officers canteen, which was a super market style one with air conditioners newly installed at the billing counters and not at the shopping level. It was best to stand at the billing counters and catch people. Those buying blades were easy to convert. Either ask them to buy two or flip the brand. One customer I wont forget is one lady that I approached. I gave the entire spiel to have her laugh like crazy. I was like, “what happened”. She was trying to hold her laughter and she said she was buying the blades for her son while I gave her the spiel about her husband appreciating the blades. Her husband has a Beard. Navy man you see. No what’s so funny about that? But it was sweet. Another thing I wont forget is – I used to wear a tie and short sleeves. The good part fo eth short sleeves is that I used to put my hand overt the Ac vents (window A/c’s) and let the cool breeze run into my chest through my arm pits. That used to help me cool off as the AC was quite inadequate.
A fallout of this job was that I got a few santoor soaps at home. Unethically of course. Fibbing a few sales figures as no one was really tracking. I felt guilty but I flicked around a dozen in the days I was there. It was pretty silly but we at the time saw it as a perk. But at least I was on time and did my job without shirking and goofing off. Hence the high sales numbers. The other kids were just relaxing and roaming around instead of doing their job. That was bad. But I guess my ethics evolved over a period of time. Enough to resist pocketing Oakley’s glares while I could have easily done whatever I wanted to them. It’s been a long journey. Coming back to the soap, I then got tired of the sandalwood smell of the soap and horribly bored of it. Instead of bathing with it I decided to use to create soap sculptures. A ganesha was one of them.
Briefly I worked for the Presto blades which was a flop show as the outlet at lokhandwala at Andheri hardly had footfalls. This was around ’93 and the suburb was yet to take off.
Lawande, seeing my work (I assume) put me on Glucovita project. A glucose product that needed to be doctor sampled. Basically I led a team of kids trying to go from doctor to doctor sampling the product and talking about the benefits. Simple one but my first taste of leadership. It didn’t taste like anything. Simple water I guess.
What I get from all this? Well those days we were paid 180 bucks a day plus 20 bucks for traveling. So you have 200 bucks a day. Not bad. You got around 15 days of employment. We saved a lot of that money. I used to take the bus from kings circle to navy nagar for four rupees and twenty five paise as it was cheaper than the train to VT and a bus thereon, by around one buck. That’s it, one measly buck. V-inu used to go by train as his dad was in the railways and hence a free pass.
We sweet talked the navy canteen guys to let us shop there as you got stuff cheaper there thanks to the tax cuts. We even managed to get some booze for friends, and some champagne for cheap. I never did drink it yet I got great kicks from doing it for friends. The few things I remember buying for my self was a swimming trunk, the real sexy cut ones… hehhehe. And one pair of lotto shoes for 400 bucks. That was half the price. And that too LOTTO. That was amongst the early foreign brands available in India. I felt good. I also had some money to spend with Jasmine. Finally! She had financed a lot of our courtship. But it still was much less than what she had. She was always loaded.
But the most important thing the work did for me was during my MBA, I was amongst the few to have some work experience written on my CV. I could speak about it as opposed to others who had nothing to write and nothing to talk about. That helped my CV stand out and help me get short listed. That was the coolest thing for me.
I sure wish Jispa does some summer jobs, works a bit while in college and learns a lot. I had some low days, some high days ad lot of them were pretty flat. But I loved them. I never complained, I had no reason to. Wearing my Lottos to the pool and changing into my costume with some cash in my piggy was an awesome feeling. I wanted to do a napoleon and crown myself. but, here's thank you Bhusan, thank you V-inu, than you to a guy I think named satish. he was the team leader types guy. He was a bit political but I was ok with him.

An odd ball - some one later told me that there was a chick who tried hitting on me in the Glucovita project. I honestly never noticed and never cared. I was too busy 'leading' I guess. I remember her being very irritating instead. i cont remember her name or face, but can vaguely place her. forget it!

Here is the lawandes visiting card.

wasted chores

‘DOMESTIC CHORES SAP WOMEN’S ENERGIES. IF THE FAMILY BECOMES THE LIMIT OF YOUR WORLD, THEN YOU CAN NO LONGER THINK BIG’

Haha. Well said Krishna Sobti “Hindi fiction writer and essayist” in the Tehelka.

I have always believed that women have much more potential than is being used. The potential being eaten up by the domestic chores. I don’t believe that domestic chores area waste of time and effort. They definitely add value to the family and keep them going. The question is of margin. Like the old Surf washing powder line – agar kum dam mein utni safedi mile toh phir koi surf na le? If you are wasting potential on chores that can be done by others leaving you to focus on what you believe is important to fulfill your potential, then something is wrong.
Jasmine has been a housewife and we think its important part of Jispa’s growing up. We believe that not having a 24X7 maid in the house for Jispa is important to Jispa’s growing up and our sanity. We can take care of her better and nurture her better. We are also ill prepared for a maid whom we see as a liability. It mean we have to sacrifice a bit but its worth it. Jasmine is definitely adding value to our home by making the conscious call of being a full time mother. But I have always urged her to look around and expand her interests in the free time she gets. We missed having her working before Jispa, something I blame both her family and my mother equally for. I thought it was important for her to work somewhere, anywhere… but hell, we have lived with a lot of calls that conservatism thrust upon us. Add one to that total.
I have seen many women enter the workforce in the time since I started working. You get equal number of them being dim or bright as the men in the workforce. The poor dim women are highlighted and being ridiculed as they are women where as the men, as dim or worse tend to get spared. My take is that given equal probability of intellectual capacity, the women breaking through the glass ceilings and prejudices tend to better than the men. I first tried to have women in my team to balance the ratio, then when it got women centric I tried to balance the ratio the other way. It just couldn’t work. I just couldn’t get any decent men. After specifically asking human resources for men, I still ended up hiring women. The men were just so dumb. Or maybe we just attracted the worst men to apply. Whatever the fault, I ended up having one guy and three girls in the team and the team is kick ass.
Yesterday we were at café coffee day and there also I have been seeing a trend of women being the waiters. These are typically women from possibly middle middle class, speaking simple English and having confidence to talk to customers. They are better than the men waiters for sure. The men tend to be dumb, stupid and lead headed. The women tend to be sweeter, receptive and understand service. You get your oddballs everywhere but I think the probability is better with women. I think it’s the same reason. It takes much for a woman to break tradition and hence by natural filtration the good one pass the sieve. This works at all income levels, as I have seen equal prejudice even at higher incomes.
With so many women entering working class, it creates more competition. It’s a GOOD THING, in case some chauvinists were wondering. There are gains in eth economy that this workforce will add. In India my belief is that this huge economic multiplier is missed by many economists. It is rarely spoken of. I find it quite odd. The benefits go beyond the increase in income level. There are benefits of exposure, understanding, confidence and the like that permeate the population. Mindsets change, minds open, options emerge, directions change.
Do whatever you want as long as you get to choose what you want to do. House must be a choice not a chore. For too many years we have needlessly corked this potential. What a waste!

education... creativity...? the answer is a shel?

Yesterday I came across two videos. Both of which are interesting and in a manner of speaking on the different quadrants of an axis.
The first one was the speech by Obama on education urging the kids to follow through (right word?) on their responsibility towards education. Not bad at all, though I am a bit tired of him talking everywhere. While I might be falsely accusing narcissism what he says is definitely worth listening. It did make sense.
In the evening I came across another video, (actually the audio I heard in a horrific traffic jam) where the sir Ken Robinson talks about something even more pertinent. He argues that the education system designed to aid the industrial revolution post the 1900’s kills creativity and is unable to provide our kids with skills needed or hone the varied skills they are born with. A lovely one that. My favourite line "My contention is that creativity now is as important in education as literacy"
If you have to choose between the videos see the Ken Robinson one. The first is something enforces something you thought to be true and the other one enforces what you suspected to be true.
Choosing one over the other is pretty stupid but understanding the context of one with the other is having the ability to reconcile quadrants.





On the subject of creativity and education, Jispa has an elocution contest on Tuesday. Now I don’t really care if she wins or not but I sure want her to have a wild story to tell and a unique way to tell it. A little bit of overacting may not be out of order. As long its funny and Jispa enjoys it! The poem I choose is a Shel Silverstein one. Those are the best with enough twist on our notion of ‘normalease’. It is called the crocodile’s tooth ache. I found it extremely funny and allows for a play between two characters. The crocodile who is normally fierce is the victim and the dentist who is normally the sweet heat is the perpetrator of the crime. And in the end the dentist’s ghastly end leaves you with no remorse but a sense of justice. That was too much analysis for such a lovely poem. We have lost the ability to see it for what it is…. Essshhh.. Here enjoy it as much I did…it’s in his uniquely gruff voice

turn the other way

I was talking to one mother about parenting. Actually I talk to a lot of mothers on parenting. For some reason I seem to be more involved in it or probably more vocal about it than others. Funnily when two guys get together rarely is parenting discussed. I guess it’s a girl thing and I discussing it might be effeminate, but hell, that’s one topic I love and I can talk about it for hours. I obviously have no formal knowledge and claim no expertise except the experience of raising one cute kid. So I stick to my experiences and what I know.
So I was talking to this lady in office about taking kids to nice places. One new one is the park at breach candy it someone Mahindra Park for kids. It is easily the best park I have seen in India with high quality imported play equipment. Wow. I had never seen some of that stuff anywhere else. A dam good place and a well maintained park. I must go there more often for sure. The other place I normally recommend in the Jijamata Udyan or zoo. Most would shun the Byculla zoo and most would come back from not so happy memories of dull cages with no life. But there is a trick to enjoy this place. I know because I used to go with Jispa many times when she was little. How you enjoy the park is dependent on two things – first – what time do you go. Evenings on weekends is always a mess with a lot of overcrowding and second and more importantly is the turn you take when you enter the park. Almost everyone will take a left turn. That’s the route you first get the tiger, elephants, monkeys, bear, leopard etc. these cages are bad, dull small and the poor animal is normally hidden inside the cave. He is probably bored and is least interested in showing you his stuff. And you get to one animal in a cage then you have to walk to see another. You follow the route which is a bit confusing and you hit half point at the hippo that is underwater and hence invisible. The rhino is typically lazing in his shelter away from human glare. You the pack up and turn around and head home. This route has less green cover and more walking… all adding up to a bad experience. I always take and recommend taking a left. You instantly come across the bird cage which is denser and has more life. You come across egrets, spoonbills, pelicans, ibis, herons and the works. Normally one of the birds or the other is flying about. They are close enough to get a good glimpse of what’s happening and the kid is straight away gratified with life. Compare that to the dull tiger cage searching for elusive lazy tiger sleeping in his den away from your kids. Then you move to the parakeets, the white peacock, Sarus crane, and other birds. The place is greener with bigger cages, great visibility and larger life. Then you hit the barking deer, spotted deer, black bucks, antelopes etc … the you hit hippo and the rest in reverse order. By then the kid is excited. He tires nevertheless and hence you can rightfully go through all the other animals fast enough.
So when at the zoo avoid what the Romans do.
Another of my fav places when Jispa was little is the Prince of Wales museum. Now why would I want a two to four year old to go to the museum? I must be a culture vulture? Nopes… here also eth same rule applies turn right. Hit the natural history section. Stuffed birds and animals. Large birds such as the flamingoes, hornbills along with huge animals such as tigers and rhinos. The small kids would love it. Mine did. Then you can take her around the museum hoping to get her excited on the small spoons and the small bottles on display. Though for the elders I strongly recommend the audio tour. I loved it.
But the main thing here is transfer of enthusiasm. That always works. If you walk by the museum or the zoo and refuse to get excited by the stuff there, what will your kid enjoy? Look at your kid. She is clearly looking up to you to see what she finds; she then knows what is fun, funny or hilarious. Monkey see monkey do.

world consiparcy

I have nothing against Robin Sharma or Paulo Coelho. Though I am sure either would be slightly slighted to see either written in the same breath. But what can I say I abhor them both. Equally. No no … not personally but I don’t like their books. I read one from each author (tried to) and its not that they speak lies; but I don’t need a whole book to know the truth that is apparent in my face. I have spoken about it in the past, and the reason I mention it now is because I was reminded by Paulo’s lines in the Alchemist - “When you want something, the whole Universe conspires to help you realise your desire”.
Ever since our office moved to kalina I have been driving to work. No other convenient option. It’s definitely helped me cut my commute time. But the trade off has been no reading in the trains. I have also in the past written about bad radio programming and the same songs with inane radio jockeys. Aggghhh. Makes my blood boil just thinking about them.
So while browsing around I came across ted.com and their audio downloads. I downloaded a few onto my cell phone and picked up a connection cord to the car deck. WOWieeee….. Driving has become much more pleasurable. From one of the economic blogs I was following I came across and another download with an economist. I love it! I was wondering what to do with my driving frustrations and the options emerged. There is a wealth of data there. I am still not ready for audio books on serious topics but this stuff is welcome spring water. If you know of interesting interviews on audio download with anyone at all, anyone – sports, entertainment, economy, business, vagabonds.. Whatever.. Please send me a link. In fact send me a link for any interesting audio downloads. Yes I know podcasts have been there since evolution. But I was never the music types and hence never took to the ipod. Hence podcasts gave me the miss. I have been trying to figure out a way to stay connected to podcasts with out itunes or any software (office laptop does not allow installations). So I am pretty limited. Learnoutloud.com is one discovery. Many more to follow I am sure.

So there I was reminded of The Alchemist. But did I need to read the whole book to know this? No, for sure not. I knew of it in many different ways, but I guess reading the book helped me remember it. so I guess in that way it was useful, but as a rational thinker one must ask ‘at what margin?’. The time and money spent to read that book so that you remember the obvious? Nopes. I have better things to read and do and spend on.

mirror mirror on the wall... show the guy who screwed it up all

Well… Jispa had her Hinid exam and it was all the easy words. No eravat and no charan. Some aaloos instead. All’s well that aaloos well I guess.

This is an interesting video that I came across today morning. Elizabeth gilbert gives an interesting talk about how to deal with the genius in your life. I guess a lot of it would make imminent sense to the Indian who has been fed this dose of karma ever since he was born. As rationals as we have grown up, we have felt disillusionment with the rituals of worship and hence Jasmine and me have been vary and have taught Jispa not to believe in them. But at the same time we realize that spirituality is baby we do not want to lose with the bath water.

Thinking about this talk I realized that I too have a defense mechanism. My mechanism keeps finding fault in whatever good that I have done. Keep trying to improve it for the next time, keep attributing it to good fortune; reminding myself that a 1 percent probability only means that …1 percent probability. That one instance can happen now, can happen again and could probably occur five times in a row. The probability law only will help you realize that you are now probably good for the next five hundred occurrences. I keep telling my reportees that being good is not an option and don’t really expect to be praised. It’s your job to be good. You get a salary. Its par for the course. Going outside and exceeding expectations, giving people what they did not know possible or more importantly what you did not know possible is what counts. “to act that each tomorrow finds us further than today”. I learnt this from my god Dharen Chadha. He never taught me this but I learnt it alright. Eklavya anyone?

There is another interesting theory of the level five leaders. There many attributes but one that strikes me is of the window and the mirror. “The Level 5 leaders looked out of the window to credit others for success and looked in the mirror to apportion responsibility when things didn't go to plan”. Click here for original Jim Collins article.

testing times

Jispa is going through her reviews at school. Now that she is in the first standard these would be her first quasi – exams. I always hated exams and I still sometimes get nightmares that I am horribily unprepared, which at many times would have been an accurate representation of reality. I wonder how I got through college passing the exams. Econometrics was a famous one. I still don’t know what the hell it means. And I passed it. I don’t know how. In 11th standard in commerce we had an option to choose between Math and SP. Now in tenth I scored a whopping 147 on 150 in math with 74 in algebra and 73 in Geometry. I know for a fact that I only got one mark in algebra wrong. It was first of the fill in the blanks. They had five marks of fill in the blanks. The first one being some sort of a quiz question. Something like is 1 an integer or something like that. Rest were all perfect sums. The word was that they purposely cut marks if you hit 75 else they have to give you an award or something. So basically I was something of a math cat. Hence in 11th I said chuck it, lets take SP and work at math in FYBCom later. What is SP? Er…. Secretarial practice. They basically teach us letter writing and other correspondence. I think was designed to help weak math students from running away from 11th. I can’t believe I did that. Though I am pretty happy I did that. I just traded in my favorite subject for letter writing. Not that subject helped me too much but one thing I can tell you for sure, I write more letters (emails) in a day than I do math sums. The math sums we do are learnt in the 5th grade tops. At least it gave me some more time for doing nothing in college. Doing nothing got me my wife. Beat that Mr. Mathematician.
In FYBCOM, when math was reintroduced for a year, I took classes and in those I was happy that I hadn’t lost my touch. I was good as ever solving and understanding derivates better than others, a mile ahead of the lot.
Over the years I have come to the conclusion that math for me is visual I don’t see numbers I see parts and wholes. The other day when we were buying 18 pieces of something at 5 each, my friend along with calculated 18X5 while I did 20X5 minus 10. he did not understand why I did that. I have been doing that since I can remember. 7 is a bottom half number in my head while 3 is a top half number. Similarly 27 is a bottom half number while 124 is a top half number. I see rows of tens, twentys and thritys etc and the additions are done by changing rows. So 27 plus 27 is a 40 plus 4 and a row change and is therefore 54. Weird…
So coming back to FY. I crack the classes but when we begin to start study a fortnight before the exams, I open my notes and I see the sums and my head reels. I can’t remember any of these sums. They are all the derivate sums that mean nothing to me. For some reason I forget them all. What the hell am I going to do? We study some old papers and we realize the pattern of marks. 20 marks for simple algebra (the stuff I got 74 on 75 for); so that’s done. Then we have 20 marks for BASIC programming. Yes BASIC programming. How did that get into math class. I dunno but since that was stuff that I had done in 9th standard that would have been a breeze, only thing is that I needed to brush it up a bit. Jasmine was the cat at BASIC and she taught me stuff. So there attempting 40 marks and getting a little more than 35 was the aim… actually anything more than 34 was acceptable :). Maa mein pass ho gaya, maa… mein pass ho gaya… And math was my super favorite subject. So I guess you would know how I would have fared at the other subjects. But in spite of all that I have no clue how I passed with first class through out. I guess the fact that accounts was really simple as a subject might have something to do with it and the other subjects required little knowledge else expect the ability to write long English.
But an accounts was another wild story. In 11th I was out of school and flying on my independent wings. So I sat in my first unit tests and got some 7 marks on 50 and then in the first semester exam I got some 2 marks on hundred. My really sweet class teacher (her name was Ms. Vahi) takes me one side and says, “dear boy, you might be the CR but do know that if you do not get 105 aggregate in all you four exams in a subject, you will repeat the year. You WILL repeat the year.” The penny dropped. I studied for the second unit test. Took classes from my sister on reconciliation of errors and topped the class (second I think). Some things went wrong in the final and I missed on the scores. I did not realize that I have to pay attention to trial balance (the basic of accounting) and that would carry most marks. Hence my aggregate came to something like 75. I was doomed to fail. Another obscure came to my aid – you need 75 in three subjects and 105 in three subjects to pass. Hence you could get a total of 30 marks in three subjects each as grace. Maa mein pass ho gaya, maa… mein pass ho gaya…
Wow. I am sure Ms. Vahi gave me some grace to hit 75 so that I hit the grace marks to pass. I can’t believe I risked that. That was staying on the edge… the very precipitous stupid edge. But alls well that ends well.

Well this post was about Jispa’s reviews. Now you know what stand I have on exams and I don’t really want to put any more burden on her. The first review has been a test of our belief. We don’t want to send message that school is trivial yet we don’t want it to scare her. On other subjects she would do great but hindi is omsething she might be a bit lower than her own average. So we did a small take up and I realized it required brushing up on my Hindi. Udbilava, jata, eravat, were some words amongst others that I might have got stumped on. Jispa knew 90 percent of her words so I just wrote down al the words in English and she had to give me the Hindi versions. Underlining and constantly asking her the 10percent words helped her I guess. We started yesterday and continued till the bus stop today. By the time she left, she knew them all. one remained specially tricky –charan. I told her remember that you don’t put feet in your moth but you do put your favorite churan. That’s how you remember. She remembers ilag by enlarge…hehehehe.

This was fun. Jispa’s first review saw us on the test!