celebrate

Another cake cutting in office. This time some four odd people were left with cake on their face. No no… only one person celebrated the birthday but four got the facial. This seems to be the primary source of entertainment these days in office. Tomorrow is the birthday of the ring leader. The guy who is primarily responsible every time for smashing cake on every one, celebrates his tomorrow. I am only the instigator but he is the real doer. I only nudge people in the right direction.

So tomorrow everyone is ready but really, no one know what to expect. This could turn out to be a cake fight. The ring leader is not likely to be happily stationary while getting smashed by half the office. Some will stay away, better not to antagonise, some will smash and some will not know what to do. The question is who all will get on their face tomorrow. I will keep you posted on the tally tomorrow for sure.

It does get a bit rowdy during the smashfest, but it does lighten up things a bit. We have people running around trying to get away and then we have people try to get on. In the earlier office at least we had a separate cafeteria. This place is a free for all right in the middle of work. So you have the carpet which is smelly of cake even a few hours after the festival. Nauseatingly sweet and creamy smell. What to do of it? I now feel like eating sev puri. What/ sev puri just because of the cake smell. Well I am a gujju ain’t I? any reason is good reason to eat sev puri.

On saturday after the cricket match in the evening I was a bit drained out. I batted for a long time. So I was feeling hungry and thirsty at the same time. Voila the gujju in me eats… try guessing, see if you have gujju genes in you… two plates of pani puri. That surely worked. All this talk is making me hungry. I am off. From my window I confirm the presence of the vendor across the road.

the big Q meets the big A

I really need some creative release. While one of my collegues for searching for a job, she came across this start up company on a job portal trying to be really cool. They posted this job posting which got me interested. I might be just the right guy for the job. The job description fits well. Marketing sales distribution financial services are the correct key words. She applied online only to get an email from them, asking for answers to longwinded questions. What does a man need in life except a challenge? So I decided to answer these friendly blokes myself. It’s nice to do interviews when you are not really looking for a job isn’t it?

So here is the mail I sent them. The Q are the questions they asked and the JD: precedes the answers I wrote. I myself was surprised by the wisdom I exhibited in some answers. Some of them were so deep. They also helped me clarify my own thoughts on some topics. The best part about this is that it is all true, or what I believe to be true
Don’t get me wrong. This is not one upmanship and I really think the guys are genuinely trying to do something different. It’s good for them. Boring stuff gets you boring results. I hope they get some good guys frustrated by trying to beat the systym that is tacked against them.
So if the interview guys actually read my mail and looked me up on google… here is a big thank you and kudos from me.
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The answers:-
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I am tired of inane disclaimers that financial service companies throw at customers at the last; that to in illegible fonts and if you are on the radio, at incomprehensible speed. May God make you big enough one day to inflict the same on others. In other words (duh) may you grow to spend money on above the line marketing.
Disclaimer: a cocky tone with the backing of seed investors (other people’s money) probably appreciates or expects one back…

QUESTIONSQ1 Have you been in a financial products distribution role before? Yes/No

JD:
Oh you betchya…

Q1Y If you answered “Yes” to Q1, then please tell us more. Anillustrative list is -- the kind of product, the distribution channeldetails, the turnover (+ the growth attributable to you), theincentive structure (for you as well as your distribution channel),any extraordinary achievements/contributions (e.g. record breakinggrowth, convinced a particularly difficult but important customer(s),new/innovative ideas you contributed) + any other detail you thinkrelevant.

JD:
I was in looking at Mumbai and Pune as a territory for selling online trading accounts years ago. October 00 to November 01 to be precise. Those numbers were gobsmacking awesome. Oops, did I use a hyperbole. Retract – rephrase – Compared to today’s day of lakhs of account I could only manage a couple of thousand. We weren’t a startup driven by racking numbers to please a seed community. We were owned by a shrewd seasoned business man who only threw money after you got money in. So with a limited sales force and a deeply immature market, that was industry shaking. To give you a perspective, google was just about more than a Stanford project at the time.
Selling internet broking was tough – Sensex was at 2k and internet was the haven of fraud (at least in the customers mind) and to add to that, our dear Mr. Ketan Parikh, decided to play party pooper. You know the guy?
Let’s get back to numbers – our trading volume around the time was 5 cr a day and I was directly attributable to around 3 cr. Not bad considering we had an ‘all India’ presence. But then, was that my over performance or the other idiots at the branches just decided to sleep on their jobs. The Bangalore guy was called Mr. NASDAQ as he always ambled to office at around 12 noon.
Difficult customers were part of the party. If you think difficult customers who were on the threshold of joining are painful in financial services, you aint seen nothing yet. Wait till they join and make a few losses, having their margins cut in a fall and now try recovering money from a dude in bhayendar, who happened to be the local NCP rep. Oh, does that mean I did that. You bet I did. All of the above to multiple people and yes, the bhayander story is true. Now that you reminded me let me dig up that card. I’ll probably frame the dam thing. An, numbers again – the recovery from the NCP guy was around a frightfully low five grand.
Innovative ideas bit – lotsa – we wanted direct sales agents. One poor guy walked in from Pune to start a broking coaching institute. I made him the largest sales agent in India. He is still a large guy there. Now I can happily give you his reference. A year into the job then, he might not have been a happy reference.
Then my company did the silliest thing they could. Took me out of sales (a promotion they told me) and put me in centre. Wow. Now I looked at broad sales strategy (fart), marketing (more fart), product (loud fart), customer service (fart of the highest order) and corporate strategy (beyond just fart). Hung around for a couple of years and left. Did some nice things. Conned a few websites into paying per lead generated. Those were the days of cost per thousand impressions. Google was in its nappies remember, and they hadn’t yet plagiarized the adword model yet.
Got customer service up to mark. Did simple things like design and implement software to track and manage queries as well as – wow – classify customers into buckets based on trading volume. I practically ran out of the cabin naked, shouting Eureka, eureka…. Good thing they don’t have bathing communes in fashion these days. But what’s so hot about implementing a software? Loading a CD can’t be that much tough. Errr… this is the embarrassing part. We decided to build this stuff in house. Ya… I know… my sympathies with me as well.
Incentive structures in those days for the core team was not directly variable a math model. The company made money and hopefully end of the year, they like you enough to give you a bonus. For the direct sales guy, it just was a cash incentive. Innovative stuff was done there in the form of mid month 3 day schemes to get rid of month end bottle necks and stuff like that. Nothing rocket science but a staid financial service firm like ours… boy was that tough getting through.
Record breaking growth – you tried a nice one on the percentage versus multiple growth bit “fairly frightening habit of looking at targets as “Multiples” rather than “Percentages””. Very cool line but would fail to impress anyone who was worked in a fresh company in a fresh industry. Of course you grow in multiples, that too monthly. You have a ridiculously low base. Are any of you the hallowed IIT IIM combos?

Q1N If you answered “No” to Q1, doesn’t matter (well, it might perhapsmatter, but not very much). Please tell us your approach on creating,nurturing and growing a financial product distribution channel. Pleaseremember that on a “Ceteris Paribus” basis, good ideas can be worth asmuch as (if not more than) good experience.
Two hints for you in this connection. The first hint -- our ad clearlymentions that like most startups we too (though we have a Seedinvestor in place) are resources-poor; meaning no advertisement based(or other expensive) strategies or other expensive strategies please.Whatever money we have, we would prefer to spend it on your salary,the office overheads, and most importantly, our villa in Switzerland(just joking). The first hint – Though we are achievement-hungry, wedo generally tend to ignore strategies of the type “give me ‘n”people, each will handle ‘m’ customers, each of these customers doingon an average ‘l’ amount of business annually, so I will give you‘nml’ amount of business in all”! Mathematically impeccable but then…..

JD:Well all other things being equal, while pardoning the latin or is it greek translation, your question here indicates an answer that the earlier question fails to address. So here goes nothing –
Why financial distribution, all channels follow the same logic. Plenty of hard work and sweet common sense. You keep the relationships equitable and work with the partner, you got it going. The amount of consideration that is typically the bone of consideration (eeks, bad English), roots from an imbalance created from an understanding of power. To make things simple –if the distribution owns the customer, you pay high; if you own and hence pull customer – you pay low. To validate the hypothesis, speak to your nearby kirana.
And as far as hiring people goes, it works directly in proportion to the investment you think your firm can afford. People always work well in sales. Feet on street is well – feet on street – forgive an other rubbish aphorism. But if you are like my super boss who believes that, spend money only after you see money, good for you. I have seen enough to see that both strategies are great. Though for a start up that promises growth, stock, valuations and other scary words, conservation might not be the chosen path. After all the swiss villa is calling. And it’s never been cheaper. Thank you subprime.

Q2A As you know, the distribution of financial products is a fairlyfragmented business. There are the national level distributors andthen there are many smaller (but important in their regionnevertheless) players as well. Personal equations are important. Sohow would you assess your existing senior level (decision takinglevel) contacts among the financial products distributors to sourcethem for us? If you do not have any contacts (e.g. you are from adifferent line), then how do you propose to (i) create the databaseand (ii) also acquire the relevant senior level contacts

JD:Having databases is one the surest and smartest way to short circuit the growth process in this industry; but given the wonderfully inadequate innovation in this industry I an assuring you that these databases come with a heavy cost. The cost is invisible… the cost is the mindset of the guy who comes along with it. He comes with existing preset ideas (if you call them that) and the baggage of his current employment (promises made, big talk given).
In my experience if you have a kick arse idea and service, you need a fresh guy with eager brains. If yours is a me-too product, then hire the database.
A small part of my current work does work with people who have names of distributors, and they can be leveraged. But I still can’t fathom the need for this. This industry is small and fairly friendly. A few calls here and there will get you the list.

Q2B A linked question. Once you have the database + the contacts(either because you already have these or you acquire them somehow),how would you then go about keeping it updated?

JD:uhh. That’s a tough one. Will an excel sheet help?I also assume you have budgets for people to travel (not Mallya style of course) and for people to make calls. Is STD enabled on the cell phone? That would help for sure. A greeting card sent by courier might also tell you if the addressee has moved. See. Greetings cards always come with an ulterior motive.
(Is mallya one of the seed guys… then that line just got me screwed, metaphorically of course)
Ohhh now I get it. You were talking about getting more people on it. I must be so thick. .. But if that’s your core job, you kinda just do it. Right? You keep looking, you keep talking and you keep buying them off. The last is the worst thing and must not be done, but so is infidelity. Go on – remember ‘the tiger’. As in woods? Ahhh, my sense of humor must be sickening. Imagine having someone like me around your start up.

Hint:- Please keep the “resource-poor start-up” point in mind whileanswering either of these questions (Question 2A or Question 2B).
JD:Got that loud and clear. What you hiring morons that you need to repeat this stuff?

Q3 An easy question. Please tell us something about your sellingtechniques. The answer length is at your discretion. It can be onesentence or multiple pages (coherently written, of course). And by theway, no “cut/copy + paste” jobs from Phillip Kotler etc please.

JD:PERSISTENCE

I wanted to cut that at one word, but since I seem to be suffering from typititis, here is one cut copy paste from the dictionary. By the way, who’s that kotler chick. Haven’t met her? Does she do handstands? You sure, you not from some IIM?

Main Entry: persistence Part of Speech: noun Definition: steadfastness
Synonyms:
constancy, doggedness, endurance, grit, indefatigability, perseverance, pluck, resolution, stamina, tenacity
Antonyms:
idleness, indifference, indolence

Q4 You would no doubt recall from the advertisement that we arethinking of keeping a part (maybe a large part) of your pay asvariable (incentives disbursed on a monthly/quarterly basis as well ashalf yearly and annually). And that even bigger rewards can hopefullycome your way through stock in our company (amount of stock given isof course performance linked).So what are your salary breakup expectations with us? On one extremeyou could say 0% fixed and 100% variable. Shows a lot of confidence,doesn’t it? On the other hand, you could say 100% fixed and 0%Variable. Without getting into a judgmental mode, don’t you think thisshows a lack of confidence?

JD:Try and answer this
If there was a $100 bill lying on the ground and there were (A) Santa Claus, (B) A dumb blond, (C) The Easter Bunny, and (D) A confident bloke who agreed for fully variable pay standing there, who would pick up the $100 bill?

(B) The dumb blonde. The rest are all fictional characters!

Just pay a guy his true worth and let him overachieve for bonus. Bonus does not run the house. It helps you buy the second car, the club membership and if your company is really cheap – a pair of ray bans. Variable pay to fulfil basic needs is like keeping a dog hungry so that he does tricks with food as the motive when your friends come home. Zoo zoo. As another bad maxim goes – when you pay peanuts you get … yaa.. you know that… some one…duh… Monkeys!

-- Now that the two extreme points have been discussed above, pleasego ahead and let us know your preferred breakup in percentage terms(Fixed component vs Variable component).

JD:Go figure…
Good try on the mental marking though. Dan Ariely would have been so proud of you.--

Within the Variable component, what proportion would you prefer toreceive in stock basis and what proportion as incentives(monthly/quarterly basis as well as half yearly and annually). Theincentives are in concrete/hard money so that is the obviousadvantage. But on the other hand, the stock incentives can potentiallybecome “x” times (“x” being hopefully > 10K, we pray to God), so youcan retire as a Crorepati or as a Multiple-Crorepati. What would beyour preference?

JD:The more you break incentives into multiple months of shorter duration, the more you encourage short term behavior. People will sell the dream to get the best sales for now leaving your company with empty promises and bad reputation. So go, keep a plan in place to reward employees who stuck around irrespective of performance. If you are a start up, everyone there who trusted you must get their fair share. That’s the fun of being a family. Asking people to bet on something they don’t know is such a mean trick. Give them their due. Give them bonus for great work. And give them stock for being with you. So that they too care. If you keep giving stock that requires them to stick around in the future you might just get a whole bunch of people staying around not because they love the place but because they want the stock. I always get on board people who work because they want to not because they have to. And then reward them for working for you. Stock must not be used as a carrot but used as a means for showing you care. You care for your granny not because she has to make her will, but because you care. And if she puts you on the will along with another brother who visited her less than you, you don’t crib.

-- Please also let us know your earlier (existing job or last job, ifcurrently between jobs or unemployed) breakup in terms of Variable vs.Fixed.
JD:well if you do want to know – we have fixed pay and variable in a good year can be as high as x or as low as zilch like last year. Stock – this is a complicated thing, designed to confuse. We are the financial engineers you see.

Q5 How comfortable would you be as an one-man (or one-woman) armywhich is what you would be initially?While answering the above, please do remember that you are an integral(in fact, probably the most important) part of boot strapping thecompany’s growth so initially you may have to really go out (even alone) and get us the business (see Q2A and Q2B above). This is thefirst (and likely to be the most important) phase of your career with us. Once you have done this successfully, then comes the easier andmore fun part -- setting up the marketing department, having multiplelayers below you, multiple number of subordinates reporting to you,putting your feet up on the table while others go out and get thenumbers and generally basking in the gentle glow of your achievement(+ in the context of the incentives + stock options discussed earlier,watching your bank balance grow).

JD:Is this a trick question? Is this a Miss Universe contest? And what’s with the disclaimer after the question?

Q6A What excites you the most about this job opportunity?
JD:Another trick question… you guys are good. You hire a psychologist for this stuff? This time ask Miss congeniality. No, not Sandra Bullock, but then… you sure want a lot of bullock in any case… eeeeks another horrible use of the pun. Yeh bolne ke pehle main mar kyun hani gaya.

Q6B Conversely, what are your biggest apprehensions about this jobopportunity? Please do not write “none” or “nil’ or any suchequivalent word, phrase or sentence here. Please let us know at leastone apprehension -- unless of course you are a real-life edition ofthe emotionless “Terminator” robot in which case we will certainlykeep your CV on file for the future (in case we ever need your unique“Termination of Humans” services).

JD:Now that’s a good question. Give your psychologist a bonus for this one and your copywriter a kick for the ugly ‘terminator’ idea. It is so passé. You might as well have said ‘aasta la vista, baby’. Getting the monotone though aka arnie, might take some doing.So answering the apprehensions:-
Any guy writing the job requirement in this way either is too cocky or too egoistic or too fresh or a really cool bunch. One on four might not be a great odd. But the fear here comes in terms of large ego clashes which are typically responsible for the shit we see. Especially in start ups. I have worked in a few to see it coming. If you guys are good, which I assume you are, your biggest problem is ego. If it is a one man show, then even more so.
Other apprehensions
– Will my pay come on time?
– How big is my cabin?
– How come it’s smaller than his?
– How long before I get my secretary and my big fat company sponsored credit card?
– Where’s my car?

Q7 Any other points you deem relevant.JD:errr… melody itni choclatey kaise bani?In conclusion:-We are really looking forward to hearing from you.
JD:So bless me lord

way to a man's arse...

I don’t feel like writing anything today. The office atmosphere got my brains to get the freeze. What a silly place in the world this is. People ducking, chucking responsibility. Not working but pretending that they are highly busy. Sitting on their stuff for eons and then expecting others to finish on time. Add to that tomorrow we have a divisional man com meeting. When you get sufficiently high in the system (yeah, I heard the shit floats story as well), these are perks you get to waste your time. Mancom meeting. Wow. Imagine getting a bunch of us together to discuss nothing in particular but all issues in general. This is done with a need to gets ‘everybody on the same page’. Ok.. we are on the same page now. Now what? Where the action plan to do what is is decided. The clear date and deliverables required out of members. Follow up on commitments and hold people responsible for them. With out the latter the whole point of the meetings is lost on me.
So I get the freeze. I stopped getting affected by it. I just learnt to live through it. numb. God give me change what can be, patience to deal with what cant and the wisdom to distinguish the two. Solution – brain freeze. Go numb unless you really can change stuff. Look around you. You will see zombies enter meetings, trying to look important. The give away is the eyes. The insecure ones always have shifty eye. Looking around them. The dumb ones and unread ones will be the loudest. And yes you will get mr weasel, mr oily, mr dick, mr ego, mr devil’s advocate, mr navel, mr territorial and so on. And not to mention the most important Mr Switched off. That’s me. Off most of the time till its time. Time for decisions to be taken? No, time to order the snacks and time to grab that one jam biscuit in the tray full of peleb butter cookies. The meeting is all about trying to corner the max tasty food. Only seasoned professionals like me know the difference between quality and quantity. The rest can be happy with the 6 glucose biscuits they got. I have my cream centred ones.
And the secret to popularity is not the one who does most of the work. That is one way, but that’s the tough way. The secret is to be the one that orders the treats at the meeting. Everyone else might feel a little shy to openly bare their dark inner love for mysore masala dosas or the eternal favourite – cheese vegetable grilled sandwich; you have to take the orders and openly ask them about it. Then you are the popular one. You must play the role of the pimp, who is corporatese is always the most popular guy around.
Also you know why the cheese veg grill is eternal favourite. Not because it’s sinful but because it’s the most expensive item on the menu. The pleasure derived is directly proportioned to the expense. Who is talking taste, health and other such triflities. Ditto the diet coke. You always order what people don’t want to consume with their own money.
There…I can already picture you as Mr Popular. Aren’t you the pimp?

dho dala

My wife will not enjoy this one, but this graph accurately represents her. (Source here). Though I think the word ‘sad’ need to be replaced by something more apt. How about ‘proud’?


She keeps doing the laundry all the time. Getting the clothes to the washing machine and then drying them. Many times when we are out the whole day, we come in the evening to start the washing machine. Then she does some other work, or reads for about an hour and then comes the chore of drying them. In spite of the fact that we have enough underwear to go on for a week. This is a genetic disorder. My mom in law is forever using the washing machine. Whenever we stay at her place, the clothes I throw in the morning for wash are ready by the evening, the ones I throw in the afternoon are ready by night and the ones I throw at night are ready by… you guess it…. morning. Then the curtains go in, then the towels go in and then what not goes in. If the machine was a leftist it would have struck work by now. And to add to the proof that it is a genetic mutation – her mom’s younger brother (along with his son) run a large industrial laundry. They shifted from their family business to start this. I rest my case.

On the elocution…
Jispa did not make it through to the final rounds of the interschool elocution. A second standard student from her school had made it. Wow. Am I relieved? This was too stressful for me. Everyday, making her revise, changing some nuances but the worst was seeing her caught between me and the teacher. At the event she was quite subdued in her recital and that probably cost her. I kept teaching her to be over the top but I guess she was told otherwise, or got mixed signals. But I am happier doing this without any stress. Next year we will again try and do the internal one and max it with all the fun that comes with it. With the liberty to do whatever Jispa and I deem fit. Seeing the others in action also gave me a sense of the competition and how boring the others are. It just strengthened my resolve to have a blast during the elocutions. I will scour for the most ridiculously loud and funny poem to recite. When I asked Jispa about it and she was also quite keen to do something funny. With that, my resolve has more meaning.

my froggy teaddy bear

Sometimes Jispa needs someone to sit beside her to sleep. She needs a security blanket of sorts. Yesterday was one such day. She kept making all sorts of excuses for not getting sleep. After a long time she got back into our room. ‘I am not getting sleep’. Since jasmine and me were too sleepy to say anything and it was getting late for her, we just took her in. She was knocked out in two minutes flat.
Jasmine and I looked at each other; ‘no I am not lifting her’, we said to each other. So as was predictable, Jasmine got up did the weasel thing. She slept in Jispa’s bed. It was a good thing that in some amazing stroke of wisdom we had made a full size bed for Jispa.
I am not complaining, I got my tiny warm teddy bear to sleep with last night. In morning I was searching for my teddy bear. Where was it? Ah, there it is, all curled up in the froggy pose at the edge of the bed. I picked it up and lay it correctly on the pillow and put my blanket over it. Hmmmmm…nice warm fuzzy froggy teddy bear to wake up to.
Every one needs a security teddy. I’ve got mine.

mom proposes...

Yesterday Jispa stayed over at my mom’s place so today morning I had to go and pick her. So instead of giving the snack tiffin, my wife decided to give her food coupons for the school canteen. Normally Jispa likes to have some snack and a juice so this time Jasmine decided to give her extra coupons. Typically the juice costs 15 and the food around that as well. So, almost like a treat Jasmine put a full 35 rupees in the wallet. More than she ever has put at one time. It’s normally only 20 or 25. Full treat was on for Jispa.
This is what transpired. At the counter Jispa first saw a cake, so she took one for 12 bucks and then she saw the juice which she took for 15. So now she couldn’t really have anything else as there isn’t anything available for remaining 8 bucks in her wallet. Hahaha.
Jasmine’s attempt at a wholesome snack was effectively thwarted and foiled by Jispa.
I would assume most mothers would find this story exasperating; most fathers would find this highly amusing, most childless couples might find this sweet and bachelors would ask – So?

random thoughts are not philosophy... ok they are... or atleast at least could be...some day... perhaps

Hey what an innings I played… I hit 30 runs in one over.. uhh… ok, it was a tennis ball match, but it was in a proper cricket ground… uhh, ok the boundary was brought a bit inside.. but it was a proper match… ok it was a 8 a side match… but it was a proper match… uhh it was a internal tournament… but it was their opening bowler.. ok ok… he was a bowler who might have bowled after 10 years. But I still whacked it out of the park. Didn’t I? I said this some blogs ago… if you set your standards reasonably low you will always be happy. It works well for cricket for sure. Hehe. But it was good highlight for a Saturday.

On Sunday Jasmine, Dinesh and me went for a coffee at café coffe day. There we had this petit girl serving us. Quite a small thing but cheerful and fun. I quite like her attitude. And I do like seeing young people work. And as a contrast, I saw a bunch of girls descending the steps. The typical college going girls with a ‘I am so bored’ look on their face. Forgive my typecasts, but they did look like bimbettes, ok there is no word like bimbette but you get the drift. I couldn’t help but think that while it’s likely that my daughter will grow up to be the customer at the coffee shop but I would consider it tragic if she did not even once in her life play the role of the waiter. Too much mumble jumble? Here is the short of it – Get a summer job and grow up

getting back to basics

I quote William Dalrymple from ‘the age of kali’. Here Benezir Bhutto was talking to him about the book – Freedom at Midnight.
“Was she being serious? Freedom at Midnight is terrible schlock pop/history – the Indian independence movement for imbeciles – hardly the sort of book you would expect to find a senior south Asian statesman admitting to read. Moreover, its account of the events of 1947 is deeply biased against Pakistan, and presents Jinha as a little more than a crazed megalomaniac. Assuming she was joking and now regarded the purchase as an embarrassing mistake, I laughed – only for it to become immediately clear that she was in fact entirely serious.”

I had read Freedom at Midnight and I though it’s an awesome book. My interest and regard for Gandhi started off from that book. My interest in partition started off from that book. Both of these topics amongst others in the book set me off to many more books that I subsequently read. I recommend that book to all those with a vague interest in history. But in my zeal I forgot my basic lesson. Every book is just that ‘a point of view’. No that I look back I think I was blind to this. This is a lot of weight in what William says. Louis Fisher’s Gandhi too does not really describe Gandhi in Kolkata at the time of partition in the way FaM does. But then the way Louis closes the chapter on the salt satyagraha will remain permanently etched in my memory. To jog back to the book, it was terribly poetic to be history.

So where does leave me. Hehehe. Well, it’s left me with a hard knock on my head. I have spoken about this in the past. Reading books gives you and advantage over mortal non readers. But it also gives you an inflated ego. I try and battle this ego daily. Reading books also gives me an attitude that helps me tide over the ego. The notion that truth is so subjective. Two individuals watching the same incident may such conflicting versions of the truth. There is no absolute truth. It is only a point of view. Such a vicious attack on my favourite book has left me scurrying for cover. While I hold it high esteem (I still do, albeit a bit lower), I am suddenly more open and circumspect while thinking about it, talking about it and recommending it.

This clearing of hubris is not limited to books. Over time I have realised that hubris gets entrenched in your head all the time. Anything that you do well has a potential to create it. The confidence that you get is by doing things well is the positive aspect and the ego is the negative aspect. Both come in together. In cricket after you just hit the bowler for a six, you have to clear your head and your thoughts else you will perish the next ball. You have to forget that you have just hit a six and treat the next ball again on its own merit. Even after doing an action again and again, repeatedly and brilliantly, the follow up action cannot have any of the hangovers of the first. If you let hubris get to you, read this link on hubris by Devdutt to understand the consequences.

I battle this everyday. This passage was a good tight slap to my hubris. Schlock? Imbecile? Wow. Bahut maara re… I will remember this slap for a long time to come. You have no idea what it means when someone destroys your favourite book thus.

Sometimes I too forget the title of my blog. Things seem opposite in nature and they cannot come together. But somehow in life opposites reconcile. In fact in my title I have put an additional word ‘must’. ‘Must’ gives an idea of action, which is a bit misleading. Many times they remain without doing anything. That itself is an act of reconciliation. Hence in your mind they ‘must’ reconcile. Sorry for the ‘schlock’ philosophy for imbeciles. But I have just been proved one so it does work for me :)
Thank you William. But I still do love the book. It has given me a lot.

so lonely

This is so right…
I quote “Loneliness is like a disease -- and what's worse, it's contagious. Although it may sound counter-intuitive, loneliness can spread from one person to another, according to research being released Tuesday that underscores the power of one person's emotions to affect friends, family and neighbours.” (link to full article)
Lonely people spread loneliness the same way that depressed people spread depression. While in an altruistic world, one would not shun such people but try actively to bring them out to the normal world and make them the see the ‘beauty of life’. But this shit works only if the feeling is not in tune with their essential character. If you recognise this as an essential character of the person in question – my advice to you would be – RUN. FAST.
There are so many negative characters you meet, characters who are cynical, depressed, forever getting bugged and irritated. If you stay with them you will slowly mimic them. Any mood is contagious. You can try passing on your ‘positivity’ (whatever) to them but the risk is just not worth it.
In office there are constant naysayers, constant argumentative nuts, constant idiots who just don’t see the point and according to Devdutt, the bums who fight on both sides (link here) – the proverbial ‘devil’s advocate’.
Whenever someone really gets to me by constant bitching, complaining, arguing, I just refuse to fight. Either I run or I stop the argument. One interesting way to make a bitcher run away from you is to praise exactly what they are bitching. If that’s too difficult this trick never fails – take a reverse perspective of the same and ask him to consider the other side. See him run like a black buck with Salman Khan on his tail. (wasn’t that a sad metaphor. But I couldn’t help it)


a few videos...


a political one...



and finally the one I wanted to show...

getting it right

What happens when you have two trainers? Hehehe. First we train her at home for the elocution competition and then yesterday her elocution teacher at school trained her. While she did not change the narration too much, basic differences were there in the approach. I teach to be a little over the top in emotion. A little over emotion is ok. With all the kids going for one or two tones, I like to teach at least five six tones if not more. So not everything is loud. Some words are soft, some loud, some with a chuckle, a sad one, a surprise etc… This ensures she stands out in the crowd. With kids coming and going in a procession, elocutions can get boring for the judges as well. My belief is that only if you first entertain, then will you have a chance to win. The teacher has an obvious emphasis on the clarity. She sacrifices emotion for clarity while I do the reverse. Clarity aa jaaye ga if the emotion is right.
But I guess it is wrong to undermine the teachers experience. So as I was training her today (95% of training is in the car while I drop her to the bus stop), she kept telling me that her teacher taught her otherwise. Like good parents I conceded. I allowed her to keep what the teacher said but I still tried to push for subtle emotions within the words. So that there is still enough variation in the poem. I have to teach something that takes the clarity that the teacher teaches while allowing for the emotion that makes the poem come alive.
What I am also happy is that her teacher does not simply teach the emotion. She explains why the emotion fits into the story. Like one line (“which added up to 46, or its it 52?) Where she says that you can’t be loud because you are thinking and calculating. Fair. I had told her to be loud in – ‘added upto 46’, as she is jumping to a number and then think for ‘or is it 52’ as now you sheepishly think you have made a error.
Aaaaaa. I don’t really bother. It’s right as long as there is a justification. And as long as Jispa understands it, she will be getting it right either way.
The greatest thing in parenting is that I remember my childhood. I remember a lot of incidents even from as long back as 2nd standard. So at least I know which mistakes to avoid. At least I am making fresh mistakes. I clearly remember having conflict when mom taught differently from what the teacher taught. I used to argue with mom, when she insisted otherwise. Some times I was right while I assume that most of the time mom would have been right, but the stress of POSSIBLY getting it wrong was greater the stress ACTUALLY getting it wrong. As the latter is a small thing when you just get corrected, while the former shimmers all through, from when you do home work till you hit school. So with Jispa I never argue with her if she tells me that the teacher taught her otherwise. I merely explain my point and let her do it her way. The stress is just not worth it. She will soon figure. Making mistakes is a better way to learn than to get it right all the time.
One incident jumps to memory. While I was an average to above average kid in class (rank 8 to15 out of 60 kids), in tenth standard I really started doing well in maths. I was always good but in tenth, focussed studies and better practice helped me shine in my favourite subject. Also my teachers were pretty cool. I even figured a different way of solving a sum which I thought was right. My school teacher Mr Thomas, allowed me to keep that way while just telling me to write down the calculation in steps and not jump to the answer. That was great motivation I guess. So in tenth in one of the unit tests I scored 49 on 50. Mr. Thomas looked at the final score and asked if I knew where I went wrong. I showed him and he got pissed. He said he should have cut more marks for that mistake. I had done everything right everywhere but in one sum in the end I had totalled 7+5 as 11. That was my only chance of scoring a perfect score ever in my life. I had blown it up. I knew in the finals the boards wouldn’t let me score a perfect score. Sure enough, I got 74 on 75 in algebra and 73 on 75 in geometry. There was only a one mark error in algebra where there was a fill in the blank on a technical math issue. So yes, I missed my perfect score as 7+5 is 12 and not eleven. Till today whenever I see 7+5, I will first think 11 and then see that problem in front of me and I know the answer is 12, and I regret missing the perfect score. I remember solving the sum in the exam, I remember checking it, I remember saying to myself – 7 +5 = 11. Then I remember the paper duly corrected and I remember Mr. Thomas’s words. This was all in 1990. I just won’t forget it.
Look at the trade off, if I had got it right, this would have not been a part of my memory. At best I might have remembered the perfect score, that’s all. My memories would have been worse off. Aarrggghhh. I want the score and I want the memory.

role model? look around

Once a friend came out from an interview and was talking about it. He said that he was asked a question on his role model. His answer ‘my father’ was dismissed as being boring. He then proceeded to narrate how he explained that actually, there are many role models, in all walks of life. If one person bats better, then he is role model for batting, if another presents well, then he would be my role model for presentation.
This was in college during my management when Shoppers Stop had come for summer interns. And the friend in question was the affable Cherian Varghese. God bless you Cherian. I don’t know weather he meant it or he was being sharp in an interview, but he gave me the wisdom that I have held for a long time.
Every one, everything can teach you a thing or two. No matter how bad they are, they still can teach you.
I have learnt to learn from everything and everyone. Everyone is good and look at the good side of it. It’s easy to be critical and find fault with probably anything. I have learnt that fault is a way of life and most of the time it is important for the fault to be there else the good will not be there as well. A simplistic example – a great painters vanity may be his driving force, another aggression might lead him to do great work but also is responsible for burning his team. Etc etc..

This is a video of Orhan Pamuk, 2006 Nobel winner in literature. A lot of us fail or have many failures. What do you look at? What do you look for?

but daaaaad

Yesterday I caught Jispa reading ‘the wimpy kid’ again. I told her to read it only on the condition that she asks us what she does not understand. Else no more reading for her. Later into the evening as she was reading I caught her again and asked her to read aloud some line. As we thought – she was skimming through. One word she knew the meaning but couldn’t read it was ‘definitely’. That’s when I looked at her and said… ‘no more reading’. She looked at me and a tear swelled in her eye. ‘no more Wimpy kid’ she said ‘not no more reading’. I just kept quiet and looked at her ‘nooo… you cant stop my reading’ she cried.
Did I feel like a third grade villain? I did not know what to do. I did not want to give in easily. Just giving up the wimpy kid would not have been strict enough and anything more would have been too strict.
I did the dad thing. ‘Now get and go for bath, brush your teeth and get ready for bed’. I just side stepped the punishment. What to do. I was not going to punish someone for reading but I sure want her to read and not skip words.
And then before bed another test of parenting. Teaching and preparing Jispa for the interschool elocution. I don’t want to push but if I don’t she does not improve. She wants to improve but that would mean making her rehearse again and again… these are not so easy calls. I would like her to do her best, win and compete. But I don’t want her to pay a price for it. So I try to tell sweetly. Keep telling her that I don’t mind if she does not practice, use emotional to make her practice. I even let her put her own emotions even if they aren’t 100% right, so that she has some ownership. And after all I also don’t know what the judges will be looking for. Her guess is as good as mine. I am happy she is processing and trying to use her brain. That’s the real battle. She competes this Friday. I hope to polish some rough edges by then. Without pushing her too hard. I really want her to enjoy it as opposed to having pressure.
I am not sure if I should go to the finals though Jasmine is keen to be there.
I would love to see her perform but I don’t want any burden of expectation. Go ahead and spit out on stage… it’s the fun that counts. If you had fun and did your best, then only will you want to do it again. What’s the point of a flash in the pan? Doing regularly what you like doing is the ultimate elixir.

weekend fun

This Saturday our B team played a match. Now I just love the B team. Here I magically become one of the most experienced players. So this time around we had a match with some really good players. Some 20 plus somethings who play and practise regularly. I was given eth responsibility to open the innings. It was one of the most hostile pace attacks that I might have played. The ball coming on fast and pitching and moving off the seam. Wow. The ball hit me a quite a few times. The ones that are still sore are - Once it moved off middle stump and went on to hit my bums, the other bounced and hit my thigh pad, and the third moved and hit my shin. The fact that it still hurts through all that padding goes on to show how fast they were bowling. I survived the opening six overs without getting out or beaten even once. This just goes on to prove that if your standards are adequately low you can always figure out a victory.

One Sunday we decided to have lunch at a restaurant near the gateway. Since there was a small waiting, I decided to take the kids to the Gateway. Jispa was game as usual, one other friend joined in and the third thought it was too hot. The other parents also thought it was too hot. How could that be my excuse? I just played in the same sun on Saturday. So Jispa, a friend and me went sightseeing. There you could see the standard tourists and the camera guys who now roam around with highly portable photo printers in their back packs. They give you the photos instantly. Their stated charge is 30 bucks a pop but I sure they can be bargained down cheaper. I paid 50 bucks for two prints of the same picture. I love getting these cheap touristy thrills.
While we were posing I did my usual nonsense posing and Jispa happily followed. She too is used to this. Her poor friend took some time to figure out that being silly in public is normal by our standards. You can see her a bit restrained (at least by our standards).

The original photo is a bit bleached out. I think they do that to ensure that maximum white is used and hence the colour cartridge is used much less – or they just don’t know more. Our photographer was using a Nikon D60 with his knob on manual. The other photo is what I like, a little more saturated (hat tip – the other kids mommy).

The fathers curse

Jispa has been reading a lot these days. She recently finished the book Matilda by Roald Dahl. Awesome achievement considering she is only 7 years old. It is a 225 page book. I think that’s quite something.
But the dad in me is a bit worried. We don’t change over all these years do we?
But why on earth am I worried?
I am worried that while she is reading more than her age suggests, she might be skipping words. This way while she might follow the entire story, the habit of skipping words you don’t understand is not exactly a good thing to do.
Yesterday she was reading ‘diary of a Wimpy kid’. The book is recommended for 9+. So I made her read it aloud. One line said – and rocky primitive mind said… I asked her if she understood what ‘primitive mind’ is. She replied ‘smart mind’. There, issues in my book. So while I was happy she is reading a lot but, I told her to be sure of what she reads and ask for what she does not understand.
So that’s daddying. Keep a close watch on everything. Big daddy is actually big brother. But I find it so ironic that even good things need to be regulated. That reminds me of an age old maxim that ‘if it’s too good to be true, it’s too good to be true.’

random thoughts of a unfettered mind (the adjective is for effect)

Corporate speak. One guy N wants data. He tell his flunk V. V asks R. R say H has it. H says A has it. A says only R can give. So circular loop happens and the V is flustered as he is the fall guy. N tells V to write mail. I get marked on it, as H and A report to me. I raise hands. Tell him to buzz off. V calls me and cries. I call V and R. Tell V to tell R what exactly he wants. I tell A to give whatever is required and matter solved. All it required is a guy who calls everyone else’s bluff. That was my value add to something I wasn’t even involved with. Corporate is such a bitch.

Forget that. Lets come to something I like. Teaching. This year I am given the job of teaching something I don’t know. Well I actually don’t know too much of what I assume to know but atleast I know how much I know or don’t know. This time I don’t even know that. Basically I am being asked to take some lectures on quali research. I have a fair exposure to the same and I guess any half decent guy is better than a half a point decent academic.

But this time I have resolved it to be different. I researched on some high end sites for white papers. Taken the trouble to understand these and give it to the kids to read before they come to class. Today I had to kick out around a dozen of them for not reading and coming. It is difficult thing to do but if they have to shape up then I have no option. My only worry is how much to push them and not have them break. But they must grow up and I must be tough for that. Let’s see how much that takes them and me. But at least thanks to this I am learning more, understanding more and improving my knowledge on the dam subject. It’s a good thing to be outside your comfort zone.

While you are driving around Mumbai you realise the rank stupidity of Mumbai road planning where, you have really broad roads becoming tiny and narrow suddenly. If that doesn’t jam what will? I faced this today morning at 630 am. Purely a case of narrowing. So bloody frustrating. We need mass rapid transport and connections to the stations.

One of my team is on leave. That gives me the chance to sit on her desk and with my team. I dunno about their feelings but I sure feel better. The senior cube holes are so disconnected form the rest. This is where the action is and where I don’t feel bored. Now I realise what happens in my appointed nice corner. I am disconnected with anything and everything around the office. Its nice to get demoted once in a while. This place is so much fun. It takes 10 odd years to realise that length of your cube is no barometer of fun in your office. In fact I think there is an inverse relationship there.

excuses excuses

This is easily the funniest thing I have read this month. The world’s most powerful particle accelerator was shot due to some bread (baguette) being dropped by a bird. Read here and here
This is same LHC that critics said was extremely powerful and could produce anti matter that could end the world. Something like matter meeting anti matter and BOOM – end of the world.
After the hilarity of the dropping, one another thing struck me. They actually seemed to have told the truth no matter how embarrassing it would be. Or it is the most implausible of excuses. I am sure a lot of the scientists working at the LHC would be teaching somewhere and what would their reaction be if a student gave a similar excuse for not having the assignment on time. “I finished it but a stork flying overhead shat (diarrhoea perhaps) on my laptop, short-circuiting it”.

jispa - when you do get older, remember the excuse - if a bird can shut down a LHC with a bread piece, imagine what they can dow ith your assignment. Especially if you are studying physics.

graft

I had such a long week end. It started with my trip to Igatpuri where I bought some land. Someday when I save enough I might decide to build my small home there. I remember a Nancy comic that I read many years ago. It was at least more than 25 years ago. Nancy takes her small doll house and walks to the forest. She leaves her doll house in the middle of the forest and then walks away remarking… ‘now we too can talk about our home in the woods’. I remember that comic strip as if it was yesterday. I guess, this is the first step in that direction, though the Igatpuri land is definitely not in the woods but the feel is like a hill station.
Though one thing realy bugs me is the cash dealings that in India land or almost anything is subjected to. People like us are salaried guys with zero black money and no cash income. Hence we like paying by card and cheque wherever we go. This has ye to percolate in the innards of India. Our tax laws and system seem hopelessly inadequate for the sheer breadth of this country. But atleast now the paperwork is getting computerised and they take the photos from their webcam and thumb scans for the records. That should solve a lot of issues.
While Jasmine and me were talking about cash I was explaining to her the various source of scam cash that I have come across while working. It is crazy to see the ethics of the white collared workers. We keep coming across strong instances of people across sectors siphoning off money or asking for bribe for almost anything, right from printing, ad films, stamp papers, passing routine bills for payment, choosing vendors, anything. The sheer scale and shamelessness is shocking. I even send back diwali gifts that I think cross ethic levels. Pens, watches, silver and even pressure cookers have been on the list. Somebody once asked me why? What motivates me to do this and be clean? I told him, I want to show my face to my dad. I wouldn’t be able to do so if I did this. That my dad passed away 11 years ago des not make any difference.
On Saturday while I was talking to Jasmine explaining my position I was explaining that cash is always a bad thing. In my estimate any one in my position could have taken at least rupees fity lakhs to 100 lakhs. This kind of cash would have social repercussions. Imagine if I had this cash lying around the house. I would not know where to use it. We would end up buying a lot of stuff, gadgets, premium luxury, ostentatious vacations; we would let Jispa buy a lot of stuff, pander to her whims and what not, make a brat out of her. God knows what physiographical changes it would have on us. The cash in your pocket is always ready to go out… Jasmine and I are quite clear on the values we don’t want Jispa to have. Not having cash is not a value in itself but is an important value driver. I am so glad. Ethics have their payoff in different directions.

We also saw the movie A Christmas Carol. Nice movie, but it should have been rated U/A.

office wars

I came across this amazing para from this source. http://cheeptalk.wordpress.com/2009/11/18/inside-story-saddams-strategic-thinking/
"Saddam lived in fear of a coup mounted by the Republican Guard. His solution was to create the Special Republican Guard, whose main remit was to protect him against coups particularly from the Republican Guard. You would think that the head of this outfit would be a fearsome figure who would terrify any budding coup plotters. Woods asked other leading figures if this was indeed the case and the answer was a resounding NO! Why? Saddam was well aware of the “who monitors the monitor problem” – what is the head of the Special Guard mounted a coup himself? Saddam’s solution was not original: appoint a relative. Make sure the appointee is a coward so he would not dream of mounting a coup. Just in case he is tougher than you might think, choose someone stupid so he cannot mount a successful coup and is too stupid to recognize someone else’s good ideas for a coup."

I see this happening in corporate life as well; when an insecure though seemingly smart head has an amazingly dumb guy as his side kick. Many times this amazingly dumb guy is a guy from his same caste and village. Thick caste / language loyalties substitute blood loyalties as the latter can be easily accused of nepotism.

Look around you. There are Saddam’s everywhere. One way to look at it his fate is - look at where Saddam is now, the other way is – look at how far he went.

manhood ki lalkaar

Taking from yesterday’s post, where I spoke aloud of my quest to be grey before I get bald… I was at the barber’s shop where he encountered white hair above my ears in plenty. He told me ‘saab, there is a lot of white hair inside’. “Great” I answered. I think that left him a little flummoxed and bereft of a hair dye client.
I hadn’t been shaving since the last ten days and hence I even had a beard with strands of white. I normally don’t like getting a shave outside but this I made an exception. The experience is rarely nice as they are used to really tough beards and they get a chance to butcher my skin which is still (happily) soft. I rarely get away from such butchering without a few red spots, that too after I tell him that shave only once. Otherwise they shave twice and get rid off the complete epidermis, exposing a lot of red spots. They might be trying their best to justify their price I guess. But shaving twice is an interesting habit that I see a lot of guys having, when I first took to shaving after my 10th exams, I too used to shave twice. In fact in college days, I shaved everyday and that too twice, with about 1/10th the beard that I have today. These days I shave just once and that too on alternate days. These days my laziness quotient is up to three days or even a week.
I remember around ten years back I had a shave at one of the various villages around Ahmedabad. It was a typical barber shop with a wooden rickety chair and a scruffian for a barber. He gave me a tough man’s shave. First they splash water, then apply the cream, works up a lather on your face with the bristles then give you a shave pulling and pinching your skin, then start again. After you are through with the shave, he splashes water, wipes it with a napkin (ugh), then applies alum all over the face, then wipes that off (same napkin), then takes a bottle with vile green liquid (warned poison with a death skull) and splashes it on his hand onto your face. Whew, its only an after shave. But then that’s not all. He takes an afghan snow look-alike bottle and takes some in his hand and gives you a face massage. All this is happening with his very rough hands. Why would anyone want to be subjected to this? And yes if anyone wants to know… I did tip him (I think).
Yesterday I got away with three red spots and some burning sensation. But its worth testing your manhood once a year I guess.

father of the bride

Two days and two functions to attend. One was a simple marriage ceremony of a simple colleague which was in a simple hall with minimal fuss and décor. The other was a massive celebration of the fact that a friend’s kid (friend’s brothers actually) completed five years and hence was able to finally shave his hair! Yeah yeah. The latter was an elaborate affair with three separate functions, all done in the splendour of an elaborate ceremony. What on earth? I keep thinking that one day Jispa will grow up. I have tried to keep aside some money for her for her education but have no money set aside for her marriage. It’s a complete waste. Jasmine and I are in a way quite ‘practicallists’ who don’t understand the value of splendour. We are the cheapo who have not celebrated her first birthday. Our reasoning being she was too small to figure anything. In all these functions the baby is inevitably harassed by the lights, the attention and the noise.
On all her birthdays we take Jispa and some of her key friends for a fun outing and ensure that the occasion is celebrated in a small but hopefully meaningful way. Jasmine has also struck a deal with Jispa that she will celebrate her 10th birthday in any way she chooses.
So when she grows up I am planning to oppose every prospective groom that comes our way. This way she will be forced to elope and then I could forgive all and call them back. Imagine the money we would save in the bargain. And the pain… has anyone seen the movie ‘father of the bride’, I might just fit the archetype. Only one issue – I have to figure out a way to go white before I go bald.