lets change

When the child grows up it holds the mirror to the parent. Damn, it’s not easy.

Some conversation with Jispa led to something, led to something and then I asked her – am I protective. She said – yes. You are protective. I asked her for sure. Do you really think so? Come on. I am not protective. I allow you to do stuff and all.

She was like “No. you are protective. You didn’t allow me to use a knife for so long. You said, that I would cut myself and you would have to rush. You wouldn’t allow me to go just like that for a friend’s party. You did not allow me and my friend to go by ourselves for a movie…”. OK STOP.

Dam shit. I am protective. It may be under the garb of being risk averse but I guess I am protective. Damn. I always wanted to be a father who allows a kid to explore, have fun, run around, not bother too much. I ended up being damn shit protective. I thought that I was cool. I would allow her to pierce her ear for an additional earing, I would allow her a tattoo when she turns 18, I would allow her a bike or whatever. But I think the fact that I say, that I WILL ALLOW means that it is required that she would ask me. After that I would do all the research and all the background checks before ‘allowing’ her to be herself. That makes me protective.

It’s been a massive revelation for me. After that conversation, I kept making fun of her, that now I won’t do this and I won’t that, as I shouldn’t be protective. If mommy is going to bajao her then why should I stop it and be protective. She has to learn to fight her own battles.

But I am protective. This has to stop. I can’t be like this. I am the monster that I did not want to be. In fact, I tried to actively avoid it but I guess I ended being one. Of course, I can blame Jasmine for this, but I know the truth. I am wrong. I know it.

So, once I had a short conversation with her. I told her that she is possibly right. I am protective, but I can change. It takes time and effort on my part. My constant telling you that I am trying not to be protective is basically telling myself that. I should try to not be protective at all. Keep it tight. Also, what happens is that kids don’t realize that there are tradeoffs. You can’t get the just the right amount of protectiveness. I want protection now but I don’t want it then. Its desirable but it’s not possible. So far while she was small, it was incumbent on me to be protective so that she doesn’t hurt herself while she grows up. But now, she will have to face the music as she does grow up.

Possibly I am designed to be protective. Possible because as some Freudian level, I may have required this protectionism and strove for it from my elders. Who knows – did I get too much of it, or did I not get as much as I desired from it. That perspective only a third person will give. How can I give it?

A few days back, one kid who whose first job was with me and then she joined me again later after her MBA was talking to me. I am like a father figure to her and it’s a special relationship. She recently colored her hair and for some reason, she sent me a photo and told me – I colored my hair. Sure. It looks good. I assume your husband also loved it. Yes, he did. Then she told me that she thought I will give her a scolding. ME – A scolding for coloring her hair? Why would I do that. I love it. Do whatever you want. It looks pretty. Your stupid husbands and boyfriends have issues with your hair. I never had any such issues with Jasmine. Go ahead and figure. You don’t need my approval for it. Then we discussed further and she said – that she saw me as a super protective dad in her case. I kind of protested. How was I super protective? I would tell her of dangers, coach her, talk to her, but did I stop her?

But I guess the feedback is on the wall and for me to see clearly. I was always a guy who took care and precaution and ensured that people saw danger and understood the risks. But dam shit – I ended up being protective or say – over protective. That’s not what I wanted to be, definitely not. It’s going to be a tough thing from now on for me.

The old adage that I learnt from a book that said – protect where you must, permit where you can. I don’t know. It’s a long journey. Can I change my stripes fundamentally? I don’t know. But surely, I can try and manage and lessen the impact. But if I do change something that is core to me then will I remain who I am or will I at a fundamental level change? Will that change be good or will it break and essential part of me? Most of those under me would possibly say that I was always protective of them. How much will I change? And how much of this will die? No clue. I don’t even know if I will be successful in changing for the long run.

But at least this bit of feedback is good. At the very least – I am aware of what’s happening. Now I am looking at myself and looking to change. Looking to think in a new direction. A direction that I thought I had but quite evidently, I did not. Let’s see. Let’s change. Let’s hope it’s for the better. Let’s hope a new monster doesn’t emerge as a replacement.

have a look at them too

Jispa is learning about the great war in History class. She has been reading a lot about the Schlieffen Plan as she has that as a case study. Today she told me that she has to present the plan today to the class. I told her “that’s really awesome. I am so jealous”. She looked at me and asked if I was being sarcastic. “no, not sarcastic but real. We learnt shitty history”. She said “all shivaji and all?”. “well yes, we had Shivaji but it’s not about Shivaji that’s the issue. Shivaji would also be awesome, if taught well.”

Earlier on, I used to be quite critical of the local history and culture being imposed on the kids. At school we were taught Marathi as a compulsory subject and we had every alternate year, Maratha History in the history text book. This was kind of really painful. We used this to criticize the government and the administration. The issue really is not the force feed of local culture. Today I would vote for local culture as a part of curriculum. It’s the way that it was taught that was stupid. We should have learnt a lot about the Maratha land, in fact we should have been taught even more in detail and in depth. The great Maratha sea forts, their amazing designs, their strategic importance and the various different places where the wars were fought. The Maratha history is very interesting and they even reached Delhi via the Peshwas. They held off the British and were feared.  It was and still is an amazing piece of history. Even the fact that they taught Marathi in school is important. Here the politicians have got it right, they introduced the medium of administration as Marathi in the local offices. This allows the administrative framework to reach those to whom it really matters, the common people. Ofcourse they have made it militantly so and have kept it almost exclusively so. The non Marathi speaking population does find it intimidating to converse with the officialdom. But still, it’s still better than pushing English or Hindi down everyone’s throat. Here I like the Singapore model where English, Mandarin, Malay and Tamil. It’s a bit painful, but this was all communities are integrated into the government system. So, having Marathi in school is good, but the way it is taught is shit. We learnt it by rote and did not learn the basic art of conversational Marathi. Today while I understand Marathi and possibly can go for Marathi cinema (preferably with sub titles) I can’t really speak Marathi. Jispa too studied Marathi till 7^th grade but cannot speak it. The important part of it is the ability to have conversations in it. Once that’s done, the rest can follow. The script is almost the same as Hindi so that’s not the challenge.

So local culture, history and even geography is not the issue. The issue is the way it is taught. I told Jispa that “in school, we confused history with Eulogy”. “eulogy?”. “yup, here, google the word.” Eulogy: a speech or piece of writing that praises someone or something highly, especially a tribute to someone who has just died. That’s what we did in history. We saw only one side of it and it was in many ways a tribute to the great Maratha and nothing more. A eulogy, that misses the balance in the perspective. “yes” she said. “we are allowed to see every side of history. We are allowed to criticize every aspect of everything in History. We made so much fun of King Louis of the French revolution.”. yup. That is history. Nothing but perspective from things that have happened. Something that will help us understand where we are and what we need to choose to be. History is so much more. Sadly, all my text books and teachers did was to glorify the wars the dead, have clear villains and enemies, typically those ‘Muslim invaders’ till the British came along at which time the Last Mughal Bahadur Shah Zafar became a ‘freedom fighter’. All we did was stupid dates, stupid salient features and a version was narrated to us. Jispa’s history has a whole book dedicated to the Great War, and the first thing the teacher says is that, this is a British book and hence it has the British version. If we read a Germna book, we will get the German version. I also wonder though, what a Japanese version would be.

History : From a subject that I hated and never understood its significance to a subject I read a lot about. I love it. I have tried to pass on my love for History to Jispa as well. At least at some point she wouldn’t question its importance in the curriculum like I did. I learnt nothing. 65 kids in a class, painfully bad infrastructure, stupid textbooks, stupider curriculum – what more can we expect.

Now I read so much and when I removed a few books from the cupboard, I had a few for Jispa to read. In addition to history I also asked her, if she was interested in some anti – government books. Her eye lit up. Yes, I have removed a few. Have a look at them too.

shopping list merges with the bucket list

One more item off the bucket list.

Recently after our home was redone with a lot of thinking and effort from Jasmine and me (Jispa’s inputs as well). Afterwards Jasmine is on a project to clean up each of cupboards. The big one she left at the end was the one in which the books are kept. That is one massive thing to do. Slowly but surely she removed all the books and placed them on the side. We then classified all the books and then started putting them in the cupboards. This gave me a chance to look at all the books that I had bought and read before the advent of the kindle. I don’t want to part with these, partly because of ego, partly because I think that I might need them again and partly because I think that Jispa might one day read a few of them. This time around some shitty books I definitely threw away, but they did not number in double digits. Yesterday while I was giving them to Jasmine as she put them inside, I told her “you know, some of these books are really bad” as I handed her Warren Buffet’s insipid and devoid of any insight autobiography. “I can throw at least a third of the. They are that bad. What say?”. Jasmine nodded and then answered “while we still have space, keep them. When we don’t have space, we will see”.  That was a significant endorsement from Jasmine on all the books that I have kept over the years. More than anything she knows what these books mean to me, from whichever perspective.

While rearranging the books, I came across quite a few titles that I did not read then and I relooked at them. Many a times, the book can wait till its time has come. Just because you don’t find it interesting at the time does not mean that the book loses meaning. It simply means that possibly the timing was not right. It like bosses. No boss is mean in an absolute sense, it’s just that you and the boss haven’t reached a tuning that is conducive to working together. Yes, it can be the bosses fault at many times, but at a core level it’s a question of tuning. Or in the case of books, a question of timing. In my life, there have been so many books that have worked for me at a later time in life. So many times, that I have tried reading a book but have left it on the shelf only to rediscover it years later and get its importance. I was possibly just too naïve to understand it at the point. In any case, these books have taught me a lot and I have learnt (as I have always maintained) more to think in a certain way as opposed to really taking a point by point lesson from it.

Now that Jispa is much older, I am happy that some of my books are something that she finds some interest in.  Once she came for one of my lectures and she saw me talk about the book “why we buy”. Many times, people ask me, if there was one book that they should read from all the books that I have read in my life, one book that was the best ever, I reply without thinking “why we buy”. It is the single most amazing book that I have read about marketing in particular and management in general and is completely entertaining. The author has done nothing but observe people shop and then proceeded to write a seminal book on all his findings. How people shop, how they walk in stores, layout of stores, how people behave with children, men shoppers, women shoppers, babies etc. The lessons are simple. You observe and then you understand. Once you understand the answers are commonsensical to anyone. Marketing is just that. Using good research and solving issues you spot. This book also shows how shoppers around the world are similar, dads around the world are similar. We all behave in similar fashion if confronted with similar stimuli. In many ways shopping seems to be a genetically imbibed thing amongst all humans.

So, after hearing my lecture Jispa was pretty excited and wanted to read the book. She asked me for it. I promised her that when I climb up and rearrange the books, I would keep an eye for it and get it for her. This was the opportunity I was waiting for and I removed it for her, along with a few more books. She started reading it and we started discussing it. Then one night as she getting to bed, I showed her a trick that I often do with this book.

I started flipping through it and asked to stop me at a random place. Then I would randomly start reading any paragraph. The book is so dense and full of insights that any random para starts making sense. You don’t need any context or build up. It just makes sense. So, I read it to Jispa as she was sleeping like it was a bed time story. She would suddenly say stop while I was flipping and I would read her a para or so. No discussion required, no understanding required, it just made a ton of sense.

What a lovely book and what a lovely moment for me. Reading a marketing book to my kid as she slept – that too the best book in my life – An item off the bucket list!