i love you baby, i love you school

I sat this Sunday with Jispa to ensure that she is up to speed on her school work. 8^th grade has started amazingly well for her. Her first set of exams have her scoring lovely marks in almost all subjects, except math. She is now working on her math as well and she is trying to score well there. The teachers are quite nice and are putting an effort in explaining the concepts to the students. They have tons of research and very little mugging up. A lot of explanations of terms and concepts and lots of interesting home work. She has to write a 1200 word essay on the French Revolution after researching whatever she wants on the internet. Now that is cool.

This is the right way to study rather than learning by rote. This is life. You will not know most of what hits you but you are expected to read and understand on the internet and then you are expected to synthesize the same in a short and efficient manner.

So when I sat to study with her, quite frankly I was quite lost. I had nothing to teach her. I just went through most of the work and asked her if she understood. She did and so I just went on and closed almost all the studies in 30 minutes flat. It was a smooth process. She studies on a regular basis, she researches and she manages her homework. I introduced her to Khan Academy.

Jispa now days is getting interested in her school work. She wants to do well and shine in the classroom. I find that very heartening. So I try and use that in motivating her to do better. I have told her about Khan academy multiple times but she hadn’t every really used it. This time while studying I spoke to her about it. I told her that since it’s a US based thing and you have an international curriculum you should be able to love what they do and you will find it relevant. That struck a chord and she was at it, watching videos and learning from there.

I was telling Jasmine that seriously, I don’t understand anything and I can’t really add value to her studies. The fact that I am sitting and discussing stuff with her is enough. Just show that her studies are important and her successes at school are important and celebrated. I keep telling her that she has done well and that we wonder how but we are happy that she is managing her studies and her swimming together.

So while finishing off her studies, I could really add value to only two subjects – Geography and English. In geography we were talking about over population. Here I completely dissed her studies. Over population to my mind is a mythical monster created by people with low imagination and will to do good work. There is no such thing such as over population. Cities have dense populations and in many ways its good for living as people are able to stay together and us mass transportation and fundamentally reduce the footprint. You can efficiently design living, transport, communications, leisure, recreation etc. People are better when they are dense as opposed to being completely spread out. So the problem is not over population but that of under infrastructure. The government tries to solve the problem by labelling it wrong. There is definitely a larger population than what the infrastructure can support but the problem is not the population but the infrastructure. Hence the problem is that there is less infrastructure that what the people need. That’s all you need to do. Reframe your issues. Jispa also completely agrees. She said that in class she also spoke about that as once I had spoken to her about this. People have ingenuity and enterprise.  They cannot be the problem. They are the solution. When we were growing up, I remember having this discussion and debate. I too firmly believed that over population is an issue. China’s one child policy is the solution that must be emulated. As we have seen, China has now devolved policy as it creates a various set of issues, that are also weird to handle – such as too pampered children, an ageing population and preference for males. You cannot see population as a problem but that as an opportunity. People can solve their problems, you have to give them freedom to express their enterprise. One will rise and feed a hundred. I look at my previous firm where one man’s dream took his company today to a height where they have over 40,000 employees. In effect feeding – directly over 120,000 people at the minimum. The ripple effect is much larger. One man’s bull headed vision. She said she tried explaining but she is one fighting many and also the teacher. I think this Thursday, in the parent teachers meeting, I am planning to have a smallish but healthy discussion with her geography teacher. It should be good fun. I might have Jasmine nudging me under the table to stop. Let’s see where that one goes.

The other subject that I help her and we have amazing discussions is English. Here I am learning as much as she is. And with which I am teaching her to go further. We had a few discussions about her homework and the stuff that she had to do. I took the paragraphs and completely pushed the envelope on its meanings. We started discussing and reached meanings on the stuff that we hadn’t thought of before. In English its awesome, we can go as far as we want to go without being right or wrong. Jispa then gets a few ideas and then she notes it down. Annotations and notes is something that her teacher has taught her as the way of studying and I think its completely awesome. This way she makes small notes on the side and then discusses it in class, or with her teacher or uses it in her essays/ work. It’s super cool. I wish I studied like that when I was in school.  This gives her an amazing edge. The only worry is that while talking, I put in more things in her head that I this is right. Not that she cannot process it and hold it, but it’s the equivalent of doing your kids homework. And then I think again. It possibly isn’t. It is just a new and different way to look at things. When I read books and see the authors point, I keep it or reject it to use again. So I guess, right now, Jispa is simply seeing various different points of view and possibly mine are very strong and powerful. She does keep rejecting bad ideas or she uses my ideas to challenge existing norms or challenge my ideas as well. Together we reach further than where we were. So in the end, I assume it’s a good thing.

This is another question to ask the teacher at school. How much should we discuss the home work. It seems to be helping her, but how much is the question.

Lets see…. But one thing I did do soon enough. I thanked Jasmine. When the school forms for admission were being given out, I was the one opposed to this school. It seemed like a ladida school and I was afraid it would be too expensive and that we would meet people from different high end backgrounds. It would be impossible to blend in I felt. But Jasmine insisted and we took the form and applied. Then we got through round 1 and then round 2. In the end, looking at everyone who did not get through, there was no way we were going to say no. This level of teaching and this manner of the teachers is worth spending an arm and a leg to get through. We have been lucky. Jispa has been awesome.

Here is one forward that her English teacher put on the whatsapp group. How do you find any fault with a teacher who sends this to the kids.

I so wish that someone taught me stuff like this when I was young and impressionable. I had lost faith in studying and teaching at the time. This is serious.

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And now some random lovely video that justifies the title of the blog. I love the video and I love this song. I can’t have enough of these guys.

whose world is it really?

These days I have been dropping Jispa to school by car. This is because her swim schedule leaves us no option but to drop her directly. It’s just not possible to go via the school bus. So I try and pick her from the pool and drop her as the school in some obtuse way in in the direction of my office. Over the years I think more and more kids are getting dropped off to school by car then by the school bus. I don’t have exact statistics but I definitely see a larger number of cars doing so than before.

While Jispa was growing up, one trend was definitely there – the maid culture. I have blogged about this before. More and more families with kids would employ a full time maid to take care of the kid. Ensuring the kid has food all the time and is dressed up, bathed etc. This leaves the parents to focus on other things as well as have a social life. We actively decided never to have one. We didn’t believe we needed one and we were sure that we could manage Jispa without one. It was fun in any case. It was my job to wake baby Jispa up in the morning and take her to the bathroom for brushing and bathing. One of my fondest memories is brushing Jispa’s teeth while she sits on my lap. “now do eeeeeeeeee”. Now days once in a while for old times sake I try and brush her teeth, just so that she knows how stupid my life was.

This maid culture was so bad that kids grew up expecting that the maid would do almost everything. All they needed was to open their mouth to be fed or just walk around and their bag would be carried. I don’t think kids who grew up like this would have the ability to handle situations on their own. I do think they will grow up with a heightened sense of entitlement as they grow up.

Over the last few months, this servant trend has gone crazy. Now when I drop Jispa to school, we keep a watch out for the comic show. Once we spot it we nudge  each other and laugh like crazy. The routine is straight forward. The car, typically a van or an SUV with the driver will come and stop as close to the school gate as possible. Then from the front a guy will step out and go to the back door and open it. He then will take out the school bag and lunch bag. This is handed over to him by the maid waiting inside. Then he will … mind you… pull the kid out from the car and place the kid on the floor. Then the kid will take a few steps forward and then the guy will then hold the bag out in order to help the kid wear it and off the kid goes to school. A variation of the above is the maid getting out from the front and helping the kid off the car. This is wild. The kid looks like a helpless paraplegic as he is literally pulled out from the car to the floor. What crap is this? Cant the kid just open the door on his own and get out taking the bag and the lunch box? Why is this such a tough thing to do? This is such a stupid thing to do. Today we saw a kid who Jispa says is from the third standard as she was helped off the car. I think I am going to sell tickets for people to stand as they watch this circus unfold every day.

Once when I had reached to pick up Jispa from school, the maids rush to the gate and pick up the bags of the kids as they come out. I remember when I was new to Mumbai and in the fourth standard, we were staying temporarily at my granny’s house, a stone’s throw away from school. My mom tried sending the maid my granny had along with us to school. She was worried that her kids, so used to Dubai would be unable to navigate the 200 meters to reach school. I remember the maid asking us to let her carry our bags and I remember my brother and me clearly saying no. Of course not. That’s not happening.

Jispa’s school is pretty laa-di-da with some celeb kids coming in as well. Once I saw a Mercedes pull up to school. In front of the Mercedes was an SUV from where three men jumped out taking all the corners of the car. Then one guy opens the door and out comes  maid with the bags and then she pulls out the kid who is escorted by the maid and the man and then as the kid goes inside the gate, the men get into the SUV and both the cars speed off. Wow. Money is good but it also comes with its fair set of issues. The father and the child probably need the security.

Yesterday Jispa came home wondering how dumb could King Louis be. This is the joker from the French Revolution. In the uprising he tried to escape and he was so dumb that he got caught again. He tried escaping in a heavy carriage with his men still in uniform and he carried less papers than the entourage and off all things he tried to escape to Paris where the revolution was at its maximum strength. Jispa said “in class we were wondering if this idiot was actually trying to escape or trying to get caught? Why would he do so many stupid things”.

I explained to her that if you are seriously rich and a king, it is quite possible that you are completely out of touch with reality. I spoke about the kids in my class and how South Mumbai residents (posh people) typically are not worldly wise and are just have lower IQ’s. They just don’t get it most of the time. Their projects are from their narrow and entitled world view. In fact in her school itself there would be so many kids who would have practically no idea about anything from reality. And then we turned on her. She too had very little idea about real life. So we started quizzing her – what’s the price of an idli. 10 / 15 bucks she said (reality 40). What’s the price of bread – 21 (reality 33). What’s the price of petrol or a bus ride or anything else? Jispa – you too lead a charmed life. You too won’t be able to escape so fast so soon.

Jispa – He was a king. He was brought to a reality that was his alone and not in touch with the rest of the country. “But he had the best tutors” she said. Of course. The way in your class you have the best tutors but you are probably different than some real entitled dumbos in your class, the same way, tutors don’t matter. What you learn is completely different.

The richer you are the more charmed your life will be. This is the truth and as your family becomes richer and your generations benefit from what you have set up from them, it becomes near impossible to break through the shackles of money to some out smarter.

Jispa too is today richer than what I was. She runs the risk of being dumb. We try and mitigate it. We try and expose her to stuff, but something will just remain tough. Some things will such that she will never be exposed to.

Jasmine spoke about our servant and her grand child. She said, the other day our servant borrowed a little money as while she was leaving, she felt that her grandchild was a bit warm and could be ill. So she took money in case she had to buy medicines for her. This child (possibly with fever) was left alone at home with no one to take care of her all day. This is the harsh reality of life that our kids are (thankfully) saved from and not exposed to.

This is the life of millions of Indians and its not that these are far away from our contact. These are people we touch daily in our lives. Its tough for us to understand them and for them to understand us. If they knew the cost of our shoes alone, they will throw a fit. I don’t think they will believe that the shoes we wear are worth 4 to five times their monthly salary. Now they will call us really really dumb.

King Louis was born into luxury and was not trained to escape. In fact the people revolted because in many ways he wasn’t connect to reality. And because he wasn’t connected to reality, he made a hash out of running away. What’s so surprising. Its not easy being rich in a poor man’s world, is it?

kya relevance hai!

Today on a happy day, my phone was getting a reboot and I switched on the radio. I have a love hate relationship with the radio. The dumb RJs with dumb programming and irritating advertising that doesn’t connect with anything. Luckily for the new retro channels which play some good (my age) music and thanks to the lack of advertising, have some interesting programming. They are getting some good guys to come in and chat with on the radio channels who are talking about the music they created or the movies they were in with some real life insights and anecdotes. This makes the programming so rich. Like today some lady (I did not catch the name) was talking about RD Burman (always) and Asha Bhosle (again almost always) and the song Jaan – e – jaaa… oh meri jaane jaaa…. Nisha aaa aaa aa

It was a song that I was listened to as a kid. It was a fun song in which I think as kids we used to cream aloud and dance. It was released in 1982 – when I was about 7, which is an impressionable age. It was an awesome song then and is an awesome sing now, but what a singer who has worked with the music director RD Burman said, made me hear the song in a new light. She said that RD tried to get Asha to sing like a musical instrument in the song. She was talking of some musical instrument (she was also not sure) in which there is pedal or something and the noise oscillates in waves. I did not understand what she said till she sang the song on radio. I came to office and I played it and now that I understand it a little better, I have come to appreciate it a lot more. In the song Asha sings – Jaan e jaaaaaaaaaaaa, oh meri jaan e jaaaaaaaaa. As kids we would scream out this aaaaaaaaaaa in a single tone. Its only today I understood that this aaaaaaaaaa sounds awesome because it is here that RD made Asha sing the aaaaaaaaaa part in a wave like oscillation. That is the genius of this song which is so easy to miss the nuance while so easy to love the whole. Which is so impossible to bring out for an untrained singer. At least while I was singing to myself, I could clearly hear myself make a complete hash out of it.

Here listen to the song and pay attention. Of course, forgive the poor Kamal Hasan dancing like a twerp in the song and the stupid bike entry, largely forgiven purely by Reena Roy’s awesome smile and oh so lovely long hair with the stylish fringe. It’s like a complete reconciliation of the traditional beauty and a touch of modernity. And of course do not miss the scene in which she dreams about kissing him all over with him being left with lipstick marks all over his face, but no marks on the oh so sensitive lips! The confusion of 1982 India is to be seen to be believed in this movie song.

Over a period of time I have learnt to respect the Bollywood film industry as the best marketing brains in the country. It is not possible to deliver a hit without really identifying with the core audience and having a pulse on their attitudes and dreams and desires. Movies that become hits are the ones that connect with the audience, without which the audience is very clear – he is not going to part with his money and time.

In fact, while I teach marketing, my favorite lecture is in which I explain how movies and heroes have gotten their marketing right to become super stars. They connect with the screen personas with carefully nurtured off screen personas. This is the example I use to explain how super stars like brands have to mean one and only one thing to the people and the closer they are to one thing the closer they are to real meaning.

Another song that played on the radio was from Arjun. A movie released in 1985. This was when I was ten years old and I remember that era of India when there was NO hope. None what so ever. You could only get rich if you were corrupt or tyrannical or a goon or all of the above. You could get educated but there was nowhere to go once you got educated. There weren’t enough jobs and whatever jobs were there were gone to people with some influence or some friend to recommend them. It was a complete wasted generation in many ways. This movie reflected the anger of the youth. These young guys were obviously educated and were looking for jobs. The main hero leads a gang of young men, all in formal dressing, as they are all looking for jobs and want to be employed. What I remember of the movie is that they don’t get any employment and are just hanging around the neighborhood. It captures multiple emotions. The movie touches a raw nerve – that your youth is good and powerful. They study and they are unemployed because of society and not because they want to remain so. They have an energy that must be harnessed. The youth in the movie at first are seen as a nuisance as they roam around unemployed and then as the villains strike, the same youth use the only the only thing that god has given them (their youth) and fight back. Now the transformation from young, lost and unemployed to young, hailed and purposeful is complete.

At the end even the father comes and tells his child that he was right. It sent a signal to the young and unemployed that they were not wasted but were a being wasted thanks to the system. The feeling was universal and as I saw up on Wikipedia the movie was then translated into multiple languages showing how the issues were widespread across India.

Here is the song – mamaiyo kero kero kero mama

Mamaiya Kero Kero Kero Mama - Arjun (1985... by TalishaHatcher

The entire song is set in  public spaces with the gang bordering on lawlessness and at the end you also see the hero riding a Pitch roller which is being pulled by his team, in the middle of the Mumbai roads – How’s that for complete cock a  snook at the system.

Its funny why this clip is on daily motion and not on youtube. Must be some royalty quirk. A movie like this, no matter how well made would just have no relevance today. Kids find their love soon enough and get drafted into the system that is giving them some jobs, mobile phones and T shirts to order and wear. They don’t need to use violence to save the society. They probably just need a cell phone camera, or a tweet then and then some social shares.

Check this