Democracy

I find it disturbing to hear that Democracy is a panacea in the context of various forms of governments. Though I have had the privilege of enjoying democracy throughout my lifetime and certainly have no regrets, I couldnt help but notice that all forms of institutions and organizations don't embrace democracy.

Starting from home, we have the mother, father and kids. In most cases, it is questionable to assume that both father and mother have equal rights. I dont even have to talk about the kids. It is all driven by rules. Same is true in schools and colleges, all the way to organizations. Literature suggests that, having democracy in organizations, especially for decision making is a recipe for disaster.

Shifting our focus to governments, though it often seems like, in a democratic government, everything is based on people's will. Is it really true? If not everyone, do majority of people influence government? Infact, the more I think about it, I am inclined to say that, listening the mass of people is the most inefficient way to make decisions. Honestly, how many of us love to pay tax? how many of us want our mortgage tax exemption to be removed? how many of us want our securities compromised? how many of us really want globalisation to happen (assume that India is not the country where things move to)? how many people would want government to abolish junk food places? how many people would give up social security incomes, than have people to really save for their retirement? So, if a government had to act by people's interest, would it be an efficient government? Everyone who works for a company gets his own salary though everyone wishes to get the maximum possible salary there is, for the least amount of work. If companies start providing just that, would it be efficient...

When all forms of organizations are bound by efficiency, why is government thought of differently? Is it crippled by the issue of how the leader and representatives are chosen to carry out the job of governing? I dont know...

Background Music

Did you know I was a radio star? I have performed a few times on the All India Radio (I meant that to sound pompous) Before you go and start searching for my name in the halls of fame, let me put it in context. There is only 1 important characteristic in all those programs. Nobody can make out that it was me. The only way one could have guessed is by listening to the announcement prior to the program proclaiming my name in the list of students performing.

To be fair to my father, he recorded one event. When he rewound the tape and listened to the program again, he figured it would be enough to just retain the announcement section, since the rest of the program could have been performed by anybody. So, he promptly used the tape to record M.S.Subbulakshmi songs when he got a chance. It would have been nice to have the announcement proclaiming my performance followed by MS singing. Tut Tut....That was not to be: the announcement got over-written too.

So my claim to fame is solely by word of mouth. It goes like this: List of students in today's program: Subashini, Venkat, ............., Saumya,......!

I was a versatile performer. I sang at times(never solo: lest you start bad-mouthing AIR), and some other times performed in skits. The school stationery manager stepped forward gallantly and mentioned that he had left an illustrious career in the theatrical industry to serve the school, and therefore he should be the person who provided the background music skits. We nodded and the practice sessions started.

To state it as mildly as possible, the background music was HORRENDOUS. Every place in the play where you think some quietness would do, there was music blaring. Some other places where mild music would have done the trick, we had garish music making us shout out every line in order to be heard over the music. I would not call the program a fiasco, but there were no folks waiting outside for autographs. The highlight of all this drama was the lunch we ate at Annapoorna restaurant in Coimbatore (Plus: the day-off from School to drive down to Coimbatore, perform and get back)

There are times in my life when I envision my life as a movie, and there is background music. So I see myself cooking *Sax playing mildly indicating a chef's beauty being developed* Never mind that I am making Rasam and vendakkai curry. It provides spice in my life! The washing clothes/ folding them section gets a banal harmonium. Playing with my daughter and taking her on walks gets melodious flute accompaniment.

I have worked hard at directing my life, so why not revel in my role as music director?!

Meaningless songs etc

I heard a song recently that is in my head all the time. It's from the movie Fanaa and goes something like this. "Chanda Chamke Cham Cham.."

Tongue-twisters - What a brilliant discovery! Thats what this song is all about. There is no meaning in this song. That is not to say it is out-of-context in the movie. Compared to all other meaningless songs (And definitely all songs with double-meanings and vulgarity), this is by far the best it ever got. Tongue Twisters are an excellent passtime (for a few minutes) and also a wonderful ice-breaker. It brought back memories of childhood. My favorite was the cimple - Kaccha Pappad, pakka Pappad.

There are 2 stanzas in this song and I liked the second one which is moderately challenging.
It goes like

Pake ped me paka papeetha, paka ped ya paka papeetha
Pake ped ko pakade pinku, pinku pakade paka papeetha

Talking about Fanaa, the title song brought back other memories too. A line in that movie goes something like this -"...Zidd he ab to khudko mittana, hone hai tujme fanaa..."
And as I was deciding what to make dinner that night, I sang "..Zidd to ab he roti banana, khana hai mujko channa.."

In our hostel, my dear friend and myself would spend time on composing lyrics. We made some that I don't think I'll ever forget. It fits into the Vaa Minima scheme. I would share it, except I don't want to violate any confidentiality rights.

Too busy to be a hypocrite

One common denominator when people are asked about their likes and dislikes is “I hate hypocrisy”…. Actually, if you go back to my introduction in our blog, I had sworn my dislike towards the aforementioned trait. Hmmm.. this got me thinking…How do you define hypocrisy?

Mariam Webster defines it as

1 : a feigning to be what one is not or to believe what one does not; especially : the false assumption of an appearance of virtue or religion
2 : an act or instance of hypocrisy

I remember the day I started my first job at TI,India . We had to fill a questionnaire asking about hobbies etc. And that form was posted on the cafeteria board. I am talking about the days when TI was in a small building with few employees. Incidentally, I had written “I love – hypocrisy” and “I hate – hypocrisy”. This prompted a few employees to notice me. I guess people rarely see someone loving hypocrisy. Back to definition # 1, I think every single person is a hypocrite. People do so many things that they don’t believe in. I can summarise lot of instances in my life which I did provoked by others, inspite of my disapproval. An act or instance of hypocrisy- what about the act that one puts up infront of guests conforming to basic courtesy , or the forced smile when seeing a known face . Bottomline – Yes, I would like to be a hypocrite if my act brings happiness to someone, without causing any harm to self.

I would like to see a smiling face across the counter than a frowning one.

I would definitely like to have a doctor tell me I have chances of living for 10 years ( even if he believes otherwise) rather than telling me that I cannot survive long enough.

Talking about hypocrisy got me thinking about people who are “BUSY”. It is becoming one of my pet peeves nowadays.

“I wonder how you guys manage studying with work. I am so BUSY, I cant imagine studying with my work schedule.”

“I am so busy that I don’t have time to exercise.”

“I am so busy that I don’t have time to read blogs, though I am a member and even if I read, I don’t have time for commenting.” – Gotcha ! *LOL * Now lets see how many comment for this one.

Wars

I know why the US starts wars in far-off lands.

It is a place to groom future presidents.

X: I am going to contest the presidency
X's much older opponent Y: Which wars did you fight in huh? Come on you! Tell me which war you fought in?
X: None
Y: NONE!!!!
X: But...but there were no wars for me to go to.
Y: Well..too bad. There is no metric to measure your patriotism. I went for the War in Dracola Land. I know the pain and suffering and I would like to use this office to make the world a better place to live in. So you're out!

Threshold of squeamish

There was an article in today’s newspaper about the vaccine against HPV(human Papillo virus) which causes cervical cancer. This cancer kills 10 women every day and is sexually transmitted. They have started administering this vaccine to 11 yr olds girls as it is effective before one becomes sexually active.

The interesting part about that article was

“ The development of the first vaccine for any kind of cancer is a major milestone. And yet there was a reluctance by some to embrace the new vaccine because, well, you know how squeamish Americans can be about sex.”

LOL!!.Ofcourse, I am assuming they are comparing themselves to Europeans. Wondering how this will be taken in India. At home, it is not considered just squeamish, but a taboo just to use the word. I am talking about an average Indian here, though there might be exceptions. There could be two perspectives

1. Though every parent knows that it could be beneficial, they will still hesitate to administer it.

2. They may not understand the meaning of this vaccine and administer it as part of the usual regimen , like polio. Ignorance is bliss , afterall.

Beating the Mean !

I was at a seminar couple of days back and one of the things that the speaker stressed a lot for companies to succeed was the paradigm, "Beat the Mean!". As we all know, when Microsoft was started, they had only 4 people and each one of them were extremely smart people and the average IQ of the company was extremely large when compared to most companies. As companies grow, the average IQ drops down owing mainly to the size of the company. As long as a company can keep their average IQ to not drop significantly and consciously focus in maintaining it, the company wouldnt fail. That was the speaker's claim. When the average IQ reaches the IQ of the average population, he claimed that the company would certainly fail. Though I have my own set of arguments on the theory, on a large scale, it makes sense. I think the same could be applied to individuals.

As we undertake more and more tasks, it is possible that our average performance might come down. It recursively applies to the subtasks that we perform as well. For example, in the case of long distance running, I figured that, running at a slow pace in the beginning and a higher pace towards the end or vice versa will have the same effect as running at the average pace throughout the course. Infact, the simple truth is if I improve on my average pace, my overall performance can be tremendously improved.

I think there are 2 ways to improve the "mean" performance. Either, you drop some of the underperforming areas or areas that one doesnt like to pursue. In the company sense, this would probably mean shutting down the businesses that doesnt fetch money (much like what GE Welch did). The other way is to consciously question the mean effort needed to complete a task and try to improve on that. In real life, I think this can also be looked at from a consistency perspective. As long as one does a certain activity consistently, on an average, they become the person they want to be. So, the real secret lies in not improving one's peak performance, but the average performance!

Marriage

I was reading Khalil Gibran's Prophet last sunday. He has written beautifully about marriage. Well, we learnt it the hard way...Hopefully, Madmax can be prepared :-)
Here it goes...

You were born together, and together you shall be forevermore.

You shall be together when white wings of death scatter your days.

Aye, you shall be together even in the silent memory of God.

But let there be spaces in your togetherness,

And let the winds of the heavens dance between you.

Love one another but make not a bond of love:

Let it rather be a moving sea between the shores of your souls.

Fill each other's cup but drink not from one cup.

Give one another of your bread but eat not from the same loaf.

Sing and dance together and be joyous, but let each one of you be alone,

Even as the strings of a lute are alone though they quiver with the same music.

Give your hearts, but not into each other's keeping.

For only the hand of Life can contain your hearts.

And stand together, yet not too near together:

For the pillars of the temple stand apart,

And the oak tree and the cypress grow not in each other's shadow.

Parking buddy

I parked my car in front of Party America & Linen things to let my wife shop and decided to watch my sleeping kid. I parked right in front of this dark blue BMW. Then I saw him. He looked like an Italian from distance. Or is he Middle Eastern I thought to myself? Through two car windshield it is little difficult to figure out. He must have been there for a while.

First two minutes was casual I was setting up the CD and making myself comfortable. And I am sure he was half expecting me to get down and go shopping. Then I can see he getting little curious to find out why there is another soul doing the same thing. He must have got an answer after seeing the kid in the backseat. We said our head-nodding acknowledgment to each other.

After few minutes of listening to the CD and I glanced to my buddy. He was trying to change station to keep him occupied. He must have seen me glancing, he started calling his wife. Of course, I don't know who he was calling, but again, he was trying to prove he is getting out of this parking lot anytime now.

After some exchanges in cell phone he decides to find his solace in Cigarette. "Don't smoke in BMW buddy" I said in the confines of my car. His wife must be a big-time shopper I thought to myself. She certainly must be in Linen & Things and definitely not in Party America. His looks at me suggested he is thinking the same about me. I inadvertently looked at the Party America store to check whether my wife is back may be a feeble attempt to convey my wife is not shopping like his (!!).

Finally I decided to recline the seat to put it in sleeping position. After another 5 minutes my curiosity got better of me. I peeped to see the status of my buddy. He was getting restless. And my peeping did not help his cause. He looked away.

After what seemed like an eons, his wife (must be) walked with clear head scarf. I knew he was Middle Eastern guy I told myself! He was already in reverse gear and ready even before her wife stepped in and closed the door. Just before he left, my buddy gave, what I thought, a small victorious grin!

In Peace

Following is an excerpt from Khalil Gibran's PROPHET about death.

*********************************************************************************

Your fear of death is but the trembling of the shepherd when he stands before the king whose hand is to be laid upon him in honour.

Is the sheered not joyful beneath his trembling, that he shall wear the mark of the king?

Yet is he not more mindful of his trembling?

For what is it to die but to stand naked in the wind and to melt into the sun?

And what is to cease breathing, but to free the breath from its restless tides, that it may rise and expand and seek God unencumbered?

Only when you drink form the river of silence shall you indeed sing.

And when you have reached the mountain top, then you shall begin to climb.

And when the earth shall claim your limbs, then shall you truly dance.

*******************************************************************************

For the past few weeks, my day always started with Rachel. She was a fellow blogger in my redtoenail site. A young lady of remarkable strength and determination. Her blog was taken over by her mom after she became very sick. She is finally at peace today.Inspite of her illness, she found time to thank everyone who signed in her site and signed in my guestbook. Whenever I felt like whining, all I had to do was think of Rachel and Val, to make me stop worrying about where my career is heading or what others think about me or getting angry over mundane matters. This morning, when I woke up, I knew she was at peace even before I opened her blog.
I dont feel sad, just calm.
http://rachel.redtoenail.org
Just felt like sharing with you all.