Windfall

I received an email informing me of a windfall and that too from the UN. The email is reproduced below:
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From: Gansner, Corina <Corina.Gansner@sheraton.com>
Date: 26 September 2013 10:33
Subject: Email From United Nations
To: 

The United Nation have selected your email address to receive a grant prize, Send your full details to this email address for claims and more details about your prize (un.dept09@att.net) Make sure you reply to this email for claims


This electronic message transmission contains information from the Company that may be proprietary, confidential and/or privileged. The information is intended only for the use of the individual(s) or entity named above. If you are not the intended recipient, be aware that any disclosure, copying or distribution or use of the contents of this information is prohibited. If you have received this electronic transmission in error, please notify the sender immediately by replying to the address listed in the "From:" field

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This mail had all the trappings of genuineness and I immediately proceeded to start claiming my fortune or grant as the mail says. But to be a fair citizen, I would like to share my happiness with the world so that all those "needy" and "poor" people (even though poverty is only a mindset) can benefit from my success and fortune.

This mail attracted my attention, not least because it purportedly came from the United Nations, and not from some bank, or Microsoft, or Google. The United Nations, for heavens sake!

So I had to inform all and sundry about my windfall and tell them to make friends with me, because we were taught in school that wherever there is money there are many friends. I hope to get many friends and from all over the world shortly with this information being passed around.

I have also come to know that such awards and windfall or fortune are now being distributed by the UN not to countries, but to individuals directly. However, I come to know from reliable sources, that for claiming this fortune, one must possess an Aadhaar card.
 
I have also reliably learnt that such a "direct benefit transfer scheme" of UN was a result of a new resolution proposed by India; and seconded by Somalia, Ethiopia, Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Ivory Coast. This has now been adopted uniformly for all citizens of the world.

The process of selection as a beneficiary is done by applying for the same. The application process to be declared a "beneficiary" is very complicated and involves among other things regular postings in various forums, including but not limited to Facebook, Twitter, group mails, mails to friends, letters to the editors, etc. about your dire needs.

There are regular audits for a period of 4 years from the date of acceptance of one's application and its scrutiny by the UN peacekeeping force, when auditors for UN (in the guise of relatives and friends) will visit one's house to assess the "neediness" and "aid receiving ability". 


There may be commitments and IOU's to various agencies in India and abroad (preferably in banks abroad) to "share" some of the windfall. That is a small price to pay for a generous pension!


Disclaimer: I am sure you realize that this blog is a figment of my imagination. If you have read it and believe in it, I am sure you are a worthy citizen of India, and will continue to vote for UPA.

Inverter logic

We have started having power cuts in our area and this has increased since the elections. I am not blaming the current government, since they are yet to find their feet; however, we were "blessed" since we were living in the same area as our ex-CM (Mr. Yeddyurappa) and hence had no difficulty with power or water. Maybe our days of shortage is nigh.

We have never used UPS/Inverter for our "power needs" and inspite of advise from well meaning friends and relatives, I have not yet installed one.

When my kids were young (primary and secondary school going), we used to get together during the dark period and play some games - like word building, antakshari, or country-capitals, and generally bond together. Other than Meena (wife), none of us could sing with any semblance of a proper tune, but that didn't deter us from trying our hand in antakshari. We developed and modified our own rules (we would include Hindi or tamil film songs, english songs, and school poems and songs too!). The three kids developed their capacity to remember all the capital cities of all countries and all states of India and US during this period, I believe!

Nowadays, when they can, my kids don't sit and talk with us. It is during these "dark periods" that we come together to share something.

Last night we had an outage for a couple of hours and listened to old Hindi and Tamil songs for some time. But the camaraderie that we shared long ago, when I could influence the thinking of my kids, is no longer there. Is it time to invest in an inverter now?

River inter-linking

The proposal to interlink Indian rivers has been going on and on and successive governments have only paid lip-service to this proposal. If the plan were implemented (albeit at some cost - some figures suggest Rs. 140 billion, or Rs. 14000 crores) it would benefit Indians in many ways. The amount in perspective (keeping in mind various scams over the last 2 years) seems minuscule indeed!

Interlinking of rivers would enable water transport - probably the cheapest mass transport system possible and of course flood relief through excess water diversion in times of plenty and equitable distribution in times of shortage. The politics of water-sharing will not be inter-state as is now, but will be pan-India and a major headache for the party and the PM in power, obviously. Maybe that is the single most important reason for the proposal not seeing the light of the day. The politics apart, what may be worrying for most people is how to garner so many resources needed for the interlinking. The major resource, of course, is manpower and equipment needed for canals and sluice gates.

As an aside, I am reminded of a very powerful movie  Do Aankhen Barah Haath made by V. Shantaram in 1957 which was a socially relevant movie (it is relevant in all ages) and spoke about a police officer willing to stake his career for jail reform by taking hard core criminal-prisoners to a distant place and making them farm land and be responsible citizens. It was a fantastic film and the performance of the actor-director Shantaram immaculate.

The connection between interlinking of rivers and the movie should be obvious now. Pardon, appropriate punishment for rape, death penalty or not, and such like being top of the mind concerns of many citizens and politicians alike, wouldn't it be great if all such convicts of various crimes (from Sanjay Dutt to Ram Singh to Hafeez Sayeed) were to come together and dig canals in Rajasthan, Maharashtra, Gujarat, Odisha, and Tamil Nadu? Efficient monitoring and fencing them off may be attempted to ensure that these guys do not leave the place. Even villagers which are likely to benefit by the canals can set up watch-and-ward so that these guys complete 8 hours of hard labour each day of their "incarceration".

What do you think? Workable?

Lakshman Rekha - in our daily life

Lakshman Rekha as a phrase comes from the Ramayana. Lakshman, in his quest to look for Rama who had gone chasing a "golden deer", draws the line in front of their ashram in Panchavati in the Dandakaranya forest and asks Sita not to cross that line under any circumstances. Being inside the line would ensure her safety, says Lakshman. However, that was not to be. Major events are sometimes linked to small and seemingly inconsequential actions. Ravana, who had anyway come in the guise who had asked Mareecha, his demon subject, to take the form of the "golden deer" to entice Sita, comes now as a sage asking for alms. Tradition has it that alms must not be given from the threshold of the house. The lady giving alms must cross the threshold to hand over alms. So, Sita had to cross the Lakshman Rekha. Once she crossed the line, Ravana revealed his true form and abducted Sita to Lanka.

In modern times the phrase "Lakshman Rekha" refers to any situation or convention never to be broken. I find this has another application in our daily lives. We interact with people in our professional and personal lives. We create a sort of line between us in our dealings with one another and try never to cross it. Once the line is breached, we have a situation of causing hurt to the other person. Take the case of children. When they are young, we tell them what they should or should not do. We expect them to listen to this "sane" advise since we feel we have more knowledge and experience in the matter. Most often our children listen to us. The "line" is drawn. The kids respect us for what we know and "obey" us (at least most kids do when told properly). However, as the kids grow up and attain adolescence and later on grow to be adults, we tend to keep the Lakshman Rekha in its original place. As parents we continue to treat our children the same way - maybe make some minor modifications, but generally continue to give "advice" which is misconstrued as "control". That causes rebellion. The Lakshman Rekha is not at the right place. We need to recognise this and periodically redraw this line.

Edited: 11-April-2013 (Mareecha as the "golden deer")

Teaching through stories

I came across this very interesting article in The Hindu about a teacher's experience of teaching mathematics  his students through stories.Read here.

I am reminded of my own experience of teaching mathematics - simple sums to my children when they were in primary school. The most vivid memory concerns a problem related to train - since they were fascinated by trains and train journeys. Most often these problems would be offered when we were travelling on a long journey (which can often result in boredom, if not for some interesting games and quizzes and problem solving) or when waiting for my wife to finish her shopping or waiting for her to finish with her work and come out of the bank.

The problem would often consist of two trains one starting from Bangalore and going towards Chennai, and the other starting from Chennai and going towards Bangalore. To make it simple, I would tell them that both trains have the same speed - average speed being 80 kmph (unrealistic, I know...but what's the harm in telling them that Indians trains travel fast!). I would ask them to assume the distance between the two cities to be 400 kms (again helping them by rounding off). Then my question would be "where would the two trains cross over?". I would listen with interest at the discussion that would ensue and the verbal jousting that would accompany - each kid trying to assert that his method was correct and would get to the right answer in the best way. After much noise and no result, I would intervene and give them some hints. I would be a proud parent when I saw them come to the solution quickly. Then to make the problem a bit more difficult, I would change the speeds of one of the trains or say that one train had some problem and had halted at Arakkonam for 30 minutes extra. So now find where the two trains crossed over. The solution was secondary, more importantly, I would be interested in how they approached the problem.

By linking problem solving skills with some "story" or incident or a product in which they were interested, I would be able to kindle their interest towards problem solving.

I do practice these same methods in my training program too!

Chance encounters and lasting impressions

Dave Kerpen while on a flight from New York to Boston met a Senator who gave him some amazing lessons in life. He didn't know the Senator, but brought up enough courage to strike a conversation with him, learned that he is a Senator who didn't put on any airs, but shared some of his wonderful insights. Read more here.

My experiences have been more modest. I have not met any person who is famous. But they have nevertheless been very interesting and the memories have been long lasting too.

Once when as a family  we (5 of us) were travelling to Hyderabad from Bangalore, we had another person occupying the only other berth in the same enclosure (in an AC 3 tier coach). As can be expected, we were talking among ourselves for a couple of hours after which we had our dinner and he had his. While putting the berth for sleeping, one of my sons accidentally hurt his fingers. Immediately, the other gentleman showed his concern and asked if he could prescribe and give some medicines. We came to know that he was an amateur homeopath who carried some medicines with him. He gave my son some medicines. We woke up to realize that our train was late by about 3-4 hours. We had time in the morning to share some of our experiences and he recounted his and how he came to practise homeopathy. He also gave us a list of medicines to use in case of minor ailments like cold, cough, mild fever, stomach upset, etc. We have preserved that "prescription" even now and my sons use that for stocking up on their medicines and for a long time they have always relied on those medicines for taking care of themselves.

On another occasion again while travelling from Hyderabad to Bangalore this time by Sleeper class, I found the enclosure vacant when I boarded the train at Secunderabad (those days the train used to start from Secunderabad). At Kacheguda station, however, a noisy and energetic group of school girls boarded the train. They were school students, obviously. They were travelling in a group, and this time I was the lone passenger who was the odd man out in the enclosure. Watching them however, gave me a jolt. They were deaf-mute (pardon me if I am politically incorrect; but I don't mean anything derogatory by using this term). I saw that in the enclosure for 5 other people, there were now about 10 girls in an animated conversation among themselves. One girl jabbed my arm and drew my attention to her and then started a conversation with me, asking my name, my family details, what I did for a living, where I was headed, and such other things. Then they decided to teach me their language - sign language. The next hour was devoted to teaching me the alphabets and periodic questions of my recall. I didn't do too well, much to their amusement.  I was enjoying their company and when their teacher came to inquire if the girls were a "problem" for me, I simply shook my head and told her I was really enjoying this attention from 10 girls. They mentioned about themselves, their family, why they had gone to Hyderabad and such other things. Once they asked me a question, for which I looked out of the window trying to compose my response, for which I again got a jab in my arm. I looked at the girl by my side and raised my eyebrows. She gestured to ask why I looked out of the window. I said I was thinking. She insisted that I should maintain eye contact since they were lip readers and needed the other person to look at them while speaking. Not making eye contact  was a sign of disrespect. Such a humbling experience for a consultant and a trainer who has been in that profession for more than 25 years, I thought!

In another recent incident, while on a trip to Bhutan, on the night previous to the day of my departure for India, I went to the market and on my return trip engaged a taxi. The driver kept up an animated conversation with me and told me about him and asked me about myself. He also said I could engage his taxi whenever I wanted to do some sight-seeing. I found this guy to be a bit irritating and when I reached my hotel, I alighted. He asked me if I was staying there. I suspected his intentions and replied that I had come there to meet someone, but was staying somewhere else. He handed me his business card and I kept it in my wallet. Next day, I came down to the reception desk and tried to find out if my taxi to take me to the airport had reported. It had not. It was December, severe winter (outside temperature near freezing), and early morning 4 o'clock. I didn't know what to do. I called up the coordinator, who was probably sleeping soundly and not answering her phone. I asked the desk if the guy knew of any alternative. He said he could call his friend. I asked him to do so. Time was running out. The receptionist called up his friend, who told him that he was away and couldn't come to the hotel. Now my options were almost non-existent. It was almost 4.45. I had planned to leave for the airport at 4. I was behind schedule and worried about missing the flight. Then I remembered the business card. I took it out and asked the receptionist to call the number. The driver answered the phone, and promised to come in 10 minutes since he was staying close by anyway. True to his word, he came in 10 minutes. We discussed the fare and I left at 5. It was my turn  now to engage him in a conversation for the one hour journey to the airport. We reached the airport with enough time to spare and I made a friend that day!

I was not so "conversational" before, but now my outlook has changed and I try to engage my co-passengers in small talk whenever I travel. Who knows I may one day chance to make friend of someone who may become the next PM or President!

Nostalgia

What can be more nostalgic than going to one's school after a gap of nearly 40 years? That is the experience I had recently.

I was invited to my friend's son's wedding in Ranchi in the same township that I grew up in - Shyamali colony. My friend works in Mecon and lives in the same township in which he grew up in and works for the same organisation that his father worked!

Five of our classmates with whom I am in touch decided to make the journey back in time - so to speak. I booked my tickets about three months in advance ensuring that I got reservations via Calcutta. The entire journey was by train and I enjoyed looking at all the stations that I had peered long ago. The only difference was that I travelled by AC coach, whereas long ago I travelled by III class sleeper or First class (if we were travelling on LTC).

Anyway, we visited our school, and were surprised that it has become huge and is decently maintained with a nice patch of rose garden.

I met the Principal and we sat and were discussing the various memories that we had; our teachers and the other students. One of my classmates who had also come was a school topper and we did mention that he was one and that his name was on the merit list board in the school.

The teachers and the Principal were quite happy to receive us in the school when suddenly the Principal took out a Guest Book and asked us to see the book. While we were flipping through the pages, I saw my father's name in the book. He had come with me on 01-Oct-1969 when I had been admitted to the school in VII standard. (His name was A.S.Dandapani and that entry can be seen in the photo alongside).