Reflections

The Geography of Bliss

noreply@blogger.com (Raj) — Fri, 20 Jan 2012 14:10:00 +0000

Eric Weiner is on a quest. That in itself is not surprising, given the fact that he has spent a decade as a foreign correspondent for National Public Radio (NPR). What is unusual is the object of his quest. He is searching for the quality that has been the Holy Grail of philosophers and religions alike - happiness. The main culprits, says Eric with a tongue firmly in cheek, are the philosophers - brooding white guys from Europe, they hung out, alone, in cafés, pondered the universe, and—surprise!—concluded it is an unhappy place. But is it really so? Which country is the happiest on Earth? Which one is the least happy? And why? Can we manufacture the conditions for happiness? In search of answers to questions like these he went around the globe. The book he wrote - The Geography of Bliss - maps his journey.

The first stop Eric makes is at the World Database of Happiness (WDH) based in Netherlands. Researcher Ruut Veenhoven and his colleagues have been working on happiness and although they themselves do not look ecstatic, observes Eric, they do have the most solid data on who the happiest and who is not. He spent a couple of weeks mining the data and deciding his next destinations. He found conflicting reports - often counter-intuitive. Like people who attend religious services are happier than those who do not but the countries that are on the top of happiness list are secular. Wealthy people are happier than poor ones, but only slightly so. Money can make you happy up to a certain point and no further.

One of the surprising entries in the elite club of happy countries is Iceland. It shatters many of the myths about what is required for happiness, especially if you look at it from the point of view of tourism industry. No sunlight or more precisely no Sun at all for most of time, no warm beaches and the whole island is unstable with sky varying from chocolate dark to pitch black. The place resembles the Land of Mordor. Why should anyone be happy in such a place? (Incidentally, Eric was staying in Hawaii at the time, a place that has all those purported elements of happiness in abundance.)

A closer look reveals that Iceland has a tradition of unusual attitudes that contribute towards it's happiness reserve. For example, failure is very much an option in Iceland. Teenagers starting a band in garage are actively encouraged by their parents. It's quite normal for a person to have several different careers. Larus Johannesson for instance, has earned a living not only as a chess player but also as a journalist, a construction-company executive, a theologian, and, now, a music producer. No one expects you to stay married to a career that you chose decades ago. Failure does not have a stigma attached to it. This is exactly opposite to the specialization mania that is followed religiously in the rest of the world. Da Vinci would have heartily approved. Everyone in Iceland is a poet because there is no one to say that you cannot be one. The popular joke is that if they find an Icelander who is not a poet, they will put his statue in the main square in Reykjavík. Alas, they have not found the person yet. The myth of unhappy artist - propagated by giants ranging from Dostoyevsky to Jimi Hendrix - does not hold in Iceland. All the Icelandic artists are happy. Even when they are sad, they do not brood over it, they don't need to be that way in order to be creative.

Next stop - Bhutan. Why? Because it's the only country in the world that has a policy of Gross National Happiness (GNH). It seeks to measure the progress of the nation by looking at how happy or unhappy people are. The Bhutan King made headlines in 1986 when he said that GHP is more important than GNP. GNH, it seems, means knowing your limits. Free-market economics has brought much good to the world, but it goes mute when the concept of “enough” is raised. As the renegade economist E. F. Schumacher put it: “There are poor societies which have too little. But where is the rich society that says ‘Halt! We have enough!’ There is none.” Every decision that the government takes is examined through this prism.

Then there is Qatar, where money flows like water but people do not seem any happier. And there is Moldova that does not have any money and people are gloomy. Moldova is the saddest country according to data. Thailand is happy and one of the reasons for it could be 'mai pen lai' - never mind - the Thais do not take life seriously.

Eric also meets people he calls 'hedonist refugees'. People who have come from far and settled for no other reason than 'it just felt right'. Linda came from US to settle in Bhutan while Jared, another American, stopped in Reykjavík while on his way to Europe, fell in love with the dark skies and came to live there. He has 'gone native', Eric notes, as he uses "we" and not "they" when refereeing to Icelanders.

Eric has a unique style of writing, looking at everything through a lens that is distinctly satirical, although sometimes he crosses the line and it comes across more like sarcasm. It takes some time getting used to his humor, just like you eventually get used to Seinfeld. You also discover along the way that he is brutally honest with himself as well. Lest all this humor give you an impression that the quest is not a serious one, he proceeds to prove the opposite by going to extreme lengths like eating the popular dish of Iceland - harkarl - that is made of rotten shark, quitting coffee for a while in an ashram in India or buying a ridiculously expensive pen (he does not disclose how much!) to see how it feels like to be a nouveau riche from Qatar. He takes every experience without prejudice, and later tries to simplify it to a formula, trying to figure it out in his own, American way.

One wonders if the humorous front is kind a defense mechanism because at times the armor cracks a bit and you see a different person. Like the time when he slips a hundred dollar bill in his Moldavian landlady's dictionary, next to the word schaste, the Russian word for happiness. He says,

All of the research, not to mention my time in Qatar, concludes that one hundred dollars will not make Luba happier in the long run. But it just might in the short run, and sometimes the short run is good enough.

He appears distinctly uneasy reporting this, as if embarrassed to have been caught making a rather melodramatic, Dickensian gesture in these supposedly post-modern times.
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Image credit : Amazon.

Why this kolaveri kolaveri kolaveri di?

noreply@blogger.com (Raj) — Mon, 28 Nov 2011 07:06:00 +0000

Why do some things go viral and other don't? For companies, writers, singers that is literally, a million dollar question. Some people have made an attempt to answer it. Malcom Gladwell does it quite convincingly in The Tipping Point where he tries to find an answer to why some word-of-mouth phenomena take off while others die without a struggle (Anyone remember Google Wave?). Gladwell lists several characteristics that a meme should possess in order to go viral. One of them is stickiness factor. How memorable is your message? Do people forget it immediately or does it stick? Another one is who is doing the word of mouth publicity? If it's done by people who are connected to only a handful, chances are it will not go too far. To test this, Gladwell recommended to his friends a new restaurant to see if it makes an impact. It did not. On the other hand there are people who are connectors, whose main job is to connect with other people and as a result, they are connected to a large number of people. If a meme is spread by a connector, it is sure to make a much better impact.

This is not a review of The Tipping Point. It has been reviewed countless times. The reason for this discussion is a song that is going viral at the moment in India. It's a song from Tamil movie, '3', and it's called 'Why this kolaveri kolaveri kolaveri di?' (meaning Why this murderous rage, girl?) The lyrics are in Tanglish which is a mixture of Tamil and English. The writer and singer of the song, Dhanush, says that it's a nonsense song about heartbreak. And when you listen to it, you cannot but agree. The surprising thing about it is the simplicity. There is a chance that you may find it irritating when you first hear it but you cannot get it out of your mind. The stickiness factor is huge. It has already got 8 million views on youtube and is currently the favorite of Bollywood superstars, including the B's, who cannot stop tweeting about it. (Gladwell does not take Twitter into account when he discusses the connectors. I think it would play a major role.)

The song was first leaked on the internet and noting it's popularity, the music company decided to release it officially. Be warned that it will stick in your mind even if you do not like it. :)

ps : Soup is a colloquial Tamil word used for guys who go through failure in love.

White to play and win

noreply@blogger.com (Raj) — Mon, 14 Nov 2011 18:15:00 +0000

It is usually said that what is being said is more important than who says it. Ummmm... Not entirely true. Most of you would close your browser tab in disgust if I say that I am going to review the autobiography of George Bush. In order to prevent you from doing so, I am going to talk about a book written by a man with IQ of 190, a former world chess champion who ranks amongst the eight smartest people on the planet. Yes, when Gary Kasparov has something to say, people sit up and take notice.

Credit : Amazon

As the title suggests, 'How Life Imitates Chess' is meant for a restricted audience. If you know how to play chess, you will not have any difficulty in understanding the arguments. But if you do not know much about chess, then this is not the book for you. It's like when American authors 'cover all their bases' or the British ones 'get into a bit of a sticky wicket'. Of course Gary goes well beyond simple metaphors. In a brilliant exposition, he covers the philosophy, strategy and technique of professional chess and draws parallels between the mock war in two dimensions and the real life experiences in three dimensions.

The book is meant for chess players as well as general public with at least preliminary understanding of chess. When you read a book by an athlete, you expect tips on health, diet, training etc. In case of a chess player like Gary whose strength is his brain, the discussion is highly stimulating, touching on exotic subjects like thermodynamics or artificial intelligence. At the end of each chapter, a brief biography of some of the greatest chess players in history adds an interesting flavor. In expanding the principles, Gary also presents us with anecdotes from his vast repertoire. An entire chapter is devoted to the progress of Chess computing, although he is a bit reticent on the famous encounters with Deep Blue and the surprising decision of IBM pulling the plug on rematch and dismantling the machine.

The picture of Gary Kasparov that emerges from this book is that of a man who is exceptionally intelligent, fiercely competitive and brutally honest. He does not gloat over his phenomenal achievements and freely admits his mistakes, such as the one of breaking up from FIDE that ultimately cost him his world title.

While he was still the top rated player in 2005, Gary decided to retire from professional chess. A number of factors went into this decision. He was playing with players who were not born when he first became the world champion. More importantly, he felt that he was needed elsewhere. Since the disintegration of Russia in 1991, there was increasing dissatisfaction with the succession of leaders that followed. He supported Boris Yeltsin initially, only to realize the mistake later on. The breaking point came when Vladimir Putin came into power. Under the façade of a democratic power, the old regime of KGB started gaining strength. As Gary observes,

In Russia the citizens are now in great danger from state abuse of power because officials are beyond public reach. Any criticism of state officials can be termed 'extremism', a term separated from terrorism by only a comma in Putin's law book. Not martial law exactly, call it 'martial law lite'.

Not many people realize the important role played by chess in the cold war era. It was an instrument that signified the power of the state over individual on the national front and a symbol of conflict between communism and capitalism on the international front. Gary always had a defiant streak in him, first opposing the USSR Chess Federation and sports committee when they wanted Anatoly Karpov to win the World Championship. The last straw came in 1990, when he had to rush to his home town Baku to save his family from getting killed in the riots. He airlifted his family and friends to safety, went back to Moscow and met President Gorbachev with no success. He was one of the wealthiest individuals and most privileged private citizens in the country and he had lost his home. It was then that he decided to break with communism once and for all.¹

Chess is often compared with politics, now Gary has decided to carry the analogy towards it's logical conclusion. With the organization called United Civil Front, Gary is playing an active role in bringing together the scattered opposition forces who share a common goal of democratic governance in Russia. Under the UCF banner, he traveled the length and breadth of Russia - from Vladivistok to Kaliningrad - to talk about why the countryside was poor and why the elites were so rich. He is using the same strategies that helped him become the world champion. The difference is - this time the opposition is stronger, they play by their own rules and what is at stake is life itself.

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1. White King and Red Queen, Daniel Johnson

John Reddy, John Reddy Heart.

noreply@blogger.com (Raj) — Tue, 30 Aug 2011 07:13:00 +0000

John Reddy, you had our hearts.
John Reddy, we would've died for you.
John Reddy, John Reddy Heart.

With these lines opens the 500 page saga, 'Broke Heart Blues' by Joyce Carol Oates. The novel revolves around the central figure of John Reddy Heart, a teenager at the Willowsville Senior High School, Willowsville, New York. Amongst a class of mostly rich kids who live in affluent mansions, John Reddy Heart is unique. Lugging all the family belongings in a U-Haul trailer; grandpa, kid brother, sister in the back seat, Dahlia Heart - his mother - at his side, John Reddy heart arrived in Willowsville four years ago, in a bright-salmon-colored Caddie that was pulling the trailer, driving it all the way from Vegas, sitting on three telephone directories because he was not tall enough to see the street at the tender age of eleven. By the time he is sixteen, working part time in a carpentry shop, he has matured beyond his age. Reticent, hardly acknowledging the greetings of his classmates, John Reddy Heart is already an enigmatic attraction for all the girls between ages of twelve and twenty (often their mothers included). The guys, sometimes wary of this inexplicable popularity, are not jealous. They want to invite him to their parties, bond with him. John Reddy Heart always politely declines such invitations. Sometimes, you see red marks on his face, he has been in a fight.

In the first part of the novel, we observe John Reddy Heart though the eyes of his classmates. Who, in particular, is the observer is never made clear. A general "we" suffices as if it's a collective consciousness of the class. They follow him everywhere, going out of classrooms, in the gym, during the basketball games, even drive by his apartment at night to see if he is in. This obsession takes on a fever pitch when John Reddy Heart is arrested for killing Melvin Riggs, a controversial personality involved in local politics, member of the local county board and lover of Dahlia Heart. A long period of suspense punctuated by frantic media attention, rumors and a mistrial, results in acquittal of John Reddy Heart, though he spends the next two years in prison pleading guilty to other charges.

Throughout this first part, we are not allowed even a glimpse of what is going through John Reddy Heart's mind. That is reserved for the second part. By bits and pieces, we get to know this enigmatic figure, flashes of memory fit like parts of puzzle, piecing together the sordid, painful past. His classmates, whose sole obsession was and still is John Reddy Heart, almost never appear in his thoughts, confirming what one of them, Dwayne Hewson, summed up thus, "..in some essential way, in his innermost world, the rest of us didn't exist."

Third part is a wild trip down the nostalgic lane, the thirtieth reunion of the class.

"A time of joy, if a time of sorrow; a time of bittersweet laughter, and a time of tears. Our thirtieth reunion."

Some of them will never make it, having found their permanent places in graveyards and obituaries. Once young, fresh faces have long lost their youthful luster, muscles have given way to overweight bellies and oversized hips, wallets are stronger, body is weaker - sometimes battling with viruses and diseases. Even Willowsville has changed, all the old landmarks now exist only in the memories. The once young, now middle aged friends come together to laugh, cry, reminisce, wondering how and where the time went. As Ritchie Eickhorn, now a well known poet but still the same old Ritchie to his friends, chanted

O youth O America like gold coins falling from our pockets!
So many coins! such riches! no need to stoop to pick up what you have dropped.

I must confess that, having no first hand experience of American culture, reading this novel was what a westerner may feel during a visit to Taj Mahal. The peculiar thing is that the universal character of basic human emotions transcends the cultural gap, you connect to the characters on a level that is beyond these barriers. Guess that's what great writers are all about. They make the world so real, so vivid, you get sucked into it like matter on the precipice of a black hole.

Writers have different styles, like different brush strokes, but the picture they paint touches you in ways that are hard to describe. Broke Heart Blues leaves you with a bitter sweet emotion, something that Murakami describes as, "a childhood longing, that had always remained - and would ever remain - unfulfilled."

Some writers are prolific, some write infrequently but produce high quality stuff. Joyce Carol Oates is known for consistently producing masterpieces at a breathtaking pace. While interviewing Joyce Carol Oates, an interviewer once remarked, "You're frequently charged with producing too much."

To which I may add, "And we are so grateful."
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Picture credit : Amazon

Interview with Lisa Brackmann

noreply@blogger.com (Raj) — Fri, 05 Aug 2011 13:17:00 +0000

Sustaining both physical and mental injuries in the Iraq war while serving as a medic, Ellie Cooper finds herself in the strange surroundings of Beijing. Scarred from the inhuman experiences during war, Ellie is dealing with a broken marriage, uncertain what the future holds for her, when she meets a Uighur dissident at a friend's place. This single incident proves a turning point when soon after Ellie is chased by American and Chinese Secret services and it becomes impossible to know who can be trusted. Ellie's sort-of-boyfriend is a painter. The story provides glimpses of contemporary art scene in Beijing as well as the restrictions imposed on the freedom of artists. People getting together for any reason whatsoever - it may be as simple as exchange of creative ideas between artists - causes frowns on the unseen, unknown face behind the curtain. When every move that you make is being watched, phones tapped, e-mails monitored, an ingenious form of communication evolves. Ellie and her companions communicate through Avatars of an online game called The Sword of Ill Repute. Fighting with dragons becomes a secondary task to secret exchange of messages.

Lisa Brackmann's debut novel Rock Paper Tiger starts with action engaging the reader and never lets up. Rock Paper Tiger was amongst top ten mystery/thrillers on Amazon and it was also nominated for for the Strand Magazine Critics Award for Best Debut Novel. "Be prepared for a wild ride," is how the The New York Times praised Rock Paper Tiger.

It is immensely satisfying to read a good book. And the opportunity to talk to the author about it only adds to it. It was great pleasure talking to Lisa about Rock Paper Tiger.

Raj : While writing RPT, did you try to adhere to the standard plot structures - like plot twist on page so and so? Or did you let your muse guide you, with the end point fixed?

Lisa : I usually describe my writing method as “Kids! Don’t try this at home!” I’m not very organized in how I approach it. I don’t outline, though I do at times have certain key scenes that I know I’m working toward. Generally I have a few major elements that I’m interested in exploring, and the challenge is how to fit them together.

For ROCK PAPER TIGER, I knew that I wanted to write something that takes place in modern China, a setting that I felt was underutilized by Western novelists. I wanted to explore the contemporary Chinese art scene, because I found it really interesting. I also was very much concerned about the American “War on Terror” and the invasion of Iraq. So how could I juggle these disparate elements and turn them into some kind of story? The linchpin was the main character, Ellie Cooper, an accidental Iraq War vet. Through her I realized that a lot of what I wanted to say was about how imperial powers and unchecked authority, be they American or Chinese, tend to act in similar ways.

So, I really didn’t know how I was going to end the book. I pretty much let Ellie and those concerns guide me through the story. And along the way I realized that the book was really about how to live a moral, meaningful life in the face of huge impersonal forces that don’t necessarily value an “ordinary” individual’s concerns.

Mostly though, I tried to write a fun thriller that would keep people turning the pages!

Raj : In RPT, Harrison has an interesting point of view about political art and personal expression in Picasso's Guernica. What is your view on this?

Lisa : I pretty much agree with Harrison — didactic art is rarely good art. That said, I’ve seen a lot of overtly political art that is really powerful—a lot of work coming out of China, for one. And a few years ago I saw a show of contemporary Cuban art that really resonated with me. So I personally like a lot of political art—it all depends on the execution.

In a way that whole discussion in RPT was a discussion I was having in my own mind about writing the book—obviously I’m concerned with politics and ideas, and I have a certain point of view. But I also wanted to write a book that people could read on an airplane and enjoy (I was thrilled when I made a couple of “Hot Summer Beach Reads!” lists). If the artistry doesn’t transcend the politics, your book is likely to be an annoying bore. And I really wanted to avoid that!

Raj : The city of Beijing with its cafes, game parlors and urbanized habitats plays an important role in RPT. What does the city mean to you?

Lisa : I first went to Beijing shortly after the Cultural Revolution, in 1979. I lived there for about half a year. I was quite young, and the experience had a tremendous impact on me. I’m not exaggerating when I say that it completely transformed the course of my life.

Beijing has changed so much since then that most of the city is completely unrecognizable from that time. It’s not an easy city to get to know or to navigate, and there are things about it that are frustrating, that can actually make me angry (the wanton destruction of historic neighborhoods and the structures that have generally replaced them I find particularly painful). But I still have a sense of familiarity and homecoming when I go there. And it’s never boring. Plus, if you want to understand China today, Beijing is the epicenter of it all. There’s way more to China than Beijing, and a lot of short-term foreign visitors will drop in on Beijing and Shanghai and come away with a completely distorted perception of what China is about. But if you want to see the cutting edge of China, the center of political and cultural opinion—Beijing is the place to be.

Raj : When I was reading RPT, I had this feeling of that not much is being told about the bad guys. Suit #1 and Suit #2 are carrying out instructions from the top. And in the background there is always this unseen, unknown enemy, watching your every move. This ambiguity - how did it come about?

This hearkens back to what I touched on in my answer to your first question. A lot of what RPT is about is this idea that most people are not these geniuses who are able to outwit bad guys and forces that are way more powerful than they are. I mean, it’s a nice fantasy, but most of us are worried about our jobs, our futures, our ability to make a home for ourselves in the world. To a certain extent these are existential problems: everyone wrestles on some level with the question of “how am I to live?” But the things that have screwed up Ellie’s life are not things that she can really control. She can’t find a job and wants to get money for college, so she joins the National Guard. Maybe that was a bad decision, but it’s not an unreasonable one for someone in her situation. Then, the leaders of her country, people who are way more powerful than she is, decide to start a war, a war she ends up fighting. She has no say in this. At the time she doesn’t have the knowledge or the experience to even understand what she’s been dragged into.

Which is not to say that each of us isn’t in control of our own moral choices, and that’s what Ellie comes to terms with over the course of the book.

But you know, the whole Abu Ghraib scandal, all the other prisoner abuse scandals, the only people who were ever punished for those were low level functionaries. The approval of torture as a legitimate tool of state power was made by people at the very top. None of them have been called to account. They probably never will be. And those are the “unseen, unknown enemies.” The truth is, we know who they are. We know who they are in the US, and we know who they are in China. They are the people with the most money and the most power, who make the big decisions, and who benefit the most from the power structures that are in place and that they maintain.

Raj : You speak Chinese, which is in many ways different from Indo-European family of languages. Did it change your perspective in any way?

Lisa : I really love studying other languages, and if I weren’t such an intrinsically lazy person with a short attention span, I would study a lot more of them. I actually don’t think of Chinese as something that is segregated from the other languages I’ve studied. It’s just another linguistic system to figure out. I look at the way it’s pronounced, I mean, how you actually form the sounds in your mouth, and I see some similarities to German, of all things.

That said, yes, there are no (or few) cognates with English. And the system of characters is totally different, and highly significant culturally.

Which is really the important thing. Being able to speak some Chinese (I am not fluent) totally changes my experience when I go to China. It is like having a key that unlocks all kinds of things culturally that you just don’t have if you can’t talk to people in their own language. I haven’t studied linguistics, but the idea that languages have a profound impact on how different cultures are shaped and how people raised in them think seems pretty obvious.

Raj : Could you tell us a little about your upcoming Novel?

It’s a literary thriller set in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, another place where I’ve spent a fair amount of time, about an American woman whose real estate financier husband has died, and she discovers that he was running a financial scam and has lost all their money, so she’s at a crisis point in her life on multiple levels. She takes an already paid-for vacation in Puerto Vallarta to get her head together, meets an attractive guy on the beach, they go back to her hotel, and things go terribly wrong. The book is also about the intersection of drug cartels, political power, and corruption on both sides of the border. It’s called Getaway, and it will be published by Soho Press in May 2012, and by Harper UK under the title DAY OF THE DEAD. They are also publishing RPT as YEAR OF THE TIGER in April 2012 in the Commonwealth. I’m very excited about all of this.

Raj : Many thanks Lisa for this wonderful discussion. Wish you the best for your upcoming book.

If you have questions for Lisa, please leave them in the comments.
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Lisa's official site is here. You can also follow her on Facebook and Twitter.
For readers in India : You can order Rock Paper Tiger via Flipkart.
Picture credits : Lisa Brackmann and Amazon.

And then there was silence

noreply@blogger.com (Raj) — Tue, 20 Jul 2010 17:00:00 +0000

So much has been written about death that almost everything has become a cliché. Each and every one of us thinks about it from time to time and except for the enlightened ones, we feel a mix of emotions ranging from anxiety to nihilistic solace.

The reason for writing this is two occurrences in last couple of days. I did not know both of them personally. A friend of a friend on Facebook, passed away in a plane crash in Texas. I came to know from the status of my friend where she also provided a link to his page. On his facebook page, there were normal status updates, as you would expect from a teenager (he was 19) and then they suddenly stopped. To see someone's lifeline being cut off in such a way was a chilling experience. And then there were updates from his facebook ID saying "I found my drink today". He had registered a on facebook application which will automatically update his status every day, saying which drink he has found.

Never again will think at the death scene from Anand where Amitabh hears the taped dialogue after Rajesh Khanna has passed away as melodramatic. Truth is stranger than fiction.

The second news came today. Fellow blogger Abhinay Kulakarni also known as भोचक on Marathi sites passed away in a car accident. I had interacted with him a couple of times on Upakram, his ID was well known to everyone. His page on Upakram has the usual updates followed by a chilling silence.

I find it hard to remain rational under such conditions. And inevitably, you start thinking, how long do I have? Weeks, months or years? And how many chances will I miss to appreciate people, to love life and feel gratitude? How many times will I sulk, get angry or be sarcastic?

I hope the answers keep improving with time.

Show yourself, Spiderman.

noreply@blogger.com (Raj) — Sat, 06 Feb 2010 08:36:00 +0000

There not a single person in this world who has not heard a joke anytime in his/her life. Even the tribes cut off from the rest of the world must be finding something to laugh about. (Robin Williams gave an example of a prehistoric man making a joke. "How many Neanderthals does it take to light a fire?" "None, they don't have it yet.") Before the Internet, the jokes used to be in papers, magazines etc. And off course, the good old mouth publicity. With the Internet, the jokes began spreading faster than Swine Flu, initially through email (Does anyone still forward jokes anymore?) then through websites, and all the social networking extravaganza.

Here's the catch.

Have you ever seen a joke that was signed by it's author? Or have you met anyone who said to you, "Hey, listen to this great joke that I wrote?" (Wrote is always, always replaced by heard.) In the age where people even emblem their photos with their signatures, the jokes go all around without a clue as to where they might have originated from. And we are not talking about tens or hundreds of jokes. They amount to millions, most of them good ones. Even if we leave aside the jokes made by professional comedians, talk show hosts etc., the remaining number is still quite big. So who is spending their time and energy in writing all those jokes without even the simple expectation of recognition? This has got to be the most selfless act since Mother Teresa.

I love jokes. And for this reason, I think of all those anonymous joke writers as Superheroes. Hiding behind their masks, working quietly day and night, to create one hilarious joke after other, with the simple purpose of making us laugh.

If you are reading this, O faceless Superhero, please show yourself. The least we can do as a way of gratitude, is to offer you a..

Thou art a novelist

noreply@blogger.com (Raj) — Sun, 29 Nov 2009 13:45:00 +0000

Seriously, a month ago if someone had told me that I would be going crazy in the month of November writing a Sci-fi novel, I would have laughed. On 29th October, I heard somewhere about a novel writing contest. I did not think much of it. On 30th, a friend, Adrienne, mentioned that she was taking part in a contest called NaNoWriMo, short form for National Novel Writing Month. I was intrigued and looked it up. Sounded interesting. Finish 50,000 words in the month of November and you have won.

Before I knew it, I had jumped off the bridge. :) I registered and actually started writing a novel. And what an experience it has been! 50,000 words in a month meant I had to put in ~1667 words every day. Seemed doable but I was not sure if I would be able to do it consistently for 30 days. I chose Sci-fi genre simply because I thought that was the best area where I could bluff convincingly. :) It is a story called Mind of the Machine, that happens in 2163. More details here.

The idea behind NaNoWriMo is to put aside the editor sitting inside your head and simply write, write with abandon. There is enough time for editing later. It has been a wonderful experience. At times I fell behind the daily target but managed to catch up. Fortunately, I realized earlier on that if you miss your daily target, it can be a daunting task to catch up later on. It is also difficult to keep the editor out of it, he keeps on coming back.

My perception of writing has completely changed now. It used to take days for a single blog post. It seems a piece of cake now. The novel is not yet finished, I have to save the world in another 20,000 words. :)

Are you online?

noreply@blogger.com (Raj) — Sun, 04 Oct 2009 07:22:00 +0000

The answer to that question is changing very fast. It no longer means if you are on chat/skype IMing away to glory. It means are you on the hottest social networking/microblogging/twitting-twibing-diddlle-dee-dum site- whichever it may be at that particular moment. At the moment I am using few of the sites, and here is my review.

Orkut : Orkut was the first social networking site I joined, in the days when social networking was a novelty. It was very exciting to connect with old friends, sending scraps, rating them as cool etc. Very soon the novelty wore off though. They have not changed the layout in years, not to metion quarter page advertisements staring at you when you open a page. Move on guys! Change it!

Facebook : It's basically same as Orkut, but it's more sleek and the privacy options are much better. It's one of my favorite sites at the moment. The negative point about facebook is they use way too many javascripts and on a slower connection it takes ages to load.

LinkedIn : This is completely different. LinkedIn is only meant for professional inteactions, so no sending beers to your pals. The goal is to connect with like minded people in your particular profession and expand your network. Also useful if you are looking for job, business partners etc.

Twitter : Twitter started as a site for microblogging but has now eveolved in to much more. There are some who believe in numbers. This means the more the number of people following you, the better. It makes sense if you are using Twitter for marketing purposes. How to do this is best explained by Guy Kawasaki here. Although I do not agree with his policy, it has it's own merits for marketing. By the way, if you start following Guy on Twitter, he will also start following you. But don't be flattered. It's done automatically. :-)

I use Twitter mainly for getting insights from people I find interesting. Some of my favourite people on Twitter are Steve Pavlina, Sean Stephenson, Deepak Chopra and Tony Robbins. It's amazing how much value these guys can put in a single tweet. I also use Twitter for following news updates such as New Scientist or Scientific American.

You can also use twitter as a discuassion forum. If you add #yada to your tweet, all tweets containing #yada will be shown together. You can find them if you search for #yada.

That's it for the moment. I am sure that one year from now, there will be some different answers to the question, Are you online?

Update : Now Twitter has teamed up with LinkedIn so you can chose to have your LinkedIn status updated simultaneously with your tweets. Here is how.

A tale of many cities

noreply@blogger.com (Raj) — Wed, 20 May 2009 19:11:00 +0000

Next stop, Mumbai. As usual saying goodbye is not something I am very good at, but in case of Marseille, it is relatively easier. For some reason, I could never identify myself with the city. Whenever I travelled to other parts of France, I did not feel like coming back to it. I loved Montpellier, Toulon and the lovely city of Perpignan close to the spanish border. But after staying one year in Marseille, I cannot say that I will miss it very much.

After having spent different amounts of time in many cities, I feel that every city has a unique character.The small city of Okazaki in Japan has some memorable moments of riding bike and waiting for the cherry blossom, aka, Sakura. I felt at peace with small lanes and cafés in Bologna. The red houses in Perpignan reminded me of it. I had a brief encounter with Genoa. Ah, the tasty Focaccia!

So, bottom line is I am not as emotional as I was when I left Bologna. As for the future, I am curious to see which city lies in my path next.

An Italian present

noreply@blogger.com (Raj) — Sun, 01 Mar 2009 20:21:00 +0000

Sometime back, I published an interview with Silvia, on her views on India. Silvia also decided to take my interview on Italy and Italian culture. Silvia is one of the most kind hearted persons I have met, as is evident from her other blog on slums in Mumbai. I don't know what to say, except, "Tiringrazio, Silvia. Sei gentilissima."

The original interview is in Italian but thanks to almighty god Google, you can read the translated version here.

Vivaldi

noreply@blogger.com (Raj) — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 11:09:00 +0000

It's snowing in Marseille. Something that happens very rarely, they say. The streets, houses, trees are covered with snow. Even the first few meters of the sea are frozen. It's a beautiful sight.

It's at times like this, that you cannot find words to express yourself. So you look for them elsewhere. And this time, I find them in Vivaldi's Concerto No 4, Winter and I marvel at the creative genius, that stands the test of time after 300 years!

Shivering, frozen mid the frosty snow in biting, stinging winds;
running to and fro to stamp one's icy feet, teeth chattering in the bitter chill.

To rest contentedly beside the hearth, while those outside are drenched by pouring rain.

We tread the icy path slowly and cautiously, for fear of tripping and falling.
Then turn abruptly, slip, crash on the ground and, rising, hasten on across the ice lest it cracks up.

We feel the chill north winds coarse through the home despite the locked and bolted doors
This is winter, which nonetheless brings its own delights.

Silvia's reflections on India

noreply@blogger.com (Raj) — Sun, 21 Dec 2008 19:14:00 +0000

Prologue : After reading Silvia's post about the Indian film festival in Florence, River to River, I was quite touched by her thoughts and emotions about India and Indian culture. And I felt that many Indians would like to know about them. So I thought about translating her post into Marathi, a lanuguage spoken in Maharashtra, Western India and which also happens to be my mother toungue. And in order to add more information about her, we decided to do a short interview as well. So here is the article and the interview in English and the Marathi translation is here and here.

I would also like to thank Silvia for all her help.

-------------

Silvia is originally from Genova, Italy. After completing her Masters degree in Physics, she works as an editor in Bologna. One of her interesting qualities is her love and affection about India and Indian culture. She has been to India three times and she is always trying to understand India and Indian culture through books and movies. I was amazed when I saw the list of Indian authors she has read. I have not heard of many of them, let alone read them.

Silvia came to India in the summer of 2007. But this was not a trip for sightseeing. She was going to teach chliders in Mumbai slums for a month. This was in collaboration with Akanksha, a non-profit organization that works towards providing children with education, skills and character. She has recorder her experiences in Mumbai on her other blog. They are very touching and leave you full of emotions.

Afetr getting to know about Silvia's work, her affection about India and Indian culture, I thought about doing a small interview with her.

Me : When did you first decide to visit India? And how many times have you been there?

Silvia : My first "contact" with India happened in 2002, simply reading Rushdie's Midnight children. Through that book I felt India was really a special place and I wanted to know more, to visit it, to learn about people and culture. And while I was reading my second Indian novel (Arundhati Roy's The God of Small Things), I got an email from a guy living in Kerala (same place where the novel is set!), interested in Italian literature! We become very good friends, he sent me a lot of books of Malayalam writers (that I loved...). Then I decided to go and visit him.

I first visited Rajasthan and then I moved south to Kerala and stayed with his family (wonderful experience!). Second time, I went to Ladakh. Third time, I worked in Mumbai with slum children.

Me : What was your first impression of India when you arrived? And has it changed?

Silvia : My very first impression comes from arriving at Delhi railway station at 4:00 am to get a train to Jaipur: there were so many people sleeping on the floor that I could not step in! It was a little bit shocking... In following first days I felt a bit disoriented, but then I found Indian people so nice and friendly that I started to feel at home... My impression is constantly changing with time, just because I learn more about the country and the people. Anyway, I think Indian culture and society are very different from ours, but it is incredible to see how human feeling and emotions are so similar across different cultures.

Me : Could you please tell us a little bit about your experince of working with children in India?

Silvia : It was one of the best experiences of my life! I taught Math and English to children from different slums in Mumbai, working together with Akanksha, a wonderful NGO that really makes a lot for these children. But the most important thing was the human contact with the children. I learnt a lot from them, much more than they learnt from me. The most amazing was to see how children living in absolute poverty were so hopeful and so ready to give. I came back with a word in my mind: 'human'.

Bologna : Casa lontano da casa

noreply@blogger.com (Raj) — Sun, 23 Nov 2008 12:14:00 +0000

Ho apenna finito di leggere romanzo di John Grisham, The Broker. Aparte che Grisham é uno di mio scrittore preferito, il libro ha un altro aspetto interessante. La storia succede in Bologna. La cittá dove abitavo qualche tempo fa, una di mia cittá preferita in Italia. Prima di scrivere questo romanzo, Grisham é stato in Bologna. Il romanzo descrive Bologna perfettamente. Piazza Maggiore, via della Independenza, Strada Maggiore, Le Due Torri, Porta Saragozza, Porta San Donato e anche molte strade piccole.

Mentre leggevo, ho sento nostalgico. Mi riccordo, ero più triste quando ho lasciato Bologna. C'e l'ho tante memorie di Bologna. I buoni gelati, le serate passate in Piazza Santo Stephano dove i ragazzi cantavano, la basilica di San Luca, le estati caldissimi e gli inverni freddissimi. Una volta, mi ricordo stavo tornando da Svizzera. Il treno é arrivato a Bologna e della finestra del treno, ho visto il nome 'Bologna'. Improvvisamente ho pensato, “finalmente, arrivato a casa”. Poi ho realizzato, la assurdità della situazione. Forse, Camus ha ragione. La vita é assurda. Ma nella mia mente, Bologna é sempre una casa lontano da casa.

Change has come to America

noreply@blogger.com (Raj) — Wed, 05 Nov 2008 06:55:00 +0000

At last, looks like change has really come to America! Congratulations to Barack Obama!

It's a bug! It's a feature! No, it's Windows Vista!

noreply@blogger.com (Raj) — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 08:00:00 +0000

Vista woes abound the net. They vary from vista defrag running all night to the dreadful UAC popups. Usually it's quite clear wheather an annoyance is a bug or a feature. However, I came across one where the jury is still out.

In Windows Xp, to unmount a USB you right-click on the icon in the taskbar and a popup says "This device can now be safely.. blah blah." You remove the USB and the popup vanishes. In Vista however, when I perform the same operation there is a new window carrying the same message with an OK box and I have to spend one second to click OK. I have to transfer data from the lab to my laptop several times a day. As internet in not allowed inside the lab, I use a USB. This means that I have to click this box at least once or more per day. Counting one click per day for 365 working days, I spend at least 6 minutes clicking something which has absolutely no meaning. I ask the OS to unmount the USB, the OS does it and asks me back if I am OK with it. Then I tell the OS that I am okay with it. To borrow a quote from Seinfeld, "What's this? An Abbott and Costello routine"?

I don't know what's your take on using bad words; to each his own! But at times like these, my vocabulory of Italian bad words gets used in full flourish.

It should not be too difficult to fix this ~~bug~~ feature. And I am sure there are bright guys at Redmond. Or maybe we have to ~~pay~~ wait for Windows 7?

In a discussion on slashdot (see the UAC link above), someone put it very succintly, "Microsoft embarasses me as a computer professional." Need more be said?

Excusez-moi...

noreply@blogger.com (Raj) — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 19:46:00 +0000

A funny thing happened today. While I was going to work, a woman asked me "excusez-moi, où est le métro?" Surprisingly, I was able to understand and direct her to the metro. And most probably, this was my first sponteneous conversation in a language that I am trying to learn. The feeling is fantastic. It is as if you have entered a hitherto uncharted teritory, full of surprising adventures.

I remember the feeling when I was trying to learn Italian and one day I understood completely what two men were talking. In hindsight, their conversation was not really worth eavesdropping. Questa era tanto, tanto tempo fa, in una galassia lontanissima... :)

The changing face of Bollywood

noreply@blogger.com (Raj) — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 06:26:00 +0000

Bollywood movies have been stereotypes, there's no denying that. Having grown up watching them, it was no surprise to see the lead characters suddenly bursting into a song-n-dance routine for no apparent reason. Many of the movies were known more for their songs than their script, acting or direction, if any. Jokes apart, Bollywood movies have always been kind of musicals, even when there is no place for music as in Satya. (For a latest hollywood musical, check out Sweeney Todd.) Though one cannot imagine oldies without their beautiful compositions, while watching the new movies, one did feel, from time to time, that songs could be done away with, at least in some of the movies. Ditto for the sterotypical characters of mother, son, villain etc.

A wednesday. Does not sound much of title for a thriller. Nevertheless, that's exactly what it is. There are number of non-bollywood things about this movie. First, no songs. Second, it`s only an hour and a half. A thriller based on the Mumbai bomb blasts, the film was an unforgettable ride from start to finish. As the main characters Anupam is fantastic while Naseer continues to astound with another one of his brilliant performances. The rest of the cast, including Jimmy Shergil is perfect. Finally, full credit to Neeraj Pandey, for writing and directing a thriller without any characteristic bollywood clichés. A little bit of Hollywood influence is seen, especially the Born Trilogy (shaky camera movements), but it does not spoil the experience.

La lingua

noreply@blogger.com (Raj) — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 10:38:00 +0000

Qualche anni fa, quando sono arrivato in Italia, non reuscivo di capire nulla di quello che parlavano le gente. Ora, in Francia, stessa cosa ma la lingua è cambiata. La mia prima domanda questi giorni è, "Parlez-vous anglais ou italien?".
Ci sono tanti touristi in Marsille e tante volte incontro Italiani. Mi fa molto piacere parlare la lingua che ho imparato con molto duro lavoro. Spero che prossimmo anno, posso dire stessa cosa per il francese. :)

New Thinking on the Climate Crisis

noreply@blogger.com (Raj) — Sat, 12 Apr 2008 08:55:00 +0000

I agree completely. We have an emergency. Please spread the awareness.

The heat is (not) on

noreply@blogger.com (Raj) — Mon, 24 Mar 2008 10:56:00 +0000

The disaster struck yesterday. The energy source that nourishes life around it, was compromised and everything went cold and bleak.

Or so I thought, for an hour or so. My boiler broke down yesterday. And it chose a perfect day to do it, Easter. So no mechanic was available. After some time being extremely frustrated about it, I realised that the situation was not so bad. Firstly, it's no longer winter, which makes it much easier, especially in the mild climate of Genova. And I actually do not need to take a bath at 2 am. So I quickly became used to heating water the way they used to do it in old days. (And still do in parts of India.)

It was the kind of situation Tom hanks found himself in, in the movie Cast Away. Although, on a much smaller scale. And after you get the situation under control, you really begin to think with a new perspective. There are so many things available at the touch of a button, that the line between luxury and necessity has been removed long back. How many things are really necessary for survival? And secondly, is technology achieving it's goal of making our lives simpler? Probably, I should visit Japan again. This time to see how ancient tradition and ultra-modern technology live side by side.

ps : I have noticed a consistent 'anti-technology' trend in my recent posts. It is not premeditated. Quite unintentional, in fact. And I am curious to know where it's leading to.

“Do you want to know?” “Err.. no, thanks!”

noreply@blogger.com (Raj) — Sat, 15 Mar 2008 11:20:00 +0000

Last week, Guy Kawasaki formally announced Alltop, a service which collects latest news on forty of the most popular topics on the web, based on suggestions from most active social web users. The prediction is that it will soon replace RSS readers.

Frankly, I have mixed feelings about this. That is not to say that it's not a great idea. It would be useful to many users, for specialist applications or just simple surfing. My point is this. How much information can a normal human being handle per day, without resorting to caffeine or other wonderful molecules? We are living a pretty stressful and hectic life as it is. How much more stress do we need in order to make it cutting-edge? That does not mean one should be isolated from everything. The trick is to find the right balance of how much information you really need and how much you can assimilate on a daily basis.

I have a friend in Japan and we keep in touch quite frequently. Last year around Christmas, I found him missing from all the usual places, social networking, chats, even the good old email. He turned up in second week of January and told me that he had been visiting all the Buddhist temples and Shinto shrines in Japan. And during all this period, he had unwired himself from all the electronic gadgets. Needless to say, he found the experience wonderful.

Listening to him, so did I. Sounded like Alanis Morrisstte saying,

The moment I let go of it was
The moment I got more than I could handle
The moment I jumped off of it was
The moment I touched down

A rose by any other name...

noreply@blogger.com (Raj) — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 12:43:00 +0000

What's in a name? that which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet;
So Romeo would, were he not Romeo call'd,
Retain that dear perfection which he owes

So said Juliet, asking the famous question, what's in a name?

Well, apparently, a lot. Looks like Romeo had a lucky escape. Take the American Physical Society, for instance. Recently, they modified their publishing guidelines so that Asian authors could write their names in English as well as in their own script, if they wish. The reason for this is different Chinese names appear the same when written in English. So, Wei Wang, which can be written in eight ways in Chinese, is just Wei Wang in English. A gigantic identity crisis, especially, in the scientific circles, where your reputation depends on the number of articles which bear your name (supposedly unique). And so, if you are Wei Wang and you are submitting a paper to Physical Review, you can specify your identity more precisely as in 王伟, 王薇, 王维, 王蔚, 汪卫, 汪玮, 汪威, or 汪巍.

Wonder what Shakespeare would say to that?

But why is our name so important to us? Isn't it completely arbitrary to give a label to a life form, her metabolism, her actions, her identity, her persona that sticks with her as long as she lives? A label, that was chosen on completely arbitrary grounds by some other people. And we are so used to names in our own community, region or nation. Thats why the names Douglas Adams invents for his characters in Hitchhiker's Guide seem ridiculous yet amusing. Ford Prefect, Zaphod Beeblebrox or Woebagger the infinitely prolonged.

We have a name for everything. Cats, dogs, houses, religions and streets. Maybe thats what prompted U2 to write about a place where 'the streets have no name'.

The 'Thank you' puzzle

noreply@blogger.com (Raj) — Wed, 02 Jan 2008 10:22:00 +0000

Gratitude is a universal feeling. There's a word for it in every language . But there the universality ends. Every culture has a different way of expressing gratitude.

In Europe, thank you/grazie/merci are essential for survival. From "Could you pass the salt, please? Thank you." to "Could you move that mountain for me, please? Thank you."

I have had the fortune of staying in Japan for some time and it was very interesting to observe the cultural difference. The Japanese culture is one of the most polite cultures that I have come across. And boy, do they have an elaborate system of thank you's (And these are accompanied by bowing, at both ends.)

Arigato (Between friends but not to a person older than you)
Domo (again thanks, but the slower you say it, more is the gratitude)
Arigato gozaimasu (More polite almost too polite than arigato)
Arigato gozaimashita (Same as above but say it after the favor has been done)

In India, expressing gratitude is a complex process (as with many other things). We say thank you in all formal situations. However, to a close friend or relative, we rarely say thank you. For instance, I can count the number of times I have said thank you to my sister, say in the past year or so. And if I do, she goes, "For what?" Off course, I am well aware that this may sound almost sacrilegious to the westerners. And I find that I have changed after living in Europe. Now, I say thanks even to my close Indian friends.

Note : I have noticed many google searches leading to this post looking for Indian word for Thank you. So, here goes. In Hindi, the word is Dhanyavad. I searched a lot to find the pronounciation. The best I could come up was this religious song. The first word in this song is dhanyavad. If you are in North/Western India, you can use Hindi, but in the southern part it is not very popular. So in South India, you can safely say thanks and most people will understand. Actually, thank you is quite common, so it can be used everywhere, in case you forget Dhanyavad. :-)

Isn't she just amazing?

Web 2.0

noreply@blogger.com (Raj) — Mon, 24 Dec 2007 11:56:00 +0000

I remember when I was a child, we used to send letters to my mawshi (mother's sister). It used to be a ceremony. Everyone used to write his/her separate letter. We used to put them together in a big envelope, put the stamps, write the address and send it. And then, we used to wait for the answer everyday, which would arrive in about two weeks time.

Cut to 2007. I have not written a letter in almost two years. Come to think of it, I type instead of writing these days. Everyone I know has e-mail and I can contact them on chat/skype, scrap/message them on social networking sites, leave a message on their blog, text them or call them on their mobile. Any of this can be done within one minute. I don't post greeting cards any more. I just pick some 3D multimedia stuff to convey what (I think) I want to say.

I get upset if I don't receive a reply within minutes. The response time has shrunk from days to seconds.

I have not seen a clear, starry night in months. The stars are hardly visible from the city. The only contact I have with nature is checking the weather forecast for tomorrow. But thats all right. I worry more about getting the latest security and antivirus updates for my laptop.

I am bombarded with information in all forms every second, twenty four hours a day. My senses have saturated. Games, music, movies, languages, poetry, sports, quotes, wildlife, history... You name it, we got it. There's Wiki, Google, Youtube. A new blog is created every half second. I use RSS feeds to keep me updated. I have no time to reflect.

Hallelujah! Welcome Web 2.0!