Games Indians Play - a review

I happened to browse through this book recently. The author puts forward the following about Indians' behavior :
1. low trustworthiness
2. being privately smart and publicly dumb
3. fatalist outlook
4. being too intelligent for our own good
5. abysmal sense of public hygiene
6. lack of self-regulation and sense of fairness
7. reluctance to penalise wrong conduct in others
8. mistaking talk for action
9. deep-rooted corruption and a flair for free-riding
10. inability to follow or implement systems
11. a sense of self-worth that is massaged only if we have the ‘authority’ to break rules
12. propensity to look for loop holes in laws

It will be interesting to read this book. I promise to read and give my impressions.....

Finding Inspiration

One of the cardinal principles of successful people is their ability to find great mentors or find Inspiration. It reminds me of Eklavya and Drona; but, it is a different line of thought, which I would blog on, later on. I learned from my experience is to find someone who inspires us to achieve bigger and better things in life – a source of constant motivation!! It is not often that we come across people who inspires, motivates and influences us. It is undeniable that we are influenced by our parents, family, friends, teachers and colleagues. We often gets inspired by, often then not, people in public, whom we hardly know (in person)...like a Narayana Murthy, a mother Theresa or a Mahatma Gandhi. The issue here about public icons is; we only "hear" about their great deeds (some of them may be exaggerated) and do not have an opportunity to see their actions in person or experience their greatness. I am fortunate to have seen an near-ordinary person, who sets goals and achieves them!! In the process inspires us to do many "tiny" things each day to fulfill our desires and inch closer to what we want to achieve in our lives.

When I first went to US, there is this guy, whom I have met in Cary, North Carolina in early 1994. I found him to be articulate and incredibly smart. Naturally, I wanted to spend some time with him, learn a few things from him. Fortunately, he was in the same apartment complex that I was staying. At that time, I did not know, he how he would make an impression, that I would carry all my life. In those days, I was very impressed with his academic credentials: A Batchelors degree from elite NIT, Trichy and an MBA from IIM Calcutta!! That was just a start...many people might have much better embellishments. As I learned more about him and his many passions: Help people become rich, his interests in Marathons, Mountaineering, Yoga, Music and public speaking….it was like trying to figure out the depth of an ocean. Most of his interests, to an extent became my passions as well, but haven't pursued with the same zeal as my friend.

I used to see him on the treadmill….diligent and disciplined; practicing at least an hour. I found him to be a super fast "reader" as well. He has been trying to do his MBA from a US university. He got his admission in Duke but he refused. Duke, is a top 5 university and closer to Cary, NC (may be 20 Miles). He told me, he wants to get admitted to the best of the best…..at that time it was Wharton. Given his tenacity, he got it in Wharton the next year. He joined McKinsey (A "cartier" of consulting firms), right after his 2nd MBA. Then, he became Vice President for Nextance. Now, he heads Adsense division at Google ( any takers of a job in Google?)!!

I recently heard that he won a Toastmasters Accolade, deserving so. I have followed his Treks to Mt Kilimanjaro, Mt. Kanchenjunga. His wanderlust has taken him to Mongolia, Gambia and many exotic places….I would like you to share with me a rich canvas of this friend of mine : Gopi Kallayil. There are a few snippets of his life, in the following blogs, articles and an award winning toastmaster presentations…in youtube!!

Following will give you a glimpse of one achiever!!
http://kallayil.com/articles.htm
http://gopi.blogspot.com/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hN1RifUpi88

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LDMXpuh6Npk

Let us set ourselves some goals and follow the path that gives us a sense of accomplishment and happiness.

How to spell "Genui(o)s"?

Opportunities are dawning on the youth of emerging India like never before.....

But the younger generation, who are getting opportunities (jobs) seems to be so content with landing a job in a BPO or a IT "Big 5", who does mass recruitment....the only pride for these people seems to be "pride" in working for these companies. I once asked a group of these bright kids to spell a word that implies "focussed intelligence and great insight"....they spelled "genious". Then I asked how many people disagree with that spelling, only one girl disagreed. I asked her to give the spelling that she thinks is right, she said "Genius". I again asked the group whether they agree with it. No one agreed. I asked all of them to look into dictionary....lot of them looked puzzled....(probably, they haven't heard of terms like "Dictionary", "Encyclopedia" etc.,) They did anyway (because, I forced).

What I realized is the conviction (rote learning) with which we are trained indicates, how "close" minded we would become! One of the life skills that I realized is "continuous learning". If we are not conditioned for this, we would build a weak nation. For example, it is a common experience that with every monsoon, the roads gets eroded and there will be pot holes....., then right after the monsoon, there will apprently be new layer on the roads ( not new roads). Then, there will be be monsoon, potholes, new layers...the cycle continues...endlesslessly. Do we all agree, this is a healthy cycle? Do we think this cycle can be broken? Why we do not do what we know? One reason I think is due to our "conditioning" of lack of "continous learning" and "continous improvement" mindset. I am not pointing to one set of people, it is across all sections of the social groups.

Hmmm...who worries about all this, we will import "Road laying" technology from Germany(if at all a crisis arise), because we are a super power and we have zillion trillionaires in our country!! After all, our core competency is "software support and maintenance" and all our engineers are doing a fabulous job at it.

Truth transcends emotions

In a world we live in, where there is a lot of social, political and econimic conditioning, propoganda, we often give in to notions and cliche's. Often we consider these notions as "laws". The rules of thumbs would be considered reality.

Some examples of this thinking is :

1. Real Estate prices always increases ( Truth : It is a market and subjected to ups and downs)

2. We have to "work hard" for money (Truth: "work smart" and create value to become rich)

3. Eating Bitter gourd, Fenugreek will reduce diabetes!! ( Does it? Were there any scientific evidence?)

4. "You will die if you eat snake gourd with eggs" ( I must have died several times over!!)

5. India is the greatest country ( the assumption is all other countries are not as good). ( Really?)

and many, many more!

Most of these arise, in my understanding that we are emotionally attached a notion that reinforces our deep rooted "insecurities". But, these could be understood in the context of, "feel good" factor. It often is not necessary to rely "unfounded" facts to "feel good". Even if we can accept the "truth", which again is subjective, we can be happy knowing that we have learned something about ourselves, thus achieving one step closer to knowing our true selves...good, or bad or ugly. Accepting the very "truth" is the first step towards achieving "nirvana".

To glorify ones' legacy need not result in putting down other achievements. Once we have the openness, we would achieve and scale bigger heights as human beings.

Symbiosis in Human interactions

In the very first blog, I have spoken about "collaboration". "Symbiosis" is a related term which means "living together of unlike Organisms". When applied to people, everyone is unique, but we live in communities, sometime asserting "Individuality", sometimes coming together as "brethren".

In management parlance, the relationships between two parties are classified as:

Win/Win : Both Parties win (Mutually beneficial Relationship)
Win/Lose : One party wins, the other loses (Exploitative Relationship)
Lose/Lose : Both are parties lose (Total productivity, Net-Net gain is negative, hence deemed that fatal for the ecosystem )

But, when I recently chanced upon "Symbiosis" while checking out a Biology textbook, I thought another dimension needs to be added to qualify relationships....based on the outcomes. Here they are :
Mutualism : Any relationship between individuals where both individuals derive a benefit.
Commensalism : A relationship between two living organisms where one benefits and the other is not significantly harmed or helped
Parasitism : A relationship is one in which one member of the association benefits while the other is harmed.

Mutualism can be attributed to a Win/Win relationship and Parasitism can be attributed to Win/Lose scenarios. The dimensions that can not be mapped directly are Commensalism and Lose/Lose. In Biology, Lose/Lose is not discussed because, it can not exist, if an ecology needs to survive. Lose/Lose unique to Human relationships ( because of developed intelligence and ego).

Commensalism is also unique to Biological world, if it were to be translated to the human relationship, the benefactor needs to be a Saint or a Philanthropist. In a world where deprivation and "abundance mindset is in short supply, commensalism is a distant thought in general Human relationships.

But, understanding of these two realms also gives us a sense of how we need to evolve in harmony with Nature.

Ramayana and Mahabharata Vs Science

Generally, I do not comment on the controversial topics such as this. But after reading reports on the Ram Sethu and the passions it arose, I just couldn't resist saying something.

How do we know if Ramayana or Mahabharata happened?? How would Archeologists and anthropologists establish historicity of the same?

First, we, in India culturally, very inept in documenting any historical happenings and generally passed on orally (our mechanism of secrecy and protection of Intellectual Property). So, there is no knowing of what is actually said, and interpreted by future generations. Actually, what is told as a story could have happened millenia ago as passed on...

We all know about "Chinese whispers". We could all generally agree, that any story ever told either reflects our dreams, aspirations, inspiration from a fact or collation of all the above. The stories are aimed at entertaining, entralling, inspiring awe for some fantastic, often exaggarated events. For example, almost all the civilizations, in one form or the other spoke about flying machines or fantastic creatures such as Dragons or Phoenix reflecting their aspirations and a sense of fantasy. Hence, some of the events would have happened, may not necessary as a single story in series (that means the story might have been strung together with various fascinating events at different points of time), the stories would have been enhanced, dramatized and fine tuned as the thought progressed. So, the progression might have been, an event becoming a stories, stories embellished to become legends, Legends becoming myths... Natually, since, the stories have evolved over time, they may also reflect the cultural aspects and realities of those times.

The second perspective is scientific, for every conclusion, there needs to be some material evidence. Say for example, when we say, dinosaurs existed and perished about a 65 Million years ago in the Jurassic period, first of all, we need to establish the existence of these creatures (which is done by the skeletal remains and fossils), Their age needs to be determined (by carbon dating or DNA evidence). Then the next challenge is to prove that they were extinct...for which, initially, there would be a set of hypotheses (like epidemic, hit by a comet, earth quakes etc.,) and one by one, the options will be eliminated based on the evidence collected. All these are done based on inference, circumstantial and material evidence.....

What is surprising in Ram Sethu theory is all the numbers projected in the media seems to be a little challenging to put together a timeline. According to Hindu Vedic tradition, there are 4 eons which are Krita 1,728,000 years Before Now (BN) , Treta 1,296,000 years BN , Dwapara 864,000 BN and Kaliyuga started 432,000 BN. Ramayana happened in Threta Yuga. Some eminent vedic pundits and scholars put Threta Yuga as 1.7Million years (placing it of the advent of "Homo" species particularly, Homo Habilis). Mysteriously, they were only a species separate from other Humunids. Is this the reason why, in Ramayana, Humans (sapiens) and Vanara (primates) who belong to same Genus, communicate and mingle freely with each other?? This is a very plausible theory and is widely quoted in the Analysis of Vedic Scholars. The same reasoning is applied by Hindu scholars to date the formation of Ram sethu aka Adams Bridge, whose formation dates back to about the same time...

Pundits have used Scientific reasoning to substantiate the age of the Adams bridge. Should Vedic scholar's numbers reconcile scientifically, they have to peg the Mathsyavataram / Kurmavataram at 360 Million years (well before the age of Dinosaurs). It is claimed that Bharatam happened 50 generations later. This means Bharata (Which is Dwapara Yuga) has happened 2500 years after Ramayana (if each generation is 50 years). Hence, in best case scenario, both these epics should have happened in a span of 2500 years. If an epoch such as Yuga is say, 50-100 generations, then each Yuga may not be a fraction of Million years!! So, there is only so much reconciliation we could do with a religious claim.

Now, coming to scientific calculations.... Let us start with a brief story of life on earth. Single celled organisms called "Archaean" started in sea 4600 Million years in sea and an Amphibian life with "Carboneferous" started 360 Million years ago. If the theory of evolution and all the support for Human evolution that needs to be considered, first human was known as " Australopithecus afarensis" lived in North Africa about 3 Million years ago. It is generally believed man's hominid ancestors did not leave their African home until about two million years ago. There is, no evidence of a human presence in the Indian subcontinent before roughly 250,000 to 300,000 years ago(Did Threta yuga happened before the Human ever appeared on the continent?).. It is scientifically agreed that the "Fire" is discovered by Homo sapiens only about 20,000 years ago. The earliest known civilization is "Chinese", which happened to be called "Neolithic" or Stone age that occurred 8000 - 3700 years ago. The societies evolved, literature, medicine evolved. So, all that we know "Archeologically" about our Human civilization can only be reliably cover or history to the last 20,000 years. Anything beyond is a realm of mythology and speculation!!

Given the advances and society described in Ramayana/Mahabharata, we can reasonably sure that the societies are well formed and we can nail them, at best to have occurred from 5000 - 2000 years ago (based on the culture, society, science and astronomy, political scenario). For example, when we read descriptions of stories about castles, it tells us some engineering, architectural thoughts and principles. All the "anthropological" history with Sword making, Jewelry means, metallurgical advances etc., deals in the last 6000-3000 years. Even Harappan and Indus valley civilization of ancient India is estimated as 5000 years old. Even if Rama predated this age, it could not have been more than 8000 years old (oldest known Chinese stone age) or for benefits sake, make it 10K years old!!

If we accept the above, Adams bridge could not have been constructed by Human by no stretch of imagination (at least with the knowledge and means at his disposal during that time), but it can be conclusively said, it is "God" constructed, before human ever appeared on the Indain subcontinent and is, most likely 1.7 Million years old..as claimed. Vedic scholars have apparently has a lot of ground to cover (actually, there is no need) to rationalize the mythological events with the Hindu eons and archeological/ antropological progression. Trying to retrofit science to Vedas is next to impossible and isn't rational. The two realms are different. One is fantasy another is established science. Religion and mythology transcends reality and should hold its place nevertheless. Hence, the debate to mix and match, trying to prove "science" in mythological stories and epics will be a futile exercise.

To prove historicity of Rama will be as difficult as establishing the existence of God. Whether Rama existed or not is a mute question, as he is present in the deep conscience of the faithful. Sometimes, we will have to just go by leap of faith and and respect the sentiments of majority of the people. But, by knowing the facts and giving a rational thinking will help us make conscious choice rather than giving in to passion or emotion.

Why should we fail?

Let us muse on a few things like :

What do we do in order to consider failure a stepping stone?
Why do wise people say failure to be essential for eventual success?
Will Knowledge reduce the affect of the fear...?
What events in our life triggers fear?
How do we unconventionally conquer any fear??

One of the most enduring sayings that is used again and again is "failure" to be stepping stone for success. What is success? With out giving a complicated definition is : success is achieving a goal we have set out for ourselves. Actually, success is not determined by any other person other than ourselves.

We meet again soon. Till next time.....suspense!