Aakaash Ganga

Painful Parenthood

2011-05-02T06:32:00.000-07:00

It has been about a year that my kids are not in Singapore and about six months since I have been staying alone in my apartment in Singapore. My wife went back to join my kids in Bangalore in Dec beginning.

I have been meeting my kids and wife every three months or less but still some of the moments become so painful and in these moments restlessness inside knows no bound. Urge to break the bondage to work and rush off to Bangalore to see the kids is heart wrenching. Work has been hectic, challenging, kind of pressure cooker ambiance and as a result there is opportunity that bring out best in a professional but It doesn't bring any glitter to my eyes and evokes no desires of professional growth either. Only desire I have is the peace & happiness that comes with seeing kids play, sleep and jump around. Of course the bonus is parents, wives and siblings and larger family all around. God knows when will this humankind nature win the battle against the professional with in me and I will run off to Bangalore in order to please my eyes and ears that a phone call or video call hasn't been able to give to my soul with in.

Even a slight break at work brings the thought of the kids and family to my mind. I have tried almost everything from jogging, reading, swimming, nothing helps. Going off to meet friends on week-ends makes me even more weak to fly off to Bangalore. Discussing investment and business with like minded buddies takes off the attention momentarily. I am still here in Singapore, because I am bounded by some life changing decision with legal implication that could affect not only me and my wife but even my kids for whom I have been longing so much. Things like this and the financial security of monthly pay checks keep me bounded.

My kids are known amongst my family members and friends for being mediocre, for being so non-serious towards academics, for being ever so careless but I never ever feel like telling them on phone or when they were here with me to focus on these things. All I always wanted is to see the smile on their face and happiness within me of seeing them and touching them. I don't know if I am spoiling their future by not being critical of their habits and actions. Don't know if the world and they them selves will blame me for not being a good enough to think of future of my kids. But how can I admonish them - It's so difficult to do anything that will make them frown or take smiles away from the little faces. I am waiting for the time to come when I can start having meaningful dialog with them on these subtle things. School, college and university curriculum and studies is of least importance is of least priority. I believe outside of it humans can thinks of better ways to contribute to society.

Some times staying here makes me feel if this is what a jail is like in a civilized society. In Jail you have all the minimum necessity for a comfortable life but you have the emotional pain of being away from society, away from family and friends. I find my self in similar situation - at least at times I think along these lines and if I am serving a jail sentence. I may have the liberty to indulge but none of those appeal me. Many times I do think I am not the only person who goes thru this phase of life - being away from your near and dear ones. Critically I come to conclude that may be I can take this separation but then I need to change the place to lessen the emotional pain I am going thru. Seems leaving Singapore is the only solution. In the back of my mind, I do feel that I wont be able to stay long in India living a comfortable mediocre life with family. Is leaving Singapore the solution as here I was used to seeing my kids with me. They were born here, they grew up here under my eyes. Not able to see them around is making me emotionally disturbed. If I move to a new place away from Singapore - will the thoughts of kids diminish to make me emotionally more balanced. Let's see what future has in store for me and my family.

Family Vacation - I found Bali better than Phuket

2010-08-09T01:25:00.001-07:00

I have been telling all my friends that I liked my 7 night vacation in Bali a lot. I liked it better than Phuket. Though I wont say I liked it more than Maldives trip as I guess Maldives was my first vacation with my wife.

Now though some of my friends and colleagues have asked me what you liked so much in Bali and why it's better than Phuket. I have replied them what ever came to my mind then. Now It's almost a month so if I still feel Bali is better than Phuket for a family vacation then I guess I have been right and it's not the infatuation(If I may use the word) with Bali. Let me try to put down things that we liked so much in Bali.

[1] To start with the weather. I was there in July end and it was quite hot here in Singapore with frequent bouts of showers. During the day in between the showers sun is scorching the earth.. In Singapore it's more of tar road and the high rise building around it. Though I know most of us are in our dingy cubicle with a/c on so don't feel this but on few days like week-ends and if you move out and cross some open area for lunch outings in between office then you will agree. I was expecting something similar over there in Bali. After all it's just about 2 hours of flying from Singapore to Bali. Both are islands in with some other small islands which seems like a walking/swimming distance when viewed from airplane window. But when we landed in Bali in early evening that was not to be, weather was nice, pleasant, cool bridge. In the back of my mind I felt I guess that's so because it's evening time and it could have rained early on. Tomorrow would a hot day as it's in this part of the world. But this tomorrow never came and we were back to Singapore. Then just a day before leaving for Singapore I asked one of the local on the beach - Is this how the weather is over here in Bali most of the times. He told me more or less YES but some times it's hotter. May be I was lucky to have booked the holiday in right season then. But then I came on and did some googling and found indeed Bali enjoys similar weather in terms on temperature round the year. Check this simple non technical link which captures the temperature, rain, humidity and sunshine - things that makes a place weather wonderful or awful !!

http://www.balirentavilla.com/bali_climate.htm

[2] Next would be people. Other natural or even man made wonders will follow but I feel local population, their attitude towards tourists and towards each other make a difference. Local population is mostly Hindu but then it's a bit different form of Hinduism then what you will see in the land where most of Hindus in the world reside. I guess Hinduism must have taken shape as well in India, Nepal and I guess to some extent even Srilanka/Myanmar and what's Pakistan and Afghanistan today. Sadly today Af-Pak region is known in the world for radical Muslims instead of being associated with moderate Hinduism. Anyways for that matter even some view Indonesia[Bali is part of] also in similar light. However local population their eschew radicalism and hate it as it has hit their bread & butter twice. If you all remember Bali have been bombed twice in past as this heavenly island is frequented by tourists which doesn't go down well with radical thinking.

People are very welcoming and soft spoken. Not just soft spoken but even their behavior and action reflects this flexibility and accommodating nature of the local society. I guess LA too has great weather but I wont the Yankees good set of accommodating and soft spoken people. Taxi drivers, Local souvenir shop-keepers, Staffs working at eateries and restaurants, Beauticians and masseurs at Spas and Massage parlors, all are very warm and nice people. You will love to frequent their outlets.

[3] Next would be the beaches and glorious sea-views, Volcanoes, Serpentine Hills, Lakes the top of the hill, Lakes beside the Volcano, Sea facing cliffs, Sun-sets from the cliff top into the wavy sea, Temples on the those cliffs, Temples in the sea, Temples inside the lakes, Dinner on the beach. These are things I enjoyed over there during my stay. I know there are host of similar stuffs that I didn't try. Like what every beach vacation spot offers - all kind of sea sports. But above stuffs that I mentioned was amazing. I loved being at those places.

In fact there are numerous beaches in Bali which are just great. Sea surfers love coming to Bali for sea surfing. you will find people of all ages rushing with surfing boards on bikes, motor-bikes, cars etc... Two beaches I liked most are :- Beach in Nusa Dua - Opposite to Bali Connection. This is a rocky beach - Water moves about 200/300 meter depending upon whether it's low tide or high tide. Good thing is that it's smell rotten when water retreats like beaches in Singapore. Go to any of the beaches in Singapore including Sentosa and it smells awful when water is receding. At Nusa Dua beach you can start seeing lot of small creatures coming out and moving into the clean rocks exposed by receding water. You will start seeing people trying to catch them for food in poodles of water left behind. You will love to see how slowly the water is moving forward to drown the rocks with incoming wave or going back depending upon at what time you have arrived. 2nd beach I liked most is named Dreamland beach. It really felt like a dream land. Just one big wave with blue-green water and then you are in relatively calmer seas. Full white sandy beach - with cliffs on both side protecting/marking the beach. Sea curves and you can see the houses perched on the hills as if any objects falling from the house will definitely hit the waves in the sea. I don't like entering into salty sea water - I hate the itchy feeling because of salty water. But this view soul satisfying. In fact I started looking and thinking is there a possibility that I can own a house on the hills facing the beach. Though when I researched that Indonesian law doesn't allow foreigners to buy landed property, at best you can lease property over there.

First time view of Volcano was great. Technically it's an active Volcano but it hasn't been smoking for last 5+ years. Last time it spewed ash and lava was about 70 years back. Still from the near by hill when you see it - you can see all the black lava around from the crater. Chilly wind hitting you as it's on top of a hill about 2 hours drive from Nusa-Dua/Jimberan area where most of the tourists prefer to stay. There is a lake beside the volcano. If you are not there at right time then you can't get a good view of the volcano as the cloud covers the crest. Lunch is a definite there facing the volcano. There are 2/3 good restaurants facing the volcano.

When you are standing on the cliff facing the sea and warm, moist, humid air hitting your body. It's a amazing feeling. Sun setting down.. Sky looks reddish, water ahead down looks greyish black, water immediately below looks greenish and bluish depending upon the rock structure below. It takes some courage to look immediately below because of the height of the cliff you are on. Especially if you are a Hindu and them you would have come out of the ancient temple on the cliff hanging into the sea, you feel the nature's motherly nature and beauty of the nature's creation. You can feel the might of nature. There is a local dance program there on the cliff. Whole package and combination makes it just fascinating and gets entrenched in your memory. You feel so satisfying on your journey back to the hotel from this place. It's like a feeling that entire Bali trip was worth it just because of this sight seeing visit.

Not to forget dinner on the Jimberan beach. There are number of restaurants lined upon the beach. Ambiance is still totally non-commercial. Normally at such a place you see restaurants folks trying to get customers. Here it's nothing like that. You just walk over into one of them and it's you will not sit in the rooms but on the open sandy beach. There is very limited lighting along the beach. Most bright thing would be the stage where some local dance and music would be ongoing. You can sip your drink along with it take in some local culture music also be sinking in to you. After the dance you will prefer to turn 180 and face the sea instead. Lot of colorful flickering lights in the sea as I guess many night fishing and boat dinner programs are organized for the tourists. Near by you can see waves crashing on the shores and breaking into white lathers out of otherwise darkness in the sea. This dinner is like more for thirsty soul than for the body. And so it really didn't matter if I was vegetarian sitting in restaurants famous worldwide for gourmet seafood.

Coming to my Phuket trip which was more than a year back in May of 2009. Phuket has all of this minus the temples, sea facing cliffs and Volcanos. Phuket has hills too but not as elegant as you see in Bali with step framing being practiced. There too sea is great for surfing. In fact it know as a little more notorious and so surfing should done by experts mostly. Hills are there too - I remember the view from the hill. It's still very clear in my mind. I was biking towards Potong beach from Mai Khao where I was putting up at Mariotts. From one location very close to Potong beach, view is awsome. Clouds on the one side and greenish sea on the other end. Potong beach has it's own commercial sporty business charm but Dreamland beach in Bali makes you feel majestic. I guess two things unique to Phuket and can't be found in Bali would be :-

[1] Dance by Elephants. Full one hour program with dinner being served.

[2] Caves and lagoon in the sea. This was a nice exp for me and my kids. Specially towards the end in the evening you can see in the Andaman sea light flashes in water if you splash. I think this is unique to Andaman sea in Asia.

I am going for my next Bali trip again next year I guess. And may be Phuket too as it's a nice expensive spot but costs just a dime for me.

Human Emotions and Chemistry

2010-07-10T04:33:00.000-07:00

Sorry friends it's going to be messy post as it's difficult to convey such complex thoughts in writing. Complex to convey in writing but quite clear in my mind as to what I am experiencing - What I am wondering about.

Almost every week-end me and my wife watch one or more movies. Mostly it's the Bollywood latest releases which ever has a good picture quality and voice quality. It's important as it has been that we have almost stopped going to theater for watching movies and we see the movie on net. Last one in Theater was "Avatar" - It wan enjoyable as movie was nice and importantly it was first movie with my kids. Sadly my kids are in Bangalore for good reasons[which is a bit hard for a father] but I am sure other wise our small family would have visited theater more often as it was one of our desires that when can we start going to theaters again with our kids and our kids will understand the movie and enjoy it and we will enjoy the togetherness.

Today we tried two latest movies which were of good picture quality but sound was very low so we switched and my wife brought out one of the oldie-goldie "Rajnigandha". She is a Amol Palekar & Deepti Naval fan. I watched the entire movie [Which is atypical of me as I find old movies very outdated in concepts of contemporary living]. While I was watching - I felt how much have the times changed. We[Mankind] has been moving at good speed. The trains, houses, streets, people, parties, talking style, dressing style every thing was so different than what it's today. It felt like watching old movies definitely will allow some one to figure out how has man changed over time. Two thoughts was in my mind when I was watching the movie.

[1] I started with it when the movie started and it remained till end. -- Some of us don't want to change. We don't even want others around us and the surroundings we grow up in to change. I feel my wife belongs to this group of people. I wont write much about it as it's a well know topic that change is only thing permanent and it's mostly for good. Though some feel insecure with the thought of change and don't want to see that happening.

[2] Based on the movie subject my mind was racing and observing how are the characters in the movie are reacting in the situation. Good thing was that movie was complete reality kind - unlike Bollywood type unreal characters and movies. And my mind started comparing it to one of the article I had read on TOI about human behavior and brain functioning related to LOVE and MIND. I can't find the link to the article but article was trying to connect some part of brain or rather brain activities that makes a person sad or heart broken when he/she is dumped by his/her partner.

Essentially if you think about it = it's so true. It may be complex and beyond our logical understanding still as to how does it all work. But it's for sure that we are all chemical machines. All living being are nothing but chemical machines. All the action, movements and thoughts of our mind are nothing but some form of chemical interaction between complex chemical compounds and I guess many times chemical interaction over a period of time. e.g. our memory. And like chemical reactions which are mostly bounded by law so is human and animal/plant behavior predictable to a large extent. It's just that end result we want to predict e.g. Will a person show love, or will keep mum and not answer to the question, or will choose fight or give up in a situation is a result of lot of chemical interaction and possibly over time and at times in anticipation of influencing the results of some possible chemical interactions. Over time because in past in form of some atomic/electronic movement it would have been stored that this Individual I am going to fight against is stronger so better for me to run away. In anticipation of affecting future chemical interaction because an animal might like to load up with more food now assuming that none of it going to be presented to him for foreseeable future. Hence the chemical reaction of our chemistry text books are so predictable that we observe them in the school/college/uni chemistry labs but these animal/plant behavior are predictable to large extent but not completely as theory is well known yet.

How interesting the thoughts of exploring something like this is. It excites me a lot. But again some reactions in my brain are telling - Reign your wild horses -- Think of the how are you going to get the bread on the table for you and your family first...... Many times I tell my friends that I want to earn enough and retire. They are amused by the thought why do you want to retire. If I don't retire how can I let wild thoughts just go wild and think of all this.

(Incomplete) Reality - Limitation of Human Mind

2010-06-19T23:19:00.000-07:00

Few days back my wife was telling me about ghost stories(or is it reality) that her colleagues had told her. In brief she was told about the experience of her old colleagues - few of whom are still working with her in their Singapore suntec office and few of whom have been transferred to other countries but all of them involved with the ghost affair are still with the firm. She called up to ask the transferred colleagues if what she has been told is right about their experiences :) I guess it's natural for we folks to do so as ghostly stuff are not a common phenomenon in day to day life here in Singapore or in urban India.

All her colleagues has two common things in their narration - (1)Presence of colorful moving shadow on the wall/curtain (2)Anklet and key ring chimes reverberating in the office

Somethings which again is common in their narration but they didn't tell but I could infer it after hearing it from my wife are - (1) All of them experienced this para normal behavior late in night while working still in office (2) They were alone in office

and as usual the story goes that except one guy no one had experienced it thrice as they didn't had the fortitude to face it again after a repeat, so mostly late and lonely workers/staffs have experienced it twice. How ever one of them seems to really brave enough to ignore and focus on work of course with help of alcohol in spite of these scary events around him or rather especially for him:) he has lost count how many times he has experienced this phenomenon.

In fact I too have one close experience that I didn't know was a ghostly paranormal experience till next day. Let me put this in brief. I was born a village bumpkin and then put on to a school in city to become smarter as it's felt that I guess rightly so(when measured in terms of monetary wealth) city dwellers are smarter and wiser than villagers. I use to love the long summer and winter vacations that we use to get in my boarding school. And in teens listening to local radio playing just(soon to be) released Bollywood numbers was satisfying and thrilling. So there I was lying on a cot in a hut amongst the village greenery about 200 meters away from the thick village settlement. Radio was tuned in to "vividh bharati" and placed on the earthen floor below the cot. One of the village boy around 4 years younger to me comes running and rushing to the hut and tries to get beside me, rather hide behind me on the cot. There was another empty cot lying there, it would been a more comfortable place to lie down and enjoy the Bollywood music for some time before having some food and sitting for a few hours of playing cards session. More ever I was a little amazed that instead of strolling thru the paddy fields he had come running... anyways.. So I told him let me rest in piece and you go and lie down on the empty cot and don't talk - just listed to the songs. He didn't say anything just looked into me as if he didn't like me asking him to move on to other cot. So I thought let me give up this cot to him and told him that I will be back in 15 minutes. I am going to tube-well ahead for a dip in fresh under ground water. He just nodded his head and I proceeded towards the tube-well. Another 200 meters farther away from the tube-well lies the village crematorium. And in about 15-20 minutes I was strolling back towards the hut. Breeze was nice and cool, It had rained the day before but rain was not enough so all diesel tube-wells were on duty pumping to water thirsty paddy plantations. Now when I imagine it feels like it's a different world and pleasure to walk on the grassy ribs separating the paddy fields amongst the natural greenery when summer is not at the peak and in rains in between but not enough to create mud pools all around the village. And I see this guy who had disturbed me on cot running towards the tub-well. I called out for him but it seems as if he had gone dumb. I called out again..no response. He kept his pace towards the tube-well. then I thot of chasing and catching him up to ask. and I did so... when I was holding his hand which he was trying to get free and asking - Tell me what happened, where are you going.. no response except for some muffled incomprehensible sound. After 2-3 minutes when my questions didn't yielded any result and I got confused my self - I pulled/dragged him towards the village and handed over to his folks. I rushed to the hut to listen to sweet Bolly numbers :)

And next day I meet this guy again - and I have heard in mean time that When I handed over, he was possessed. I asked him - what had happened yesterday. He candidly explained me - I was bemused !!!! He told me - He came running to the hut because the spirit was chasing him and so he wanted to hide beside me. Then I asked why he didn't tell me that yesterday I would have helped him (I was a hero - I dont know If I am ;)). He tells me that he couldn't think that I am not able to see the spirit who was standing standing beside the cot waiting to get hold of him. For some reason the spirit was not touching him when he was in contact with me. And as soon as I left (In fact I had just walked passed the spirit when I got up to go to the tube-well), spirit challenged him - So now...what do you do !!!! He doesn't remember anything there after.

In fact there are many stories but these two are something which are not stories but reality.

Reason I am writing above story is not to say ghosts (what ever you call) it exists and is TRUE/REAL. Over time in last few years, I have got to kind of understand that we humans have developed this concept of REAL/UNREAL. By doing this we have boxed our self. As soon as we feel/think something as UNREAL we box/close ourselves. Boxing something or in other words drawing a boundary is the way to go when you want to achieve or work on a specific stuff and want to achieve a given result/outcome. In general we all have to keep our self open. Open to something like ANYTHING IS POSSIBLE. If this thought hasn't been in your head/mind then it may be more difficult to accept. If you plant this up now and then with time you will see this idea taking root and you will start to see everything rhyming and synchronous with this thought all around you.

Think of it - earlier EARTH was thot to be center of universe. At that time everyone who would have thot themselves to be wise would say REALITY is - Earth is center of universe. Then it must have taken some effort to break this notion and say no SUN is center of universe. What was once REALITY in mind of humans became UNREAL but REALITY still remained and now this context as sun in center of universe. With time what was once REALITY became UNREAL but a new REALITY emerged and concept of REALITY still remained and now it took the form as milky-way is all that exist and sun is one amongst the few billion stars in milky-way. Then came the concept and REALITY as people believe is today universe is ever expanding and milky-way is one amongst the billion galaxies floating away. So this cycle will continue. If you think of it this pattern of new discovery will apply in every walk of life. Your home, office, Medicine, sociology, psychology, human/animal behavior etc...

It's just instinctively we humans all start of put something as REAL. In other words we start to classify somethings as FALSE/UNREAL. We need to accept and start to live with the thought ANYTHING IS POSSIBLE. At times task on hand would be to explain what was observed or what is being observed. At times task would be to predict what would happen in future given certain set of input. These are the times when you can draw boundary and work in limits of those boxes.

There should be nothing what we should call as LAW, everything should remain as THEORIES. These theories hold true under certain boundary. i.e. boxes have been drawn and these will likely hold if the boxes and boundaries have not been violated and boundaries and boxes have been understood and drawn correctly. What intelligent man kind had learnt and thought of as newtons law of motion and gravitation fails to explain movement of certain planets and where as Einstein's relativity theory predicts and explains all of these including bending of lights in a picture perfect way it fails to explain sub atomic particle movement and behavior. If you see what is happening is that human kind was looking at something as solution to explain and define new REALITY and he stumbles upon something what remains unexplained. So it may be at certain time what man observes can well be explained by certain theories but again mistake has been made to recreate REALITY. Sooner or later it will fall apart. So it's best to realize and work based on notion ANYTHING IS POSSIBLE.

Thought of REALITY makes the human mind to go to rest. Like seeking for a long long vacation as I am ever in search of:) REALITY creates a limitation for our mind and psyche to stop thinking. It's what brings us to the illusion that we now know the TRUTH and REALITY. I feel there is no TRUTH, no REALITY.

Seems like I am still confused and sorry to have confused you - but I hope the idea has been planted and you will start seeing things from this view point.

Why don’t we worship Brahma

2010-02-26T06:37:00.000-08:00

Sorry freinds. I read it somewhere so posting it.. I have been too lazy these days to blog - I guess partly because I am perched on a sunny patch in lifes journey.

Why don’t we worship Brahma? We know he’s part of the Hindu trinity as the creator, but we worship Vishnu, manager of the cosmos, and Shiva, its eventual destroyer. The answer lies not in religion, but in culture. But in what way does our religion shape our culture?
Max Weber explained the success of capitalism in the US, Germany and Britain as coming from their populations’ Protestant faith. This ethic, or culture, was missing from the Catholic populations of South America, Italy and Spain. Protestants, Weber said, extended Christianity’s message of doing good deeds, to doing work well. Industry and enterprise had an ultimate motive: public good. That explains the philanthropists of the US, from John D. Rockefeller to Andrew Carnegie to Bill Gates. What explains the behaviour of Indians? What explains the anarchy of our cities? To find out, we must ask how our behaviour is different.

Some characteristics unite Indians. The most visible is our opportunism. One good way to judge a society is to see it in motion. On the road, we observe the opportunism in the behaviour of the Indian driver. Where traffic halts on one side of the road in India, motorists will encroach the oncoming side because there is space available there. If that leads to both sides being blocked, that is fine, as long as we maintain our advantage over people behind us or next to us. This is because the other man cannot be trusted to stay in his place. The Indian’s instinct is to jump the traffic light if he is convinced that the signal is not policed. If he gets flagged down by the police, his instinct is to bolt. In an accident, his instinct is to flee. Fatal motoring cases in India are a grim record of how the driver ran over people and drove away.
We show the pattern of what is called a Hobbesian society: one in which there is low trust between people. This instinct of me-versus-the-world leads to irrational behaviour, demonstrated when Indians board flights. We form a mob at the entrance, and as the flight is announced, scramble for the plane even though all tickets are numbered. Airlines modify their boarding announcements for Indians taking international flights.

Our opportunism necessarily means that we do not understand collective good.Indians will litter if they are not policed. Someone else will always pick up the rubbish we throw. Thailand’s toilets are used by as many people as India’s toilets are, but they are likely to be not just clean but spotless. This is because that’s how the users leave them, not the cleaners.

The Indian’s reluctance to embrace collective good hurts his state. A study of
income-tax compliance between 1965 and 1993 in India (Elsevier Science/Das-Gupta, Lahiri and Mookherjee) concluded that “declining assessment intensity had a significant negative effect” on compliance, while “traditional enforcement tools (searches, penalties and prosecution activity) had only a limited effect” on Indians.
The authors puzzled over the fact that “India’s income tax performance (was) below the average of countries with similar GDP per capita”.
We do not think stealing from the state is a bad thing, and our ambiguity extends to corruption, which also we do not view in absolute terms. Political parties inIndia understand this and corruption is not an issue in Indian politics. Politicians who are demonstrably corrupt, recorded on camera taking a bribe or saying appalling things, or convicted by a court, can hold legitimate hope of a comeback—unthinkable in the West.
The opportunist is necessarily good at adapting, and that explains the success of Indians abroad. We can follow someone else’s rules well, even if we can’t enforce them at home ourselves. The Indian in the US is peerless at the Spelling Beebecause the formula of committing things to memory, which in India passes for knowledge, comes naturally to him. But this talent for adapting and memorizing is not the same as a talent for creation.
The question is: Why are we opportunists?
In his great work Crowds and Power, Elias Canetti observed that the rewards
religions promised their faithful were all far off, in the afterlife. This is because a short goal would demand demonstration from God and create skeptics instead of believers. There is an exception to this in Hinduism. Hinduism is not about the other world. There is no afterlife in Hinduism and rebirth is always on earth. The goal is to be released entirely and our death rites and beliefs—funeral in Kashi—seek freedom from rebirth. Christianity and Islam are about how to enter heaven; Hinduism is about how not to return to earth, because it’s a rotten place. Naipaul opens his finest novel with the words “The world is what it is”, and Wittgenstein ( “The world is all that is the case”) opens his Tractatus similarly.
Hinduism recognizes that the world is irredeemable: It is what it is. Perhaps this is where the Hindu gets his world view—which is zero-sum—from. We might say that he takes the pessimistic view of society and of his fellow man. But why? The Hindu devotee’s relationship with god is transactional: I give you this, you give me that. God must be petitioned and placated to swing the universe’s blessings towards you. God gives you something not through the miracle, and this is what makes Hinduism different, but by swinging that something away from someone else.
This is the primary lesson of the Vedic fire sacrifice. There is no benefit to one without loss to another.(Theory of Isostasy?++) Religion is about bending god’s influence towards you through pleas, and appeasement, through offerings.
Society has no role in your advancement and there is no reason to give back to it (in any way, including leaving the toilets clean behind you) because it hasn’t given you anything in the first place. That is why Indian industrialists are not philanthropists. Rockefeller always gave a tenth of his earnings to the Church, and then donated hundreds of millions, fighting hookworm and educating black women. Bill Gates gave $25 billion (around Rs1.2 trillion), and his cause is fighting malaria, which does not even affect Americans. Warren Buffett gave away $30 billion, almost his entire fortune. Andrew Carnegie built 2,500 libraries.Dhirubhai Ambani International
School has annual fees starting at Rs47,500 (with a Rs24,000 admission fee) andMukesh Ambani’s daughter was made head girl.

An interesting thing to know is this: Has our culture shaped our faith or has our faith shaped our culture? I cannot say. To return to the question we started with: Why is Brahma not worshipped? The answer is obvious: He has nothing to offer us. What he could do for us, create the universe, he already has. There is no gain in petitioning him now.

Dubai - Pakistan & India. India should fund social projects in Pakistan.

2009-12-12T23:04:00.000-08:00

This thought is of mine is not a very positive things but then truth if it seems to be then lets face it. After all many of reader will like it as well as not most of the human actions & thoughts are positive for fellow mens and society in general. Few days back I had read an article about how Keynes[father of modern economic] had predicted long back that working hours will keep reducing and reducing over time and at this time[21st century beginning] it should have been about 30 hours per week in Europe. He had put his arguments based on GDP growth and positive human ingenuity thinking and behavior. While the assumptions he had made to come to the conclusions seems to have been correct and achieved end result hasn't been achieved. I guess that negative thoughts and behaviors of human wasn't taken into account while making the forecast by Keynes.

Anyways this piece of blog is about living in peace and harmony and letting entrepreneurial instincts take over. Things that make the society better place to live over time. But all thing comes in pair so when we talk of these stuffs how can terrorism and associated stuff and under world be not discussed which are detrimental to society and bizes. Peace vs Terrorism & Entrepreneurship vs Under world.

India in year 2009 hasn't seen major terrorist activities. I hope remaining 20 days December will pass peacefully, if that doesn't happen it means my thoughts mentioned below are not correct. Let me tell you why??? Pakistan has been too pre-occupied with its own internal problems. They have been trying to deal with friend turned foes internally. As both friends are not able to come together to strike at the common beacon shining across Indians are thriving and turning around the dark 2008 into bright 2009 and 2010. I wont term India as their common enemy as India has remained focussed on mending it's own things instead of bombing what makes it [Infra]structure break and what makes it citizens/guests cry in pain. Forces on the other side think India as enemy as they cant shine like how their neighbor is of whom they think of one like them. So they cant see India moving away from the pack and start to shine bright. In fact to some extent even Chinese state has this mentality. they have prospered but still don't like to see their neighbor prospering. But I guess Chinese people are a fine lot and don't subscribe to such negative thoughts. But then China is not a democracy so Chinese state thought will take time to change when a new generation of leaders come in and current generation becomes too old to run the country.

Associated with these are D-world. With Dubai having been shaken[Dubai world debt fiasco] and Pakistan under fire from with in they as well are in dis-array. Newspaper articles shows that they have crossed their peak and are waning. After all the bis bosses had to start participating in O&T activities instead of heading the strategic units and M&A division.

Now let me put some data to support what I am telling. India had seen following cities under attack in 2008.

Mumbai - November

Guwhati - October

Dellhi - September

Ahmedabad - July

Jaipur - May

Even one towards end of 2007 in August in Hyderabad. Of course 2007 and before Indian society and bizes had done pretty well and Indian leaders were being magnanimous in accommodating Pakistan. So this had resulted in some prosperity. This lead to wealth creation and then of course funding the activities that we all saw manifesting itself as the terror on Indian in 2008.

So it makes sense for Indian bizes and society to keep diverting a part of money to keep Islamabad occupied in it's own soil and other places like Afghanistan. Keep funding humanitarian and other project for public interests and these negative forces will remain engaged and destroying them. They will let India succeed as they cant see Afghanistan rising at any costs. In their psyche they may have accepted India as something which is set to go up and would have given up on running after it even they have something more simple to bring down. On the same lines I guess like US India should start funding some projects of public interests in Pakistan as well.

Can new government take India to what this lady observed

2009-05-31T00:08:00.000-07:00

New governement is place, Financial world specifically stock market is rejoicing. I have an expectation on social front after reading the article below. Can Indian home minister take this an aspiriration and target for the Indian society.

Incident as observed by the lady :-

One day I went to see doctor with my younger son to my nearest clinic. Once I entered to the clinic a lady with no English tongue but she was trying to talk with my son. Old ladies generally love to talk n play with young kids.

All of sudden I saw few Singapore police officer entered into the clinic and they were enquiring about that lady. I was waiting there for my turn to see the doc. So I had time to listen their conversation carefully. The old lady could not speak English so one of the clinic attendants at the counter was explaining about her case to the Police.

That lady was holding a piece of paper and few sentences were written on that paper. Definitely I could not read her letter but I heard from the attendant of the clinic.

Attendant explained to the police officer that old lady had a minor an accident by a SBS transit bus (that lady had mentioned bus no also in her letter) so her leg was injured. I could not see the extent of that injury but I could see the bandage on her leg and she could walk also. So doctor were advising him to go to hospital and take an x-ray in order to check in detail but that lady was not willing to go to hospital because of financial reason.

Police, nurse and doctor started discussing her problem that how to help her. Finally they decide to take to the hospital but at whose cost? One of the senior police officer advise that they will give a memo written to hospital explain about her case and request hospital management to see her without any fee for time being and police will claim all the charges to bus company and they will debit to the hospital account. Next problem was who will take her to the hospital? Police officer said they will take her to the hospital.

One more conversation I saw there between police officer and doctor. Doctor were complaining about police service as doctor had called them on 999 but no body came to his hospital within an hour or more. Since they knew nearest police station no so they call them directly. In addition doctor said why you police dept announce everywhere to call 999 for any help if you can not provide that service. Police was quite and apologized to the doctor.

I was surprised to see this case. Police at

Singapore

is so kind and helpful to the public. I can not imagine it if it can ever be so in my country.

Praise for Indian Election Machinery and past glory

2009-05-16T19:51:00.000-07:00

This article from a NY journalist praises Indian elections and the challenges it poses. Of course it's a great feat and is well deserved. How ever down the line like every other one of us delves into past for search of more motivation. I hope that 10 years down the line some one writing such an article wont have to go into past of Indian greatness. He will get 90% of the contents from the late 20th and in force 21st century. Thanks to a friend who sent the article to me on mail.

Though I would say thanks primarily to EC and T. N. Seshan which gave the body self respect to stand against the politician/political parties and play an important role in Indian polity.

Article follows :--

THE INDIAN ELECTIONS - NEW YORK TIMES

It is truly the greatest show on Earth, an ode to a diverse and democratic ethos, where 700 million + of humanity vote, providing their small part in directing their ancient civilization into the future. It is no less impressive when done in a neighborhood which includes de-stabilizing and violent Pakistan , China , and Burma. Its challenges are immense, more so probably than anywhere else, particularly in development and fending off terrorism -- but considering these challenges and its neighbors, it is even more astounding that the most diverse nation on Earth, with hundreds of languages, all religions and cultures, is not only surviving, but thriving. The nation where Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism, and Sikhism were born, which is the second largest Muslim nation on Earth; where Christianity has existed for 2000 years; where the oldest Jewish synagogues and Jewish communities have resided since the Romans burnt their 2nd temple; where the Dalai Lama and the Tibetan government in exile reside; where the Zorastrians from Persia have thrived since being thrown out of their ancient homeland; where Armenians and Syrians and many others have to come live; where the Paris-based OECD said was the largest economy on Earth 1500 of the last 2000 years, including the 2nd largest only 200 years ago; where 3 Muslim Presidents have been elected, where a Sikh is Prime Minister and the head of the ruling party a Catholic Italian woman, where the President is also a women, succeeding a Muslim President who as a rocket scientist was a hero in the nation; where a booming economy is lifting 40 million out of poverty each year and is expected to have the majority of its population in the middle class, already equal to the entire US population, by 2025; where its optimism and vibrancy is manifested in its movies, arts, economic growth, and voting, despite all the incredible challenges and hardships; where all the great powers are vying for influence, as it itself finds its place in the world. Where all of this is happening, is India , and as greater than 1/10 of
humanity gets ready to vote, it is an inspiration to all the World.

Queue for getting capital punishment

2009-05-10T06:43:00.000-07:00

We all know India is soon going to take over China as most populous country. Though India stands far behind when it comes to top countries in terms of land area.......So there is natually queue for every product or services that the republic can provide to its citizen or even foreigner. Justice and punishment being one amongst those !!!

Now the funny part. Top Indian political leader [assumed to be future prime minister] says that there is queue in India for even getting hanged :))

Quote/Unquote from a address at a rally at Mohali in Punjab :-

"There is a huge line and there are others before him. When his number (turn) comes, he will be hanged."

...... entire article is here....http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Hanging-Afzal-does-not-suit-UPA-Modi/articleshow/4506227.cms

Democracy makes power hungry people do and say crazy things :))

Life is the impurity sorrounded by purity all around

2009-02-20T07:45:00.000-08:00

I was off the office early today and so here to pen down this thought which was going on with in me for so many days/months. This post is really going to gel with the title of this blog site which seems to be related to cosmos and universe and basic nature of all the PURITY called life[IMPURITY] can see, feel and hear and interact with in what ever possible way. This may also wound bizzare to many as every new thing to start with is though of.

Let's think of it. When we refer to as "WE", "I", "OUR", "YOU", "YOUR", "THEIR", etc -- this is when we refer to something non tangible and so we loose the same as well with time. When is it lost when a living thing becomes dead. Mostly spiritual teachings of all forms in almost all part of world refer to it the SOUL/only pure thing and this is what all living thing associate them selves to. I call this IMPURITY and every thing else as PURITY. Even any interaction between IMPURITY is not possible without touching the PURITY, what is EXCHANGED between IMPURITY as well is PURITY. I will unravel this complexity down the line in post but this is the truth and IMPURITIES have to accept this PURITY of nature that they have been trying to make IMPURE. After thinking about it for so many days/months and finally able to write it down I feel what I am arguing is correct way of looking at things. To understand this I have to explain it with some standard facts which will need very basic understanding of physics.

It's well know fact/law that ENERGY and MASS are one and same and interchangeable. Mass is what everything around us is. MASS and ENERGY combined is what we see, what we feel, what we hear, what we cant see, what we cant hear, what we cant feel. Everything all around is encompassed with and are these two forms of PURITY. Nothing escapes this except one thing which is the IMPURITY among all these PURITY which has a expression in nature either in form of MASS or ENERGY or a combination of these forms of PURITY. PURITY cant be destroyed and can only be either changed into ENERGY or back into MASS. They are PURE. What goes missing at times unable to do away anything to the PURITY is the IMPURITY is what makes something lively or widely known as SOUL. Now if this is sounding complex and untrue, you are welcome to show as comment one example where you observe a violation and I will be able to correct you as to where you have gone wrong in your analysis.

While what I have mentioned above is the only truth but what ever else I am mentioning down may or may not be truth. These are only my hypothesis :-

[1] IMPURITY always tries to keep itself unchanged or maintain it's state. Though this may not be possible and it will be thrown out of the PURITY soup at some point in time. In other words in past there was no life[IMPURITY] in entire universe in past and in future as well there will be no life[IMPURITY].

[2] IMPURITY finds PURITY fascinating and tries to create more IMPURITY but this is myth. IMPURITY is not able to sustain myriad possibilities and ways PURITY is able to express it self.

Thoughts during transitions 2008 gives way to 2009

2008-12-31T08:11:00.001-08:00

Was awake to catch some of the events that have been witnessed in Yr 2008 in TV. Though I didn't find anything such on any of the channels which are trying to capture and ponder upon all the events of yr 2008 in an hour special or something. In fact print and electronic media do a much better job in this regard. Ended up watching the fireworks across the globe with New Zealand[Auckland] starting and following it up were others nations from east to west. Aussies, Japaneese, Koreans, Chinese, Malaysians....and of course Singapore. I stay here so I would watch others tomorrow morning. So I thoughts of putting down thoughts which were criss-crossing my mind while watching the countdown. Very-very varied thoughts I guess !!!!

[1] SETI :- It's new year. Earth's completing one revolution around SUN. If there any other intelligent form of life other than humans on earth or anywhere in universe capable of obsering our planet, they would definitely be observing something unusual as entire Earth will be lit by firework serially which is directly opposite to Sun[mid night] when it's suppose to be darkest spot on the planet. May be they would think it's a cycle which this planet has started going thru recently and it's getting stronger and stronger every cycle. As in each subsequent years fireworks is a notch above the previous years. No other event is celebrated in the same spirit as arrival of new year on Gregorian Calendar !!!!

[2] Human tendency to ignore weak :- While the countdown they touched upon some of the biggest events to have happened last[I am 22 minutes into 2009 now :)]. They mentioned about loss of life because of Sinchuan earthquake in China which claimed so many lifes. In deed it was one of the most tragic event to happen in recent history to so much loss of human life and of course property. My thought immediately went to Burmeese Cyclone as the loss of life in Myanmar because of deadly cyclone was much more than loss of life in China. It deserved a mention unless and until loss of life for people of Myanmar doesn't count as much as loss of a life in China. I guess this imbalance is because of poor economic standing of MYANMAR !!!

There was mention of loss of life of a Singaporean in the Mumbai terrorist killings. It certainly was the biggest terrorist event of the year 2008. Thought that came to my mind is that Pakistan is doomed and it will cause a lot of pain to the unaware and innocent citizens of Pakistan as the state has become a hotbed and birth place of terrorism. I have remarkably observed that many of the predictions based on astrology have been true that print/electronic media publishes on the last day of the year. This time I read that by end of Yr 2009 Pakistan will become a failed state and will be on brink of collapse economically and socially leading to civil unrest. I suggest all innocent Pakistanis to spread the word and leave the country to save themselves from the incoming pain and tragedy. I think even moving to IRAQ and AFGANISTAN is a better option than staying on in Pakistan. God bless and save the innocent and punish the culprits.

[3] It's a FALSE world :- This thought came to me when mention of Mumbai terrorist incident leading to the death of lone Singaporean was mentioned. Singapore and the entire world is definitely standing in the side of INDIA in this event and watching the moves of Pakistan. Still the world at large doesn't say this. Most of the nations are trying to see their own benefits in the course of things. CHINA wants to establish itself by showing sidelining with PAKSITAN. AMERICA & UK wants to see that two birds are killed in one shot. Perpetrators of the terrorists acts gets punished but it's doesn't add any additional cost in terms of American life in the war raging in AFGANISTAN. SINGAPORE supports CHINA because of the economic clout that CHINA weilds but it makes a subdued noise during the tainted milk saga from Chinese exports. It knows that incidents unfolding in Mumbai does affect lives in SINGAPORE much.

In fact you would see this human nature being exhibited in almost every thing every where. It's all done with a facade using nice acronyms for these activities. Let's move to the work place. There is no co-relation with what is put on paper and what the truth is on ground. If this had not been the case world economy would have been in chaos. A year back all banks and FIs were reporting growth and profits and now they have gone bankrupt. Same risk management pratices which audited and found sound and working were declared to have failed and source of problem.

Another example from corporate world. What one writes in resume/bio-data, talks in interviews is vastly different from what he/she has been doing. You will know this if you ask a friend/colleague who has recently switched job and then he would tell you he tailored his resume as per job spec and answered what the interviewer wanted to hear.

Anyways...Enough of now... Wish you all a happy and prosperous 2009.

Mumbai Terror attacks - Innocent Pakis should move to safer grounds

2008-11-28T20:58:00.000-08:00

I guess Indian leaders and other world leaders are putting lot of time and energy into rooting out terror from the world map. Either the terrorists have been better than the world leaders or the world leaders aren't much better than the terrorists as a result terrorism have been flourishing around the world.

While coming to the recent Mumbai terrorist attacks most of prominent world leaders active in world politics have given their reaction and solidarity towards in-efficient Indian goverment and reverred Indians. What I found missing was no coverage in media about reaction from China and Russia. Either I am missing some media coverage or something is seriously wrong which kind of is suggesting that Terrorism is here to stay for foreseeable. Those of you who are interested to know the details and the events after recent Mumbai killing and hotel seizure by PAK based ISI linked terrorist organization, there is compiled list of coverage on the same. Click here to open the link.

Anyway while this is on-going I am thinking about the Pakistanis - I am sure a lot them would have been thinking that there is no future for them in their own country which has demons like ISI & and the country army sitting to nip the humanity in the buds when ever it starts to take shape. So option is moving out of their own country and working out a better future for their kids and future generation. Their nation has been so badly publicized that most of nations where some one can hope for a decent living look at any one from Pakistan with a suspicion. What to do - I suggest the Pakis to take it in their stride. People can choose friends and not parents. In this case because of their birth place they have to accept that there are dangerous radicals in their homeland who have spoilt the name of an entire nation. Still don't give up hope and keep trying to look for what ever decent work you can get outside. Those of the pakis who are rich should definitely move out of the country. Their wealth should help them and family to secure visas of other humanity friendly and civilised nations. If they see good biz opportinuty in their country and don't want to move out, I will suggest them still to rethink their decisions. As they can still do biz with in Pakistan keeping themselves and their loved ones in a safe and prosperous neighborhood. Even their money and biz will be more secure as Paki goverment whether run by a rouge or benign people will protect them as without this they can't go out begging for alms once in a year or so. As they have roots in pakistan they will have the benefit of able to connect to masses as the public does not care the biz owner has Paki passport or not. Public at most considers if they can speak their language and can connect to their civil culture or not. If required even consider relocating to China and India before flying to different shores.

Good luck my Pakistani bro & sis !!!!

My Dream - Will it consumate with reality when I am 40 - Part 1

2008-10-28T04:54:00.000-07:00

Today[On the day od Diwali] I have been thinking a lot about this at work. This is so unlike me if I retrospect and look at my self and what my thoughts had been about at work place in as long as I think of. So, I guess this untoward thought frequenting me so much today deserves a place in my blog. I am off from work early too, seating late at work is a work habit for all in office where I work... :)

For readers it may not make much sense as it would be more like a early morning dream -- so incoherent if you try to make logic out of it. Still if it's forward looking dream, you will like the end result of the dream to come true and some people make it turn true over time. So readers please pardon me for this post if you are disappointed about it nad you are reading it patiently till end.

Lately and so much today I have been thinking about making my self financially free by the age of 40 to lead a average middle class life in India/Singapore. With achieving this I will be able to start again what had been of so much of interest to me in my school days. Ya in school days and NOT COLLEGE DAYS. I guess decisions and action later on in my life after school that I have made till date are more to lead a normal successful social and human life. If I succeed in becoming financially free then my abnormal and self indulgent life will kick-off. I guess it will last till I am off this world as briefly I was obsessed with programming as well. This was in college days which strated with my tryst with a month training during college break. I am over it now :)

Let me look at it briefly how I had been during my school days[till 12th]. I was a average student all the while in school till 8th. All of a sudden when I was in 9th, all subjects started to look interesting to me. So it was natural to be placed into top-10 after that. May be CIVICS was only exception and with age I guess there is nothing which does not interests me including LANGUAGES. Of course I would admit that LANGUAGE was the last thing which started to appeal me and to draw my interest. Still I haven't been developed liking for MUSIC and ARTS. As I have been growing up It has been becoming more and more clear that it's not class room based or I should say degree based studies that is attracting me. It's sheer inquisitive human nature and attraction to unravel and learn more about all things which you see and learn about in day to day life. You want to know more about it but then you are left at the shore in an alley and there is NO-ONE who can lead you to the sea of knowledge or at least in search of it safely. In my school in 9th standard I was introduced in real terms to SCIENCE and started to scratch it's surface. I got so interested in it that studying became a part of me that I wanted to do when I got some time. Of course significant amount of time was into studing and researching more on what was not in prescribed textbook nad that was beyond the syllabus of the course that was taught at school. Of all the subjects till 12th I LOVED PHYSICS and BIOLOGY. I guess only thing I didn't love so much was ENGLISH. In Biology, GENETICS/CYTOLOGY and EVOLUTION which was most appealing and in Physics it was MODERN PHYSICS and esoteric THEORY of RELATIVITY. Given a choice in school I would have preferred to read GENETICS of all others things. Now I would go for MODERN PHYSICS and THEORY of RELATIVIVTY and related exiciting stuff. At school when I tried to find out what lay ahead for a guy interested in GENETICS - I found out this : Graduate in Biology and there is only one institute in India where I can pursue GENETICS there after. Back in early 1990's it was not an appealing option at all. I guess leading a WELL-OFF life was the first thing if you wanted to do something good in life at any point in time later on till the time you go down six foot under or into ashes in a pyre for last rites for hindus. Other related choice was going for medicine. Oh GOD..--..Thinking about a long 5-6 year of graduate course and followed by 2-3 years to get a masters degree at minimum to start a pro life was a huge investment of time, effort and persistence and with not a very promising result with high probability of it happening. I took the short-cut and join Engineering course. Hadn't thought what lies ahead and was confident of at least a decent life there after. Definitely I had thought of pursuing what would be more appealing after a 4 yr graduate degree. Defintely I was a frugal guy in terms of putting in effort what was really not very iontersting irrespective of the END it was leading to. I wanted to achieve the attractive END with least amount of effort to put. While put in rest of time into what was more enjoyable - READ what was not considered worth investing time and effort by teachers and other class mates. But it was so interesting, how can one not like it. I still feel the same way when I think of school days. I was so lazy that I was into reading mathematics in stead of crunching the integral equations of geometry and Trigonometry. Unlike others I always felt it was better than aching your knees and elbows to score high in mathematics. I use to put in only 4 hours week into really solving equations and probability sums to pratice for sitting thru a exam 3 hours long. I guess rest one hour per week to ward off the fear that students dont score in mathematics if they dont practice it on paper. I use to take samples[draw number from a lot for each odd/even chapter] so that I have to put least amount of effort in crunching them on paper instead of reading them:) In fact I use to do the same for even PHYSICS, CHEMISTRY[Physical mostly]. Reading the books on all these was so much fun. I really miss it even now. It's so much better than reading story books and novels. I guess I had left reading novels some where in 11th standard and had become very selective in picking up any new novel. Only based on recommendations... Other difficult part in student life was drawing all those boring lines and curves for Boilogy and practical books for Physics and chemistry as well. It still doesn't make sense what the syllabus prescribers had/have in mind when they have introduced thing like drawing those testubes/Screw- gauges/Pendulum/.... Sheer waste of time for student I think. If you go out and play garden cricket with socks balls and hockey stick it so much more refreshing. I think this is the only think about games/sports I miss to date. If you have spent more time playing then it fills you with a guilt with in - I should read now. You see - In encourages you to study - may be for the sake of scoring if not for the sake of inquisitiveness - but then it's the seed which draws you to read about things which are beyond the syllabus. So I guess in school days my life been self indulgent from 9th onwards. I use to read and research a lot about things which use to arouse and make my thoughts wander off. I use to get into day dreaming most of the time.

One DREAM which I always use to harbor and I guess it got crushed during the engineering degree is as follows. These days I have started seeing the same dream again. It goes like this :)

THERE IS A WAY WHICH CAN MAKE A MAN LIVE ETERNALLY. IT JUST HAS NOT BEEN DISCOVERED. SECRET LIES IN THE GENES. BUT THERE ARE SO MANY COMBINATIONS OF THE ACT/CGT THAT GOES GOES INTO MAKING A GENE AND THERE ARE MILLIONS OF THEM IN A PAIR OF CHROMOSOMES. hUMANS HAVE 26 OF SUCH PAIRS. HOW WILL I KNOW WHICH ONE HOLDS THE MAGIC FORMULA/COMBINATION. WHAT DO I DO - SOLUTION :- I WILL READ COMPUTER SCIECE AND ROBOTICS AND WILL EMPLOY THEM ALL TO DO ALL THE CALCULATIONS AND SOLVE THE RIDDLE.

It sounds funny and I laugh at my self thinking about it. Now I have started getting this dream again but it has been altered a little as I have observed and read more during the course of my life since the day I had above mentioned dream. Do you want to go thru my version of altered dream that I am harboring these days:)

STEM CELL RESEARCH AND GENETICS. I THINK THIS HAS THE TRICK. WITH STEM CELL RESEARCH I CAN REPLACE EACH OF THE VITAL ORGANS ONE BY ONE. STEMS CELLS CAN BE PROGRAMMED OR ARE SELF PROGRAMMED TO BECOME ANY PART OF THE BODY ORGAN. SO PROGRAM THEM IN ADVANCE TO BECOME A SPECIFIC BODY ORGAN. THEN INJECT THEM INTO THE BLOOD OR DO SOMETHING SO THAT THEY START REPLENSHING THAT PARTICULAR ORGAN IN THE BODY. IN THIS WAY WE CAN REPLACE EACH AND EVERY ORGAN/BODY PART AND THIS INDIVIDUAL WILL CONTINUE TO LIVE ETERNALLY AT LEAST THEORITICALLY UNLESS AND UNTIL HE MEETS DEATH ACCIDENTALLY.

Wasn't it interesting dream of a dreamer :)) don't share this with hollywood sci-fi authors and movie industry fellows. They would milk money out of ideas like this !!! Wasn't few of the sci-fi movie made in Hollywood having some nice dream like this. I wouldn't say the same about bolywood movies though. All Bollywood movies have lot of emotions packed around a sci-fi theme else it would not sell for the producer to make next one. Though few of them have NICE DREAMS too into them if you just look at it from sci-fi point of view. Anyway isn't it that what is sci-fi today became truth or scientific theory/law tomorrow with little bit of alterations and into well known fact day after there after !!!

I think it's becoming too long for a single post, but I wont publish it till I complete all the parts. I have dropped many a things/topics in between in my posts promising to come back and write about it later :) So I will do the same again for now - I guess I will sit and write again to read it again few years later when I turn 40 and am financially free to pursue it :)) I will definitely come back type in more of these dreams till I am 40 and fincially free - WILL I BE ????

Amway & BWW - One of the $ pipeline

2008-10-20T05:49:00.000-07:00

There was 2 day event organized by BWW to teach how to excel in AMWAY biz model. I couldn't attend 1st day because of unexpected allergy leading to nasal imflamation and sneezing. Though I really wanted to attend the event - actual reason behind it was building network instead of really excelling in the AMWAY biz. In the post below I am not going to typically bragg about how AMWAY biz model works and flount about how a nice way it is to make money. I am sure many a blogs would have been written about it. I am going to just put down what I saw on the 2nd day in the FED[Free Enterprise Day] event organized by BWW.

Definitely of this 6 hours event each day, I attended only 3-4 hours but it met the purpose for me. Though it's called "Free Ent..... Day" - It actually costs SGD75/- to get an entry ticket for all the 5 sessions on both day. There is no way that you can buy tickets for 1/2 of the total 5 session. There was a big and very energetic crowd at the venue. People were full of energy and they were all dancing around the floor in between the sessions. Achievers in the AMWAY biz were the speakers and sought after people who the entired crowd wanted to emulate. It indeed fetches good money if you succeed in the biz. There were mngmt pro, bankers, engineers, Doctors, Lawyers, house wives, students, marketing pro, etc..... in the crowd. It means it all it takes is common sense to participate in it. Model is based on human networking and self use of the products from AMWAY or marketed by AMWAY.

What I liked about the event is that so many people being present at the event with not many a raised hands for first timer means that many people were persisting with the biz and were some money, though some had made huge amount of money.

What I liked about the event is that many a professional in this associated biz were from different walks of life which in turns means it's definitely possible to carry it on as a side biz and should be fine if I devote less than 5-6 hours per week.

Over the period definitely it will mean improved network which would prove beneficial later in profession and other $pipeline I will like to build.

Intial investment is very minimal - in fact just one time registration fee. I am not paying this fee over web to a party I dont know so I know I am thorwing away this small sum of money.

Some of the speakers did make fun of the highly energetic behavior of the crowd re-inforcing that it takes discipline and planned approach instead of just sheer brut force to make it good in the biz.

I have joined the crowd and have registered for the biz. Please pray GOD for me that I successfully create $ pipeline out of this AMWAY and build many more pipelines.

One down - New life with new set of people

2008-10-18T07:38:00.000-07:00

Lately I had been very lethargic to do another post. But during the today office Deepavali party I really felt that I have go and type it down. I had felt similarly before as well on certain occasions but had not been able to sit down on the computer to write a post :) I guess the reason was not that today's event led to my thoughts being more strong than they were before but the difference is that today is Saturday and I am not stressed out because of office work. Full day in office really saps me out of all energy. I don't why don't feel this as long as I am in office once I start to near my home on my way back I start to feel very very tired.
I guess the title of the post is very vague but then it's really for me and some people who really follow these posts on my blog.
There are two related posts on my blog related to this. Please check out before reading this. You may want to read them after reading this as all three posts are related.
1) Is everything okay at my workplace !!! (Part 1)
2) Is everything okay at my workplace !!! (Part 2)

About 2 months now one of the director has since left to join another well known competitor bank who have not been hounded at all by recent financial turmoil globally. Behind all the good words he had to say in his farewell speech, story emerging from behind the curtain is that he felt that it's enough. Enough of useless unproductive politics. He was a my favorite of the two and a candid manager and leader. There was lot of hope when he was around of my organization coming back to past glorious days.
Only remaining king now was having a free hand to set things right. To twist and trun things so that there will no voice of dessent. All the while he had been putting all his people in critical positions though they had no experience about the work the organization was involved in doing. Only 2 of old people are their in his team as they showed comeplete loyality towards him. In fact these two gentlemen/ladies are such that they would lick any one up and look down upon anyone below them. There is another lucky guy in this director's team. He had planned his moves well and time too favored him. Though if we look at what he had achieved to deserve this - then there would be only failures to be shown without any success. But all this still got him the necessary visibility to fetch him a place as new Director's one down. I will not be surprised if new Director will not be able to turn things around then this lucky guy would one of the first people to leave the sinking ship. Of course the other one would be the Director him self as at my work place captain dont sink along with the ship. They only force others to sink with the ship and later as well by throwing staff out of the life-boat to make a place for them selves:)
Other important that affected me was that with the exit of the wanted director my boss to decided to move on. With this there was a set of staff including who were prized catch for others but none of us wanted to work with anyone around as over period none of them had shown the necessary leadership and managerial skill worth look upto. How ever none of us had a choice to moe out as department was in such a bad shape that BIG BOSS[Director 2 up] has closed all exits from our department. Only exit was to leave the bank. My boss relationship with BIG BOSS was good enough that he let him move as he subtly explained the stress relationship he had with the director who was now in charge of entire organization.
In todays party I felt like being in a new place. None of the old timer who have been forced to stay with the organization were present. In fact I was having running nose and heavy sneezing due to some allergy but I made it a point to go because I felt not going there would as well put me into the group who is not liking or supporting the new organization. With none of the old timer present in the party was a clear signal that they were not their in the department anymore with their heart and soul. They were just there like machines from which you will get good output as long as input is good. BIG BOSS too was there. I respect him for his organizational leadership and people management skills. I am sure he must have noticed this as it was so obvious. He would surely try to set things correct or find a way out for the department to succeed. There is no way that he can allow the organization to fail and then to replace the Director. Doing anything like this would be too costly for the bank. This department product is the face of the bank for customers through out the world.
Positive thing that I observed/felt about the party that new set of people were showing life and were gelling well. Now the thing is that it will depend upon how quickly they are able to learn the department's business and achieve it's old glory. As of now things seems to be settling down but as a 2nd grade compared to what the department was in it's shiny days. Having worked with a set of people who knew the job and systems, I feel so akward to work with a set of people, most of whom are 2nd grade. There is a growing urge to move to another department as I still feel like working with best team, building a great team and delivering mesmerizing stuff.
Please wish me LUCK so that I succeed in doing the same.

Profession of Finance & Forecasting - Making others a fool

2008-09-13T00:47:00.000-07:00

A lot has been happening in my office and still so as to keep my focus away from work and feeling sic I have determine not to think of work on the week-ends. At times I feel that I am working at a sic place. In fact it's not the work which is sic but the people you work with especially peers and seniors. What can be done!!!! Life has to go on and work is very important part of life. I am just hanging on at the same work place as in remote corner of my heart, I am getting a thought that things have become so bad that soon I will get a chance to correct them.
Anyways this post is not about my work life which is going thru a very bad patch. God save my office and some of the diligent colleagues who have got stuck. I wanted to write a little about the profession of finance. While this profession has seen the likes of Warren Buffet who has a methodical approach to investing and prooving the same in terms of returns that he is generating for his investors. There have been few others like George Soros also but this industry is also filled with cons and most of the people employed in the industry have not done well and mis lead their investors. See the below example related to the developments in Sterlite Industries.
Sterlite industries part of Vedant group[based in London and owned by a NRI] has announces restructuring plans. Upon aanouncement it's shares started tumbling and this diff investment houses have differing opinions which I feel is very absurd. All the information about the company is in public and all of these investment house follow same principle of finding a predicting future of the company. It makes sense that their target price would differ based on certain assumption that is made in calculations. How ever it does not make any sense to predict the movement in different direction in days ahead as long as theories and laws of finance and economics remain same for all.
Morgan Stanley and Emkay global have forecasted increase the future price of sterlite industry securities where as Karvy has forecasted sharp drop in the price of this counter based on nagative sentiment about the metal industry[check out moneycontrol portal - news section]. To me it just doesn't make sense and seems like regulators should still have a role to play and regulate the industry of falsification and save the population/investors.
I would like to share following write-up sent to me by a wise friend about the same. I am not telling all in the industry of investing are cheats but definite a wiser population seems to be of dubious nature. Enjoy the story below :)
The confession of a finance professional Every morning in the southern part of the country, mostly in my home state of Tamil Nadu, hundreds of astrologers sit below a shade, usually a tree and predict the future of their 'clients'. Their tool is a caged parrot. The mechanism - the parrot when allowed to come out of the cage is trained to pick one booklet from many that the astrologer spreads out.
And based on the clues printed in that particular booklet the astrologer predicts the future of his clients. Mostly the questions are predictable - problems relating to cash flows, business, finance, health, children and of course marriage. Years of experience has taught the astrologer to give non-standard yet satisfactory replies to these standard questions even to the most intelligent clients. Interesting, isn't it? Or is it mastery of the human psyche?
Cut to the metros. Every morning across the country, we the finance professionals begin our work as meticulously as the parrot-astrologers mentioned above, but with a crucial difference. Instead of the parrots we use laptops, and instead of the unsophisticated printed booklets, we
rely on Microsoft office.
Without Excel spreadsheets and Power Point we will instantly be rendered hors de combat. Ask us any question about anything we will answer you only through these tools - even if it means introducing ourselves, our company or our services. We will use jargons or acronyms even for silly things. We have our own grammar for our operations.
The idea is to bamboozle our clients and give them an impression of being in a hurry. If a client is a multi-product company we would advice them on de-merging and concentrate on core competencies. If it is a single product company we would ask them to diversify to de-risk
themselves. Never mind, in both cases we are actually experimenting with our clients at their cost.
And should a client have a rupee term loan we would advice them on a foreign currency loan and exactly the reverse should they have a forex loan. For the former we would predict the depreciation of the dollar, for the latter, the appreciation of the dollar. Who said cheese for the
goose is cheese for the gander?
If we find a non-finance professional on the other side of the table we reckon that they are lambs to the slaughter. When we encounter fellow finance professionals on the other side, things are no different. After all, he would be compassionate to our cause, understand our jargons and
empathise with our constraints.
In effect, others' ignorance (or their negligence) is our strength. We sell from the mundane to the complex, in the process warranting far above what we can deliver, causing much more havoc than what the clients could have ever imagined and charging much more than want is apparent.
Welcome to the world of finance professionals and consultants.
You dream, we make money
We understand the fundamental human psyche far better than any other professionals with the sole exception of the parrot astrologer. We know the proclivity of businessmen to make quick money and the power of greed. We love such people. In fact, we encourage them to dream big,
bigger and better. After all when you dream it is money for us.
Most of you don't waver. But if some of you do, we have the ready quotes of Shiv Kheras and Robin Sharmas of the world to motivate you, chosen with outmost care to be quoted out of context. Added to these are the real life stories of Narayana Murthys and Aziz Premjis. And when all these weapons are used, most of you fall. Only the extremely lucky escape from the heady brew that we concoct.
So, to a small timer we will recommend public issue. From being a partner of a small firm or to a private limited company, we play on his psyche and encourage him to go for a public issue. If his capacity today is 1000 MT, we easily work his profitability for 100,000 MT, never mind the availability of raw materials or ability of the person to market or any other fundamentals. Naturally profits one-hundred times the present levels can excite even a saint. Why talk of lesser mortals? Surely, Excel spread sheets has made life easy for us. But to make life far simpler we have ready made templates, of course, with the usual disclaimers to cover our backs should something go wrong. Yet we occasionally goof up by denominating steel in litres or some liquid
chemicals in meters. Our clients are very understanding - they do not find fault with us. How can they when we have bamboozled them in the first instance?
Our fundamental mantra is to calculate the earnings before Depreciation, Interest and Tax. Then we extrapolate such calculations to the next few years adjusting the prices to what we think is 'reasonable', never mind that the commodity prices are gyrating by the hour. If we decide, a four per cent variation can be serious. In the alternative a 40 per cent can be immaterial.
But if you still understand what we do, we will talk in terms of IRR, cash flows, MAT, dividend tax, tax-shield, leverage etc so as to flummox anyone. Management of most corporates wastes millions of precious man hours to check and recheck all these as if it were Bible, Koran and Veda
all rolled into one. When all these happen, no wonder, we chuckle in front of you and have a hearty laugh behind you!
The next step is to approach banks for financing or other non-conventional lenders viz. venture capitalists and Private Equity. Here it is very easy for us. Since we have our own people on the other side of the table speaking our language, jargons and lingo, it becomes so easy. As we try to sell the dream of our clients, the finance professional sells his 'products'. And it takes two to a tango. Isn't it?
For us short term is few hours. Long term is a few days. And when something goes wrong we blame everyone from Bush, Iraq, Oil, Pakistan, Taliban and for that matter everyone except ourselves. And when people succeed we ensure that media covers the same adequately. On such
occasions naturally we act with extreme alacrity and appropriate the credit.
Our relationship with these lenders means that it only we who can get you the funds or the facility. And when things go bad, it is only we who can bail you out. It is only our restructure package that will be accepted by these lenders. In tennis parlance - it is game, set and match for us. In chess, it is check and mate.
Horse multiplied by an ass is equal to a pig The earnings of 30 companies that determine the BSE index is approximately Rs 1000 crores. We multiply the same with a price earning (PE - the Holy Grail) multiple of say 12 or 15 or even 21 to arrive at the BSE index. Much as all this is voodoo economics, when it is a bull market we point to markets that have a higher multiple and justify such higher prices. When it is a bear market we point out to markets with lower PE multiples to justify the market prices of shares. Either way you will lose.
Worse still, we move from channel to channel and from columns to columns using charts and what not to justify either the rise or fall in stock markets. And for the past six months we have first suggested resistance to NSE at 5,800, then at 5,400, then at 4,800, subsequently at 4,400.
In the process we had encouraged every small investor to stay invested. When all these levels have been broken, we have now suggested 3,700 little realising that an umbrella is of no use when you face a tsunami. Yet we continue without any shame or remorse to pontificate. How can you shame the shameless?
And when people survive all these, we tutor them to repurchase their shares or better still de-list. And should they have surplus cash even for a movement we move in silently as the big cats move in for their kill and make the gullible invest in commodities, real estate or some other exotic markets.
Better still, we advice on mergers or amalgamating with some other companies or better still sell the stake to others. Yes, in all these transactions we are interested.
And on all these, whether you make profit or loss, we would ensure that we make money first-up. Naturally, we see money in every transaction, why every part of a transaction. We would encourage one set to sell and other set to buy, and broker the deal both ways. Of course we do profit both ways. Did I hear that dirty word called ethics? Remember, we see value in everything except in values themselves.
But what is surprising is that despite what we do blatantly remains beyond the comprehension of many. Consequently as a class we remain un-critiqued. No wonder as the cliche goes, what is obvious is usually the most oblivious. This allows us, like the astrologer in the streets of South India, to endlessly play on the psyche of men and their greed.

My flu made me think of this

2008-09-07T23:57:00.000-07:00

These days I have been a bit more busy and occupied mentally because of mutating equations in the office. Before I understand and develop an antibody to fight the opposition, equation mutates itself to infect me and others around :)

I had a nastly flu and I am still recovering from it. I am on M/C today so could find some time to type this post. I have a bad habit and an urge to attend office when ever possible, because of this I am in office at times even when I have a M/C in my pocket. This time I tooo did the same. I took only 1/2 a day M/C when I should have had gone for 2/3 day of rest and the result was that after a delay of about a week, I came down with heavy headache, vohmittting and body pain. Well, everyone knows what is the lesson lesson learnt from this, but will I correct my self. Will I stay at home when there is need to stay :))

Anyway the thought which is crossing my mind is not related to my work & office and the field I work in at all. But related to medicine and microbiology. I have an interest in almost all things/subject/field arouond the world. You see name of this blogsite is "Aakaashganga" - Milky Way. Universe is an exiciting thing to read and know about. So is everything - Physics, Chem, Bio, His, Geo, Eco, Fin.. etc... Now days I even find Political Science intertesting :))

So All of know that flu is a viral infection and it infects us time to time if our immune system is not strong enough to cope with new Virus infection. We have also seen that it infects us during WINTER and RAINY seson more. In the WINTER season though what we suffer from may be flu like sypmtoms but may not be a viral flu. How ever in tropics and equator side during rainy season flu which spreads is definitely viral. Since entire population suffer more during this season, could it be that VIRUS MUTATES itselfs FASTER IN THESE CONDITIONS - HOT & HIGH HUMIDITY. As it's well known that once a virus has attacked, it wont be able to inflict any more damage in our life time unless and until the subject is HIV positive.

Any one of you who knows more on this subject, please let me know if my thoughts are correct or could be correct.

Mobile phone habits - better be safe

2008-08-08T17:42:00.000-07:00

It has been a long time. Was very deeply involved in the work. Successfully got the project to an end. In the time developing spiritually too. I will talk about it some time later.
Today I saw this nice piece of advice coming out on CNN website about safe way to using mobile and cell phones. I am sure you all must have read many survey/studies and their results about relationship between brain activities and how brain is affected because of radiation from cell phone. Some studies claim brain cancer and high cell phone usage are related while others claim it's not. So there is no clear verdict regarding it. After all it's related to huge cell-phone industry and they will let the biz die so easily.
Some say strict no-no to carrying cellphone in your pocket because it roasts the bone marrow near it because of the radiation. So, will the man kind stop using cell-phones :) No of course not.. If there is problem or a probable problem then there is a solution or a probable solution. It's well known that cancer or tumor is a slow activities and takes at least 10s of years to manifest but it does it's deadly. So let be safe and continue to use mobile and cell phone to our advantage for social/economical reasons. Here is the advice from CNN.com :-
[if the below text is not clear - just click on it for it to appear in proper font.]

Hope it was useful and healthy for all of you !!!!!

Is rising oil prices good for man-kind - Seems so !!!!!

2008-07-04T21:52:00.000-07:00

This is another contradiction from me against the popular view. I still urge the reader to read through as I decided to post this after lots of deliberation over last 15 to 20 days. It was not easy for me to accept too that how can high fuel price be a good thing but at the end of repeated NOs, I felt YESSSSSSSSSSS, looks like it's good for the human race.
Over last few months I have been reading effects of rising oil prices over world economy. Many economies including developed, developing and under developed have started reported slowing down of the growth. This is not helping to pull out vast populations in the economies from below poverty line to live a better life. There are reports that high food prices are also a result of high oil prices. Reasons given are (1) Transportation cost :- Food is often consumed are far off places than the place of origin. (2) Processing and storage cost :- Many of the produce of the nature has to be processed before it can become edible and at many times needs proper storage solution so that it can be consumed later. All these need energy and with oil/crude prices spiraling these prices are going up. (3) Moving resources toward bio-fuel production :- Because of high oil costs it's economical to produce and convert bio-fuel to be used in vehicles and factories.
All of the above mentioned stuffs are correct. High oil prices are partly responsible for throwing many economies out of gear and high inflation is being experienced. High oil prices contribute to rising food cost as well which affects poor population of the world more than better-off population. How ever lets think of the following effect of high oil prices on the society and population which are equally true and seems to be better from a long term perspective.
(1) High oil prices in free economies[mostly developed countries] are making think of moving away from using more of fuel. There are lots of people who have stopped using personal transport and have switched to public transport. There are lots of people who have switched to bi-cycles from motor bikes and cars. There are report booming sells for bi-cycles in Europe and America. This is leading governments to improve public transport at faster pace as it's becoming more and more important for the economy. People moving to bi-cycles is leading people to exercise their body making the population fit, reducing health care costs :) Think of it friends !!!
(2) Many closed or semi-open economies are being forced to withdraw oil subsidies and move toward open and free system. They don't find it any more affordable for the national exchequer to continue to subsidize the oil and food prices. This is doing a lot of good to them though they have been forced on this path because of high fuel prices. I think most of you will agree that open and free economy is the way to move forward in comparison to a economy where good and prices are not tuned to the demand/supply rule. This will lead to a better life for people in the economy.
(3) Certainly less/efficient oil consumption is good for the environment and earth. We owe it out future generation and other co-habitants on mother earth. It's not really lesser consumption but as oil production is not going down but instead it's going up. It's more of efficient consumption - this means it's ensured that burning the fuel is not causing to have detrimental effects on environment. If this is continued for 1-2 years it's will become a habit of society, industry and regulators. There after even if the oil prices come down good habit developed will not get wiped out. I have been reading few reports where by it's being predicted that oil price rise is temporary and with in 2-3 years time it will have to come down to about USD100 level. Many reasons have
been given for this to happen. Anyways for me what I see high fuel prices doing is reduction is detrimental effect on the environment and nature.
(4) Necessity is mother of invention :) You must have read of reports of governments increasing research budget for alternative budgets and green environment. Again it's because of high oil prices. They want cheaper energy sources and are therefore scouting of other ways of harnessing energy. So we can look forward to new invention is days ahead to take the human race forwards in the journey of time and space.
These things are definitely better for long term then the temporary blip we are facing because of high inflation and food prices. Food prices have in fact started coming down specially for rice though we can look forward to going back what it used to be 6 months back but it looks like will adjust some where in between. Man and animals can adjust to these fluctuations but we can not be assured of the same adjustment to be done by nature and trees in favor of humans. And the adjustments/changes nature will make may be something to which we/humans can not adjust
:) So I feel that high oil prices is good for us for about a year or two.
Comments are welcome !!!

Did the Chinese quake helped quell bad vibes about Bejing Olympics

2008-06-14T01:16:00.000-07:00

I think this very very quaint thought came to my mind. I know many of the readers to this post will think that this is most rubbish thing that anyone can write or think of. But still I felt so and I think I am not really wrong. Let me put it out why I think so.
If you remember days before the Chinese quake. Media was full of negative talks about different events connected to Beijing Olympics.
- London, Paris, San Fransisco torch relay marred by protests against Chinese abuses in Tibet.
- Quality of air in Beijing may not allows athletes to bring out their best. There were talks of that we might witness scenes of athletes vomiting and crashing during events.
- Major world leaders giving a miss to the Olympics opening ceremony and in some cases giving it a miss all together.
- Steven Spielberg's withdrawal as artistic consultant of the Beijing Organizing Committee citing concerns over the humanitarian crisis in Darfur, which he believed the Chinese government could do more to prevent.
- Sentencing China’s leading human rights activist, Hu Jia in April 2008. Human Rights Watch said the International Olympic Committee’s (IOC) failure to raise Hu Jia’s case with the Chinese government was at odds with the letter and the spirit of the Olympic Charter.
- Beijing Olympics broadcasts at risk. As per report in "The Australian":Saul Shtein from Australia's host broadcaster, Seven Network, has told an emergency meeting in Beijing between Chinese organisers, high-ranking International Olympic Committee officials and TV executives from nine host broadcasters that "if this story gets out that these difficulties are being experienced, it will have a very negative impact, not only on the Olympic ideals, but also on Beijing and China".
These are few items that I could remember. There could be more that I am not able to remember. However When Cyclone Nargis arrived with all its fury to loose hell upon Burmese people all these reports revolving around Beijing Olympics lost media focus. Media was abuzz with views and reviews of how apathetic Burmese ruling Junta were towards their own people. How about more than thousand people have lost their lives in the Burmese Island which had faced of the cyclone fury and about millions would be impacted in absence of timely help. While this event was still in its prime in media China was jolted by the massive earthquake. China being more integrated to the rest of the world got more aid from rest of world and entire world media was covering the Chinese quake now though may be number of souls impacted would be about one-tenth in comparison to Cyclone Nargis. This went on for about three weeks when Cyclone Nargis aftermath again started getting attention as UN General Secretary could persuade Burmese Junta to let foreign aid and professionals flow into Burma. Then there was minor events like smaller earthquakes in African Continent, Japan, flooding in US.
In the background Beijing Olympics date kept coming nearer and nearer. Before the earthquake China was looked upon very differently by most of the people and administration in the world. With the quake and post quake effects Beijing was looked upon in a very different view. There was no more an image of cruel China which has caused pain to Tibetan people or had a role in Darfur humanitarian crisis. Image of China was as a society who had recently faced the nature fury and needed help to save human lives and agony. This perception change brought about by quake which makes me think that Chinese quake did bring some thing good for Beijing Olympics as it helped it to avert more bad publicity which was doing a lot of damage to China, it's image in other parts of world and even it's economic relationship with some part of the world.
Note: Any comments on this is most welcome.

Biz evolves - Ladies as recovery agents

2008-06-10T07:32:00.000-07:00

This news/article that I read in the Economic Times[financial news] was really inspiring. It kind of set me thinking that how competitive things are in biz world. I will of course provide the link to this article but first I would like to share my thoughts that started criss-crossing my minding.
For last few months Indian who read newspapers and non Indian who track FI industry in the Indian market must have noticed how the Judicial system had come heavily on the high handed tactics that banks and lending institutions were employing for loan recovery. And with the number of such incidents appearing in media it's sure that this was definitely working for the lending institutions.
Now lets think of Indian society and how woman fair in the society in social and security sense. Some where I remember reading India was second most infamous country after South Africa when it cames to abuses against woman. Indian definitely know and understand what I am trying to convey. For NRIs and international readers of this post, I would post some links at the bottom of the post which will give you some idea about how women are placed in Indian society socially and from security point of view. There is no distant comparison even among workforce equality in terms of numbers in India and in defense, police and other private security industry women hardly have any presence.
Coming back to gist of this post which really set me thinking. I had never thought such a solution to the problem was possible. With Judicial system coming heavily on the high handedness of recovery agents and slapping multiple fines lending institutions were in problem. There was serious risk of high rise of problems in loan recovery and bad debt rise. Today I read in this article that woman have swapped placed for their male counterparts and new companies have opened to take over this bizes and they have providing great results. Lending institutions have got what they wanted and Indian economy has got what it wanted. Higher female participation in work force as opening of a new kind of service industry to the female work force.
Now how did the system worked out so well!!! What women did that was forcing men to use high handedness approach for the same job. It's a very common sense that it's not easy for anyone to make some one part with his money[read capital]. In India where judicial and political system is so slow and such that for the lenders it will take years for getting fair deal and outcome and by then they would be out of bizes because of loss of all invested capital as bad debts. A member of management of such a company which provides loan recovery bizes to FIs says that main reason for their business principle to work is "Our principle is persuasion is better than prosecution. We make defaulters understand the problems they may face if they don't pay". She further adds "Defaulters, who are generally men, find it embarrassing to be addressed by a woman and hasten to pay up large parts of the loan". She goes on to add "Those who find it easy to bribe male recovery agents realize that they can't do the same with women.".

Link to the post in TOI. Open it. [http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Business/Now_women_recovery_agents/articleshow/3115324.cms]

Some links about central bank and Indian courts coming down heavily on banks using muscle men for loan recovery.
(1) Central bank sets norm for loan recoveryOpen it.
[http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Business/India_Business/File_Fresh_RBI_norms_to_rein_in_recovery_agents/articleshow/2586490.cms]
(2) ICICI Bank fined Rs 50 Lacs(INR 5 Million) Open it.
[http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Business/India_Business/File_Loan_recovery_ICICI_fined_50_lakh_for_employing_goons/articleshow/2520118.cms]

Body control us or we control our body - Concious vs Unconcious

2008-06-01T07:44:00.000-07:00

These two weeks were very very busy. Many many different kind of thoughts keep coming to my mind at different times. I have not written anything about them because these may be momentary and if it sustains more than about 2 months then I would start writing about them. These will be mostly office management and corporate psychology. In between a different kind of thought also kept coming to me. Isn't there an innate way that me and my team transforms to a super performers? Then thinking along these lines different kind of thoughts about training, tools, management and communications kept coming to mind for dealing with work and people. At times have you thought that you will have to keep a team member just to keep all others senior management and at times even dumb middle management updated who are supposed to know the nerve of the project and update senior management:). This burden just adds to the project team strength and cost unnecessarily.
Then going along these lines of random thoughts this cam to my mind and I thought of writing it down. Is our mind the best thought machine which is most capable of solving all our problems or there is something with in us[in mind or somewhere else or distributed all across the body] which is even more smarter and capable of getting solutions to our people. Yes, looks like there is !!!!
Have you thought why our bodies starts to readjust itself to any external stimuli or change in environment. When there is scarcity of food body reduces it metabolism so that body can manage on less amount of food and contrarily when there is extra food body increases it's metabolic rate so that extra calories can be burnt to the keep the body weight in control. When we move to darkness after a few minutes we can start to see objects hazily and contrarily when we move to very bright area then our pupils contract so that less light enters our eyes. Similarly there is countless instances when you can observe this phenomenon in play. In fact on each and every instance you will see this innate body behavior to start coming into play.
However the ability of develop this is mostly driven by need to survive and continue the process of recreation. And if our body or for that matter any living organisms body is able to get the signal it start to change itself to the new environment and over a period this starts to get exhibited from birth after few generation. I think this is what evolution is all about and differentiates living from non living things. Looks like this is the reason why we all believe in GOD as body made of non living shows this behavior only as long as it is alive and there is soul it in.
Anyways, so coming back to from where I started or rather how this thought came to mind. Stressful and long working hours for me and my team in office. I definitely is reducing sleep for all of us. It's reducing the time we can spend with our family and friends. It's definitely reducing the time we can rest and time we can give to revitalize ourselves. I am also sure that mankind must have faced such stressful situations before so my bodies defense to face these situations will kick in soon. I think all the while I have read of human body adjusting it self to visible conditions like, food, temperature, pressure, Humidity, Predators, mates and procreation etc... Here I am looking forward to human body adjusting to white collar job mental fatigue and stresses.
Some interesting links on human body adapting itself.
[1] Human Body Adaptation To Overeating. Open it....I want to read.
[2] Human adaptation to space. Open it....I want to read.
[3] Generic human body adaptation story. Open it....I want to read.

Innovative ways to save mother earth. Reduce global warming.

2008-05-16T10:27:00.000-07:00

There has been lot of attention world over about global warming, Earth not able to sustain high environmental strain because of increased human activity. Even I have written one or two posts on the same and related topic. If you like this post you can search and read other posts on related by using the search at the top or bottom of the page. In this posts I am going to write about what would happen if global warming continues or in other words affects of global warming. Then I would mention numerous ways and methods that have been suggested by humans all over the world to stop or reduce global warming. In fact some of these ideas are very innovative and most have been backed by sound rational and good amount of study.
Firstly talking about the affects of global warming. Some of these are already visible and some are predictions based on assumptions. There have been prediction of :-
1) Rising ocean level because of melting glaciers in the poles and even on mountain ranges.
2) Rising ocean level means human establishments near sea shore would be undress stress and substantial amount of populated land mass would get submerged. You can imagine the rehabilitation effort required for this.
3) Now coming to the impact it would have on areas which is in center of large land masses. These land masses depend hugely on river system and which in turn have their sources in the mountain glaciers. With rising temperature as these glaciers would melt faster, it would lead to flood and deluge initially followed by these river system becoming seasonal. It's estimated lot of fertile under cultivation will no more remain fit for cultivation. Think of what would happen to the world food supply problem.
4) Higher CO2 and other green house gases is leading to depleting ozone layer. There have been pointed holes even in the ozone cover and thinning of ozone cover above all of us. This is likely to result into living beings exposed to more radiation which is mostly harmful for us. Likely to lead to more deadly diseases and cancer is predicted to leading this. You can faintly compare this to being on the outer zone of a nuclear disaster or working in a radiation zone without protective gears.
5) It has been observed that wild animals and birds have started their migration earlier than ester years. This is believed to be because their bodies gets tricked to think of change in season earlier because of rise of world temperature. Again world food chain so intricately balanced that these events will disrupt the food chain.
6) There has even been report that earth to become like Venus over time. You might be aware that Venus is twice as hot as Mercury is but Venus is twice as far from Mercury. This is because of high CO2 in the Venetian atmosphere. But I think this is too far an extension of human imagination and studies.
There could more such predictions but what we see there are mostly two problems. Food & Water problem and temperature problem.
Now good part after this bleak picture that I have shared with my friends who read my blog posts. However it's good to be aware and prepared of this so that we thinking being can get cracking get our house and planet earth in order for future human generations to continue to inhabit the planet. So here are some of the most innovative ways that has been suggested. Some of these are really radical.
1) Burying trees might solve global CO2 problem:- Here the idea is that trees capture CO2 and it gets recirculated back into the system. So by burying the tree especially fast growing huge trees we are taking CO2 out of the system. Go to the below mentioned address to read more on it. http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Earth/Global_Warming/Burying_trees_might_solve_global_CO2_problem/articleshow/3040186.cms
2) Obesity contributes to global warming, so get slim and trim physique:- This idea is simple but bold enough as human population is very sensitive towards their own looks. Obese and overweight people require more fuel to transport them and the food they eat, and the problem will worsen as the population literally swells in size. Go to the below mentioned address to read more on it. http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Earth/Obesity_contributes_to_global_warming/articleshow/3045719.cms
3) Use a laptop to save energy:- As more and more human population have become dependent on PC as a necessary tool saving some energy here will save a lot of fuel because of huge population. Laptops use 5 times less energy than desktops. At least move to use LCDs instead of CRT monitors. This applies to mobile and other commonly used gadgets as well. Use fuel efficient vehicles and if possible use public transport. Inculcate fuel saving driving habits. Have you thought about it - Every litre of petrol saved keeps 2.5 kg of CO2 out of the atmosphere.
4) Ponds can absorb as much carbon as the world's oceans:- This one is really a savior if practiced well. This will go a long way is reducing CO2 from the atmosphere. A study has shown that small ponds absorb a lot more CO2 than trees, large ponds and oceans. So let small ponds sprung up everywhere. When ever you see one, feel good about it. Think of the way it is helping the environment which general public may not have been aware of. To read more about this go the below mentioned link. http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Earth/Global_Warming/Ponds_can_absorb_as_much_carbon_as_the_worlds_oceans_/articleshow/3022430.cms
5) New grass to tackle global warming:- I am sure you knew that it's not only CO2 which captures heat in the atmosphere leading to global warming. In fact gases like Methane[CH4] capture many times more heat than CO2 but good thing there quantity is minuscule. How ever it would be good if we decrease it even further. Our benevolent cows emit substantial amount of Methane in their excreta and burping. This is because of their diet mostly consists of raw grass. So scientists have developed a grass which can reduce the methane emission by the benevolent cows who supply human the diary products and meat. To read more on this go the below website page. http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Earth/Global_Warming/New_grass_to_tackle_global_warming/articleshow/3025084.cms
6) A solar bra to charge your phone. Use solar and wind energy:- Wow!! This is great. In Japan a bra is being marketed which allows mobile phone to get recharged as it captures solar energy and converts them into electrical. Anyway I think the underlying message is using more and more renewable sources of energy like Hydroelectricity instead of Thermal generated electricity. More usage of Solar energy, wind energy and tidal energy. In case you want to read more about the solar go to the this page. http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/3041080.cms
7) Use veggie diet:- Even if you can't become a complete vegetarian try to use more and more of vegetarian food. Use as little meat as possible. See food is still acceptable from point of view of food conservation. Underlying idea is that meat come from animals which are fed vegetarian food and same land can be used for producing crops for human population.
8) Growing giant veggies in zero gravity:- This one is also really innovative. If it can be brought into practice it will go a long way in serving to the food crisis. Scientists have said that vegetables grown in zero-gravity conditions in space can grow up to huge sizes, which could help solve the world’s food crisis. Go to the following page to read more about it. http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/HealthSci/Growing_giant_veggies_in_zero_gravity/articleshow/3038224.cms

So dear friends I hope that my article will help spread the message and we will pass on an inhabitable earth to future generations. Any comments from any one of you.

China Earthquake eclipse Myanmar Cyclone !!!

2008-05-16T10:25:00.000-07:00

While I was extremely busy this week as it seems work momentum going back to how bad it was about 2 months back. I definitely have to find a way out of this. Life has to take priority over work. I don't think people in society should live to work but should work to live happily. Without it would become like new form of bonded labor. Anyway I am going to type down my thoughts on this in some other posts as this is one of the subjects which has been criss-crossing my mind and thoughts these days.
In this busy week in the back of head thoughts of Chinese and Burmese[Myanmar's cyclone] had been making rounds. I was more than happy when during my course of work this week there was something to be done towards the good cause of helping the Chinese people affected by the earthquake. It seems the death toll will cross all other previous historical earthquake to have befallen on Chinese people except for the deadly 1976 earthquake. I think this time the death toll will keep rising in days to come because of modernization drive that China has gone through over last 32 years since 1976. There are reports coming out of the earthquake affected area that Dams and Rivers seem to have been stretched and could cause more disaster if they break their banks and walls. I am happy for one of my co-workers who returned back safely from the tour to Sinchuan province in China where he was on Holidays when the quake struck. He just had to take round about arrangements as the airport does not seem to be operating any more. All most all infra structure has been badly damaged around the area. Good that it has not affected the facilities which was host 2008 Olympic events. Anyways 2008 Olympics seems to doomed as it has been marred by Tibetan up rest. It's also that during this Olympic record number of people will face the gallows as Chinese lead the world in dishing out capital punishment. If you want to briefly know about some of previous deadly events humans have have braved, go to this page. There have been news of entire generation of Chinese families getting wiped out, part of it contributed by one child policy that Chinese authorities have in place. Among these bad news there are pocket of news like - No damage was done to red giant pandas and to Olympic facilities. Chinese like Burmese counterpart have allowed foreign aid to flow into the countries but have denied foreign personals to come in.
Looking at the Burmese cyclone catastrophe which seems to be outnumbering populous China and Sinchuan in terms of death tolls. Here the government and authorities seems to have utter disrespect towards human lives and fellow countrymen. Indian ocean and Bay of Bengal have been facing violent cyclones recently. India, Bangladesh seems to have been braving them of recently. They have done much better when disaster has struck especially cyclonic disasater. Indian authorities claims to have given advanced warning to Burmese authorities of the Cyclone Nargis but they seemed to have ignored the warnings completely. This could be because poor countries may not have infrastructure in place to taken on massive evacuation to avoid human life losses. At least relaying this message should have allowed agile human race to make their own preparations to save them selves. There are reports that authorities have not allowed even local wealthy and influential people to distribute supplies to the local stranded people dying of hunger and disease in semi nude stage. Local people have been blaming authorities to be hoarding foreign supplies and dishing out mushed and rusted rice to locals in name of aid from foreign countries. Check out this page which talks about plight of Burmese people who have been forced to turn into baggers where alms comes only from authorities. All the UN could do was to suspend supplies when Burmese authorities seized UN aids supply. I think UN should either intervene militarily and led Democracy usher in in future soon if it could not muster the courage to do that in past. Let Myanmar flourish at least to the stage of Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Nepal.
If we do comparison between how things have moved in China and Myanmar during these time of crisis you will see that initially world media was flush with news of Burmese tragedy but soon all over the media there were talks of only Chinese quake. It was all because how the authorities have worked for their people post tragedy. Chinese government much to respite of our Chinese brethren have given wide coverage and have been very candid in reporting the situation on ground. This was in contrast to how China in past have been very close during such events. Remember the recent Tibetan protest and Chinese authorities coverage and reaction. World over there was so much foul talk about Chinese oppression and this time world is going gaga over Chinese authorities effort to save people. I think this time only thing where Chinese authorities have lagged behind is not allowing foreign logistics professionals to take charge of aids distribution and human life saving effort. I think world will surely understand this and allow Chinese some more time as this change has been very positive for human civilization. Secondly Chinese system can definitely be trusted for their know-how in logistics for aid distribution unlike Burmese who have no expertize to handle such mass human saving cause. Thirdly it could be remotely because of Chinese militarily sensitivities. Recently there have been media reports about two[one land based and other under water] huge Chinese missile facilities being uncovered by commercial satellites. If Burmese would have allowed media coverage and aid distribution then things would have been much better in Myanmar after about 1 and 1/2 weeks post cyclone. More media coverage would led to more aid and who knows this would have led even Economy turning for better and Burmese becoming a part of main stream world.
I would love to see reader comments on this. In case you want to know past Chinese earthquakes, take a look at this.

Is your PC a tool in your hand or your master

2008-05-10T22:32:00.000-07:00

This simple but powerful machine entered into all our lives very dominantly over last 10 years or so. Advancement in networking and as a result improved internet connectivity made humans to remain glued to the computer more and more time. Slow a brilliant and useful tool discovered by man became its master. For most of us now it's difficult to comprehend life without PC and it's an norm to spend about 8-10 hours daily on the computer for work and social reasons. Let's take a while to skim through the health hazards and dangers for using PC or laptops for such long duration. I easily spend about 10-12 hours of my time everyday in front of the computer. What does it do is that it makes us sit in fixed posture for long hours and making few of our body parts go through same movement pattern and stress continuously. Over prolong duration these develops into different kind of body ailments and many different syndrome have been known to be named after computers and increased usage of computers. Lets go through few of them and how to save our selves from it while we go through our daily chores whether for work or other reason.
1) Mental problems:- These days our productivity, social circle, friends seems to related to number of hours one stares into the computer screen and rubs on the keyboard. There are even reports about young people attempting suicide when their parents have removed the PC or any of the associated parts like modem.
Likely solution to these is that from begin you have emphasize to your kids to look at computer just as another tool for work, fun and play. Reemphasizing this again and again would encourage them not to put in so many hours in front of the computer. when it comes to adults and if they are addicted I guess only option left out is to treat them for addiction at any psychological therapy institute.
2) Back or other related orthopedic problem:- Most common of these is back problem. As it has always been told for any one who sits long hours in front of computer or related job - treat your back with respect. You will find lots of material on this, use the search option at the bottom of the page. Do watch your neck, shoulders, elbows, wrists, thighs and even feet as well in addition to the back. There have been reports about increase in problem from these body areas from computer professionals. Look out for other body joints as they remain in fixed position for long hours - wrist pain, elbow pain, and shoulder pain. Find proper position and resting place for all of them.
3) Eye problem - Most common computer problem:- All problems of the eyes associated with using the computer can be clubbed under the Computer Vision Syndrome (CVS). Symptoms of CVS include headaches, blurred vision, neck pain, fatigue, eye strain, dry, irritated eyes, and difficulty refocusing the eyes. CVS generally occurs because we don’t give our eyes enough rest while staring at the screen, and also do not blink at regular intervals, to lubricate the eye. Use the search function at the bottom to find out more about it. Some simple advice would be to use LCD instead of a CRT monitor. Keep appropriate distance between monitor and eye. One very commonly observed habit is that during the course of work people get engrossed and slowly moves close and close to screen as of they are going to pluck out the problem from the computer and throw it away. Also keep the monitor at appropriate height, this will be soothing to your eye as well as neck. If there are window near your computer terminal and it gives you a good view, every hour try to look out of the window on some distant object for about 2-3 minute. This is good for eye-retina as fatugue must be building up for looking at close range for long hours.
So I would say exercising helps. Whether or not you are one of those who spends long hours in front of the monitor and chugging away at the key board it help. It helps more for some one who spends lot of time on computer. Try very simple exercise for your Neck, Wrist, Thigh, Hip, Elbow etc. Just ensuring that these body parts gets a healthy dose of all possible movement would be good. Don't try to strain your self doing it as aim is not to become a body-builder but to stay fit keeping your job and other responsibilities for spending long hours in front of computer.
Develop and inculcate good food habits. Don't addict your self to junk food to stretch the available time. As you have very less time to burn away calories it will not be good for your body to take in huge amount of junk food as they normally have lot of calories and undesirable quantities of fat.
Thanks...Take care and remain healthy.

Helpless US balmes rising food and oil prices on India and China

2008-05-05T08:19:00.000-07:00

With all the noise all over the world about rising food prices and crude oil prices world leading countries and leaders have started pointing their guns on one another in the blame game. Looks like they are no more able to keep silent after UN and world bank hold US and EU squarely responsible for the rising food prices [Read previous post in the blog].
US president and their admistration blamed India and China for rising food prices. Some of secretaries there after tried to portray the same thing in a positive manner. Read this coverage by an leading Indian newspaper where by it's being reported that US president feels rising affluence in India and China is leading to increased demand for food and this is prime reason for the sky rocketting world food prices. This statement is coming soon after US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's controversial statement about apparent improvement in the diet of Indian and Chinese people. So looks like it's a researched report to the US administration by the federal agencies and watchdogs. They argue that Indian middle class population is more than entire US population. Though they admit that diverting agricultural resources towards biofuel has a part to play but that seems to having a minor impact on the world food prices.
I did not read sharp response from Chinese goverment to these comments but Indian political class cutting across party lines including those who are not in power. I don't understand the silence on this by Chinese authorities who are very fast to rebuke or issue statements otherwise. How ever Indian side has retorted back data supporting their claims in this blame game started by US president. Looks at this report again in the Indian media. Report notes that as per US Department of Agriculture for Yr 2007:-
Total foodgrain consumption — wheat, rice, and all coarse grains like rye, barley etc — by each person in the US is over five times that of an Indian., Twice that of EU and thrice that of China.
In order to do past comparison as US president is blaming increasing prosperity report quotes US per capita grain consumption was 946 kg per year in Yr 2003 which increased to 1046 kg last year in Yr 2007. In comparison comparison, India’s per capita grain consumption has remained static over the same period.
Milk consumption, in fluid form, is 78 kg per year for each person in the US, compared to 36 kg in India and 11 kg in China.
Vegetable oils consumption per person is 41 kg per year in US, while Indians are making do with just 11 kg per year. These are figures for liquid milk, not for cheese, butter, yogurt and milk powders which are consumed in huge proportion in the more advanced countries.
Beef consumption, for example, is 42.6 kg per person per year, compared to a mere 1.6 kg in India and 5.9 kg in China. In the US, 45.4 kg poultry meat is consumed every year by each person, compared to just 1.9 kg in India.
In the European Union, 42.6 kg pork is consumed per person every year, while in the US, 29.7 kgs are consumed. Pork is a staple for Chinese, and so over 35 kg are consumed per person per year. It's negligible in India.
Indian politicians were taking potshots at US president remarks with comments like "President Bush has never been known for his knowledge of economy.....". Looks like these were double meaning words commenting on US president for where he has taken a strong US economy to in current days. Good that US Ambassador David Mulford dismissed suggestions that the president had made any critical comments and was quoted saying "hostile political commentary is not productive". Read another report where he tried to cool tempratures in the political blame game.
Shortly after this US administration has again targetted developing world like India and China for significantly contributing to soaring world crude oil prices. It remains to be seen how Indian media/politicians reacts this time. Looks like this will not draw so much criticism as US was mostly silent during the anti US comments in Indian media about food price except for a comment by US ambassador.

Hypermilling - Chip in to save earth and reduce emission

2008-05-03T01:55:00.000-07:00

This is not an new concept but not too old an concept either. Hypermilling is becoming increasingly popular among drivers who are cost savvy and who are environment conscious. Undoubtebly it's catching everyones attention because of cost saving but think of it - amount of cost you save you contribute equally to save mother earth by reducing CO2 emission and other associated vehicular exhaust emission. Less fossil fuel you burn less you pollute. To me this is the biggest advantage of hypermilling.
I will not be explaining in detail about what hypermilling is as there is lot of material on internet to know how to get started and save your purse and the environment. I will still touch the basic steps so that my friends who read this and did not have time to read other related articles will still start praticing this concept to save money and mother earth. More about that down the line in susequent paragraphs.
Let close our eyes for about 5 to 10 minutes and go back in time as far as we can. You would be seeing your self as a kid playing in the park, walking across field, running across streets. You might be seeing your teenage years along with your favorite bunch of friends or that one special friend and sweetheart of yours walking across the spring holding hand trying to find a cosy corner for romantic chat. Are you with your bunch of favorite friends fishing and cycling. Or is it that you are getting across for shade against the huge tree and enjoying a ball game among mates passing to each other trying to hide from the blazing Sun. If you are old enough you might be seeing yourself teaching your kid at park or fountain or in the mooring who has grown into handsome or beautifull adult human being over time. Okay!!!! Let's come back from the dream. Do you still see those fixtures and natural stuff around you which you had enjoyed once with your lovely companions years back. Chances are that half of those stuff are not around any more. So looks like with time world has been slowly loosing beautifull things in the quest of economic growth and leaving us environmentally poor. If we continue at this pace which seems slow we may not leave what ever remaining left for future generation. Our future generation will be left even more poorer environmenatlly. Is this what we want to do? Don't we want our future generation to live in a more beautifull and natural world with good health and vigour and even longer life span. If you want and cherish all this, please act and be religiously serious about the environmental degradation that is happening around us and negative impact it's having on human life in terms of health and quality. Now lets learn some of the tricks of hypermilling amongst many other activities and ways to save environement and mother earth. After all human as an intelligent creature deserves to live longer on earth. If you compare time humans have been the dominant species on earth it's to small to other dominant species in past like Dinosaurus.
So here are tricks of hypermiling. If you start praticing, you will get nearly 30% more mileage from the tank fills and your purse will start filling 30% heavier and air you breathe will start getting 30% better in quality.
1) Start calculating your vehicle's MPG[Miles per Gallon]. Of course this is not going to increase the MPG performance for your vehicle but you will start becoming conscious and this is what you will measure you hypermiling performance against. How to calculate MPG? Try to crunch the numbers in your mind as you drive away from each gas station fillup.
2) Are you braking a lot? Possibly like other drivers you are applying breaks 10% to 25% more than what is required. To avoid this maintain adequate gap with the vehicle in your front. Braking turns motion into heat via the friction of the brakes, slowing down your car. Fuel was used by your engine to achieve motion. While driving if you can let up some of your thoughts and focus more on driving. Focussing more on driving will lead to apply less brakes.
3) How long is your engine running and your vehicle is static? Minimize the time that you spend with your car stopped. You get ZERO MPG when this happens. Let your foot off the accelerator the moment you see a red light in front of you. And think ahead, even if you don't see a red light: maybe there is a big street coming up, or maybe there is a 'stale' green light. The moment you see brakelights in front of you, take your foot off of the accelerator pedal, or hit the cancel button on your cruise control.
4) Are you in a traffic Jam or creating one? Learn to break traffic Jam. If you master this art of driving smoothly and breaking traffic waves you are not just saving some dollars slip out of your purse but because of you others too are saving their dollars and imagine how immensly you are contributing towards reducing fossil fuel emission. Entire fleet of cars and vehicles behind you are suddenly saving more than 50% of their fuel. So this *article* by William Beaty an electrical engineer in 1998 has the tricks. These have been proven in experiments too. Thanks for prarticing these driving techniques and giving us all clean air to breathe.
5) Fast accelerating burn more fuel. Do you really need to zoom off - I guess no. If you can control your testesterone and urge to zoom off you can save some precious fossil fuel. If you drive an automatic transmission vehicle give an extra second of pause when you switch between break pedal to accelerator pedal. If takes less energy and hence less fuel to speed up a moving object comapred to a static object. Accelearting a bit slowly will enhance the MPG significantly. This is the number you are gunning for a cleaner environment and lesser fuel cost for your trips.
6) Cruise Control. It's not for highways only. Mix it with item#4 above. Cruise control allows for slow accleration and brakes. This means less fuel requirement for doing the same job. How ever please master the cruise control functions of your vehicle before you start using it. Safety comes topmost in driving. Few things about cruise control - it work only above a certain speed. Once you apply the break pedal it's gets disengaged. How does cruise control work?

Thanks for reading thru this. Please pratice and share this article with friends and save mother earth and our environment. Help in the effort to reduce global warming.

Inflation - Biggest of all demon

2008-04-29T05:44:00.000-07:00

Soaring food prices but it's not just food prices and rice in particular whose prices are heating the roof. All other commodities used by society in day to day life has become dearer. It can be that seen that Inflation in most of the countries are running high these days in mid 2008. Let's see India for example and count the steps the govt and central bank is taking to contain inflation. You will find similar reports coming from China and other economies of similar size like Russia and Latin America. Ideas and measures that have been taken by these economies and discussed below can be extended to other similar developing and under developed economies.
1) Letting the local currency appreciate if it is not pegged. It is hoped that this will allow imports to become cheaper as the local currency will appreciate. This is supposed have some cooling effect on the soaring prices. This has been helpful to keep the price rise of imported items low but general public may not be able to feel it as most of Asian economies is highest impacted by crude oil only in the list of items to be imported and crude oil is already subsidized by most of these government. This option can not be used by China and similar economies whose currencies have been pegged against standard currency like USD or EURO or similar basket of currencies.
2) Raising CRR instead of raising Repo or Reverse Repo rates. Most of the economies in region prior to the sub prime bust in US and food problem were registering robust economic growth. This was leading to good poverty eradication in those economies. Though the distribution of newly generated wealth from booming economy was not evenly distributed which was another problem to be addressed in order to stop future social division. Still wealth was flowing into the economy and standard of life was going up. So political brass is very sensitive against killing the growth story the economy was registering. This is leading the government and central bank to raise CRR as a result trying to suck money out of circulation. Thinking of money as another commodity means lesser availability of it will make it costly. So less of this commodity[money] would lead to buy more of other commodity[Rice and other food items]. At least increase in interest rates were done lot more cautiously as it was certain that killing the growth story of the economy means being thrown out of power in next elections/voting.
Seen a report in Indian newspaper reporting increase of CRR.
3) Raising Deposit rates. Economies like China and similar economies where political stability is virtually guaranteed and there are very little if any chances of govt being overthrown have used this option very frequently. This option compared to hiking the CRR leads to controlling the inflation much sooner. More ever China GDP growth rate has been very high and there was worries about government to cool off the economy and avoid over heating. So this mechanism works well for Chinese economy.
4) Removal of duties and banning exports or levying high taxes for exports. Most of economies which import edibles to feed their population had certain duties in place for import. Since then in order to contain inflation and making these items come in more to the country at a cheaper cost government and authorities have abolished the duties or reduced it to bare minimum. This has not been very helpful for all food items but have certainly been helpful for certain food items and commodities like Metals. Reason for this not working for all food items is that economies which were exporting these commodities have banned exports in order to be more cautious and to ensure supply in the local economy in future. In cases where banning exports completely was not feasible because of local of international equations high export taxes have been slapped.
5) Price control by government instead of market determined price for certain commodities. In certain economies government has moved to the extent of fixing the prices of certain food items and commodities like metals to keep the inflation in control. Though these are not prudent measures at all and if last longer than endurance limit of the economy[This again depends upon how robust the economy is] will lead closure of businesses and if it is government control then fiscal deficit ultimately leading to currency devaluation. This is again calling for higher inflation. For weak economies with poor democratic roots and head strong government and authorities these can even lead of hyper inflation causing even more pain to the consumers and producers of the economy.
Many political and economic leaders have been crying foul that problem is emanating because of supply side constraints. Over time demand for these commodities have been increasing either because of population growth world over or because of increasing life standard around the world. So if it is a supply side problem then there are only two solutions :-
A) Increase supply. This would call for more focus and investment in R&D by the economies. Given the current money supply which government have been tightening it will not be an easy thing to do. How ever going through and enduring the hardship in planned and sustained manner is the solution to these kind of systemic problem economies face.
Bring back the resources which have been diverted towards other causes back. There has been an report by UN slamming developed world for doing this and throwing the entire world into this chaos. Developed world have to give and donate and help in the human cause to eradicate poverty world over and improve standard of living in poorer economies.
Additionally some unscrupulous element in the market who are in involved in hoarding. There idea is to make some money to sell later inflation will cause prices of these commodities to rise. Though most of the economies have rules against such practices but corruption makes the implementation more difficult to implement them. As has been traditionally seen Corruption is normally higher in poorer economies.
B) Reduce demand. All the consumers have to give up part of their non essential consumption even if it is affordable for them. This will lead to reduce demand for those items and reduced price. This will allow these resources to be diverted back to produce more essential commodities and increasing their supply.
Other option is teaching common about birth control in poorer economies. This will certainly means in long term demand will decrease and consumers would be reduced.

Tibet - Olympics - Chinese Human Rights Record

2008-04-17T19:20:00.000-07:00

Olympic is the time when China is getting a lot of attention about it human rights abuse. Seeing over recent past and some of statistics, I feel there is something that Chinese can do make people all over the world more comfortable. Lets look at few of these :-
[1] China does not give journalist and media freedom to report and cover events live from it's territory. When problems started in Lhasa on 10th March like in past China started with banning foreign journalist from going to Tibet region. Media in the Chinese territory is in anyway under government control and it decides what to be known to public and world. This many times leads to reports or cases which is and are worse than ground reality. If Chinese government feel what it is doing is the correct thing in case of any event unfolding on it's territory it should allow journalist to report and relay live to keep the world over aware. This has advantages like healthy criticism of government and even NGOs who are always involved in human tragedies world over. Chinese rulers keep thwarting any international comments saying don't involve in internal matter. I think this is one of most important that needs to be changed to get China more integrated to the world socially and politically. Chinese communities living the world over are lovely people and have these in them inherently. They need to tell their relatives back home on main land about this and help them on this.
[2] Chinese support to other rulers who are perceived as human right perpetrators. Chinese are providing support to Darfur in Africa, Junta in Myanmar and Pakistan, Autocrats in North Korea and perceived fundamentalists in Iran. I think there are many more such instances in Africa which lets the world to look upon Chinese rulers as close to demons. All these just sends wrong signal about Chinese rulers to the world at large. Even if Chinese forces would not have dealt high handedly in Tibet to crush the Tibetian protesters in absence of allowing media world over to capture the events it will definitely be perceived so. It's akin to Chinese government thinking world at large is colluding against China if there are support to protesters around the world. China must allow Social and Human values a place along with its economic interests and desire to remain in control of 1/5th of world human population.
[3] I have so many friends who are Chinese. I have so many colleagues who are Chinese. I perceive them as great thinking individuals who love peace and prosperity. They shun violence more than other races of world be it Western civilizations, Middle East, Indian peninsula. I don't know many Africans so can not compare them against Africans. In spite this when you compare China outnumbers it's distant second Iran in Capital punishment. According to an news channel during the Olympics itself about 350 will face the gallows. In yr 2007 officially 470 people were executed in China where as the unofficial estimates puts it at 8000. I think world's oldest civilization and people at land of cradle of most of the ancient knowledge deserves better.
[4] Perceived belief that Chinese government does not all religious freedom. Though Chinese constitution allow religious freedom to Chinese population on ground religious teachings and followers have been reported to suffer a lot. It is widely reported and believed that this manifestation of Chinese government towards all major religions in China is because they perceive it as a threat to their throne and to remain in power in future. Chinese government feels that religious freedom is allowing democratic behaviors to take root and external contact which fuels these even faster.
So, is it that like Zimbabwe and Mynamar, Chinese rulers are just trying to remain in power for ever. If it's so it will taste the character of our Chinese brethren. I believe Chinese population and civilization is good and smart enough to out do any oppression for long.

Tibet, China, Olympics Torch and Future - I want to say something

2008-04-16T06:43:00.000-07:00

These days we all have been reading a great deal about Olympic Torch and Tibet's protest against Chinese oppression. Western world definitely seem to be more and more sympathetic to Tibetians and side with them in their voice against China and human rights violations in Tibet by Chinese government machinery. Media both print and digital including internet is filled with views, events and analysis if and how these will impact Chinese rulers in anyway.
Let's start with hot topic of torch relay disruptions in western world. Media has been reporting that Tibetans had lot of support from French and even some of the French politicians were vocal about their support to Tibetans. Media was mute about state support for the Tibetian in US and UK and for that matter many other countries. Though media and blog have been reporting wide support from human rights groups in most of these countries. Now there has been lot of patriotic and nationalistic[Choose your words] whip in China against these western countries and calls to boycott French products as a tit for tat. Let look at it deeply. I find two forces at play :-
[1] Human Right is a topic close to heart in developed world and obviously that includes western countries. It comes naturally to humans once your basic needs are met and you are better off and you are moving up the value chain. So society there has lot of support for human rights. I think Japan may not be faring as well as other western countries probably because it is surrounded by third world and developing economies.
[2] Money or trade and economic sense is at play when it comes to state support. Compared to other countries France does not have as deep trade relationship with China as US, UK and other countries where Tibetian protest had some or other form of state patronage. Look at the blow links and table on the right hand side.
For Chinese economy France does not appear as top export destination or import origination.
Similarly for French economy China does find a place in top export destination of origination of import.
Now for US economy China a 3rd top export and top import origin and for UK economy 5th top import origination is China.
[3] Chinese response especially from youth brigade again is a very common human psychological reaction. For any country which is economically growing on a scorching pace nationalistic/patriotic feelings run high during these years. Anyway these will die away once the fuel stoking the fire get exhausted which in this case seems to be Olympic games and media to some extent.
I have something for my Tibetian friends as well. I will suggest them to look at Australian and HongKong's history. Both of these were associated with British rule for long long time. Now what I want to take from here is this :- Chinese economy has been developing very fast few years. Chinese government is investing significantly in Tibet region as well. For now it may feel that locals are not benefiting from these but only native Chinese are reaping the benefits. It's all a question of time. Economic prosperity fruit will have to reach you and your entire region. I guess 15 yrs to 20 yrs maximum. There after Tibetians will not have to protest against Chinese as it is being done today. It might become more and more of dialogs and no human right violation. Tibetians may start thinking that it's better to remain integrated with greater China for economic gains and have more and more of autonomy from political, social and religious point of view. 15 to 20 yrs down the line with more economic prosperity these autonomy would come lot more easily but I think not without the economic development of the region. Look how easy was Hong Kong hand over to China by UK or how easily Australia deals with UK monarchy. Think of it - would it have been so easy for Australia and Hong Kong 40 years ago. I feel what Hong Kong and Australia achieved on 40 years Tibet with mighty China will achieve in 15 years.

Rice shortage - Switching to other food will be helpful

2008-04-13T19:50:00.000-07:00

Lately I have been reading lot of articles and concerns about rising inflation in poor countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America. It has always been mentioned that cost of food has gone up. Rice is the staple food in most of these countries. In the news and articles when it came to poorer countries I always saw Rice being mentioned. Wheat hardly being mentioned in similar context. For other food items like edible oil and vegetables which were mentioned at times background was always developed countries or larger economies like China and India.
I thought of trying to really understand what is happening as I have normally seen that there is always a lot of hue and cry and media attention on few things causes more and more attention to it and circle continues and then it fades out all of a sudden once the public is saturated. People don't really understand and human pysche is wired to best run in herd mentality. Anyways, I started looking for historical prices of various staple food items. I found some very useful information. I just believe that my interpretation of the data is correct I managed to extract free of cost on the web.

Historical Rice price. Choose the year from the drop down below the chart.
Historical Wheat price. Choose the year from the drop down below the chart.
Historical Soyabean meal price. Choose the year from the drop down below the chart.
You can choose and look at the other food items historical price as well. There are links below on these pages.

There is no doubt that food prices have increased. But this is an healthy increase as per normal inflation rate and economic cycle. World had seen rapid economic expansion is last 3 to 4 years. Only exception is Rice whose price over last 2 or 3 months that has really shot up. Fundmental supply-demand economics could be at play. Supply seems to have been chocked by natural and artificial reasons. There have been many other articles in the media that land acreage for food production has come down significantly over last 2 to 3 years. How ever I have not read how of this switch has been from Rice producing land acerage. I believe it must have been proportional reduction from all crops and not just Rice. Given this the conundrum is why has Rice price shot up so much over last 3 to 4 months. Another economically detrimental pratice may be the reason for chocking the supply of Rice. Plausibly Hedge Funds trying to make profit and getting more and more involved in commodity market after their profitable run in stock and real estate market. Rice stocks world wide are not maintained deep unlike other food crops like wheat, corn, edible oil. Here stock maintenance by countries I am referring to is not in tonnage but reserves/tonnage production & consuption. This ration seems to be low. This could have lead Hedge Funds and PEs to calculate that it is easiet to manipulate and make profit by trading in Rice.
Two solutions are coming to my mind to help poorer nations and impacted communities :-
1) Diversify the food habit of the population to include other food items like Wheat, Corn and Soyabean. This will reduce the dependency on the Rice and this could help. When the food pool becomes bigger then it would be as much difficult for HFs and PEs to manipulate the market for Rice. Powerful nations and their regulators will come in to stop HFs and PEs.
2) Develop commodity exchange in the region instead of depending on US and London commodity exchanges. This is long term solution and with great economic benefits. With this goverment together can control and regulate economically detrimental trends.
Getting the land acerage back to be devoted to Rice and other food articles from bio diesel is not the long term solution as the set of poor countries facing the Rice price manipulation also bleed because of crude oil cost. Crude oil cost has gone up approximately 3 times in last 5 years since IRAQ invasion. This will only help to stop media outcry as a household without light does not draw as much attention as a house hold with hungry stomach. In reality the house hold and community is infact bleeding more because of hydrocarbon prices in search of a better living condition.

Plight of Maids in Singapore - Economic suppression to begin with

2008-04-12T02:51:00.000-07:00

Over last 5 years of stay in Singapore I have employed several domestic helpers[maids] and have seen and briefly talked to several other maids employed by other friends and colleagues.
Singapore government allows maids from a fixed set of countries to be brought into Singapore. Details of the process, procedure, cost and time can be found from this official website.
There is healthy competition in the market between different agency who supply employers with maids. How ever it seems to be a niche business with very good margin. There is high demand as well in the market for the maids as this allows employers for both the partners to work, to take care of house hold chores, baby sit, look after elders etc, etc. Employing a maid is not very costly either compared to other countries like UK and US where I think it would surely be a luxury to employ a maid legally. Though often it has been seen that employers are not happy with maid to start with because of hidden costs, lost of privacy to some extent at home and other reasons. If we look at the statistics that is produced by CASE majority of the complaints are against maid agencies. Complaints against maid agency out numbers any other category by a huge difference. Any society has mixed set of people there are some employers who are errant and similarly there are some maids who work towards detrimental interest of their employers. How ever something seriously seems to be amiss when it comes to maid agencies. As per me it calls for a reality check by the government agencies.
Now coming to economic hardship that maids have to go at the start of their work life in Singapore which at times doesn't take off and they are thrown into financial chaos. Most of the maids I have talked to including those who I have employed normally pay about 1000 SGD to a broker back home in their countries for getting employed in Singapore. Many a times these ladies have to take loan keeping their house or land or any other similar property as mortgage. These collateral have an average value of about SGD3000 to SGD4000. These loans are not financial transactions under the aegis of any govt approved bank or credit distributing financial organization. These are mostly illegal money lenders who hold clout in the locality maids belong to. This makes these loans very exorbitant and it is kind of guaranteed that if the maid has to return from Singapore for any reason with in about 3 years from taking up work in Singapore she and owner of the collateral will have to forgo the collateral. Moving on and coming to the payments they have to make to the local maid agencies. Normally it's 4 months salary of the maid goes to the maid agency. Maid agency also collects about 4 months salary from the employer. Looking at from employers point of view it may not be a very significant sum but you can think from economic point of view how profitable a biz it is. Biggest barrier for more and more people entering into this biz I think is the moral obligation towards society. This biz looks like you are making money at the cost of other human beings. As per me and my interactions if you are able to deal with this barrier you can have an economically profitable setup in 4 to 6 months of time.
Coming back to the economic plight of the maids. Maids don't end up paying just 4 months of salary but on an average 6 months. This is because agencies will charge additional 2 months for transfer to another employer. As maids are still in learning phase employers often ask for a change.
I have tried talking to 2 of the maid agencies about the deduction that maids have to take from their monthly salary in Singapore. Agencies have always told me that a lot of cost is involved in getting a maid to Singapore and it's not really very profitable. Biggest cost they count is air ticket. Once you tell them these poor maids have paid about 1000 SGD back home for tickets and other expenses. They will promptly tell you they have no idea about this. It's between the maid and their off-shore agent. Putting it in perspective it's like an credit card loan @ 16% of about 10 times of the monthly salary keeping your house as collateral. I am help less and can not do much about but I hope spreading this word will make an impact and some people or organization may come forward with a solution with help from government.

Recovering from flexible bronchoscopy

2008-04-10T01:47:00.000-07:00

It's 7 days now since the day the surgery was done. Left flexible bronchoscopy was performed before VATS to remove the cyst between food pipe and heart. In case of any complication left thoracotomy was to be done to remove the cyst. This in case the cyst would have attached it self to any of the other vital organs in the thorax [upper chest] region of the body and removing it safely using pin hole surgery was not feasible.
Before the surgery I was informed by the surgeon and his team of different complication and some very bad possibilities that can happen to any human undergoing this kind of specialised procedure. This was a bit scary but I think the law dictates that this be informed to the patient. There are very minor possibilities for the following complications and mishap :-
Stroke
Cardiac Arrest
Pneumonia
Post surgery bleeding - At times another surgery is required to fix the cause of bleeding.
...few more that I don't remember...
Anyway I will suggest not to pay much to attention to these as it may increase your anxiety level just before the surgery. I was advised by the doctors that very likely following would happen during the course of recovery after the surgery if no complications happen.
1 day in the ICU
3 days to remove the tubes from the chest
4-5 days of recovery time in the hospital ward
4-5 weeks of rest at home before resuming active duty as an employed adult

Till now I have been lucky that I have been recovering really well. Recovery rate in the hospital was much better than speed at which I am recovering at home. I was not taken to the ICU at all. After about 3 hours of supervision post General Anaesthesia from OT[Operating Room] I was directly brought into the ward. Here when I was back in my sense I was not having pain in the chest area but I was having some irritation in the groin area. I was felling as if I wanted to pass urine. I was also feeling as if my groin is already wet. When I tried to feel the area I found that a pipe is connected to my penis. I asked the attendants I was informed that Urinary catheterization has been done as part of standard process for this surgery. This will keep sucking all the urine and I don't need to pass urine. It would be removed tomorrow. I persisted why is it wet then. They checked and refitted it again as seems there was some leakage happening. They seems adjusted it again and it was so painful. They told me it's fine now and there would be no more urine leakage. They changed the bed linen and they had put me on nappy. Such huge nappies, I had never seen before. I think I was still stable and not really irritated by this pain and uncomfort. I tried to sleep with the pain and constant drive to urinate. I could not sleep at all. I asked the attendants to remove the catheter so that I can pass urine normally and more importantly I can sleep. They told me I have to pass urine and motion on the bed till the tubes from my chests are removed[this was about 3 day away]. But the pain in the penis and constant false signal by body to urinate was really bothering me and I was becoming irritating[my wife tells me] and aggressive in my conversation. I told them I am willing to urinate in urine bottle but this catheter has to be removed for me to sleep. Surgery has been done in chest and why am I being tortured for urinating. They heeded and consulted the doctors. With Doctors consent my catheters were removed. I think it was one of the most painful medical experience of my 32 years of life. Even removing the catheters was so excruciatingly painful. After about 15 mintues of catheter removal urge to urinate had subsided. I was as sleep amidst constant hourly blood pressure and temperature check. Next day morning first chest X-ray was done. Next one again in the evening. Next day morning doctors informed me that X-ray are looking good and there is no more fluid coming out of the tube as well as of now. They will observe for 4-5 hrs and if all goes well tubes would be removed in the after noon. They took the third and last X-Ray in the morning before removing both the tubes from my chest. I was feeling great thinking that I am recovering really fast. Doctors wanted me to be discharged next day[Friday] but then thinking about my naughty kids[twins] at home I thought it's better to stay back for 2 more days and recover here. I was passing motions and urine normally. I feel lucky that I didn't had to pass motion from the hospital bed. While passing urine I use to have burning sensation because of the post effect of catheters. I think only mild problems I was having was :-
Blood in the sputum
Very shallow breathing
Burning sensation while urinating
All of these are not surprising but expected condition after bronchoscopy and VATS and Urinary catheterization. I was discharged on Monday noon time with medicines to take care of pain of varying degrees.
On Tuesday bandage was to be removed from the wound and I would take my shower after about 5 days of sponge bath. When one of the bandages were removed wound still seem not to have healed and so my wife did not dare to remove the bandage from 2nd wound. As was advised in the hospital while being discharged to go to a GP and get the wound cleaned and bandaged again. I could take my shower a day later as I was feeling more comfortable on Wednesday. GP had put water resistant bandage on both the wounds. Other than that two other problem I am having as of now while writing this post are :-
Recurring fever - I am taking Panadol for this about twice daily as when I feel feverish.
Burning sensation while passing urine.
Mild Gastric - This was expected in hospital as side effect of the pain killers. How ever I am having the symptom now. Expecting it to away soon.
This is the reason I feel that recovery in hospital was better compared to home. I guess one of the reason for speedy recovery in hospital was optimum rest before going for the surgery.

Following link provide useful additional information on VAT :-
http://www.health.harvard.edu/diagnostic-tests/video-assisted-thoracic-surgery.htm
Patients Guide to Thoracoscopy
Patients Guide for Cardio Thorasic diseases

First hand experience of Pinhole/keyhole/laprascopic/thoracoscopic surgery

2008-03-30T23:40:00.000-07:00

I will go thru the phases and stages of the events that ultimately is leading me to the hospital for the thoracoscopic surgery on 3rd of April. It wasn't a good experience and I am hoping that it comes to a satisfactory end with this surgery. I am hoping to recover fast and come back to post on my blog again soon around 15th of April.
It was September of 2006 and I went to Raffles hospital for medical checkup as part of pre employment check up. I went to thru a series of test as part of medical tests to confirm my fitness to be able to discharge my duties in good health that included chest X-Ray. I was called next day to collect the X-Ray report and to meet up with the doctor to do some other tests so that doctor could write up my fitness report. Next day upon arrival I was being asked to go for detailed chest X-ray as the radiologist is not able to make decision based on the previous X-ray and wants to re-affirm his suspicision based on this round of X-ray. I went thru another round of chest X-Ray. My appointment with the general physician who was supposed to write my fitness report was cancelled as general physician now needed a advice from thoracic expert and cardiologist. I was referred to Glen Eagles Hospital for expert advice from thoracic experts and cardiologist. In the absence of immediate dates I will have to see them 2 weeks later that's when I was able to get an appointment.
At this time I was in Bangalore[India] for a 2 week vacation. With this news My planned vacation had turned into series of marathons to multiple departments and doctors of Manipal Hospital in Bangalore. In the family there was a bit of palpable tension and every one wanted to get a 2nd advice from doctors in India too. I got an appointment with Thoracic expert. She adviced for CT scan. Next day CT scan was scheduled, this has to be done empty stomach. Day after tomorrow I will have consultation session with the specialist with the CT Scan report. She suspected the dreaded diseases TB[Tuberculosis] as the CT scan were showing 2-3 small scars not just one around that area and probabley in lungs. She adviced for montu[Mantoux test]. Me and family was having a night mare. I am so very normal and fine without any external symptoms. What all is there with in me hiding and waiting to explode. I cam back for next session with the Montu test. It was showing negative. She referred me to surgery section of Thoracic department for advice. There the thoracic surgeon adviced for endoscopy. Oh God!!!! another test next day morning - empty stomach. Next day morning I came back for the endoscopy. It was scheduled at 11 O'clock but for some emeregency that this surgeon had to attend to, I had to wait till 5 in evening. At about 5 PM I went for the endoscopy. It's not a nice experince at all with tubes going down your throat and all. After 2 hours of observation because of the mild anaesthesia during the endoscopy procedure I returned back home. Next appointment was next day noon with the reports of the endoscopy.
After all these tests thoracic sourgeon told that - there is some benign growth beside the food pipe adjacent to the heart. It's about a little less than a inch in length and width. It isn't harmful and you need to keep monitoring it's growth over time. May be you should get endoscopy done every 12 to 18 months where ever you are. In case there is any problem while swallowing food or whomitting or pain around that area get check up done immediately. You can also consider surgery to get it removed. Surgery will be advisable in case there is any further growth in the size. There are very little chances of it becoming malignant[cancerous] or it getting infected. How ever in case this happens it would be critical and immediate surgery would be required because of the proximity to heart and food pipe.
I was back to Singapore for work. I was at Glen Eagles Hospital for expert advice from thoracic experts and cardiologist regarding my fitness to take up the new appointment. Seeing these detailed test reports and finally the advice from the thoracic surgeon I was cleared fit to take up new appointment. How ever they adviced to go for endoscopy every 6-12 months instead of every 12-18 months.
I went for next Endoscopy in August 2007 to Glen Eagles Hospital and they referred me to NUH. No growth was reported and growth was still homogenous and smooth suggesting it's was not malignant. How ever I decided to go for the surgery as it was very frightening and uncomfortable to go for the endoscopy and wait for the results. It was like a bomb waiting to explode. There were some thoughts that at times body automatically absorbs these abnomral growth and it had not happened in my case so it was better to get it cleared thru surgical way. No more tension of this growth turning malignant or getting infected and affecting other body organs near by.

Note: Please also take a look at post titled Going for pin hole heart surgery. Above post is inspired by this post. Though there is no logical relation between both the posts.

Keywords: Some of these fairly technical. Each of them is an hyper link which will help you to learn and know more about it.
Laparoscopic surgery - Laparoscopic surgery, also called minimally invasive surgery (MIS), bandaid surgery, keyhole surgery, or pinhole surgery is a modern surgical technique in which operations in the abdomen are performed through small incisions (usually 0.5-1.5cm) as compared to larger incisions needed in traditional surgical procedures. Laparoscopic surgery includes operations within the abdominal or pelvic cavities, whereas keyhole surgery performed on the thoracic or chest cavity is called thoracoscopic surgery. Laparoscopic and thoracoscopic surgery belong to the broader field of endoscopy.

Chest X-ray - A chest X-ray, commonly abbreviated CXR, is a projection radiograph (X-ray), taken by a radiographer, of the thorax which is used to diagnose problems with that area.

CT Scan - Computed tomography (CT) is a medical imaging method employing tomography. Digital geometry processing is used to generate a three-dimensional image of the inside of an object from a large series of two-dimensional X-ray images taken around a single axis of rotation. The word "tomography" is derived from the Greek tomos (slice) and graphein (to write).

TB[Tuberculosis] - Tuberculosis (abbreviated as TB for tubercle bacillus or Tuberculosis) is a common and deadly infectious disease caused by mycobacteria, mainly Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Tuberculosis most commonly attacks the lungs (as pulmonary TB) but can also affect the central nervous system, the lymphatic system, the circulatory system, the genitourinary system, bones, joints and even the skin. Other mycobacteria such as Mycobacterium bovis, Mycobacterium africanum, Mycobacterium canetti, and Mycobacterium microti can also cause tuberculosis, but these species do not usually infect healthy adults.

Mantoux test - The Mantoux test (or Mantoux screening test, Tuberculin Sensitivity Test, Pirquet test, or PPD test for Purified Protein Derivative) is a diagnostic tool for tuberculosis. The Mantoux test is used in Australia, Canada, The Netherlands, Portugal, and the United States, it is endorsed by the American Thoracic Society and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). It was also used in the USSR, and now most ex-USSR countries. Multiple puncture tests such as the Tine test are not recommended. The Mantoux test is one of the two major tuberculin skin tests for tuberculosis used in the world. Until 2005, the Heaf test was used in the United Kingdom but the Mantoux test is now used.

Is everything okay at my workplace !!! (Part 2)

2008-03-30T03:07:00.000-07:00

Note: This is continuation of the post titled Is everything okay at my workplace !!! (Part 1). Recommended to read it before continuing with this post.

In the mean time our departments previous director had been pulling key staff from our department into the NAIT unit. There he was in charge of setting up a new department. Though the working model for this department was pre established but there were no people as NAIT has moved it's operations in America to a cheaper location from LA. Most of the staff had chosen not to move out of LA to the new cheaper locale for personal and family reasons. He was virtually setting it up from scratch. This was another canabalism on going but I guess it was acceptable as these brilliant team workers moving to NAIT unit from our department would have left anyway after the gruelling frustrations over last 1 and 1/2 years that each and every one in the department is going thru. On top of this some other people had moved to other departments in ASIAIT as the work wise movement were certainly more comfortable and a relief for them. These people also were hell bent on taking their pound of flesh from a crumbling department as I guess they too had felt the pain in the daprtment for about a year or so after the re-org that ASIAIT had gone thru. More ever new directors[one outgoing person was replaced by two] who have been imported from NAIT unit to resurrect our department did not had the chemistry, charishma and connections to rein in the people in other departments. More ever they were also while elephants because of the expat benefits they were entitled to for having moved to ASIAIT unit in Singapore from NAIT in LA.
Mostly two kind of work gets done in the department. First is BAU work - this ensures that production line keeps running with minimum glitch. There is minimal impact to the external customers and problems if any are addressed in a timely manner. Second is new project role out - this is like putting new things on to the production line once the user test, quality test and all checks have been performed. How ever no amount of checks and test can simulate the actual production environment. As I had mentioned our department is an IT shop which works on INTERNET channel. It ensures that biz critical fucntions are available 24*7 to external customers on internet. Department's job is to upgrade and launch new function on the INTERNET channel to our customers. So in this line of biz no amount of load test and checks can simulate the actual production load and pattern. BAU is so important and vital for the entire company which is now being compromised by the new MDs/EDs and unit head. I really fail to understand how can these people be so short sighted. I can't imagine if something like what is happening to British Airways newly opened T5 at heathrow happens on internet channel of our company. Apart from monetary loss it will be severe loss in terms of good will and reputation. Our customers are with us because of the reputation that has been built over years. New customers join because of brand name that is associated with our organization. I think the financial regulators thru out the world will be so severe on the penalty and punishment for the pain/losses that customers will face when the smooth function of the system will be disrupted. Department is involved for taking care of the INTERNET channel across the globe except for North America. Anyways I think the reason for our MDs/EDs and new ASIAIT unit head not focusing on the BAU is that they don't get visibility for this. No visibility means no promotion and no good bonus. Some thing is definitely wrong in the benefits and compensation policy and correction is required. Like I had mentioned in Part-1[previous post] all new roleout go with more than 100% schedule slippage and between 200% to 300% cost over run. In spite of these over runs and slippage each and every launch is done with fanfare and celebrations. I am also part of the celebrations but still at back of my mind it keeps ticking that the department is on the brink of collapse. Process is definitely on the back seat. Thought of ensuring that newly launched product need to serviced well during BAU phase is not in anyone's mind in this team. It's BAU team's headache - why to loose sleep pondering over this.
New EDs/MDs and even quite a few of the VPs/AVPs are senile fellows. They just want to ensure that they have another place to pass about 1/5 of their life out side thier cozy home. They are content with monthly pay package and are least bothered with what is going on around them in the department and impact it will have on the company and brand name. Any thing wrong is promptly passed to their sub-ordinates. Any thing good invokes a steriotypical "Thank You TEAM" note with a wide distrubtion list. In fact in our department like other departments such a population always existed but then the problem that happened now is that they are all sitting at the hot seats and supposedly responsible for bring things back to track. This is making things worse as of now. I always think it's best to cull them during once every 2/3 year trimming that happens in the name of cost cutting in form of golden handshake[Pink slips]. Hardly 5% of the staffs are old timers[This is where entire knowledge base is] and I think most of them including me are running thin on patienece now. Mind is always cluttered with the thaught that should I start looking out and move out of the department and may be move out of the organization as well all together. Every day is fire fighting on new set of problems threatening to bring down entire production line. Work hours have been streched to 14 hrs per day for more than 9 months now. Percentage of sick leave utilization in the department has shot up sharply because of this. Our senile EDs/MDs and VP have made we 5%[old timers] as in charge of BAU as well new product role outs with BAU as main responsibility. Entire team working under us has no knowledge of the systems and processes. There is no time to think of long term view for BAU as time has to be devoted to new role out as each of these are always escalated to highest level and they keep waiting for our time. They remain quite only when they see some thing critical happening on BAU side.
In four days from now I am going for the pin hole surgery and there after it's likely that I will start looking out. Please send a prayer for me and my department.

Is everything okay at my workplace !!! (Part 1)

2008-03-28T04:40:00.000-07:00

It's almost end of the day and I have not been able to think how to convey the things and activities [which can be least but called chaotic] at my work place. It would be a little difficult to comprehend for a reader if you have not faced, heard or gone thru it before at your work place.
It all begin about 2 years back then it was being managed fine by set of people who can be described as mediocore but were passionate about work and hungry to succeed. I would not be taking any names as world is a small place and specially so in the IT[Information technology] world. The guy leading the organization about 2 years back was some one who had joined the organization as the smallest ranked soldier and had grown up there after as the department had grown over time. This department had grown really fast and with it few people grew very very fast and most of the guys who were there at the inception too grew considerably. Now for last 1+ yrs there has been no growth in real sense. He joined the organization when it was being conceived. It was started with about 5-6 people then nearly 5 and 1/2 yrs back. I joined the department when it was about 25 people team in the begining of year 2003. He was leading the department in background even before formally being announced as the director of our department in year 2005. He was not a junior person in terms of experience but since it was a new department just formed he had hands on experince with all the jobs that is done in the department even today on day to day and regular basis. This allowed him to feel each and every movement in veins and nerves, he was able to feel the pulse of the department as it was growing. He along with his direct reports use to tweak the governance model of the department as required based on the need of the department and the environemnt in which department was serving the bigger behemoth conglomorate. This is a place where intra department cannabalism is rampant. This means if the guy steering the department is not alert entire department would vanish in few months. Talking about present - there wouldn't have been the problems that the department is facing if same team would have continued to manage the department or at least a slow transition in the departments management team.
Before I get into present state of sad affairs of the department and I guess I will be more critical about the present mainly because I am not a person who believes in making castles from thin air. Let me tell a bit more about the set of people who were running the department earlier. They were not master planners and had not charted the course for the department for too many years or even months in future. Most of the decisions taken by them were improptu based on the prevailing circumstances. And as per me 70% of these were turning out as winning decisions. As I had mentioned the work place is such, if you draw long term plans your existence is at stake. Investment into anything for each dollar is counted on paper and yes on paper only. If you present a solid plan which shows that any of the project executed by the department would be delayed by 2 more month and it will need XXX $$$s. You[Department] are out of the project. Another team will promise that delivery would be done 2 months before need date and at lower $$$s. This attitude and behavior has led to projects over running twice of the estimated schedule and cost over running 3 times at places[2 times was the norm]. So this team leading this department too had mastered this art of over promising as this was I think the key to survival for the entire depatment. I guess some where higher up[2/3 ladders up] cost and schedule was still being met or may be exceeding their expectation. Anyways what was the result of this environemnt - this had led to no documentation of the any of the things that was being done on a day to day basis. It was all in the minds/actions of the person on job. Every time a new member joining the department had to learn things when the problem[mishap for non techies] had happened and he/she would fire fight to resolve it and in the process learn about it. Even in the good days days a team of people were always on stand-by for the fire fighting.
Things changed when entire organization I mean the "behemoth conglomerate" faced credit crunch. Stocks of the company listed in the US started plunging. Board started questioning the day to day operations of the company. Rising operating cost but falling revenue generation comparted to operating cost. This all was the state when the entire world economy was sanguine and ASIA in particular was shining bright with China and India leading the pack. What did this do the department where I work - Some one up[CIO of the conglomerate] decided to change the way the department was operating and align it in as per new line of thought. Reasoning was that this mehod had worked well in the NA[North America] region for years. These biggies[CIO/MDs/EDs] could not see that the conglomerate is in poor financial health because of poor performance of the NA region. They decided to split the department including other departments in the conglomerate in ASPAC[Asia Pacific] region on the same lines as the setup is in NAIT unit. Director of our department was adamant and against this move. He was given the marching order and as I had told resource canabalism is rampant in this conglomerate. Competition with in the conglomerate is so strong and stiff that social responsibilities and ethical professional behavior can take a walk when work is on mind of the people. These things comes to mind of executives and managers only when they are not working together. Ya so our director was immediately gobbled up by NAIT[North America Information Technology] unit along with a promotion to MD[Managing Director]. I guess the main reason for this was that NAIT and our department had worked very closely in past and NAIT guys had seen the managerial acumen of our director. In the mean time not just our department but entire ASIAIT unit had started falling apart. CIO had resigned and moved on leaving the mesh behind in ASIA which he had exported from America. I guess main reason that this model had failed in ASIAIT is because of the cultural difference between NA and ASIA. I strongly feel that cultures affect the behavior of the people at work too. A working model and setup has to suit the culture and the environment in which it is being applied else it is bound to fail in absence of proper conditioning while moving to a new model. For ASIAIT unit new model had been forcibly thrust upon. New CIO had been appointed in Newyork. There was a big time shuffle between MDs/EDs by this new CIO. He had made a young guy in charge of the entire ASIAIT unit. This guy[new ASIAIT unit head] was no one but previous director of our department who had a meteioric rise because of the success that our department had achieved. He had left the department long back in good hands of the new director who had recently moved to NAIT unit.
Many of the old timers in the department like me are familiar with this old wine[our new ASIAIT unit head] in new pack. He is such a good marketing guy and has so much focus on the financial numbers. He only thinks of present and TODAY and for him TOMORROW NEVER COMES. It is widely believed by many of the us[department old timers] that under the great package in which our department was presented to all when he was moving out things were not very rosey in the department in terms of day to day operation. Thanks to our new director that he had taken charge unofficially and things had started to fall in place. I guess it takes different traits for starting/setting up a shop and running a shop when it's of significant size. Our current ASIAIT unit head[old wine] is very good at starting things but does not seem equally adept at running a bigger unit smoothly. He still is hell bent on meeting his financial numbers and may be in doing so there will be no ASIAIT unit. It might be broken up and packaged to individual Biz units at country level. It is just a question of time when entire company will come to know of and demand it if the purpose for which the department was created will not be met. This time our man[ASIAIT unit head] has taken over some thing which is already has rust and if not handled carefully will certainly fall apart.

Note: It's becoming too long. Continuation of this post can be read by clicking on Is everything okay at my workplace !!! (Part 2)

Going for pin hole heart surgery

2008-03-27T02:40:00.000-07:00

I have finished my pre admission test to get admitted into NUH[National University Hospital]. NUH is one of the well known hospital in Singapore. Next week I would be under going a surgery to preempt possible infection or chances of turning a benign muscular growth malignant. Thanks to advancement in medical science that it will not be an open surgery. It will be done using a technology what is called as "Pin hole surgery". As per surgeons this allows the patient to heel and recover faster as the wound[cut from surgery] is smaller. There are lesser chances of any infection as the area exposed to open air is much smaller given the smaller cut.
I have to go for this surgery to remove some muscular growth between food pipe, arota[this is the main artery coming out of heart] and heart. To explain a little more arteries are the blood vessels in we humans which carry blood from heart to all other body parts. Hearing of such a surgery to your known ones sounds a bit scary. My parents, well-wishers, wife, kids, friends and colleagues are all a bit worried. They are all putting prayers for me before God for fast re-ceovery and every thing gets done smoothly as per surgeons plan. Some not so close people who are aware of it are giving a kind of sympathetic look.
As of even today I hardly feel worried/tense about the major invasion surgeons would be doing on me beside such an in important body organ[Heart]. Anyone looks up with ear focussed and searching for the words to hear about any talk of heart surgery. I have been thinking and trying to analyze why it is so that I am not at all worried about it.
I have taken leave from my work 10 calendar days before the surgery so that my immune system becomes strong to recover and cope up with the additional demand surgery will exert on the body's immune system. I will be on 5-6 weeks of leave after the surgery as well. This will include about 2 week of stay in hospital. I am still happy with the thought of not attending office for such a long period of time.
I think the office has been draining me so much that I don't feel at all worried about going through surgery. In stead I am happy that I will not have to attend office. If this is how other colleagues in office feel, what holds for the future of my department at work place. We will talk about it next writeup.
All reader, please pray and wish for my department as there are about 150 souls suffering with no doctor/surgeon to attend to. After this do pray for my personal physical well being.