Mysterious Ways...

Ganesh was in a hurry. He just saw the bus 83 go towards the terminus, which was about 3 (or 5, depending on the driver/conductors’ moods) stops away. He knew it would be back in another 30 minutes are so, with a 15 minute break. He had planned it in a way that he is on commute for the minimum time required to get to the job interview, so that he can stay with his mother who has been very sick, but getting better. He just could not afford to go all the way to Majestic and take another bus to the industrial locality outside of Bangalore. He had desperately wanted this job – his father had passed away three months ago and he was told he could apply for a job in the same company and will get a fair interview. Ganesh was confident that he could get the job – he was a bright young man and has also gone to the factory with his dad, when his dad had Sunday shifts. It was for a job as a machinist. He had cooked the food that his mother had needed with the help of his 11 year old sister who had gone to school for her exams; she would come home in about another 45 minutes.. His mother was still in the bed, coughing intermittently… He mentally checked everything, it was another 15 minutes to go. He was ready to leave, when his mother started heaving with wracking coughs… He sat her up in the bed, against a pillow and gave her some water and felt her fore-head. She still had slight fever; Ganesh was in a hurry, but her cough was bad – he decided to heat some water up for her; and as he was giving her the hot water, he watched in despair through the window, across the sparse lay-out his bus rolling into the bus-stop… His heart sank… he needed this job desperately and he could see that slip away, if he weren’t there on time… the bus would leave in a minute or so…

Thimme Gowda was lost in thoughts. Sitting on the bench Nair-Tea shop, with the work-day (or night) behind him, he let his mind wander. He was a police-man in the area. He has lived in the area all his life; or atleast it seemed so. He had just reached the position of head-constable. He had no great dreams or ambitions. He lived a simple life, with his wife and son, who will finish engineering in another 6 months and perhaps get a better job than he ever had. Maybe I would take the VRS and retire then, Thimma thought… as he sat on the bench sipping tea before he headed home. He has not done anything spectacular – he assumed those were all reserved for people who had high ambitions and not for himself… Maybe he would retire after doing something like that, he smiled to himself, amused at the thought. He had the night duty last night and told his wife that he would be home for lunch. Retiring would be good. The job has become complicated of late – earlier, he just had to tackle local thieves and at the highest complexity scale, the local goondas. Now, with all the crap going on in the world, they had every kind of fundamentalist to look for. In addition, these days there are also phoren terrorists! His inspector kept telling them to be careful and Bangalore had become a hiding place for every kind of people, particularly, in the suburbs where his police station was situated. There was a dossier that his Inspector got – there were every kind of people in that – Muslim fundamentalist, Hanuman Sena, Tamil separatists added to that local goondas and thieves, who had these days, had become allies against these outsiders as they called the ones in the dossier. How I wish things were as simple as old days; catch a local thief, give a thrashing, lock him up for a day or two and then let him out and you don’t hear back from him for another 3 months or so; and then the cycle repeats… In spite of all of these, Thimma had still wanted to do his job honestly, still believed that he could make a difference to honest people, who needed help, in the locality… As he was sipping the tea, he saw the 83 come to a halt at the bus-stop ahead…

Rafiq Ashraf was the typical guy with in-your-face-attitude; which these days was worn in the lapel as a badge of honour and as the face of New India! He worked in a call-center, had the money to throw away. Although, he just could barely get past his PU, he thought he knew more than everyone around him, since he spoke English with an accent, thanks to the call-center training. He belonged to the neo-youth that thought everything was wrong around them, without giving a thought as to what they are doing that adds to the faulty lines in the canvas. Like the rest in those elite, he too believed the money gave him the right to be arrogant. He was packed at the back in the company car, a standard Tata Sumo that ferries them to the company, to the 2’0 clock shift. After his work at 11PM last night, he had a late-nighter where he had lot to drink and a very little to eat – He had stopped on the way back, bought a few bananas; he recalled eating a few of those bananas on the way back in the auto-rickshaw and tossing the skins somewhere on the road. He had woken up with a splitting headache and a total hangover, using the deodorant instead of a shower and was in the taxi at the back-seat, hungry, with just one left-over banana. He saw his taxi-driver overtake the other vehicles, with the reckless abandon that he was used to and he kind of enjoyed it – as their speed made the other road-users scurry, like scared cockroaches he thought. He was finished with the banana; as the car sped and swerved to right side of the road to overtake yet another driver (“scared wimp”), he nonchalantly tossed the banana skin out of the window and it plopped on the road… The taxi hit a pot-hole and shook him up, as his head knocked against the side of the car, exacerbating his head-ache; Rafiq cursed the Government, driver, and the truck drivers and everyone around him for lack of civic responsibility. As his car overtook the almost stationery bus, he saw his car swerve back on the left side to avoid the oncoming truck and was heading almost straight at one of the guys who seemed to be sprinting…

Kulasegaran alias Sekar was living in the suburbs of Bangalore. He had taken a boat from Sri Lanka about a year ago, fleeing the Government troops, landed in an unmarked spot in the vast shoreline. With a little help from his friends, had gotten a new identity as Sekar, had moved several places and finally into the suburbia of Bangalore and had gotten lost in the milieu. Today, he had gone to the Terminus to get to the post-office and to the courier drop-off, to mail something back to his handlers elsewhere. He had gotten a specific instruction; since he was he was here, he might as well, eliminate one of the opponents. When going out, he usually carried two things – a gun and his Cyanide capsule. But the past year has been so peaceful, he didn’t bother to carry his Cyanide, just his gun. Today he was coming back from the terminus in the 83 bus – a standard guy who went about his business (as people thought he was doing). He was still in a call on his mobile as he got down on his stop – he didn’t notice that his bag had swung and knocked down an old man’s crutch, making the old man lose his balance. Had Kulasegaran noticed that, he would definitely have helped the old man and perhaps taken good care of him and helped to his destination… Unfortunately he did not!

…Thimma was watching the bus roll to a stop just ahead of the tea-shop. As usual there was the buzz around the back-entrance as people wanting to get down and board at the same time, but with a slow and painful progress. How about a bit of order to make it easy for all, thought Thimma. To add to the spectacle, there was an old man who was walking on the side of the road with a crutch, had stopped to the let the crown diffuse and he was watching the people get on and down through his thick glasses leaning on the crutch, waiting for the bus to leave so that he can hobble on his path. Thimma watched a guy, who looked quite educated, dressed neatly get down from the bus, talking on his phone and knocking down the crutch and the old man but didn’t bother to stop to help. That made Thimma furious and indignant. He kept his tea glass down, got-up from the bench, moving swiftly to confront the man…

… Ganesh was in a panic. He just cannot afford to miss the bus. Through the window, he saw the bus roll to a stop. As he began to leave his mother started coughing again – Ganesh was torn on what to do – maybe he would borrow money from someone and take an auto, but who? He was already in debt, with everyone… Fortunately, he watched his mother’s cough stop; he quickly told his propped mother that he had more hot water on the stool nearby and picked his bag, rushed out; the bus was still stationary, it would take about 2-3 minutes for him to clear the empty space between his lay-out and the bus-stop…His heart sank as the bus began to move…

…Rafiq’s nonchalance, in what seemed to be an eternity, slowly turned into horror, as he found that his driver was losing control of the car, as the car’s path would take dangerously close to the man who was sprinting. He wasn’t sure if the driver had noticed the man; the man seemed to slip on something and fell right on the path-way of the car; Rafiq could see his driver brake hard, the car screeching to a halt, careening a bit and hit the man with a sickening thud and the taxi losing control and heading for a lamp-post; when it hit the lamp-post, Rafiq was thrown into the back of the front seat, headlong first. It opened up a nasty gash and the blood started pouring… The splitting head-ache would not be his greatest pain for a while…

…Kulasegaran could not afford to get caught. He started running after he had evinced interest with the people around. His mind raced; he would brandish his gun, steal one of the countless bikes parked and make his get-a-way. He stopped running, pivoted quickly, but found that his leg gave way, as he stepped on something squishy – it was a mushy banana skin with half-eaten banana, he slipped; to his horror, he saw one of the Tata-Sumo heading his way; it hit him at his knee, probably broke his leg and threw him off balance and his gun flying the other way! Today, he wasn’t carrying his cyanide capsule!

…Ganesh was about 100 yards away as the bus started moving; and with that his hopes of being on time for the interview and the job! As the bus was eclipsed by a house, he saw it slow down. Ganesh raced at full tilt and got to the back of the bus, that had stopped completely now; as he was boarding, he saw an accident in front of the bus, where people had milled around a Tata Sumo; as he boarded the bus, he saw a panting policeman run past the bus towards the accident scene. After a few minutes of milling around, the bus started rolling. Ganesh heaved a big sigh of relief!

…Thimme Gowda alias Thimma was the star of the small police station an several other adjoining stations. He was scheduled to meet the Commishner a day later. He was lauded as a brave policeman, who with a lati had caught a dreaded terrorist with a gun; Every government that Thimma voted for and didn’t vote for and every politician that he liked and disliked, had promised him cash reward. Thimma felt as if the Gods had smiled at him just on the eve of the retirement.

The Weekend Cycle.

Graph made possible by graphjam.com

Sunday... sum musings !!!

• Sunday afternoon - the cusp where excitement and inspiration slowly turns into perspiration, looking to the week ahead...
• But even tomorrow would be the first day for rest of my life... (and with the additional one day behind me, bit more of past data to help me in my decisions and what I want to do), exploring what He has in store for us...
• But, God moves in not so mysterious ways - its for a  reason; that is an opportunity that our simple minds are yet to fathom and see
  
• And being lucky with the opportunity being at the right time, right place... and more importantly with the right preparation...
• Right prep making an honest effort at the key variables (x, the efort and y, the attitude) we control and be aware of the "K", that we do not...
• Playing our role in the game, that is much bigger than our own cause...
• ...Believing our cause is a miniscule pixel in the vast expanse of the canvas; miniscule but NOT a trivial piece the overall big picture of the existence of this universe...

...Sunday, bloody Sunday, as U2 would sing; or Sunday, bloody boring Sunday !!!

Director Top Talent !

Blogging after a long time - someone had forwarded me the link to the new Bala's movie - Naan Kadavul. Being a big fan of Bala, am looking forward to seeing the movie; after having seen Nandha several times and enjoyed Pithamagan. I have seen Sethu a long time ago too. In fact he made actors out of Vikram and Surya. Ajith was supposed to act in Nan Kadavul and it was said NK would do to Ajith what Nanda did to Surya and Sethu to Vikram, but Ajith backed out (and that had several other issues)... Given the pedigreee, Naan Kadavul should be a must-watch movie...

Then I thought back about the directors in Tamil movies. Here are some that I've enjoyed seeing over the past few years. These are some of Tamil Directors, who do make some really good films, but dont get noticed on national stage:

Bala: Outstanding director, but with a really dark outlook - if you are a fan of Pink Floyd and Roger Waters, you would love Bala. He weaves an amazing story together; the actors really fade into the background of the characters. Technically brilliant, with no frames wasted and no characters extraneous. Very very low noise/signal ratio. If only, he makes a movie, with more positivity like the one he produced - Mayavi (who else... with Surya); I suppose he needs to make peace with his urge of "poetic justice" thing and take some creative liberty !

Cheran: Pretty good, could be as good as Bala, if not for his first love of acting; apparently he wanted to be an actor, couldn't make it and then went on to become a director. He has several very very good movies. Pandavar Bhoomi, Solla maranda Kadhai, Porkalam, Autograph (a bit long, believe could have made the Sneha part a bit more terse) and Thavamai Thavamirundhu, aided by some brilliant acting by Rajkiran; if only Cheran had foregone his part (of eloping, suffering etc), the film would have been truly outstanding. His inability to make it as an actor when he started out, should have given him the message ! Of course, few friends I know didn't like the movie - their argument being why pay money to cry through the movie ? However, of late, seems to have run out of material with Maya Kannadi. I'm yet to see Pirivom Sandipom.

Radha Mohan: A new director; so far has combined well with Duet movies (Prakash Raj's production company) - Azhagiyae Theeyae was the first one - usual off-beat softie, a decent one. Then came Mozhi, which I had covered elsewhere in this blog; it impressed me a lot; the characters, storyline, dialogues, songs - each dovetailed perfectly into a well orchestrated symphony. He has recently done a another out of the box movie - exploring father-daughter relationship - Abiyum-Naanum... Stand-alone, it might be a good movie, but somehow it would get seen through the lens of Mozhi; I believe even Radhamohan had done that; seems like he felt a heavy responsibility to fit into a genre and tried hard to to be as good as Mozhi.

Ameer: He of Bala's understudy. He seems to be more versatile and makes films of all kinds - Mounam Pesiyadhae (an entertainer), Ram (serious subject with "autistic" as an hero) and Paruthi Veeran (somewhat mirroring Bala's style of story-telling, complete with a dark ending). Paruthi Veeran, with the village background and Karthik performing like a seasoned actor on his debut was worth watching. It was kind of throwback to Bharathi Raja's Padhinaaru Vayadhinilae kind of set-up ! Some trivia about Paruthi Veeran - pre-release, it had gotten into some controversy around money, and Ameer who was very close to the Sivakumar's family split with them, after this movie.

Myskkin (Or Mishkin): Possibly, the new emerging talent - with Chithiram Pesudhadi and Anjaathae - IMO, both were very intriguing with some unexpected twists - the one in CP was brilliant; He seems to have lots and lots of ideas and comes across as struggling to fit all of them in the same frame. He also chooses some unknown actors - Naren and Bhavana for Chithiram Pesudhadi, who were very very irritatinlgy loud in the movie; In Anjaathae, Naren, Ajmal Ameer (who was passable as Krupa) - and Prasanna who, in my opinion was terribly miscast as the villain. Additionally, I also think Mishkin works with very poor team; usually you find some of the editing amateurish, screen-play redundancy, camera angles puzzling. If only he had a good technical team, he would come across lot more professional; and perhaps a better product packaged well all around.

Venkat Prabhu:

He of bit-characters-in-Vijay movies and he of son-of-Gangai-Amaran fame. He is the up and

coming director who looks very promising. Much like Radhamohan-Prakash Raj combine, he seems to have struck a good rapport with S.P.Charan (he of S.P.Balasubramaniam's-Son fame). His first movie Chennai-600028, was funny (thanks his to his brother Premgee, narrative, dialogues and screen-play), very cogently constructed and narrated. Some good scenes, with funny twists, down to earth dialogues ("Dei, leg side'lae podathada"..."eppadi pottalum, adikarangada") made the movie lovable. His second movie was Saroja. If you didn't know its a rip-off from an English movie, it is a good movie pictured well. If you forgive the start trying to woo the college folks, its quite taut thriller, building up the intensity slowly. Lets see what he comes up the 3rd time, now that everyone knows that the 2nd movie is a rip-off.

Vasanth: discovered him recently :) with Rhythm... Need to look at his other movies

If you are not looking for story lines, but want to take your brain off and get completely entertained, look for these directors; there are pure, 100%, unadulterated entertainers... like Hari (Thamizh, Saami, Aaru, Thamiraiparani), A.R.Murugadoss (Ghajini), Dharani (Dhil, Dhool, Gilli), Perarasu (Sivakasi), Lingusaamy (Anandam, Run, Sandaikozhi, Beema) K.S Ravikumar (who is fun to watch - has directed quite a few Kamal, Rajni movies)...Gautham Menon started well, but has hit a plateau. All of them have their flashes of brilliance and some of their movies stand-out.

And ofcourse, not talked about Maniratnam - i thought he was over-rated, anyways, because of the urban appeal !! And after Mouna Ragam and Nayagan, imo, he kind of lost it.

Deep Thoughts !

Not to be anywhere close to the original Deep thoughts !

...but my question, should I leave January 2009, unblogged ?!

Reach for the Skies !

On the way to Lake Tahoe sometime in summer !! 

Slow down, Cross Roads Ahead !

Musing over
a shot of expresso...
I had felt
a tug on legs
Jokes on me,
Thank you Lord...
Dusting myself up,
Left behind,
Ahead of me,
Is that life ?

Gentle knock,
in my head
Feeling that bump,
I see
besides me...
Opportunity!
I'm told
Life's a circle...
I'll board it
the next time around.

A shot of expresso,
lazy pain expressed
in mutilated pottery!!

Genius Vs Genius - Who is better ?

I’ve grown seeing Borg and Mac play and win Wimbledons. Then when the TV was truly in India fell in love with the beauty and precision with the serve and volleys in the 80’s. To me it was a combination of Art and Engineering coming together! McEnroe, Edberg, Becker, Henman (to some extent) were all masters at that. They brought a kind of wistful romanticism into Tennis…

…Then came this kid along – as a 19 year old winning the first US open in 1990 – he was good at that time, but personally I thought he would be in the top 10 player. He didn’t win another grand slam for another three years; and then it rained. Pete Sampras was a sight to behold. In the era when you needed to be bad and loud to be noticed, he was boring and great. To me, it was just good enough to watch his game. Serve, move in and Volley, finish. Go back, serve and iterate until win. In the mean time, on the opponents serve, unleash that ferocious tongue-hanging-out cross-court winner, killing the opponent flat footed.  Or swift and bleeding cuts with the one-handed back-hand… He was unparalleled with his single minded focus and pursuit of greatness. Perhaps one thing that can be held against him was he was never good at clay. He has never even played a French Open final. I believe the closest he came to it was in 1996 when he had a great preparation on clay, playing Russia in the Davis cup (IIRC) and he beat the clay-court specialist (was it Kafelnikov ?) in the 5^th match and in 5 sets. On court, although he had his vulnerable moments – when his coach and mentor Tim Gullikson was battling cancer and was critical; and playing against Courier in Australian open and a fan calling out, “Do it for Tim!” – from there on it was gut-wrenching to watch – he cried, cried and cried through rest of the match and demolished Courier from there on.  He ended up with 14 Grand Slams – 7 Wimbledon, 2 Australian and 5 US open. He would have won 8 wimbledons in a row, if not for a loss to another up and coming genius…

…Roger Federer. If Sampras was a complete serve and volleyer, Federer seemed to be complete all-court player. He is graceful, quietly confident without being arrogant, moved as well as Sampras, has the same forehand as Sampras, has a backhand that was amazing when on song - (in this youtube video line, watch for the amazing backhand flick winner) and all over the place when the timing was off. He has a serve that was very deceptive; he seems to use his wrist a lot more to generate incredible racquet speed. His movement in the court is graceful and with his sense of anticipation, minimalistic – he seems to be there before the ball gets there; that also perhaps explained why he was healthy and injury-free during his peak. If I’ve one doubt about Federer’s game, it is the serve and volley – I’m not sure if he is in the same class as Sampras (or Edberg or Becker) was. I used to joke to my friend that Federer starts practicing for French open throughout the year by staying at the baseline and winning just as easy out with ground strokes, some of them just incredible and defying reality. The 4 years, from 2004 to end 2007, were Federer years; perhaps for the first time in recent years there was a complete domination of one player in an individual sport – there were others too, with Nadal being in the fore-front. This was the time, when the aura of Federer was good enough for him to go to a 5-set match with a 1-set lead; the opponents seemed to come to the match with a resignation of defeat. From there, it always seemed the opponents had to win 3 out 4 sets, which was impossible. Of late, there is a marked decline in his wins – not sure if it is due to his game decline or his health issues or if the opponents have caught up – definitely Nadal seemed to have caught up. One dimension that stands out in favor of Federer when compared to Sampras is this – Federer reached three consecutive French open finals (the streak that was a started with a semifinal appearance). And in all the three he had lost out to Nadal – who possibly, after his time, would be known as the greatest clay court player ever (Sidenote: I had a fortune of watching live in Chennai in 2007). We can safely say, at his peak, Federer was the best Grass court and hard-court player and 2^nd best in the Clay-court.  For the record, Federer now has 13 Grand-slams, one shy of Sampras’ – 5 Wimbledon, 5 US Open and 3 Australian.

Watching some of the games with couple of friends and in discussions, usually the discussion around who is greater would surface. I tried to do a mathematical compare of the two, based on their wins.

Here goes. The below table assigns points per Grand Slam wins and bonus points:

The table is self-explanatory - The Grand Slams carry the most points, ATP Masters half of that and the ATP tourney half of ATP masters (I think ATP points are similar - 1000 for GS winner, 500 for ATP Masters and 250 for normal tourneys). Qualifying for Masters gets a point. Finally, #1 ranking gets a point for every week.

Using this, here are the tables for both Sampras and Federer. For the “Years at Peak”, I looked at their number of years they have been within top-10.

Federer:

Sampras:

So what does this mean ?

Although in points per year, Federer seemed to be much ahead, I’ve no doubt that would fall in the next few years, when he continues to play to beat Sampras’ grand-slam record. Also, if he does that in the next two or three years, I’m not sure if he would have the same motivation to play any longer. I believe Federer would probably retire earlier than Sampras, so he would always have an advantage on points per year – ofcourse the extreme case being that he wins nothing in the next 2-3 years.

In conclusion; I loved watching and was a great fan of both of these geniuses; I’d like Federer to also get 14 grand-slams and retire; perhaps for his French-open deeds, may be get to 15. Both are geniuses and we were lucky to have one follow the other – it leaves space for lesser mortals like us to work the spreadsheets! The versus should hardly matter !!!

5C's of Problem Solving in a Complex Space...

I’ve used a framework (5Cs) that I’ve come up with to solve some complex problems – both in professional life and personal life… I’ve solved and am in the process of resolution for a few of them using this concept. Although you could live without complex issues, at one level these are exciting and keep life interesting.

When I had first inherently started using the model of 5Cs approach to a solve a problem, I did not have a knowledge on Cynefin framework. However, understanding the Cynefin framework, gave me further clarity as to when to use the 5Cs method and when to use other methods like reductionism etc.

My first approach to a problem is to step back and think and place it in the Cynefin Framework. Although I had inherently used the 5Cs framework, the knowledge of this tool has given me more clarity. Cynefin framework essentially divides the problems into 4 quadrants – Simple, complicated, complex and chaotic – essentially a problem can be based on how much line of sight you can draw between cause and effect. The further the cause and effect are, the problem tends to be in complex or chaotic domain. Cynefin framework also talks about complicated problem could be solved by reductionism, where as different approaches are required for problems in the complex quadrant.

Looking at complex problems, where we cannot clearly draw a connection between cause and effect, I use the 5C framework mentally to discover, construct and craft solutions.

1. Compartmentalize

The first C is Compartmentalize the problem. A complex problem could have lot of extraneous information, corner cases that can appear central to the problem thus only serving to introduce a high noise ratio. Hence, it is key for us to compartmentalize the problem into several cores (fewer the better) and excluding those noises. This is not linear reductionism approach – the problem itself not broken down, where the sum of the parts is equal to the whole; the cores have similar complexity to that of whole, but perhaps at a lower scale. The core at the center has higher clarity and at the edges it could be blurry. Imagine core to be something similar to fractal - a piece of similar shape although a bit smaller in scale.

2. Constrain

Once the problem is compartmentalized into multiple cores, the next C is to Constrain the core. Name those variables that have an impact to this specific core; including dependencies amongst these variables. Analyze in-depth to out the variables; but use the 80-20 rule to name the variables that only has bigger impact on the result; for now ignore the weaker influencers. There would be variables that play across the cores; have cognition of that fact, but for now keep them in the back-burner; you will bring them to the fore-front later on.

3. Contain

The third C is the Contain. The fact that it is a complex problem implies that there will be dependencies across the cores. But it is also important to use the same approach and contain the problem within the core. Minimize the interfaces across the core; eliminate dependencies across the cores as much as possible and as much as a solution allows for the specific core. As we are looking to contain the core and ignore few of the variables, it is possible that the solution that we would have come up with would be incomplete to a certain extent. Let us live with it for now.

Now the core is small enough for it to be solved, although the complexity of the core (much like fractal doesn't lose its shape) is not diminished – the scale could be lower. This is where we use whatever standard methodology for any solution - analytics, empirical, statistical etc. By resolving multiple cores, we perhaps have reached much more clarity on a larger part of the problem that we started with. There would still be areas of holes – that’s where the next C comes in.

4. Connect

Once the cores are resolved, we are going to have few loose threads, the ones we left in the backburner – some part of solution that seems not in place or fitting in right since it has the dependency on another core or an adjacent one. Now its time to Connect; and introduce the variables (from the back-burner) and across the cores – this is where one looks as each core as a puzzle piece and then start fitting the edges together. Now is the time to connect them – its like building a complex Lego pieces with dovetail joints… We now work on the connections to make the cores cohesive enough with each other – start introducing the variables that now run across the cores – go back tune the cores to manage the impact of the new variables. Re-work the core; as we do that, typically I found the blurry edges are places where I needed to work on; the center of the core remains untouched in most cases. In exceptions, it would take a couple of iterations.

5. Complete

Once you have the connections done, we now Complete the solution. The Complete phase is also the phase, I use, what I call, the “Bounce-High and Bounce-Low” method. We have to keep moving between big picture and details – bounce-high for a big picture view to see if the resolution of cores put together does solve the problem and bounce-low to see if the connectors are indeed fitting well enough to make the solution right. This is key, since the solution could be neither solved at a big picture level nor at details level – its like keep a 10 ft x 10 ft puzzle pieces… One cannot solve a large puzzle piece by either staying at 1000 feet level; nor can one put together the puzzle pieces, by just look connector end of the pieces. 

The Final “C” – the sixth C – is the Context. But that is an assumption that I have all the time – it is a necessary condition for a problem resolution (so, it should really be the zero’th C). The context in which the problem exists needs to be understood. Without that understanding, my belief is that the people do not acquire the resiliency required to live in the same space in which the complex problem exists. Building that context is very important and essential – it also gives us the ability to look at things in the shades of grey and not just black and white.

Sighting Surya

It was about 11AM in the morning – I was taking the Chennai MRTS for the first time today. I had gotten a job at a software company in the ITPL at Velachery. Since this was the first day at the job, this company had asked us to report at 1PM – I found it unusual, but when asked, I was told it was easy to get all the HR formalities done at that time, with the availability of a bank representative to aid us open the salary account and so on and so forth (thus spake the HR person who had made me the offer 2 weeks ago).  I had worked for about 2 years in a small company in Coimbatore, staying with parents; and then took up an offer at Chennai as the company seemed to be bigger and the work seemed to be interesting – in the product creation area as against IT services.

So, the planets had aligned and here I was waiting at the Thiruvallikeni MRTS station. I was going to join a couple of my college mates who had taken up a house nearer to Velachery, but both of them were out of the country and one of them was returning in a month’s time. Until then, I was to stay with a distant relative of mine, who had children in college. It was not the perfect situation I would have preferred, but I was ready to roll with it until one of the friends returned; atleast the relatives kids are older !

Since it was late-morning, the office-growing crowd was thin at the station. So was the MRTS train that bawled into the station. I got into general compartment, which was just half-full (I am not the one ever to be blamed for seeing things half-empty…). I got in, made myself comfortable in a window seat and took out the book I was reading. As I opened the book, I heard my cell phone ring…

I picked it up – it showed my house number, should be mom. As I picked the phone up, I let my eyes rove absent-mindedly… I almost gasped – was that guy on the sunny side of the compartment, Surya?

“This is Shalini…”, I answered as a matter of habit and mind being elsewhere. It was mom, wishing me the best on the first day and as she was enquiring about my well-being. I quickly answered my moms few questions and then said byes – I had promised that I will call her later in the day after everything is settled.

I looked at that guy again – He looked very much like Surya in Khaka Khaka !! He had laid his head back on the guardrails of the window and was snoozing – or so it seemed… I took another glance at him. Hmmm… he had serenity in his face – a sort of still calmness that is compelling and makes you look at someone one more time… In his case, I had shamelessly looked many times.

I noticed that he had an ear-plug. There was obviously some music playing, since I could see his fingers drum and his feet tap once in a while. I wonder what music would he be listening – would it be Sheryl Crow that’s on my phone? “Shoot!” I thought – what the heck is this – how long have I been looking at him! I tore myself away, looked out and into the book, that talked about the specifics of product development and management. I had found the book very interesting and absorbing thus far, but in the train, I just could not focus. I was hoping he too was joining my company!

As I looked down at the book, I mentally checked out myself – not bad looking myself, in fact was quite attractive and was told to be photogenic, with a great smile and much greater sense of humor; I was wearing a colorful dress, yet not very stand-out but a simple patterns; I believe it accentuated my personality. I was wearing shades pushed up on to my head. I was wondering if he would see me, when he wakes up or his station comes by.

As the stations rolled on and Taramani was the upcoming one, I discreetly looked myself on my tiny vanity mirror (“looking good”), got up, stole a surreptitious look at Surya – he was still looking handsome, I told myself. I could see early signs of movement on him. I quickly moved and stood in way that I will have to be on his line of sight, just in case he was getting off at the station. As I planted myself on the way, it became quite apparent that he was getting off too… He was taking off his ear plugs and switching off his ipod. I was directly on his way to the door and there is no way he is going to get past me, without looking at me – my heartbeat quickened…

As Surya got up, he looked directly at me, took out his sun-glasses out of his pocket, wore it and took out his stacked white stick, opened it up, tapped it on the ground and moved towards door…

_____________________

Author's Note: Had to use "Surya", since my DW has a crush on him ! :-)

Altruism 101

Someone posted this link in one of the common forum in response to a "complaint" (which was actually set of observations mixed with his own editorial comments)...

http://www.livemint.com/Articles/2008/08/13234230/Taking-responsibility.html

The link has some great reading... However, I hold a view that I'm not sure if its complementary, alternate, contradictory or supplementary to that...

Perhaps some economist expert can explain better, what Adam Smith meant. On the other end of the spectrum (to the link above) was something expounded by Adam Smith in his book "An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations" (terming the concept as invisible hand) - "There is a school of thought in economy which revolves around the idea that every individual necessarily labours to render the annual revenue of the society as great as he can. He generally neither intends to promote the public interest, nor knows how much he is promoting it ... he intends only his own gain, and he is in this, as in many other cases, led to promote an end which was not part of his intention. Nor is it always the worse for society that it was not part of his intention. By pursuing his own interest he frequently promotes that of the society more effectually than when he really intends to promote it"...

(which in turn you see, Russel Crowe, as John Nash, say "Adam Smith is wrong" in the bar, when he and his friends all try to hit on a same women in a bar).

Through this, I'm not saying I'm for or on either side of the spectrum. Given this continuum, I believe people generally think of/about and do what is right for themselves and the society at large. Very few people pick just one (either). If they say so, they are perhaps not telling the truth - that goes for both end of the spectrum, imo.

Vibrant...

Someone who saw this snap said the colors were vibrant and positive...

End of a Rainbow

It was typical hot summer day – as is wont in our part of the world (which, by the way, is Chennai) when its hot, its really sweltering hot. The afternoons before the onset of the sea-breeze are the worst affected – it affects me and my friends more – the ones that lives on the street and off the streets! During such heat (or rain), I take shelter in the shade that the bus stand offers; with my friend, Jimmy, the stray – this was the stray who adopted me – and I named him Jimmy since every dog’s named seemed to be Jimmy or Tommy; I’ve very few needs and usually work when I have to and rest of the time, I sit around the shelter. My home was a makeshift made of paper and remnants of gunny bag, just beside a shelter. Due to the nature of the materials, my home does get renovated more often than any other houses in the world!! I get ignored by all who have their transience presence in the bus-stop. Looked like, Jimmy and I were the permanence in that part of small-world.

Today seemed to be different – I guess, its that time of the year when the first rains show up late in the summer. The hot afternoon seemed to be transforming slowly – there was a distant thunder. The breeze had picked up in strength to a brisk wind, brining in dark clouds from somewhere else and deposited them right overhead. It was cool and sultry. As the afternoon wore on, the college crowd seemed to increase, so were mothers who were going home early from the office. Everyone seemed to have a frown and a worried look on their faces as they looked up to the darkening clouds – there was a smart old man, who was smug in his looks as he was the only one with an umbrella !

Then the drizzle started. In a while the drizzle turned in a down pour – typical of Chennai, quickly water puddle appeared. As the rain poured, there seemed to be a transformation within that shelter – it had turned into a small world itself. Jimmy was curled up besides me, inconspicuous and trying to blend into the backdrop so that his place in shelter would not be taken away by others. I looked around – a fat lady, who seemed to take the whole corner, seemed to deflate herself willingly and give place to another old lady. The three college girls were giggling and talking about something else – at the same time they seemed to enjoy the rain and being consciously careless and get themselves wet. That office guy in the opposite corner, who seemed to peep out to look if the buses were coming, stole a look at the girls every time he did that. The girls conscious of that, increased their giggling frequency – one of them even smiled at the guy. Hmmmmm….

The shelter was getting smaller for the crowd; but everyone seemed to be kind and accommodating as more people filled in. The smart old man with the umbrella, even opened it against a leak in the corner and let another old man to share his umbrella, but at a cost – the other man had to listen to the changing weather patterns in the world and how unusual this rain in Chennai was.

There was a mother with her two kids in the shelter. It looked like on the way back from her office, she had picked her children up from the school. As she was protective of her kids and shielding them from the cold water spray from the heavy rain now, she found another kid, a bit older hit by the spray at the front of the shelter. She took her tiffin box out of the plastic cover and handed that to the boy – the boy thanked her and wore it over his head as a protective cap. Meanwhile, the old man’s umbrella had become another shelter on its own, he had added a small girl and her mom to his vast umbrella, and added them to his audience on global warming. The cycle-rickshaw man, who was in the shelter with others, looked hopefully at the crowd to see if he would get a ride when the rain-stops. He took at a beedi which I’m sure was a substitute for his lunch and started lighting it. Few of the people at the shelter looked at him; the man smiled and put the beedi out. As I watching the world around, I saw this person purposefully threading his way through the crowd towards us. He came near, opened his tiffin box and offered us his uneaten food. Jimmy’s ears perked up and started wagging his tail; I would have wagged mine, if I had one too – we both looked at him thankfully and devoured it down; I had not had anything since morning and the late-summer heat and humidity had taken a toll.

It was an ideal world in that shelter – everyone was benevolent and helping each other. It seemed a vibrant and symbiotic existence there. I thanked the rain, and looked at the people with gratitude, particularly the one who had shared the food with us.

Normalcy was around the door – slowly the rain had stopped to a drizzle and people were now craning their necks to look if their bus was coming. The girls had stopped their giggle, their wet dress a liability now. The rickshaw man who seemed not to have found a customer in the crowd, lit up his beedi to the irritation of others – but he could care less now. The old man had now turned his ire from global warming into the state of Transport Corporation – only now there weren’t any willing listeners – they had turned their back to him. The office guy stepped into a puddle and muttered a curse – he was no longer looking at the girls. The mother with kids wanted to get home early and was looking for an auto; she was irritated by the other kid who threw away the plastic cover that she gave as a shield against rain; at that instance her kid dropped the school bag on the ground and she smacked him.

As the bus appeared, in the horizon, everyone was hopeful – but the bus had a board that announced it was headed to shed and moved on without stopping and in fact seemed to speed-up as it was close to the shelter spraying an unprepared few with puddle water. The character of the shelter had changed definitely – it was clearly more tense and filled with irksome people. Fortunately, within five minutes another bus appeared, but it was so full that it had people hanging out of the door-way. The college girls were able to board the bus through the front door – they guy who had shared his food with us, tried his might to get in, and Jimmy went behind him. The bus started to move and the guy was left behind – as he turned, he stumbled into Jimmy who had followed him; The man was clearly annoyed and angry – he swung his office bag at Jimmy; it hit him on the head – Jimmy gave a loud yelp, continued to wag his tail and scampered from that place.

The rain had stopped, the sun had come out. As the collective mood turned blacker in the shelter, a rainbow had blossomed at the horizon. I wonder at the end of that rainbow, if there was a bus-shelter in a pouring rain.

Bouquet

One of the shrubs in the apartment complex...