Global Citizens

 My wife and I have lived in multiple places, and visited a few countries.. more than twenty, I am guessing. So some reflections about the places, though we are not particularly attached to any place.

Bangalore- great weather, great filter coffee, and many old friends.

Lucknow- good memories, professional and personal, bad weather, great kababs and biryani

Hyderabad- Great biryani, Irani chai, friends and some relatives too.

Delhi- bad weather, good metro service, bad traffic, good friends, positive attitude

Mumbai- bad traffic, efficient train service, professional workers, friends galore

Pune- Bad traffic, good bakarwadi from Chitale, great cultural scene, lots of relatives

Kolkata- Bad weather, good food, new friends who are nice, Chai addas, celebrations with gusto

USA- Some good friends, no domestic help, good National Parks, roads, no railways or autos..

Vietnam- Friendly people, no English, Ha Long Bay is world class

Cambodia- Cheap, Historic, nice buildings

Sri Lanka- Green, beautiful, good beaches, people

Greece- Chaotic, friendly, historic, Sea is amazing, islands too. Good food- Moussaka is my favourite

Amsterdam- Fun place with unique features

Rome, Venice- Good for long walks, bad traffic, Gondola ride like a Shikara in Dal Lake..

Countries I am Aware of

 I became aware of England due to the language that they left behind. Vilayat meant England. There were a few Anglo-Indian families too, when I was growing up. Not sure if there are too many left. But in college days, USA was definitely the dream destination for many. I applied for an M.S. too, but managed to go there later for a Ph.D.- not in engineering, but Management. During stopovers in Europe, visited Greece, Italy, Belgium, France, Switzerland, Germany (West at the time), and Holland. France more intimately, thanks to Anne, a friend from Brittany we met at Clemson. 

Many years later, I have met people from Sri Lanka (have a good friend Samudrika there), Vietnam, Cambodia, Japan, S. Korea, New Zealand, Dubai, Sharjah, Australia, England, Thailand, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, China ( I have a couple of friends there), and so on. 

I am yet to visit Down Under (Covid stole my thunder), and a few countries like China, and South America and Africa. Maybe I will, maybe I won't. But I had friends from Iran, Nigeria and Portugal in my Ph.D. program, and also from Turkey, and a colleague from Venezuela at Greenwood where I taught.

That is not a bad score! Yes, I know there are around 190 countries, but I am just one person..

Astrology Backwards

 This is strictly in the realm of fiction, let me state up front. Since I don't have a name for this technique, I am calling it backwards astrology- rather, Astrology Backwards.

It involves looking back at your life, and telling you what you did, and when. For instance, it will tell me I won a race in the 100 metres in school, in the year 1967. And got a chocolate as a prize. Of course, it will also tell me when I acted like a prize idiot in life, and did not get a reward. So there is a downside.

You might argue that if people kept a diary, they wouldn't need this. Or, with Facebook reminding you what you posted N years ago, you think this technique is worthless. But what about the Kodak moments that got away? For instance, your first awkward speech that you did not record in your memory, your first awkward attempt at dating,...you get what I am getting at, I suppose. Backwards astrology will give you all of that, and more.

Not just people, it will give you the foolish things countries did and when. There seems to be a memory loss in that direction, barring Shashi Tharoor's calculations in the case of British looting India. So it will serve us well to remember these things..particularly when it deals with OTHER countries being foolish. 

So you see, your arguments don't hold water. What, you want to call it History? No, I would argue my name for it is much more compatible with what you get.

Diversity is Amazing

I am amazed at the diversity I have encountered in the human interactions I have had over the fifty nine years I have spent on the planet. Not necessarily boasting, but I have spent significant amounts of time in the four major regions of India, and a few years in the U.S. teaching and studying. While there, had a lot of international students/colleagues too. I visited at least one, Anne, in France at her home in rural France (and HER friend in Paris). Also met an Iranian friend in Malaysia and later, in India. Lots of American friends also invited us (my wife and I) home while we lived there.

It is also obvious while teaching in class, that diversity of age, gender, experience and background (previous education/subjects) usually leads to a richer class experience for all. This is true at least in management, where both technical and non-technical skills are equally important in solving problems.

The U.S. was open to immigrants (still is, compared to a few others, barring Canada and New Zealand/Australia) and has been enriched by those who chose to settle down there and adopt the American lifestyle. A few Indians are also at the top of the academic and corporate ladders there- I know at least a couple of them personally.

One has to wait and watch where the recently-made-fashionable anti-immigrant stance of countries/governments around the world will lead.

USPs of Countries-Part 2

Continuing from where I left off...

Cuba- The cigar is a lasting symbol, though the economy went up in smoke a long time ago.

China- Their English is funny or music to the years, depending on how you look at it. But their political aggression is not.

Indonesia- Good 'bad'minton players- a paradox? And lots of earth-shakes.

Australia- People of dubious ancestry who managed to spoil the gentleman's game with rough play- and the virus has caught on.

Sub-saharan Africa...where is that exactly? Except in reports on poverty, nobody talks about it.

South Africa-Mandela is absolutely the most forgiving man who ever lived. Hats off!

Kenya- the most famous giraffes in the world live here.

Brazil- The Samba, Pele and the annual jamboree on the streets make a heady combo.

Bhutan- They measure the Gross Happiness Index. Could they be the most sensible country on earth? Possibly.

Norway, Sweden, Finland- There's light at the end of six months here, so everyone who lives there must be an optimist!

Egypt- Barring Hindi films (older ones), the only place where Mummies get the respect they deserve!

USPs of Countries

In marketing, we used to have differentiation, which morphed into Unique Selling Propositions or USPs as I morphed into middle age. Brands are supposed to have or unique attributes so that consumers would prefer them over competing brands. Similarly, countries (they are also brands) can develop unique intangible attributes, so that consumers (tourists) or people at large view them accordingly.

Here is an attempt to view some countries through the lens of a distant and disinterested observer.

England- The guys love to talk about the weather. They invented cricket, and their neighbours invented Golf. Shakespeare continues to give an inferiority complex to writers.

France- They like to think they invented love. But who wrote the Kamasutra is a relevant question to ask.

Italy- The word mafia owes its origin to somewhere in Italy. Lions ate men in their colosseums.

Switzerland- Their Banking is famous like the pirates were at one time in the Caribbean. Clocks are out of fashion.

Greece- They used to have a civilisation...

USA- The world's most gluttonous people seem to live here- McDonald's, Coke, Pizza Hut are all really big brands. Why?

India- The sadhus in their Rolls Royces are ready to take on the world, and their wrong ideas about us.

Sri Lanka- Ravan once ruled here, but he can't rule anywhere today, even after changing his spelling to Ra.One.

Will be continued...

Bliss et al

The pursuit of bliss has driven mankind into a variety of activities- from praying to making money, and several others. But a journalist has actually gone to various countries to study how happy people there are. The result is a book, The Geography of Bliss. Written in a very engaging style, it starts with Netherlands, where happiness is a subject of university researchers, to Bhutan, which measures Gross National Happiness rather than Gross National Product, to Switzerland, Qatar, India, and a few other countries in between.

What happens everywhere is quite educational. The Himalayan country of Bhutan itself is a calming influence on visitors and residents alike. They look at life differently, not only materialistically. The residents want monarchy to continue, whereas the king wants to bring in democracy.

Happiness is linked to living in the present, paying attention to what we do, being nice to people, having some money (though not as much as we think), having unpredictability in life (even good things get monotonous after some time?), and above all, feeling you are linked to something or things beyond yourself- the cosmos, or ancestors, or future generations, other animate (or inanimate) beings, etc...

Switzerland is boring, Qatar has no culture (?), India is chaotic but has its fans who feel at home here (I am one), are some of the findings. I am yet to complete the book, but these nuggets of wisdom were endearing.

Happiness also may have something to do with age and marital status (this is my own theory)-children seem to be happy most of the time- the cribbing increases as we age..married people seem happy in spite of cribbing..a paradox?