And then, just like that, I stopped writing. There was increased pressure from work, the twins took up some time and I guess I also lost interest. And then, again, just like that, it all re-started, when I received a call from Mumbai Mirror. They had somehow managed to find me out and Meenal asked me if I would write about Matunga in their "Writer's Bloc" column. Without wasting another second, I took up the offer and here I am…back.
This site continued listing all the Mumbai Mirror, Matunga-based articles till 2006. Somewhere in early 2007, Writer's Bloc died a natural death.
Well, guess what! I am back. I now have a weekly column, titled "An insular mirror into a 40-something's life" that will be published every Saturday, in the same paper. I will keep updating the site each Saturday/Sunday. If anyone wants to receive a notification related to my posts, please mail me at bhavin.mm AT gmail DOT com. And those who are more Facebook inclined can use the link below.
March 06, 2010
Is Negative Thinking Always Bad? Think Again!
The last few weeks have seen a spate of suicides among school-going children in our city, the usual reasons touted being the stress of exams and studies coupled with unrealistic expectations from peers and parents and eventually the inability to cope with these pressures.
An interesting article, in a recent issue of the New York Times, penned by Mr. Jonah Lehrer describes a new theory about depression, put forth by a psychiatrist, Andy Thomson and an evolutionary psychologist, Paul Andrews. According to them, occasional bouts of depression that occur following major setbacks such as a death in the family or extreme pressure at school or work, are actually due to a protective mechanism that kicks in spontaneously to help cope with these problems.
The article quotes studies where functional MRI in patients with depression, has shown activation of a part of the pre-frontal cortex whose main role is to help the brain focus intensely on specific thoughts or problems. According to Thomson and Andrews, getting into a funk and spending long hours ruminating and internalizing, actually allows the brain to focus better and to slowly but surely arrive at the correct and appropriate thought-processes that are needed to help bring the person out of the depressive state.
Our seers have also had similar thoughts. Shantanu messaged me this excerpt from Yoga Vashistha, 'There are two types of depression. The first type that results from pining for the things of the world, takes one into a downward spiral to hell. The other type of depression that results from the realization that the external world can never bring lasting happiness, leads to enlightenment. Rejoice O King for your son has the second type of depression’.
Proponents of positive thinking will poo-poo all this. And yet, this so-called “negative thinking”, which is part and parcel of the process of rumination and introspection, is not always undesirable, even though it may take weeks or months to help heal. A counsellor or a psychiatrist with experience and training may be able to speed up this process and help the depressed person navigate his/her problems better, but it is unlikely that drugs will give anything but temporary relief.
What perhaps is an issue with our school-children though is the lack of time and guidance required to cope with the initial bouts of depression and uncertainty. Firstly, the children may not be able to express their feelings and problems and unless parents or teachers pick up warning signs like change in behavior or scholastic performance, they may remain undiagnosed, with potentially terrible consequences. Secondly, if the child does come out with his/her problems and/or the parents or teachers pick up the fact that the child needs help, the solution may still not be forthcoming. It needs aware parents and teachers, willing to make changes in the way they approach the affected child and willing to invest in the time that it takes for the healing to occur. Which then brings us to the third problem. Even if the parents or teachers or counsellors have the time and patience, the external world makes it extremely difficult. The cacophony of stimuli that a child is exposed to these days, willingly or unwillingly, often can prevent any kind of rumination and introspection that would otherwise have been much easier, say 20 years ago.
Slowing down, pulling back and letting things happen on their own, rather than making them happen is often not a bad idea, not just for children, but even for adults, especially when things take a turn for the bad.
Posted by bhavinj at 11:37 AM | Comments (0)
February 26, 2010
Hope: Melanoma, Miracles, Mirages
Amy Harmon is a Pulitzer-prize winning journalist with the New York Times, who writes articles about the "effect of science and technology on American life”.
From Monday to Wednesday earlier this week, the New York Times carried a three-part article written by her, describing the battle between an oncology team and advanced melanoma, a type of skin cancer. It is an amazing write-up on people with metastatic melanoma, the initial failures with a new type of treatment, the sudden and miraculous regression of these tumors, the insidious re-appearance of the nodules and masses after around nine months and then the eventual deaths of many of the patients, all of this strung together by the enthusiasm and relentless efforts of Dr. Keith Flaherty, his team and his colleagues in other institutions. The series explores the complex relationships between the drug industry that is needed to fund the research, the researchers themselves, the oncologists who conduct trials and treat patients, the support staff, melanoma, the cancer in question, the patients and their families.
This article is a must-read for all kinds of people; doctors, cancer victims and their families, scientists and researchers working with drug molecules, pharmaceutical company executives and journalists writing on health-related issues. For the last group, these articles should be an integral part of their training to learn how a health-related story needs to be researched, vetted and written!
One issue that is very striking in Ms. Harmon's series is the extent to which Dr. Flaherty becomes emotionally involved with all his patients. Perhaps this was required so that he could continue to be as enthusiastic as possible to push the treatment through. And perhaps this emotional attachment will help Dr. Flaherty fight hard for the new trials and combination drugs that he wants. But for most doctors and oncologists, this kind of involvement with their patients is extremely difficult and usually comes with the risk of extreme emotional stress.
Most cancers kill. There have been some notable successes in certain kinds of cancers, but for the most part, the statistics are still grim. This also makes medical oncology one of the most depressing branches to be in, since eventually most of the patients die. Therefore, it is necessary for the treating doctors to maintain a certain level of emotional detachment, so that they can maintain their own sanity. Every patient has a story that can tug at the hardest hearts, but at some point all doctors, not just oncologists need to draw a line at the amount of involvement they are willing to accept. This does not mean that doctors should lack in empathy or be callous, but it does mean that a certain amount of distancing is required.
And yet some patients get through to even the most-detached doctors. And so when you meet the 30-something woman, a lymphoma survivor for 15-odd years, with a 3-year old son, now coming with bilateral advanced breast cancer due to the radiotherapy used to cure the lymphoma, you can't but help feel horrible for the rest of the day. Which then only leads to more problems when dealing with the rest of the patients that day, for no fault of theirs.
In the end though, Ms. Harmon's series is about hope. Hope that somehow some form of treatment will cure cancer, that some drug will halt the spread, that one of the drugs in the research pipeline will turn out to be "the" one and that perhaps it will be this particular patient that will beat the odds!
Posted by bhavinj at 05:32 PM | Comments (0)
February 19, 2010
Making A Difference - Changing Lives and Being Changed as Well
When you can make a difference to someone's life, when you can influence peoples' behavior for the better and have the ability to do this repeatedly, it changes you as well. Not too many people in this world can claim to have positively changed the lives of people who are not just their relatives and friends. Sure, doctors do this every day, as do perhaps priests and counselors, but that's part of their regular, daily job. The true challenge and therefore the elation comes when the activity is not just another thing one does daily, but requires a significant adjustment in one’s behavior and routine.
A bunch of medical students realized this last month.
About a month ago, Piramal Healthcare funded a social initiative competition, as part of its "Helpyourbody" campaign. A team of 10 students from each medical college in Mumbai, had to work on a social project in the field of chronic cardiovascular diseases and diabetes. Six teams participated and the projects they did ranged from working with BEST employees, to analyzing the health of police personnel in Zone 1, to conducting health checkups in a BPO and creating an anti-smoking awareness campaign.
Two of the teams stood out. The team from TNMC, the college attached to Nair Hospital, went to 12 schools with the slogan, "Catch 'em young", aiming to educate students in their formative years about the ill effects of poor food habits, smoking, lack of exercise, etc, thereby hoping to positively influence their lifestyles. Their interactive sessions with the students became so popular that they now receive daily calls from parents, teachers and other schools to do similar programs. They reached out to more than 3000 students and through them to around 6000 adults and then topped these with a well-attended cycle rally and then an inter-school competition. The program's success was quite unanticipated and took the medical students completely by surprise. They had never expected that this idea of bringing health issues to school children would snowball into an actual positive movement and make such a significant difference, in the bargain changing their perspectives as well.
The team from LTMMC, the college attached to Sion Hospital, took a more focused approach. It worked on the "Gruhini" concept, the idea being that if the homemakers' health issues were taken care off, they in turn would be able to influence the whole family. They went to Dosti Acres in Wadala and spent 9 evenings with about 300 womenfolk. Through various activities, which included a walkathon, a healthy cooking contest and a health-related treasure hunt, the team members established bonds with the women, which in turn helped them teach the women healthy food habits, proper methods of exercise, correct ergonomics and the ill-effects of stress and chronic diseases, without having to didactically thrust facts and figures down their throats. The overwhelming response made them understand what good social initiatives can achieve, when executed with passion and planning.
I am not sure if the teams have quite understood the significance of what they have achieved; that as medical students they have already made a difference to hundreds of lives and now have the potential to influence many more. I only hope that their efforts don't end with the completion of this contest and that they figure out a way of continuing these initiatives on a sustainable long-term basis.
And hopefully these initiatives will also instill within them an understanding of seeing humans as people rather than patients, thus creating good, empathic and caring doctors.
Tags: Piramal, Helpyourbody, TNMC, LTMMC
Posted by bhavinj at 08:15 PM | Comments (0)
February 05, 2010
The Republic of Karmistan - Day 8, 24
Mr. Anil Kapoor, in Season 8 of the show “24”, plays the role of Mr. Omar Hassan, the President of the Islamic Repubic of Karmistan. In the first five hours (episodes) of the show, while in New York, he has already survived an assassination attempt by his brother who has since vanished, his American mistress has been arrested, mentally tortured and then released, his wife has left him to go back home, he has started a purge against his plotters in Karmistan, and he has recently learnt that his brother is about to buy Uranium 235 from some Russians to make his country go nuclear. The best part is that Mr. Kapoor has gone through all this, uncharacteristically underplaying his role, without his Indian / Middle Eastern English accent sounding too fake.
What is also heartening is that Mr. Kapoor gets 3rd billing in the credits, immediately after Mr. Kiefer Sutherland, who plays Jack Bauer, the main lead and Ms. Mary Lynn Rajskub, whose character Chloe O'Brien, a data analyst with amazing computer but poor emotional skills is probably the best anti-heroine currently on television.
It is a bit sad though that 24 has never been popular in India, considering that it is one of the most tightly directed, action-packed television shows of the last 10 years. Each season is made up of 24, one-hour episodes that chronicle events occurring over the course of one particular day, each episode actually detailing only what happens in those 60 minutes (e.g. 8.00AM-9.00AM).
24 revolves around Jack Bauer, a counter-terrorist agent with nerves of steel, who over the last 7 seasons has always managed to avert major terrorist attacks against the United States, within the time-frame of a day, working with or against the Government, usually with his team, but often alone. He is a modern-day, angst-ridden, "Batman”, who eventually wins against all odds, but unlike Superman, has to rely only on his human abilities to deal with the usual cast of villains that includes terrorists, American super-patriots, the Russian mafia and Mexican drug-dealers.
Despite knowing that he will eventually win, each season has continued to be gripping. My wife and I usually start each season, watching one episode on DVD, every 2-3 days, until by the 10th or 11th episode, the excitement becomes so palpable that we just clear off an entire weekend and then finish-off the balance 12-14 episodes back-to-back, ending up unwashed, bleary-eyed and jelly-brained.
Season 8 promises to be even more interesting with the return of Renee Walker, played by Ms. Annie Wersching, who was fired as an FBI agent at the end of Season 7, but has now turned up as an emotionally drained ex-agent, living completely on the edge, along with the presence of Ms. Katie Sackhoff, who in the past has played Kara Thrace, one of Battlestar Galactica’s most popular characters, BSG arguably being the best sci-fi show ever on television.
I have been lucky that I could catch these 5 episodes while traveling recently. Unfortunately, in India, we have to usually wait for a year or perhaps even more to be able to see shows like 24, Lost or Heroes, on Star World, AXN or Zee English, assuming that they are aired at all, in the first place. My appeal to the English-language Indian channels would be to at least run the current season of 24 right away. Given that President Hassan is a pivotal character with enough episode time, I am sure that Mr. Kapoor’s presence will generate enough viewer interest in India. Is anyone listening?
Tags: 24, Day8, Karmistan, AnilKapoor, JackBauer, KieferSutherland, ChloeO'Brien
Posted by bhavinj at 07:02 PM | Comments (0)
The Future of Books My Friend, Is Only Electronic!
"Bhavinbhai, you are spoilt, man". The "bhai", when sarcastically affixed to a Gujju name, especially by a non-Gujju, reflects a certain state of Gujju being; well-fed and flashy and showy. Chaitanya from Boston used this line to comment on my Facebook status update two days ago. I had written, "Just saw the IPAD specs, etc on the Apple site. Wondering if I should have waited for that, before getting the Kindle. Decisions, decisions..."
To backtrack a little! The Kindle is an e-reader sold by Amazon that has revolutionized the ebook industry. I have been a Kindle user since it was first launched in the winter of 2007. I was in the US at the time, managed to get one delivered to a friend's place and since then, have been using it for almost all my book reading. It's allowed me to read multiple books simultaneously (sometimes upto 10), all over the world, at any time that I feel like, without having to actually physically carry all of them around. I am both an early adopter of technology and I also like to have all my books together in one place. The Kindle is ideal for someone like me!
Sometime last year, the Kindle 2 and DX were launched, but I saw no reason to upgrade. Then Amazon decided to launch the Kindle DX globally. I pre-ordered it on the site and four days after its worldwide launch on 19th Jan, I had it in my hands in Mumbai. It is much larger than the Kindle and this makes reading much easier. More importantly, I can read newspapers quite well on this device (Hindustan Times, Financial and Indian Express are currently available from India) as well as all my scientific pdfs, which form a bulk of my daily reading. The pdfs are extremely well rendered both in portrait and landscape, though only in black and white. There is also a GSM chip in the Kindle DX, which allows me to wirelessly download books, magazines, etc directly from Amazon.
And then Apple yesterday announced the IPad, a tablet that runs the IPhone OS and has IBooks, which will allow us to read books downloaded via ITunes. In color! It's enough to make one mad. Though in all fairness, when I ordered the Kindle DX, it wasn't as if I didn't know that Apple was going to announce some kind of book-reading device.
There is already a lot of stuff that has been written about the IPad in the blogosphere, which is amazing considering that no one outside of Apple has actually used one. There are however significant differences between the IPad and the Kindle and the choice of device will probably depend upon a person’s profile, needs and wants.
Still, in a world that is getting to be more and more monopolistic, it is great to have choices. The Apple / Amazon competition will only make it better for us consumers with respect to book prices, availability and reach.
And for those of you, who are going to get back to me about how the smell of paper and the warmth of a book are irreplaceable, don't! Don't compare until you've actually used the Kindle or the IPad. After that, if you still prefer paper, that's fine! I used to be an avid book collector and now I find that if a book is not available electronically, I perhaps may not want to read it at all. The future is eventually going to be only electronic...the only question is in which form and when!
Tags: Kindle, IPAD, Amazon, Apple, eBook
Posted by bhavinj at 06:49 PM | Comments (0)
January 22, 2010
The Great Marathon Divide and Other Stray Thoughts
1. Mumbai’s class divide: This was never more apparent than when you looked at the people who came out of their houses to cheer us during last week’s marathon.
When running through the middle class area around Lilavati Hospital leading to the Bandra Sealink or along the northern part of Worli Seaface till where it meets Annie Besant Road, there was hardly anyone who had bothered to line up along the roads. However, all along the Seaface as we U-turned southwards, outside all the upmarket buildings along Peddar Road and Babulnath and along the residential parts of Marine Drive, the local residents were out in droves, cheering, egging us along, sometimes full families together, handing out water, biscuits and sweets.
And of all of them, the Peddar road residents rocked! They were the most enthusiastic this year as last year and it felt really good to hear their encouraging shouts and words, especially during the difficult uphill inclines.
I do not want to speculate on the reasons why different localities behave differently, but it seems to have to do with the class of the locality, whether middle or upper and rich. Perhaps our sociologists and psychologists can shed more light on this!
2. Bandra-Worli Sealink: This was a great experience for all us half-marathoners. Running with the sunrise on our left was fantastic. Sure, there was no water available on the Sealink, but this only affected the marathoners who came much later.
3. Electrolytes: There should be more stalls or kiosks along the route, handing out electrolytes. Water was and is never a problem; in fact there is a lot of wastage as runners take one sip and throw half-full bottles on the road. But in the hot sun, when you also need to replace salt and sugar, it would be great to have slightly better access to Electral or similar powders or drinks.
4. Crowd control: Once the elite marathoners started reaching the finish line, the volunteers, policemen and those controlling the crowds seemed to lose interest. All across Marine Drive upto the finish line at CST, visitors and perhaps tourists, would often walk onto the road, coming in our way and making us break our stride. For those of you who somehow find the pavements of Marine Drive too small to walk on, please do this during peak traffic on working days!
5. Commentators: We can really do without idiot runners like the full-marathoner, who looked across at a 60-plus-year old woman running the half-marathon next to me and said "Aunty, this is a running race, not a walking race!" Go @7&# yourself!
6. The Drudge kilometers: For half-marathoners, the drudgery starts once you take the left from Babulnath onto Chowpatty, past Wilson college, with only 4-5 kms left. It is hot, the road is hard and your mind starts telling you that it’s not really worth the effort. This is the time when we need the most encouragement and cheering and unfortunately, once you are past the Girgaum Chowpatty junction, there is nobody on the road all the way upto the end of the Gymkhanas. This stretch is really, really, really, the toughest!
Having said all this, this year’s run was far more enjoyable than last year’s, despite being 20 minutes slower. I ran/walked, stopped if something interesting was going on, took great photographs on the Sealink, didn't freeze up at the end of the run and had no injuries. All of which is enough incentive to run next year as well!
Tags: MumbaiMarathon
Posted by bhavinj at 08:25 PM | Comments (0)
January 15, 2010
Registered for Tomorrow's Marathon? Dropping Out Because You're Unprepared? Think Again!
This is for all those, who like me, registered very enthusiastically for the half-marathon/marathon in July and were already training or had started doing so in earnest, but have since, for a variety of reasons, not been able to get into adequate shape and are now not too confident of running or are thinking of dropping out and doing a no-show tomorrow. It is for all of us who can't help but get irritated by all those stupid feel-good articles about the event, where previous runners, or the "oldest" or the "youngest" or the "100 marathon" participants are being profiled in an attempt to generate a positive buzz about the race, but which only serve to depress us further.
I started this column in December 2008, with a piece, titled "What I write about, when I write about running". I had touched upon my motivation for running and had written. "I've started focusing on the anger; on the terrorists, on the events, on the enemy. This helps pump up the adrenaline and endorphins...". This time unfortunately, there is no such "greater" motivation.
Then in May, when I started my training schedule, I wrote a piece, called "130 days", for the number of days left for the marathon. In some kind of runner's euphoria, I had actually come up with these words, "And yet in the end, it comes down to just one elemental issue. The simple act of running! Putting on a pair of shoes, with shorts or a track-suit and a T-shirt, without any fancy equipment, getting out into the open, either in a garden of sports track or on the road and pounding the ground, one foot after another, on and on, emptying your mind of all unnecessary thought, zen-like, focusing on just one goal; running." Currently, the mind that stringed this together, is a complete stranger to me!
And then somewhere in September/October, it all collapsed like Port-au-Prince did two days ago. There was no time to run or train. The few times I was able to shoe-up, only drove home the fact that I was out of shape and in no condition to run a targeted 2 1/2 hour half-marathon. By early-December, I had mentally decided to forego this one, simply because it made no sense at all to run without adequate training and without some kind of timing goal.
But then two things happened. The first was the announcement that we would get to run over the Bandra SeaLink. The second was a realization after speaking to some friends, that I needn't run with a purpose...I could just stay at the back of the pack, and enjoy myself, partly running, partly walking, and have a good time! The last time, I had taken the race too seriously…perhaps this time I could go there and have some fun!
Once I had filtered this idea through both, my right and left-brains, it just began to make a lot of sense. Even with a slow run/walk, you can usually finish the course in reasonable time. Moreover, what is the certainty that the Sealink will be a permanent fixture of the course next year as well? What if this is a one-time chance to walk/run on it? Would you want to miss that?
In the last few days, I have successfully sold this logic to a few of my friends who, like me, had decided to opt out, but have now decided to show up, just for the heck of it.
And as for the serious running...there's always next year.
Tags: MumbaiMarathon
Posted by bhavinj at 08:09 PM | Comments (0)
January 08, 2010
Smart and Brainy = "Good" Doctor! Yeah Right!
The stultifying stupefying status of our education system is suddenly being talked about with renewed vigor, thanks to “3 Idiots”.
It’s not just that teachers don’t inspire. Students hardly ever ask questions and usually behave like zombies, few parents create a conducive, questioning environment at home and job-givers are rarely enthused by non-conforming job applicants. We are all equally to blame and in this collective satisfaction that no single individual or institution can be brought to task, no real change happens. The few “different” and successful experiments unfortunately only prove the rule.
This is why we have so many anomalies, for example, with doctors and medicine. Being a doctor is not really about how much you can rattle out about anatomy, pathology, medicines, surgical procedures, etc, but is more about the ability to apply this knowledge in real life, on real human beings, using all these facts to make daily judgment calls, adapting this knowledge to the individual patient in front of us, with the utmost empathy and concern, in an attempt to do as much good as possible and as little harm. And so, though knowledge is important, more important is the ability to take correct action in as caring a manner as possible.
It is this discrepancy between “brains” and “good doctors” that is responsible for this 2 x 2 grid.
1. Academically brilliant/good and a good doctor
2. Academically brilliant/good and a poor doctor
3. Academically average/poor and a good doctor
4. Academically average/poor and a poor doctor
Those who are in Group 1 are obviously the "great" doctors. They know a lot and they are able to use this knowledge for the benefit of their patients. But those in Group 3 also don’t fall short, because they have enough common sense and street smarts to be able to provide above-average care. They know where to look for and who to ask for help when they are stuck, and most importantly, they know what they don’t know.
Those in Group 4 are obviously complete disasters. But there are also a good number of doctors, who fall into Group 2, who can rattle out pages from Gray's Anatomy and Harrison’s Textbook of Internal Medicine, but somehow have no clue how to translate these facts into meaningful "care" for their patients.
In an ideal world, where learning medicine would essentially mean learning how to care, there would only be "good” doctors. There is precious little connection between the ability to mug and retain information, and caring for and treating people. The former is what we find and need in researchers and scientists; the latter is what is important in doctors. And yet, we continue to believe that if someone has come first in the XIIth standard, or has a gold medal in Anatomy or Physiology, that this person will make a great doctor some day as well. How getting 100/100 in Physics, Chemistry and Biology, teaches someone the skill-sets to be a superlative "care-giver", is something I find great difficulty digesting.
Today, fortunately, even keeping all those facts and figures in our brains is no longer relevant; most information is easily available with a few clicks of a mouse and as long as we know what to look for and where, that’s good enough. What we can’t learn however from Googling, is how to apply all this knowledge to practical problems and situations, which is where great teachers and equally inquisitive students make all the difference.
The greatest doctors in this world have rarely been the brainiest.
Tags: 3Idiots, Doctor, Medicine
Posted by bhavinj at 05:37 PM | Comments (0)
January 01, 2010
Simple, Healthy New Year Resolutions
Ring-a Ring-a roses
Pocket full of poses
Husha, busha
All fall down
This ditty and the game are an integral part of growing up. As part of an urban legend, many also believe that this refers to the Great Plague of London of 1665, a time when people used to fall down (die) sneezing.
Assuming it to be true, and I know that this is very depressing for the first piece of 2010, this little poem quite aptly captures the current plague of stress in our lives; first Mr. Ranjan Das of SAP and now Mr. Ravimohan of Reliance - here yesterday and then gone tomorrow; poof, just like that!
And like them, we have a large number of high-performing, type A individuals in our city, working 18-20 hours a day, 6-7 days a week, sleeping 4-5 hours, multi-tasking, traveling 10-15 days a month, drinking after work and sometimes during work, along with power naps, power lunches, power vacations, wedded to the laptop and/or the Blackberry, and constantly bothered about numbers, toplines, EBITDAs, governance and the next quarter.
Stress like this kills...
This problem is all-pervasive. While we are all gung-ho about our country’s projected growth rate over the next decade, we also have the dubious distinction of being high achievers with respect to diabetes, hypertension and similar chronic diseases, across all levels of society. Young aspiring achievers, middle managers, professionals...each and everyone seems to be falling prey to the "work hard, party hard, sleep less" syndrome.
And so perhaps the only New Year resolution that many of us should make is to “slow down, pull back and sleep more”. Here’s my list of related simple resolutions.
Simple (in no particular order)
1. Eat only as much as needed.
2. Don't smoke.
3. Exercise - any amount is fine, even half an hour a week, though more is better.
4. Sleep - a minimum of 7 hours.
5. If you must drink, then do so with moderation. Don't get drunk. Don't eat fried food with the alcohol. Don't drink and drive.
Simple, but needs a shade extra effort.
1. Spend time with family.
2. Take breaks.
3. Try not to lose your temper - there is a difference between controlled anger and just completely losing it.
4. Meditate
5. Have sensible working hours. The French work 35 hours a week and still manage to be productive.
6. Give time to old friends.
And, if you need, there is enough help out there, in the form of social movements such as HelpYourBody (www.helpyourbody.in), which is trying to raise awareness about these health issues, hoping eventually to make our workplaces and us, healthier and less stressful. But eventually, it’s still our responsibility. Granted that we may not have much control over the occurrence of accidents and cancer, but there is still a lot we can do to take care of our physical and mental health.
Being healthy is not just about not being sick or dying. It is also about being well enough so that when we grow old, we do so without too much disability and without ending up being burdens to our children and society.
If we want to live and die with grace, we need to live healthily. Now!
Tags: NewYearResolutions
Posted by bhavinj at 07:05 PM | Comments (0)
December 26, 2009
A Year of Friday 8PM Deadlines
I am not used to weekly deadlines. And so, the 8.00PM Friday one, which is the time by which I have to turn in my piece for this column, has become an interesting milestone that I have to abide by, and one that now affects quite significantly the way in which I spend most of my Friday afternoons and evenings.
And so, for the past one year, starting from the first piece that was published on 27 Dec, 2008, irrespective of where in the world I am, I have usually managed to send in my 600 words by around 7.00PM. And except for one week in March, when someone forgot to publish the column, each Saturday morning, unfailingly, has seen my vertical, one-column, top-to-bottom piece with my caricatured visage, appearing somewhere between pages 6 to 12 of this newspaper.
Trying to beat the deadline has led to ridiculous situations like the time I typed out a piece while being driven in a rickety cab from the hotel to the airport in Kolkata, praying that my laptop battery would not die; I had a similar prayer on my lips last week when a flight to Kolkata was delayed by 90 minutes and I had to finish my piece in exactly that much time, with just enough battery juice left and no power connector on the airplane. Looking back, I've realized that my travel and the pieces seem to be intricately connected; I've pounded my Macbook Pro first and now the Air, in Patna, Hyderabad, Kochi, Indore and Delhi as well as in Vienna, London, Zurich, Geneva, Orlando and Frankfurt. It is thanks to the marvel of the Internet that it really doesn't matter where I am, as long as I can get connected for enough time to shoot off one email, but which also means that wherever I go, I have to carry a laptop along, which is one of the curses of today’s tech-suffused world.
So why all this today? Because, the words that you are reading right now, mark the start of my 2nd year with the Mirror. I consider myself extremely lucky and fortunate to be able to write a blog-like newspaper column. I started www.manfrommatunga.com in 1999. Then came the Matunga pieces in "Writer's Bloc", a series that started with the paper’s birth, but then died after 3 years. Much later, after some persistent prodding, Meenal let me have this column. It's interesting; I am neither famous, nor a celebrity, nor a political pundit or a certified critic. And yet, here I am, thanks to her, able to expound on everything from Matunga issues to books, films, restaurants, food, technology and its social impact, my 9-year old twins and their problems, small issues with life in Mumbai, airline and travel incidents, and sometimes, just "nothing".
It used to take a long time initially to put the 600 words together. But with one year's practice under the belt, it has become easier with each passing week. Many friends (thanks Anand) want my writing to be more responsible and relevant; hopefully I will get there over time.
I know that today's piece is all about I, me and myself! But I guess, I am allowed this liberty today. I'd like to thank all the people at Mumbai Mirror who've helped me along the way; friends and family who've given honest feedback and criticism; Facebook pals, who've not hesitated to dissect my words when required; and all you readers, who've always come back with interesting feedback.
Here's looking forward to another interesting year.
Tags: MumbaiMirror, Deadlines
Posted by bhavinj at 04:19 AM | Comments (0)
December 18, 2009
Stupid is as Stupid Does: Speeding, Rage and Idiotic Driving
The last two weeks have seen all of the above, singly or in combination hitting the headlines. Someone burning with road rage, overtook a car near the airport dragged the driver to the car, drove off with him, then dropped him, in the process running over him and killing him. Speeding cars on the Sealink collided with each other and resulted in fatalities. Another car idiotically made an illegal U-turn on the Sealink and was run into by another car coming from the opposite direction.
All of us at some point or the other have probably succumbed to one of these three deadly sins.
Road rage is perhaps the most difficult to handle, especially when young. The older you get though, the more willing you are to let others have the right of way. When I was younger, if anyone were to cut in front of me or overtake illegally, I would completely lose it. The first reaction invariably would be to try and overtake the person and then bad-mouth him. At times, I would get in front and then slow down or brake hard. Often, the overwhelming emotion would be to anyhow hurt the person. Today, though older and a shade more restrained, I still have to sometimes make a conscious effort to control myself. Road rage is stupid and has bad consequences both for the person who is affected and also the person against whom it is directed. Both lose, especially the person who is raging...there are always physical and emotional consequences of such a heightened animalistic, “flight-or-fight” response.
Speeding is stupid as well, and also difficult to control, when young, given its endorphin releasing, positive drug-like kick. I still remember the first time I hit the Expressway in my Honda City and then kept the accelerator pressed all the way to Lonavla, without any hindrance. In the city of course, it's very difficult to speed and trying to do so during the day only leads to a jerky, brake-race-brake experience. But sometimes in the early mornings or late at night, you can still find some stretches that are safe and empty of all kinds of traffic, and then it gets really difficult to resist ripping through.
When I look back the stupid things we did when young, I shudder and hope that I will be able to prevent my kids from doing the same things. Races on the Worli Sea-Face road at night, Sion to the Taj in 12 1/2 minutes at 2.00AM in the morning, Mumbai to Mahabaleshwar in 3 hours on the National Express Highway...jeez! At that age, the consequences of something going wrong are not even on one's horizon and it is only when you grow older and have a family and other people dependant on you, does the extent of this stupidity finally dawn!
Idiotic driving however takes the cake and perhaps is one reason why others get road rage! What do you do with a person who suddenly brakes to take a right or "U-turn", without giving a signal and forces you to brake hard, to avoid hitting him? What is your response when someone drives bang in the middle of a two-lane road, not letting anyone pass by on either side? How do you react when someone tailgates you and then cuts in front of you without warning, or goes suddenly from left to right or right to left forcing you to react evasively?
Road age, speeding and idiotic driving! All interconnected! All difficult to control! And, all potentially fatal!
Posted by bhavinj at 06:36 PM | Comments (0)
December 11, 2009
Entitlement - Does it Begin With Schools?
Last week's piece on "entitlement" evoked quite a response. Since Facebook allows more interactive communication, a very interesting thread developed around this.
Sharada, from the US, immediately wrote "be generous with your time with them; demonstrate empathy and charity; keep your own head on your shoulders; live in a neighborhood that does not scream money ... and hope for the best" and followed this up with "if kids have free access to your time and attention (as opposed to materialistic things) THAT is what they should feel entitled to...or am I being naive?"
Anil, who too lives in the US, then penned down his "A Dozen Rules For Successful (Sociological) Parenting". The first rule was "Buy a house in the best feasible school district (public schools) you can afford (and when your child is of school-going age, send him/her to a public school)." I immediately wrote back saying that this was irrelevant in India, especially in Mumbai.
For those who may not know, in the US and in many parts of the Western world, children are entitled to free school education in the specific district that they live in. This right comes from the fact that all residents of that particular district pay taxes towards the public school in that district. Typically then, a public school will have a variety of students cutting across all social classes, which partly of course is dependent on the composition of the school district's residents. Most people send their children to public schools and often people choose their homes based on the reputation of the schools in specific areas. Private schools also exist, but are horrendously expensive. Of course, the richer you are, the greater the chance that your children would go to a private school.
In our country, the equivalent of a US public school would perhaps be a Government- aided private school. Unlike in the US, being a resident of the area where the school is located does not automatically guarantee admission into that school. Nevertheless, the majority of students are usually from the surrounding area. For e.g. Don Bosco and other similar schools in Matunga, are Government aided, quite affordable for the middle and upper classes and by and large service children from Matunga and the surrounding central suburbs.
Anil, answering my "irrelevant" note, wrote back in the context of public schools, "While this may seem irrelevant, the principle is not - what it means is - give your child the best education (best -academically, socially, culturally) you can afford - stretch your money, sacrifice some other things if you need to, for a while." and Sharada chimed in with "even if there aren't good public (govt. funded) school districts in Mumbai.... send your kids to a school that you think best fits your ideology and still meets their needs - not necessarily the priciest school .... also, when you don't live in a pricey neighborhood, there's less peer pressure on you and on the kids."
If you've haven't already figured out where this is all going, then here it is. Does sending your children to a middle-class, Government-aided school like Don Bosco, St. Joseph's, J B Vachha, etc allow your kids to be more grounded in reality, given that the students come from a significant spectrum of society, as against sending them to expensive, private schools, where given the intense peer pressure to conform, they all learn to be "entitled" that much earlier in life? Or in a similar vein…should your children travel to school in school buses or be chauffeur-driven in style?
Tags: Entitlement, Schools
Posted by bhavinj at 05:52 PM | Comments (0)
December 05, 2009
Entitlement and The New Rules of Parenting
Two weeks ago, I wrote about the DYKWIA syndrome; people who keep going around shouting "Do you know who I am?", especially when they seem to be ignored or poorly served, trying to throw their weight around in an attempt to get ahead of others next to them, to get better and superior service.
There were quite a few interesting comments that readers came up with as responses to this question.
"I'm sorry, but is there a problem? Do you need help to find out who you are?"
or
"From your behavior, I definitely know who you are. If only you knew that as well."
or
"Do you want me to ask your mother"?
All of this of course sounds a little funny and trite at present, but a recent quick trip abroad, brought this into significant focus. Among the various reasons that one can think of for people behaving like DWKWIAs, is the fact that they often feel "entitled". Entitlement implies a state where an individual truly believes that he or she is God's gift to mankind and needs to be treated in a special manner, with kid gloves, on an elevated pedestal.
It is this entitlement that plagues families that are very successful and have money that will last over multiple lifetimes. The subsequent generations often do not understand the value of the hard work that went into creating this success and grow up believing that this is a natural entitlement. They have everything they could ever need and are so privileged compared to the rest of the world, that they actually believe that they belong to the “homo superior” tribe.
The affliction of entitlement is also often seen in self-made individuals, specifically in those who have made it very big and very rich, very fast, especially if they have come from extremely underprivileged backgrounds with no yardsticks of middle-class behavior for comparison. They then try and emulate the other entitled people around them with disastrous results.
And then is the last group of the "powerful" that includes ministers, CEOs of large companies, and even celebrities, who also start believing that they are truly special as compared to the other “ordinary” people around them.
Many of us are not as rich and powerful, but still belong to the middle and upper middle classes that given the poor circumstances that 80% of the world finds itself in, can still lead to a sense of entitlement, whether in India or abroad. And how to prevent our children from picking up even small slices of the "entitlement pie" can be quite a challenge.
This is a question that I discussed constantly for the last 5 days during a whirlwind trip through the US, with at least four sets of friends, all of whom are highly successful professionals, but with strong middle-class Indian backgrounds, now at the peak of their careers with plush houses and good money. One of the risks in such situations, is that the children start believing that their current lifestyle is routine; access to toys, computers, televisions, comfortable trips abroad, occasional business class travel, etc. The constant struggle then is to make sure that they learn that none of this is an entitlement, that it doesn't come free and needs a lot of hard work to attain.
This feeling of entitlement, especially in children, can also often lead to reduced motivation and a lack of "fire-in-the-belly", which given our competitive world can actually then turn out to be quite a disadvantage.
How do you’ll deal with these issues?
Tags: DYKWIA, entitlement
Posted by bhavinj at 09:45 AM | Comments (0)
November 28, 2009
We are like that only...or are we?
Today, as I write this, is the 26/11 "day". There has been a gradual media build-up over the last week, culminating in today's intense newspaper focus. I presume this is true of the television networks as well, but I no longer bother watching. The print media is full of interviews, post-mortems, analyses, etc, among which, are a few articles comparing the "then and now" scenarios. How then a lot of us were angry, motivated and ready for action. And how now, all of that seems to have dissipated.
I have taken this little time off in the middle of my working day to think and introspect. The door is shut with "do not disturb" orders, the cell phone is offline and the landline is off the hook.
I was in Barcelona that day. I woke up at midnight to go to the loo and saw the smoking Taj on CNN on an in-loo television set. I called home and got the rest of the story. Though the company had decided to let its employees take the day off, we proudly kept all our set-ups open; there was seething anger and this was our way of answering the terrorists back and not letting terrorism win and cow us down.
I didn't join any group or cause. Though, I didn't know anyone directly who had died, we all knew someone who had lost a friend or family; during those days, most of us would have willingly given an arm and a leg to help and change things. Most people I knew were angry, especially at the politicians but more at the "system' itself.
A month later, a British friend wanted to see the "sites" and we took him to see Leopold and the Taj. These areas were teeming with tourists.
Then came the elections, where even though some candidates tried to capitalize on this incident, nothing much really happened. Voting rates were pathetic. I didn't vote as well.
And life went on.
A grueling 12 hour daily schedule, the commute, the social responsibilities, the kids, meetings, conferences, domestic and international travels...all of these eventually pushed all the November angst aside. The media in the meantime moved on to other issues as well; swine flu, elections, Koda and Shilpa Shetty's wedding.
The only reminders were the irritants; the inability to use Arthur Road because of Kasab's trial and the added security at the hotels.
Today’s newspaper coverage has brought back a little of that November angst, but it is highly muted. The blatant use of this occasion for self-promotion hasn’t helped the cause much. And the mudslinging among the police officers as well as between them and the politicians, which seems to have reached a crescendo today, has just made things worse. And I know that I am not the sole person in the city thinking along these lines… in fact, most people I know seem to be in the same boat as me.
Does that make us insensitive boors? Are we self-centered, insular creatures? Is this a typical Mumbai problem, or is this what happens universally, after events as shocking as these? During those rare moments where I am able to be with myself, without being disturbed by people, phones and email, I wonder...are our daily lives so filled with tasks that we forget to feel and act on those feelings? What is right? What should we be doing? Was a world without a "to do list" and where the word “multitasking” didn’t exist, a better one for empathy and caring?
I don't know. Do you?
Tags: 26/11MumbaiTerror
Posted by bhavinj at 07:23 AM | Comments (0)
November 20, 2009
Do You Know Who I Am!
Last Saturday, flying my favorite blue and yellow airline to Delhi, I was lucky to get an upgrade. I stretched my legs in the first row, in an attempt to sleep through the take-off and hopefully for a little while longer. I must have fallen asleep when suddenly I was woken up by a loud voice cutting across the cabin. When I looked back, it was some "politician-type" in white and white, shouting at one of the stewards. I couldn't quite make out what he was saying, but he kept repeating one sentence over and over again. “Do you know who I am?" The steward and the supervisor were unable to calm him, but he finally ran out of steam and stopped shouting. Then in a loud voice, he proclaimed to no one in particular, "You have to teach these people". During the lunch service, I asked the supervisor what the issue was. Apparently, the "white and white" wanted a non-vegetarian meal. By the time the steward reached him, all the non-vegetarian meals had already been ordered and there was nothing left for him. Therefore, he lost it. Over a measly plate of food! I asked the supervisor, whether she knew who he was. She said "no".
Obviously. If someone has to shout, "Do you know who I am!", it is almost certain that the person being asked this question doesn’t have a clue! If you are the type of person who needs to utter this sentence, i.e. if you are a DYKWIA, then rest assured, you are definitely not worth it.
There is a great piece on this subject by Stanley Bing, who pens a column on the last page of Fortune magazine. This has always remained stuck at the back of my mind and I promised myself then, that some day I would write about this. If you read that piece and find some borrowed ideas here, that would be because I completely agree with him.
The DYKWIA who says, "Do you know who I am?" or the more colloquial "Saala, tum jaante nahin main kaun hoon?” screws up the situation for everyone, including himself/herself. Since only insecure and self-important puffed-up shirts say this, the moment this sentence is uttered, the people around have already sized up this DYKWIA for what he/she is. The person being told off obviously does not know who the DYKWIA is and then gets badly stuck between the devil and the deep blue sea. He could say "No, I really don't" and figuratively kill the idiot, but at the risk of getting into some trouble if the DYKWIA escalates this; or he could try and accommodate the DYKWIA, usually over someone else's head and then risk the ire of that third person who is being passed over. Which means that if the DYKWIA actually gets what he/she is shouting for, the others around the DYKWIA will also make a noise.
Either way, no one really wins.
Imagine if the steward or supervisor had requested someone in the first two rows to give up a non-vegetarian meal in favor of the "white and white". Someone in the sixth row could have then created a ruckus. This just doesn't work.
I still think though that the best response to this question, even at the risk of losing one's job or possible repercussions, should be, "I am sorry, I don’t. Can you please educate me?". Ninety-nine percent of the times, the DYKWIA will be some inconsequential insect. You can take a chance on the other one percent.
Tags: DYKWIA, StanleyBing
Posted by bhavinj at 08:10 PM | Comments (0)
