Sorry, not sorry.

I don't, in general, get too influenced by articles I read or videos I watch. Well, that's not true. I do, but not when the article or video is clearly intent on influencing you. "36 things successful people do" and "6 animals you must hug to be a happy person" won't do much for me. Sneaky and subtle works better on me.

In the last month or two, however, there have been two pieces that made an impact on me.

One was this article I read on how a password changed the author's life. Apparently, every time he changed his password, he chose a tiny (or no so tiny) goal, and keying in that password every day helped him internalize those goals and his life went from meh to whoa. Which, if you think about it, is a pretty simply yet profound way to achieve your goals. The biggest obstacle for me achieving my goals is that I really don't internalize them. I think, dude I should do that, and then forget all about it.

So I decided to try this trick. I have to change my password every few months at work, and as it happened, I had to change it soon after I read this article. So I chose a password that would remind me of something I wanted to do everyday.

In the six weeks since I've had this password, I haven't done this activity once. Not. once.

Here's the thing. It's my password at work. I never use it once I get home, and that's where I should be doing this activity. I could change all my personal passwords to something similar, but... meh.

So no, this hasn't worked so well for me.

The other piece that had an impact on me was this video Pantene came out with a while back on how women tend to say sorry for everything. I saw it, and shrugged, and went about my day. And then an hour later, I was sending someone an email asking them to clarify what they meant, and started it with "I'm sorry, but...". And I caught myself, and deleted that part of the email, and went about my day. A while later, I was emailing someone with a request for more data, and I started it with "I'm sorry, but..." And I had to again make myself delete that line from the email.

And I've caught myself doing it over and over again, the last time being an email I sent just 15 minutes back. I'm not sure why i do it. I don't know if it's my gender, my cultural context, my personality, or what. Saying women do this seems too easy an explanation, but maybe it's true. But I had never realized I do it so often till I saw this video. And I'm trying to stop.

So unlike a blog post I wrote a month or so back, I'm not ending this one with "sorry, you guys".

Because why should I be?

Nuggets from here and there

I'm in my last semester at business school (wow, time flies), and taking two classes this semester, both of which vary between being fascinating and putting-you-to-sleep boring, all within the space of two hours.

The professor in my first class today showed this video, from Louis CK's appearance on Conan O'Brien's show a few years ago. The entire conversation is funny, but the segment between 2:15 and 6:05, which we saw in class, is brilliant. Watch:

"Everything is amazing and nobody is happy" by Meowbay

True, isn't it? We take technology and all offers us so much for granted, we forget that when we were born, or even as growing up, we didn't have any of this. @_GoneNative wrote this post a while back that had a line I absolutely fallen in love with and shared here:

"My generation has had to say a lot of goodbyes in quick succession to the things we built our lives around. I have a feeling the next lot will find it easier to use & throw."

That's true, in a way, but also so sad.

And then, in my second class today, we were talking about price discrimination, for possibly the gazillionth time since school began (and I still suck at it. go figure.), and our professor shared this passage, which I think is the most beautiful description of price discrimination that I have seen in a very long time.

It is not because of the few thousand francs which would have to be spent to put a roof over the third-class carriage or to upholster the third-class seats that some company or other has open carriages with wooden benches… What the company is trying to do is prevent the passengers who can pay the second-class fare from traveling third class; it hits the poor, not because it wants to hurt them, but to frighten the rich… And it is again for the same reason that the companies, having proved almost cruel to the third-class passengers and mean to the second-class ones, become lavish in dealing with first-class customers. Having refused the poor what is necessary, they give the rich what is superfluous.

 ~ Jules Dupuit (1849), On Tolls and Transport

It's a good day, when your classes make you see or hear something that strikes a chord, that makes you think, that makes you want to share it with everyone else.

The day the Sur died

If you haven't seen the "new" version of Mile Sur Mera Tumhara, you clearly haven't been on twitter or Facebook all day. Both sites have been full of updates lambasting Zoom's attempt to modernise the classic we grew up watching on DD 1 on a regular basis.

I sat through it, all 16-and-a-half freaking minutes of it (which is nearly thrice as long as the original), and have the following thoughts on it:

1. As I said on twitter, in the original one, you felt you were watching Indians sing about their country. In this one, you never, for one second, are allowed to forget that these are the stars of Bollywood you're watching. I mean, did anyone look at Priyanka Chopra in that suit with the kids and think, "awww, look how sweet and loving she is"?!? And what the heck were Shahid and Deepika doing?!?
2. Some of the acts were truly cringe-worthy. I love Aamir Khan, but his whole act with the kids was totally uncool. And SRK at the end, with his trademark spreading arms out. Really? What was this, a promo for your next movie?
3. The original had mixed India's two passions, movies and cricket. This one, being made by Zoom, naturally focussed on move stars and movie stars alone (with a few musicians thrown in for fun). For some reason, however, they decided to then also throw in a few sportspersons at the end, all people who've made it to the papers in recent times. Firstly, the way it was shown seemed utterly patronizing and there-for-the-heck-of-it. Secondly, and interestingly, not one from cricket. What happened, was Lalit Modi not entertaining their calls?
4. The singing, oh, the singing. The original had Lata Mangeshkar's gorgeous voice for all the actresses. I know she's not singing anymore, but really, could they have at least tried to match the singer to the face? And didn't someone tell Shiamak Davar years ago that he should never, ever sing in public again?
   
5. The original had managed to show glimpses of India, the country. This simply couldn't. This was nothing but a bunch of actors being taken to a bunch of sceninc spots, and asked to smile at the camera.

This is yet one more reason why I have no respect for the TOI group.

For some more excellent points on why this new version is such a disaster, you may read the tweets put up by @mojorojo. (Update: He's put them all in one place here, so you may just head there.)

And now, for your viewing pleasure, the old:



And the new:



Tell me you didn't feel like a little piece of your childhood died.

(PS: A modified version of this post was also published on Desicritics.)

Il y a deux ans...

It suddenly struck me that this blog turned two last month. Which means I've been a blogger for more than three years. 

But as I read my old posts, both here and in the private blog I had for a year before that, I wonder if there's any growth or, for lack of a better word, maturity that comes across in my writings. Because I don't see it. I still seem to be as opinionated, obnoxious and self-obsessed as I was three years ago. 

And if so, and if I've just stagnated since I began blogging, then that's just a pity.

What do you think?

****

On another note, Max New York Life Insurance has come up with a fabulous ad. Even if you don't listen or understand to the background song, you still get the gist of it, so enjoy:

Incidentally, has anyone ever read that short story by Jeffrey Archer, The Grass is Always Greener?!?

Feelin' extra Indian

I always did love those patriotic/ country-lovin' type of ads, and the latest Maruti ads are no different. Which is ironic, considering the majority stake in that company is no longer Indian.






These remind me of the Hamara Bajaj ads that used to come some time back, which I'd put up here if I wasn't worried about how long a post with three videos will take to load.

One of the things that makes Ranbaxy's sell-out to Daiichi that bit sadder is that Ranbaxy was one of those companies which really was an Indian multinational company that we as Indians could be proud of. Now, it's just another subsidiary of another Japanese company. I met someone this week who said that not only was this not an unexpected happening, but that eventually, all the big Indian companies will sell out. Now, I'm usually quite clueless about anything to do with the financial markets or the corporate world, but isn't this an extremely bleak view to take? I mean, do you really see the Tatas or the Birlas selling out anytime soon? Or at least in the next decade or so?

I'm just feeling extra Indian tonight. It must be the cold.

Job satisfaction?!?

Oh dear dear... HR really does need to get its act together here.

glumbert - Bad Day at the Office

Brilliant, ain't it?

Happy Independence Day!

Our National Anthem is supposed to be 52 seconds long, thank you very much.

Don't get me wrong. I admire A. R. Rahman tremendously. I think he's a brilliant music composer (although he has lost his touch in recent years). Rang De Basanti was one of the most brilliant movie soundtracks ever - I still get goosebumps when I hear Khoon Chala. And I loved what he did with Vande Mataram ten years ago.

But I do wish he'd left our National Anthem alone. The idea's great, and the kind of lineup of singers he's got is mindblowing (although, admittedly, I don't know enough about most of them). However, I happen to belong to that breed of people who like to stand up every time the Anthem is played, if not sing along. And it's really quite annoying to see these videos played on television every few minutes, in the middle of whichever weird show that I might be watching at the time.

*sigh* I tend to get emotional around Independence Day.

But take a look... what do you think?