OLD VERSION
The ant works hard in the withering heat all summer, building his house and laying up supplies for the winter. The grasshopper thinks the ant's a fool and laughs & dances & plays the summer away. Come winter, the ant is warm and well fed. The shivering grasshopper has no food or shelter so he dies out in the cold.
NEW VERSION
The ant works hard in the withering heat all summer, building his house and laying up supplies for the winter. The grasshopper thinks the ant's a fool and laughs & dances & plays the summer away. Come winter, the ant is warm and well fed. The shivering grasshopper has no food or shelter and calls a press conference and demands to know why the ant should be allowed to be warm and well fed while others are cold and starving.
NDTV, BBC, CNN show up to provide pictures of the shivering grasshopper next to a video of the ant in his comfortable home with a table laden with food.The World is stunned by the sharp contrast. How can this be that this poor grasshopper is allowed to suffer so?
Arundhati Roy stages a demonstration in front of the ant's house.
MedhaPatkar goes on a fast along with other grasshoppers demanding that grasshoppers be relocated to warmer climates during winter.
Amnesty International and Koffi Annan criticize the Indian Government for not upholding the fundamental rights of the grasshopper.
The Internet is flooded with online petitions seeking support to the grasshopper (many promising Heaven and Everlasting Peace for prompt support as against the wrath of God for non-compliance).
Barkha Dutt hosts a talk-show spread over two weeks on the disparity.
Opposition MP's stage a walkout.
Left parties call for "Bharat Bandh" in West Bengal and Kerala demanding a Judicial Enquiry.
CPM in Kerala immediately passes a law preventing ants from working hard in the heat so as to bring about equality of poverty among ants and grasshoppers.
Lalu Prasad allocates one free coach to Grasshoppers on all Indian Railway trains, aptly named the 'Grasshopper Rath'.
Finally, the Judicial Committee drafts the Prevention of Terrorism Against Grasshoppers Act [POTAGA], with effect from the beginning of winter.
The ant is fined for failing to comply with POTAGA. He has nothing left to pay his retroactive taxes, so his home is confiscated by the Government and handed over to the grasshopper in a ceremony covered by NDTV, Aaj Tak & Star News.
Arundhati Roy calls it "a triumph of justice".
Lalu calls it "Socialistic Justice".
CPM calls it the "revolutionary resurgence of the downtrodden".
Koffi Annan invites the grasshopper to address the UN General Assembly.
*****************************************************
Many years later...The ant, who has long since migrated to the USA, sets up a multi-billion dollar company in the Silicon Valley.
1000s of grasshoppers die of starvation somewhere in India ...
- Source Unknown.
Wednesday, June 27, 2007
Thursday, June 07, 2007
A grand welcome for new employees
Check out this welcome given to new employes by Aditi technologies, Bangalore!
Wednesday, June 06, 2007
Workplace madness
Found a very interesting article on Fortune by Stanley Bing.
(Link: http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/2007/06/11/100082884/index.htm?postversion=2007060506)
He had earlier written about how bosses are crazy and I won’t go into that, since there is enough literature on that, the best being Scott Adams’s Dilbert cartoons.
He talks about how for ages we have been researching authoritative behavior of bosses, but not paid enough attention to the tantrums thrown by employees.
It is indeed true that some times employees are as crazy as their bosses!
To quote Bing: “Because we are nuts, you know, we who work for those who go insane above us. We're crazy and incompetent and lazy and churlish and occasionally stupid and cowardly and disloyal. And it's time we all sucked it up and stopped blaming our bosses for everything. “
The full article is too long to be posted here, so I am providing the link and would stop with the six points of employee behavior that drive bosses crazy:
1. We don't listen.
2. We show up late.
3. We leave early
4. We squabble.
5. We need to be loved.
6. We leave.
I guess there is enough ammunition for Dilbert’s boss to start his own comic strip :)
(Link: http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/2007/06/11/100082884/index.htm?postversion=2007060506)
He had earlier written about how bosses are crazy and I won’t go into that, since there is enough literature on that, the best being Scott Adams’s Dilbert cartoons.
He talks about how for ages we have been researching authoritative behavior of bosses, but not paid enough attention to the tantrums thrown by employees.
It is indeed true that some times employees are as crazy as their bosses!
To quote Bing: “Because we are nuts, you know, we who work for those who go insane above us. We're crazy and incompetent and lazy and churlish and occasionally stupid and cowardly and disloyal. And it's time we all sucked it up and stopped blaming our bosses for everything. “
The full article is too long to be posted here, so I am providing the link and would stop with the six points of employee behavior that drive bosses crazy:
1. We don't listen.
2. We show up late.
3. We leave early
4. We squabble.
5. We need to be loved.
6. We leave.
I guess there is enough ammunition for Dilbert’s boss to start his own comic strip :)
Tuesday, June 05, 2007
And then it rained...
On an unusually hot and dry Sunday evening for Bangalore’s standards, I decided not to venture out further and confine myself to the cozy comforts of the new house I had moved into.
I decided to watch a movie and picked up “Guide”, from my ever expanding movie collection.
I had got the movie ling time back and saw it once, but was half asleep that day and did not give it its due attention. I was in a better frame of mind for this profound movie, this time around.
For those who haven’t seen it or don’t know about it, Guide is based on the novel of the same name by R.K Narayan, and was made into a commercial film in Hindi and English by Dev Anand.
I remember a very funnayfunny narrative by Narayan in one of his books, about how the book and the films are so different from each other, and he never accepted the film! In his own imitable style, he talks about how the book was set in the sleepy southern town of Mysore, which was integral to the story, but the film was set and shot in the North. And when you add aspects like S.D Burman’s haunting music, you get a fairly romanticized version of the book.
But what else do you expect in a bollywood movie? I am not complaining though, as the film manages to entertain and engage, especially the lead stars. In spite of all the criticism – right or wrong, what stands out about Dev Anand the movie maker is the excellent themes he chooses. Some of my favorites are Des Pardes and Hare Rame Hare Krishna.
In Guide, what turns out to be a story of a happy go luck charmer, changes in the later part to a deep philosophical message, conveyed in the form the Indian audience is likely to understand.
That they did not and the movie bombed, in spite of a series of awards, is more a reflection of our inability to understand complex movies and prefer the masala movies. This trend, though is changing with some excellent recent movies that are non conformist doing well commercial as well. (My favorites in the recent past are Page 3, Rang de Basanti, Mr. and Mrs. Iyer)
In the meanwhile it is getting hotter outside and I am sweating in spite of having the fan blowing at full speed and with all my windows open. I wish it rained today…
This is turning out to be a movie review, and that was not what I intended.
While I would like the readers to go and try this movie , I want to focus on the aspect of faith that is played out in the climax of the movie. Raju, on ordinary guy, runs away from the harsh realities of life, and by a strange twist of fate, becomes a Swami in a remote village. The village is hit by sever drought, and the villagers start believing that their Swami would undertake a fast until it rains. Raju is unable to escape this situation and slowly starts accepting the reality.
The villagers are rock solid in their faith that it would rain, and although Raju is an educated man, he slowly starts believing that it may be his chance to redeem himself and ensure their faith is not shattered.
Raju undergoes a tremendous spiritual transformation and leaves you with many questions that are the basis for Indian philosophy:
“Is the entire world, the people and the events, one large illusion or Maya”.
“If you have thousands of people collectively believing and praying it something would happen, would it indeed happen?”.
There is an unmistakable similarity to Paulo Coelho’s assertion that if you strongly believe something would happen and want it to happen, the entire universe would conspire to ensure that it does.
In the process Raju realizes that the soul or “athma” is higher than anything else and it is always pure. Raju realizes the god in himself and if we all do that one day I am sure it would be pouring good will all over the world.
I would not out it in my list of must watch films, but do g0 ahead and watch it if you get a chance. I have heard the book is much better – so I am certainly going to try it out!
Mean while, I looked out of my window and felt the lovely smell of earth…and then it rained…
I decided to watch a movie and picked up “Guide”, from my ever expanding movie collection.
I had got the movie ling time back and saw it once, but was half asleep that day and did not give it its due attention. I was in a better frame of mind for this profound movie, this time around.
For those who haven’t seen it or don’t know about it, Guide is based on the novel of the same name by R.K Narayan, and was made into a commercial film in Hindi and English by Dev Anand.
I remember a very funnayfunny narrative by Narayan in one of his books, about how the book and the films are so different from each other, and he never accepted the film! In his own imitable style, he talks about how the book was set in the sleepy southern town of Mysore, which was integral to the story, but the film was set and shot in the North. And when you add aspects like S.D Burman’s haunting music, you get a fairly romanticized version of the book.
But what else do you expect in a bollywood movie? I am not complaining though, as the film manages to entertain and engage, especially the lead stars. In spite of all the criticism – right or wrong, what stands out about Dev Anand the movie maker is the excellent themes he chooses. Some of my favorites are Des Pardes and Hare Rame Hare Krishna.
In Guide, what turns out to be a story of a happy go luck charmer, changes in the later part to a deep philosophical message, conveyed in the form the Indian audience is likely to understand.
That they did not and the movie bombed, in spite of a series of awards, is more a reflection of our inability to understand complex movies and prefer the masala movies. This trend, though is changing with some excellent recent movies that are non conformist doing well commercial as well. (My favorites in the recent past are Page 3, Rang de Basanti, Mr. and Mrs. Iyer)
In the meanwhile it is getting hotter outside and I am sweating in spite of having the fan blowing at full speed and with all my windows open. I wish it rained today…
This is turning out to be a movie review, and that was not what I intended.
While I would like the readers to go and try this movie , I want to focus on the aspect of faith that is played out in the climax of the movie. Raju, on ordinary guy, runs away from the harsh realities of life, and by a strange twist of fate, becomes a Swami in a remote village. The village is hit by sever drought, and the villagers start believing that their Swami would undertake a fast until it rains. Raju is unable to escape this situation and slowly starts accepting the reality.
The villagers are rock solid in their faith that it would rain, and although Raju is an educated man, he slowly starts believing that it may be his chance to redeem himself and ensure their faith is not shattered.
Raju undergoes a tremendous spiritual transformation and leaves you with many questions that are the basis for Indian philosophy:
“Is the entire world, the people and the events, one large illusion or Maya”.
“If you have thousands of people collectively believing and praying it something would happen, would it indeed happen?”.
There is an unmistakable similarity to Paulo Coelho’s assertion that if you strongly believe something would happen and want it to happen, the entire universe would conspire to ensure that it does.
In the process Raju realizes that the soul or “athma” is higher than anything else and it is always pure. Raju realizes the god in himself and if we all do that one day I am sure it would be pouring good will all over the world.
I would not out it in my list of must watch films, but do g0 ahead and watch it if you get a chance. I have heard the book is much better – so I am certainly going to try it out!
Mean while, I looked out of my window and felt the lovely smell of earth…and then it rained…
Monday, June 04, 2007
Pepsicide controversy…
I recently found this article in Business week on Pepsi and its challenges in India given the “Pesticide controversy”. For those who are not familiar with the issue, please read this article at:
http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_24/b4038064.htm?chan=rss_topStories_ssi_5
The article appears to be highly patronizing towards Cola firms especially Pepsi.
There are a few aspects of this issue that I want to do a balanced analysis on:
- How healthy are these drinks, irrespective of whether they have pesticide content or not.
- How good is the quality of water we consume in India?
- Is it enough to expose the pesticide content in these large cola offerings? What are the results when tested on “staple” drinks such as water, milk, fruit juices, and other bottled drinks in India?
- What are our awareness levels on these topics?
My contention is that aerated / carbonated drinks are unhealthy in the first place. It is fairly well known that they have no nutritious value and tat regular consumption has long term health effects. While the West is fairly aware of these and the harmful effects of the fast food that goes with these drinks, the same cannot be said about India. Thus, India serves as huge growth market for these firms given the high levels of education on health in the west may lead to a drop in cola consumption.
This leaves them in a position to go all out and attack the Indian market with expensive ad campaigns, sponsorships, but with zero or very little education on the effects of consumption of their products.
This should not however, divert attention from the fact the quality of water and other drinks we consume are abysmal. We have no clue how good the water used in restaurants, juice and coffee shops is, and we consume more from here than from the cola majors. This leaves us exposed, unknowingly to tremendous health hazards. So while a fruit juice is a healthier alternative to Pepsi, we have no idea how good the water used is.
This is where institutes like the Centre for Science & Environment (CSE), and its activists like Sunita Narain, need to play a much more critical role. Granted the scope is big and the challenged are enormous, but they should not be content with “exposing” the cola majors.
Our awareness levels when it comes to health and environment are painfully low, predominantly due to lack of quality education, and the lack of pro active messaging from the media. For all you know, there must already be reports from CSE on other drinks, that are never publicized, simple because it’s not as good a story as a Sunita Narain vs. Indra Nooyi one.
Unless we have increased awareness levels through multiple channels, we continue to kill ourselves silently.
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