Tag Archives: Lessons

Mr. Bay, You are not Rajni

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This post follows a situation in which I chose not to speak, though my heart pounded in an urge to do respond. Simply put, it was a lovely moron who questioned me on the ‘most important’ inconsequential thing (saying it was a question could be an injustice to the intimidating and ordering tone). The details of the situation, I cannot go even slither more deep. But, to satisfy myself and to get a good night’s sleep, I am having to do this; though I know this is not the ideal post to celebrate the second anniversary of my blog. What follows is an outburst of all love I had to express to this moron ever since I knew he was one. And one request before you read further: if you can, please avoid reading this post. If you can’t stop yourself, then read it and forget it! For the comfort of conversation, let me call this moron as ‘Bay’, the word whose little variant might actually fit the character.

Dear Bay, 

Thanks to the real estate restrictions, I am pleasedat hell to share the corner with you. No one except you could have had the uncontrollable need to throw in a towel to reserve that place. Come the first opportunity to leave that place, I am off from there, for such a place is reserved for your uncorking highness! If you ever want to spare a thought for why I think I cannot afford to share your corner–which I know for sure your highness shouldn’t bother to, and even if you did, I am sure your highness has the brains only to read the lines as published–here are some of my thoughts. Continue reading →

The Laughable and The Uninspiring

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Series of incidents since yesterday–I can’t resist sharing them here.

I received a call from a professor yesterday. She asked me if I knew what I should be doing today. Frankly, I did not know what she was referring to. But she told me that she told me what I had to do long back. I know I have a little problem with my memory in general, but my memory works efficiently when it deals with work. Fundamentally, that call asserted that I did not keep track of what I had to do. The reason behind that professor’s such forceful assertion–I guess or may be I felt–was to escape from that activity if I said I was not available, putting the blame on me, a scapegoat in the bottom of the hierarchy.

Lesson: It is easy to blame someone’s memory as poor, and hence him/her. Any argument to defend can be made to sound foolish if you are in the bottom of the pile. In how many movies have we seen tactics of the crooked to convince the society that who is innocent is actually mad.

In the course of a discussion with another professor, I got to know one of her experiences. One of her friends, who often keeps calling her, had one day called to share a happy news that he was awarded the ‘Best Teacher’ in his University. But the sad part of his story was longer; in that, his kid was being counseled by this professor for psychological reasons. And more painfully, his wife claimed that her husband uses lots of ‘psychological stuff’ on their kid, so that the kid does not have any problem. Now, this professor has an experience, and her friend has an award.

Lesson: Best outside, Worst inside does not really work that way. It ends up becoming a story!

I visited another professor at her residence after a long time. Just before I entered her residence, there stood a kid who asked me for a little help. He asked me if there were any doctors available in the surrounding area. I told him, I was going to meet one. But just before entering the professor’s residence was when it lit up in my mind that he might be referring to a medical doctor.

Lesson: Knowledge is a curse. It only confuses!

After that little fun in the last paragraph of this post, I have to reveal the activity that we were expected to do at Andhra University. A professor and me, a research scholar, were sent to that university where their admissions counseling was going on, to distribute pamphlets promoting admissions in our university. Just imagine having to make a first impression to a prospective student distributing pamphlets on road, and then presenting yourself as a faculty in the college! This happens only in my college, I guess. This act of our college best represents what they usually do, create paradoxes and argue their case. Here, it was a conflict they created between having ‘dignity of labor’ and having ‘self-respect’. If I were to argue that my being a faculty needs that I follow certain standard of living, then they would push the case to ‘dignity of labor’ side. If they read this post, then they might be cautious in pushing the argument to ‘sophistication’, suggesting that being a faculty and distributing pamphlets on road can be managed. The university may not know that a clerk of our college was hesitating to do the job that was given to us, but they speak management and run an institution. Let me end this post with just this case, before I am tempted to roll out too many!

Lesson: There is always a conflict when fools rule, to compromise or to challenge. But seldom, there is a choice. And life offers what?! May be more jaw-dropping questions, for which answering would make you feel insulted.

Life is really fascinating, and I mean it!

Don’t forget contributing to World Food Program. :)

Bills and Barcodes

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Wanting to give a perfect new house for my fiancée, I went out shopping to Big Bazar, Vizag, with plans of purchasing various household and decorative items. Since it was  a planned affair, my shopping was finished in less than an hour. I stood at the bill payment counter for about half hour. No complaints! May be I can imagine the long queue was because of volumes of business. Then came my turn and the bill was handed over which read Rs. 1960, apart from lots of other bills, worth Rs. 4000, they broke into pieces so that I could get Rs. 200 discount. Fantastic till here, but that Rs. 1960 bill was special.

I recalled that as I was moving around, buckets were offered as ‘buy one-get one‘. I needed two, and I took two, similar ones. My understanding was that I have to pay for one bucket only. But the bill showed two different prices for two pieces, and two different discounts applied to them. This is completely different from what the earlier offer said. It would make a difference of Rs. 40 in my favor if it was done as per the offer I had seen and considered. I asked for an explanation, and that is where the story began!

Representative who was billing sent me to customer care counter. Representative there was busy documenting lots of stuff, or so he was showing. After a while, like about 20 minutes, I get the attention of Mr. Busy, to find that I have to get the sales rep who sold me these buckets to sort out the issue. I question ‘why me‘, and then he ‘announces‘ in mike calling for a representative from ‘buckets‘ section. He comes and explains to me that one is an old bucket and one is new. Obviously, his argument fails because I am purchasing only new goods, can’t pay for an old one, at least in a shopping mall of that size. He brings himself some help. This representative tells me that I have taken two different buckets and they vary in their capacity. The sarcastic self in me took the dirty pleasure of proving him wrong in the crowd. They bring in more help. This Mr. Intelligent (perhaps an MBA) representative explains to me, that as the economy changes, prices keep changing. So one bucket was bought earlier, and the other was bought later. His explanation fails too, because it is me, the customer, who is purchasing two pieces of the same product on the same day. On top of it, I had to remind him we were in a retail store, and not in a bullion market or commodities exchange. Then as I expected, after all this action for an hour, to meet the store manager, another representative suggests me that Rs. 40 is not worth my time and energy there. I had one simple answer: that it was not Rs. 40 that was motivating me, but the case was so bloody interesting.  By this time, I figured out that it was a case of ‘prices changed, offers changed, but barcodes not changed, and systems not changed‘.

At this point, one representative (new one again!) who does not speak EngRish, walked up to me, took the bill, spoke to the customer care representative, got a credit note, changed the bill, and gave me ‘bottles‘ worth Rs. 40. I wish he backed up his good job by saying, ‘we wish you could have a better experience next time‘ or something to that extent.

Haa! What an experience! And the lesson came at a low cost! Does this case convey failure of staff in this retail store? If it does, just wait for me to tell you that the system had calculated 3 x 14 as 38.25. And the billing representative said he was rounding it to Rs. 40. Now, that was hilarious. :)

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Gödel’s theorem may have been a blow to mathematics, but it contains a profound lesson for us all. We had taken too much pride in the power of human reason to erect vast, impermeable towers of reason, logical systems of flawless perfection, and all-embracing canopies of knowledge. Gödel pointed out the potential flaws in this dream and showed that all-embracing schemes may contain unsuspected inconsistencies—no matter how hard we try to be comprehensive there will always be some missing knowledge. Gödel’s metaphor applies to everything we do; therefore if we are to relate to the new millennium in a creative fashion we must learn new ways of thinking, ways that are more flexible and open than ever before. Rather than dealing with organizations that are rule-bound and hierarchical, we should be looking to systems that self-organize, that are organic and open in nature, and that generate their own, internal, context-dependent logics and connections.

David F. Peat, From Certainty to Uncertainty

Expressions

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He is a writer. Imaginations were more beautiful when he conveyed them through his eyes. Dreams became vivid once people read him. Expressions were precisely put, touching the heart of even the rock-hearted. And yet on that day, I found him speechless in two contrasting occasions.

On that morning, he was attending a college to give share his views on life with the students. One of the enthusiast asked him, “Sir. I have a problem expressing my feelings. How is it that you do it so easily?“. This question is not new to anyone as recognized like he was. The intent behind answering the question is thus well-thought of, encouraging people to learn language. His answer was quick, “Vocabulary and use of language“. Like others, this enthusiast was not satisfied with the answer. Instead, he was disappointed and threw back his words, “I thought you were embracing life, but you seem to stitch vocabulary“. And he stayed silent, for any response other than that would be proving the enthusiast right. He embraced life, but that expression could never come out in words.

He went deep into thoughts, reflecting his experience. We tried cajoling him. Just then, he looked at the sky. So beautiful the sky was, with the sun hiding behind the clouds, showing her might on the silver lining. Various shades of blue contested to be his favorites, I guess. And from somewhere in there, a shade of pinkish orange too showed up. No matter how much time he spent looking at the scene. It was nearing the dusk of the day, and he spoke again. This time only to say, “Words don’t seem to make expressions complete“.

His next work was titled, “Expressions: Embracing the gift of life“.

Not everything can be a lesson. But every lesson can be learned.

Ends of Criticism

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His new model was given to his superiors. He requested them, a critical review before he could bring the model into practice. The boss said, “Congratulations but… may be you could do better if only you did some superficial modifications”. He took his lesson and did it with sincerity. The redesigned model was resubmitted to his superiors. And the boss said, “The last version had some appeal that this version seems to have lost. I believe you need to be more clear with the fundamentals“. It was a tough lesson but he learnt it through experience by now. He respecified the redesigned model, and made a resubmission of the resubmitted version. And there came another suggestion…”  ____   “, and he went willingly-deaf; for, he realized that his new model is no more new, and with what he was working on, he became a martyr to innovation.

He came out in distress and agony, and said, “I shouldn’t have asked for a review. I feel like I don’t own this anymore“. And there I took my first lesson that even asking for a criticism ends in distress and agony. He continued, “I guess the knowledge of these guys is limited to estimate the innovation that went into my model.” And there it was, the beginning of another story which ends in, perhaps, the same lesson. Only this time, it is an unasked criticism. I only hope he learnt his lessons to make mine better.

Criticism and Curiosity: They limit each other.