Challenge accepted

I often wonder if growing up in any other country around the world is as competitive as growing up in India. Would I have had to go through the countless imperceptible struggles that I went through if I had been born in New York or London or Dubai? There is no way of finding this out obviously, and that is not even the purpose of raising this question. The truth here is that India is so unique is so many ways that it is hard to have an uneventful childhood here. 

When I say that, I do not refer to something spectacular or bizarre that you might have been subjected to. It is a simple concept of economics that all starts with the country’s population. A pure demand supply mismatch, which has ensured that at every single juncture, we have to prove that we are in the top 5% of whatever sample space we are representing, so as to achieve what we are being considered for. This is applicable everywhere, be it education or job or even marriage. Because there is abundance of options here but lack of opportunities!

This had actually led to Indians being a part of all the major job markets of the world. There is a school of thought which believes that talent migration is one of the biggest dangers facing our country. Whether they are right or not, is not for me to opine about, but it just seems to be the obvious solution to many of the problems that the educated population here faces. During the formative years, everyone has a vision of their future and when you see that you can’t get that within the boundaries to which you are striped, you have to look out. This has been prevalent for ages now, with the difference that instead of moving from villages to city, you now have to “go global”. If not here, you have to make it big somewhere!

So what impact does this kind of a backdrop have on the way you think? For starters, it makes you prepared. Because you have seen so many prospects lost to preferences and reservations that you know what you have is not going to stay. And this thought never leaves you, not when you land a job after years of struggle, not when you become the best rated employee and not even when you become the CEO… For there is always an equally qualified guy waiting around the corner to prove he is better than you!

But more than that, it makes you so persistent, that beyond a point if things come easy to you, you start doubting its genuineness! I do not know how many of us have made this observation that Indians as a bunch are bloody determined! Especially when it comes to the subject areas where mind rules. Well I have noticed this and far too frequently now.

The Indian mind knows that the only form of survival is to keep getting better at the game, to make sure that the opponent is always two steps behind, trying to figure out how to catch up. It seems like we all take up a challenge when we are born and are obstinate to let that go till the very last day. So much so that, at some point of time, we may have overlooked the fact that we have already won, but are still playing just for the fun of it!

The Dissociation Paradigm

The belongingness that you feel towards a city is a peculiar phenomenon. More often than not, there is not much of a clear cut reason behind why you feel the way you do about a particular place. For me, that city was Delhi for a very long time. And after a considerable amount of thought, I came to the conclusion that this attachment was based on a single premise: Familiarity. I spent 20 years in that city and a part of me began to be defined by Delhi itself. That is true of every place though! There is a certain trademark of every city’s inhabitants. Delhi is for aggression, Mumbai for progressiveness, Kolkata for simplicity, Chennai for conventionality and so on (these are my views and I am not typecasting anyone).

So I was all Delhi – aggressive, boisterous and a bit egocentric (by using the word “bit”, I am just cutting myself some slack to be honest!!!). I spent so many years getting each and every bit of Delhi ingrained in me that even today the mention of the name brings a sudden allegiance towards Delhi as if it is a long lost sibling! And when destiny took me to Mumbai, a city that I had heard so much about but never really wanted to be a part of, I vowed to myself that I will keep that Delhi spirit alive in me. There was no reason to have an aversion to Mumbai other than the obstinate resolve to be addressed as a “Delhite” for life!

And then came the transition phase of my life, when I moved to Mumbai some 30 months ago. There is a compulsion within to keep yourself so fervently attached to your hometown (which for me is Delhi for I have hardly spent any time in my birthplace Chennai). It is an emotion so hard to describe. For one thing, that is where all your roots are – friends, family and so many memories built out of years of growing up. And then you know that, here in this new city, you are an outsider and you always will be. So you want to keep that bond with the city you left alive, just so you have some place that you can call your own. And for that, you keep going back to the memories that you have of Connaught place and Lajpat Nagar where you have spent all your teenage days, even as the memories become thinner and thinner as years progress. After a point of time, you are forced to accept that you have gotten over the obsession of wanting to be referred to as  a “Dilli ki ladki”!

For me that moment of realization happened in the very near past. On my last visit to Delhi, I became aware of the change in me. I don’t speak the same language any more (I have a lot of Mumbaiya slang in my Hindi). I don’t know what restaurants to go to and when people ask me for suggestions my mind keeps going back to Lokhandwala or Colaba or Bandra. I have considerable difficulty in remembering some of the “galli and raste” that used to be at my fingertips. I feel a bit out of place when my friends are talking about a new place that they have been to recently. And above all, I feel like a visitor in the city! I find myself wanting to get back to my life and that life is not in this city anymore!!!

It was unsettling initially to feel so unconnected to Delhi. But it was even more of a shocker to think how less of a time it took me to move from one end to the other of the spectrum! May be, I was not as fixated on Delhi as I thought I was. Or probably, the familiarity that makes one belong somewhere developed between me and Mumbai! Perhaps, I was much better at adapting to a newer territory that I ever imagined myself to be!

The love for politics

In most countries, politics is just a study of power, who governs, who makes laws and what those laws are. But not in my country! In India, politics is a lot more than that. It’s the hottest topic of discussion, the bread and butter of a millions of news channels and above all the livelihood of so many party supporters. In my country, politics is larger than life itself and there is a reason for that. We are the largest democracy in the world. No other country has as many political parties as us. There is competition in every field in this country and politics is no different.

Well everyone knows that “With great power comes great responsibility”. But when you have the kind of power that politics bestows on you, you have arrogance, pride, superiority, over-confidence and a lot more that responsibility is forced to take a backstage. We are a democracy for the namesake. But on the ground level, many still refer to the system as monarchy! And why won’t they… what with generation after generation of the same family controlling the government at the centre. And when you see it that way, it turns out to be a pity. People here do not really have a choice in deciding who should be their leader. It’s like giving a young boy a dozen barbie dolls and telling him that he can play with whichever one of them he wants! The choice here is a delusion.

It is sometimes hilarious to see how this system works. A party comes to power on the strength of many, many false promises and then, during the tenure does a million changes to the local laws, which forces so many of us to change our ways of life because all of a sudden there might be new traffic rules or tax policies. And then after five years of this happening, the opposition swaps positions with the ruling party and what you see over the first one year is the repealing of all the codes that were put in place by the previous government! And this cycle continues with the only disturbance being in the life of a common man.

But despite all this, we all love politics! Talking about it, discussing at length with our colleagues, following newspaper columns religiously and even watching each of those million channels that talk about them! Of course I am writing this from personal experience but there is at least a 50% of Indian population like me. I think after cricket, this is the most common field of interest in India. I remember distinctly a particular period in my college life when I so wanted to join politics. There might have been quite a bunch of enthusiastic youngsters like me. But, the field in itself is intimidating! Not because it is dangerous, but if you really give it a meaningful thought, it is an enormous task to be in a field where you have to keep the common good before self. Not all can do that. And I definitely had my doubts.

When you are from a middle class family that has no political history, it is next to impossible for an Indian parent to encourage his/her child to enter this field for here it is like entering a battle. You leave your jobs, regular lives, families and friends and even your own interests behind. So rather than do this, people choose the highway, that of being a spectator. I am not blaming them for being this way. To be fair, there is very limited precedent in the history of Indian polity of a person with regular credentials and background making it big in the field. In a world where everyone is out to prove oneself, why would you even try to do that in a field where the odds are stacked up against you! The entries to barrier are super-high here.

But when there occur these occasional social outbursts (for e.g. the Anna Hazare episode), you realize the power that a common man in this country can have. We still can’t make a huge difference as an individual for there are these laws of politics that are always working against us. But as a society, you still have that influence to make heads turn, to stop and take a notice. We have the habit of finding impossible ways to keep our hope alive (Like expecting a no ball and a six from that when Indian cricket team needs 7 runs to win of a ballJ)!!! And is that not enough reason for all the politics lovers to be so passionate about the subject!

The perplexity that is the arranged marriage!

This is probably one of the most controversial topics that I have selected for a blog. But to be honest, everyone is entitled to an individualistic opinion on such subjective social issues and here is where I present mine. This blog is, per se, inspired by the millions of conversations that I have with friends, kin, parents and everyone else who has a bit of time to spare for they think that that is the only issue going on in the life of a 24-year old woman in the Indian society. It is a bewilderment why a 26-year old man does not get the same number of heads turned focusing on his age when the ideal age gap in an Indian couple is considered two years! Such double standards!!

I am not against marriage for I strongly believe in the concept of matrimony and how essential it is to the functioning of the society and human race in general. To put matters simply, it is beautiful when it happens the way it was planned… which I believe is a rarity to say the least. It is the whole idea behind arranging a marriage that seems a bit irrational to me. I am probably questioning one of the oldest prevailing Indian traditions but I just believe that like all other older rituals, that we have revamped over time to suit the changing trends, this one should be given a thought too.

I recently heard a very strong case in favor of arranged marriage which I actually did appreciate. A friend of mine pointed out that not all people are outgoing or forthcoming enough to find their own mates and if my logic of marriage necessitated by love was to be applied, some might remain single! This is a good way to look at the idea and I sincerely accept that in such a scenario, my reasoning fails. But if you look at the society of today, everyone (at least 99% of the population) has a successful/failed love affair, which only goes to show that my principle is easily applicable to the broader base, and that is what all theories are targeted at. Even hard sciences do not give a 100% success ratio.

I understand when people are eager to get married. But what baffles me is when a few of them say that their choice is an arranged marriage! How is arranged marriage a choice??? I can comprehend if it is the choice of your parents. But how can it be a voluntary decision on the part of the person getting married to go for a mate selected by some astrological matching!! There are further some cases where some of us are forced to go for an arranged matrimony for the simple reason that we do not want to go against the wishes of our family. This reasoning, I can accede to but even then not fully. You have to live with someone for 40 years of your life (on an average), raise kids with him/her, spend your old days together and plan your life together. It is a bit hard to compromise on all that. What if the astrology matches but the interests are poles apart!!!

Some of the readers might find my thoughts too radical. This is not to criticize the people who think otherwise. This is only to put a case forward that there is no right or wrong here. You ridicule my way and I am puzzled by yours. I am not forcing you to get married only when you fall in love. By that logic, you cannot force me to go for an arrangement that I am not comfortable with. It often eludes me why people try to convince each other that theirs is the right stand. And that too in subjective issues as this one!

For me, the only reason to go for matrimony is when you know that you want to spend your life with someone for whatever reasons! And without that realization, a marriage in itself is unnatural!

The Last Night

Well, I started to write this blog so that I can keep it as a diary entry, an episode which I could go back to whenever I want to relive my days, here in UK, far far away from home. There is no clear line as to whether the feeling that I have today is good or bad, let’s just call it a grey area as of now for I am sure that the dark side of it is just temporary and will vanish as soon as I go back to my country.

I have a huge slam book of memories to take with me, of the Emirates, the Theatre of Dreams, the city of Manchester, the UK Somerset country side, the sinfully frantic shopping experiences at the happening central London streets, the beautiful London architecture, the go-crazy intoxicating music in some of the legendary London clubs, riverside beer conversations with some unexpected yet very special friends and so many more picture perfect frames!

And as I sit here in my flat spending my last night here in London at home, I realise that the three months gone by have been as rewarding as anticipated in the beginning! The reason for the most part is my job though it gave a few rough days, sleepless nights and crazy stress, all impossible to handle but well, it’s a package. If you want the good part of it, you take the other side as well.

There were some breathtaking moments along the way, professionally as well as personally. And these made up for the countless nights that I spent in front of my system unable to figure out why I was doing all this. There comes a point in life when your mind starts playing tricks on you. And in my case, my brain was teasing me as if to say, “Isn’t this what you always wanted? So what are you crying about now?” But then things became better, which is primarily because you get used to even hangovers when they stay for more than a day! That’s what happened to me and once I got used to that, life was miraculously easy.

There was one extremely special moment, which was life-changing yet completely unexpected. I always thought that I was slogging to get that job, to be a part of this fraternity, to fulfil the next level of my well-thought out dream process. And finally the reward was there for the taking and when all should have fallen into place, they did but just not to form the same picture. I had to make one of the toughest choices apparently but it was not tough at all. So the most awaited words are spoken. “We would love for you to join us here.” And at that moment, it was spontaneous! I knew I had to go back, not because I don’t want this job. That was never the argument. But because there is something more important to look forward to! And now in hindsight, I probably realise that the only thing that was driving me to finish these three months here is the thought that my future is there, back in India waiting for me, where I left it!

Now there is no more confusion. I leave this city only with fantastic experiences that will speak for themselves long after I leave this place. There are no regrets. Not even a remote sense of curiosity as to how different life would have been if I had said a yes to moving to London. Just a hidden nostalgia for I will surely miss this city and the independence that it gave me in terms of every single decision of my life. But that’s about it! All the tricks by the mind fail for there is a content feeling that getting this far in itself was a big feat. And if I have to feed to my ego, well I can always use the self effacing thought that “they did actually pick me and it was I who wanted to move along!” and that feeling is almost like winning a break-up!!!

The weeks gone by

I had planned to write this piece before I even left India. Just did not know when I would befriend the city enough to be able to do justice to the culture that this city is so famously known for. And after the three weeks that have gone by getting to know London, there are mixed feelings. The positives are definitely attributable to London itself and the negative ones are nowhere related to it. I have no benchmarks because this is the only country that I have come to besides my own and needless to say, there is no comparison to India, not just because it is exemplary but because it is home and any expression about home is bound to be tainted with favoritism for obvious reasons...

The enthusiasm that I had when I entered London was quite high just because I was longing so much for a change. Being the restless soul that I am, I get weary of my surroundings and people very easily and a change always does good. And besides, I was stepping into the actual career of my dreams, probably the closest that I can get to the real investment banking world in its magnanimous persona in the near future. So it was all supposed to be an adventure. And more or less, it has been that way! The city has done justice to all my expectations. If you are someone who loves to be alone, who enjoys personal time so much so that you prefer time with yourself over being in a crowd, well perhaps this city is one of the best options. 

It takes no time to be part of the crowd, the crowd that I am referring to, being a part of a particular genre of people. If you go anywhere in the city of London (that is just one square mile at the center of the city, the rest being referred to as Greater London), you see the standard set of crowd, especially on a weekday morning. A sea of people who take the tube, a Starbucks in one hand, a newspaper/novel in the other, earphones making sure that people know you do not want to be disturbed from your personal space, looking up from their book once in a while to see if they reached Moorgate/Bank/Monument (tube stations), then walking at a speed from the station to their workplace that is enough to win a marathon, all the while mailing someone on their Blackberry or calling their bankers/bosses to tell that they have already mailed the work from yesterday at 4 in the morning!!! It's the same kind of people, whether man or woman and all of them dressed in exemplary fashion and looking super fit by the way! 

It's easy to be part of that crowd because you need to know no one unlike back home where travelling by Mumbai local gives you a bunch of friends referred to as "Train buddies". This is not to say that people here are unfriendly. They are quite the opposite actually. I was impressed by so many gestures, a cab driver wishing you a good day, a driver stopping in the middle of the road to let the pedestrians cross first even at the peak hour, people willing to help newcomers get familiar with the city and lots more. But I have never seen personal space my entire life the way I have seen the past three weeks. You don't know if you like it or dislike it. You know you are a part of something big (holds true only if you have the same dream for a career as I had since I was 16!!!) but you also know that so are the thousands of others walking alongside you.

The city in itself is a paradise, the architecture of a shopping mall is no less than a castle and you sometimes get the out of the world feeling, when you look at a St.Paul's Cathedral from a Millennium Bridge at 3 in the morning. That's beauty at its best. You are always alone but you never feel alone for if you stop a moment and look around you see that there are so many like you. Hanging out as a group isn't the norm here which was a shocker for me. But you have to give this one to me. History has given me too many shared laughter and such strong bonds of camaraderie. And as far as I am concerned, misery and euphoria, both needs company!! 

I haven't seen much of London other that the fifth floor of 10, Aldermanbury, London Wall and to be honest, settling in was hard. I had a tough time getting used to this lifestyle because there are a few people that I always need to fall back on and they all are 4,500 miles away. My health didn't support much either and above all the work is taxing beyond levels. But things are falling into place now, because as my dearest friend said yesterday, when you have to be working 20 hours a day, meeting no one but your colleagues, struggling to take out couple of hours to do just anything besides work, you may as well do it with a smile!! And when you think of it that way, things seem all peaceful again. It's strange how much of a role perspective can play in your life.

Well, giving it time did work! I am falling for this city.. Slowly but surely!

Of beliefs and of reality - A common man's perspective

The Jan Lokpal Bill has today reached a stage, where every Indian wants to be associated with it, every form of media talks about it (for like days together!) and every individual wants to have a say about it… so much so that people like me are willing to write blogs on it to share our views on one of the most talked about issues in the recent past of Indian politics.

For people who aren’t very familiar with the concept of the bill, it is an anti-corruption bill drafted by civil activists for the appointment of an independent body (to be called the Jan Lokpal or Citizen’s Ombudsman) which would investigate the corruption cases with the aim of finishing the trial within a period of one year so that there is justice for all and that too in a reasonable time frame. And by independent body here, we mean that the government has no influence on them. This independent body is to be made up of people selected by judges, citizens and other authorities and since the politicians have no say in the constitution of the body, the corruption angle within the Lokpal will be minimal and even if such a case of corruption happens within the body, there are ways to remove those people within a period of two months. That’s the summarized yet comprehensive version of the concept of Lokpal bill.

 This bill has time and again been proposed and there have been frequent controversies and oppositions. And my opinion is that these oppositions aren’t really unfounded. I know this statement may not be very well received by a major portion of the population which has shown its keenness in supporting the widespread revolution that started in the capital city but is spreading like a wildfire now. For people who have been victims of corruption and bureaucracy all through their lives (and trust me there are millions in this category) this is like a light at the end of the tunnel for they know that if there is any chance that this thing gets implemented, that would be like a fitting climax, what you see in a Bollywood movie where the good wins the evil and then everyone lives happily ever after. Let me make it clear that I am not being sarcastic about the concept of the bill in general but that being said, there are serious questions on the implementation and the understanding of this bill.

Being an Indian, I can very much empathize with these people who are trying to fight out corruption with all that they have in their hands. We all talk about it at workplace, trains, buses and any other place where we have two people to listen to us but no one takes any step forward and these people (the supporters of the bill) have done that and that’s an achievement and no wonder everyone wants to be a part of this because each one of them believes that they can fight it. They were all waiting for a trigger and they got it in the form of these people. We need to acknowledge their bravery and proactiveness because they are fighting for what they believed in.

But let’s not overlook the bigger picture here. On paper, everything looks perfect but what about the reality? Is it really a viable option to create a ‘larger than life’ body that will have so much power within its hands? Is that how the laws of a country with a billion people are supposed to be made? And when we talk about the power, we don’t even know clearly what all these powers encompass. The bill is not very clear in terms of the judicial authority that the Lokpal will have. There is a reason why the constitution of India separates the powers of executive, legislative and judiciary. Are we sure that we want to create a body that will tread within the borders of all these areas? How can we expect that kind of an organization to work? And who are these people who we think are qualified enough to judge on every other person in the country and be given irrevocable powers for that? Howsoever qualified that person might be, will it be unfair to assume that those ‘impartial people’ are not likely to be affected by the same conflicts of interest that every other person in power does? And above all, are we saying that a small body of a few individuals will have the capacity to handle loads of cases and then provide fair justice in all of them? Not unless these people we are talking about are some super-humans or mutants for the sheer volume makes it look like a gigantic task. All I am saying is that before creating unrest in social life through agitations and protests, for the implementation of a bill (which is likely to become like a parallel constitution) whose clauses are not even clear to the larger public like me who is going to be the beneficiary of the bill in the first place, should we not make sure that what we are fighting for is feasible and not just a concept that looks excellent on paper and is going to be failure when we see the practicality of it?

No doubts that this is a good cause and an excellent act of courage, but let’s not fool ourselves. Let’s not be tempted by the longing dream of seeing a corruption-free country into believing that such a big change is going to happen just with a dream (howsoever strong and noble it may be). The patriotism inside me also cries out to fight for the good cause but let’s not let our emotion overpower the practicality that life is!