Having now lived for about 15 months in Switzerland I feel considerably more at ease than I used to. Now that is a relative term, lest any of you think I am an expert in the field (I am not). But enough of comfort to be able to get round and about without difficulty. Went to Triberg yesterday, that's a village in Germany with a population of 5000 people or so. Triberg's claim to fame is that it has Germany's highest waterfall inside the village centre, a beautiful, pretty scene- was lovely and exciting and in the deep winter too, when you have spray descending on your face in a fine mist. It also claims to be the place where the Black Forest pastry was invented. We went to the Restaurant Schafer, which claims to be founded by the inventor of the pastry Schafer and ordered one each. Absolutely divine hunk of cream, chocolate shaving, sponge cake, the whole lot liberally dipped in cherry brandy and with real cherries in it. To be honest, transported briefly to heaven for the brief while I was eating it!

Two tragically different posts

Derek O'Brien has written a brilliant article about what it is like to be a minority in India. He comes straight to the point, and admittedly this is the first time I have heard someone saying it is for the country to integrate the minority, but it is also for the minority to integrate into the country, or words to that effect. He talk sof his childhood in Kolkata, when his parents encouraged all their kids to speak Bengali (not their mothertongue), celebrate Diwali and Id (at least from the sweets and visiting friend pov!) etc. And how, at the time of Partition, part of the extended family was in Pakistan.
He went back to meet them a few years back. And that is when the grittiness of the comparison come through and you feel proud of being an Indian. Parts of his extended family converted to Islam because it is simply too difficult to be a minority in Pakistan.
I am not a religious bigot, and not thumping my chest about how good India is (or worse, how bad Pakistan is). But my heart stopped for a minute, my eyes misted and I wondered about the heterogenous miracle that our country is.

Read http://quizderek.blogspot.ch/2012/08/the-obriens-of-india-and-pakistan_13.html

And separately, another article appeared in 'The Dawn' in Karachi: a fictionalised account of the plight of a Hindu girl in Pakistan (discriminated against twice over: first a Hindu, then a girl) and the horror of her forcible conversion and marriage. It is fiction, but it seems pretty close to the truth, if you read the internet about Rinkle Kumari and similar cases. It touched me.

AIG Update

So here's an update, which I should provide in all fairness, since I panned AIG considerably in my last post. The Government of the US of A has decided to tax the bonuses received by AIG executives @ 90%, effectively ensuring that they keep only 10% of what they receive and the balance returns to the public, whence it came. That's justice and I'm considerably more at peace now.
Ironically, it also came to light since the scandal broke that it's not the CEO of AIG who's getting the lion's share of this "bonus" but his direct reports and their direct reports .. that only made me feel a bit worse as it were.

I'd like to be working for AIG

Life doesn't get better than this if you are an AIG executive, frankly. Think. You work for the one of the biggest corporations in the world. You mismanage the company to the point where you drive it to bankruptcy. You are able to ransom the Government of the US, on the basis that if AIG sinks, a substantial portion of the international banking industry will collapse since it is so heavily linked to AIG. Effectively, you blackmail the government into giving you a US $ 180 billion bailout (yes, that's BILLIONS, not millions!!).
And then, as reported in rediff.com today, you give yourself a BONUS. Yes Sir. A Bonus!! Because talent like yours is hard to find and needs to be retained!! Of course!! So none of the leaders at AIG stop to think, without this bunch of losers we might have actually had a business going.
And now Obama has stepped into the act, fortunately. As the CEO of AIG's biggest shareholder (The US Government, in other words, the US Taxpayer) he has vowed to block the bonus payout through every means possible. Let's hope he succeeds.

ISABS Labs

Plenty of stuff coming up. First is the National Event from May 11 - 23 in Goa. Second, a possible 3 day event on Appreciative Inquiry in Mumbai or Lonavla. Third, a lab on Sensuality and Body Image that's in the pipeline for the first week of April 09. Anyone interested, give me a buzz or write in for further details.
All ISABS events are moderately priced : it's a voluntary organisation that functions on a no-profit-no-loss basis.

Slumdog Millionaire

And so I'm trying to figure out, why are Indians resentful of slumdog? And indeed, what's the entire hype about?
First, the facts. It's a very good film, that I maintain. It has action, passion, grit and is engaging from the word go. It's realistic to the hilt in its depiction of slum life in India, while I have no first-hand experience of life in slums it seems gritty enough to be called realistic. It certainly deserves it's Oscars, though the introduction of Jai Ho at the end of the film is very clearly a ploy to ensure that the nomination for music was made possible.
I have two basic cribs about the Indian reaction. First, that we behave as if the victory of the Slumdog team at the Oscars is a victory for India. Surely that cannot be the case. Danny Boyle has made a masal film for a Western audience and has done so very well. It's not even the first time an Indian has gone onto the Oscar stage - Bhanu Athaiya was there for the costume designs for Gandhi, a full two decades back (more than that, actually). Sure, there's good reason for us to be proud -it's international recognition of the talent embodied by AR Rahman, Resul and others. And anything that works for slumkids must be good, is my blatantly partisan opinion - and in this case, those kids are getting a chance at an education that they'd otherwise have never seen, so I'm all for it. But it's not a victory for India and India is not on test every year when the Oscars are announced, so let's get a bit mature about it.
Second, why is there so much negative reaction from Indians to the idea of a westerner making a film about slums? First AB went ballistic and then a few others as well. My own theory is that we earnest believe that we should show only our best side to the world and if we pretend long enough that there is no seamy side, that belief will somehow magically become the reality. That is really stupid. There is a seamy underside to life in India and it is for us to be ashamed of. 60 years after Independence, we still are not able to offer decent housing, food and education to our population and that has resulted in a completely different lifestyle for this other India, that is in our metros and yet not urban. We need more people like Boyle to hold up mirrors to us and let us know that there is a world out there that is savage, primitive and which we have not impacted positively as yet. AB I guess went ballistic because he belongs to those who believe that the seamy side will vanish if he pretends it does not exist, besides, the film does a takeoff on him at different times and in different forms (after all, Anil Kapoor pays him the highest compliment possible while portraying his role!!). But clearly, whatever AB's motives may be - and I'm one of his biggest fans - let's remind ourselves that this is not about AB or Boyle, it's about an India that we've ignored for long and need to work with.

The Last Lecture- A Sad Update

Just learnt that Prof Randy Pausch died in July last year- from the pancreatic cancer that he was suffering from. He outlived the doctors' predictions by three months and that must count for something. I think what was especially touching about the Last Lecture, in retrospect, was that it was not a presentation he made to his students, but one that he made to his kids about how his view of the world was changing now that he was conscious that time was finite.
Rest in peace, Randy. You deserve this one. With applause for the equanimity and courage in the face of death - I would certainly wish for that courage when the time comes.