Christopher Martin Jenkins writing in Cricinfo magazine on the opening game of the IPL in Bangalore:
local interest was spurious, because they were watching a game between sides made up of mercenaries and little-known youths.
When Bangalore cheers for Mark Boucher, the sportsman becomes a mercenary and the interest spurious. Manchester United supporters cheering for Christiano Ronaldo if fine. Did CMJ ever describe Mushtaq Ahmed as a mercenary, or Sussex supporter's interest as spurious, when Mushy bowled Sussex to the county championship?
The English cricket establishment's sniffy insecurity when confronted with the success of Indian cricket is downright embarrassing. It starts getting nasty when the sniffiness results in ECB bureaucrats elbowing professional cricketers away from a decent chance to make good money.
Friday 25 April 2008
Thursday 24 April 2008
Zorro. By Isabel Allende
Completely satisfying. Just the right mix of emotions, just the right balance of historical context and personal drama, just the right length, just the right complexity (for someone who typically reads after a hard day in the office and putting the kids to bed). Couldn't recommend it more strongly.
Don't read on if you like to read in suspense. But if you've read the book, or don't plan to read the book, or trust that I've given away nothing essentially suspenseful, or don't really care about suspense, here are some of my favourite nuggets/ reflections:
- "from the literary point of view, (childhood) has no suspense, children tend to be a little dull. Furthermore, they have no power, adults decide for them." Interesting point. Children are great as subjects, as authentic voices through which to observe the adult world. Think back to To Kill a Mocking Bird. Or the precocious Oskar Schnell in Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close. Or even Richmal Compton's William. Maybe children, or even completely powerless adults, don't really work as the objects of fiction
- I loved the historical context. Spain had been annexed by Napoleon's France. Mexico was a Spanish colony. California was a Mexican territory. New Orleans had been sold by Napoleon to the Americans in the Louisiana land purchase. Britain fought America for Louisiana, and was defeated. Pirates ruled. The stench of the slave trade permeated the Caribbean. The Gypsies are a hunted, haunted European tribe, tenaciously holding onto their Indian roots. The Indians are a hunted, haunted American tribe, tenaciously holding on to their pre-European roots. None of this is hammered home. One picks up all of this casually wandering through the plot
- "Diego was a Gemini". Makes sense. The cultured, dandified, effeminate, patrician: Don Diego de la Vega. The fearless, swashbuckling, dashing, darling of the masses: Zorro. Are all super-heroes Geminis? Clark Kent and Superman. Parker and Spiderman. Bruce Wayne and Batman. Could they be Libras? No. The two sides of the balance are yoked together. Super-hero identities are completely separate. Could they be Pisces? No. Piscean fish swim in opposite directions. Super-hero identities swim together. Had to be Gemini
- Diego does not get his girl: Juliana de Romeu. That had to be. Diego's love was real. Juliana was worthy of his love. It was not their destiny. If Diego had got his girl that would have been the end of the story, he would have become a happy and wealthy ranchero in Alta California. The lost love was essential to Diego remaining forever hungry, forever young, to Diego remaining Zorro
- Juliana de Romeu would have been the perfect girl for Zorro. She is the wrong girl for the Diego de la Vega + Zorro combine. Juliana is about pale skin, cascading curls, beauty, grace, care, perfect taste, dignity under duress. She is all yin. Her man would need to be all yang. Every couple needs a balance of animus and anima
- "We shall soon be saying goodbye, dear readers, since the story ends when the hero returns to where he began, transformed by adventures and by obstacles overcome. This is the norm in epic narratives from the Odyssey to fairy tales, and I shall not be the one to attempt innovation"
Don't read on if you like to read in suspense. But if you've read the book, or don't plan to read the book, or trust that I've given away nothing essentially suspenseful, or don't really care about suspense, here are some of my favourite nuggets/ reflections:
- "from the literary point of view, (childhood) has no suspense, children tend to be a little dull. Furthermore, they have no power, adults decide for them." Interesting point. Children are great as subjects, as authentic voices through which to observe the adult world. Think back to To Kill a Mocking Bird. Or the precocious Oskar Schnell in Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close. Or even Richmal Compton's William. Maybe children, or even completely powerless adults, don't really work as the objects of fiction
- I loved the historical context. Spain had been annexed by Napoleon's France. Mexico was a Spanish colony. California was a Mexican territory. New Orleans had been sold by Napoleon to the Americans in the Louisiana land purchase. Britain fought America for Louisiana, and was defeated. Pirates ruled. The stench of the slave trade permeated the Caribbean. The Gypsies are a hunted, haunted European tribe, tenaciously holding onto their Indian roots. The Indians are a hunted, haunted American tribe, tenaciously holding on to their pre-European roots. None of this is hammered home. One picks up all of this casually wandering through the plot
- "Diego was a Gemini". Makes sense. The cultured, dandified, effeminate, patrician: Don Diego de la Vega. The fearless, swashbuckling, dashing, darling of the masses: Zorro. Are all super-heroes Geminis? Clark Kent and Superman. Parker and Spiderman. Bruce Wayne and Batman. Could they be Libras? No. The two sides of the balance are yoked together. Super-hero identities are completely separate. Could they be Pisces? No. Piscean fish swim in opposite directions. Super-hero identities swim together. Had to be Gemini
- Diego does not get his girl: Juliana de Romeu. That had to be. Diego's love was real. Juliana was worthy of his love. It was not their destiny. If Diego had got his girl that would have been the end of the story, he would have become a happy and wealthy ranchero in Alta California. The lost love was essential to Diego remaining forever hungry, forever young, to Diego remaining Zorro
- Juliana de Romeu would have been the perfect girl for Zorro. She is the wrong girl for the Diego de la Vega + Zorro combine. Juliana is about pale skin, cascading curls, beauty, grace, care, perfect taste, dignity under duress. She is all yin. Her man would need to be all yang. Every couple needs a balance of animus and anima
- "We shall soon be saying goodbye, dear readers, since the story ends when the hero returns to where he began, transformed by adventures and by obstacles overcome. This is the norm in epic narratives from the Odyssey to fairy tales, and I shall not be the one to attempt innovation"
Saturday 19 April 2008
London Marathon
Just ran my first marathon. The Flora London Marathon. On April 13, 2008. Had a totally fantastic time. Also had some reflections on marathon running while running the marathon. Hallucinatory reflections of this sort may be a symptom of extreme glycogen deprivation.
Yin and yang
A Jungian framework I happened upon years ago maps all social motivation onto a single axis. The psyche has an innate desire to feel connected, to belong, to feel at one with, to be a part of a larger whole. Yin. The psyche also has an innate desire to stand out, to be unique, to win, to conquer. Yang. The greatest fun happens when the psyche reaches both the yin and yang ends of the axis.
That happens at a big marathon. The sheer fact of running 26.2 miles delivers the yang. There is something special about the physical achievement...even in these days of mass participation marathons. Yet, that's only a part of the story. The training runs on foggy grey mornings stretching out over 20+ miles feel meaningful (and get done) only in the context of a framing event.
And what a great event it is. The company I work for had done a great job, putting up posters across town wishing our runners good luck. My daughter was delighted to see my picture on an advert while riding on the tram. Travel in London is free for runners. You start the run at the Greenwich observatory. The streets in front packed with other runners, with whom you feel a reflexive kinship. The route is packed with hundreds of thousands of cheering spectators. This is clearly the only time in my life >100000 people have cheered me on. My family and friends were along to cheer. It was fantastic.
Agoraphilia
I love the word. Will never have a better opportunity to use it.
After training outdoors through crisp winter sunshine, persistent rain, the occasional snow or hail, and - worst of all from a running perspective - gusty winds, I am more aware of the weather and it's moods than I've ever been. Less obviously but more powerfully, I love the sense of physical space, of eating up the distance, that I get running outdoors. I've had the same feeling when I'm out hiking.
Yin and yang
A Jungian framework I happened upon years ago maps all social motivation onto a single axis. The psyche has an innate desire to feel connected, to belong, to feel at one with, to be a part of a larger whole. Yin. The psyche also has an innate desire to stand out, to be unique, to win, to conquer. Yang. The greatest fun happens when the psyche reaches both the yin and yang ends of the axis.
That happens at a big marathon. The sheer fact of running 26.2 miles delivers the yang. There is something special about the physical achievement...even in these days of mass participation marathons. Yet, that's only a part of the story. The training runs on foggy grey mornings stretching out over 20+ miles feel meaningful (and get done) only in the context of a framing event.
And what a great event it is. The company I work for had done a great job, putting up posters across town wishing our runners good luck. My daughter was delighted to see my picture on an advert while riding on the tram. Travel in London is free for runners. You start the run at the Greenwich observatory. The streets in front packed with other runners, with whom you feel a reflexive kinship. The route is packed with hundreds of thousands of cheering spectators. This is clearly the only time in my life >100000 people have cheered me on. My family and friends were along to cheer. It was fantastic.
Agoraphilia
I love the word. Will never have a better opportunity to use it.
After training outdoors through crisp winter sunshine, persistent rain, the occasional snow or hail, and - worst of all from a running perspective - gusty winds, I am more aware of the weather and it's moods than I've ever been. Less obviously but more powerfully, I love the sense of physical space, of eating up the distance, that I get running outdoors. I've had the same feeling when I'm out hiking.
Sunday 6 April 2008
There is a specter haunting Europe (2)
Britain is one of the world's more over-priced property markets. Prices can go into free-fall.
So what should be done about that? Cut interest rates to prop up prices? Or use the inevitable carnage as an opportunity to massively expand housing supply...to deliver a step-change improvement in the real lives of real people?
My (contrarian) vote is for the supply side expansion.
The elephant in the very-tiny-room during any conversation about housing in Britain is that the quality of housing really sucks. A country as rich as Britain need not live in homes that are so small that a standard "bedroom" is about the size of an American walk-in closet. Where double bedrooms don't fit double beds. Or where faucets that mix hot and cold water are an exotic luxury.
The simple and obvious solution is to develop large tracts of high quality housing, either on greenfield sites or by bulldozing some of the existing housing stock. But this simply has not happened. Is there a subtle but powerful political pressure from property owners defending high prices?
A counter-argument that is sometimes reflexively trotted out is: Britain is a small island and land is scarce. This is pure hokum. Britain can easily import tomatoes or milk. Britain can't import land. A very similar argument was used in the 80s to justify Japan's over-priced "rabbit hutches" and its heavily subsidized rice farms.
More realistically, a supply side expansion that might happen during this downturn is that sellers might be forced to spend more on the house to sell it at the same price. This will not get picked up as deflation in the published house price indices. But that investment will be a welcome improvement in the real lives in real people.
So what should be done about that? Cut interest rates to prop up prices? Or use the inevitable carnage as an opportunity to massively expand housing supply...to deliver a step-change improvement in the real lives of real people?
My (contrarian) vote is for the supply side expansion.
The elephant in the very-tiny-room during any conversation about housing in Britain is that the quality of housing really sucks. A country as rich as Britain need not live in homes that are so small that a standard "bedroom" is about the size of an American walk-in closet. Where double bedrooms don't fit double beds. Or where faucets that mix hot and cold water are an exotic luxury.
The simple and obvious solution is to develop large tracts of high quality housing, either on greenfield sites or by bulldozing some of the existing housing stock. But this simply has not happened. Is there a subtle but powerful political pressure from property owners defending high prices?
A counter-argument that is sometimes reflexively trotted out is: Britain is a small island and land is scarce. This is pure hokum. Britain can easily import tomatoes or milk. Britain can't import land. A very similar argument was used in the 80s to justify Japan's over-priced "rabbit hutches" and its heavily subsidized rice farms.
More realistically, a supply side expansion that might happen during this downturn is that sellers might be forced to spend more on the house to sell it at the same price. This will not get picked up as deflation in the published house price indices. But that investment will be a welcome improvement in the real lives in real people.
Sunday 23 March 2008
Science or religious war?
Are neo-classical and behavioural economics truly irreconcilable? Are the foundations of one of our great sciences crumbling before our eyes? Or, is behavioural economics a useful elaboration on the neo-classical tradition, that enriches rather than wrecks the great neo-classical insights?
My chips are on the enriching rather than wrecking side of the argument. Right here, right now, I clearly am in the minority. The sloppy-thinking chat tends to pit one tradition against the other.
Here is Elizabeth Kolbert, writing in the New Yorker.
"Rational calculators are supposed to consider their options, then pick the one that maximizes the benefit to them. Yet actual economic life, as opposed to the theoretical version, is full of miscalculations, from the gallon jar of mayonnaise purchased at spectacular savings to the billions of dollars Americans will spend this year to service their credit-card debt. The real mystery, it could be argued, isn’t why we make so many poor economic choices but why we persist in accepting economic theory."
Notice the condescension. "The real mystery...why we persist in accepting economic theory." She illustrates this self evident truth - that the assumption of rational economic behaviour is so broken that it is pitiful - with a personal anecdote.
Ms Kolbert was buying a book on Amazon for her work when a message popped up on her screen "add $7.00 to your order to qualify for FREE Shipping". She hesitated. Her nine-year-old twins wanted a Tintin book. She clicked it into the shopping cart and checked out, saving The New Yorker $3.99 and spending $12.91 of her own money.
Then comes the sucker-punch. "From the perspective of neoclassical economics, self-punishing decisions (such as this purchase of a Tintin comic) are difficult to explain." Really?
Neo-classical economics is very comfortable thinking about the Tintin comic as a bundle of information (about prices), services (delivery) and physical product (the comic book itself). Remember complements and substitutes from Econ 101? Amazon reduced the price of that bundle by flashing a free shipping advert on Ms Kolbert's screen, which reduced her tacit search costs, and by waiving the delivery charges. This prompted a purchase which otherwise wouldn't have happened. Lower price, more sales. This is the demand curve from Econ 101. There is no more unsurprising result in neo-classical economics.
My chips are on the enriching rather than wrecking side of the argument. Right here, right now, I clearly am in the minority. The sloppy-thinking chat tends to pit one tradition against the other.
Here is Elizabeth Kolbert, writing in the New Yorker.
"Rational calculators are supposed to consider their options, then pick the one that maximizes the benefit to them. Yet actual economic life, as opposed to the theoretical version, is full of miscalculations, from the gallon jar of mayonnaise purchased at spectacular savings to the billions of dollars Americans will spend this year to service their credit-card debt. The real mystery, it could be argued, isn’t why we make so many poor economic choices but why we persist in accepting economic theory."
Notice the condescension. "The real mystery...why we persist in accepting economic theory." She illustrates this self evident truth - that the assumption of rational economic behaviour is so broken that it is pitiful - with a personal anecdote.
Ms Kolbert was buying a book on Amazon for her work when a message popped up on her screen "add $7.00 to your order to qualify for FREE Shipping". She hesitated. Her nine-year-old twins wanted a Tintin book. She clicked it into the shopping cart and checked out, saving The New Yorker $3.99 and spending $12.91 of her own money.
Then comes the sucker-punch. "From the perspective of neoclassical economics, self-punishing decisions (such as this purchase of a Tintin comic) are difficult to explain." Really?
Neo-classical economics is very comfortable thinking about the Tintin comic as a bundle of information (about prices), services (delivery) and physical product (the comic book itself). Remember complements and substitutes from Econ 101? Amazon reduced the price of that bundle by flashing a free shipping advert on Ms Kolbert's screen, which reduced her tacit search costs, and by waiving the delivery charges. This prompted a purchase which otherwise wouldn't have happened. Lower price, more sales. This is the demand curve from Econ 101. There is no more unsurprising result in neo-classical economics.
Notice that the neo-classical theory makes no claims about the mechanism by which people maximize utility. In the neo-classical view people maximize utility the way a dog catches a frisbee. The calculations a dog needs to make to catch a frisbee are way beyond the scope of what a dog, or human, can consciously perform. Yet, dogs and humans successfully catch millions of frisbees every day.
This is where behavioural economics comes in. It sheds more light on the heuristics that people actually use while maximizing utility. This might prompt governments or businesses to use those heuristic mechanisms. For example, tax collections in America increased when taxes were collected at source. Once the money is in my bank account I am much more reluctant to give it to the government. Brilliant behavioural insight. By Milton Friedman, the godfather of neo-classical economics.
None of this challenges the one thought central to all of neo-classical economics: people respond to incentives. The way in which different people respond to different incentives is infinitely varied, which is why economic life is fascinating to observe.
Tuesday 18 March 2008
Debark?
Much better than disembark.
Found it in Isabel Allende's Zorro. Thought it was Allende's genius that had conjured up the elegant new word. But http://www.m-w.com/ assures me that the word has been in use since 1654.
Found it in Isabel Allende's Zorro. Thought it was Allende's genius that had conjured up the elegant new word. But http://www.m-w.com/ assures me that the word has been in use since 1654.
Sunday 16 March 2008
Stealing Music?
Fans and musicians are enjoying each other's presence at the South by South West music festival, unencumbered by record companies. And they are talking about how they can do just fine, forever after, without record companies.
It's good to move beyond the toxic divisions of the digital rights/ copyright wars and start the conversation about how the music industry ought to work.
Record company jobs and copyright laws serve a useful purpose if they bring together artists and fans. Everything else is secondary.
It's good to move beyond the toxic divisions of the digital rights/ copyright wars and start the conversation about how the music industry ought to work.
Record company jobs and copyright laws serve a useful purpose if they bring together artists and fans. Everything else is secondary.
Saturday 15 March 2008
Nemo's dad can become Nemo's mom
It's true. Sure, it is not appropriate material for Disney movies. But the scientific fact is that when Nemo's mom was ate by a shark, Nemo's dad could have just turned himself into a mom.
All clown fish start their lives off as males. The live in colonies inside an anemone, typically on coral reefs. The largest fist in each colony is the breeding female, the next largest the breeding male. A number of smaller, sexually inactive clown fish also live in the anemone. If one of the breeding couple dies, the biggest of the sexually inactive lads will step-up-to-the-plate and become a breeding male. The promotion always goes from sexually inactive lad to breeding male, because if the fish who died was female the breeding male will become a breeding female.
There is a rigid hierarchy from sexually inactive lad, to breeding male to breeding female. Promotion up the hierarchy is based on an objective criterion: size.
It is fairly common for reef-fish to be able to change gender. A quick Google search did not reveal the genetic basis for this gender identity. But clearly gender in reef fish is something more subtle than X and Y chromosomes.
Acknowledgements: this post was inspired by a visit to the Sea Life aquarium in Birmingham
All clown fish start their lives off as males. The live in colonies inside an anemone, typically on coral reefs. The largest fist in each colony is the breeding female, the next largest the breeding male. A number of smaller, sexually inactive clown fish also live in the anemone. If one of the breeding couple dies, the biggest of the sexually inactive lads will step-up-to-the-plate and become a breeding male. The promotion always goes from sexually inactive lad to breeding male, because if the fish who died was female the breeding male will become a breeding female.
There is a rigid hierarchy from sexually inactive lad, to breeding male to breeding female. Promotion up the hierarchy is based on an objective criterion: size.
It is fairly common for reef-fish to be able to change gender. A quick Google search did not reveal the genetic basis for this gender identity. But clearly gender in reef fish is something more subtle than X and Y chromosomes.
Acknowledgements: this post was inspired by a visit to the Sea Life aquarium in Birmingham
Monday 10 March 2008
If you want to start a revolution...
...use radio. If you want to suppress a revolution use TV.
Radio forces people to focus, and listen to your words, and engage their imaginations. With TV, people are more focused on the colour of your tie than on what you're saying.
Just heard this on BBC Radio 4 ten minutes ago. I love the Marxist interpretation. TV is the ultimate capitalist plot to foil revolution by feeding the masses an opiate.
Radio forces people to focus, and listen to your words, and engage their imaginations. With TV, people are more focused on the colour of your tie than on what you're saying.
Just heard this on BBC Radio 4 ten minutes ago. I love the Marxist interpretation. TV is the ultimate capitalist plot to foil revolution by feeding the masses an opiate.
Friday 7 March 2008
The Sultanganj Buddha
Should great works of art stolen by discredited, morally bankrupt empires be returned home?
This question has been rattling around in my head for a couple of weeks, since I stumbled upon a fabulous, life-size, 1500 year old bronze Buddha from Sultanganj, Bihar, in the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery.
My mind came to rest at this thought: a day will come when India is rich enough and proud enough, to care for our heritage. Maybe not in my lifetime, but that day will come. That is when the Sultanganj Buddha ought to return home, perhaps to Sultanganj. But until then, it’s OK for the Buddha to stay on in Birmingham, where it has a place of honour and is displayed with sensitivity, respect and taste.
This is an interesting case, really. It is not an obvious story of rapacious, colonial plunder. This is not like the Kohinoor diamond, which was stolen by Queen Victoria for her crown from the crown of Maharajah Ranjit Singh.
Apparently, this Buddha was consecrated at the center of a Gupta era vihara on the right bank of the Ganga c. 500 AD. The vihara came under military threat c. 700 AD. The monks chose to bury their sacred icon rather than let it fall to their enemies. Their ruse worked. The vihara was razed. The Buddha survived, unseen but unharmed.
About 1200 years later, in 1862, a British engineer was laying a Railway line from Burdwan to Kiul. He was mining earth for ballast to lay under the railway track, and came upon a large, regular block harder than the earth around it. He mined around the block, dislodged it from the earth, chiseled open the block the next morning, and stared into the tranquil face of the Buddha.
The advice from his railway colleagues was to melt down the Buddha into rails. Not unreasonable; there is not a lot else that one can do with a massive metal thingummybob when living on a railway camp 500 miles upriver from Calcutta. But fortunately, a combination of fate, patience and the modern miracle of telegraph communication located a wealthy merchant who was willing to pay two hundred pounds to have the statue shipped to Birmingham. Maybe the Buddha travelled to Calcutta on the same railway tracks that he had so nearly become a part of. The weary Buddha finally reached Birmingham 1867.
The wealthy merchant, Mr Samuel Taylor, went on the become the mayor of Birmingham. On his death he donated his art collection to the city. Mr Samuel Taylor’s name is immortalized on a plaque near the Buddha. I couldn’t spot the name of the railway engineer.
So in what sense does the statue belong in India, or in Sultanganj, more than it does to the city of Mr Samuel Taylor?
One could make legalistic arguments here. The Greek state has trotted out a legal argument about the legitimacy of the Ottoman firman by which the British Museum acquired the Elgin marbles. But the argument which resonates with me (and apparently with the fair-minded British public who overwhelmingly support returning the Elgin marbles to Greece) is an argument about identity rather than legality.
India is not just the land of cricket, curry and customer service call centers. India is Bharatavarsh.
One could make legalistic arguments here. The Greek state has trotted out a legal argument about the legitimacy of the Ottoman firman by which the British Museum acquired the Elgin marbles. But the argument which resonates with me (and apparently with the fair-minded British public who overwhelmingly support returning the Elgin marbles to Greece) is an argument about identity rather than legality.
India is not just the land of cricket, curry and customer service call centers. India is Bharatavarsh.
One of the most wonderful things about India - the modern nation state that was born in 1947 - is that India fiercely embraces its history. India isn't just a bunch of lines drawn on a map. India is charged with mythic meaning. India is the heir to the Mauryas and the Guptas, the Cheras and the Cholas, the grandeur of the Moghuls and the grit of the Marathas, heir to both Tansen and to Baiju Bawra. The choice of Ashoka's pillar as India's national symbol was inspired; the symbol of the "soul of a nation, long supressed, finding utterance".
That is the sense in which the Sultanganj Buddha might belong in India. The statue's story feels like the story of India itself. A nation, long suppressed, finds utterance. A magnificient statue, long buried, finds expression. The Sultanganj Buddha in Birmingham is just another beautiful museum-piece. The Sultanganj Buddha in India could be so much more redolent with meaning: the symbol of a great nation, once vanquished, now discovering it's own greatness.
The Sultanganj Buddha has his own tryst with destiny. The day hasn't yet come to redeem that pledge.
Sunday 2 March 2008
The last of the Eyak
Words are probably the wrong medium to express what this means
http://www.economist.com/obituary/displaystory.cfm?story_id=10640514&CFID=10936602&CFTOKEN=e5314cade73cf83b-6D129736-B27C-BB00-012B1E18390442D7
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/7206411.stm
http://www.economist.com/obituary/displaystory.cfm?story_id=10640514&CFID=10936602&CFTOKEN=e5314cade73cf83b-6D129736-B27C-BB00-012B1E18390442D7
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/7206411.stm
Tuesday 26 February 2008
Culling elephants
The South African government has decided to kill several thousand elephants to keep the elephant population within sustainable limits. Are they killing 5000 elephants? The number is not totally clear.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2008/feb/26/environment
This is heartbreaking, especially for the foster daddy of a four year old elephant called Naserian who lives at the David Sheldrick orphanage in Kenya. But understandable. Especially if more humane alternatives have been seriously attempted. The good news is that elephant and tiger populations do really well when protected, unlike say, cheetah or pandas.
The news so far has shied away from a really interesting economic question: should the South African government sell ivory from this cull?
The money from selling ivory could be used to give elephants better protection. This has traditionally been the South African position. On the other hand, legitimate sales of ivory could "prime the pump" of the ivory trade by bringing craftsmen back to ivory, increasing steady state demand, and make it harder to protect elephants. This has traditionally been the Kenyan position.
I totally see and sympathize with both sides of the argument. Would love to hear about an objective no-spin analysis that sizes up these arguments.
Saturday 16 February 2008
My Family Owns a House in Telluride
Sometimes, things come together. Time, place, people, thought, soft afternoon sunshine, salty sea spray - everything - everything comes together in an exhilarating, intoxicating rush of adrenaline, testosterone, music and laughter that sculpts the soul, makes life real, and makes you who you are.
But things come apart again. Life moves on. The clocks didn’t all stop. We didn’t die then and there. The grey world that dawns the morning after Camelot, packing your bags for Faisalabad after winning the Ashes, it’s the hardest part. You still gotta do what you gotta do.
But things come apart again. Life moves on. The clocks didn’t all stop. We didn’t die then and there. The grey world that dawns the morning after Camelot, packing your bags for Faisalabad after winning the Ashes, it’s the hardest part. You still gotta do what you gotta do.
This haunting story is about the end of magic, about when the universe no longer has a center. Fortunately, the story still is on the New Yorker’s website.
Friday 8 February 2008
360 degree feedback: is there a trade-off between usefulness and transparency?
The company I work for has a well-entrenched culture of 360 degree feedback. Five years ago, this feedback was often pointed and tended to emphasize the negatives. But it was genuinely helpful in helping managers poinpoint the skills/ behaviours their people needed to develop. Today, the same process spews out feedback that rarely rises above the level of anodyne praise.
What’s changed?
Five years ago, feedback was typically anonymous. Today, the norm is to copy the subject of the feedback on the feedback. Could that be the culprit?
I was around when the culture of copying the subject in on feedback started. The Senior Vice President who ran our department believed “if you’ve got something to say about a colleague, be man enough to tell him face-to-face.” That made sense. It prevented people from abusing the system by using feedback to vent, or to settle personal scores. It felt right. Initially, it seemed to be working well, because some old habits persisted and the feedback remained pointed. We didn’t imagine that the quality of feedback would diminish. But five years later, feedback clearly is a blunter instrument.
The other plausible explanation is a change in the company’s life stage. Five years ago, we were a young, fast-growing company. Employees were paid stock options. Promotions happened frequently. Now, we are a mature company that pays dividends, growing at about the same rate as the economy, where promotions are rare and precious.
So why would the slower corporate growth impact the quality of feedback? It takes a fair bit of work to write accurately-observed, balanced, insightful, constructive feedback. That effort is worth it if the feedback is acted on, and colleagues change their behaviour for the better. In a slow growth environment, improved behaviours don’t materially change the likelihood of getting promoted. With small or no incentives, people don’t respond to feedback with behavioural change. And so the effort that goes into writing high-quality feedback becomes as futile as writing a well-reasoned blog.
The loss of anonymity makes feedback risky. And the slower career trajectories make feedback futile. Which effect is more real? Without any scientific analysis, the loss of anonymity feels more specific/tangible and therefore more real. I suspect there is a grain of truth in both arguments.
Despite feedback becoming a blunt instrument, I still think it has a ton of value. My company has virtually no disrespectful or abusive bosses. People tend to treat each other as social equals across the hierarchy, despite very substantial differences in income. That is partly because a culture with 360 degree feedback self-selects leaders who conduct themselves in a particular way. 360 degree feedback just goes from being a tool that effects fine changes in behaviour, to being a tool that prevents grevious abuse. Sounds a bit like democracy.
What’s changed?
Five years ago, feedback was typically anonymous. Today, the norm is to copy the subject of the feedback on the feedback. Could that be the culprit?
I was around when the culture of copying the subject in on feedback started. The Senior Vice President who ran our department believed “if you’ve got something to say about a colleague, be man enough to tell him face-to-face.” That made sense. It prevented people from abusing the system by using feedback to vent, or to settle personal scores. It felt right. Initially, it seemed to be working well, because some old habits persisted and the feedback remained pointed. We didn’t imagine that the quality of feedback would diminish. But five years later, feedback clearly is a blunter instrument.
The other plausible explanation is a change in the company’s life stage. Five years ago, we were a young, fast-growing company. Employees were paid stock options. Promotions happened frequently. Now, we are a mature company that pays dividends, growing at about the same rate as the economy, where promotions are rare and precious.
So why would the slower corporate growth impact the quality of feedback? It takes a fair bit of work to write accurately-observed, balanced, insightful, constructive feedback. That effort is worth it if the feedback is acted on, and colleagues change their behaviour for the better. In a slow growth environment, improved behaviours don’t materially change the likelihood of getting promoted. With small or no incentives, people don’t respond to feedback with behavioural change. And so the effort that goes into writing high-quality feedback becomes as futile as writing a well-reasoned blog.
The loss of anonymity makes feedback risky. And the slower career trajectories make feedback futile. Which effect is more real? Without any scientific analysis, the loss of anonymity feels more specific/tangible and therefore more real. I suspect there is a grain of truth in both arguments.
Despite feedback becoming a blunt instrument, I still think it has a ton of value. My company has virtually no disrespectful or abusive bosses. People tend to treat each other as social equals across the hierarchy, despite very substantial differences in income. That is partly because a culture with 360 degree feedback self-selects leaders who conduct themselves in a particular way. 360 degree feedback just goes from being a tool that effects fine changes in behaviour, to being a tool that prevents grevious abuse. Sounds a bit like democracy.
Monday 4 February 2008
Tear-free shampoo and the frightening guest
Took my daughters swimming on Sunday. Showered many blessings on the wonderful person who invented tear-free shampoo. And reflected that the history of science is obsessed with boring things like penicillin and does not celebrate genuinely great advances like tear-free shampoo.
This blogger is not alone in trying to set right this historic injustice. The late Viktor Schreckengost - whose name means "frightening guest" in German - is the grand-daddy of the sort of scientist who invents tear-free shampoo. Dan Boudreaux of Cafe Hayek thinks Mr Schreckengost has "done more for humanity than any single politicican in the twentieth century". Homage is in order.
http://cafehayek.typepad.com/hayek/2008/01/viktor-schrecke.html
This blogger is not alone in trying to set right this historic injustice. The late Viktor Schreckengost - whose name means "frightening guest" in German - is the grand-daddy of the sort of scientist who invents tear-free shampoo. Dan Boudreaux of Cafe Hayek thinks Mr Schreckengost has "done more for humanity than any single politicican in the twentieth century". Homage is in order.
http://cafehayek.typepad.com/hayek/2008/01/viktor-schrecke.html
Sunday 3 February 2008
Fixing match fixing
This is absurd. The organizers of the French Open are sueing online betting sites (including Betfair - the site I use) to prevent betting on the French Open.
http://sports.espn.go.com/sports/tennis/news/story?id=3225440
Yes, match-fixing in tennis is a serious problem. Tennis matches are easy to fix. But surely, major branded sites like Betfair and Ladbrokes are part of the solution. These sites are dependent on the trust of millions of small time punters. They have the data needed to spot odd betting patterns and extra-big bets.
This could actually be counter-productive. Betting on sport is great fun. It will always be a part of sport. Driving good, clean, fun betting underground will only bring in sleaze and increase the likelihood of match fixing.
http://sports.espn.go.com/sports/tennis/news/story?id=3225440
Yes, match-fixing in tennis is a serious problem. Tennis matches are easy to fix. But surely, major branded sites like Betfair and Ladbrokes are part of the solution. These sites are dependent on the trust of millions of small time punters. They have the data needed to spot odd betting patterns and extra-big bets.
This could actually be counter-productive. Betting on sport is great fun. It will always be a part of sport. Driving good, clean, fun betting underground will only bring in sleaze and increase the likelihood of match fixing.
Friday 1 February 2008
Tintin
Found a superb article on Tintin in a back issue of the New Yorker, by Anthony Lane. The highlights:
- General de Gaulle declared that Tintin was his only international rival. He was envious, perhaps, of not just of Tintin's fame but of his defiantly positive attitude. Both figures can be recognized by silhouette alone
- Stimulation in Herge's solid, Catholic, bourgeois youth in Belgium came from his exploits as a scout. There remain in Tintin traces of the try-anything, do-gooding spirit of the scout troop
- Tintin was first serialized in 1925 in a daily newspaper which was described in it's masthead as a "Catholic and National Newspaper of Doctrine and Information". The editor had a framed picture of Mussolini on his desk
- Tintin in Congo (1931) is an unmitigated parade of racial prejudice, with bug-eyed natives swaying between ignorance and laziness. Herge later redrew the comic...and claimed that his concept of the Congo was no different from that of his compatriots at the time
- A crucial happening was Herge's encounter with Chang Chong-chen, a student at the Brussels Academy of Fine Arts. Chang suggested using real events as the inspiration for his adventures...the ouevre would have a historical value...The Blue Lotus (1936) was born
- Chang returned to China and lost touch with Herge. Tintin in Tibet (1960) showed Tintin searching for a lost friend called Chang. In 1981, two years before Herge died, the real Chang came to Belgium for a tearful reunion. Chang had shown Herge how to beat back prejudice: just tell the truth
- Herge's principle: the further your reach, the more compelling your duty to get it right. Herge knew he would not be able to emabrk on Tintin in Tibet without amassing photographs of monastries, lamas and chortens, all of which would be copied in fanatical detail in his book. I was thrilled to read Hindi in Tintin which was real
- Belgium was occupied. Herge - like Wodehouse, who was interred as an enemy alien - not only survied but bloomed into one of his most flourishing periods. Once the war ended, both were interrogated about the nature and intensity of their collaboration. Both pleaded guilty of innocence; neither ever dispelled the shadow of suspicion. Herge's (and Wodehouse's) ability to avert his gaze from evil verges on the chronic
- Commentators are both enticed and exasperated by how little he gives away. In particular, the Tintin who gazes out from the cover of The Castafoire Emerald (1963) shushing the reader with a finger held to his lips
- There is no sex. Tintin passes increasing portions of his time with an unmarried seaman, yet it seldom occurs to us to question their rapport. He never has a girlfriend, and never expresses the need for one. He has no parents or siblings. We are unsure whether he counts as a child himself. He reminds me, if anyone, of Charlie Brown. Enid Blyton, and maybe even JRR Tolkien, would be at home in this beautiful, adventure-filled, but asexual world
- Tintin may be too constrained for American tastes, being posessed of no superpowers. He is Clark Kent without the phone booth, although Clark at least had a paying job , wheras Tintin, nominally a reporter, never receives a paycheck or files a story
- General de Gaulle declared that Tintin was his only international rival. He was envious, perhaps, of not just of Tintin's fame but of his defiantly positive attitude. Both figures can be recognized by silhouette alone
- Stimulation in Herge's solid, Catholic, bourgeois youth in Belgium came from his exploits as a scout. There remain in Tintin traces of the try-anything, do-gooding spirit of the scout troop
- Tintin was first serialized in 1925 in a daily newspaper which was described in it's masthead as a "Catholic and National Newspaper of Doctrine and Information". The editor had a framed picture of Mussolini on his desk
- Tintin in Congo (1931) is an unmitigated parade of racial prejudice, with bug-eyed natives swaying between ignorance and laziness. Herge later redrew the comic...and claimed that his concept of the Congo was no different from that of his compatriots at the time
- A crucial happening was Herge's encounter with Chang Chong-chen, a student at the Brussels Academy of Fine Arts. Chang suggested using real events as the inspiration for his adventures...the ouevre would have a historical value...The Blue Lotus (1936) was born
- Chang returned to China and lost touch with Herge. Tintin in Tibet (1960) showed Tintin searching for a lost friend called Chang. In 1981, two years before Herge died, the real Chang came to Belgium for a tearful reunion. Chang had shown Herge how to beat back prejudice: just tell the truth
- Herge's principle: the further your reach, the more compelling your duty to get it right. Herge knew he would not be able to emabrk on Tintin in Tibet without amassing photographs of monastries, lamas and chortens, all of which would be copied in fanatical detail in his book. I was thrilled to read Hindi in Tintin which was real
- Belgium was occupied. Herge - like Wodehouse, who was interred as an enemy alien - not only survied but bloomed into one of his most flourishing periods. Once the war ended, both were interrogated about the nature and intensity of their collaboration. Both pleaded guilty of innocence; neither ever dispelled the shadow of suspicion. Herge's (and Wodehouse's) ability to avert his gaze from evil verges on the chronic
- Commentators are both enticed and exasperated by how little he gives away. In particular, the Tintin who gazes out from the cover of The Castafoire Emerald (1963) shushing the reader with a finger held to his lips
- There is no sex. Tintin passes increasing portions of his time with an unmarried seaman, yet it seldom occurs to us to question their rapport. He never has a girlfriend, and never expresses the need for one. He has no parents or siblings. We are unsure whether he counts as a child himself. He reminds me, if anyone, of Charlie Brown. Enid Blyton, and maybe even JRR Tolkien, would be at home in this beautiful, adventure-filled, but asexual world
- Tintin may be too constrained for American tastes, being posessed of no superpowers. He is Clark Kent without the phone booth, although Clark at least had a paying job , wheras Tintin, nominally a reporter, never receives a paycheck or files a story
Sunday 27 January 2008
Guru
This movie is about Bollywood telling India what Deng Xiaoping so successfully told China: "to get rich is glorious." Bollywood shapes India's attitudes. Bollywood delivering this message - to an India that has been wallowing for decades in the Gandhian mythology of self-denial, and in the consequent hypocrisy, mediocrity and poverty - just the concept makes this film a winner.
At heart, this is a thinly disguised Bollywood style documentary on Dhirubhai Ambani. There's a great item number with Mallika Sherawat, set in Istanbul. Aishwarya Rai plays Kokilaben (I'm sure Kokilaben is flattered) and is introduced to the film in a peppy dancing-in-the-rain sequence. Dhirubhai makes a big speech in the courtroom denouement, kind-of-sort-of comparing himself to Gandhi. It's fun to watch.
But the film never goes from being visually interesting to being viscerally compelling. There is no knot, no conflict, no tension that drags to plot forward until it is resolved. Nor is their any character development. Dhirubhai seems to have been born being Dhirubhai. For instance, there is no conflict between Dhirubhai's high aspirations and the sordidness of the bribes he needs to give out to meet those aspirations. The only attempt to create inner tension was with Nanaji, a Ramnath Goenka like character, who starts off as a father figure to Dhirubhai and then proceeds to wage a crusade against him. That storyline didn't really work.
That might be why Guru was not a box office blockbuster. It's not going to have a Sholay or Lagaan-like impact on India's psyche. A pity. Because the "to get rich is glorious" message really is reshaping India.
At heart, this is a thinly disguised Bollywood style documentary on Dhirubhai Ambani. There's a great item number with Mallika Sherawat, set in Istanbul. Aishwarya Rai plays Kokilaben (I'm sure Kokilaben is flattered) and is introduced to the film in a peppy dancing-in-the-rain sequence. Dhirubhai makes a big speech in the courtroom denouement, kind-of-sort-of comparing himself to Gandhi. It's fun to watch.
But the film never goes from being visually interesting to being viscerally compelling. There is no knot, no conflict, no tension that drags to plot forward until it is resolved. Nor is their any character development. Dhirubhai seems to have been born being Dhirubhai. For instance, there is no conflict between Dhirubhai's high aspirations and the sordidness of the bribes he needs to give out to meet those aspirations. The only attempt to create inner tension was with Nanaji, a Ramnath Goenka like character, who starts off as a father figure to Dhirubhai and then proceeds to wage a crusade against him. That storyline didn't really work.
That might be why Guru was not a box office blockbuster. It's not going to have a Sholay or Lagaan-like impact on India's psyche. A pity. Because the "to get rich is glorious" message really is reshaping India.
Tuesday 22 January 2008
Safe in the warm after glow of victory...a gentleman's agreement?
Of all the daft things that have surfaced in this India-Australia series, the daftest has to be the gentleman's agreement between the captains about taking the fielder's word on catches. Kumble should have figured out that the agreement would break down at the pivotal moment when a catch made a vital difference. That’s exactly what happened. It’s common sense.
And if this were about the mythic spirit of cricket, why should a gentleman’s agreement be limited to claiming catches? Why not nicks? One can't blame umpire Benson for asking Ponting if Michael Clarke's catch was clean. That is what the captains had agreed to.
Kumble was naive (or gullible) to have agreed to Ponting's proposal. Jayawardene, one of the most gentlemanly modern players, was smart enough to turn down the same proposal.
The more interesting question is around why Ponting is proposing this agreement. It feels out of character. He has also made his team sign up to a spirit of cricket pledge. Which, in addition to feeling out of character, is bureaucratic and suggests Ponting does not understand that spirit describes what can't be codified.
What's going on here? Is Ponting trying to capture a special place cricket's pantheon that his gracelessness on the field just doesn't support?
Ronting's Australians are the easily the least loved champions in the history of cricket. Just think back to the reverence Clive Lloyd's West Indians inspired to get that into perspective. One of the defining memories of Ponting will be his spontaneous and passionate swearing after being run out by Gary Pratt at Trent Bridge in the 2005 Ashes. The day after the Sydney test, the BBC quoted a poll which showed 82% of Aussie cricket fans rating Ponting a bad captain, despite having delivered 16 wins on the trot. Does this lack of respect hurt prickly little Ponting?
The comparison that hurts Ponting most is with Steve Waugh. Like Ponting, Steve Waugh inherited a great team. Like Ponting, Steve Waugh played to win: his most important contribution to cricket's lexicon was the "mental disintegration" which did not happen to Saurav Ganguly. But Steve could take the Aussie team to lay a wreath at the ANZAC memorial at Gallipolli and look authentic. He raises money for Udayan, a charity for the children of lepers, without provoking a snigger. He won a special place in my heart when we spoke of how cricket would be poorer with Zimbabwe, deprived of quality players like Neil Johnson (one of my obscure personal favourites). Steve Waugh didn't do spin. He meant what he said. He cared. It showed. The gravitas came naturally.
Waugh's nicknames are Tugga and Iceman. Ponting's nickname is Punter. Maybe Ponting fears that he is destined to be a Miandad...snapping away in the shadows the the Imran like figures - Border, Taylor, Waugh - who came before him. Maybe an Indian captain can sense that insecurity, and twist a dagger into that chink in the armour, and engineer a "mental disintegration" at Adelaide that would make even Steve Waugh cringe.
Hope springs eternal :)
And if this were about the mythic spirit of cricket, why should a gentleman’s agreement be limited to claiming catches? Why not nicks? One can't blame umpire Benson for asking Ponting if Michael Clarke's catch was clean. That is what the captains had agreed to.
Kumble was naive (or gullible) to have agreed to Ponting's proposal. Jayawardene, one of the most gentlemanly modern players, was smart enough to turn down the same proposal.
The more interesting question is around why Ponting is proposing this agreement. It feels out of character. He has also made his team sign up to a spirit of cricket pledge. Which, in addition to feeling out of character, is bureaucratic and suggests Ponting does not understand that spirit describes what can't be codified.
What's going on here? Is Ponting trying to capture a special place cricket's pantheon that his gracelessness on the field just doesn't support?
Ronting's Australians are the easily the least loved champions in the history of cricket. Just think back to the reverence Clive Lloyd's West Indians inspired to get that into perspective. One of the defining memories of Ponting will be his spontaneous and passionate swearing after being run out by Gary Pratt at Trent Bridge in the 2005 Ashes. The day after the Sydney test, the BBC quoted a poll which showed 82% of Aussie cricket fans rating Ponting a bad captain, despite having delivered 16 wins on the trot. Does this lack of respect hurt prickly little Ponting?
The comparison that hurts Ponting most is with Steve Waugh. Like Ponting, Steve Waugh inherited a great team. Like Ponting, Steve Waugh played to win: his most important contribution to cricket's lexicon was the "mental disintegration" which did not happen to Saurav Ganguly. But Steve could take the Aussie team to lay a wreath at the ANZAC memorial at Gallipolli and look authentic. He raises money for Udayan, a charity for the children of lepers, without provoking a snigger. He won a special place in my heart when we spoke of how cricket would be poorer with Zimbabwe, deprived of quality players like Neil Johnson (one of my obscure personal favourites). Steve Waugh didn't do spin. He meant what he said. He cared. It showed. The gravitas came naturally.
Waugh's nicknames are Tugga and Iceman. Ponting's nickname is Punter. Maybe Ponting fears that he is destined to be a Miandad...snapping away in the shadows the the Imran like figures - Border, Taylor, Waugh - who came before him. Maybe an Indian captain can sense that insecurity, and twist a dagger into that chink in the armour, and engineer a "mental disintegration" at Adelaide that would make even Steve Waugh cringe.
Hope springs eternal :)
Friday 18 January 2008
Betfair on Perth
Established behavioural economics finding: people are willing to pay more for insurance against death caused by an airplane accident than for insurance against death by any cause. Clearly death caused by an airplane accident is a subset of death by any cause. But when thought of a dramatic cause of death like an airplane accident is planted in the mind, the imagination takes over and makes that cause feel more real, tangible and likely than it actually is.
I have a hunch the same cognitive bias is happening on Betfair in assessing the odds of an Australian victory at Perth. Betfair thinks the likelihood that Australia will win is ~30%.
The point is: it is easy to imagine the Australian batsmen playing out of their skins to steal a memorable win. I remember Ponting's innings in the 2003 World Cup final, Gilcrist's innings in the 2007 World Cup final, Symond's innings in the first innings at Sydney...it's easy to imagine something like that happening again. The sheer ease of imagining another breathtaking, match winning performance from Australia might make the market over-estimate the odds of an Australian win.
What is critical is that India channel their imaginations into just putting the ball in the right areas and holding their catches. Think about nothing else. That's the action which will make the odds on India shorten.
BTW...writing this post hasn't quite given me the courage to go and bet on India. Not yet, anyway.
I have a hunch the same cognitive bias is happening on Betfair in assessing the odds of an Australian victory at Perth. Betfair thinks the likelihood that Australia will win is ~30%.
The point is: it is easy to imagine the Australian batsmen playing out of their skins to steal a memorable win. I remember Ponting's innings in the 2003 World Cup final, Gilcrist's innings in the 2007 World Cup final, Symond's innings in the first innings at Sydney...it's easy to imagine something like that happening again. The sheer ease of imagining another breathtaking, match winning performance from Australia might make the market over-estimate the odds of an Australian win.
What is critical is that India channel their imaginations into just putting the ball in the right areas and holding their catches. Think about nothing else. That's the action which will make the odds on India shorten.
BTW...writing this post hasn't quite given me the courage to go and bet on India. Not yet, anyway.
Perth
On the eve of the fourth day's play in the Perth test, I'm way too excited to sleep. 8 wickets to win. Five of those wickets need to be Ponting, Hussey, Clarke, Symonds and Gilcrist.
India are too close to not hope. And Australia have pulled off the impossible too many times (three wickets in five balls?) for me to let myself hope.
If I can't take the pressure 10000 miles away, how are the team coping? The good ones, the ones who've been around a while - Kumble, Sachin, Rahul, Saurav, Laxman, even Dhoni - they'd be immersing themselves in rituals. Sportsmen are called superstitious, but more accurately, they are ritualistic. The regimen anchors the spirit. Keeps the butterflies and demons from taking over. The same thing works on the field..adjusting the top of the pad, tapping the bat to the ground while taking guard, bouncing the tennis ball before serving...they work the same way. They help focus the spirit and mind on the task at hand.
It's harder for the less experienced players to stay calm because their regimen/ rituals are less well established. It's hardest on us watchers; we don't have rituals to anchor us or any task at hand to focus on.
India are too close to not hope. And Australia have pulled off the impossible too many times (three wickets in five balls?) for me to let myself hope.
If I can't take the pressure 10000 miles away, how are the team coping? The good ones, the ones who've been around a while - Kumble, Sachin, Rahul, Saurav, Laxman, even Dhoni - they'd be immersing themselves in rituals. Sportsmen are called superstitious, but more accurately, they are ritualistic. The regimen anchors the spirit. Keeps the butterflies and demons from taking over. The same thing works on the field..adjusting the top of the pad, tapping the bat to the ground while taking guard, bouncing the tennis ball before serving...they work the same way. They help focus the spirit and mind on the task at hand.
It's harder for the less experienced players to stay calm because their regimen/ rituals are less well established. It's hardest on us watchers; we don't have rituals to anchor us or any task at hand to focus on.
Thursday 17 January 2008
Harmless snobbery
Observing the pristine, clean shoes of other people at the gym. People whose shoes have clearly not run 10 miles on muddy tracks last weekend while training for a marathon.
Saturday 12 January 2008
The Little Mermaid
Some gems from opera director Francesca Zambello's interpretation of Little Mermaid for a Broadway production:
- The mermaid ascends to the surface of the sea, her tail unfurling to reveal shapely legs. There is so much metaphor in that. It is like a rite of passage, her first menstrual cycle
- The wish-fulfillment element would give it broad appeal. Show me anybody in the world who hasn't wanted to be someone else. That's a universal theme. Everybody sees themselves as an outsider
- It was possible to interpret the little mermaid flight from the confines of the sea as a gay theme. The reality is that there are only two minorities who are born into families: disabled people and gay people. Every other minority is born of a family. That Ariel is an outsider in her own family connects...
- Mermaids have no genitalia. That's something you don't really think about until you work on mermaids, but then you think about it a lot.
- The mermaid ascends to the surface of the sea, her tail unfurling to reveal shapely legs. There is so much metaphor in that. It is like a rite of passage, her first menstrual cycle
- The wish-fulfillment element would give it broad appeal. Show me anybody in the world who hasn't wanted to be someone else. That's a universal theme. Everybody sees themselves as an outsider
- It was possible to interpret the little mermaid flight from the confines of the sea as a gay theme. The reality is that there are only two minorities who are born into families: disabled people and gay people. Every other minority is born of a family. That Ariel is an outsider in her own family connects...
- Mermaids have no genitalia. That's something you don't really think about until you work on mermaids, but then you think about it a lot.
Friday 11 January 2008
Benazir Bhutto
The commentary about Benazir's assassination has been mainly about what a dangerous place Pakistan is. That is true. But all that geopolitical risk is obscuring is the poignancy of Benazir's life...the intense, shy, awkward, intellectual, ambitious young woman...wounded and humiliated by the hanging of the father she hero worshipped...who chose to marry to a hard-drinking, extravagantly mustachioed polo player, who swears like a wounded pirate and is nicknamed Mr. Five Percent the size of the bribes he routinely took...the big pile of Mills and Boon novels at her bedside...the pristine white head scarf and the scarlet lipstick...her uneasy truce with the mullahs who murdered her father...her cynical betrayal of the peace process with India...her heartfelt tears at the grave of her brother, a brother she once was close to, whose murder she had allegedly commissioned...her returning to Pakistan even when she could see in Musharraf's eye the shadow of Zia-ul-Haq, the man who murdered her father...
The British still take pride in the dramatic lives of Queen Elizabeth I and Mary Queen of Scots. The subcontinent still has royalty whose lives are similarly dramatic.
My wife spotted this great piece in the Asian Age.
http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/12/28/opinion/edyusef.php
The British still take pride in the dramatic lives of Queen Elizabeth I and Mary Queen of Scots. The subcontinent still has royalty whose lives are similarly dramatic.
My wife spotted this great piece in the Asian Age.
http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/12/28/opinion/edyusef.php
House Prices
Enjoyed Robert Samuelson's take on housing in America.
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2008/01/can_we_cure_our_house_lust.html
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2008/01/can_we_cure_our_house_lust.html
Wednesday 9 January 2008
Run, Fat Boy, Run
The ideal in-flight film for a guy running his first marathon. Watch the trailer here.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lTrfuX1Pb-k
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lTrfuX1Pb-k
Wednesday 2 January 2008
The Strange Rise of Modern India
I have rapidly gone from being delighted with this book - because this is a non-Indian writer who clearly gets India like it is - to being bored stiff - because it is telling me nothing that I don't already know. I'm not going to bother ploughing through the rest of the book. But it probably is a nice introduction to modern India for someone who isn't already immersed in the culture.
Saturday 29 December 2007
Tom and Jerry
Having successfully avoided Tom and Jerry through my childhood, I'm now consuming it at a rate that feels like 90 minutes per day. My impressions:
- The music is superb, and under-appreciated
- I'm surprised that my children enjoy this. They generally dislike violence on TV...even in Disney films. The probably get that the violence here is stylized
- I'm surprised the violence, stylized or otherwise, hasn't worried the censors or the morality police
- I find it a lot easier to identify with the predator (Tom) than the prey. That might be part of the reason I don't enjoy the violence
- The music is superb, and under-appreciated
- I'm surprised that my children enjoy this. They generally dislike violence on TV...even in Disney films. The probably get that the violence here is stylized
- I'm surprised the violence, stylized or otherwise, hasn't worried the censors or the morality police
- I find it a lot easier to identify with the predator (Tom) than the prey. That might be part of the reason I don't enjoy the violence
Thursday 27 December 2007
Attack of the Thermo-Nuclear Mosquitoes
Marathon training is really not happening here in Madras. I started off training outdoors. The heat and humidity sound manageable: 22C and 88% humidity. Just did not work out. I was dripping sweat, struggling to concentrate and was ready to drop after just 2 miles.
Have given up on road running for now. Did 5 comfortable and satisfying miles on the treadmill in an air-conditioned gym this morning.
The first unexpected hazard is the mosquitoes. They hang in the air in swarms thick enough to be opaque. They are able to bite even under my t-shirt.
The more interesting unexpected hazard is the culture. Road running is so counter-cultural in Madras, I almost expect the scrawny urchins loitering around on the pavements to break out into hoots or whistles as I pass. I was running in the Boat Club area partly because the roads are clean enough for a run to be possible, but also because it is an unambiguously posh area. Urchins just seem less likely to hoot at rich people in posh surroundings. The only other people running on the Boat Club roads were white. It's weird being a foreigner in my home town.
Have given up on road running for now. Did 5 comfortable and satisfying miles on the treadmill in an air-conditioned gym this morning.
The first unexpected hazard is the mosquitoes. They hang in the air in swarms thick enough to be opaque. They are able to bite even under my t-shirt.
The more interesting unexpected hazard is the culture. Road running is so counter-cultural in Madras, I almost expect the scrawny urchins loitering around on the pavements to break out into hoots or whistles as I pass. I was running in the Boat Club area partly because the roads are clean enough for a run to be possible, but also because it is an unambiguously posh area. Urchins just seem less likely to hoot at rich people in posh surroundings. The only other people running on the Boat Club roads were white. It's weird being a foreigner in my home town.
Wednesday 19 December 2007
What are Moonballs?
This is my 50th post. It is time to clarify what moonballs are. Or more specifically, what moonballs are not.
I have been surprised to learn that moonballs sounds risque to some of my peers and potential readers. While my imagination is piqued, I must confess that as a married, heterosexual, 37 year old banker of middle class south Indian antecedents, I am completely ignorant of the risque connotations of moonballs.
Rather than coarsen the tone of this blog by speculating on the possible risque connotations, here are a bunch of other possible meanings of moonballs:
1. A nick name for idlis. A soft, white, round and iconic Tamil staple food
2. A nick name for rossogollas. A soft, white, round, very sweet and iconic Bengali staple food
3. Collector's item golf balls made from rocks that were brought back from the moon by Neil Armstrong
4. Balls made of flubber, the material invented by The Absent Minded Professor in the film of the same name
5. Formal dance balls (think Cinderella) held by the light of the harvest moon
6. Brand name for a green cheese. This is a sphere of synthetically coloured cheddar cheese about the size and shape of a bulls-eye which is being test marketed as a healthy snack for American children
7. Special white bowling balls used in the final, decisive round of professional bowling matches if the previous rounds fail to identify a clear winner
8. A very high and slow lob played in tennis. As in: hit the ball all the way up to the moon. This is a cunning shot ideally played on floodlit courts. The ball is hard to spot if it goes above the height of the floodlights
9. Balls bowled by Mr Moon. Which translates to Mr Chandra in Sanskrit or Hindi. Planet Earth translates to Planet Prithvi
10. A cricket delivery mastered by Jeremy Snape, captain of the Leicestershire Foxes and occasional England one-day specialist. A spinner's slower ball. Typically an offbreak bowled so slowly that the batter tends to mistime his hoick and holes out to mid wicket.
Thursday 13 December 2007
Cultural learnings of Eng-a-land for make benefit glorious nation of Hindustan
Kevin, our electrician/ plumber/ handyman came in over the weekend to help assemble the kid's bunk bed. He's a genial, happy and very helpful guy we've worked with a lot. We offered him tea or coffee. He turned us down...because he drinks only freshly ground coffee. How posh is that!
Tony Blair once famously claimed that "we're all middle class now." Is he right?
The Guardian survey below shows that the children of the old upper classes (think Bertie Wooster and colonial colonels) now describe themselves as middle class. Truck drivers and electricians want the best schools for their children and drink tall skinny lattes while referring to themselves as working class.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,,2195560,00.html
The Guardian survey below shows that the children of the old upper classes (think Bertie Wooster and colonial colonels) now describe themselves as middle class. Truck drivers and electricians want the best schools for their children and drink tall skinny lattes while referring to themselves as working class.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,,2195560,00.html
My take is that there is a real convergence of identities and values happening. Slowly. It's being driven by the emergent service economy. The fascinating twist is that the old notions of class are still self-defining, even while this convergence is happening.
My clearest window into English culture is Watching the English, by Kate Fox. The author is an English anthropologist, who has an insider's right to make un-PC anthropological observations that can never really be made about Amazonian tribes.
One of her central theses is that every English person comes with a built in radar that automatically switches on during social interactions to plot the other person onto a fine, richly layered social hierarchy. The English are uncomfortable with foreigners because this radar no longer works.
Will that class-radar get slowly ground to dust by the service economy? Hard to say. My money is on the service economy winning.
Wednesday 5 December 2007
Flight 714
Just watched my favourite Tintin, Flight 714, on DVD.
It works. It was fun. But it doesn't work as well as the comic. Mainly because the DVD goes by too fast to soak up and enjoy the details.
I remember the comic frame when Professor Calculus demonstrates a "savate" move in Jakarta airport. I've spent hours laughing at the hundreds of things that flood out of his pockets. That frame lasts just a fraction of a second on the DVD. There's another frame when Captain Haddock pours some liquid (mineral water?) into a potted plant at the airport...and the plant wilts. I didn't spot that at all in the DVD.
A less visually rich comic, like Peanuts, probably works better on DVD than Tintin.
It works. It was fun. But it doesn't work as well as the comic. Mainly because the DVD goes by too fast to soak up and enjoy the details.
I remember the comic frame when Professor Calculus demonstrates a "savate" move in Jakarta airport. I've spent hours laughing at the hundreds of things that flood out of his pockets. That frame lasts just a fraction of a second on the DVD. There's another frame when Captain Haddock pours some liquid (mineral water?) into a potted plant at the airport...and the plant wilts. I didn't spot that at all in the DVD.
A less visually rich comic, like Peanuts, probably works better on DVD than Tintin.
Saturday 1 December 2007
Blood Diamond, Syriana. The Economics
To me (and fellow geeks like me), the economic truth Blood Diamond and Syriana illustrate are as fascinating as the movies themselves.
Resource based economies tend to breed truly horrible social and political systems. Because to get rich and powerful in resource economies, all one needs to do is control the resource in question. The tycoon/ mogul/ sheikh/ oligarch who owns the oil well is the boss. The rest of society is all about getting on the gravy train that this tycoon/ mogul/ sheikh/ oligarch maintains. There is no reason (or room) to create or cooperate.
This is often phrased as "why is Bihar the poorest state in India despite it's wealth of natural resources?" This question is almost precisely invested. The real question is "how to save Bihar from it's wealth of natural resources?".
It's a hard question. One thing we do know is that nationalizing the resources does not work. Just look at Bihar or Putin's Russia for proof.
Resource based economies tend to breed truly horrible social and political systems. Because to get rich and powerful in resource economies, all one needs to do is control the resource in question. The tycoon/ mogul/ sheikh/ oligarch who owns the oil well is the boss. The rest of society is all about getting on the gravy train that this tycoon/ mogul/ sheikh/ oligarch maintains. There is no reason (or room) to create or cooperate.
This is often phrased as "why is Bihar the poorest state in India despite it's wealth of natural resources?" This question is almost precisely invested. The real question is "how to save Bihar from it's wealth of natural resources?".
It's a hard question. One thing we do know is that nationalizing the resources does not work. Just look at Bihar or Putin's Russia for proof.
Friday 30 November 2007
Blood Diamond, Syriana. The Movies
Watched (and enjoyed) a couple of recent Hollywood movies with overtly political themes.
Blood Diamond is about the horrible things that happen while mining diamonds in war-torn Africa. It features a superb performance by Leonardo DiCaprio as the Rhodesian mercenary: Danny Archer. It left a phrase embedded in my mind: TIA - This Is Africa. It had a happy ending.
Syriana is about the horrible things that happen while mining oil in the war-torn Middle East. It features a superb performance by Matt Damon as an American investment banker. It left a couple of gritty montages embedded in my mind: a lush, luxurious, sensuous party in Tehran, Pakistani migrant workers so bored that they would walk through the desert for entertainment. It had an ambigious and possibly tragic ending...and probably suffered in the box office for it.
Both movies have a ring of truth. Horrible things happen in oil and diamond mining.
Blood Diamond is about the horrible things that happen while mining diamonds in war-torn Africa. It features a superb performance by Leonardo DiCaprio as the Rhodesian mercenary: Danny Archer. It left a phrase embedded in my mind: TIA - This Is Africa. It had a happy ending.
Syriana is about the horrible things that happen while mining oil in the war-torn Middle East. It features a superb performance by Matt Damon as an American investment banker. It left a couple of gritty montages embedded in my mind: a lush, luxurious, sensuous party in Tehran, Pakistani migrant workers so bored that they would walk through the desert for entertainment. It had an ambigious and possibly tragic ending...and probably suffered in the box office for it.
Both movies have a ring of truth. Horrible things happen in oil and diamond mining.
Thursday 29 November 2007
Marathon training
The score:
Week 5
Thu Nov 29: 30 min intervals + 10 min rowing m/c. 5 km
Wed Nov 28: 36 min @ 10 kmph. 6 km
Mon Nov 26: Skiing on Capital One fun day (it's tiring)
Week 4
Sun Nov 25: 50 min @ 10+ kmph. 8.3 km
Friday Nov 23: 42 min canalside. 7 km?
Thu Nov 22: 4 games squash
Wed Nov 21: 36 min intervals. 6km
Tue Nov 20: 40 min canalside. 6.6km?
Mon Nov 19. 40 min @ 10+ kmph. 6.6km
Total for week: 34.5 kmph + 4 games (bad) squash
Observations:
- Running outdoors is a huge enthusiasm builder. I need to slot in more time in the natural light
- I'm not really pushing myself hard. Will do that this weekend, when I run early in the day when I have a lot of energy
- I'm sorely tempted to blow £100+ on a GPS enables stopwatch that keeps track of my distance and time when I'm running outdoors
- I played lousy squash on Thursday. I was tired after some pretty focused training. I'd had a heavy and oily lunch at Red Hot Buffet Shack with Lalit K. I was in no mental shape to compete. Next time, I'll organize my day in a way that I have the energy to compete
- Protein bars at my desk in the office are working quite well at providing a good 4 pm snack. Not sure where that leaves me on net nutrition and calorie balance, though...
Week 5
Thu Nov 29: 30 min intervals + 10 min rowing m/c. 5 km
Wed Nov 28: 36 min @ 10 kmph. 6 km
Mon Nov 26: Skiing on Capital One fun day (it's tiring)
Week 4
Sun Nov 25: 50 min @ 10+ kmph. 8.3 km
Friday Nov 23: 42 min canalside. 7 km?
Thu Nov 22: 4 games squash
Wed Nov 21: 36 min intervals. 6km
Tue Nov 20: 40 min canalside. 6.6km?
Mon Nov 19. 40 min @ 10+ kmph. 6.6km
Total for week: 34.5 kmph + 4 games (bad) squash
Observations:
- Running outdoors is a huge enthusiasm builder. I need to slot in more time in the natural light
- I'm not really pushing myself hard. Will do that this weekend, when I run early in the day when I have a lot of energy
- I'm sorely tempted to blow £100+ on a GPS enables stopwatch that keeps track of my distance and time when I'm running outdoors
- I played lousy squash on Thursday. I was tired after some pretty focused training. I'd had a heavy and oily lunch at Red Hot Buffet Shack with Lalit K. I was in no mental shape to compete. Next time, I'll organize my day in a way that I have the energy to compete
- Protein bars at my desk in the office are working quite well at providing a good 4 pm snack. Not sure where that leaves me on net nutrition and calorie balance, though...
Wednesday 28 November 2007
The lion, the witch and the wardrobe
My six year old daughter, Arundhati, is buzzed with the excitement of being able to read by herself. She is devouring books too quickly for my wife or I to edit what she's reading, or frame and contextualize her books for her. She's on her own now.
She has just devoured Enid Blyton's the Magic Faraway Tree (four times), Roald Dahl's Charile and the Chocolate Factory, and C. S. Lewis' The Lion, the Witch and The Wardrobe. She's a hop, skip and jump away from the rest of Enid Blyton, moving moving on to the Ramayana and Mahabharata, and perhaps Tolkien.
This is potent stuff. Fiction like this can shape values for a lifetime. Which is why I was a little worried when I noticed Arundhati reading C. S. Lewis. Because C. S. Lewis was, "not to put too fine a point on it, a racist and sexist pig."
Should I point out the racism to Arundhati, so she is better able to protect herself from toxic attitudes? Or should I just let her enjoy the narrative, and trust that the rest of her upbringing will give her enough protection from toxic thoughts? In the balance, my wife and I chose to let her just enjoy the narrative. But it wasn't an easy choice.
_____________________________________________
Am I being being paranoid about C. S. Lewis? Nope. Tragic but true. A bigot is he. Here's Anne Fadiman's take on C. S. Lewis in her excellent introduction to Rereadings:
When my son was eight, I read C. S. Lewis's The Horse and His Boy aloud to him...
Henry loved The Horse and His Boy, the tale of two children and two talking horses who gallop across an obstacle-fraught desert in hope of averting the downfall of an imperilled kingdom that lies to the north...
My jaw dropped when I realized that Aravis, its heroine, is acceptable to Lewis only because she acts like a boy - she's interested in "bows and arrows and horses and dogs and swimming"- and even dresses like a boy whereas the books only girly girl, a devotee of "clothes and parties and gossip" is an object of contempt. Even more appaling is Lewis's treatment of the Calormenes, a brown-skinned people who wear turbans and carry scimitars. Forty years ago the near homonym slipped me...
The book's hero, Shasta, is the ward of a venial Calormene fisherman, but, as a visitor observes, "this boy is manifestly no son of yours, for your cheek is as dark as mine, but the boy is fair and white." That's how we know he belongs to a noble northern race instead of an uncouth southern one...
It was difficult to read this sort of thing out to Henry without comment...I blurted out "Have you noticed that The Horse and His Boy is not really fair to girls? And that all the bad guys have dark skin?"...
Henry...didn't want to analyze, criticize, evaluate or explicate the book...He wanted to find out if Shasta and Aravis would get to Archenland in time to warn King Lune that his castle was about to be attacked by evil Prince Rabadash and two hundred Calormen horsemen. "Mommy," he said fiercely, "can you just read?"
I sort of trust that Anne Fadiman's son will not turn out to be a racist or sexist despite having swallowed C. S. Lewis's poison.
___________________________________________
And how harshly should one judge C. S. Lewis himself? Was he just reflecting the spirit and attitude of his time? Or was he worse than that? Given his intelligence, erudition and the privilege he enjoyed as an Oxford don, I'm inclined to judge him harshly...but I can see both points of view.
And what about Tolkien? He is, of course, too sacred to be judged. But it does worry me a bit that he was a good friend of C. S. Lewis. I remember seeing their bust side by side when my sister Radhi and I had visited Exeter College, Oxford. This was before Hollywood made these men famous with Shadowlands and the Lord of the Rings trilogy.
She has just devoured Enid Blyton's the Magic Faraway Tree (four times), Roald Dahl's Charile and the Chocolate Factory, and C. S. Lewis' The Lion, the Witch and The Wardrobe. She's a hop, skip and jump away from the rest of Enid Blyton, moving moving on to the Ramayana and Mahabharata, and perhaps Tolkien.
This is potent stuff. Fiction like this can shape values for a lifetime. Which is why I was a little worried when I noticed Arundhati reading C. S. Lewis. Because C. S. Lewis was, "not to put too fine a point on it, a racist and sexist pig."
Should I point out the racism to Arundhati, so she is better able to protect herself from toxic attitudes? Or should I just let her enjoy the narrative, and trust that the rest of her upbringing will give her enough protection from toxic thoughts? In the balance, my wife and I chose to let her just enjoy the narrative. But it wasn't an easy choice.
_____________________________________________
Am I being being paranoid about C. S. Lewis? Nope. Tragic but true. A bigot is he. Here's Anne Fadiman's take on C. S. Lewis in her excellent introduction to Rereadings:
When my son was eight, I read C. S. Lewis's The Horse and His Boy aloud to him...
Henry loved The Horse and His Boy, the tale of two children and two talking horses who gallop across an obstacle-fraught desert in hope of averting the downfall of an imperilled kingdom that lies to the north...
My jaw dropped when I realized that Aravis, its heroine, is acceptable to Lewis only because she acts like a boy - she's interested in "bows and arrows and horses and dogs and swimming"- and even dresses like a boy whereas the books only girly girl, a devotee of "clothes and parties and gossip" is an object of contempt. Even more appaling is Lewis's treatment of the Calormenes, a brown-skinned people who wear turbans and carry scimitars. Forty years ago the near homonym slipped me...
The book's hero, Shasta, is the ward of a venial Calormene fisherman, but, as a visitor observes, "this boy is manifestly no son of yours, for your cheek is as dark as mine, but the boy is fair and white." That's how we know he belongs to a noble northern race instead of an uncouth southern one...
It was difficult to read this sort of thing out to Henry without comment...I blurted out "Have you noticed that The Horse and His Boy is not really fair to girls? And that all the bad guys have dark skin?"...
Henry...didn't want to analyze, criticize, evaluate or explicate the book...He wanted to find out if Shasta and Aravis would get to Archenland in time to warn King Lune that his castle was about to be attacked by evil Prince Rabadash and two hundred Calormen horsemen. "Mommy," he said fiercely, "can you just read?"
I sort of trust that Anne Fadiman's son will not turn out to be a racist or sexist despite having swallowed C. S. Lewis's poison.
___________________________________________
And how harshly should one judge C. S. Lewis himself? Was he just reflecting the spirit and attitude of his time? Or was he worse than that? Given his intelligence, erudition and the privilege he enjoyed as an Oxford don, I'm inclined to judge him harshly...but I can see both points of view.
And what about Tolkien? He is, of course, too sacred to be judged. But it does worry me a bit that he was a good friend of C. S. Lewis. I remember seeing their bust side by side when my sister Radhi and I had visited Exeter College, Oxford. This was before Hollywood made these men famous with Shadowlands and the Lord of the Rings trilogy.
Saturday 24 November 2007
Cultural learnings of Eng-a-land for make benefit glorious nation of Hindustan
The city magistrates of Nottingham has just banned five notorious, aggressive beggars from begging in the city center, sitting within ten meters of a cash point, or selling the Big Issue without authorization.
In case you're wondering, the UK's per capital GDP at ppp is around $35000.
http://www.thisisnottingham.co.uk/displayNode.jsp?nodeId=133965&command=displayContent&sourceNode=133948&contentPK=18991107&moduleName=InternalSearch&formname=sidebarsearch
Reminds me of a conversation I had with my driver back in Bombay in the late 90s.
My driver then was Anil Thakker, a hard working Gujarati who was carefully saving up money to pay a broker for a job in the Gulf. We were on Marine Drive. A few beggers were hovering around the car. Anil asked me if there were beggers outside India. I told him there were, many. He flatly refused to believe me.
In case you're wondering, the UK's per capital GDP at ppp is around $35000.
http://www.thisisnottingham.co.uk/displayNode.jsp?nodeId=133965&command=displayContent&sourceNode=133948&contentPK=18991107&moduleName=InternalSearch&formname=sidebarsearch
Reminds me of a conversation I had with my driver back in Bombay in the late 90s.
My driver then was Anil Thakker, a hard working Gujarati who was carefully saving up money to pay a broker for a job in the Gulf. We were on Marine Drive. A few beggers were hovering around the car. Anil asked me if there were beggers outside India. I told him there were, many. He flatly refused to believe me.
Extremely loud and incredibly close
Just finished this outstanding book. One of the most satisfying fiction reads in at least a couple of years.What's it about? It's about a nine year old boy whose father dies in the 9/11 attacks. But it's not remotely political. It's about missing dad, thinking too much, wondering about mom and grandma, finding heroes, finding anti-heroes, loving New York city, thinking too much, keys on neckchains, meeting adults, learning judo, visiting the Empire State building, being swamped by New York, hating bullies, missing dad, thinking too much. Most of all, it's about a dad who dies tragically when he still is a hero in his son's eyes.
I know I'm enjoying a book if I feel the need to pick up a pencil and make notes to myself in the margin. This book now has scrawls all over it. Thanks to my cousin Aarti for pushing this my way as a birthday gift.
Monday 19 November 2007
In praise of Kumar Sangakarra
Kumar Sangakarra, the spiritual heir of David Gower, Mark Waugh and VVS Laxman, is playing out of his skin. Still at the crease. 128 not out.
I'm not calling this the inning of a lifetime because I still hope that Sangakarra can play an innings like this in a winning cause. Looks like his class and courage can't hold off the baying pack of Aussie bowlers. Sri Lanka have slumped from an overnight 263-3 to 272-6 between the time I resolved to write this post and right now, with Lanka need to bat out the fifth day to save the Hobart test.
Still, as long as India are not playing, I don't mind at all if cricket ki jeet hui.
I'm not calling this the inning of a lifetime because I still hope that Sangakarra can play an innings like this in a winning cause. Looks like his class and courage can't hold off the baying pack of Aussie bowlers. Sri Lanka have slumped from an overnight 263-3 to 272-6 between the time I resolved to write this post and right now, with Lanka need to bat out the fifth day to save the Hobart test.
Still, as long as India are not playing, I don't mind at all if cricket ki jeet hui.
Marathon Training
What's the score?
Week 2
Tue, Nov 6: 5 games of squash
Thu, Nov 8: 30 min. 5 km. Intervals at 7.5 and 12.5 kmph
Fri, Nov 9: 45 min. 7.5 km @ 10 kmph
Sat, Nov 10: 30 min. 5.0 km. At 10 kmph
Total: 17.5 km + 5 games squash
Week 3
Tue, Nov 13: 4 games of squash
Wed, Nov 14: 30 min. 5.2 km. Just slightly over 10kmph
Thu, Nov 15: 36 min. 6 km. Intervals at 7.5 and 12.5 kmph
Sun Nov 18: 36 min. 6 km. Cruise @ 10kmph + 10 min on rowing m/c
Total: 19.2 km + 4 games squash
Observations:
1. My attitude to training has changed since in signed up for the Marathon.
Working out used to be me-time that I looked forward to. Now that I have to do the miles, working out has become a chore to be completed rather than a treat I'm giving myself. I'm feeling apologetic about tearing myself away from work and the children to go clock in the miles. That saps energy. If I slope into a training session feeling apologetic, half-embarrassed and unconsciously thinking I really ought to be elsewhere, I'm not going to find gas in the tank when I want to push myself for another couple of miles or pump up the pace on the last lap.
I'm going to set this right. I'm going to slot in training carefully into my calendar, so I know I'm not stealing time from another part of my life. I'll spend a couple of minutes warming up and visualizing the run before I set off. And approach each run with focus, enthusiasm and pride.
2. I need an afternoon snack. I'm out of fuel around 4:30 pm. That's prime time for unhealthy and energy sapping snacks. That also takes energy away from my run in the evening.
3. I need to watch my diet more closely because I'm in training. I've let myself indulge a bit. I'm in training has become a bit of an excuse to over-eat and snack on potato chips. This is absurd
4. Squash is actually a nice change from running. I'm going to continue playing through the marathon training period. I'll basically be playing only league matches. That's OK.
Week 2
Tue, Nov 6: 5 games of squash
Thu, Nov 8: 30 min. 5 km. Intervals at 7.5 and 12.5 kmph
Fri, Nov 9: 45 min. 7.5 km @ 10 kmph
Sat, Nov 10: 30 min. 5.0 km. At 10 kmph
Total: 17.5 km + 5 games squash
Week 3
Tue, Nov 13: 4 games of squash
Wed, Nov 14: 30 min. 5.2 km. Just slightly over 10kmph
Thu, Nov 15: 36 min. 6 km. Intervals at 7.5 and 12.5 kmph
Sun Nov 18: 36 min. 6 km. Cruise @ 10kmph + 10 min on rowing m/c
Total: 19.2 km + 4 games squash
Observations:
1. My attitude to training has changed since in signed up for the Marathon.
Working out used to be me-time that I looked forward to. Now that I have to do the miles, working out has become a chore to be completed rather than a treat I'm giving myself. I'm feeling apologetic about tearing myself away from work and the children to go clock in the miles. That saps energy. If I slope into a training session feeling apologetic, half-embarrassed and unconsciously thinking I really ought to be elsewhere, I'm not going to find gas in the tank when I want to push myself for another couple of miles or pump up the pace on the last lap.
I'm going to set this right. I'm going to slot in training carefully into my calendar, so I know I'm not stealing time from another part of my life. I'll spend a couple of minutes warming up and visualizing the run before I set off. And approach each run with focus, enthusiasm and pride.
2. I need an afternoon snack. I'm out of fuel around 4:30 pm. That's prime time for unhealthy and energy sapping snacks. That also takes energy away from my run in the evening.
3. I need to watch my diet more closely because I'm in training. I've let myself indulge a bit. I'm in training has become a bit of an excuse to over-eat and snack on potato chips. This is absurd
4. Squash is actually a nice change from running. I'm going to continue playing through the marathon training period. I'll basically be playing only league matches. That's OK.
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