Artificial Intelligence

Confession - This is primarily meant for those who think Artificial Intelligence is something like artificial insemination or in that zone. Done in the brain area for enhancing chances of harvesting badly needed and inherently scarce intelligence.  Those who have more than a pea-sized understanding of AI are requested to pass this by.  Or if they read this anyway, they are requested not to tell me `ah, this is too basic'.  It is, they are forewarned.  It is a common man's look at AI, not for those who are looking for research material on AI.

Laymen's idea of artificial intelligence (AI) today varies from vaguely amorphous to seriously flawed to reasonably good, depending on how much effort they have made in this pursuit of comprehending the phenomenon. One friend who is ludicrously disinterested in and almost offended by all such things asked me innocuously how exactly would doctors perform this procedure!  Another one who is viciously antagonistic towards politicians of all hues wondered whether an `one kilo package of AI', procured at a discounted bulk price, can be attached to all budding and senior politicians so that they work marginally better, for the benefit of people! As an afterthought, he recommended a higher dose - 20 kilos - for the likes of a few specimens who have risen be presidents or opposition leaders in some countries.  Now I don't know the answer to that because AI's ability to enhance the native intelligence of people, especially politicians, might be more than doubtful.  A few are somewhat better informed, thanks to inputs from people with higher skills and knowledge.  I realize that AI is making things better for the common man in various areas like organizing data, in-depth data analysis, quicker and more informative responses to queries.  As it is making serious inroads into the functioning of conventional technology companies/platforms as they help in manufacturing, defence and other advanced sectors.

But experts don't seem to have fully resolved the more serious question as to how much AI will do to deprive people of their software/programming jobs.  There have been serious differences among technology pundits about this issue.  Some are vociferous in saying a big chunk of job losses will result.  Others believe while people will be thrown out of current jobs, many might be fitted into AI related work that will be booming.  While AI is already being used in many fields successfully for productivity and creative benefits, doubts persist elsewhere about AI being always accurate and correct. So, in critical domains like medical science, AI may have to go much farther for convincing results. If you wonder why these questions have not been popped to AI for clarity and resolution, I am with you!!  Another spin ball that has dogged the experts is how much investment into AI related build-up is too much!! Some companies were overly gung-ho in the last few years in piling capital investments into the domain of AI. Of late they seem to have pulled back a bit, after realizing that pit is bottomless and sustained returns may not as assured as they thought. 

In this swing from zero to aggression to caution, these companies have lost market-caps and investors have lost their pants in the stock market. Very dependable, marquee technology companies have taken big hits to their bottom-lines, profitability and also share prices in the past few years. Principally because there was no clarity about the impact of AI on traditional software/IT companies' business prospects and their robust profits. As was most likely to happen, these companies are making phenomenal adjustments to their own business models and plans, to accommodate and gain from AI as an integral tool in the way they build technology platforms for themselves and their clients.  Very soon such technology behemoths may metamorphose into IT and AI companies - such a synthesis will happen eventually.

Remember the early days of automated spreadsheets?  They integrated many formulae and made calculations easy.  Calculators and mental computations became passe overnight. That was for just one minuscule task, but that benefited a section of humanity immensely by saving millions of man-days involved in computing, accounting and tabulating.  Now, multiply that a billion-fold or more and apply to any subject under the sun.  This is what AI is aiming to be possibly doing and the results will be staggering.  Before the advent of AI, we were popping questions to Google or Bing and getting simple one sentence answers (or more) on any subject, which had related information compiled and stored in the cloud.  With AI, the quantum of information stored as well as the capacity to analyze the same in a jiffy have increased exponentially and the outcome is that very complicated inquiries even from domain specialists/experts are getting answered effortlessly in a blink. So enormous amount of time is being saved and obviously productivity is increased multi-fold. This comes from the fact that the quantum of data available with AI is huge and the logic built into it for analysis is very advanced. 

One thing must be clear by now.  The quality of the responses generated by AI will entirely depend on the quality of the information already stored, ongoing updates and the correctness of the analytical tools used.  If the information assimilated is compromised or the analysis is flawed, the answer is going to be goofy, unreliable and harmful too.  Recently a report came out somewhere that people should not blindly trust the answers they get from AI in the area of medicine and go for treatments. Because there seem to have been instances of the analysis being erroneous, thereby rendering the entire response questionable.  What this means, at this stage, is one cannot use AI to save one's life because what it puts out as a solution may be far from a life-saver.  Such a response will require manual intervention, for a review by an expert. Meaning, one has to still go to that painful doctor for diagnosis and treatment; one cannot self-medicate, something Google has always told us.   

Where will all those poor souls who are likely to lose their jobs go?? Especially if software coding itself can be done using AI by anyone, without knowing any coding language.  Partial redemption is around the corner, may be. All data compiled by AI from multiple sources should be seriously checked for accuracy for obvious reasons. By whom? You should not be surprised, primarily by us humans as of now.  So, compilation of huge amounts of initial data gobbled up by the AI platforms, updating that constantly, categorization, labelling, checking for accuracy, editing, corrections and finally implementing the last step to get AI to be ready to answer fresh queries have all to be accomplished by people. Even though the AI platform itself can pull in new data  and to some extent do the editing/correcting/updating, I understand.  But, leaving AI as the final arbiter in this process will not inspire too much confidence, at least for now, in people.  This means a lot of manpower will be shifted from technology jobs to AI work.  That will have to continue, until AI platforms are fully self-sufficient and can manage all the above tasks by themselves without the intervention of anyone.  Technology personnel will have to be re-trained for different things and for higher level intervention.  Something like, a cook making shapeless onion pakodas now will have to be readied for gourmet Italian food.  Of course, the world has to develop faith in the whole AI process, its integrity and the accuracy of the output.  This will take time.

AI surely is being asked more heavy duty questions - more than mundane questions like `what is the best route for Bangalore to Chennai', which we reserved for Google and Bing.  Certainly AI should be benefiting people at large and youngsters especially.  But, it is not clear how much it would help students to skip classes completely and rely on AI. A certain segment of students might do that because AI can become a substitute lecturer, as we have seen in a TV commercial.  Should it matter, is a question for the academics to sort out.  If learning is the ultimate goal and students do that well from AI rather than the mostly boring classrooms today (at a fraction of the cost??), will that be an issue? They might miss the essential fun part of student life and social and real-world skills.  And then there are individuals like the ones in an another TV commercial who asks AI `I have spent half my salary in shopping and still have to go for 25 days for the next pay cheque.  How should I manage'?  As if you need AI to tell you that and this is the real danger.  So long as this is not the prevalent scenario among the majority, the so-called Gen Z, which is hoping to revolutionize everything in India should be fine.

When I asked my dear wife what she thought of AI, as a true-blue teacher, she said it should be used extensively to supplement teaching methods, especially to offset the abysmal quality of teachers in general.  But she also wondered, based on past empirical evidence, if despite the prevalence of AI and its monumental analytical prowess, people would progressively become naturally more stupid by the day because of over-reliance!!  Possible.  

 

 

     

 

               

 

 

Recommenders, beware!!

How many times have you felt like an imbecile, being indicted by a friend for recommending something which he, the friend, did not savour much??  Happens to everyone, I am sure.  Take a recent case narrated to me.  Someone from Madras (Chennai for many, but remains its original self to me) visiting Bangalore asked for a good, very Bangalorish `benne dosa' (butter dosai) restaurant. This man gladly obliged by enthusiastically vouching for a place he frequents for the very same item.  He did not even have to think twice because benne dosa is known to be absolutely awesome in that place.  This visitor from Madras goes to the restaurant, enjoys benne dosa twice over and comes back with this feedback - `benne dosa was very nice, but the sambar was not the spicy Madras version, was the sweet Karnataka type and that spoilt the whole deal'.  There are people like that.  This chap knew it was a Karnataka restaurant, will cater to the taste of Kannadigas.  Still comes out with this rather stupid feedback.  His wife, who is usually more sensible, cribbed that they had extra mustard in the chutney, which made it almost inedible.  Such peeves should make the recommender to ask the recommendee to fill up a lengthy questionnaire for clarity before recommending something.  Defensive action from someone who has been burnt once!!

But the above experience is not something unique, it is par for the course; most people just shrug off the uncharitable criticism and move on without changing their ways.  But, it is probably good for the recommender to couch his recommendtion in a diplomatic statement and say `For me this is a good place/thing.  I dont know about your expectations.  Check it out, if you want'.  Seems a good way of hedging one's bet.  If one is the thin-skinned, super-sensitive type, this probably is the way to go in such contexts. 

A few years back, a visiting friend from Bombay wanted to see the IPL match between RCB and MI at Chinnaswamy Stadium, Bangalore.  He wanted tickets to be organized.  I enthusiastically found out prices for various stands and provided the information.  This guy innocuously asked me to select a good stand/place to watch from.  Having no great experience with the various stands in the ground, I went for a middling option, keeping a reasonable price-tag in sight and procured the tickets.  The Bombaywala watched the match, came back and went generally gaga over the experience.  But, during the ensuing conversation,  in the manner of expertly passing a needle through a banana, told me that there was too much noise, there was some obstruction to one side which prevented him from looking at Kohli from close, cleanliness was lacking in the rest rooms, chairs were uncomfortable, some glare from the lights obscured the ball from one angle, so on and so forth.  As if, he expected me to have done thorough reconnoisance beforehand. I almost thought he was going to demand full refund from me for my blunder in selecting that stand!!  He knew he was not paying for the Hospitality Box of a Corporate, so I thought this carping about niggles was totally unwarranted.  With that episode, I stopped making choices for others and now insist on specifics being communicated by them.

Recommending a movie is another chore in which you could dig a big hole for yourself. A movie is a highly personal experience and what one individual likes need not be appreciated by all around him.  But this dictum does not stop you from freely doling out advice to friends to watch a movie because you loved it. 'It is fun'.  This goes well if the other person shares some vestiges of your taste in such things.  If not, this is a risky proposition and may backfire.  The guy might come to you with a sour face and almost blame you for an expense of Rs.1000 for two to watch an 'inane' movie. Some difference of opinion is fine, but if the criticism is trenchant enough to sound like the guy got into the wrong theatre and watched a completely different movie, then the seeds of this disaster were sown when you chose to do the recommendation! It is critical for us to not only assess the movie, but also the individual receiving our recommendation for taste compatibiity. 

There are certain experiences which are pleasurable simply because of the various individuals work together to deliver that.  This also implies that if some of the variables were to change a bit, the whole edifice might collapse in a heap.  Take a flight for example.  One might have a superlative experience flying from Bombay to New York on a specific airline.  Great. While the airline itself is deemed always good, one has to be lucky too.  A month later the same flight may not deliver the same delight, simply because a lot of personnel involved in the whole service delivery chain might have changed as well as the aircraft with its configuration.  One never knows what kind of black sheep is hiding where in this chain, so it is a brave man who assumes the flight would be consistently great and recommend it to others.  If one does recommend the flight, it is only par for the course that some negative feedback will come through in such cases, unless the airline is such a service wonder that its name is good enough to always and unfailingly guarantee a good experience.

If a simple cup of coffee or a benign benne dosa or harmless movie referral can bring a load of backlash to the unsuspecting recommender, what should we make of a guy who ventures to link two families through a match for a marriage, through a two-way recommendation?? This would rank as the most dangerous recommendation one can make and it would take some supreme conviction on the part of the recommender.  As with all arranged marriages, the risks remain very unpredictable but some part of the blame subtly shifts outside of the families involved, to the person who is recommending the match.  While one or both the families may seek the recommendation from the giver as a family-friend, the man-in-the-middle would probably never absolve himself of all blame, even though the final decision in the matter was never his. I would cringe at the thought of the girl's parents helplessly looking at me, if something were to go wrong later, as if to ask `you told us the boy is a gem and he turned out to be this!" or the other way around.  This is one recommendation nobody should take rather lightly.

A recommendation - any - for that matter, is made in good faith and looking at things from a particular perspective, personally yours.  So, obviously who is receiving the recommendation and his/her tastes etc would matter most. Unless, of course, the recommender is diabolically inclined and intentionally wants the recommendee to suffer through a bad experience.  Which is why most of us would not risk advising a half-baked, casual acquaintance with any serious suggestion. How well we know the receiver and his/her tastes, style, preferences etc should be the deciding factor. 

My dear wife has stopped the exuberant me many a time from making a fool myself, by making a strong recommendation to a person we have barely known.  Her wisdom prevailed always and though peeved a bit at that time, harking back now I know why recommendations should be kept for close friends and family.  As she says, if at all you are going to be rebuked for the advice, it better come from someone well known to you!!  Touche!   

Cricket Muhurtham

You are out one evening in that nightmare that is Bangalore traffic, dreading the stress of the journey.  But, surprisingly, you are moving along nicely as if some supernatural power has cut a swathe through the eternal mess and eased your path.  You are confused and wonder what is wrong, correct?? Nothing is wrong - either you are a bit cricket-unaware or forgot that there is a slugfest of a T20 cricket match involving the Indian team, being played somewhere in Asia.  This 'cricket muhurtham' is invariably between 6.30 pm and 10.30 pm, when most of India does a general abdication and congregates around the TV at home or elsewhere, as a family, as a chummy group, as a community, as a neighbourhood. The more adventurous and affluent strain themselves extra, in the name of enjoying the stadium-ambience.  They choose to suffer through the milling crowds to occupy some obscure corner seat, from where you can just about barely tell if it is India or the opponents batting or fielding, nothing more specific.  The beauty is they dont care because they have that genie called the mobile, which can provide context and substance when necessary!  These fanatics like risking lives and limbs, paying huge sums for the ticket and weathering all kinds of headwinds in transportation/car-parking, serpentine queues, endless security checks and enduring a two-hour post-match exit routine.  These are the craziest of the crazies and will do anything, well almost, to get one ticket for the match, especially if it is a momentous occasion like the final of a marquee tournament.  You get the picture, right? This is the muhurtham, akin to the conventional wedding muhurtham, that we are talking about.

The pre-match preparations for the day last only 2-3 hours for the players themselves, but start quite early for the households and take much longer.  Pretty much like the early morning hurly-burly of the wedding day. The elderly grandparents are out of the block first, as in the case of a family wedding - God forbid if their interests are not covered well in the run-up to the match; others will not be able to see the match in peace if the elders are not satisfied.  They are given the pride of place in front of the TV, just as in the case of a wedding.  They get busy around forenoon, organizing their things for the spectacle.  Yes, specs ok, check; water bottle ok, check; dinner will be served at their seats, check; some murukku, cheedai for munching, check; medicine box handy, check and so on.  They sternly warn the youngsters not to mess around with the TV/TataPlay connections `like they did the previous week during the climax of our favourite TV show'. The younger generation gets busy taking care of their swigging requirements, snacks, pizza, etc.  Ladies vow not to enter the kitchen after evening coffee and let others fend for themselves for dinner.  Grandkids living overseas would have already been cautioned not to call during the muhurtam hours and cause unwanted disturbance. This, by the same people who would pillory them for not having the time/inclination to call once in two days otherwise.  The grand old man will check a few times during the day to see the weather is alright in the match location and if TV broadcast is working okay.  

At about 6.29 pm, the eldest of all will curse the match authorities for not doing the toss early enough and announcing the playing eleven.  Expert opinions will be flowing out at the rate of five/minute, with barely any clarity as to who is saying what, exactly as in a wedding context.  Strong dictats will  vociferously be issued by various members of the audience as to what India should do if they win the toss; who should be dropped; which over Bumrah and Hardik should bowl; who should open the batting and why Varun should be in the team.  Some experts would even venture critical opinion of what the opposition should do to contest well, but eventually lose the match.  You see, the essence of all these can be compressed into the two-sentence verdict, framed succinctly by our physical eduation teacher in college - 'Every ball they bowl, we should hit for 4 or 6. Every ball we bowl, we should get a wicket'.  That is how we can ensure victory, indeed. Exaggerated, but very simple but effective counsel.

Toss is done.  If India loses the toss and is put into bat, SKY will nonchalantly say,`we would have batted anyway; this will be a good wicket to bat in the first half'. So, the opposing captain did not see that because he was wearing dark glasses during the toss'? Who is going to clarify that?  If India wins the toss and fields first, the experts will say `there will be dew later on, so bowling first makes sense'.  Even if there is no prospect of dew, expert opinion will go `India fancies chasing here, so they bowl first'.  The beauty of all this is, there are only a handful of possibilities, but a thousand interpretations would gush forth to justify or criticise each option.  That is because each half-warm body in India becomes a seasoned, forceful expert commentator, with cricket.  One is not sure if the same is true of other games like badminton or tennis. May be not, because the noise level is never the same.

Now the game begins and so do the shenanigans in front of each TV.  One sour-face complains that Rinku should have played, without revealing who should have been dropped; he probably suggests a rule change to permit 12 people to bat.  When Ishan Kishan swings and misses Gautam Gambir is blamed.  When Arshdeep Singh gives some width and is splashed for a six, Gautam Gambir is criticised.  As if, GG is asking them to do those things!  When Abhishek plays one of his trade-mark, lofted shots for a six over cover, adulation flows generously.  And when he gets out playing the same shot in the next over but fails to clear the ropes, he is denounced as a novice, who does not learn.  Varun is pasted for 16 runs in five balls and `has lost his ability to deceive the batsman'.  Wait, he sneaks one in and cleans up the timber off the last ball ! Euphoria all over, he has made full amends and has become mystery spinner all over again.  SKY is blamed for tossing the ball to Axar when he could have called on Dube to bowl or vice versa.  This piece of accusation will be levelled only after the end of the over, not at the beginning, after runs leak!  SKY knows he will be blamed anyway, whoever he bowls, so he probably does not care. During a tense phase, the grandfather insists nobody moves for whatever purpose just so the lucky run continues.  And when the next wicket falls, the old man does not try to figure out why the batsman got out, but first he looks for that scapegoat who went to the bathroom, defying the earlier instructions. So on!!  When the match ends and India does win, hurrah, the collective sigh of relief is similar to the release of tension a bride's parents feel after completion of the wedding.  If India loses, psssst, post-mortem continues vigorously and every performance dissected, until nothing more is left for burial or cremation.  Tension dissipates into intense disappointment as if a wedding has been disrupted and the groom has absconded without a trace!!  The grandfather typically has identified seventeen instances where a better player from the sixties (he can specify names) would have performed a miracle and saved the match, but has no audience to talk to.  This cycle repeats for every match!

What happens, if on the same day, there is a wedding and a cricket game, that is, a clash of gigantic proportions.  My dear wife points out that this is nothing new and discreet arrangements have been made during many weddings for people to watch the match away from the wedding scene.  There is always this lurking concern that the match will obviously be a bigger box-office hit than the wedding ceremony itself, but this is always brushed aside in the interests of open-minded behaviour.  My wife wryly remarks that she is sure the biggest shout and applause will be for India winning rather than two people successfully settling into matrimony!!

Touche!!  

 

Group Activities!!

In today's hyper-analytical world, if a child of 5 years wanders six feet away from his/her playgroup in school, to enthusiastically explore something harmless which has attracted his/her attention, that may probably be taboo.  If the trend continues even intermittently, school teachers and child psychologists would label the kid a loner, non-conformist or worse, because he/she chose to break away from group activity.  The alarm expressed by these worthies may even be thinly justified, given the proclivity of even smaller children to get severely glued to some, any, kind of screen very early in life, avoiding social contacts to a large extent.  So, the prognosis is why accentuate that tendency by letting the child exhibit unnecessary `individuality' while in the mix of other kids in a group. To remedy the nebulous issue, modern day parenting may complusively kick into the exaggeratedly protective gear, scheduling counselling sessions for the child, visiting psychiatrists etc so that he/she grows up as a good team-player or at a minimum does not turn out to be a sociapth.  So, there is much more emphasis on group activities even in the early stages of a kid's life nowadays.  One presumes that is the reason for the pregnant women being persuaded to do group aerobics, group yoga etc so that from the foetus state, the child is nudged to be part of groups. Even a group of two is infinitely better being singularly alone-- that is the motivation.

But from our own personal experience, we know for sure that not all group activities are salubrious. Or even to be recommended as desirable. Especially now, as groups may involve perfect strangers, forcibly strung together as an assemblage paying a fee, for temporary reprieve.  So, a lot depends on the activity itself, what kind of company one has and one's own mindset at that particular point of time.  Some people tend to work well together, without caring for what is actually being done -- even if the activity involved is lazily throwing pebbles into a shallow water-body from a manageable distance of 4 feet, lying down or standing up.  Or instead of chucking something outwards, throwing something inwards into that orifice called mouth, like boiled peanuts, one kernel at a time, once in two minutes with an eerie silence filling the intervals! Certain activities stitch people together well, like games or related pastime -- cricket, football, basketball,  or kabbadi.  This because a certain degree of common interest is already baked into the stuff, including bitching about things and people one dislikes intensely.  Or if one is simply thirsting for some company and resigned to tolerate any kind of fellow beings, then one tends to make something out of any type of temporary formation.  My point is, there are all kinds of group activities at our disposal today and we, as consumers, should read the labels carefully and do a sniff test before jumping in.  Because some of them might sound innocuous but some danger might be lurking around the corners.  

During my high school days, I had a very good friend, who was extremely mischievous and would rather even do a shepherd's chore than waste time studying for exams.  His family was very close to mine, since our fathers were part of the same institution.  Once, when this friend's study pattern took a plunge for the worse, his father, concern writ large on his face, told mine that I should help his progeny  pass the exam. He suggested we did some 'group' studying twice a week for the next few months.  My father readily agreed and told me to do the needful.  In a lighter vein, he also cautioned me not to absorb my friend's habits, ending up having the reverse effect of what was intended.  I was really happy to spend some time with this friend and we got on well for the first few days, even though `study' did not occupy much of our interactions.  One day, I was surprised out of my skin when the friend, with another boy in our class, pulled out some beedis with flourish and started smoking nonchalantly.  As would happen normally, I threatened him that I would report to his father about this transgression.  He coolly told me to go ahead and retorted he would tell my father I had also smoked beedi.  That jolted me because I remembered what my father jokingly said about `reverse effect' of the joint study routine.  Obviously I shut up for the rest of our joint study days and was relieved when it was over.  In later days when we were working men, this friend teased me many times whether he should inform my father of the beedi smoking bit!!  Blackmail it was, but was successful, I must confess.  By the way, this friend became a Chartered Accountant and did very well in life!!  So much for all the paranoia of the parents, when he was playing truant in school.

Another group study escapade of mine was of my own choosing, for the final examination for graduation.  With a couple of friends who were actually doing different subjects and the purpose of the group study was just to ensure they studied in the nights prior to the exam days.  These two were the closest friends I had during my college days and we spent a whole lot of time together. The problem was I was an early sleeper and went to sleep latest by 10.30.  These two were night owls and listened to music (one favoured old Hindi and Thamizh songs and the other was maniacally devoted to western music) late into the night usually.  I was barely able to make them hold their books until I slept, then they went their ways, chucking their books and leaning into their radios/tapes.  But at about 1 am, they would shake my up awake, pull me out of the house for our nocturnal walk for a kilometre, to a tea shop where we got hot potato vadai and tea.  That was ever the undoubted highlight of our joint study nights.  One of the elders in the friends' family (they were cousins), kept vigil at that time of the night also and ensured that we got back in 30-40 minutes, since they were worried about our gallivanting at that time of the night.  When we returned, they resumed their musical entertainment and I went back dutifully to sleep.  Some study team-work that was!  The irony was that their families thought that I was successfully putting the friends through their hoops for successful graduation.  I tried, but could manage only so much and also because I enjoyed the potato vadai and tea!

Two group activities which I have often been compelled to be part of, without ever attaining the status of a participant, were card games and drinking binges (sometimes, a cocktail of both, which was indeed deadly).  Obviously some 8 to 10 people were involved, which entitles these to be part of this blogpost and the action was raucous and belligerent. I sat around reading something when friends were drinking/playing and was perennially the butt of all the jokes flowing due to my detatchment.  In all such meets, a time came when a rather innocent word or an intended slight became the match-stick for the combustible tempers, which burst into flames immediately.  Angry words were exchanged, liberally peppered with the choicest expletives and sometimes friends turned minor pugilists to shower blows on each other.  Almost always the whole proceedings were amusing to me and I was aghast that grown up guys can make such asses of themselves, indulging in group activities which were meant to be fun! To give the devils their due, the next day almost everything is forgotten (probably nobody remembered anything, due to their extremely sloshed condition) and in one case I have even seen a machette which was used to threaten earlier became the subject of inspection the next day, with both the macheter and machetee admiring it together and wondering how to enhance the power of that scything implement!

Political discussion is another volatile group activity one should venture into, only if the members are of even temperament and don't tend to fly off the handles ever so quickly when they resent a point put forth. It should be a ubiquitous occurrence where thick friends turn nasty foes by the time the group aborts the arguments in a huff. We all know that our opinions do not count for much in the overall reckoning and such discussions have no real impact value. Still the whole process turns incendiary within minutes, leaving the scars on the friends-turned-foes for a few days, if not weeks.  Ultimately they would get together, but the transient damage is done.  And probably this will be repeated soon again when the present scars heal a bit.

But when we reminisce about our earlier days, especially school and college life, group activities are always a perpetual source of happiness and entertainment.  Group trips, cricket matches, kabbadi games, evening strolls in the bazaar, high decibel movie outings on the first day of a picture, weddings of friends and other similar functions etc always resurrect those warm joyful feelings which we experienced earlier.

When I presented this to my dear wife, she looked at me sarcastically and said I had forgotten one important group activity we always thoroughly enjoy.  I looked at her, puzzled and pat came the statement `family get togethers of all hues'.  She twisted the knife in a bit by saying that as usual, friends occupied so much space in this blog and the family none at all!!  I had to agree sheepishly. 

  

 

 

Careless And Panicky, In A Digital World

All of us have in our lives, as permanent fixtures, some people who have this facile power to irritate the most tolerant of us with their constant, sheer idiocy.  If one such person merecifully vanishes from the scene for some reason, before a sigh of relief is expelled by you, inexplicably the void is instantly filled with another! Of equal calibre or better, as if this presence is an essential concomittant for us and a blessing.  One such specimen got my goat recently, doing something phenomenally stupid, well beyond even his own known limit when I was online, looking for something. In performance reports, that would have rated `Far Exceeded Expectations'! While I was peeved and distracted in the extreme, I was also meddling with a digital order, in response to an attractive ad for roasted, peri-peri pistachios -- an avoidable mistake, as it would transpire.  Because I was not paying adequate attention, I ended up placing an order impulsively, without checking the antecedents of the seller.  As it turned out, it was a `clothing company' selling pistachios cheap!! 

When I discovered that, my reaction was a disgusted `why on earth did I buy pistachios from a clothing company'?? The amount involved was small, so I did not panic.  I also realised subsequently that they were promising to deliver one kilogram of pistachios for a ridiculous amount in three days - another screaming clue I did not latch on to, only because I was not paying attention.  Then I had this epiphany -- that I have been had and I will see no pistachios for the small amount paid because it was a scam.  The amount involved was pittance, but the blow delivered to the solar plexus of my self-esteem was lethal. Like many of my cohorts, I have always prided myself on the impregnability of my defence mechanism against fraudulent pitfalls of all hues and it pained to accept that this one hoodwinked me, getting through a chink in my armour when I was negligent.  The lesson for all of us is, the moment you drop your guard even a bit,  somebody is waiting in the wings to get through and hurt you as much as possible.  The onus is on each one of us, we the people, to exercise extreme caution while dealing with situations involving payments, orders etc online, especially when transacting with unknown outlets and platforms. 

Of late, there has been a deluge of reports about digital/online cheating of hapless individuals by fraudsters, who have honed their craft skillfully and can execute a plan flawlessly.  In some cases, the amounts involved are huge, running in multiple crores.  The targets are chosen after careful profiling - - generally seniors, with good savings in the bank, living reasonably well, probably living alone without the support of children/relatives. Or greedy guys, who are willing to cut corners in life for advancement on any front.  A recent case involving a retired banker saw him being duped of Rs.23 crores through what has come to be known as Digital Arrest (DA).  If you analyse the cases even superficially, it becomes apparent that either the victims had panicked and had failed to exercise reasonable care and precaution because they were obviously put under tremendous pressure by the culprits. Or the poor souls were made to believe they have something to hide, that they have committed some crime like tax violation, drug distribution, money laundering etc and authorities were on to them.  Either way, while it is charitable to say that people were bulldozed into helping fraudsters to dupe them, the fact remains they omitted to probably exercise their normal level of caution and their behaviour betrayed a lack of application of mind.  This is not to rub salt into raw wounds, but to pinpoint the fundamental issues involved.  I am not into preaching normally, so please take on board the following as friendly observations and suggestions.

It is not uncommon to see a senior at an ATM, who probably cannot see well and/or has forgotten his specs at home, looking a bit lost and for help to withdraw some cash.  I have helped some and such elders do not hesitate to give a stranger the card and the PIN, if he/she is decently dressed and speaks English well. Once this act of benevolent trusting is done, it is upto the helper to exploit the situation and get richer by a few hundreds or thousands of rupees, if he/she is a crook.  Such child-like faith in aliens appearing on the scene as God-sent angels in times of desperation is the most common reason for eventual distress.  More often than not, it is the security guard at the ATM, who performs the auxiliary role and is probably safe because he is associated with the bank in some way.  Unfortunately if it happens to be a crook, lurking around in the hope of snaring an unsuspecting victim, the senior lives to rue his mistake.  What can one do??  Either choose somebody well known who you trust completely, send him with the card and PIN to the ATM to withdraw cash.  Or use the special facility banks have for seniors to have cash sent home under a specific procedure.  

While online (dont go browsing unnecessarily and get lured into providing information to anyone) for a specific requirement, it is critical to ensure that only well-known companies and websites/platforms are used for execution of transactions.  If one goes on a digital fishing expedition needlessly, one might come to grief because there are many ways tricksters extract `useful' information from unsuspecting people, eventually to dupe them.  Why walk into such situations??  Avoid all such pitfalls, where your vulnerability can be exploited by sharks waiting for a prey.  And if possible, use mobile phones only as an instrument for communication and not as a medium for payment etc.  It is entirely possible that any payment you want to make can wait till you reach home and your laptop or desktop, which are safer to some extent.

Regarding Digital Arrest, there is no reason for a common man to walk into a trap based on a phone call, unless he has some nasty skeletons in his cupboard.  Otherwise, if someone pays his taxes, has never been involved in shenanigans like money laundering etc why be afraid of someone pretending to be a Policeman threatening you with arrest and agree to part with portions of your savings?  Begin with the belief that the person at the other end is a fraudster and disconnect immediately.  Report to authorities forthwith, after consulting friends, if you can.  Request help from others  you trust, who can understand the situation better and put safeguards for you in place, despite all the threats from the alien on the phone. I realise it is easier to advise in this context than actually confront the situation head-on, but then there is no other way to escape the horrible punishment of losing money and nursing an almost permanent wound on your psyche??

Coming back to the pistachios order, my dear wife sniggered and said I deserved the bite on my backside for wanting to buy whatever makes an appearance on the net, just because I think I am a smart shopper.  I am trying to assuage my guilt as well as the feeling of being a nincompoop by asking the bank to cancel the credit card transaction and rejecting the benefit of funds for the fraudsters!!  Something face-saving, my dear wife says with a smile, still far from convinced!!

  

  

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Geriatric Childishness

How often have we heard some smart-alec middle-ager admonish his/her aged parent in public about some behaviour which is seen as `childish', without an iota of sensitivity to the feelings of the elder?  Most seniors are acutely aware of the likelihood of such an embarrassing fate befalling them occasionally and they voluntarily go into their own cocoon.  Trying to be absolutely prim and proper in their demeanour, just to avoid that dressing-down by their own progeny and others.  The problem with this approach is that they will be inhibited from indulging in some harmless fun due to their inability to complete execution on their own.  They perforce have to solicit assistance of someone else for such indulgence and are self-conscious enough not to seek that help.  This is a pity, because this hesitation, twined with excessive sensitivity to others' perception. deprives them of very simple, child-like pleasures in old age, which they are absolutely entitled to enjoy, all external opinions and sensibilities be damned!!  Oldies need to be reassured that seeking help of others to find some joy is no different from resorting to specs for better vision, hearing aids for better audibility and prosthetics for mobility in old age.  They need to be encouraged to partake of the small pleasures as long as they enjoy them, rather than be criticised for being `childish'.  At the other end of the spectrum, there are those other elders, who have been seniors from their childhood in this particular aspect, being consciously appropriate every step of their life because public opinion shapes their life!  This is not about them. 

Having said that, this loveable geriatric childishness in elders is a perennial source of genial amusement and mirth among others.  Exactly like the playful but endearing acts of children bring so much joy to the grown-ups at all times.  That is god's gift to us, who do not always have small children around us, but are bound to have some elders in our midst most of the time.

My own dear grandmother (Patti) lived till 92 and is fondly remembered by all who knew her for her zest and go-get-it attitude in life. Till a couple of months before her passing away, she was an absolute lover of everything interesting in life.  Whenever I visited Madras, she would beckon me and in a hushed voice, would ask me to buy some son papdi and ice cream for her.  I used to assume that since she was forbidden from eating too much sweet stuff and my brother and sis-in-law were doctors, my grandmother was not getting her restricted quota of sweet dishes.  I would comply with her request and get her the things she wanted and she would joyfully consume them over the next three days.  When my brother found out about this, he told me that every week he got her all her favourites and she was far from deprived.  When I looked at her questioningly, Patti would grin sheepishly, nod her head in assent and ask me innocently `when did I say I am not getting son papdi and ice cream'?  Touche!

And this pattern in her life never changed and no one mercirfully wanted to change that.  To this list, one should add her desire to drink goli soda from time to time. And the urge to eat murukku and thattai (fried eats) - only that she was completely toothless and could not munch anything, so we had to press a mortar and pestle into service to powder those things and give her to eat. And her penchant to use the wheelchair to the car, go for a sunset on the beach with my dear wife, who kept encouraging Patti to go to the moon, if she so desired! And Patti's very realistic and practical response was always that she was not sure of rockets and also she did not want to go that far away.  The two would share on the beach, peanuts steamed in their shells and other soft eats to their heart's content. And top up with a glass of sugar cane juice -- basically a lot of similar stuff that we might not have done so adventurously by ourselves, without for our Patti's nudge!  Obviously this trend continued with our own parents, even though they had imbibed a lot more reservations and circumspection in such matters and were no match for Patti's quiet, devil-may-care attitude!  Even if others are willing to help joyfully, the raw material, the elders, should have a somewhat irrepressible attitude to life, regardless of their age and the setting, to help them enjoy the smaller joys of life all the way. This type of benevolent seniors have a special, loveable streak of child-like earnestness in everything they do, which makes us smile whenever we think of them, even after they are long gone!

Then there are the others, who have grown up to be just old, abandoning all sense of fun and frolic, somewhere along the line.  This is not to criticise them or be judgemental, because one has no idea of what turbulence they have gone through in life, struggling with whatever cards that were dealt for them.  You can tell this class of people apart, by the complete absence in them of love of simple pleasures of life in old age.  And by the negation and dismissive cynicism that coats their behaviour and interactions generally.  What comes out, alas, is a mixture of childish petulance and a display of avoidable immaturity in their actions from time to time.

Recently I attended a wedding and as is wont nowadays, even before the priest had uttered the last mantra and signified that the couple are husband and wife, every single seat  in the lunch hall was taken in a hurry, as if people had been fasting for a few days prior to the wedding.  Actually, even when the wedding ceremonies are on, half the crowd moves to the dining hall in a hurry, resulting in the above situation.  My friends's  82-year-old, always brooding father wanted to eat first but could not move without support, so waited for my friend, who was more keen to be present for the entire ceremony.  The old man was probably ravenously hungry and when my friend came ten minutes later and took him for lunch, they found there was no seat available.  Terribly vexed, the old man started ranting about how he was being ignored and mistreated by everyone at the wedding, especially his own family.  Despite entreaties from his son and the host-family, he flatly refused to take part in the wedding feast, sat sulking for a while and went home in a huff.  The hosts were distressed and my friend was left flustered and embarrassed by his father's display of temper and peevishness in that specific context and was left red-faced. 

We have all been witnesses to instances of angry exchanges and acrimony between the oldest in the family (grandpa or grandma) and the youngest (grandchild) regarding things which are really unimportant or even silly.  The grandma asking for a reserved, window seat on a plane ride so that she can get a glimpse of the Tirupati temple from air and the grandson refusing to yield that seat on the flight caused enough furore to attract the attention of all the passengers nearby.  Grandma probably severed diplomatic relations with the grandson subsequently.  An old relative of mine refusing to shake hands or sit next to another old man, because the latter `right royally' ignored the former after deliberately running him out in a cricket match some 4 decades back during college days! What a serious grudge to smart under, for years!!  An old lady stubbornly refusing to travel in a car with another one because the latter went out of the way to garner all the attention in a group context in high school days, without letting others get in even edgeways.  So on and so forth.  I am sure you have all encountered such people many times over involved in similar `major' controversies.  Beauty is that the oldies are still nursing the `raw' wounds after decades and one cannot even laugh at the situation - they get very hurt.

My wife, with her superior wisdom, has this take on this matter. Such immature behaviour from an elder is nothing rare.  You see, this class of elders, nurtured by old age values, develop the notion that simple seniority entitles them to certain concessions and privileges in life and probably rightly so.  On top of it, without too many companions, no other pastime or hobby,  they develop the tendency to focus internally on themselves and chew the personal cud all the time. Their old-age world view gets warped seriously consequently. Sadly when they are outside their homes, they expect the whole hurried and indifferent world to adhere to their wants and dictates - somewhat unreasonable. Unfortunately, not everyone is empathetic to that extent and when elders fail to make necessary adjustments to their expectations depending on the context, with maturity and equanimity, they get emotionally hurt.  Easier to say that here than explain to a sullen, agitated elder, bristling under an imagined bruise of an insult.

Personally, both my wife and I like those seniors who are gregarious and outgoing enough to have all the childish fun they want with people around them, enjoy the small pleasures all the time but are able to also adjust with the rest of the world with geniality and good humour when situations warrant that switch.  

 

  

Jhatka Ride

I have this unadulterated antipathy towards `forwards’ via Whatsapp.  It won’t be an exaggeration to say that my fingers are wired to the auto-mode to delete the item instantly.  But let me not digress at the very beginning, this is not about forwards.  That can wait for another day.  Very rarely a `forward’ triggers a spark in a writer to hark back to something in his own bag of experiences.  And follow through with a piece of his own, which may or may not have seen the light of day otherwise.  One such prompt a year back ignited a spark in me to reminisce about a commonplace occurrence in mofussil towns of India in the 60s – a ride on a horse cart.  Yes, the humble Jhatka (horse cart), which was perceived a quantum jump from the bullock cart of earlier years because of the increment in speed purportedly achieved by the former. Although one has seen some bullocks clocking up higher velocity than horses! The `forward’ in question was a piece on a horse cart ride the author had taken from the train station to his home in a small town in Thamizh Nadu.  Most of us in that generation have had similar experiences in our childhood and this is about mine.

We used to live in a place called New Colony in Thuthukudi those days.  Most of the commute was done on one’s own legs because generally the distances were pretty short.  Those who were better off owned bicycles and the upgrades were like cycle rickshaw, horse cart for public transportation, apart from bus. When a family had to make that cherished, occasional trip from home to the bus stand or railway station for a holiday, with a multitude of people and assorted bags, the jhatka was the answer.  Even then a couple of sprightly youngsters were asked to walk or jog along the vehicle for want of space inside.  There were about half a dozen jhatkas plying their business in that area and we were all familiar with the names of the jhatka owners as well the horses.  Our favourite jhatka owner was Karuppan (meaning Blackman).  There is no racial slant, intended or otherwise, involved in that name in that area at that time, so please don’t pounce on me for committing a political impropriety. Black was the predominant skin colour of the locals, with allowance for various hues of black in complexion.  But, to put things in perspective, the name might have come about because the parents wanted to give the child the exalted name of a local God, Karuppasamy, which later got truncated to Karuppan.

Karuppan was the first port of call normally when a family wanted to make the periodic, heavy-duty trip with a fully laden cart to the train station.  Our protagonist was about four feet tall when he is fully erect and stretched a bit, with the top of his head almost measuring up to the face of the horse, if the horse is standing still and not attempting to climb up from its usual horizontal position. You get the picture?  His midriff had a good protrusion because obviously he ate well and there was very little space else, except for his pot-belly, for the digested food to get gladly assimilated into.  So, the first impression any quizzical onlooker would have was that it was going to be a mammoth task for the man to assume his driving position in the cart.  The onlooker need not have worried.  Once the time of departure arrived, the man and the animal worked in amazing unison as Karuppan jumped up with alacrity, placing one foot on the wheel and assumed his assigned seat.  That is an exaggeration because after everybody and everything requiring transportation had been accommodated in the cart, what was left was just enough space for one butt of his to rest on the cart.  But for that small vacant perch, he would have hung out completely and we could have none of that.

Karuppan knew that his rather emaciated horse was not a thoroughbred and we all knew that too.  But no one had told the horse that, so it started off in a brisk canter, as if it had the strength and mien of a race horse, -- may be, just to pretend to impress the customers.  But after just a few steps, reality prevailed and it sobered down to a slow trot which translated to about one kilometre per hour kind of speed.  It could not have miraculously done anything faster because out of the earnings, a very meagre amount was spent on the sustenance of the horse.  It did not look like there was any apparent long-term plan to invest in the horse to bring about a drastic change in status-quo, due to the current and projected income-expenditure patterns.  It was all very short term and what mattered was the next two kilometres, that’s about it.

This piece will not do justice to itself if it fails to describe the cart involved.  The main arched, canopy which provided the occupants some relief from the elements itself was antiquated, very plain and non-descript.  It could have done with a touch of paint, not having seen that luxury in many years. The two large wheels, on the move, were somewhat wobbly around the axils and they seldom moved in a straight circular motion.  There was a hint of a gentle, crisscross movement as they rolled, pretty much like the gait of the models when they walk the ramp.  There was a cushion inside the cart, made of dried grass which had metamorphosed into powder over a period, inside an old bed cover.  That provided some protection to the riders from shocks pulsing up from the roads, that essential ingredient of any such trip.  A sack hung down the bottom of the cart and contained some grass, supposedly refreshment for the horse if it collapsed during a ride. Some upgraded carts had a dirty length of cloth decoratively draped as a curtain at the back, to provide the riders some privacy from the prying eyes of the town populace.  But Karuppan’s cart did not boast of any such frills and was rudimentary in all respects.

In Thuthukudi, the bus stand was between our home and the railway station, meaning the cart would have to pass the bus stand if the station was the destination.  And the horse carts were all parked at the bus stand almost permanently, awaiting business. There is a reason why I am laying out the topography for you.  The process of going to the station involved, as a first step, the boys of the household running to the bus stand, looking out for a cart and invariably snagging Karuppan for the ride.  Next, all the people and the luggage would be stuffed into the rather elastic inside of the cart until there was no space to squeeze out.  The horse always sensed that the cart was overloaded and resented that. It protested meekly for a minute, shuffling its feet without moving forward an inch.  After some expert cajoling by Karuppan, the journey started.  The horse moved at its own customary pace, as if it had a prior, iron-clad contract of partnership with the train that the latter would not depart before the load is transferred successfully.  On the way, there was always a minor incident.  When the cart was crossing the bus stand, invariably the horse made an involuntary turn towards its `shed’, its resting place while not plying the trade.  Karuppan had to use the carrot-and-stick method (except that the carrot was missing here) to coax the horse to understand that the time was for work, not rest and that the desire for recuperation had to remain suspended for a while longer. 

Towards the end of the journey there were always some anxious moments when the horse thought it was highly overburdened and firmly refused further co-operation. It had to be bullied, begged and treated with fresh-grass-incentive for any further progress.  When the destination was reached, the whole cart-load, including the baggage, heaved a collective sigh of relief.  This whole scenario had been repeated in our lives multiple times, but as children we never got bored or tired of this journey.

My dear wife is ambivalent about this.  She thinks we could have all walked to the station with the cart left carrying just the luggage, so long as there was no really superannuated individual in the group.  That would have been fairer to the horse.  But then, she also says after she read this piece, that the experience itself was invaluable and cannot be artificially replicated.  No amount of wide-bodied-jet travel comes anywhere near the jhatka trip – not by a few thousand miles!!  So, for once, she did not have to frown at me and pass a serious indictment!! God bless her.

Burden Of Being A Landlord

The title does not refer to the troubles of the owner of inherited land in an ancestral village he/she never visits. Meaning, the owner is an absentee landlord in this context and he does not even know if he is really the owner or someone else has appropriated the land in his prolonged absence. Most often, he is not,  because some scheming local farmer who leased the land fifty years ago and had never paid the lease value, has now taken over fully, whether the actual owner likes it or not.  Why this long-winded explanation?   Just to say that this kind of `ownership' is not a burden because there is nothing weighing down on the owner, he knows who legally the owner is, reality is different, that the land is gone.  I am referring the burden or owning a residential property somewhere, renting it out for the paltry compensation received every month and in the bargain, facing constantly irritable problems arising from the quirky demands of the renter.

If one is lucky, one gets a good company, which happily signs successive leases for its officers, with a routine increment of some pittance.  So long as the accommodation in question is well maintained, this just requires the landlord to tolerate a couple of visits by the prospective tenant for inspection and approval.  Sometimes you do get those nose-in-the-air parties, who will not get any place for the next few years since they are looking for something close to Utopia. But mostly they are reasonable because the previous occupier has done the good job of explaining the pros and cons of the apartment/villa. Such a corporate lease is a blessing because it saves the landlord the draining experience of having to identify a new renter every 2-3 years. That exercise brings in a horde of brokers, who are circling the properties like vultures all the time and want to bring in somebody every two days to earn their brokerage, even when they know most of those people are not the right fit. Every client of theirs they usher in as if a presidential summit has been organized with you.  Then follow prolonged negotiations, which make one wonder if the party of the second part is buying out the entire apartment or villa complex in a multi billion dollar deal, rather than entering into a lease agreement for a single unit.  You heave a few long sighs of relief when the deal is done, you see the broker's back and the new tenant arrives.

Every new tenant, especially expatriate - even from Vietnam or Mexico,  pretends that the landlord is a poor serf waiting to do his bidding and he is royalty, who can demand and get what he wants.  One will ask you to relocate the guest bathroom or the study room to a location of his preference, which is always a no-brainer.  Another will ask for supply all the furniture etc for the whole apartment, because he did not ship anything from his country, knowing the short term nature of his assignment. Fair enough. But, the landlord has to be wary of this because if he makes the mistake of buying all the required items for this tenant, he is likely to be doomed, when the lease expires and the next kingly tenant walks in. This one will probably say he does not need any furniture since he has brought his own and the landlord has to take out all the timber already there.  The latter will now have to scurry around to either store the extra furniture and pay storage charges for the near future at least or sell the whole stuff and incur a loss.  One gets wiser with experience and bluntly declines any initial request for additional stuff and asks the tenant to rent the required items himself.  There is a likelihood that the deal falls through because of this, sometimes.  

The landlord should know better than to gleefully imagine that now that the tenant has moved in, he can be relaxed.  What he does not realise is that it was not the end, but rather the beginning of a string of issues which pop up with alarming regularity during the lease period,  which need resolutions forthwith. Even if some door creaks a bit, these foreigner tenants feign lack of understanding about local support and come after you.  This despite the lease clearly indicating that all ongoing maintenance should be the responsibility of the tenant.  Once or twice the landlord can help initially but should firmly put his foot down sooner or later and point the tenant towards the maintenance team in place, for future help.  Otherwise every second week he gets woken up in the middle of the night for one reason or the other, just because the tenant has chronic insomnia. 

One tenant called me at 2 am and said he is unable to sleep because the airconditioning had conked off. When told that he should contact the AC support team in the morning, he innocently queried how he was supposed to sleep without airconiditioning.  When told that there were 3 other rooms with working ACs where he can go, he seemed surprised!!  By some strange coincidence, those tenants who tend to be overly fussy and complaining non-stop seem to get all the hitherto-unknown problems cropping up during their stay.  An electrical burn-out, a gas leak, water seepage, being locked out of the apartment due to loss of keys -- all these are par for the course and the landlord should be on his toes to provide relief in a jiffy as the household comes to a standstill with the members standing bemused, wringing their hands in despair.      

Some belligerent tenants are bent upon a course of non-coperation with the apartment's association, cutting corners or blatanly violating rules all the time.  Such ongoing friction causes headaches for the landlords long after these tenants vacate and vanish.  One such tenant persistenly had raucous parties well into the night, with loud music, punctuated with high-decibel shrieks at least twice a month.  He just refused to back down, even when association members warned him repeatedly.  He almost demanded this as his right, saying in him home-country he did not face any problem.  Finally the landlord got a notice and had to seek the intervention of the company to stop the orgies and calm the neighbours down. 

Finally when the tenant leaves, one more test awaits the landlord.  The lease provides for the tenant to put everything back in the same condition as it was when first taken over, except for normal wear and tear.  One tenant's kids had damaged most of the walls by using non-erasable markers to sketch all kindds of pictures.  Even the ceilings had some spray paint in many places.  When told that some repainnting had to be done and the costs will have to be paid by the tenant, he revolted.  His point was that with small kids in the house, all these should be considered normal wear and tear!! Nice try. He held back the keys even after the company agreed to settle everything and close the deal.  It took a lot of persuasion by the company and the broker before the matter was resolved. Another tenant tried to say that all broken appliances were given to him in the same pitiable condition, so he would not pay up.  With every such experience, the landlord gets aged faster.

The perennial dilemma is this - does the measly compensation of 3% of yield on the capital as rental good enough for the landlord to take all this angst in his stride??  But as usual, my dear wife has the answer and the last word.  What is the alternative, she asks.  Do we want to keep the apartment locked up for years together?  Then the cost of restoration due to disrepair and non-maintenance will be much higher with zero returns in the meantime,  she correctly points out.  So, for one more time, in such an august presence, I just shut up as is customary and prepare for another re-run!    

   

Newspaper Reading

Multitude of people of older vintage would nod vigorously in agreement with me as to what a supreme pleasure it was to snatch a sheet of that day's newspaper from rampaging siblings and read gleefully. After the father finished with the paper and put it down, the entire household would descend on that bunch of printed sheets as if it was a treasure involved in a veritable battle of partition.  There would be a scrap among the children to get hold of the Sports page, specifically.  After the initial fighting, things would settle down to a state of relative calm, when the kids read their sheets and then started exchanging with the others, so that at the end of a half-hour period, all the sheets would have become things of the past, really history!  Still, no one dared to touch the paper till the father had slowly consumed all the news, along with his morning cuppa, at first.  Even when he was reading the English newspaper `The Hindu', the Thamizh paper `Dhinamani' would sit invitingly there untouched, waiting for its turn, just as we all waited for our turn. 

At that time none of us realised what was happening.  We were unconsciously cultivating the venerable habit of reading newspapers.  Which will grow in intensity with us and survive to aggressively compete with all the other news peddling media like radio at first and then TV, online channels and of course, born gossipers in our midst of whom there was and is never any dearth.  Our territory was part of the backwaters, where English Literature courses were taught partly in Thamizh (!!), entirely due to the students' inability to grasp the foreign language well, let me hasten to clarify, lest our Literature gurus curse me from afar.  A lot of us owe whatever initial proficiency we had developed in English language to the newspapers, magazines like Sport and Pastime and radio commentary on cricket, tennis matches and events, Radio news and the like. There have been times in our later lives, when we were either travelling for an extended period overseas or were on foreign assignments.  Apart from badly missing our kith and kin, two major things we longed for were home food and Indian newspapers.  To such an extent that we earnestly cultivated friendships with Air India personnel in our locations and asked them to retrieve for us, the newspapers given to the passengers on flights and avidly read news which was at a minmum 3 days old!!     

The story of how the newspapers reached our thresholds daily during our childhood days was also something very captivating.  The papers were printed at Madurai or arrived there by the first flight from Madras.  They were hurriedly bundled into waiting private taxis doing this `paper-trip' daily, even before too much sunlight seeped into the world.  The taxis covered the distance of about 150 kms to Thuthukudi in about 3 hours in champion ambassador cars, with top notch maintenance all round the year.  Because if there was ever a delay, Thuthukudi's entire paper-reading public would be up in arms, demanding someone's head for the lapse which prevented them from getting their daily staple in time! Even though there were other newspapers which were printed in nearby locations and delivered earlier, the demand was only for the abovementioned papers + The Indian Express, in most households.  The maharathi drivers of those Madurai-Thuthukudi paper-run taxis were real-life heroes for most of us in childhood for the daredevilry embedded in their driving throughout the year.

Now, cut-over to the present day.  While the newspaper reading habit is not exactly dying or moribund, it seems to have shrunk drastically overall. Many old timers have also chosen to discard the newspaper habit because it is a redunduncy in the age of mobile phones, which provide more up-to-date news.  Youngsters, of course, never even begin their association with newspapers, with exceptions of course, because the reading habit is not very appealing to them, outside of the screens they perpetually peer into.  So generally, it has become fashionable to look down into your mobile phone/tablet with crinkled eyes for news, rather than read a newspaper relaxedly, for the majority.  Children fighting to grab sheets of newspapers to read, as was the practice with us, is no longer a common sight nowadays, surely.  Probably also because most households have ceased buying newspapers daily - not required and a waste of money!

For those who are still sticking to the old-world habit of buying newspapers and reading them, the reasons could be very real or imaginary. Absolutely no doubt, there is a huge element of nostalgia in the whole experience.  They like the touch-and-feel type of experience everywhere, be it the newspapers or shopping.  This group is very unlikely to order on-line for items which require sensory perception to be experienced, like clothes.  The very unique smell of the fresh newspaper sheets, the joy of scanning the paper from top left to bottom right, covering all the columns, the pleasure of seeing the name of a village, town, enterprise or people one was associated with long back, included as part of a news item -- these are enough for the inveterate newspaper readers to pursue the habit for ever. You cannot substitute these small pleasures by watching TV or going online always.  Having said that, there are novel challenges to the enthusiasts now, to maintain their composure and love for the paper, despite what can only be seen as irritants and provocations.

Those into newspapers would not have missed the thin strip of extra paper sticking out on the side (how can they?), with some printed ad, raking a bit more money for the publisher.  For some reason, this innocuous intrusion causes distinct angst in avid readers.  They first want to tear that stip off, from top to bottom and bring the newspaper to the `normal' shape and size before starting perusal.  But stripping that piece off is not very easy because once you start, the tear veers off into the paper and a small portion of the actual news is also lost sometimes.  More irritation!! The damage being done, people can only look at the unevenly torn page and do some cluck-clucking, while cursing the publisher wholeheartedly.

A sizable number of newspaper lovers are probably in the over-50 quadrant.  That means most of them also sport spectacles, perched gingerly on their noses while peering at the paper.  When the fonts used by the publishers gradually reduce in size and sometimes necessitate a magnifying glass to decipher what is printed, it is distressing.  The least publishers can do is to ensure that news is readable by an average person, even with specs by sticking to a decent size font.  But, the smaller font, the more space they get for moolah thru ads, so that is that.  So, most old people keep their specs on and also have a magnifying glass handy to ensure that they do not miss anything -- that is what the they buy papers for, right?

Another stupid mistake publishers make is printing news items in colour (who is asking for this?), choosing the colours indiscriminately without any thought for the readers.  Try reading anything printed in green against red background, or dark blue against black and the like.  Publishers know the readers are probably on the older side, so why frustrate them with such a punishment? Do all the colourful gimmickry with the ads, which appeal to youngsters, but the reading material should be printed in conventional fonts and colours so that the older generation feels comfortable and satisfied.

The worst grouse we have is that while there are 10 pages of news, there are 50 pages of Akshaya Trithya ads + 20 pages of property ads + 50 more pages of assorted furniture, biriyani, restaurants ads. People like me are glad that there are pull-outs most of the time for ads and related material.  We can comfortably just ignore that.  But when ads are constantly mixed up with news on every page, that is a major intrusion which cannot be condoned easily. Avoidable, that is.  Reel in all the ad revenues you want, publisher, but keep the ads as separate pull outs or at least on separate pages.  Those who are interested are most welcome to read the ads only and throw the news, while we will be happy to do the reverse. We too deserve some attention; after all we pay for the newspapers; not getting them free!!

My dear wife is going through her leisurely read of to-day's newspaper and decreeing that there should be some authorised proportion of ads to news for everyone and all in the form of pull-outs. And there should be a serious Ombudsman to oversee compliance.  She is on our side!!

      

Lawyer's Documents

Caveate - This is not about all the practising lawyers in the filed today.  But most of the specimens we go to for day-to-day transactions are probably like this.

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I am sure most of us have had the misfortune of dealing with a lawyer for a sale deed or power of attorney or rental agreement and the like.  The ubiquous lawyer you come across for such purposes is someone who, at best, has a legal degree (hopefully) and has indeed passed legally (iffy).  They carry a double whammy for us -- pathetic language skills and an absolute inability to structure a straightforward sentence.  To begin with, their idea of a legal document is it should be smothered in legalese and should have bombastic language coming out of its pores.  As you can see, this is a deadly concoction and the result is a sale deed in which you invariably can decipher very little except identifying your name and address, if at all.  With our moderately better English, if we dare to suggest some changes in the structure or the language of the document, God help us.  The lawyer takes terrific umbrage and bristles for the rest of the transaction time with us.  And to be fair, it is not even his `own' document to begin with, but some shoddy cut-and-paste job, generously gifted for use by another lawyer-friend, who has similar or lesser credentials to boast of, if that is possible.

Typically such lawyers have one of two reactions when we attempt to infuse some decency to the laguage which is masquerading as English in their documents.  Either they bristle at our insolence in suggesting language changes to what they perceive as an outstanding piece of literary exposition or they shrug their shoulders with utmost indifference. They are wondering `why this idiot is paying me for doing the job and then wants to it himself'! The latter section of the tribe is easier to deal with.  We just write the document in better English and hope that the guy ensures that legally it is adequate, which is the bare minimum we can expect.  The former type is the real blistering problem.  Such guys have a preposterously inflated opinion of their document and, of course, themselves and would not even want us to tamper with a few `whereases' and `hereinbefore mentioneds' in that.  All we can do is some essential editing to satisfy our linguistic integrity and ask him to update the document.  The lawyer's pride and possessiveness about his master-piece will come glowing through when you discover in the next draft that three quarters of the changes we made are back in all glory, mocking at you and screaming out the lawyer's aggressive refusal to accept anyone as more proficient with English language.  

Most such lawyers think that the longer a sentence and more fully loaded it is with multiple synonyms and multi-syllable bombast (not that they recognize what they are), it is that much more convincing to the client.  Many sentences begin well, but are made to meander and stretch so interminably that one loses track of what the beginning was, when the end comes after some excruciating grind.  Once, I remember chopping down one sentence in a legal document to seven or eight individual sentences, which metamorphosis definitely helped in understanding the intent better.  More often than not, such gems of literary eloquence do not add any value to the document, except increasing its bulk.  And there lies the crux.  I realised, from personal experience, that such lawyers are very wary of letting us edit any of their crap out; because then the final outcome has only one quarter of the number of pages they began with, without losing any substance.  According to one somewhat honest lawyer  -- an oxymoron? --  many clients complain he has not done his job well if he skimps on verbiage, because their own legal perspective can only measure his work by volume and not by the quality of content.  To provide satisfaction to such clients, many lawyers insist on heaping up all the meaningless verbosity they can muster from assorted sources, including previously manufactured similar documents.  

Recently I had to do a real estate transaction and a broker was also involved.  This broker was familiar with my need/desire for crisp and precise documentation. He very earnestly told me that I dont have to worry about legal documentation because he has someone who is competent enough to do the job.  When the first draft arrived, I was appalled by the overall quality, since the language was terrible and many statements, long-winded and meaningless.  Redundancy was the hallmark of the entire piece and I shuddered at the shoddy nature of work.  When I rebuked the broker for such a document, he was shocked and blurted out that this was the best of the ten odd lawyers he had worked with in recent years.  After I briefly explained to him what the problems were, he realised his best was even beyond being the worst.  One vignette stood out and I showed the broker that the document, supposed to be a sale deed, had some seven pages of stuff which pertained entirely to a rental agreement, neatly tucked into the middle pages.  There were some twenty paras of how the buyer should conduct himself while living in the apartment and there was an indemnity clause to boot, for the seller's comfort, to cover breach of such rules of conduct by the buyer! Instead of being abashed at being an accomplice to such a document, the brazen broker sheepishly told me to help edit the whole thing completely, so that he can keep that as a master document for the future.  That was what I did free of cost for the broker.  The result, the document was downsized from twenty four pages to thirteen without compromising its legal sense, which responsibility I left to the lawyer.

As bankers, some of us have always wondered why Reserve Bank of India's circulars, containing directions to the banks as well as rules of banking, still rely so heavily on antiquated language from the colonial era. This not only makes reading of the circulars difficult, but requires some internal simplification and re-writing in the banks to enable lower level personnel to grasp the requirements well. In the process, there have been instances of silly errors creeping into the simplified instructions, causing grief to the banks later.  RBI and the lawyers are guilty of the same crime -- long-winded sentences which invariably have a good portion of redundant and/or heavy-duty verbiage.  The core difference is that while RBI's method is establishment-driven and probably requires an institutional shift whereas independent lawyers do not have the same problem, yet persist with antedeluvian mode of expression.

Over the years, I have wondered if younger lawyers coming into the profession would necessarily bring a wind of change and make the documentation easier to peruse and comprehend.  But unfortunately, that does not seem to have happened much.  Probably because of the copy-paste culture which is very prevalent in legal documentation. It will be interesting to find out how many young lawyers have drafted a proper legal document ab initio.  Your guess is as good as mine, but not many probably and not much of it, anyway.  Long live the serpentine sentences and bombastic expressions in legal documentation - posterity will also enjoy the fun!!  One young lawyer I recently met boasted of some fresh and modern methods of producing legal documentation, which impressed me....until I found out that the primary change he has adopted is in the matter of billing the client by the number of visits he made and the time he spent on the documentation!! Little else he had changed.  

The trigger for this piece is a sale deed I had to get done.  My dear wife did warn me I was going to end up drafting the whole thing and asking the lawyer to put some `law' into it.  That is what happened finally.  Why do you think she is omniscient??

    

      

Cacophony Of Quacks

Years back, during my school days, one hot summer evening I returned home all grimy and sweaty after a few hours of exhilarating outdoor games with friends.  Grandma promptly screwed up her nose and said `go and bathe'.  One of my sisters, without looking up from the book she was reading, very casually suggested that a dirty cat had brought a very dead rat home! Mother shook her head the usual way and looked askance with a wry smile.  True to form, I royally ignored every form insult and taunt, had my bath and made a glorious re-entry, all cleaned and spruced up, in a rather satisfied state of mind.  That was when my mother asked me `What are those dark blotches around both your ankles?  Could n't you scrub yourself properly'?  My sense of happiness ebbed immediately and I looked at my ankles - yes, there were two semi-dark patches, one on each ankle, etched in symmetry as if someone deliberately planted them there.  I did not, at that time, realise that what I was witnessing was the beginning of a family drama which was going to last a few weeks!! 

By then, an audience of sisters and other senior household ladies had gathered around as if they were being treated to a world-class spectacle, not to be misssed.  They were curious to see what I had got this time!  `Come here' said grandma, always the presiding deity, and carefully examined the damage suspiciously, without touching the spots.  She declared `Looks like some insect bite, which is spreading' and sought clarification from the patient if there was any pain.  I said no and she expertly decreed that coconut oil should be applied to the spots for the next week or more, in order to first arrest the spread and then get rid of the patches.  The tremendous interest the patches had generated earlier, dissipated quickly and everyone went back to what he/she was doing - nobody even attempting to fetch the coconut oil.  When I brought the oil, grandma directed me to apply it myself without anyone's assistance, because the patches might be infectious and we did not want the whole family getting infected and immersing in coconut oil soon. 

At that time, no one had an inkling that we were all part of a two-month extended episode, which would involve a whole lot of speculation, mirth, discussion, verbal volleys and weird recommendations, not restricted to our family.  As the patches became slowly darker and spread wider, as if some internal spider was relentlessly weaving a design under the skin; make it two spiders, because two ankles had to be covered, unless a spider could finish one ankle and travel all the way in the blood stream up and down.  The awful part was, coconut oil did not do the job and grandma had started on a complex paste with five ingredients, to be applied on the ankles three times a day - that meant the ankles stayed covered by home made bandage (pieces of old, torn dhotis transformed into this avtar).  But the old lady insisted there was no need to seek any medical help because she had seen and treated darker patches, which could react to allopathy medicines; she brooked no challenge on that count.  All this while there was no serious problem since I had no pain, not even a desire to scratch the affected part.  So, it was all fun and frolic for the family, with me playing the pliant and hapless protagonist. 

Very soon, the matter became top news in the vicinity and all the unofficial home remedy peddlers from the neighbourhood visited, hoping to look at the patches and prescribe their solutions.  Over the next month, everything available in the family grocery section and what the volunteers brought, free of charge from their homes, was used on me.  There was always a small crowd waiting for me to come back from school, all equipped with their wares, to get to work and insert something new into the bandage.  I recall ghee being used, turmeric, tulasi, cinnamon and garlic in the first installment. after a while, grandma could not resist the onslaught of multiple practitioners and gave up with indignation, with her customary declamation `Okay, do what you want, but all this is not going to work'.  Even then she characteristically refused to concede that she had no other remedy in store either! After that some ten to fifteen different things were used in permutations and combinations in an effort to defeat the enemy, but no one succeeded.

The blotches were very stubborn and cocked many snooks at all the quacks from the neighbourhood, flourishing all the time and slowly extending their territorial boundaries, much like Russia is belabouring to do with Ukraine now.  They did not seem infectious because no other region of my body got affected, but were obstinately refusing to budge.  Since a lot of the neighbourhoold ladies were involved, during their gossip sessions, the blotches around the ankle were a fixed point of agenda and updates were given as to whether any new quackery had been administered.  So much so that when I met on the road someone even remotely acquainted, the only question posed to me was about the `well-being' of the dark patches and the other party promptly went on to suggest yet another remedy!! 

After applying all kinds of things for almost ten weeks, suddenly the patches started waning and all the quacks in the entire neighbourhood were beaming with satisfaction as if their own remedy had worked to solve the problem.  Actually there was no telling what worked, because when fifteen different things were applied, nobody could pinpoint what addressed the issue.  That was the time I learnt that if you apply or eat multiple things to solve one problem you cannot stop anything until well after the issue is fully resolved, simply because you dont know what to stop!!  In truth, the actual remedy was an ointment our compounder had surreptitiously given me to apply daily, asking me not to inform my grandma because he was petrified of her. I followed his instructions fully and in complete secrecy to prevent the quacks from crying foul and prolonging the agony! Also to avoid incurring the wrath of the old lady for myself and the compounder. 

Why am I narrating this now, you ask?  Two weeks back, after a golf session, when I waded into some tall bushes to retrieve one of the many mishit balls, a felt some insect bite.  When I came home, lo and behold, there were two dark patches, small ones, near the ankles.  Now, there are no grandmas, mothers, sisters, neighbourhood ladies milling around and jostling to fix my problem. So I am my own quack now, using multiple creams and ointments to see how quickly I can get rid of the blemishes on my skin.  Still trying after 3 weeks!!  My dear wife says I never learn and she, as usual, is probably right.  The dark blotches on the ankles I carry now are proof of that.   

20th Century Breakfast Experience!

A friend was visiting Bangalore from Bombay.  A rather innocuous suggestion from my dear wife that he should grab a bite at one of the antedeluvian `hotels' (restaurants actually, but those days we did not consciously make that difference) was wholeheartedly endorsed all around.  When I asked him if he wanted to immerse in a vignette from the past, he was indeed very exuberant!  Of course, he would love to visit one of the old world restaurants which still doled out the classic idli, vadai, benne dosai, coffee routine to loads of craving people daily, with very little change in its menu or dishes from decades ago. That enthusiastic response meant a half-hour drive to Basavangudi, with a lot of expectations, for a peek into history with our stomachs. But what we did not factor in was that it was a Sunday and that a sizeable population of Bangalore would have converged on that particular 'hotel' to satiate its pangs for the traditional stuff.  I encouraged the friend not to panic on our approach (he wanted to beat a hasty retreat) saying it was almost 1030, way past normal breakfast time and we should be ok.  I was lamentably wrong -  and there was a hungry mob milling around, at the entrance of the restaurant, as if free food was being distributed from a soup kitchen during a natural disaster or war.

No exaggeration - some 150-200 people were standing in assorted lines and that many hungry souls could never be kept quiet until something substantial went into their mouths.  Most of the people did not even know which line led to what.  Important to note, because they did lead to different destinations as we realised after some 15 minutes of queueing up. One line was for take-away (`parcels' as the restaurant had indicateed on a carefully concealed board, which can be seen only from 6 inches away); another one was to get a token with a number, which then gained some momentum for you by placing you in the main queue, waiting for entry through the golden gate. Many people stood in the wrong line for quite a while before realising they were literally misplaced. I felt very diffident now, because I did not anticipate such a deluge of people for the ubiquitous idli, dosa and multiple queues to contend with. The ultimate prize was entry into the famous, nearly 100-year old eatery, where the menu remained constant throughout the day - yes, one got the same items whatever be the time. People congregated just to savour the food and atmosphere from way back because there is no other logical explanation when the same stuff is available in some hundred other joints, with good quality to boot. 

Fittingly, the gentleman guarding gate to the culinary heaven, keeping the ravenous mob in some semblance of control was a symbol of the bygone era.  Seemed to have bypassed a few decades and generations and descended on this scene.  A blue Gandhi-topee was perched on his top and he was dressed in loose-fitting trousers and shirt, with a generous splash of vermillion on his forehead!  He growled whenever he announced a token number for the holder to make a hasty entry; hasty because people were convinced somehow that even a small delay might cause them to miss their slice of history.  Frequently he was mixing up token numbers, thereby causing frustration and confusion among the already restless. He was moderately dictatorial in his own way, entrenched in his high stool with a modern walkie talkie in hand a-la a war chief, gently reprimanding people when wrong approaches were made.  Due to some malfunction in his mouth/tongue, phonetically he was able to make very little distinction betwen his J and K when he bellowed the token numbers. So when people with K14 enthusiastically responded and tried to jostle through, he was derisively castigating them, with the clarification that he was calling J14.  When we thought our turn was coming up, he took a toilet cum coffee break and extended our agony. In addition to the walkie talkie communication, he also resorted to hand signals and sheer vocal-cord power, to obtain prompt updates on vacancies available inside.

Like all Indian establishments, this also had its own ways of playing favourites.  When people known to the management or the chef or even a waiter wanted to enter, even without a token, they were surreptitiously ushered into the restaurant, giving them priority over others and were secreted in a back-room without access to the public.  And they justifiably gleamed very proudly at being able to bypass the commoners like us.  Why wont they??  These were ushered in,  ignoring token numbers and calling out names of the favourites, making it obvious that something devious and  inequitious was happening and a grave crime was being perpetrated on the waiting mob. And as elsewhere in India, some people were trying to dodge their way inside, using cheatsheets - like one guy said he had left something inside and pleaded to go in. But when we were sitting there after one hour, he was still eating!!  Again a very Indian trait - find a hole in the process and get the thrill of cheating the majority even if it is only for a regular breakfast.

Finally when our turn came and we entered triumphantly, without further ado we were reminded that rules prevailing still pertained to 1900s.  We were two and the table was for four. We were pretty strictly warned not to sit opposite to each other but side by side on one side of the table so that one more party of two can be accommodated opposite. Saring a table with strangers is the norm like in days of yore; if you dont like it, too bad, you can foot it to some other forgiving place.  The waiter who took our order was also half ancient and must have got the job on quota, as a descendant of an old staff member. Seemed dreamily distant and had to be reminded four times about our order.  A smile was not in his portfolio and a permanent frown adorned his face, a reminder of the fact that this place is a no-nonsense old world establishment where nobody had time for pleasanty.  I was almost expecting him to give us something available and ask us to take it or leave it.  And when he miscounted and ordered one dosa extra from the kitchen, he was trying to cajole one of us to eat that extra dosa also!!  I would have done it, if he was the friendly type, but not for a scowling one.  And the autocratic environment was reinforced when we got the items we asked for, in an order unilaterally decided by the establishment.  Apparently, the kitchen chose what to turn out in bulk and when, nobody else had a choice. So, we just gulped down our irritation and self respect along with the food.

Quality?  Was good, but nothing I would travel one hour for and stand in three lines to reach.  There are many restaurants in Bangalore which serve similar food with same or better quality.  So, I personally felt a bit tepid after this experience and may not revisit this any time soon in a hurry.  But the benne masala dosa we brought back for the others was a hit and vanished in no time.  Some consolation, I guess.  My dear wife made the final adjudicating comments - `surely you guys enjoyed the outing with this kind of food to go with'.  We did not have the heart to contradict her, with the gory details of our venture.  She has to be always right!!