The curious case of the single kid

I am a single kid in my family. I have yearned for a sibling. Always.  I remember I asked my mom when I was a little boy –why don’t I have any brother or sister? Mom very nicely convinced me – God does not give brothers or sisters to everybody.. From that day, I reconciled to the fact that I had to be on my own. 

It is Raksha Bandhan time in India. There are jokes floating around which talks about people running away in fear of the Rakhi. Jokes apart – there is still something missing inside me..

I had a wonderful drive in the rains this morning.. slow moving traffic, the raindrops and a beautiful song by Kishore Kumar “ Phoolon Ka taron ka!” Bliss!

http://www.allthelyrics.com/lyrics/kishore_kumar/phoolon_ka_taron_ka-lyrics-1206543.html

`https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4h1bacPNTkA

While I was already on the trip last few days on the above mentioned topic, the beautiful song by Kishoreda made me think further..

I was missing a sibling.

That also made me think a little more in detail about the mind of the single kid.

The other day I was having a chat with somebody when he casually mentioned to me about a peculiar behaviour of his son, and he wondered why his son reacted in a funny way on his some suggestion to him. That’s when it immediately struck me… It’s the phenomenon of the single kid! Instantaneously took me back to my childhood. And I could relate to the issue so well, that I could offer a bit of solace to my friend that this not something he should worry about, but that he should know how to handle it.. To understand the sensitivities behind the being of a single kid.

Complicated isn’t it? Not really!

My views on this subject based on my analysis, experiences and introspection as a single kid myself -  You could find these kids or persons mostly of two types. 1. Too bratish as they have all the attention. 2. At times expressive, but at times too quiet; depending on the upbringing of the child and family circumstances. Majority of these persons could fall in the second category. In either of the cases – it will be worthwhile for the parent to understand the behavioural pattern typically as it stems from this concept of single kid.

They are in their own world.

It is for us to understand the real “them” in them. As they have no siblings to share their feelings or fight with or to even give a hug. They don’t have to fight for their corner with anyone else nor do they have any competition. They usually get what they wanted. And yes they learn to be on their own.  They create a world of their own in their minds. More like a wonderful fairy tale world of adventures and ambitions and they learn to bask in its glory.

Even if there’s an extrovertish or a happy go lucky behaviour from the outside, but if you dig deep inside, you could find a rare symptom of quietness and stillness coupled with melancholy in them. This is not to scare you, but these are some traits which are hidden deep inside.

The person may have been grappling with what to express and what not to express and to whom. Most of the cases, they share many of their thoughts and feelings with their moms. But that has some limitations too.  And it may not be fair to expect that, at a later date even his spouse would understand where the person comes from and his fairy tale world.

It needs a fair bit of understanding to make the person help themselves to be expressive or articulate about the innate feelings with someone whom they can trust and take the person out of the stillness!

If you are a parent of a single kid – spend time with him to be a part of that wonderful fairy tale world that he must be creating or living! I am sure it will be fun!

Can we have a hassle free and a balanced life?

Recently I saw a note about a launch of a new shoe. The shoe is equipped with blue tooth and can synchronise well with your smart phone. The shoe can help you navigate, synch up with maps and provide you directions to reach your destination.

The shoe is also designed well. The blue tooth module is supposed to take the shape of the sole and aesthetically designed well with beautiful curves. And there are of course a plethora of other features and benefits that it can offer including the calories burnt, fitness levels, BMI whatever…

Brilliant!

Interesting to see such new devices being launched on a daily basis.

However that set me to think. Where do all these all lead to??? Aren’t we becoming slaves of technology day in and out? I know that the shoe can be very useful in day to day life amid the stress and chaos...

Fundamentally – is it really helpful? Well, I was once a geek myself. Grew up as a kid with a dream to make it big in the Electronics world. And was an early adopter of whatever technologies and gadgets that came my way.

Now slowly my tendencies are shifting, while grappling with the thousands of apps in my smart phone and tablet. I am yet to have a glimpse of the Google Glass though.

However my submission today is that, in the process of technological advancements are we losing the simple skills that we were once proud of? We have forgotten the art of remembering telephone numbers(you might argue previously there weren’t this many telephones), thanks to the smart phone’s address book. We don’t have to remember birthdays – Facebook is there to remind us. We don’t have to waste our time calling someone – texts and video sharing have become so easy.. Aren’t these leading to a bizarre concept of people avoiding to talk? Meeting people is far-fetched.

Kids are happier playing a weird and a scary game on the iPad than playing outdoor with other kids. Oh, they connect with new friends online L! Don’t know if it is a good idea.

We need not remember roads or directions – the shoe will help you!

Call me a laggard.. Or even a luddite..

I prefer a simple hassle free life. I wouldn’t like to miss out on those simple skills that I had developed over the years. Do I need to enrol my kid into a specialised coaching program for developing those simple natural skills and instincts?

Technological advancements are good, but the perils are too costly too.. Challenging times! 

Stand up for what you believe in!

What a wonderful Birthday I had! Birthday is definitely one day which makes you feel good.. There’s attention all over… Phone calls, text messages, greetings, FB messages, gifts whatever… Feels good! Thanks all of you who took the time to wish me.

The messages were lovely. There was one message from a good friend which got me thinking.

She had sent me her beautiful greetings with a note that I inspire her too, more so because she had learnt to take a neutral stand in a diverse set of group and in group communications – which apparently she began her learning from me.. Interesting! Thanks for those kind words.. Was flattered to hear that.. More so to receive this compliment from the person whom I respect… She also said that I did leave an impression too..

Ha! – what more one needs to receive as a compliment on the Bday!

But that set me to think as well… Perhaps neutralism in groups is something which I think I have imbibed over the years of practicing “goodness”.. One does get carried away by the tag attached to one… Though I was brought up in that environment since childhood to practice being good and kind..

As a modern day manager one does get to face myriads of issues. My trait of following neutrality has helped me a lot in managing diverse factions with reasonable ease. But in the process one should also be careful that it doesn’t always work to be neutral.. That was another learning for me.. Yes I had to learn to take a stand!

At that time some I came across some quotes which I thought were very relevant in my learning process… Life teaches you new things everyday.. this is one such!

There have been occasions when my so called “good and neutral” stand had led to some people comment that I was being a coward or being an escapist! Oh, well!

Tough calls!

Well thinking a bit deeper into it – I do feel that my approach is perhaps “what I believe In” …. And why should I be afraid to take that stand? Isnt my approach helping me in making me dig deeper to take a wise and a balanced stand? Let me keep exploring…

Thanks friend – for reinforcing the faith in me.

And, it’s not easy too…

The New Age Autograph

Many years ago, as a kid I went to watch a cricket match in the stadium, I had a chance to meet the legendary Sunil Gavaskar. When I proudly told this to my relatives after reaching back home, the first thing that they asked me was - “Hope you took his autograph”.

Over the years I had bumped into many celebrities, with the likes of Amitabh Bachchan, Lata Mangeshkar, Kamal Hassan, Shah Rukh Khan, Aishwarya Rai Bachchan, Sachin Tendulkar, many actors, ministers et al.. And I do have autographs of some of them.

But now a days, no one asks me if I got an autograph. Not that the celebrity status has reduced. I feel the celebrities are more accessible now, at least through the electronic medium in its limited way.

Nevertheless, they ask me when I say I bumped into a celebrity at the airport – “Have you taken a picture with him?”

Yes, this is the age of Selfie!

IT IS SCIENCE! NO... IT IS ART, BABE!

I have been a science student and had been away from any form of Art since childhood. Perhaps an inherent feeling that I may not be good at any form of Art. But then I always wanted to pursue some sort of art form as a hobby, be it Painting, Music and many such things.

There was a feeling that such art forms are in born talents and one needs to have it naturally… Was I right in this thinking?

After so many years, I did really start to pursue some of the so called “Art Forms”. And that really set me thinking. The other day my Piano teacher was teaching me some mathematics behind a particular note that I was to play. In simple terms I was to precisely hit a button in intervals of One-eighth of a Second or in say two seconds. And I had to be really precise. This I had to calculate it mentally and play it. Boy! Is this any form of art? This is precise implementation of mathematics man! A Key board is simply a medium.  

Coming to think of it, if I look at any other forms of Art. Consider drawing or painting – Yes there are set of rules. The boundaries. A miniature is made and then extrapolated. The choice of colours and the mixing could be predefined and just follow the set of rules. The painting can be done isn’t it. Simple logic. Then why do you call it an Art?

Same goes for cooking. We had a visitor who commented – your mom really cooks well. And made a statement - Cooking is such an art. Is it? We have the recipes. Follow the ingredients and put them in the right proportions and follow the instructions, cant you make delicious food? But as they say, the day you decide to cook with your heart, you are sure to do a great job of cooking. Just with a good feel for the taste you can do a decent job of it.

I was brought up in an environment of Carnatic Music. I have always been given to understand that such Carnatic Music is quite complicated and with thousands of Raagas available and many great Composers have used many Raagas and have created good Musical Offerings. I wanted to understand what these Raagas mean as a layman. To my surprise I found that these Raagas were nothing but very scientific arrangement of different notes grouped together for ascending & descending frequencies. They have given names to these groups which are otherwise called as Raagas. Some of these groups of frequencies may sound better during the day and some perhaps in the night. So they became classified as Morning Raagas or Evening Raagas respectively(some purists refute this theory though- according to them there are no morning or evening Raagas , people have labelled to their convenience). Anyways, this is a vast subject in itself. But little that I touched upon, I found that they were very systematic and scientifically arranged forms. One needs to perfect this scientifically… How is this then an ART?

I am asking this question – doesn’t this prove that I am no artist. Yes the artists who are proficient in any of the art forms know better, whether they are trained artists or they have inborn talent, Artists are artists.

Science can give them the set of rules, but it requires an artist to understand and implement the Science in one glimpse. Or let me put it this way – like our very old classic theory – which came first – Chicken or Egg? Perhaps the Art form came first, and Science did a good job of analysing the art to give it some definitions!

Young Traders!

It was a Sunday morning and I was sitting on the couch lazing and suddenly my son came running and asked me “Daddy Daddy, I had kept my Doctor Panda here. Did you see it?” Dr. Panda?? I wondered! I found a new small bear toy and I gave it to him and asked him – “Is this the one you are looking for?”. And he retorted immediately- “No Daddy. This is a Security Panda! I was looking for the Dr. Panda. “

Dr. Panda?? Security Panda?? Am I missing something???  My wife saw the puzzled face on me and told me – “Don’t you know about the Trading Panda?– it is the new thing that is being marketed and advertised heavily on TV!”

So Trading Panda – these kids trade the different Panda’s for other toys. Wonder which of these Pandas have higher points?  Now there are other such trading opportunities for the kids. Slam Attax! Cricket Attax ! and what not…

Trading opportunities!?!  I am quite dazed at this concept. Is this really good for the kids to go through such trading and barter schemes at this age?  When I think back, when I was kid there was one Monopoly game which taught us a little bit about trading. Other than that the only trading or barter schemes that I could think was about philately.

I thought today’s kids are more techno savvy. But trading – I didn’t expect. Do I consider this a good sign that they will learn to negotiate or will they make good entrepreneurs?

Let time tell that.

I am still not able to understand the points in Slam Attax! Is it Generation gap – as they say?

Straight Bat

So here’s another one about one of my favourite topics. Sachin Tendulkar. A few months ago, Sachin ditched his trademark curls to go for a straight one.

A big decision this could have been, after nearly 40 years of sporting the Curls and having managed the celebrity status. I wonder what prompted him to do that. But the moment he did it, we could see many news papers and journals talking a lot about the Salon or the Personal Care Industry. The market valuation of the Industry ranged from Rs. 6000 Crores to Rs.12000 Crores in different journals. Perhaps this difference was due to the fact that there was no concrete data available on the so called Personal Care Industry. Tendulkar’s this one act opened up many avenues, much more than the regular advertisements of “Bald prevention” which are generally targeted towards the needier ones.

The Personal Care Industry blokes were quick to ride on the free publicity they got out of this magnanimous act of Tendulkar of sporting for a photograph with his straights.

Mr. Tendulkar – you brought more recognition and visibility to this new industry. Look forward to see many  more such new industries getting opened up!