Showing posts with label Stories. Show all posts

July 26, 2019
There are two types of people in this world: the bees and flies. Bees are smart, and flies are dumb.

If a bee gets trapped in a bottle, it'll fly straight up, towards light and get out. The fly flies into the side a thousand times, go round and round till it finds its way out by chance. Pretty dumb, right?


But, what happens if the bottle is flipped upside down?

The bee still flies upward, but there's no way out. The fly keeps trying by going round and round till it finds its way out through the bottom. The bee dies in the bottle.

In some situations, what we can't see is that someone's turned the bottle upside down, and that sometimes you need to think as a fly.
,

May 22, 2019

The following is an excerpt from a speech by India’s Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar at an event hosted by the Federation of Gujarat Industries in Vadodara, India on 11 September, 2016.

am from the village of Parra in Goa, hence we are called Parrikars. My village is famous for its watermelons. When I was a child, the farmers would organise a watermelon-eating contest at the end of the harvest season in May. All the kids would be invited to eat as many watermelons as they wanted.

Years later, I went to IIT Mumbai to study engineering. I went back to my village after 6.5 years. I went to the market looking for watermelons. They were all gone. The ones that were there were so small. I went to see the farmer who hosted the watermelon-eating contest. His son had taken over. He would host the contest but there was a difference.

When the older farmer gave us watermelons to eat he would ask us to spit out the seeds into a bowl. We were told not to bite into the seeds. He was collecting the seeds for his next crop. We were unpaid child labourers, actually. He kept his best watermelons for the contest and he got the best seeds which would yield even bigger watermelons the next year.

His son, when he took over, realised that the larger watermelons would fetch more money in the market so he sold the larger ones and kept the smaller ones for the contest. The next year, the watermelons were smaller, the year later even small. In watermelons the generation is one year. In seven years, Parra’s best watermelons were finished. In humans, generations change after 25 years. It will take us 200 years to figure what we were doing wrong while educating our children.

Transcription by Eisha Sarkar. Emphasis mine. Also published on scaeceditorial.

August 18, 2018

Most of the folklore that I keep posting on this blog is from what I can recall as far as my memory allows me to. I had a teacher back in school, Ms. Aryama, who used to teach us Sanskrit, and she oft-times talked about the mirroring nature of human beings; as to how humans are just like mirrors, and how our own behavior can go a long way in influencing the opposite person's reaction to your opinions and beliefs.

So, highly inspired from the saying that goes:
Be the change you want to see in the world. ~ Mahatma Gandhi.
She wanted us to behave in the same manner we wished our colleagues or acquaintances to behave in, in order to get them mirror our own spirit and soul.

I was a fan of this philosophy ever since, but the story she used to narrate this was rather weird, to like it or not, as I usually emphasize, is rather subjective, but the point here is it stuck, and that made all the difference.

A weird story, here goes...

nce a king wanted, as kings usually want, to do something substantial. We all seek an escape from oblivion; art, writing and architecture are merely some ways we can get any close.

He thus contemplated and settled on an idea of arranging a painting competition as a quest to find out the best painter in his kingdom. Time passes him by a few days and he decided upon two finalists that would, for a month each, stay in one of the palace’s luxurious halls as the king’s guest and spend their days painting to win, a prize, of course, and then their is, moral gratification.





But wait, what if they cheat? They could’ve looked at each other’s work because they were in the same hall and so the king decided to put a circular curtain around both of their work-spaces.

Thirty long days, it was autumn, the first painter could’ve been painting drawing conscious inspiration from the window he was near to. We couldn’t really guess what the second painter was up to, though, this guy was rather elusive.



The king walked up to them to decide upon which of the two masterpieces would hang behind the walls of the throne for the others to feast their eyes to. The first painter revealed his work.
Jaw dropping realism and attention was paid even to the minutest of details.
And when the second painter removed his curtains, every single soul present around was flabbergasted. Not a word was spoken for what seemed like eternity. Because what the second painter had drawn, was exactly the same as the first one! In fact, it was actually better.
The second painting had a characteristic shine to it that the first one lacked.



But, it was impossible to cheat! Was one of them sneaking around? Negative, the guards, who were appointed on duty to prevent this mishap, but apparently had failed, confirmed. The king, now confused, frustrated and baffled, took to inquiring the two. The second painter explained what had he been doing for the past month.
I didn't paint anything. All I was doing was polishing the surface I should've been drawing on. I kept on doing this till the curtains were lifted. My canvas, by now, had become a mirror. When this mirror witnessed the first man's work, and because the painting was a masterpiece and of great quality, it absorbed and embraced it.

Which tells us to...

Polish our inner selves to get them to be like mirrors, so that the next time we see a good quality, the mirror within us embraces it and the quality becomes one with our own self.

August 15, 2018
I was out on a walk with a close friend of mine, and it's a tale of that sultry evening in August, which you can only see getting any better when you're bitching about a common classmate that everyone hates.

But, hating is a strong word. And I say we don't usually hate things, ideas or even people. What we perceive as hatred may be just be something or someone that we don't understand. As for me, there was a point of time until which I couldn't appreciate art.

So, I tried to ask him into why'd he think that he hated that guy. Turns out that it was because he didn't even try to appreciate anyone. His remarks were always condescending (Oops!). So, even if my friend had burnt the midnight oil and came up with something outstanding (we're working on models made out of cardboard back then), he would come up to him and remark, "Sheesh! That's nothing to be proud of, anyone could have done that."

Appreciation, I said. How important is it?


Well, there's folklore...

nce upon a time, an old man, probably in his 70s, went up to a famous artist. His tired and weary eyes were devoid of excitement and his pale brown skin displayed some deep and prominent wrinkles.

This young artist, though, was at the zenith of his career, extremely skilled and flamboyant, which made him the best candidate to get an honest critique from.

The old man handed him some paintings he'd been working on the past few days while pleading him that he'll not be offended and he's seeking an honest review. The artist, held his intense stare at the works for a quite a while, and sighed deeply and said, "I'm sorry, but the man who drew this paintings has really no knowledge of what is art. I'm sorry."





To this the old man, took out some more works from his torn and worn out bag, and handed them out to the artist, "And what do you think about these?", and one could clearly see the artist's eyes gleaming with a newfound energy. "Wow! Amazing!", he almost jumped out of his seat.
These works are out of the world, whoever this person is, he could become an idol in this field of art, I'm sorry, but is he your grandson?
It was evident that the old man's eyes were becoming wet as he collected his work to put them back in his bag. He answered, almost as a whisper, for he couldn't bring himself to speak,
No, this is me, when I was my grandson's age. I had a natural flair for painting, but no one appreciated my work like you did today. So, I never continued. Only if someone back then said I was good, I could've been an artist extraordinaire.

Which brings us to...

Appreciation can make or break a person's life. And it can make you favoured for taking the time to value someone else's work. Beware, this is difficult, it takes courage to appreciate someone who's doing the same things you're doing, better than you are doing. Perhaps it makes you feel like it’s some sort of a competition. But this shouldn't stop you from appreciating someone. Or should it?

Lastly, when someone appreciates you, be sure that you're accepting it.

,

July 28, 2018

A few days ago, I found myself in a meeting with the GM, Finances for the Suwalka and Suwalka Group. He's a widely recognized name, and an outstandingly wiser man for that. As I got up, I couldn't help myself to ask him what his philosophy on life was. He gave a short albeit meaningful essence to his words. He asked me to,
Dream big. Dream on, but whatever you dream, never let it be small. Dream the biggest you can and you'll have nothing but success in your hands.
This reminded me of Clotaire Rapaille, a French marketing consultant, whom American corporations pay top dollar (read: $200,000 which is approximately Rs. 1,37,25,000) for correcting their marketing misdemeanors.

Dr. Rapaille was once hired by Jeep, the leading SUV manufacturer in the United States, to hunt down reasons for a rapidly declining revenue from sales. What he came up with, was a bizarre theory. He wanted Jeep to switch back to their earlier designs which featured circular headlamps instead of rectangular ones. Jeep executives agreed, albeit reluctantly, but thanks to the prodigy, the world once again saw sky rocketing sales from the automobile manufacturer.





I read an interview of him at PBS, which you can read here. He started out as a teacher, helping autistic children to learn to speak. When he was delivering a lecture at Geneva University, one of his student asked his father to attend it with him. At the end of the lecture, that student's father came up to him and said, "You know, doctor, I've a client for you.". And he said,"Is it a little boy, little girl, doesn't speak?". "No, no, this is Nestlé.".

Dr. Rapaille was taken aback, but he wasn't scared to live a dream, or as NY Times puts it, he was about to live a dream life which Freud would have envied. Nestlé had spent some of its time conducting surveys in Japan. They handed out free samples of coffee and asked consumers how they liked it. This had been going on for over an year now, and the reviews came out to be positive. Nestlé then decided it'd be safe to invest in the Japanese market and it started with them opening up cafés. Aghast, not a single Japanese soul was to be found wandering inside these newly opened coffee parlors. So, they had asked Dr. Rapaille for assistance.

According to him, marketing is all about gut-thinking. He tells us that when you're born, you're born with a reptilian brain, and after 7 years of age, we have in place the cortex, what most of us think of as being "intelligent". And it has been seen that children usually start learning a foreign language after 7 years of age, and yet they still continue to hold on to their accent. So, for example a child who has been brought up in wartime France, may learn the English language when he grows up, but his imprint of English would be different from a child, who's been brought up in a contrasting environment. If you're, thus, to create an imprint, it'll be best to do it before the cortex starts developing.

How could thus Nestlé expect a child who's been brought up in a culture which favors tea over coffee switch to coffee once he grows up. Dr. Rapaille told Nestlé to start selling sweets that were based on a coffee flavor, coffee flavored toffees and books for children that encouraged coffee drinking. Decades of careful execution of planning, led to wonderful results; between October 2015–September 2016, Japan was the world’s 4th largest consumer of coffee.

What it took was dreams, and careful planning that spanned decades.
,

July 22, 2018

I can recall a story of a recognized female Indian voice. Those were the days when she was young and her career was starting off and she'd been doing shows on the Indian radio. This had given her enough fame already and this was perhaps the phase where you'd be figuring out how possibly could someone live while being under the limelight. Having booked a seat in the train, as she searched for her seat in the coach, an aged woman had already fixated her gaze upon her, contemplating, as to whether she was the same voice she had heard and seen so much about.

As the young talent took her seat, the aged woman called out to her and she said something on the lines of her confirming who the young girl was and then appreciating her.
The other day I heard you out on the radio. You sing beautifully. Almost every Saturday, I sit with my daughters and we hear you out. I know there are just 7 notes, but your voice, it feels as if you're searching for the 8th.
The young girl was flabbergasted on hearing this. She shied away, blushing and meekly denying that she isn't as good as she was portraying her. "No, no, ma'am...", was all she was saying. The old woman, as she was a wiser soul, scolded the girl.
When someone appreciates you, you should take it. Never deny someone's appreciation. Say something like "Thanks." or "I'm glad you liked it.". If you don't want to take it onto yourself, the best thing to say would be, "It's all God's grace."
It's absolutely okay to be humble, but denying of someone's appreciation isn't humility, it's the lack of self-esteem. 

June 28, 2017
 
I'm busy doing [some important work of] mine, I request you to do your own [work].
The art of focus.

It's an important skill taught in martial arts.

And can be used in a multitude of areas. When you're at your grandparent's house, and there's a power cut, you've the entire cool and windy night to listen to stories. Stories inspire us, make us a wiser person and urge us to give life, a different perspective. Ah, so here's the one I was told this time:

Once upon a time, in a kingdom far away, a king wanted to appoint a Prime Minister to his court. As it was, and still is, the most important position in the empire, the Prime Minster was required to be a man of supreme intellect.

An entrance exam was organised by the king. Lots and lots of enthusiasts turned up and when the results came out, only 3 candidates were selected for the final test round. After hearing this good news of their selection, these three folks headed out of the king's castle on their way to home.

The only thing they were wishing for was the following day's question paper. Oh how dearly they prayed to Lord to provide them anyhow with at least a mere glimpse of the questions!

Amazingly, the moment they stepped out of the castle, they were taken aback with surprise. Almost all of the hoardings, newspapers, radio (the people who went around from village to village announcing things) talked of the same thing – the following day's question paper. It was out there already!

It went on to read something like this:

Tomorrow, at 10.00 A.M. will report at the castle, from whence the three of you would be led to a chamber. You'll then be locked inside. At the door there will be a lock. You've to open the door. The person who comes out the first will be declared as the Prime Minister by His Highness.
On reaching their abodes, two of those three immediately set out their books and started learning about the types of locks, the mechanisms they work on, the various kinds of puzzles you'll have to solve to open them etc. The third person however quietly went and sat in a corner. Upon asking him, he replied:
I'm busy doing [some important work of] mine, I request you to do your own [work].
Time flew by, in came the silent night. Those two by now had completed most of the literature on locks that was available to them. The third man, however still sat silent. I leave the answer to whether or not he was contemplating life to my dear readers to ponder on.

At 11 P.M. he was again disturbed by the presence of the other two scholarly folks, who once again asked him to study a thing or a two. He again gave the rather monotonous reply of his:

No, I'm doing my work. Please do yours.
Which led them think that he's not suitable for the post of the Prime Minister. Or rather he doesn't want to become one. There's no zeal within him. There's no fire. It's better to leave him alone and continue our studies. And they went back to get immersed in their books.

This man still sat in a corner, and funnily enough because we at this point are expecting something rather extraordinaire, went to sleep. Although his normal bedtime ranged from 11 P.M. to 7 A.M. but that day he chose to wake up at 8 A.M. And that was only to find the book loving mates still studying. Turns out they studied the entire night. They would've slept for around 3 hours or so, if not less.

At 9 A.M. they once again tried to ask him to study, but he remained adamant with his answer. Finally it was time to go for the test.

On their arrival at the castle, they were greeted by the king, who reiterated the question to them. The men were locked and the test commenced. As soon as they saw the lock, the two quickly opened their books to figure out what's the mystery in the lock and how would they be able to open it. The third man however went to a corner and sat quietly. No doubt, he was given crude remarks by them, who urged him to try opening the lock, who knew he could get to be the Prime Minister. Like we expect, he gave his dull reply yet again.

After about half the time it takes to an hour, he stood up, walked to the door, opened it and went to meet the king. The other two was so deeply engrossed in their books that they failed to take notice of the happening in their vicinity. It was only when the king himself entered the door and informed them that your reading would be in vain. The Prime Minister had already been appointed.

The thing that intrigues us, or should if that's not how he opened the door, is what was he doing while sitting in the corner? He was arranging his chain of thoughts. More precisely, he was removing completing the pending thoughts he had in his mind to make room for something which was extremely important. But, wait. How did he open the lock?

He didn't. There was a lock. There was a door. The question wasn't to unlock the lock at all, it only asked them to open the door. The king had cleverly used a deception trick, so the door appeared as if it was attached to the lock which you'd have to open if you really wanted to pass, but what gave its appearance wasn't the reality.

What I want you to know is that he was able to do this with the power of focus. And you should be doing this too. Concentrate at the task at hand. Don't think of a hundred things while working. Finish one first and then deftly move on to the next. I hope to see you reach something as great as our newly appointed Prime Minister's.
,

March 28, 2015


Gone are those days in the local vegetable markets in Bhopal, when you would be more tensed about the correctness of the vendors’ weighing scales, than your shopping list. The other day, when I accompanied my parents to the vegetable market, I found that a majority of the vegetable-sellers were selling vegetables with the help of an electronic weighing machine, instead of the traditional pan balance. I asked one of them, “How could you make it possible?”. “We have taken it on rent. Can you see that tomato vendor right there in the centre? He is the one who is giving these machines to us. He charges Rs. 20 per day.”, replied he. He added further, “And do you know, these days he has bought himself a loading auto, and he loads all these machines and gets them transported to another marketplace the next day.”

"Development." I thought at last.

And do you know friends, these people have started refusing polythene bags as well? They are asking people to carry their own cloth bags instead.

Isn’t it all good? :)
,

November 04, 2013

It has been quite long that I have been blogging. This blog is slowly emerging. It has crossed over one thousand (1000) page views. Thank you readers for your support. Due to lack of time I have started micro blogging. I would like to post some of the incidences that I recently came across. Here is a lesson.

During a visit to Aashima Mall, in Bhopal. On 1st November, occasion of Dhanteras. I saw some foreigners there. I wished them a happy journey to our country and of course, a happy upcoming Diwali. He asked my name. Yes, in that little conversation, he threw in a warmth of friendliness and asked my name while shaking hands with me. This, the lesson. We conversed further, but I had already got my lesson.

So friends, do not fail to ask the person's name. It can successfully make the conversation worth remembering.

May 07, 2012

Patience is very important these days. There is a Hindi proverb which states the fruit of patience is very sweet. And surely it is. After all a ripe mango tastes far yummier than an unripe mango. To prove this point here is a story. Read on to find out what it reveals.

The Story:

In a valley among the mountains lived an old man with his son named Tom. Tom had a big business in Chicago. He had become quite rich till now. One day he and his father were sitting in the garden of their big house watching the tall mountains. Suddenly the old man pointed to a bird and asked his son what is it. Tom frankly answered it was a crow. The old man said laughingly, "A crow? My eyes are going old nowadays." A few moments later the old man asked his son, "What is that?" Tom replied,"It is a crow." The old man said,"Ah! I see." The same question was repeating itself after a moment or two. At last an angry Tom replied,"How many times will I have to give you the same old answer? It's a crow!" Tom was very angry now. To this the old man went inside and brought a diary and opened a page which dated back to the year 1982. At that time Tom was about 5 years old. This was the diary entry —

March 12, 1982
".... Today my 5 year old son Tom was sitting on my lap. We both were talking and suddenly a crow passed by. Eagerly Tom asked what was it. I replied politely that it was a crow. He asked the same question about half a hundred times and I answered it every time with the same politeness .... I did not shout or yell at him. Well, none of the times ..."
He showed the page to Tom. After reading this Tom's anger and pride vanished. He decided to be a changed person after that.

The moral of the story is to be polite, patient and down to earth, and then you will surely succeed. Here's a beautiful quote summing up this —

Never cut a tree down in the wintertime. Never make a negative decision in the low time. Never make your most important decisions when you are in your worst moods. Wait. Be patient. The storm will pass. The spring will come. ~ Robert H. Schuller.

May 06, 2012

Originally published on 06/05/12, was based on an oral narration by my school teacher back then, apart from a minor grammatical edits, the story has been left untouched.

 Following is a very interesting story which has a good moral which we should always remember and follow in every aspect of our life. 

For your information: All characters in the story are fictional and do not resemble any person in real life.

The story:

In a class of forty students, there were twelve boys who were very good friends among themselves. All the boys in the group were good at something or the other.

Rahul was one of the boys in the group. He was a weak student. He was neither good at studies nor at sports, but he was an excellent dancer. He wanted to become like Rohit, a boy in the same group. Rohit was good at studies as well as sports. But do you know whom Rohit wanted to become like? He wanted to become like Ankit, a champion swimmer. But Ankit wanted to become like Rajat, who was a great basketball player. Rajat liked cricket very much and so he wanted to become like Gaurav who was a good batsman. But Gaurav had his own interest in singing and so wanted to become like Devansh who was a star singer in the whole school. But Devansh wanted to excel in dancing instead which was a growing trend these days. And so Devansh wanted to become a good dancer like Rahul himself.

So what was happening here? Each boy was copying some boy or the other. None of the boys in the whole group could achieve anything. They lost their talent, their original talent which they had been practising since years.
We should not copy each other just because they are an expert in a particular field. However we should practice our own specialities so that we may stand out in the world. However there is no harm in learning good qualities that others posses. But that does not mean that we start copying everything he or she does.
Note added by Ansh on 20/06/17: Almost five years down the line, today, when I'm now and then confused in taking major decisions in my life, this is the story I fall back on; basically I'm not the next (insert name of a well established person), I'm the first me. Part of this is inspired from a Classmate advert serie, but it holds firm in the modern day scenario.

May 04, 2012

Today while reading the daily newspaper I came across a story. Here it goes —

There was a poor boy. He was standing outside a shoe store looking through the big glass window hoping he could buy a pair. An old woman standing outside the City Hospital waiting at the bus stop was watching him. She asked him, " What are you doing here?".

To this the boy replied, "I am praying to God that I can buy a pair of shoes."

The woman took the boy to the store and asked the shopkeeper to give her a nice pair of shoes. She bought it and gave it to the boy. The boy asked her, "Did God send you?" which was out of sheer innocence.

The woman smiled and replied ,"No, I am just trying to be good. My son met with an accident and lost both of his feet."

The moral of this story was we cannot be like God to any person no matter how much we help him or her. But we can at least make ourselves a good person.
,

May 04, 2012

It was Monday, 30th of April. As my father was back home after a long course of time, it was my time to celebrate. We did a lot of shopping that day. Of course, a good deal of shopping gives a great deal of discount. So I purchased some snacks too - Potato chips and some soft drinks too. But I cannot hold food in my hands because my stomach wants to hold them. And I could not resist. After about five - ten minutes I was wiping my hands and my mouth with the handkerchief. Then it was time to go to my favorite destination - Mc Donalds. We had some spicy Mexican treats and some fries. When we got back home my mother cooked some pizzas for supper. My tank was filled up completely but I didn't give up.

It were days and days before I could stand really still and think clearly because those spicy mexican treats and yummy pizzas kept working in my stomach till a long time later.

It is very well said by Mahatma Gandhi, which gives the very well awaited “Moral of the Story” to the readers, as —
“Earth provides enough to satisfy every man's needs, but not every man's greed.”
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