Category: Life Ordinary

  • Master Classes

    The last few episodes of Masterchef Australia Season 2, especially after it came down to the final four, were quite awesome. For me, it went beyond the cooking or even the amazing camaraderie between the participants and the judges. The final two turned out to be Adam and Callum, separated in age by more than a decade.

    Adam, I thought, (thou shalt not dare to bring up the fact that I know zilch about cooking) was quite a genius. Though he was a bit too arrogant in the mid-episodes to be my favourite, his range and the thinking and creativity he brought into his cooking were nothing short of phenomenal. Meanwhile Callum’s level of cooking sometimes made you forget the age (and experience) difference between the two.

    But something more than that made me identify with Callum. A very smart friend recently gave me a Master Class and pointed out to me a classification of personalities – askers and guessers. I belong to the latter, I do tons of calculations and thinking before I can ask something of someone, and I still wonder if I’m being presumptuous or inconveniencing them. The worse part, I’ve noticed that the shyness is mistaken for arrogance!!

    In one episode, when Callum’s dish earns special praise from an external judge, he mumbles a ‘thank you’. Matt Preston admonishes him and reminds him of what he’s supposed to say when he’s praised. Callum then asks the judge whether he can do a stage, (“Staging is when a cook or chef works briefly, for free, in another chef’s kitchen to learn and be exposed to new techniques and cuisines”), and is promptly rewarded. I wonder how much ‘asking’ has to do with confidence and passion. Callum is fortunate to have discovered a passion early in life. I’m sure that his experiences will make him more confident.

    I read this excerpt from a book, which talked about “young adults in America choosing to slow down their path to adulthood”. Probably a good move. (Generalising) By the time we go through the motions of education and work, the baggage and constraints start accumulating. The passion practically disappears, and the experience possibly does more harm than good. Rediscovering all of it is no easy process.

    Perhaps, if we had an ‘education system’ that could help identify what we wanted+were good at+ could earn money with, we’d have more askers than guessers. Because then, we’d know our passion, and with that knowing would come a direction to seek our experience, with that would come confidence, and then all the world would actually be a stage – to learn and to perform.

    until next time, youthopia indeed

    Related Read: A toast to common genius

  • When you’ve no business doing it…

    Sometime back, I read this amazing piece titled ‘The Night I met Einstein‘ – how Albert Einstein helped Jerome Weidman discover his ear for music, step by step. I put that very simply, but the story has to be read fully to understand its depth and context, perhaps best summarised by its ending, Einstein’s words – “Opening up yet another fragment of the frontier of beauty.”

    I wonder if amidst prioritising our lives, we have lost the  ability to experience for the sake of experiencing, and to help others discover that magic. We have an entire web to discover content on any interest we might have, and yet even an Instant search does not mean that we can do something without an agenda, a purpose that goes beyond the sheer thrill of a new experience. Yes, I include the vacation – Facebook photos nexus (para 7) in this. 🙂

    When I watched the participants getting eliminated on MasterChef Australia, week after week, I felt sad for most of them. (there are perhaps only a couple towards whom I had taken a strange dislike) I felt sadder when they showed the ‘what do they do now’ and I realised that many had gotten back to their lives, and different lines of work that has nothing to do with the love for food. While the show gave them an experience they would cherish, it was also perhaps the best push they’d get to realising what they’re really meant to do.

    And that is perhaps a rare opportunity, especially when I look around and increasingly feel that the business of living has become the meaning of life.

    until next time, lifejacking

    PS: An insightful read in the same context “What does it mean to work hard?” via Mahendra

  • Id+entity

    There was this experiment suggested in ‘Tomorrow’s God‘ – to look in the mirror and stare into your eyes. If you concentrate and hold your gaze long enough you’ll begin to ‘step outside yourself’ and ironically, have a more objective view. Its a bit similar to some meditation techniques, I think, and though I read (and tried) this about 6-7 years back, I remember having thought of things (about myself) that don’t usually surface. But it does lead to a very interesting question – who are you? 🙂

    Is it the job you do or the designation you hold? Or do you define yourself by your nationality or religion? Or the perception you have created among your friends, family, extended family etc? Or a persona you have created among those who you deal with, only virtually? Or the things you consume and the thoughts that arise in your mind? The beliefs, the notions, the perceptions, the likes and dislikes that are created in you over time? The things you say and the things you do? The person you see in the mirror, the physical manifestation of you? All of these are transient, in varying degrees. Even nationality and religion because for me, they are notional. The fun part is, this ‘you’ is the way you see it, the moment you change the point of view, it all changes. So, who do you think you are?

    until next time, identify yourselves in the comments 😉

  • Across time.. universe

    I’ve never claimed an understanding of poetry and have never had any affection for it either, but once in a while some bits catch my attention. Verse, lyrics, any other form…

    The dawn rouses one man to acquire wealth
    Another to earn food, another to achieve greatness
    Another to sacrifices, another to his own (pursuits)
    Another to activity, and lights all men
    to their various means of maintaining life
    Ushas (dawn) has given back all the regions

    People say I’m crazy doing what I’m doing
    Well they give me all kinds of warnings to save me from ruin
    When I say that I’m o.k. well they look at me kind of strange
    Surely you’re not happy now you no longer play the game

    For how long a period is it that the dawns have risen?
    for how long a period will they rise?
    Still desirous to bring us light Ushas (dawn)
    Pursues the functions of those that have gone before, and
    Shining brightly, proceeds with the others (that are to follow)

    People say I’m lazy dreaming my life away
    Well they give me all kinds of advice designed to enlighten me
    When I tell them that I’m doing fine watching shadows on the wall
    Don’t you miss the big time boy you’re no longer on the ball
    Ah, people asking questions lost in confusion
    Well I tell them there’s no problem, only solutions
    Well they shake their heads and they look at me as if I’ve lost my mind
    I tell them there’s no hurry
    I’m just sitting here doing time

    Gone are the men who in the days before us
    Looked on the rising of the earlier mornings
    We, we the living now, behold her brightness
    And they come nigh who shall hereafter see her

    I’m just sitting here watching the wheels go round and round
    I really love to watch them roll

    Now the fun is, most of you would have realised that stanzas 2, 4 and 6 are Lennon’s classic ‘Watching the Wheels‘, and the rest? Stanza 1 is the Rigveda Mandala 1 Sukta 113 verse 6; stanza 3 verse 10 (both translations by H.H.Wilson) and stanza 5 verse 11 (translation by Ralph Griffith). 🙂

    until next time, more per verse 🙂

  • A small matter of life and death

    There’s this wonderful scene in ‘The Hurt Locker’ in which James talks to his baby son who is fully engrossed in playing with his toys

    You love playing with that. You love playing with all your stuffed animals. You love your Mommy, your Daddy. You love your pajamas. You love everything, don’t ya? Yea. But you know what, buddy? As you get older… some of the things you love might not seem so special anymore. Like your Jack-in-a-Box. Maybe you’ll realize it’s just a piece of tin and a stuffed animal. And the older you get, the fewer things you really love. And by the time you get to my age, maybe it’s only one or two things. With me, I think it’s one.

    Its probably a generalisation, but I’m sure many people can identify with that. Figuring out at some point, that all the things and people they cherished, or they themselves, have moved on. In fact, there are many who might be even more unfortunate and realise that have nothing to love, going through the motions of life, as a job to be finished. But it could be even worse.

    Quite a morbid line of thought, but one that I felt compelled to share, because it made me think about so many things we take for granted. Sometime back, I had written about the ‘alone’ people I see in many places. Well, there’s another kind of people I have seen – sometimes during daily commute, at other times, when I travel.

    The kind of people who make me wonder what it is that makes them hold on to their life. The easiest example I could give are the beggars – no, not the ‘professional’ ones who haunt our traffic signals, but the ones that frequent obscure places, where there’s hardly a chance of them getting anything, the ones who don’t even ask. They sometimes look too old or invalid to move out of there. There are other examples too, ones that need not be at such levels of despair, but you probably get the drift.

    So what makes them plod on? A hope that things will become better? A dogged belief in the sanctity of life? A dull notion that life has to be lived on unto its natural conclusion? Or maybe they are in a state where they’re okay with what they’ve to live with or what life will dish out next? Or maybe they’re afraid that the experience after death will be worse.

    I’ll end where I started from – ‘The Hurt Locker’. To quote James again ‘Everyone’s a coward about something.‘ Sometimes it’s life, and sometimes it’s death.

    until next time, alive and clicking 🙂