Unstability in diversity?

I believe there can be a broad utopian classification of people based on how they want to lead their lives as follows:
i. people who want to earn lots of money
ii. people who want to have diverse experiences
However,the first group consider themselves as steady& reliable while they look at the second group as unstable.On the other hand,the second group consider themselves as diverse ,their life as an adventure and the first group-people as a boring lot who lead the most mundane life.
But,the big question is 'Are these two groups mutually exclusive?...don't they overlap?'
Someone might want to have a life full of varied experience,and at the same time,earn decent money,if not lots!
In reality,there are plenty of them! In fact,the people who earn in crores are the one's actually having an extraordinary life...filmstars,sportspersons,business-tycoons.
So,do the normal office-goer's lose out...both on the monetary & experience-part?
Maybe,yes...but I'm sure even they must have had lofty goals as children ...while growing up...before settling down to fit into the image of 'Responsible Adults' precisely the aforementioned Group 1 people,even if that doesn't make them filthy rich.They just are not risk-takers.Fair enough! But ,what about the other lot who are creative,want to live life the 'Zindegi na milegi dobara' style,at the same time,like everyone else have responsibilities to carry out & families to take care of. Does just the experimental ways of leading one's life make one unstable or it's excused if he/she earns enough money to compensate?
and,where exactly does one draw the line in terms of experimenting with one's career?
A chequered career-graph can be viewed from both angles...it can be either diverse or unstable...simply lacking any focus or direction?
In our generation,attention-span has reduced a great deal.There's a tendency to get satisfied with anything we get hold of & start thinking 'So,what next?'
In a developing nation,where opportunities are manifold,the somewhat financially stable are all part of this race...engineers want to leave their jobs to become MBA's...MBA's want to leave their jobs to become entrepreneurs....& so on & so forth.After all,what is it?...upgrading yourself...or complying with the vicious cycle of eventually making a successful career?...Maybe the next generation will be able to find the answer...hopefully!

sophistication ,or the lack of it?

As I complete one month of being in a government job,working in a not-centrally-AC office and staying in a village,to my surprise I find little reaction within me towards these changed circumstances.The change was not overnight though...I was an IT-professional once working in big state-of-the-art facilities,amongst an young crowd
& attending office-parties in banquet-halls.But,is it my stint as an mba-student in a govt b-school that has made me prepared for a de-galmourised lifestyle or I've matured€ as a person on a whole with increased tolerance & openness??But,the that's what management education imparts inclination towards taking up new challenges,exploring new opportunities and having a broader & unbiased perspective.It's equally intriguing how priorities change for an individual with time.At 21,when I decided to take up an IT-job was lured just for the taste of earning raw money,irrespective of the amount & also by the hip-lifestyle of an MNC-worker.But,5 years later ,equipped with a post-graduate qualification,my primary satisfaction lies in getting the ROI of my education,and not offices with glass-doors & AC-cubicles or an all-young-work-group with whom I could party on weekends.But,then is the temptation of leading a so-called glamorous life an illusion of early 20's?? I can't help borrowing from one of my rare same-age-colleagues,who said,"Glamour is within me!who cares what the surrounding is like?" Indeed,these are signs of growing up...when one realises that there's more to the meaning of life than what we often perceive when fresh out of college.Especially,working in a village makes one experience what rural India is like & what being in poverty means. For me,the starting month itself as a govt employee was eventful...had to manage a visit of 18 IAS-officers at our plant....also got the chance to interact with an young officer who incidentally has done his engineering & mba from premier institutes & then worked in a global consulting firm in a happening city like mumbai before cracking the civil services exam which has landed him in a remote village in bengal ,yet he seemed pretty chilled-out about all of it.Meeting him kinda' inspired me...to take on the ordeal I'm facing for the times to come...afterall,a challenge is a challenge & it's all part of the bigger world,where all of us live!

Customer-branding:the new face of 'Service-Marketing'

Post Employer-branding & Employee-branding, here comes a new concept in Service-marketing..."Customer-branding". Customers or end-user's are really the people who build a business's brand...by dint of satisfactory results & feedback.....& branding of the individuals with such results has become an indirect way of branding your own business.
Visit any big hospital & you'll find walls adorned with smiling faces of cancer-survivors who got treated there along with a write-up of their stories of recovery.
Go to any Entrance Exam Coaching institute...passport-size photos of toppers produced from there, lined up on the walls will welcome you...almost with an indirect affirmation that 'You've come to the right place, baby!'
Or just travel through the busy city-roads...you are bound to be distracted by hoardings showing happy family-portraits with a picture-postcard residential complex in the backdrop & a bite from any of the family-members mentioning how wise a decision they have taken in buying an apartment in such a complex.
Now, it’s not that models were never used earlier to advertise products but they used to be celebrities or professional models. But, over the years, we’ve come to an age when being a celebrity has become relatively easier….& people have realized that it’s no longer a ‘taken-for-granted’ thing that celebrities advertising products will make them sell. Rather, it’s the age of creating celebrities out of common people …the age of ‘reality Show’s where an apparently ordinary person can become a star overnight….it’s all about creating heroes out of people in the crowd &,thereby entice the crowd….which actually has led to so much importance being adhered to the concept of ‘Customer-branding’…that has made the ‘Service-marketing’ landscape undergo a paradigm-shift.

Pleasant Pains

Recently I read in a facebook post about a yoga-teacher asking his trainees to feel the 'pleasant pain' while exercising. Now, that's an oxymoron indeed. Pain is supposed to hurt us, not please us!....But, must say in our times, it has become a luxury, a way of celebrating 'how tough you are'. Otherwise, why would youngsters flock towards gymn's & tattoo-parlours....or reality-shows like 'Survivor' ,'Fear Factor' & 'Roadies' notch up such great TRP's. It's all about how much pain you can endure....that defines your 'Toughness Quotient'. But,at times it's also about lack of strength…& vulnerability. I remember, some time back, during one of my post-breakup post-mortem's, I was told by a friend that ,it was the 'Pleasant pain' or 'Meetha dard' of reminiscing about my ex that was not letting me get-over my past affair.I have also heard some people say that 'tension' & 'anxiety' works benefecial for them before exams & suchlike. I guess in such cases, we create pains for ourselves as it makes us believe that it will make things our way…& such pains are worth tolerating I believe…as they not only help us getting the work done but also prepare us for such pains when they actually happen in the future. As wise people say,’Today’s pain is Tommorrow’s gain’.

The lesser-known 'gems' of Maniratnam

In a country like India where national cinema is synonymous with 'Hindi Films'....it's no mean feat for any regional language film-maker to make his presence felt across the country by having his films known about,if not shown throughout the nation.Satyajit Ray,Mrinal Sen,Tapan Sinha,Adoor Goapalkrishnan,Buddhadeb Dasgupta,Gautam Ghosh,Rituparno Ghosh,Aparna Sen have done that... through subtitled prints/dubbed versions(Chokher Bali,Antarmahal,Khela)/hindi remakes of their bengali originals(Zindagi Zindagi,Sagina).
But all of them have been from Parallel or Middle Cinema.But,in the last three decades,a South Indian mainstream film-maker has been able to do it in style....none other than Maniratnam.I'm calling him a mainstream film-maker only because unlike the others I mentioned,his films have songs,dances,action and all other elements of popular cinema.But,still he's one film-maker who has been able to make superbly-crafted & socially-relevant films within the ambit of commercial cinema for more than 30 years,as a result of which his films much like the films of Ray,Tapan Sinha & Rituparno Ghosh have been well-received by audiences & critics alike & have also won accolades at national awards & international film festivals alonside breaking box-office records.
And,when it comes to box-office, going back to where I started,it's imperative to mention that his films have not just been limited to tamil/telugu audience....but dubbed versions of his films like 'Roja'& 'Bombay' have been seen,loved & appreciated by audiences all across India....to such an extent that They have become 'Cult' films in the history of 'Indian Cinema'.However,there are some earlier films of his as well which were dubbed into hindi or subtitled & got some viwing outside South India.I saw three such films recently 'Nayakan',Geetanjali' & 'Anjali'.Though I liked all,still can't say they reached the excellence of 'Roja' & 'Bombay'.Only,'Nayakan' can be said to be very well-made & well-crafted film where action,drama,social commentary,humanity were all wonderfully interwound into a magnum 'biopic'.Supposedly based on Francis Ford Coppola's 'Godfather',it showcased one of the finest performances by one of the fines Indian actors,kamal Hasan & is included in Time magazine's list of 'All-time great 100 Movies'.
The other two films 'Geetanjali' & 'Anjali' are relatively softer films devoid of too much action & emphasizing on human relationships. 'Geetanjali' shows the romance between two terminally-ill people....shot in the picturesque 'Ooty',it featured action-hero 'Nagarjuna' for the first time in a romantic role.'Anjali' tells the story of an autistic chld who changes the lives of people around her....it is regarded as one of the best Indian Children's films ever made.
All these films & also 'Roja' & 'Bombay' showcase Maniratnam's mastery over the language of Cinema,his eye for innovations & his concerns for under-served people & his ability to tell their story in simple & engaging way.According to me,he is also one of the best directors of child-artists as is evident from the performances of children in his films like 'Nayakan','Geetanjali','Anjali','Roja','Bombay' & 'Kannathil Muthamittal'. Watching a Maniratnam film is always a heart-warming experience & I eagerly look forward to watching more of his films.

Mumbai darshan

Yeah,as the title suggests,last week I had my first trip to Mumbai,the city which I had just seen in Movies & I wanted to visit for long.But,since I went for an interview,didn't have the bandwidth to travel around much.All I went to was Marine Drive & Inorbit mall...but within the short stay,I was bowled over by the tremendous glamour of the city.While going across the Sea-link,the worli-skyline looked akin to Dubai from a distance & felt the same from marine-drive as well.While CS-staion was like a heritage-spot, LTT station resembled an airport...it does come across as a city with contrasting features.Moreover,the sheer cosmopolitan nature of the city's crowd made me feel like I was in Kolkata only,but 10 years ahead.Indeed,the bustling of the traffic,the breeze from Arabian Sea,the smell of Vada-pao...all such nuances make the composite hodge-podge called Mumbai.....a city so much like other metro's...yet with a character oh her own!