It is always personal

In 1950, on the 26th of January, India kicked out the colonizers for ever. 

The new constitution was adopted and went into effect, the Bastard Raj ended, and the old colonizer was to become an island increasingly irrelevant in the world as it had always been for the most part of human existence!

Even as an Indian, I never cared for the Republic Day celebrations, however.  Because, it was less about the spirit of independence and more about jingoism and the military spectacle.  Exactly the kind that trump wants to see happen here in the US for the Fourth of July!

Decades later, my brother has another reason to mark the 26th of January.  It is the official national day of his adopted country, which continues to have the crown as its figurehead, for reasons beyond my understanding.  Maybe it is a white thing!

January 26th is complicated.

But, those are political. Not personal.

On a strictly personal level, January 26th is a day to celebrate.  I owe my existence, my male chromosome, to an event that happened on the 26th.

It is the day that my father was born in 1930.

Paal paayasam for the 90-year old and for everybody! ;)

Like father, like sons ;)

A dog's life

Congo was a remarkably friendly and wonderful dog.  I was always, always, struck by the absolute lack of any meanness in him.  And always, always, he was happy to see us and to be with us.  If only we humans could have his attitude.

"Was" because Congo died more than a decade ago.  His heath problems began to show up when he simply could not even climb a couple of steps of the staircase.  He could not walk for long.  He started curling up like the proverbial sick dog.

The vet examined him. The verdict was in.  Congo had an enlarged heart that was slowly weakening.  The fellow literally and metaphorically had a big heart.  The vet didn't think Congo had more than a few months left, unless we were willing to spend a whole lot of money on a few options.

Over the weeks, Congo seemed more and more tired.  Sometimes he did not even walk up to welcome me when I came home; instead, he continued to sit in his basket and waited for me to go to him.

At one point, I asked the vet when I would know what the time will be to ease Congo's troubles and put him down.  I still remember the vet's words: "You will know."

About six months after the diagnosis, it was clear that Congo had suffered enough.  A different vet, who made house calls only for the terminally ill pets, came home to administer the euthanizing drugs.  It was a traumatic for us, but a peaceful end for him.

Congo died at home, with his loved ones.  A privilege that we do not extend to the human kind.  Rarely ever do suffering humans get such good deaths.

David Goodall could not get such an option for himself in his home country of Australia.  The 104-year old had to travel to Switzerland in order to get help for his life to end.

On the eve of his death, David Goodall, 104, Australian scientist, father, grandfather and right-to-die advocate, was asked if he had any moments of hesitation, “even fleeting ones.”
“No, none whatever,” Mr. Goodall said in a strong voice. “I no longer want to continue life, and I’m happy to have a chance tomorrow to end it.”

It is a shame that he had to do this in an alien territory.  Far, far away from Australia.

He expressed gratitude to the Swiss and regret at having to leave home for Switzerland, the only country that offers assisted-dying services to foreigners if the person assisting does not benefit from the person’s death. (Only 40 Australians are known to have made the journey, according to Exit International, because of the length of the flight and the cost of the trip.)
“I am very appreciative of the hospitality of the Swiss Federation and the ability that one has here to come to an end gracefully,” Mr. Goodall said, adding, “I greatly regret that Australia is behind Switzerland in this move.”

Even when the person is 104, and wants to call it quits, society does not extend him the treatment that Congo was legally eligible for and which he received.  Some day we will change the way we think about good death.  Soon, I hope.

Can't breathe. Is it the smog or the marriage?

Through all the years that I can recall in my early life in the old country, father sneezing was a daily event.  Loud enough not to miss it.  That was the case in the life that we had in the industrial town and later in the bustling city.

Quite some years ago, during my California life, my parents came for a visit.  My mother appreciated the cleaner air and water.  No sneezing sounds from father.

And that was in one of the dirtiest places in California!  Even now it is!

Years later, they visited Australia after my brother immigrated to the land down under.  My parents could feel the difference via what their bodies were telling them.

The sneezing and everything else returned every time they got back to their own settings.

And where they live is not even the dirtiest city in India.

News reports suggest that China's cities easily out-pollute India's cities.  I shudder to think what a visit for a couple of days will do to my system, especially when I go there from the clean and green Oregon where I live.

Commenting about China's pollution, and whether it is all worth it, is not new here.  (like here or here.)  Yet, I am always blown away by the stories of China's pollution and how people deal with it.

No surprise, therefore, to read this in the Economist:

Chinese emigrants are leaving good jobs, cashing out their high-priced homes (or investment properties) and leaving China’s rat race behind. They are unlikely to find better jobs anywhere else, but the air and water are less polluted where they are going, the social safety-net less frayed and the food safer to eat. And there is no one-child policy.

If they can, people will vote with their feet!

Others are keeping one foot, or one half of their marriage, back in China, unsure they want the slower-paced life abroad. Windson Song, a 35-year-old marketing manager in Beijing, and his wife and baby boy, are close to getting approval for permanent residence in the Canadian province of Quebec, where they meet the requirements for skilled-worker emigration (his wife’s ability to speak French helped). She and the child will go first, and will perhaps fulfil the requirement of living in Canada for three out of four years. Mr Song prefers to stay behind in Beijing, where career opportunities in marketing are much better. He often thinks, though, about his first day in Australia as a student a decade ago. It was a “fairytale world”, he says, with “green trees, colourful flowers”, few people and almost no cars. He wants the option of escaping Beijing’s grim cityscape. But his émigré friends remind him that although (or perhaps because) it is safer, cleaner and less corrupt, life is “really boring” abroad.

Indeed, to the immigrant who cannot adapt to the way of life in these "cleaner" locales, life can be excruciatingly boring. Painful. Depressing. Even in the most scenic settings.  After all, happiness comes from within.

It is not quite easy, it seems, to develop a Solomon's split the kid approach to having one half of the marriage in polluted China and another part in a cleaner paradise.  The split could become real:

A Beijing man is seeking to divorce his wife after she took their son to a tropical island province to escape the capital's notorious smog, saying the long-distance relationship had destroyed their marriage

Now, it is not as if the wife left Beijing and emigrated to Australia:

[Their]son developed serious health problems because of Beijing's air pollution and his wife took the son to the southern resort island of Hainan to escape the haze.
However, Wang's wife did not like Hainan and nor did she like living apart from him, and whenever the two of them met they fought, the report said.
Fed up with this, Wang has filed for divorce in a Beijing court, the newspaper said.
"Smog 'buried' my son's health, and it has 'buried' my marriage," he was quoted as saying.

Who woulda thunk that smog might kill marriages too!

Back in India, father sneezes, and mother coughs.  And they are not bored.

Australia pivots towards the Asian Century

That is the official document from the Australian government on how the country could/should adapt to the changing conditions outside Australia and to the demographic changes within the country. (ht)

I wish the report didn't have a corny map like the one below... looks like Australia is trying to parachute down and away from the dark clouds way above :)

Yes, a good idea to systematically think about how to integrate with Asia where the action will be this century, unlike the approach here in the US, which is to portray China as a villain that we have to be ready to fight against.  Our pivoting is for all the wrong reasons, it seems like.

What a long way from this cartoon that I saw, among others, at the immigration museum in Melbourne!

Good luck to them.

Julia Gillard: More on the Wonder Woman

Two-plus years ago, I wrote impressed with Australia's Julia Gillard, who was leading her party's contest at the elections (and won, of course):

And it is not merely because of the gender, which itself is a huge positive development.  Gillard, unlike politicians all over the developed world who strut around with their spouses and children, and talk about family values, is, well, not married.  Has never been married.  She has, as it once used to be said, shacked up.  And with one who is a hairdresser.  She has no children.  What a contrast from all the politicians we are used to, particularly here in the US.  A wonderfully fresh take on political life.

And the ultimate clincher: Gillard has openly said that she does not believe in god.  Hey, GOP, when do you think you might evolve enough to have such  person among your leadership?  For that matter, hey Dems, how about you?

It is a shame that people have to fit a certain profile in order to be political leaders here in the US.  By and large, a conservative country this is!

Recently, in a couple of different instances, Gillard once again demonstrated that she has quite some cojones.  It was awesome how she dealt with the leader of the opposition:

Gillard – Australia's first female leader – accused Abbott, head of the centre-right Liberal party, of repeated instances of sexism and misogyny, including his description of abortion as "the easy way out", his apparent characterisation of Australian women as housewives doing the ironing, and appearances at political rallies in front of posters urging voters to "ditch the witch".
She told MPs: "The leader of the opposition says that people who hold sexist views and who are misogynists are not appropriate for high office. Well, I hope the leader of the opposition has got a piece of paper and he's writing out his resignation because if he wants to know what misogyny looks like in modern Australia, he doesn't need a motion in the House of Representatives; he needs a mirror."
Abbott had sparked the Labor prime minister's fury by calling for the speaker of parliament, Peter Slipper, to be sacked over a series of sexist and vulgar texts he had sent to a former member of staff. Slipper has since resigned as speaker.
Seized with indignation and pointing her finger across the despatch box, she retorted: "I will not be lectured about sexism and misogyny by this man. And the government will not be lectured about sexism and misogyny by this man. Not now, not ever."

Talk about, pardon the expression, bitch slap! You go, girl!

Soon after that, she made the news, yet again because of the gender issue.  An issue that won't bother male politicians--unless it was President Gerald Ford, who couldn't manage level ground even with flat shoes on.  Gillard fell flat on her face at the Mahatma Gandhi memorial in New Delhi.

Gillard so casually brushed that off; good for her.

Male political leaders, for the most part, do not have to worry about high heels. Or even having to spend time to get themselves ready for work.

"He had very self-consciously sought to eliminate all trivial decision-making from his life, such as what he wears to work," Lewis tells NPR's Renee Montagne about his interviews with the president for his piece in the October issue of Vanity Fair. "So, he says, 'I got rid of all the clothes I have except for gray suits and blue suits, so I don't even have to think about what I put on.'"
Why? The president "started talking about research that showed the mere act of making a decision, however trivial it was, degraded your ability to make a subsequent decision," Lewis says. "A lot of ... the trivial decisions in life — what he wears, what he eats — [are] essentially made for him."

Hillary Clinton was routinely made fun of for her pantsuits, but it is totally ok for Barack Obama to wear nothing but grey and blue suits.

I recall Hillary Clinton remarking--during the primaries--that Obama could allocate time for a workout because he didn't have to set aside time to get ready: no hair-dressing, no makeup, means that he has that much more time at his disposal compared to Clinton.

When Clinton went without her face all made-up, the photos and the jokes went viral, which says a lot about the atrociously different treatment we give men and women:

The caption read “Hillary Au Naturale,” and the photo showed the Secretary of state without makeup except lipstick, wearing black-framed glasses. Her hair fell in natural, unspectacular waves. Clinton was speaking at a news conference in Dhaka, Bangladesh during a trip to promote democracy and development. The event followed a complicated and highly dramatic trip to China.
Of course, if this was a male politician, few — if any — would focus on whether he had primped before his public appearance this deep into an overseas trip. It would only become a headline if Joe Biden suddenly started wearing eyeliner and lipstick.
But we aren’t accustomed to seeing female politicians and politicos without camera-ready makeup and, God forbid, showing wrinkles. 

Joe Biden with an eyeliner and lipstick?  Now you talking :)

Speaking of eyeliner and lipstick, remember this?

Flag burning in India. Look, it is not the American flag! ... but Australia's?

Over the decades, we have gotten used to photographs of protesters around the world burning "Old Glory."  And, often enough, effigies of American presidents as well.

So much so that the only time photos of flags being burned get my attention is when it is not the American flag. Which is how this photo of the Australian flag being burnt makes it an interesting news.

No, the Australian government didn't launch any military operations to incur the wrath of these protesters.  And, no, it is not because of Oprah's gazillion dollar trip down under along with a planeload of adoring fans.

The Aussie flag was burnt because images representing the Hindu goddess of wealth, Lakshmi, were used on swimsuits by Australian designer Lisa Blue

Swift was the response:

A statement attributed to Lisa Blue Swimwear, headquartered in Byron Bay said: "We would like to offer an apology to anyone we may have offended and advise that the image of Goddess Lakshmi will not appear on any piece of Lisa Blue swimwear for the new season, with a halt put on all production of the new range and pieces shown on the runway from last week removed.

"This range will never be available for sale in any stockists or retail outlets anywhere in the world. We apologize to the Hindu community and take this matter very seriously".

(editor: ahem, by reproducing those images here, aren't you attracting criticism as well? 
If it does, it will be no different from the nasty comments that a couple of readers left in response to my post on Islam and modern art!)

This is, yet again, a reminder that religion is alive and well in the public spaces of the world.  I keep telling my students this, and I hope some actually pay attention--economic development correlated with a secular public space in the West, and we assumed it would be the same case everywhere.  But, it is increasingly turning out that economic development and globalization are actually strengthening religions and their institutions.  It is a completely different paradigm.

Here is Timothy Samuel Shah:

Modernization and globalization are bringing increasingly rapid social and moral change to people all over the world, especially those prosperous enough to consume satellite TV and the internet. Such innovations are widely welcomed, but they also help create a pervasive perception among modern publics that traditional ways of life are getting lost -- a perception the Pew Global Attitudes Project has identified in almost every society in the world.
One way some groups try to offset the perceived decline of tradition is to identify with religious revivalism. This dynamic is one factor behind the strong and consistent support for Hindu revivalism among large segments of India's urban middle class, as well as a similar pattern of urban middle-class support for Buddhist revivalism in Sri Lanka.
It is relevant to note here that combining advanced modernity and religiosity is hardly new: The U.S. is probably the most salient and longstanding case of a society that has consistently combined intense modernity with relatively high religiosity, private and public. As we discussed in the article, at least some evidence from both the Pew Research Center and the World Values Survey suggests that both private and public religiosity have, if anything, become more robust in the U.S. in recent years. Religion is showing signs of new private and public vitality in many places in the world, not just among people that are economically insecure and underdeveloped

Thus, the following BBC news doesn't surprise me at all:

The Allahabad High Court has issued notices to the Hindustan Times group for publishing the photos that show female models wearing the swimwear.

Oh well, I might as well end this post on a "cheeky" note :)

Tennis: A new China? Cool!

From the Australian Open:

China’s Li Na could ascend to the final while charming everyone in Melbourne with a hilarious postmatch interview in which she blamed her snoring husband for her lack of sleep, among other humorous anecdotes. That spawned the idea that Li could be the crossover star in tennis that Yao Ming was in basketball, but Greg Couch writes on Fanhouse.com that he doesn’t believe she can capture enough attention in the United States. She will get attention in China, however, where tennis was once so obscure Li had to explain the sport to her mother when she decided to play it.

Tennis is, of course, like gymnastics and diving, an individual sport.  Here is a column I wrote on how China doesn't seem to make it in team sports though.

The wonder woman down under

I am rooting for Julia Gillard, the current Australian prime minister, and her Labor Party to win the upcoming elections.  Primarily because of the freshness she brings to politics.  Just as the Tory/LibDem alliance, if successful, could begin to change politics even outside the UK, Gillard's victory could have significant effects.

And it is not merely because of the gender, which itself is a huge positive development.  Gillard, unlike politicians all over the developed world who strut around with their spouses and children, and talk about family values, is, well, not married.  Has never been married.  She has, as it once used to be said, shacked up.  And with one who is a hairdresser.  She has no children.  What a contrast from all the politicians we are used to, particularly here in the US.  A wonderfully fresh take on political life.

And the ultimate clincher: Gillard has openly said that she does not believe in god.  Hey, GOP, when do you think you might evolve enough to have such  person among your leadership?  For that matter, hey Dems, how about you?

One of my many observations (editor: to whom?) is that the ultimate test for "democracy" would be for a country to elect as its leader a childless lesbian Jew, who is is also an atheist.  Because, this will be such a contrast to the past conditions when such characteristics have even meant death sentences from societies.  If Australia elects Gillard to power, then it will be a remarkable victory for democracy itself--that we have progressed beyond the stereotype of bible-holding white male married to a woman, and with children in tow.  Of course, countries have elected women leaders, but not a childless, never-been-married atheist.

Gillard's story is that she was born in Wales.  I have known two women who are Welsh.  Both are competent and strong-minded women.  I picture them in my mind when I try to imagine Julia Gillard's personality.  Good for the Welsh, and good for the Aussies, eh.

And, Gillard is from Melbourne, which is where my brother and his family live.  So, yet another reason to cheer for Julia Gillard :)

A ht to this piece for making me think more about all these

Kookaburra has the last laugh

Back in school, we used to sing "Kookaburra sits in the old gum tree" as a rhyme.  It was neat to recall that in the context of the court order that the Men At Work had copied that tune for their famous hit song ... this old news segment has a neat comparison of both tunes

"Can I catch a train from Fiji to New Zealand?"

ALDaily had a link to a report on dumb questions that tourists ask, which is from where I got the title of this post.  A hilarious read.
A few excerpts from the questions that were reportedly asked by tourists:

 "Why did they build so many ruined castles and abbeys in England?"
"if they would end up in Holland if they drove through New York's Holland Tunnel."
"what type of car they would need to drive overnight from the Great Barrier Reef to Perth'

BTW, in case you are still wondering where Fiji is, here is a map that shows Fiji relative to New Zealand and Australia :)

As Dubai goes, so goes the recession

For The Register-Guard

Appeared in print: Monday, Dec 14, 2009

DUBAI — I am in Dubai, as I write this, on my way to Tanzania.

My last and only other visit to this city was in the summer of 2004, to spend a couple of days with my brother and his family. And boy, is it a different Dubai since I was here five years ago!

Those were the good times across the planet, and the signs were obvious everywhere in Dubai.

Construction cranes were active despite the intense desert heat and stifling humidity from the Persian Gulf, and flashy cars were competing with each other on the roadways. Shoppers casually were juggling bags full of expensive goods at Dubai’s ritzy shopping malls, compared to which Eugene’s Valley River Center was practically a convenience store.

As one commentator put it back then, “Dubai is like Singapore on steroids.”

I remember feeling awfully poor while in Dubai — a strangely new feeling that, since gaining American citizenship, I was not used to while traveling in Asia. It was terribly humbling that my dollars were, well, not worth all that much.

My brother drove us to the gates of the Burj al Arab hotel—the only self-­proclaimed “seven star” hotel in the world. There, a couple of months earlier and for a $1 million appearance fee, Tiger Woods famously cracked a tee shot from the helipad on the roof.

That day, however, no visitors were allowed past the gates due to some special event, which meant that I did not get to see the fabled architectural luxuries, including gold-plated columns.

It is a different Dubai now. Even the airport is much larger, thanks to the massive new terminal, which was constructed recently for the exclusive use of Emirates Airlines at a cost of more than $4.5 billion.

I am reminded of the taxi driver in Singapore, a few years ago when I was there on my way to India, who was worried that Singapore’s government was not acting fast enough in order to compete with Dubai.

“Even our airport will soon be smaller,” was his complaint. Almost!

But there is a feeling of emptiness even at Dubai’s very spacious airport — as if the steroids are no longer working. It simply does not feel like the fastest growing airport that it has been for a few years now — this despite the fact that according to Dubai Airports, international passenger traffic registered a “growth of 11.7 per cent in October, marking the fifth consecutive month of double-digit growth.”

Perhaps it is reflective of the very reason Dubai is in the news now; it appears that the economic excitement of Dubai was yet another bubble that started deflating along with the global recession, and that finally has burst.

When the world learned that Dubai World — the premier investment vehicle of the ruling al-Maktoum family — would delay payments on the more than $60 billion in debts owed, it was a financial earthquake felt across the global bourses.

Even New York Times columnist Paul Krugman has expressed his concern that we might be at the verge of sliding back into another recession — just as we were beginning to feel confident that the United States and the world were on the path to recovery.

The economic downturn will have immediate implications for the hundreds of thousands of foreign workers and their families. After all, “natives” account for barely a fifth of Dubai’s population; the overwhelming majority are expatriates from all over the world, and the Indian Subcontinent in particular.

Thus, by extension, Dubai’s misfortunes could affect significantly foreign exchange remittances sent to the respective “home” countries. India, for example, gets nearly a quarter of its total remittances from the United Arab Emirates, of which Dubai is a major component.

Personally, the huge difference between now and five years ago is a rather simple one; my brother and his family do not live in Dubai anymore. In hindsight, their decision to immigrate to Australia three years ago, even as Dubai continued on with its go-go-growth, seems immensely prescient. They timed the market well, indeed.

The curious academic in me wishes that I had more than the half a day that I spent in Dubai in order to try to understand the economic craziness. But to paraphrase Robert Frost, I have miles to go — about 2,500 miles more to Tanzania.

Christopher Hitchens kicks up dust down under

I am not referring to his essay on Sydney's dust storms, but the following discussion:

The Australian dust-storm: "Oh my gosh"

The massive dust-storms that has been described with many phrases including, "eerie," "bizarre," "surreal," and "martian." This video (HT) shows how quickly it went from a Mars-like orange to total blackness all in a a matter of seconds. The woman's "oh my gosh" captures my feelings on watching the video:


The Boston Globe has a fantastic collection of photos from this freakish dust storm.  Reuters has an interesting colelction of Q/A related to the dust storm.  Excerpt:
IS THE DUST STORM LINKED TO CLIMATE CHANGE?
Weather scientists are reluctant to directly link climate change with extreme weather events such as storms and droughts, saying these fluctuate according to atmospheric conditions, but green groups link the two in their calls for action to fight climate change.
Dust storms in Australia, the world's driest inhabited continent with a vast desert-like outback interior, are not uncommon. Central and eastern Australia is a major global source of atmospheric dust, say weather experts. But dust storms are usually restricted to the inland of Australia. Occasionally, during widespread drought they can affect coastal areas. Australia is battling one of its worst droughts and weather officials say an El Nino is slowly developing in the Pacific which will mean drier conditions for Australia's eastern states.
Before the Sydney dust storm, one of the most spectacular storms swept across Melbourne in February 1983, late in the severe El Nino drought of 1982/83. The extended dry period of the 1930s and 1940s generated many severe dust storms, culminating in the summer of 1944/45 when on several occasions dust in Adelaide was so thick that street lighting had to be turned on.

Real news, versus the Onion News Network

My students, and readers of this blog (ed: really? there are readers?) know how much I am a fan of The Onion. But, some times, real news items are so outlandish that they confirm that it is only a very fine line between the Onion's satire and the real world itself. Here is one such example, which one would think that The Onion made it up, but, alas, is a real world news:

A teenage girl agreed to have under-age sex because she wanted to lose her virginity before the Large Hadron Collider caused the end of the world, it has been reported.

I would laugh this off, but for the fact that this is a report in the Telegraph, and it is not an April 1st issue either. How unfortunate that scientific illiteracy results in horrible outcomes!

The Telegraph further notes that:

[Police] in Brisbane, Australia believe that the teenage girl was so scared by the doomsday speculation that she agreed to have under-age sex with a boy in their school lavatories.

Her fears came to light after their sex acts were filmed by another boy at the school, with the footage circulated among pupils via their mobile phones.

Police have launched an investigation under child pornography laws, although The Courier-Mail newspaper reported that they did not expect to bring any charges.

Oh boy!

BTW, if you are curious about the status of the Large Hadron Collider, which came to a halt after a great deal of hype about what the scientific knowledge that it would add:

Unfortunately on 19th September a serious fault developed damaging a number of superconducting magnets. The repair will required a long technical intervention which overlaps with the planned winter shutdown. The LHC beam will, therefore, not see beam again before September 2009.

Given that we are already almost at mid-September, ..... I wonder whether the re-start will not be for a while?

Rationing through "Medicare for All"

A few years ago, when I was at CalState, the Ethics Institute brought Peter Singer to campus. Oh boy, was there a crowd! It was not because there was a huge fan base; there were lots and lots of people upset with his arguments that did not agree with their interpretations of life, death and how to deal with them. I doubt whether the campus ever had such a security presence for a visiting philosopher :-)

To his credit, Singer does not shy away from controversies, and the recent NY Times magazine essay is an example of that. In discussing how "rationing" has unfairly become a dirty word in the healthcare debate, Singer asks:

Is there any limit to how much you would want your insurer to pay for a drug that adds six months to someone’s life? If there is any point at which you say, “No, an extra six months isn’t worth that much,” then you think that health care should be rationed.

A simple question, right? How much are you willing to pay? We do this individually all the time, whether it is for the pets at home, or for the humans we love. Yet, this is practically an unspeakable topic, and how we arrive at these decisions is supposedly not because of dollar calculations.

It is something similar to a question I typically ask my intro class students when we discuss population. I ask them how many children they think they will have. Most think it will be 1, 2, or 3. I ask them then "why not six?" Their responses are, say, "I won't have time for that many", or "I won;t be able to go on vacations with that many kids" .... to which I then state that this is nothing but cold economic calculations: children are expense items that take money away from other possible spending options. We, therefore, "ration" kids.

Singer writes:

The debate over health care reform in the United States should start from the premise that some form of health care rationing is both inescapable and desirable. Then we can ask, What is the best way to do it?

Indeed.

Rising from the ashes: more on the US dollar

Never before has economics interested me on such a daily basis! Mark Twain was a genius, indeed, when he commented that he never let schools interfere with his education. That is how I feel with the financial crisis--it has provided me with a wonderful opportunity to learn more about economics, but without having to sit through horribly dull and boring lectures with pretentious differential equations to unnecessarily complicate simple ideas.

I mean, the story of the exchange rates of the American dollar is simply fascinating. The short story, I mean--the story just over the last two months. A year ago when we visited Australia, the American dollar was all fluff. We were sorry ass Americans trying to hold on to our wallets, which quickly ran dry. And now, the Australian currency

closed in US trade at US61.78 cents, down US4.5 cents on Friday night and 37 percent from the high of US98.49 cents it reached three months ago. The slump in
the currency has confounded even the most seasoned of market commentators. The dollar has even been strongly outperformed by Iceland's hapless krona and Brazil's real over the weekend.

I love it when I read something like how even the economic experts are confounded. It is just an euphemism that actually means nobody knows a damn thing and we merely bullshit all the time!

More on the Booker Prize winner

The winner is a global citizen ... The Guardian notes that:

Adiga was born in Chennai in 1974 and was raised partly in Australia.
Having studied at Columbia and Oxford universities, he became a journalist, and
has written for Time magazine and many British newspapers. He lives in
Mumbai.

And, hey, I am from Chennai. My brother lives in Australia. A bunch of relatives live in Mumbai. .... We are all global citizens, and the world will be a better place if we adopted that framework.

But then, Rudyard Kipling reminded us that despite all the exposure, we choose to affiliate ourselves with a much smaller part of the world. He wrote:

Each to his choice, and I rejoice
The lot has fallen to me
In a fair ground—in a fair ground—
Yea, Sussex by the sea!

I hope things get better soon

It appears that our economic crisis and the bailout plan are in front and center across the global stage.

Last week, my brother, who is an accountant in Australia, instant-messaged me, and soon after the hello shifted to questions like “are more people losing jobs?” and “how much will Uncle Sam spend?”

It is not new to me anymore that my parents and siblings are like most of the world when it comes to how closely they follow major developments here in the United States. Of course, over the past decade, America has been in the news a lot, either by its own doing or otherwise.

It seems like more often than not events here tend to worry my parents. When I called them soon after the catastrophic events of September 11th, my parents sounded as sad and distraught as any American was on that fateful day—perhaps even more than the average American. And then dad suggested that I shave my beard and not go out anywhere—just in case some crazy people took out their frustrations on me.

And when the internet-economy bubble burst, dad suggested that I find a job in Singapore or Australia because their economies were booming, and because teaching in a university paid a lot more in those countries than here in America. My brother was confident: “now that you are an American citizen, you can earn more than double what others would get paid here.” There was a silver lining in that dark cloud: American citizenship commanded a significant economic premium!

Now, my parents and my brother are following the news about our economic crises, more so because the metaphorical tsunami waves are beginning to show up in their countries too. I asked my brother how things were in Australia and his response was, “ok, so far.” While Australia seems to be managing well for now, neighboring New Zealand has officially become the first country in the Asia-Pacific region to enter into a recession, with Japan and Singapore as most likely to follow suit. Credit is tightening in India, but it helps the retired folks like my parents because they are able to get higher interest rates now for their deposits.

My sister, who is keen on her daughter coming to the US for a doctorate in computer science, is concerned about the slowdown for completely different reasons: my niece has a fabulous offer to work in India for an American firm and might, therefore, be tempted to forego higher studies in America.

What is fantastic in all this familial feedback about the American economy is that there is only a feeling of “I hope things get better soon.” No feeling of schadenfreude—the German expression that describes the pleasure people enjoy in the misfortune suffered by others. Even the major newspapers in India seem to only express concern and worries about the crisis and how it is handled, and rare are commentaries that delight in our misfortunes.

A contrast to such a background was the recent comment from the finance minister of Germany, Peer Steinbrück, who lived up to the geographic origin of the phrase schadenfreude. In his remarks to the Bundestag—the German parliament—the finance minister proclaimed that America would soon be finished as an economic superpower, and that the US should show more humility.

At least in the public sphere, the likes of the German finance minister are in the minority. On the other hand, it appears that there is still enough punch in that old saying that when America sneezes, the rest of the world catches a cold.

We are a long way from being finished as an economic superpower. However, that possibility always remains. After all, the superpowers of yesteryears—from the Roman Empire to Spain and the UK—are economic laggards now. For a few brief years in the 1980s, Japan seemed poised to challenge us, and now we feel China’s speed.

I am hoping, and a tad confident as well, that this, too, shall pass. Then, my dad will not worry about my economic future. And, more importantly, German politicians will give up their schadenfreude!

Cricket, Don Bradman, and Babe Ruth

Yesterday was Don Bradman's cenetenary. He was a legend even among the legends of cricket. It is interesting how he and Ruth were quite contemporary, and they both left deep and wonderful marks on the respective games they played. Ruth was born in 1895, and Bradman in 1908. Ruth's final game was in 1935. Bradman played his final test match in 1948.

Every cricket batsman has The Don as the ultimate, as much as The Babe is the ultimate to every Little League kid.