Commercialization makes it liberal

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Christmas is the time for shopping, parties, lunches, dinners and decorations. It is also the time for observations, and one of which is

Christmas is the most popular festival, celebrated across the world in all the countries and among people of all the religions

People of all country, of all religion were wishing each other ‘Happy Christmas’. The festive spirit could be seen from USA to Singapore with even the shopping malls in Middle East draped in Christmas decorations. One of them even had an artificial skiing track fully decorated with Christmas items. It didn’t matter whether there was snow in Singapore or too much of it in Finland, the Christmas was celebrated by equal enthusiasm. Santa Claus from Lappland or Santa Claus popping from coke bottles was equally busy.

So why this mass scale phenomenon of Christmas, why this Christian festival has transcended national boundaries and religions? The answer lies in the same fact which is most of the time despised. Yes, commercialization. It is this which has brought this change. Today not every home will have little Jesus in cradle, or a highly decorated tree but they will still buy and give gifts and they will have their special lunch or dinner. Every corporate office situated anywhere in world will have Christmas parties. When the industry saw this potential of profit from Christmas, they popularized the festival. Their power packed advertisement made everyone aware of it; their sales promotion on the occasion allured everyone to buy things. In fact people most of the time wait for Christmas season to buy things, for this is the time when the stores will have their best merchandise.

Someone will argue that this all has killed the real Christmas, but it also has popularized it. It has made Christmas one of the most accepted religious festival. I think this tells us about other religions as well. The most commercial religions are also the most liberal one.

Bad Luck Gets Lucky !!

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Your bad luck needs just one chance to get lucky, this is all that I can say at the end of an eventful day.

The Day

It was the last day of Christmas break, actually the holiday was till yesterday but all of us had taken a day off for tuesday as well. It started just like any other day, woke up late, made my breakfast and was surfing and blogging. I thought of making lunch, took out the chicken from the fridge to thaw, shifted my laptop to kitchen table to surf as I prepare the lunch and then went for shower. After shower, I had to do the weekly laundry, which I had postponed for today. Our washing machine is kept in the basement, and is used by the six flats (3 flats in each floor) of our building and we pay 2 Euros for each wash.

The Event

I was thinking of many things, scheduling the rest of day in mind, took the laundry basket and stepped out. I was out, the door clicked and closed, at that very moment,I got the shock. I had left the key inside!!!

It took a moment for me to comprehend the situation, and then the reality sunk on me. I had locked myself out, the incident which you will find mostly on TV soaps. I didn’t know what to do? It was a grave situation and my brain started racing.

The Aftermath

I remembered once during our office chat, one of the colleagues was saying that if you lose your key, the house company will come and provide you one, for a charge. So there was a ray of hope, but how to contact them? I didn’t have my phone with me, not even my wallet, worse I was in a T shirt and Capri with pair of slippers on my feet. The temperature outside would not have been more than minus 10 C. I was on the stairs inside the building so the area was heated. The only persons I know in this town are my colleagues, and their phone numbers are stored in my phone (ah, so good were the days, when we had to remember the phone numbers rather than saving them in phone memory). Out of the remaining 5 flats in the building, in the last 15 months, I have not seen any neighbour. Though, occasionally I hear the doors being opened and close. Since it was a working day, so there was little chance any of them would be in their home at noon.

Groundwork

I took my chance and knocked on the flat opposite to mine, no-A6. Nothing happened, after few minutes I could hear some one opening the door and a guy was there. Great after 15 months, I was face to face with one of my neighbour; he was a guy around the age of 20. I explained to him that I live in the flat opposite and have locked myself out. He understood me but was not able to speak English, so he called his girl. They were a couple living there. Luckily the girl could speak English and she told to me the house company people can come and open the door for me. It was not difficult for her to understand that I don’t even have the phone with me, she volunteered to call he house manager from her cell phone, and talk on my behalf as I can’t speak Finnish. She called the number, but it was not of house manager, seems the house maintenance company had changed. I had the number of our house manager but in my phone. Whenever I need to talk to my house manager, my nice colleagues do it for me, and so I didn’t have the faintest clue about the number. We checked in the notice board, the number was correct. The issue was still hanging fire. I was feeling so embarrassed to land myself in this situation. I think the girl sensed this, and said, they too had once locked themselves out this summer.

The Solution

We were now discussing what to do? Just then an old man entered from the door of the building, carrying many of grocery bags. I discovered, he also was one of our neighbour, infact next door to me, no –A5. The girl explained to him, in Finnish, the situation and he pointed out to a different number on the notice board. He called the number from his phone and voila! it was our house manager. She replied that someone will drive there and the charge is 10 Euros, for night time it is 20 Euros. Money was the last thing on my mind.

Result

15 minutes later, the guy from House Company came. He had a bunch of keys with him and I was praying that he does not ask me for ID. He didn’t, since I am the only Indian in this whole town, so the guy was pretty sure the flat belonged to me. He opened the door and I was so happy to get in, and thus the whole issue was solved.

Learning

I knew of the possibility of locking myself out, so I always made sure to carry the keys, even if I step outside to throw the garbage. Never in past 15 months, I have forgotten it, but once was enough for my bad luck to get lucky. No problem, atleast I got to know my neighbours.

Movie Review - Closer

Well, I for once, don’t feel good while writing about one more movie. All of you readers, you will get an impression that I watch movies more than doing any other thing. I won’t blame you, considering the number of movie posts I am churning. But this movie is a special one, so, I could not contain myself.

This movie is the perfect reply to all those, mushy, out of reality, romantic movies, which ends up with the couples living happily thereafter. This movie takes you a step further to give insight into what happens after they start living happily thereafter. The actors in the movie are not glamorous movie stars, but treacherous individuals. There is emotion in the movie but only to exploit those emotions as weakness in the power play. The movie is mayhem of emotion, love, trust and honesty. In short, it’s a disturbing and almost real story movie.

This movie is love story of two couples, where there is everything but love. Each of the character is infidel who betrays, and gets betrayed. Who instigates infidelity, and cry when the same is done to them. It is about game of infidelity and possession played to demonstrate power. It is a movie about always wanting to have something different than what you already have. This movie will demonstrate how much love hurts - in ways how those whom we love can hurt us, and also in way how can we hurt those who love us ?

This movie can be confusing sometimes as the scenes are played back and forth in time period of 4 years. The story has been adopted from the stage play so the dialogues are quite frank and strong, for example “Heart is nothing, but fist draped in blood”; but there are no melodramas.

The tag line for the movie is perfect

“If you believe in love at first sight, you will never stop looking”

Merry Christmas

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Wishing you all

Merry Christmas!!


Hvyaa Joulua !!

Data Management

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Of many things about Finland, one of them which impress me most is their efficient data management. Full details of each and every person, citizen or temporary resident like me, are maintained in a centralized location.

About phone numbers, here they are portable. One can change the service provider and still keep the number and there is a directory enquiry for the cell phone number as well. I am not sure but I think your phone number is updated at the ‘maistraatti’ (town manager’s office kind of) as well. I experienced this twice.

Last summer, my ADSL connection went down and I filed the complaint; they said that there was some major problem and the broadband connection for whole of the town as down. Next day around evening, I got a call on my cell phone! This was strange because I had never given my cell phone number to the service provider. The time I had applied for broadband I didn’t have cell phone; it takes around two weeks to get the phone connection. The next incident happened recently, a day before I was going to Stockholm. I needed Swedish Kroner, so I went to my local bank to get the forex. I asked for 400 Kroner and when the receipt came there was some extra charge of 3.5 Euros, I asked the teller but she was not able to speak English, so I came back. In office my colleagues told me that it was the commission for forex, which they should not have deducted as I had my account there. I decided to take my chance and called the bank on phone and explained the situation, they asked me to come back and the charge will be reversed. I was a bit busy that day and 3.5 Euros was not that amount to risk a walk in the shivering winter, so I forgot it. Around 4 in the evening I got call from bank, again on cell phone! , like Internet I had not given my cell phone number at the time of opening the bank account. So where are these people pulling my phone number?

The other rule in Finland is that if you are changing your address, then you need to inform at one place, either at post office or at the maistraatti. They will update your information and all other places like banks, Phone Company etc will get the new address, you don’t need to do anything(this makes me think that does the town manager has record of my bank account as well?). I guess all this information is maintained along with your social security number. You can even search for your name online in the population register, all this while at no time your privacy being compromised.

In Finland the traffic fine is according to your annual income, so whenever you get a ticket, the police pull out your income data from the tax office and decide your fine.

It might be easy to maintain the data as population of Finland is only 5.2 million, but it helps in great way to keep other process streamlined and efficient.

Christmas Lunch

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Time flies fast, after celebrating my first Christmas in the land of Santa, other is round the corner. The Christmas festivity is at its height, one can see people shopping, carrying gifts and going to their loved ones to deliver them. Everything has been draped in the Christmas spirit, even the office space.

After having the pre-Christmas party in the office in November, couple of days back we had the Christmas lunch. It was the traditional Finnish Christmas lunch, and we had it in one of the local restaurant (ravintola).
I got one picture of the lunch table; since it is taken from cell phone camera it does not show things in greater detail.



The ‘Christmas’ lunch had the following items

Smoked Salmon, Fresh Salted Salmon, Rosolli Salad, Pear cubes with blue cheese, baked Ham, Liver pate, chicken as well as turkey pate, potato and carrot casserole. The breads were Christmas bread (apple bread, I guess) and rye bread. The dessert was cheese with crackers, fruit salad, pastry (though I didn’t see it, but I guess it was there) with coffee.
Rosolli salad consists of potato, carrot and beetroot. Tt is accompained with fish salad, which is fish(herring) piece kept in a sweet sauce months before Christmas.

The traditional Christmas drink is Glogg, it is drink made with red wine, sugar, raisins, cinnamon, cloves and almonds. Sometimes a splash of vodka is added. It has a non alcoholic variety as well, where the red wine is replaced by fruit concentrate. Glogg goes with ginger cookies or ginger bread men.
(the O in 'Glogg' is actually 'O umluat',I have English keyboard so I can't type it)

The last thing, I wanted after the lunch was to come to office again. But it was a day well spent.

I always find it so interesting to experience different countries, people and cultures. I hope to keep these memories long after I am gone from Finland.

WTO debate

While I was blog-hopping today, I came across this blog by Pasi. This is a debate on the recent WTO talks, where the developed and developing countries are having a face-off, since Doha meet in 2001. He talks about reducing agricultural subsidies by EU and USA to which I agree. But he goes on to write

“On the other hand, I wouldn’t feel too proud for being from sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America or some other area in which countries rely heavily on protectionism either. Some of those countries are even worse than the EU, they blatantly refuse to even talk about lowering their own trade barriers because we won’t cut ours. It’s almost like mercantilism never died! The poorest countries in the world raise their trade barriers on average three to four times as high as we do here in the prosperous West. In India some import tariffs are even way over four hundred per cent! It’s like forcing people to have to either buy expensive goods or no goods at all instead of buying cheap goods would make them more prosperous, what the… I’d be really ashamed if I were from one of those countries and didn’t move out already.”

The gist is this, he believes that protectionism by developing countries is equally to blame.
I disagree here, so I present some facts.

I won’t term the support by EU and USA as subsidy, this actually reduces the real extent, it should be termed as “trade-distorting support”.

USA pays its cotton farmers 72cents per lb, no matter what is the price on the world market, whereas a farmer in Africa gets 32cents per lb. The total figure of agriculture subsidy by USA is $12 bn and $53 bn by EU. This encourages the farmer from these countries to grow more, thereby dragging down the international market price.

West African nations produces high quality cotton at a cost of 31cents per lb, whereas the cost of production of same cotton in USA is 68cents per lb. Still, USA is the largest exporter of cotton due to its export subsidy.At a minimum, it requires 119% of subsidy ! If the richer nations are giving subsidy to sell products (which are most costly to produce) at a cheaper rate, then the other countries have to put up import tariff to protect their produce.

In a free market theory, the one which has lesser cost of production will be the gainer. So if the developed countries does stop the export subsidy, we will drop down the import tariff. Let the market decide whose product is going to be sold.

These subsidies most of the time drop the international price to less than the cost of production. According to Oxfam, when US export of cotton went up from 17% to 43%, the international price of cotton has fallen by half. So what shall African farmers do? their government does not have that much of money to subsidise them, hence import tariff.

The International Cotton Advisory committee says that developing nations have lost $23 billion over past four years due to western subsidies.

Take this example:-

30 years ago Europe was net importer of Sugar and today it is second largest exporter, considering the fact that sugar in Europe is produced in cold countries like Finland from sugar beets. The tropical countries which are better suited to produce sugar such as Haiti, Mozambique and Thailand lose out in price war.

What next? Banana, it can be grown artificially in greenhouse, so EU can pay the farmers in Finland to grow Banana, and then subsidise it to be sold at a cheaper rate than Caribbean countries. And when those countries support their production by restrictions, they are to blame.

Some raw facts:-

World Bank chief economist Nicholas Stern estimates that a European cow receives $2.50 a day in subsidies while 75% of African live on less than $ 2 a day.
Burkina Faso received $10mn in US aid in 2002 and lost an estimated $13.7 million in exports because of US cotton subsidies.

Pasi further writes as

“No, no one can choose their place of birth. But they can try to influence it while they are there. Ultimately it’s the fault of the local government that a country and its people are poor.”

I agree, we should influence.
Agriculture in India support about 70% of our population and comprises 21 % of our GDP.

But why don’t the Americans ask their government which spends tax payers money to subsidies farm sector which employs 4% of American population and comprise 4% of US GDP ?

It is clear, developed countries are using revenue from Industrial and services sector to prop up their agricultural sector. So we are controlling the non-agriculture market to support our Farm sector.

Everything in world is ‘quid pro quo’ , you don’t distort the trade in agriculture and we won’t distort it in non-agricultural trade.

P.S.
1.All the data and facts, are compiled from authoritative sources,yet, if anyone wants to know about the source, please drop a comment to this effect.
2.The term 'We', wherever used, refers to developing countries.

Weekend Update

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Listening to soft music, while lazing after Sunday dinner, I guess, is the perfect time to post update for the weekend. So, here I am,

It was an easy Saturday for me, getting up at 10.30 and enjoying the morning tea without any hurry of getting ready for office. Not really. When I looked at the thermometer it was minus 14 C, seems temperature had a total free fall in the night, a little more and the thermometer would have fallen down. I am now realizing that my Saturday trips to library would have to be cut off, courtesy the temperature. Anyway, I managed to drag myself out from the apartment, for the library. I had one incentive as well; there was this local Christmas market in the castle behind library, which I wanted to visit.
When I reached the library, I found that my hair had frozen; much like icicles, only they were not hanging down. I dare not run hand on my hair, lest they would have cracked and fallen down. After borrowing two books, I went to see the Christmas market. It was much like countryside market, with Christmas merchandise on display. There were little Santas, Christmas lights, hats, traditional Christmas breads, decorative items and beads. The local press was also there, the reporter was conversing with the ladies behind the counters and photographer was taking snaps of their shops.

In related news, the lake has started to freeze

Sunday was spent in weekend chores, like doing the laundry and cleaning the apartment.

Now movies of the weekend,

1.Into the Blue - A total waste of time. The only thing worth seeing in the movie was numerous scenes of bikini clad Jessica Alba and the underwater life of the Bahamian coast. And Veera, yeah, they were doing underwater photography! I find it hard to believe that a plane loaded with dope, will crash in the sea and no one would get to know about it. Except several years later, when those amateur divers will find it totally preserved for them.

2.A Lot Like Love – Far better than the earlier movie. Impressive performance by Ashton Kutcher and Amanda Peet. Not the usual romantic movie where boy meets girls – some differences- they get together, but it took five ‘getting-together’ in seven years for the happy ending. The chemistry was sure to have some result if not precipitation. My favourite - the scene in the Japanese restaurant where the water spiting action was going on. Ah! Got to love that one.

3.Der Untergang (Downfall) – The German movie with English subtitles. It pictures the last ten days of Hitler and is about the downfall of Third Reich. The most hated man of the history is aptly shown as sadist, conscienceless and deeply in love with his authority, hence usage of word ‘Nazi’ in modern English. The most chilling scene was of the mother killing her 8 children by crushing cyanide capsules in their mouth, after making them sleep unconscious. The movie was good and connected with the book I am reading. It did brush up the little Deutsch I know.

4.Hostage – One of the better movies from Bruce Willis. I had seen half of this movie when I was flying from Paris to Mumbai and wanted to complete. A better thriller than those ‘Die Hards’. For once, Willis is not the super cop but one individual troubled cop. I liked the acting of the seven year old boy and also love that gizmo’fied house.

Books – Out of the two books borrowed, I could start only one.

Fateless – by Nobel Laureate Imre Kertesz, I was waiting to lay my hands on this book. It is about a Hungarian Jewish boy’s experiences in German concentration camps and later when the war is over. Will write about this book after I complete it.

The second book is so-popular ‘Gone With The Wind’, nothing has to be said about this book.

So that's how it was.

Movies

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For lack of anything better to write, I shall talk about the movies which I have seen in recent past. I don’t get to see movies as they are released, so most of the times, I am several years behind the release dates.

Couple of weekends back, I saw two movies back to back and I realized later, that their titles make such a funny combination. They were “Mean Girls” and “Bad Boys- II”. I know "Bad Boys II" was actually sponsored by some Aspirin manufacturers, yet, I had to see it. I had seen Bad Boys I about four years back and after saving myself for a year I gave in to the temptation. Of course I had the strip of Aspirin with me and generously consumed them. “Mean Girls” is based on high school life, similar to Drew Barrymore’s “Never been Kissed”. The previous Barrymore movie being “50 first dates”, the other numerical title which I saw in recent past was “How to Lose a Guy in 10 days” featuring Kate Hudson and Matthew McConaughey.

Yesterday I saw the movie “Blow” which is third in series of drug movies for me. Previous ones being, “Scarface” and “The Untouchables”. I saw “Scarface” as I like the acting of Al Pacino who was superb in “God Father“. “Blow” has Johnny Depp and Penelope Cruz. I don’t know what Tom Cruise liked in Penelope Cruz ? may be her being Spanish. Tom Cruise reminds me of the movie “A Few Good Men”. I had stopped watching Tom Cruise movies after the “Top Gun” but with “A Few Good Men”, I feel Cruise has re-established himself. “A Few Good Men” has got excellent direction and keeps the audience glued for the whole duration. It is totally centered on one issue and there is not a single scene which is unrelated. I keep this movie in the genre of “Chariots of Fire”. I am trying to get one other movie of Cruise, “The Client” based on the novel of John Grisham.

When we speak of Cruise how can Nicole Kidman not come in mind, her last movie which I saw was “The Interpreter”, a compact suspense thriller with Sean Penn. Sean Penn has shown some good acting with his role of pathetic loser in “The Assassination of Richard Nixon”, this movie has similarity to “Taxi Driver”.

Christmas is the time for romantic movies like “When Harry Met Sally”, “Serendipity”, “The Eternal Sunshine of Spotless Mind” and the recent one “Love Actually”. Out of the above four, I still have “When Harry Met Sally” and “The Eternal Sunshine of Spotless Mind” with me and I am planning to see them in the holidays. “Serendipity” has John Cusack and cute Kate Beckinsale. The other movie of Cusack I saw recently was “High Fidelity” which has cameo by Catherine Zeta-Jones. Catherine’s award winning movie “Chicago” was so boring that I could not go beyond the first CD.

One of the best movies which I can see only once in a month is “Schindler’s List”, this movie always makes me go numb. The other such movie, and this too based upon real facts is “Hotel Rwanda”, where the protagonist Paul Rusesabagina saves many Tutsi people.

The post is getting long so I should stop. But I would like to mention this 21 year old promising actress Scarlett Johansson. I have seen two of her movies and liked both of them, “In Good Company” and “Lost in Translation”.

A Day

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Since I am not in mood to write, here is a photo blog. Please click on the individual picture to see it better.

In December it is a privilege to see Sun coming up in the sky, well 'up' is wrong word, it never comes up, just keeps hanging above the horizion for about half hour and then it goes.



You can see how low the Sun is, from these pictures





Here the Sun could not come above even the apartment



Only a part of the town gets the Sunlight



Now this is the damn place where I slipped. The tread marks made when the ice was slushy helped in generating friction today.



and now today's temperature

First slip of winter

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Today the temperature is in positive, plus 1 or 2 C and I don’t like it. If it is winter, the temperature should be in negative especially after week or two of minus 4 and 5 C. I have a perfect reason to rant about positive temperature.

Whenever it becomes positive the snow on the street, particularly the sidewalks becomes ice and hence slippery. Though the city workers grate the sidewalks by spreading pebbles but there are some areas which are always left. These are those places where you are most likely to slip while walking. Last year I slipped in almost five or six such places in the town and I remember each of them. I am determined to save myself from slipping at those places this time, come whatever may be. This morning while I was walking down to my office, I reached one such dreaded spot, I was unaware, thinking something and it happened. I slipped there! The only solace in slipping in Finland is that there would be no one in the streets to laugh at you, they are always deserted. But it was so bad, I had marked that place, and I slipped at the exact same place, how pitiful for me?

I don’t know why the city workers don’t grate those places, when they even grate the personal driveways? If it is not possible for their vehicle to negotiate those corners then atleast they can throw some of their salt there.

When I narrated this to one of my friend he said “even a donkey falls in the same pit only once “ arrrrrghhhhhhhh !@#$ but a donkey does not lives in Finland !!!

I wish I don’t slip anymore and I am not going to buy those caterpillar boots. Even if I slip so what, I was not born to live in a polar country. I can still ski like them; it is other thing that I need to fall every time to stop as I can’t make a snow plough.

Back in town

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So I am back in town after spending the weekend in Stockholm. It was a good visit and a great contrast to the summer time when I was last there. But it happens with any other European country. It was surprisingly warm in Stockholm, the temperature might be around 0 or -1 C and there was no snowfall. There wasn’t any snow on the street either, though I could see heaps and mounds of snow here and there.

Like last time, I found Stockholm to be so different, a vibrant cosmopolitan city bustling with energy. People walking hastily for catching their subway or train, no one turning their head if they hear some one talking in English. The downtown still alive late in evening, with shops opens much beyond 4 pm. It feels good to see people around you; for many of you it won’t sound a deal but after you have lived in Finland for one year, trust me you will love crowded places. I also like the extensive reach and frequency of subway in Stockholm and the highly decorated subway stations. Almost all the stations have artistic paintings and carvings.

The only thing which I don’t like is paying in fifties and hundreds of Kroner. Eat one burger and pay in sixties rather than paying in five or six here in Finland. Get a one way ticket for the subway and pay thirty Kroner, here you way 3 Euros. You need to carry a fat wallet there. Though I being from India have no right to complain, there we pay in hundreds of Rupees.

This time the security was quite high in evening of 10th December, police cars were parked everywhere, other police cars were racing down the streets blaring their sirens, a chopper was patrolling the sky; all I think for the Nobel Prize ceremony.

I didn’t see much of Christmas decorations there, other than the usually decorated shopping malls. The central station was decorated with bright lights though.

Stockholm

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I am leaving for Stockholm today, will be back by Sunday evening. There will be no respite from snowfall for me; the forecasted weather for Stockholm does have predictions for snowfall.

Have a nice weekend all of you

Old Posts

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Though I have several things in my head which I want to clear by writing, but this week is kind of busy and stressful for me. Still I can’t restrain myself from surfing the internet to read the newspapers and the blogs I frequent.

I managed to squeeze some time but I spent that in reading old posts from my blog. The last one year has been the most eventful, dramatic and unforgettable (not in a good way) for me and all my thoughts are subtly poured out in those posts. I found lot of typos in my old posts and wanted to correct them but I could ‘proof-read’ only few of them. It reflects very badly if there are typos in your posts, and I think I will now make a conscientious effort to correct my old posts, though after this week.

It is surprising that how some incidents in life can affect you? It will change not only your conscious but subconscious behaviour. It will change your thinking, speaking and writing habit. Much like it gets beneath and hits your psyche and I have found changes of this proportion in me. Good or bad I don’t know but you never remain the same. Ah, I forgot this; it will even change your internet surfing habit. Earlier I used to indulge in those ‘IM’ chats which I don’t do know, hell, I even stopped the text messaging. I also used to know those cool ‘MSN English’ used in IM and text messages but now they are buried deep inside me. I have given lot of happiness to ‘you all’ who wanted me to be crestfallen. I even exceeded the expectations, customer delight you see. I have left ‘that’ world which rightfully belonged to you all, though a little late but I finally stand defeated. But let me be very frank, I never thought I had won anything, and what you all wanted to happen to me, I always saw that day coming. My only regret, I could not be there with you all to celebrate my demolishment, the human in me does not allow that. But rest assured, I am in different world now, where I don’t wish anything and have nothing which I fear to lose. All what is left will get interred with me.

God bless and always be there for you all.

P.S - It is a bad idea to read the old posts in your blog

Independence Day - Suomi

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Today Suomi (Finland) is celebrating its 88th independence day.



Happy Independence Day to Finland, and all the Finns, anywhere in world. Finnish flag,one of my favourite, has the pristine beauty of blue and white, depicting sky and snow. The Finnish national anthem is also sweet even though I don’t understand it. The Finnish history is fascinating, and has tales of how Finns have valiantly fought for their freedom and later to preserve it? How they steered their nation whenever they had hard times? How they pulled their country from the great depression of 1990 to world’s most competitive economy? It tells about their resilience and their love for country.



Celebrate, dear Finns, you all deserve it.

Planning and Execution

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Planning and Execution are both quite important aspect, one decides what has to be done and other translates it into reality. Which is more important? It is difficult to choose one, because they so totally complement each other. But my personal view is that ‘execution’ is more demanding, more adventurous and thrilling. There is nothing more delightful than to execute a plan to its expected result. There is nothing more satisfying than to think of every minute detail, find out alternatives, do an analysis of the options and then go for it. There is nothing more interesting than to read the details of a well executed plan.

The only reason I am fan of John Grisham is because of this, the meticulous details of execution in each of his books are so interesting that one will be compelled to finish the entire book in one go. His books like “The Firm” or “The Partner” has stories of flawlessly executed plans which spans across continents and different agencies like banks, intelligence agents, politicians etc. The way Grisham describes every little intricate details and the finesse with which the protagonist moves about achieving the plans is awesome.

The movie “Black Hawk Down” is about UN army operation in Mogadishu, involving American forces and fighters loyal to Mohamed Farrah Aidid. The operation was not successful and 18 American soldiers lost their lives. I don’t know whether the actual happening was same as shown in the movie, but it showed Major General William Garrison controlling the entire operation from the base camp, with images beamed right to several monitors in his tent. No job in this world could be better than to get an opportunity to execute an operation that way. The operation failed, and my view is that execution failed because risk management was not done. The plan was optimistic rather than being realistic. Whatever, the movie is worth watching again and again.

I have found many people, who are adept in making strategies, developing plans, analyzing scenarios but they fail when it comes to execution and it puts paid to all the earlier efforts. Well, obviously there would be excuses but the real reason is lack of sincerity. The failures are not due to poor planning but failing to execute some of the steps which might seem small but have an important bearing on the result. More often it is also due to lack of evaluation of all the possible worst cases that might happen. The plans draped in ‘folie de grandeur’ are useless unless it has resolutions for those worst cases.

Take a simple example, tomorrow I need to catch an early morning flight to Paris. The plan is to get up in the morning, reach the bus station and take the bus to airport and check in. Now the plan should also include that what if there is no bus tomorrow, what if the bus is late? If there is no bus then what is the next option? If the option is to take taxi, then is there a possibility of getting taxi that early in morning in the bus station? Yes it is possible but what if there is no taxi at the bus station? The next step then would be to call the central taxi number and ask for one taxi to pick you and that would require having that central taxi station number. Just the failure to have the taxi station number can wreck the whole plan in the worst case. Look around for any example where execution has failed; most of the failures would be due to lack of sincerity and for evading simple details. It is always okay to be the devil’s advocate when you have to plan and execute.

It speaks volumes about a person who can flawlessly execute a plan, be it a simple plan. They are the real achievers and not those who can only make grand strategies; I respect, admire and appreciate them immensely.