Spending is an Art or My Heroes 2020

There’s a difference between expenditure and waste. Wonderful words. I typed them on the screen and read them aloud and I was going to expand on them, when I could type no further, because Shri Husband peeked over my shoulder and made a nasty comment. Because he had nothing better to do. Because he is presently partially locked, and it doesn’t matter to him that all of us are. He scowls nevertheless, thinking he alone is being punished for something that is not his fault in any way. He is, therefore, in a permanently bad mood (since it’s a continuing condition, can’t really make out what the triggers are, honestly). When the government says ‘bhiu-pa chi garaz na’ and the doctor says, ‘take all precautions, mask-wash-distance, it’s a bad infection, this corona virus causes’, can’t blame him now, can I? They say, and I have read, that full un-locking (or should I say locking-up?) will take years if not months, vaccine or no vaccine, because the no-one’s sure how the virus will behave and mutate. So, bored in the interim period, he’s (Shri Husband, not the doctor) ready to pick on anyone. Mainly, me. I erased what I’d written. “You mean ‘deleted’,” said my personal, domestic interferon (what an apt word to use in these Covid Times, heh, heh, to describe Shri Husband). “Whatever,” I retorted, typing on, hoping my months-long-grown hair would block his vision. No such luck. “But it’s true,” he said, agreeing with me in a grudging kind of way, “Spending really is an art.” He must have heard this in childhood or read it on a car-sticker or something. Can’t believe he could come up with something so profound. “Means?” I said, hoping to shut him up. Usually, when I ask such questions, he gets up and walks away. He didn’t. Instead, he told me: “Spending, whether of time, energy or money, is a habit. A habit is an acquired behaviour pattern that is followed so regularly it’s almost involuntary. Examples of spending habits might include shopping for trivia on pay-day where money is concerned. Where time is concerned, getting up late in the morning and watching television at night and then panicking when the deadline for the column is very close.” He was getting into lecture-baazi mode, so I kept typing, bashing on regardless, ignoring him. That’s the best thing to do, I’ve learnt. In bygone years, I have known housewives who sorted out the husband’s salary (in those days wages were disbursed in cash even if the earner wore a white collar) and put fixed amounts in envelopes labelled ‘bread’, ‘eggs’, ‘butter’, ‘daal’, ‘soap’, ‘gas’, ‘milk’, ‘vegetables’, etc. Oh, and ‘matches’, for induction and micro-wave cooking didn’t exist even in fantasy stories. Nor did the internet. Or the mobile-phone. It was always a mystery to me what they did if they needed extra salt, sugar or oil in a particular month because the ants attacked a dabba or carelessness led to spillage. Shri Husband felt, still feels, that wives like me “would take out from one envelope some money and put it in another to neutralize a deficit in the latter and play musical envelopes till the end of the month”. Not true, but I don’t protest. I still know families who budget their EMIs, credit-card amounts, birthday-party gifts expenses, Netflix charges, petrol-bills, medical insurance and stuff. As an afterthought, they add school-fees: I should know, have been phone-chasing defaulters since the beginning of this academic year. But I stray… Smart people manage and manipulate their twenty-four hours. Shri Husband snorted: ‘Smart’. I knew he was thinking of, or referring through that snort to those like me, who need twelve hours sleep, some minutes snatched through the day and, steadfastly, many hours at a stretch at night. They also need to chew their food well and sit before, during and after meals/baths or returning from or before going to office/market. How to spend time calls for another column. Some are good at energy-conservation: they peel garlic while the milk is on the boil, run the mixer whilst the pressure-cooker whistles, sweep and mop whilst the washing-machine churns. Wise they are, for they accomplish much through the day. “And,” mumbled the man in my life, “some are otherwise.” Before I could react, he rectified that and said, “You do manage a lot of free time, I must admit. Teach me how to do it.” When he asks a favour like that, I go chup. He believes I’m a creative person. He also believes that lazy people are creative: they think of ways to get out of energy-expending situations. We both appreciate—and you know it’s rare for us to agree upon anything at all-- those who know what gives them pleasure: music, trekking, bird-watching, growing vegetables, collecting mouse-pads (or wrist-watches, which is my hobby, ahem), brewing wine, making jewellery, baking sour-dough bread, travelling, clicking photographs, etc. Those are the people who rule the money they earn. Money doesn’t dictate that it should be saved or splurged upon short-lived joys like buying shoes you will wear but once and then let the fungi and mould feast upon them. “The same,” said Shri Husband, indicating that I should take down what he’s saying, “is true about spending/wasting time or energy.” I have noticed that those who are careful with money are careful with time and energy. I saw Shri Husband nodding. In agreement. A never-to-be-forgotten moment. It was then that the Universe colluded: we both simultaneously heard the news that Mr. Ranjitsinh Disale had won the one million US dollar Global Teacher Prize for being an exceptional teacher who made an outstanding contribution to the profession. There were 12000 applications and nominations from 140 countries. The gentleman is from a Zilla Parishad Primary School in a place now prominently on the map: Paritewadi, Solapur, Maharashtra. That was impressive. We were delighted. More joy: Mr. Disale shared half his prize money with the other nine finalists. Which means half of more than seven crores in Indian rupees. Each of the other finalists will get, thanks to Mr. Disale’s generosity and consideration, fifty-five lakh of our currency. Whew. Shri Husband said, “He’s only thirty-two, and he knows how to spend correctly.” We’ve learnt a big lesson from someone half our age. I thought—Shri Husband all but forbids me from thinking, says it tires my brain, but I think anyway—that just as important was the fact that the person who constituted this award in 2014 was also an Indian, Mr. Sunny Varkey from Kerala, a businessman and long-time resident of the UAE. He heads the Varkey Foundation, which is a charitable organisation dedicated to changing lives through education. Imagine spending a million US dollars per year on a prize. Another man really knows to spend; for once, Shri Husband and I agreed yet again. In this Year that Changed the Planet, at the tail end of the year, I virtually met my heroes 2020. These two men, may their tribe increase, have shown how when time, energy and money are correctly utilized—‘spent, not wasted,’ Shri Husband reminded me--- magic happens.

Racism, Oz, India, Education.

(30 Aug ’09)

            There was a huge debate at office about the happenings in Australia. The attitude was “how dare they treat us like this”. In Sanskrit there’s a shlok (can’t for the life of me quote it) which says that the one in need is always the stupid one. The giver is the smarty-pants. Our ancestors understood the ways of the world better than we.

            Why are we sending our young to Oz? Because they have better ‘opportunities’. Means? Actually more money. But, it means better colleges, schools, hospitals. So why is it that we don’t crave for the same thing here? What it is that stops us from building world class institutions? Whatever quality we do have, we clamour to dilute it.

            It begins in kindergarten. The West has realized that children with enormous potential must be identified when young, and their talents tapped. They are the really ‘special’ ones for they will be the leaders of the future. Be it in art, science, sports, whatever. The slow-coaches, the ones who are mentally retarded or challenged or backward or stupid (if you want a more politically correct word, please yourself) need a different kind of education. And the bright sparks need a different kind. Which until now our IITs and IIMs were giving, but what about the schools and colleges?

            In my childhood, there were special divisions for bright children. The ‘dumb’ batch was, well, duh. It wasn’t like the label was permanent. If you lost out on marks, or gained some, you could be laterally transferred. By the way, later in life, many of the duhs actually did better than the bright sparks: will debate that in another column. Competition was edgy, but fair. Today, with ‘integration’ happening, and the movement that no one’s to be discriminated against…. Works against the gifted children. No one’s fighting for their rights. I haven’t read of any parents agitating for higher benchmarks, higher standards. No one’s demanding better quality anything. Customers want rights. Not responsibilities. If we want to teach Oz a lesson, we aught to have better universities, better colleges, better courses, and make their rich feel that their children should be educated here. Can we do that? Nyet? Then our young must face this ‘second-rate citizenship’ status in the developed parts of the world.

            See the four-generations-old schools, specially the good ones that were built during the British times. They have space, and more importantly, they’re good-looking. Homi Bhabha, when TIFR was conceived, made sure the place wasn’t just functional, it had the best sculptures, paintings, gardens, furniture, so that the scientists could give their best. Prettiness is conducive to intellectual activity. Yes, you can run teach children on a railway platform, and the odd child might even do well. But it’s only the odd child, not the herd.

            Check out discipline. My own school, which is in my neighbourhood, which is right across from my place of work, was well-known for its discipline. Yes, the cane was used. We were called ‘dunderheads’ when we did something idiotic and without fear of media or repercussions. Making us behave was part of the curriculum, well-ingrained in the genetic make up of our teachers and decades down the line, we’re grateful for it. It’s lacking today.  The principal’s afraid to tick the parents off, the teachers don’t think it’s important to check the students’ behaviour outside school limits/hours. No wonder I read on Facebook, ex-students saying school sucks. From current students I’d expect that, all of us felt that way, but from ex-s? I see children not rushing even when they can hear the Assembly bell. I see parents sloppily slurping on road-food, unmindful of oil dripping on their clothes. No pride in the appearance, no pride in the manners, no healthy home-cooked snacks after school. Perhaps my audit sample is insufficient and there are better scenes elsewhere. I hope so.

            I’m told the vocational institutes are better, but I have no experience of them, hence won’t comment. Unless we pressurize and demand quality, unless we provide and supply quality education, unless we insist on accepting nothing less than the best, we will have to be at the receiving end for a long time to come.

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