… now the blog has reached readers from 160 countries. I have a feeling I know I got this reader from a new country!

Just came out of Omicron isolation yesterday. Fortunately, it happened after I reached the US and not while in India. Also, isolation was relatively painless since I had the whole new house to isolate from! The only hassle was there was no bed – so it was more of camp night experiences with a couple of camp blankets used as mattress on hardwood floor. But, otherwise, I had the place all to myself.

Because of coughing and the bed situation, I could never sleep more than 15-20 minutes at a stretch the first five or six days. And I could not talk to anybody over the phone because of the coughing.

That actually opened up to me an experience I had never had before. For about 10 days, I was in near 24 hour silence. With no talking whatsoever. Any of you who know me can be excused for not believing it.

I sat endless hours in that picnic chair you see looking outside the door. I could not go out into the patio – it was too cold for me. And that step stool was my handy tea-cup stand and place to keep my phone and ipad.

This has gotten me intellectually curious in the topic of Silence itself. What does silence do to us? Is it desired or have we evolved out of it? Does being a social being still jive with silence?

Reached out to my friend Neal Rajdev for some pointers on books that I can read. Have you ever read a good book on Silence or the Practice of Silence? If so, could you share with me?

One of the things I veered into during those long nights of Covid isolation was poetry on silence. Most of them had some kind of an inner self / spiritual kind of bend. The best ones for me were from the Persian poet Rumi. This particular one became my favorite:

“Silence is the language of God
All others are just bad translations”

Loved it!

This is Asterix and the Black Gold

Here is an excerpt from Wikipedia about the book:

Asterix and the Black Gold (French: L’Odyssée d’Astérix literally “Asterix’s Odyssey”) is the twenty-sixth volume of Asterix comic book series, originally published in 1981. It is the second book to be both written and drawn by Albert Uderzo.

The book describes Asterix’s and Obelix’s voyage to the Middle East. It is mainly inspired by James Bond films and biblical tales.

After the “last” post of the cobbler from India, this is yet another tool that I remembered from early childhood in India. Before winter, these folks would come with this tool that can be best described to look somewhat like a big safety pin – made mostly of wood except it had a thick string on one side. And the guy would have a wooden thing in his other hand that looked like a dumbbell that he would hit the string with. This whole contraption was used to fluff up the cotton that would have invariably flattened out in the mattresses and quilts after many years of use.

People who grew up in India will definitely remember this. Did any other country use a similar looking tool?

In any case, do you know what is the English word for it? After a lot of research, I am still struggling. I have found at least what the guys who are in this profession are called. Want to take a guess?

I am sure we all talk about fading memories – especially as you grow old like me. Here is the thing though – even when our memory is not fading, we cannot unequivocally trust your memory.

Meeting a new friend

“Matt wanted me to come and meet you”, said the young lady as I was passing by a bunch of empty cubes in our PE firm’s office in San Francisco. I had grabbed my lunch between meetings and was walking towards where I had parked for the day to finish eating.

Not knowing the context, I replied “Sure. Let me finish my lunch and I will get you in 20 minutes”.

Well, lunch did not take that long. I figured I would check her Linkedin profile and get to know her background – so I would be a little prepared during the introductions. But there was one catch. I did not know her name!! Of course, going back and asking her “What is your name?” would have been silly.

So, I went around the office from the other side and tried to locate Matt. Unfortunately, his door was closed and he was in a meeting. I strolled further and came across my birthday-buddy Raj. “Hey Raj, you know that young lady sitting on the other side right in the middle by the corridor?”. Raj tried his best to remember but could not.

Saw Leeraz was nearby.

“Leeraz!”

“Hey!”

“You know that lady sitting on the other side by the corridor in the middle section?”

“Ummm… blonde, right?”

“No. Black, flowing hair”. I could not remember her face – I had seen her but for a few seconds – but I remembered the black flowing hair – almost glistening like many Asian ladies have. In fact, I could close my eyes and see the hair. Not much of the face though.

“I do not think I know her then”.

Fortunately, Matt opened the door at that moment and stepped out.

“Matt. Did you send a lady to come and meet me?”

“Yes. Her name is Paige. She has joined our sourcing team. You will enjoy talking to her. She can learn form Riverside too.”

“Ok. What is her full name?”

“Paige Dolby.”

“Cool. I will meet her.”

Went straight back to my room – this time went by Paige (I had nothing to fear – I knew her name now 🙂 ) and waved – “I will see you soon”.

Checked her background in Linkedin. Saw the picture I have attached here.

“Ah! she had dyed her hair blonde when she took this picture”, I mused to myself.

Fully equipped with her background info – and some threads of potential intersection points, I went to call her in.

I went over to her desk. And stood there staring at her. There was Paige Dolby – right in front of me – blonde, as blonde could be. Even then, I could distinctly recollect the black shining hair picture in my mind.

After a couple of awkward seconds, I told her “You will not believe this…..” and narrated the story.

This has happened before

This has happened to me many times. Especially as the daughters were growing up.

“So, Nikita – which friend of yours has a parent working in our company?”, I would ask after a kids’ party at our home.

“Bethany”

“Which one was Bethany”

“The red haired one”

Arrrgh!!! That never narrowed down for me.

Why does this happen to me?

You see, growing up in India, I was used to only one color of hair – kind of like what Ford said – black. Usually jet, shiny black. The only other color was what we call grey hair (actually white in color). And then, there was no hair. But there was no other color.

Hair color was never a differentiating characteristic. Length of hair, style of hair, skin color, nose length, eye width – all that yes. But never hair color.

After coming to the USA, I got to see other kinds of hair colors. But they never registered much at all when it was not in front of my eye.

My eyes “see” it – meaning the brain processes alright but does not register it or push it to the hippocampus for short term memory. Let alone long term in the cortex.

And this is how all brains work. Our memory does not remember the whole event or scene. But when the brain tries to recall it, instead of recognize the gaps, it just fills in the gaps!! Much like you never see a hole (“blindspot”) as you look out corresponding to where your optical nerve meets the retina. That is because the brain just fills the hole up with approximate data from the immediate surroundings.

When I saw Paige, I would have surely seen her hair. But the brain just did not mark it as an interesting data point. It was biased to believe all hair color is black. And moment she was not in front of me, my brain promptly filled it up with black hair when I needed to recollect.

Remember, I saw her Linkedin picture. But my brain did not even doubt itself. It convinced itself that she had dyed her hair!!

The dissonance of seeing her actual hair color and then close my eyes and see the black hair distinctly was palpable.

It can have serious ramifications

Later that evening, over some cocktails at the Pier, I was narrating the story to Celeste, Jim and Leeraz. I was still marveling at how memories can play tricks on you. Celeste asked a very interesting question – “So, how much can we really trust eye witnesses?”

The import of the question hit me immediately. In a court of law, I would absolutely say under oath that the lady I saw had black hair.

That is the power of unconscious bias!!! And how unreliable memory can be!!!

Donated all shoes but one pair of dress shoes, one pair of sandals, one pair for yard work, one pair for motorbiking and two pairs for running. Also gave away all socks and caps but three sets each.

I am not sure I have succeeded in the goal of being able to get everything into a suitcase (Phase 4) but certainly I need less than two suitcases… Will keep pushing the envelope.

Thinking of turning my attention to the library now. Will keep pens and music items since I am passionate about them. But I have 500+ books (paper books) that I am never going to read again.
Need to find a good place to donate them too.

Got a reader from a new country after some time! First reader of my blog from Seychelles!! Is that you, Kang Lu?

Reached an interesting total number of countries from where I get reader – 153. That is an Armstrong number. 1³ + 5³ + 3³ = 153 !!

Most of all the clothes are now taken care of. In all, got rid of about 220 pieces of clothes – that is 75% gone!

I have about 70 now – including motorcycle clothes, running clothes, office clothes, casual wear, sleep wear, yard work clothes and all that – for both winter and summer.

I think I can go down 20 more to about 50. 10 are the funny T-shirts of this summer that will go away in a year. I think I still have 10-15 more than I need because I cannot gauge correctly how much winter clothes I might need. I have a sense between my running jackets, office jackets, motorcycle jackets, sweater and warm layers, I can go down a few more. But might need to go thru a winter and then make the call.

Phase 3 will be all the accessories – shoes, caps, gloves, socks etc.

Then will be Phase 4 – how to get the world’s largest suitcase!! 🙂

The “think within the box” project has started. The idea – as I had explained before – is to fit all my clothes and shoes in a suitcase. This includes all summer, winter, office, home and running clothes and shoes. After about two hours, I managed to come out on the other side of Phase 1. Nikita helped me take the 150+ articles of clothing to the Goodwill center and give them away in donation.

As I was cleaning up the closets, I remembered what my brother and sister are having to do back in India after our parents’ demise. I felt vaguely good that after my death, others will have to spend less time getting rid of my stuff.

Coming up soon – phase 2. I have to tackle all the office clothes and winter clothes in that phase.