20 February 2018

Four different paths converged for a few hours!

Last week I was in Virginia Tech to meet an old classmate of mine – Madhav. More on him later. The second highlight of that trip was meeting these three guys you see in the picture. I had never met them before but we had one common thread – we all went to the same high school (Narendrapur Ramakrishna Mission). All in very different years but the same school, nonetheless.

Rounak, the youngest of the four of us, is yet to reach the half way mark to my age!! He was not even born when I left India for US!! Arindam – the one who insists that not shaving is lower maintenance than shaving everything off like me – is the avid runner in the group. Srijan – the professor – is an outstanding person. His ability to hold two opposing thoughts at the same time and argue both sides of the case is something I have to learn some day.

Like I said, other than the fact at very different points of time, each one of us studied within the same four walls of a particular classroom, we had little in common, at the surface. But somehow, we managed to find ourselves in the same latitude and longitude at the exact same time last week – thanks to some help from Madhav.

The discussions that I had with these youngsters were of varied themes. And I realized how rich the diversity in their thoughts were on a wide range of topics – from social media to statistics to politics. One thing for sure – their thought processes are far more evolved, their perspectives in life far more mature than mine were at that age.

That is why, while many are given to believe that things are getting worse by the day, I continue to conclude that the world is actually getting better and better with every generation. And so much so, the better for it!!

Category: Intersection Points | 4 Comments on Four different paths converged for a few hours!
19 February 2018

From the bartender’s corner: Gin #31 – 3 Howls Old Fashioned Gin

The first curiosity that I had to overcome was to understand where the name came from. From their website, I go to know that this goes back to a Scottish folklore of a red-eyed giant wild hound (looks like a wolf) that used to howl three times before taking souls to the underworld. A similar creature is there in Irish folklore as well as some Welsh folklore. All these consider the monster as a harbinger of death.

Beyond that, the website really does not have much helpful details on the details of the gin – including the botanicals used, the iterations of distillation and all that. They do not even spell out the base alcohol but do make some tall claims about how good their products are. The gin is made in Seattle, USA (and not Scotland as you might have thought by now).

It being a very young distillery (a little over four years old) and me never have taken a liking towards American Style Gin (3 Howls position itself between London Dry and American style), my expectations were very low. Also the fact that none of the other gin reviewers I knew had ever reviewed this prepared me to expect very little.

That said – or maybe because of the low expectations – I did not find the gin to be too bad. The nose is mostly citrusy. However, it is in the palate that you notice the distinction first. It fills in the mouth very quickly. There are the citrus notes and the juniper that make their presence felt almost immediately. But more than that, there is a certain bite to it. I almost want to suggest a faint hint of spiciness (peppery might be a better description). The finish was long and very rich with the junipers.

I liked the “on the rocks” version far more than I liked the G&T. In the G&T, I felt the tonic clashed too much with the biting of the gin in the mouth.

Overall, I would say this is a good gin. Not the most memorable. But at least it got me to start respecting American style gins a little.

I will try with cocktails and report back how it goes.

Category: Cocktails | LEAVE A COMMENT
17 February 2018

Where did that come from – a “checkmark”?

Have you noticed how in many forms and applications, you use the “checkmark” symbol to say “Yes”? It is often called – and I remember in India that is what we used to call – a “tick” mark in other parts of the world. Some of you growing up in India, probably also remember the “tick” mark on your answer sheet that the teacher used to put if you got the answer right and a big “X” if you got it wrong.

Almost universally, that “check” is used to say Yes and the “X” is used to say No. There are exceptions though. In many forms in US – in general when it is a multiple choice question – for example the US customs form, you put in a “X” to mark the correct option. Also in certain places like Sweden and Korea the check mark stands for “No” or “False”.

The question is – why do we say “Yes” or “True” with that weird character – one short stroke from left to right downwards first and then a longer stroke upwards left to right next. Turns out there is a very interesting history of this symbol. It goes way back to the Roman Empire.

In the Roman Empire, when voting, citizens would put a “V” sign against the candidate that they chose. The “V” stood for the latin word “veritas” – mean “true” or “affirm”. (Remember “In Vino, Veritas” – in wine lies the truth?). This “V” symbol took a life of its own as it got used over a long period of time.

So, how did we get to the short line on the left? Well, for that we have to blame fountain pens. Or rather the pre-cursor to fountain pens – the “reservoir pens”. While “dip” pens (like the quill pens) were simply dipped into ink and then written, the “reservoir” pens held ink inside of it (like a modern day fountain pen). References to these kind of pens go back earlier than the 10th century. I understand Leonardo da Vinci used to use a form of this pen too.

In any case, while this design took away the need to carry ink with you all the time (which was clumsy at best), the modern day engineering advances of nibs was still not available. The flow from the barrel of ink inside to the tip of the nib outside was not very smooth. If you wrote with those pens, for the first fraction of a second, you would not have any ink (the nib tip would have dried) but momentarily the ink would start flowing in (as the capillary action set in). This is what will happen to a modern day fountain pen too if you have not used it for some time resulting in dry ink in the nib. That is why often, after pouring ink in, you draw a lot of straight lines on a piece of paper till the ink starts flowing.

Well, so, every time, they wrote a big “V” to ascertain their choice and opinion, the top of the left line (which is where you start) would not get marked since the ink would have not pushed thru the dry portion of the nib yet. But moment it came in, the rest of the letter would be fine.

Over the years, all those “V”s in elections and other choices, tended to have a short left line and then eventually, it became a symbol unto itself – which is today known as a “check” mark or a “tick” mark!

Category: Word Play | 8 Comments on Where did that come from – a “checkmark”?
16 February 2018

A sub chapter in my life that I almost forgot to write about

As you know, I spend a lot of time on the road for work which means many an evening is spent grabbing a quick dinner sitting at the bar. And the days I am not traveling, usually Sharmila and I go out and get a drink. A common theme in all these settings is that I make friends with the guy or the girl behind the bar and get to know about their life stories.

There is an interesting pattern there. Try it out yourself if you do not believe me. More often than not, it would be a young person in her or his twenties. They would have invariably finished their high school. After that either they could not afford college or are working at a bar to earn money to some day go to college. I know of kids (and I consider twenty year olds – kids) for whom a few thousand dollars is the difference between going to college or not going to college.

A few months back, at the urging of a friend of mine – Aaron, I attended a breakfast meeting of YearUp.org. I had some familiarity with this organization from one of my prior jobs. I would recommend that you read up on them – what they do and all that if you live in the US. In short, they take kids who are done with high school and try to give them a “break” into the corporate world.

Money is not the only issue with the kids. Professional skillsets is also not the only other issue. Most of them do not have the background or exposure to present themselves. They have a hard time writing a reasonably good resume. Because they have no understanding of what corporate America thinks is a “good resume”. They have little to no interviewing skills in a corporate set up. Most of them would not even know how to talk to an executive for a few minutes.

That is what YearUp tries to solve for. They try to give those kids some professional skills and a lot more of the soft skills and try to engage other corporations to give them an opportunity at an internship for six months. In all, as the name suggests, the full program is for a year.

But there is a catch. They have strict rules for the students. No cuss words. Always formally dressed. Always carry a resume. Never be late…. If you play by the rules, the year is free to you. If you get demerits, you are thrown out of the program. Lest you think these are easy… I want to remind you that most of the students can not afford cars. One of my students takes a bus, then a train, switches to another train and then a bus again – a two and a half hour ordeal EACH WAY to go to his internship place. And he cannot afford to be late as long as he wishes to stay in the program.

In any case, late last year, I enrolled myself to give my time to the cause. I came in mid stream but a few folks – like Amrutha and Carla – were very helpful in getting me inducted. I was assigned twelve students. I have to tell you – all of them have incredibly humble beginnings – one girl pushes disabled people in wheelchairs at our airport, one girl worked in the catering section of a local racetrack, one guy mows lawns, one guy worked at the backend of a local retail store… but their determination to be successful someday is jaw dropping to me. I certainly had a humble beginning myself – but nowhere near these folks. My parents gave up a lot in their lives but they always paid to make sure we got college done – even if they had to borrow money. And yet, these kids while not having that advantage, has more determination than I ever had.

Ever since last November, I have been spending one on one time with these new friends of mine helping them understand how to present themselves in a corporate environment, how to behave in a corporate environment, how to write resumes, how to interview, how to think about careers and all that good stuff. I am thrilled to say that due to the efforts of Yearup, six of my twelve kids have scored jobs in the last two weeks. I am still working with the other six.

If not anything else, I would ask you to just go to Yearup’s website and read up about them. They just want to create opportunities. They certainly created a few for me. Who knows? Someday you might create some opportunities for a few of their kids too!!

P.S. In the picture, I am addressing a larger set of students giving them my thoughts on how to work with recruiters …

Category: In Transit | 31 Comments on A sub chapter in my life that I almost forgot to write about