Diya Rakusa

To people who feed and/or pose at electric fences next to wild elephants

2011-06-29T14:05:00.001+05:30

Machang,
I have big issues with people feeding and/or taking pics next to the elephants along the Uda Walawe fence.

It's just asking for trouble, removing a wild animal's natural fear of humans. It also makes the animals expect food at a given place, and they can get nasty if not fed, or teased too much by the people by the fence (even domesticated elephants get violent when they think more food is at hand).

What'll eventually happen is that, as soon as a break appears in the fence (and the locals themselves regularly break the fence to let their cattle in etc), the elephants will make a beeline for the known source of goodies, and thereafter happily do whatever more damage they like because they're no longer afraid of humans.

The humans will make a huge fuss (having caused it in the first place) and will demand that the elephant is killed. Eventually, some other animal, not even the one by the fence, will suffer for this whole cycle.

Just my $0.02 worth, but please think about it, and if it makes sense, please don't do it any more and please discourage any friends as well? Thanks - sorry if this comes off as a little intense :-) Trust you understand

Bureaucracy Can Kill

2011-05-23T17:08:00.000+05:30

I needed to hand in a document to the Central Bank of Sri Lanka today. The same one that got ferociously bombed and attacked 15 or so years ago, maiming and killing many civilians in what used to be the heart of the business district.

Having been through the silly security rigmarole previously for a meeting there, I thought I'd go straight to the off-site car park (sitting on prime real estate in the heart of the Fort), walk over and hand over the document.

The guard at the car park would have none of it. I first needed to go to the Central Bank's main gate (put in place after the terrorists drove right up 15 years ago), announce my intentions, and then be directed back to the car park I was currently sitting outside.

So I drove up to the terrorist-proof main entrance, nonchalantly left open. I stopped my Hilux, which could've been packed with about 300Kg of high explosives, at the gate (when any petty politician or terrorist could've just charged through), right by the guard room, and explained myself. I needed to go to the Mail Room, I was told. Where to park? Oh, just leave the vehicle right there at the gate, just move it so I wouldn't obstruct the entrance.

So I walked in, handed over the document, walked back out and went off home. I tooted my horn in farewell at the guard at the offsite car park, but he seemed to be busy with his newspaper in the depths of his little guard hut.

What was the point of that off-site car park again? And wait, we don't have terrorists in Sri Lanka anymore either, right?

Don't fall for trumped-up credit card "phone bill" surcharge

2011-05-14T11:16:00.000+05:30

I wrote to my bank manager yesterday about something that happened while I was on the road. The episode is what prompted my earlier post about pigtailed Chinamen. Don't get cowed into accepting additional charges. Even if you have to pay, insist on a detailed accounting - this opens them up for liability under whatever consumer protection and merchant agreements that may govern them, so they'll never do it.

"Just want to alert you to something going on at N.P.G. Appusinhgho & Sons Lanka Filling Station, Ratnapura.

I stopped there earlier today to pump diesel, and when I checked whether they accept credit cards the attendant told me they have a flat surcharge of Rs. 10/- per card transaction, which he said was to cover the "phone bill." He said I would have to agree to that before he would pump diesel. I said it would be ok as long as I was given a bill mentioning the cost of the diesel pumped (I wanted Rs. 2,000/- worth) and the additional charge separately.

Once the diesel was pumped I was brought the credit card slip for Rs. 2010/-. I did not sign the slip and asked for an additional bill as I had asked, giving the breakdown. The station supervisor got involved at this point and I repeated my request. The supervisor told me he would give me a bill for Rs. 2010/- and I repeated that I would like the breakdown to be shown on the bill. The supervisor brought me a bill for a single figure of Rs. 2010/-. When I repeated my insistence on a breakdown, a person who appeared to be the owner, who had been watching from the office nearby, appeared to instruct the attendant and supervisor to settle the issue. The supervisor made a show of telling the attendant that he should have made sure I agreed to the additional charge. Another attendant then came along and gave me back cash for Rs. 10/- to repay the surcharge."

අපි කොන්ඩේ බැඳපු චීන්නු නෙමෙය්! (Api kondey bendapu Cheenun nemey!)

2011-05-14T11:11:00.001+05:30

The best English phrase that comes close to this is, "I wasn't born yesterday." The Sri Lankan version is much richer in history and imagery (of course). I'm not the expert on such things, but the phrase has to do with the fact that in ancient times, South East Asian sailors, apparently long-haired, visiting Sri Lanka for trade, may have been considered easy targets for confidence tricks.

The direct translation is, "we're not pigtailed Chinamen!"

Two 21 year olds

2011-05-11T18:20:00.001+05:30

I started this post some months back when we had an intern with us from the U.S. He'd just graduated from Stanford, with an International Relations major if I remember right. We did several visits around the country as part of the work we wanted him to do for us. Accompanying us was my loyal "Golaya" in Sinhala, which can mean Man Friday, disciple, side-kick. Officially, Aide to Managing Director.

They were both 21 years old. One, whose parents were from Nigeria, had been born in the U.S., gone to Stanford, and was now laying the ground for Ph.D. work. The other, born in a very rural part of Sri Lanka, had studied well enough to win a scholarship at 11 years to my Alma Mater, Royal College. He has lived with his aunt in Colombo longer than he has lived with his own parents, so he could come to school. He is the eldest of three children, but as with most young men that age, in many ways he was still a child himself.

How did I find him? The old network, of course - luckily for him at age 11 he plugged in to one of the best networks you could find in Sri Lanka, no hubris and no exaggeration there. I needed a good, able dogsbody able to take some of the killer workload par for the course with social entrepreneurship. My old Scout Master knew just the man, a Prefect who was very into agriculture, perfect as I'm working in agriculture myself.

So much into agriculture in fact, that he'd cheerfully crashed his Advanced Levels (entrance exam for state universities) the first time, then started what was supposed to be part-time job at a leading agribusiness conglomerate that worked him so hard he crashed his second shy, and was just finishing his third and last shot at possibly his only way to get a higher education, given his economic condition. Get the marks, get a shot at university. In any year only 8.5% of those who pass the exams, get a score high enough to actually gain a seat at a state university.

Eight and a half percent. That leaves around 185,000 young men and women who passed the university exam, unable to go to university. Every year.

So with me in my old Toyota (itself just a year younger than my two passengers) were two young men, one already in possession of a degree from arguably one of the best universities in the world, the other yet to find out whether he would even get a shot at working toward a degree. One had already lived by himself, met people from around the world, done a semester at Oxford, worked in Africa. The other had never left his home country, hadn't even been to most parts of his own country except on the clock for someone else - he'd been to historic Polonnaruwa twice but never got the chance to see the ruins - which are right by the road for cryin' out loud! (I made sure he didn't make it a hat-trick with our own visit).

Why does Sri Lanka do this to her young people? Fine we're a conservative society, we have different expectations of how children relate to their parents, etc etc. But seeing the different vectors in life experience thus far and opportunity going forward in young men of the same age brought many issues right up in front of me.

Why am I writing this now? My golaya is soon leaving for university, to pursue his dream of a degree in Agriculture. He has a standing offer to come back to us whenever he wants. I have not met many who work harder or are more loyal, despite the many rough edges smoothed down and the much learning he has managed while he was with me.

Higher education is just about the only way people like him can blow the hinges off the gates. Sri Lanka needs more seats at universities, better universities, and overall more opportunities for more young people. Now. Private universities? Fine. Make them accessible, hold them accountable to the highest of standards, and make the old, inefficient and mostly inefficient state universities get off their backsides and give them a good fight. Please don't just let in the people with the fattest unmarked envelopes and the biggest promises. Look at Qatar. Look at Malaysia. Look at Singapore. Education is life-changing, and not too indirectly, country-changing. Be picky. These may be the the most important decisions we ever make.

If we fritter away the chances for the current generation, we will look back and see that we missed the last chance to turn this ship around.

...and since I didn't explain the "pine" part well enough...

2011-05-10T20:00:00.000+05:30

I read earlier on the web, and I guess you could be fooled for a second if you didn't know much about them, that people thought screw-pine species' fruits looked like pine cones. Hence the "pine" part (apparently).

And that's why it's called the Screw Pine

2011-05-09T22:37:00.001+05:30

We call it "rampe" (rum-pay) in Sinhala. Apparently it's called Pandan in South East Asian cultures. A researcher at the Asian Institute of Technology in Thailand (working under one of Rural Returns' advisors, Dr. Sarath Ilangaltileke) isolated the component that makes Jasmine rice aromatic, et voila, it turned out to be the exact compound found in rampe leaves. Sri Lankans have added a length of rampe to our rice for centuries. Now we know why exactly we did it - to enhance the aroma, particularly of the varieties that were less aromatic than our wonderful heirloom varieties. Don't believe me? Look up Chandrasekaran, B. et al, "A Textbook of Rice Science," 2007, Scientific Publishers India, p.293, section 13.3.5.

After much searching I finally found the missing link that led me to the English name, screw-pine. Didn't think much of it, didn't think it had anything to do with pines, nor did anything screwy about it come to mind immediately.

Thank goodness for the Kandyan Home Garden, and that people including my parents still preserve some vestiges even in crowded Colombo. Well, I gave the punchline away at the start, but there it is. And yes, the lower leaves have been cut away for cooking.

Gosh I love Sri Lanka :-)

Oh, and I need to some day scan in the sequence of photos I shot of polos (tender jak fruit) being cooked on the tree (can't get fresher - or slower - than that) in my great aunt's mother of all home gardens in Aluvihare. Now that's two whole different stories right there.

Re-cycling (pun intended) ain't new to us...

2011-04-27T22:48:00.001+05:30

..and this I've seen around on Colombo's streets before; not sure if it's the same guy though. Love the idea - so much lateral thinking, some of it literally so. However, I can only imagine what happened to the internal circuitry and the CRT. We don't even have any kind of organized (and easy) battery disposal system, let alone for old electronics. I keep collecting my old batteries to take them to a Dialog customer center to drop in those tiny forgotten bins in a corner for old cellphones; not even sure if they're actually operated or followed in the Colombo Municipal Council's separation system - where all the carefully separated garbage got dumped in the same truck in front of the chagrined customers. Could be an idea for RR though. 'Cept we're supposed to be a rural organization....

Sri Lanka Reading List - part 1 (I hope)

2011-03-14T08:01:00.001+05:30

I've been back in the U.S. for a few weeks and it's been great to reconnect with classmates and other friends, and I've been busily twisting arms and encouraging nascent plans to visit Sri Lanka sooner rather than later. Though I love painting word-pictures and treating myself as well as my friends to stories from home, I thought it would be a good idea to start a little list of recommended reading - books that I enjoyed and which have enough connection to Sri Lanka to give people a taste of what's to come. Remembering the books' highlights makes me want to bring forward my return date!

Life having been so busy for the last few years, I haven't been getting through many books, so I recruited my uncle Suren, who also studied in the U.S. (in the 80's) and as a pilot, gets a lot of downtime where he devours books (and yeah, he's the one Malcolm Gladwell mentions in Outliers). Other respected elders, you may be next for a list of books (I'm talking to you, Shaku Akki)

Diya Rakusa's contributions:

Handbook for the Ceylon Traveller, a Studio Times publication (unfortunately not available in the U.S. last time I checked)
Running in the Family by Michael Ondaatje
Flower Boy by Karen Roberts
An Historical Relation of the Island Ceylon in the East Indies Together with an Account of the Detaining in Captivity the Author and Divers other Englishmen ... There, and of the Author's Miraculous Escape by Robert Knox (give the guy a break, this was the 18th century)

Suren Ratwatte's contributions

(notes from Suren to Diya Rakusa: "Haven't read the last one yet" and "Not necessarily positive. Don't censor the reading lists!"):

Reef by Romesh Gunasekera **
The sweet and simple kind by Yasmine Gooneratne
The Hamilton Case by Michelle De Kretser *
A Disobedient Girl by Ru(wani) Freeman

Letter to the Editor of The Sunday Leader

2010-10-08T10:09:00.000+05:30

Re: "Vegetable Crates May Increase Prices"

Madam,

I write in relation to the article with the above title, published on the 3rd of October 2010. Some of the assertions quoted therein about the possible increase in prices appeared inflated and unscientific. I am in the process of putting together a basic comparative calculation to prove - or scientifically disprove - the benefits of using crates. This however is a spare-time activity and I have therefore been unable to complete the exercise ahead of the print deadlines for Sunday the 10th. I hope to be able to share something simple but indicative as soon as possible nevertheless.

In the meantime, the simplest counterfactual evidence I can point to is the fact that leading, profitable public and private companies such as CIC, Nidro etc, who are directly accountable to their shareholders, would never voluntarily use crates exclusively, as they do now, unless there is a clear overall profit advantage in doing so. My only reservation is that more short-term or closed-minded thinkers may not have the same ability to see the bigger, long-term picture that truly justifies switching to the use of crates, an action that should benefit every link in the chain between the farmer and the consumer. This is the local consumer's and the national economy's loss.

IT and Education in the 21st Century - Response to Say It, Look @ Episode 1

2010-06-05T01:22:00.001+05:30

I've been avoiding the blogosphere for a while now, despite lots of blog-worthy items piling up. I do however want to get this post out, inspired by the World Bank-sponsored Say it, Look @ TV+Social Media convergence/mashup play. Great first effort, some great commentary in there (ok, the presenter could tone it down a little but I'll keep quiet about that - for now).

The show makes the point (17:26) we all know and manage to do little about - that the "quality and economic contribution of the Higher Education system" need to be improved.

I do want to reflect a little however on Mr. Harsha Aturupane's comment at 17:34 - that Sri Lanka should focus away from expanding access and concentrate on increasing quality and labour-market relevance in public higher education. Provocative stuff, particularly coming from an institution all-too-easily targeted by the entrenched JVP student union types in the state universities.

Answer First
Here's my basic thesis: Yes we need to improve the quality of the higher education system, but we can't afford to shut out the massive numbers that still never make it through because of economic reasons. Hopefully as we increase quality, the payoff and demand for more quantity will be more visible and immediate. Oh, and this little thing called SL2College is the perfect solution to to bridge the gap in the short term, and to maintain quality competitiveness in the long term.

The Education Funnel
Sri Lanka has a funnel of staggering proportions that keeps hundreds of thousands of qualified students out of the state higher education system. The following are 2007 figures.

Of 450,000 students (mostly 15-16 years or age, at grade 11) who sat for the GCE (General Certificate of Education) Ordinary Level ("O/L") exam, around 200,000 qualified for the GCE Advanced Level ("A/L") another two years down the road. Of the 230,000 students who sat for the A/L exam in 2007, over 104,000 passed, i.e. they essentially qualified for state university.

Only 17,196 (16.5%) were fortunate enough to gain a seat at a state university.

Multiple Failings
Yes, the state higher education system is broken far beyond just the point at which people get in. In the worst years, once had to wait several years between getting one's results (many months after the exam) and actually making it to classes - because of the strikes, riots and other closures that tied up resources, used by the classes before you still waiting to graduate. One can still expect to take longer to graduate than the theoretical 3-4 years it should take, thanks to the assorted strikes, closures and other high-jinks that occur from time to time - usually timed just ahead of the more important exams that the less serious students have not gotten around to preparing for.

Yes, the system produces more "eternal students" (not quite of the Chekovian variety) and trained paper-pushers considering themselves fully entitled for a government pension and the least possible non-over-time work. State university graduates can mostly only dream of the new equipment and exposure they'd need to access to be really ready for the labour market. The regionally distorted labour market and economic center of gravity in Colombo mean that many do not want to go to the newer, perfectly good regional universities.

Not All Doom and Gloom
But look at those who really do put their noses to the grindstone. Our state universities have created some great academics, artists, doctors, engineers, lawyers and other professionals. Whether they go abroad as undergrads, postgrads or academics, Sri Lankan students and academics regularly excel elsewhere in the world. Pitifully few come back, but that must change. Our CEO at the IT company I worked for always states we are capable of producing the best engineers in the world, worthy of the heritage that created the mighty irrigation works and rock fortresses of our past.

I would say that Sri Lankan students, at least that subset who know why they are in university and are ready to make the most of the opportunity, have proven that we can shine through all the challenges they face in the state higher education system.

Walking the Tightrope
Yes, we need to improve the quality and labour-market orientation of our higher education system. That need has not changed. If we succeed, in doing so we will also change the nature of the average student who enters that system. They will be more cognizant of the tremendous responsibilities before them, to not waste the opportunities before them and the resources placed at their disposal, paid for by millions of taxpayers.

But we also need to widen the funnel. Private universities - another sector with all kinds of distortions and peculiarities introduced for political expediency and narrow interests - at least give some sort of outlet for those who can afford their costs. But for every student who can afford that option, there are hundreds, if not thousands, languishing in the provinces or in the urban slums, whose worldview is further distorted by the inequality in what might be one of the most vital Public Goods.

Until we do both, we will fall off the tightrope between a sea of "unemployed graduates" on the one hand, with no marketable skills or motivations to contribute to society; and, on the other hand, a self-perpetuating system of elitism where the gap between the Higher Education Haves and Have-Nots breeds resentment and unrest. We have experienced both, in some form, and at some point in the recent past. We need to make sure we stay on the tightrope this time.

SL2College - Short-Term Relief, Long-Term Relevance
Particularly in the interim, where we simply cannot afford to go putting up the "lecture halls, laboratories and canteens" that the program speaks about, SL2College is a service that could ease some of the pressure on the physical constraints - while also taking Sri Lankan students out into the world and impressing upon them the need to come back (and give back) with a wider world view and the vision and experience to not just accept the status quo in Sri Lanka.

Sri Lankan students are world-class. SL2College helps them explore the higher education opportunities that best fit their academic aspirations, whether locally or abroad - but always with a gentle reminder that they should also think about bringing back their skills and knowledge to the country that nurtured them and educated them, usually for free, in their early lives.

Parting Words from JFK
Education has a massive impact upon individual earning capacities. To me, the quote below pretty much sums up why education is both a Human Right and a Public Good, which can help us all find our way out of the hole we have dug ourselves into.

“Let us think of education as the means of developing our greatest abilities, because in each of us there is a private hope and dream which, fulfilled, can be translated into benefit for everyone and greater strength for our nation.”

-- John F. Kennedy.

Bad policy: short-term handouts trumping long-term growth

2009-12-22T23:15:00.000+05:30

How would you go about entrenching poverty in a primarily rural, formerly agriculture-dominated tropical island economy?

Your land is blessed with two monsoons that almost split the year perfectly in two, interspersed with inter-monsoonal rains. You have diverse agro-ecological zones, and what's more those two monsoons approach your island from diametrically opposite compass points, spreading the water wealth. Your people are inheritors of centuries of vast public irrigation works that have conquered any imbalance in water availability, bringing liquid gold to the most fertile and agriculture-friendly parts of the island.

Let's assume you already have highly fragmented landholdings due to weak land markets, previous cock-eyed land reforms and a lot of inertia around more meaningful reforms. People with handkerchief sized sub-scale plots can't sell their lands due to unclear title or worse, arcane regulations. Rational land allocation is distorted by regulations that forbid any use but agriculture, sometimes of specific crops (ref. self-sufficiency) - you can't even grow something the market might actually want.

Coddle local producers to the point of inefficiency with populist import protections, price controls and astronomical, unsustainable input subsidies (which by one of my calculations almost completely wipe out the GDP contribution from paddy); then cut them loose and bring in cheap imports when prices spike just ahead of the local harvests (or near elections) - depressing prices for everyone and killing incentives in local agriculture. Once in a while try to bring in a guaranteed-price centralized purchase scheme to repeat dramatic failures of the past. Big farmers want to cut their losses, small farmers just revert to subsistence, turning away from the vagaries of the market. Value-adders lock up their expensive (imported) machines whose output cannot be sold at a fair price thanks to the controls.

Self-sufficiency is one double-edged sword to swing around too much. The food shocks of 2008 provide an easy stalking horse for all kinds of protectionism taken too far. All kinds of marginal lands start coming back under cultivation, some of it just for subsistence, all competing with the "high-potential" zones that should be left to cultivate commodities efficiently - and cheaply - without specializing into higher-value crops or away from agriculture altogether.

There's no easy fix of course. Most of today's marginal lands were the agricultural heartlands of yore, sometimes by accident, sometimes reflecting the changing state of the art in technology. Like in Japan, agriculture, particularly rice, is embedded deep in our souls, and can't be turned away from easily. Few other alternatives exist - development in held back by isolation in its many forms; roads, technology and education have taken the longest to penetrate - and make an impression - in those same areas.

With an end to conflict, the clock is winding down on inefficient land allocations - if we don't get smarter about what we grow, where, farmers around the island will be faced with harvests they can't sell. Can we get markets working in time to keep the right farmers growing the crops best suited to their lands (and all the handicaps we can't dispense with overnight) - and to the market opportunities out there?

Don't like your score? Change the rules (again)

2009-12-22T16:08:00.000+05:30

Sri Lanka's rejiggering the main price index less than two years after the last blatant wool-pulling exercise. This time they're even dropping alcohol and tobacco from the basket, clearly choosing to believe their own fairytale that temperance can be enforced - and apparently has been achieved - with the help of a few TV spots and millions of posters.

I heard that an old journalist (maybe too old to care anymore) had interrupted a Buddhist monk trotted out to sing the government's praises in decidedly non-secular areas, asking what exactly the reverend was celebrating, given that the reporter had just been to one of the lavish vote-buying parties at the Palace where the drinks flow freely.

Another little birdie tells me His Highness had nudged and winked away the concerns of a delegation from the meat industry about the similar blanket ban on slaughtering with "don't worry about all that, we also must have something to eat no!"

Finally, an unintended consequence of a blanket ban on animal slaughter (keeping in mind that I am personally against the taking of lives but also willing to step back and think of wider consequences): Apparently a commercially viable dairy operation needs to cull 20% of its herd annually, something one large operator has already had problems doing thanks to enthusiastic preemptive rent-seeking despite the anti-slaughter bill only being in proposal stage. So, overnight blanket ban on slaughter --> further reduced local milk production --> more imports --> less foreign exchange, and more reasons for the propagandists to squeal about foreign conspiracies - except in this case too, the problem is local, not foreign.

Dud bridges? Check. Private Presidential Palaces? Check.

2009-12-22T15:42:00.000+05:30

I saw some TV coverage of this talk a while back - which also shows how long my backlog is(!)

Small groups pushing policy without evidence - sound familiar? Where are our median voters? How come they don't push for the kind of sensible reforms for which "a fair amount of consensus" apparently already exists, in "education, labour markets, land markets, and achieving macro-economic stability and better public spending?"

I suspect the median voter has had to rush wholesale to hang on to the Satakaya-tails just to survive, maybe angling for whatever infrastructure contracts the Chinese didn't bother with, or hoping for scraps from such long-term empire-building as the Deniyaya Raja-pasa-plex (new definition for PPP: Private Presidential Palace?)

A friend on holiday from the original home of the Land Rover observed over the weekend that one has to come to Sri Lanka to see tricked-out Land Rovers of every flavour hammering around - mostly on Colombo's streets of course, rather than the moonscapes all the ostentatious accessorizing implies they're meant for. I even saw an LR3 sporting a snorkel and winch - and the requisite garage plates - the other day. The cheap-and-cheerful Mahindras and Tatas seem long forgotten - good thing Land Rover is nominally Indian now - more than enough for Comrade Vimal to spin another set of rationalizations (wait - didn't he hate the Indians? Or was that last week?). Even the bald-headed, aisle-crossing Minister who pretentiously went around in a Hindustan Ambassador when he was in the last government came away from launching his own political party (better than admit defeat and go back whence he came) dispensing Justice in a shiny silver Jaguar.

Has the median voter evolved, throwing in the towel and joining the mad scramble to feed on the carcass? If the median voter has in fact had to become a opportunistic, carrion-feeding pragmatist in a ridiculously politicized society, what hope does that hold out for a "brighter future" that we all apparently still hope for, the past four years apparently not having been bright enough?

Do we really have a silent majority that might, juuust might, this time actually make the trip to the voting booth and send the Scamtastic Four and their friends and family back to their upgraded or brand-new homes to try and get by on the fortunes built up over the last four years? Tough ask, I would say, given the stranglehold on the state machinery and the scale on which it is being mis-used - why risk one's neck to put pen to paper when there are many goons happy to do it for you?

If we as voters do in fact come out of our stupor and topple the four-headed beast (wrong part of the anatomy? Many-pocketed, for sure) it's not like the journey's over. Better almost anyone than this clan, the past four years should tell us that. But we voters must keep the pressure up for the vital promises to be followed-through, for once. We must get up off our welfare-softened backsides and maintain a firmer hold on our elected servants (with less prostrating before them for a start) with clearer causality between good or bad policies and the political outcomes we voters alone should be able to decide.

It's time to step up to the plate.

New music video business model?

2009-12-21T18:25:00.000+05:30

Has the music industry stumbled upon a new model to finance music video productions?

Over the last few months (hey, I don't watch much TV) I've noticed some pretty sly product placements in Sri Lankan music videos, to the extent that there is clearly some money changing hands here. Not a bad thing, considering how small the local market is, and that most of the music is pretty good, and pretty creative too. Here are just a couple; check out the related ones too:

Ashanthi:

a womens' health supplement (? the pills in the purple box)
a new fizzy drink being heavily promoted
Mercedes might be a long shot, and Hummer an even longer one - I'll chalk those up to de rigeur rap-video props [later update - turns out the Hummer may have been a product placement too; I love how Sri Lankan companies brashly crown themselves "#1," "world's leading," etc with doubtless no evidence whatsoever]
just to editorialize, I thought the little laptop face-off between Ashanthi and the rapper (DeLon?) was cleverly done

Iraj

An European three-wheeler competing with the Indian brand
another fizzy drink promoted as an essential accompaniment to any meal (perfect as this song is about food!)
Other videos by Iraj have featured cellphone operators, fizzy drinks from the same manufacturer, and, not sure about this one, match manufacturers?

A while after I'd started on and forgotten this post, I noticed quite a bit of product placement in a Pussy Cat Dolls video too, and, in the interest of science, watched a few more to turn up some more such as

Nokia, HP, and Campari in Hush Hush; Hush Hush
Gratuitous Nokia in Jai Ho
and now, when I look back, in most of their videos I guess

Politics and Rent-seeking

2009-12-21T17:31:00.000+05:30

Departing from more mainstream (and mostly pretty good) rap in Sinhala, Tamil (with the help of friends), English and combinations thereof, Iraj has come up with an interesting commentary on the the local political marketplace.

Out of jail with no place to go? Go to work as the local politician's enforcer, putting up posters, stuffing ballot boxes and impersonating dead voters. Need protection from the few cops actually doing their jobs? Foot the politician's bills and see your problems evaporate. And the politician's take: I got here the hard way, and I ain't going back, whoever I have to kill.

Naturally one needs money to beat all the other low-lifes fighting to get a toe-hold on the elevator to power and rent-seeking heaven. Money in amounts one doesn't have, hence the need for even more rent-seeking, just to pay pipers, before one can set up one's empire, and, I don't know, say,

make one's brothers one's personal advisors,
employ one's family members, classmates and neighbours in key positions in the state machinery, ridiculously politicizing every institution as well as state-owned businesses
educate (or try to, anyway) one's sons on taxpayers' money, take over - almost at gunpoint where necessary - all the reasonably profitable-looking businesses that are unfortunate to catch one's eye with their success
or just start a competitor - say, a security service head-quartered on state property (seen it with my own eyes), and issue circulars "strongly advising" all state institutions to start employing one's own firm
wine and dine just about every sector of society (which only the tax-evaders must really enjoy, since the taxpayer is after all footing those bills too)

Of course you can't take it with you, but who cares in a land of short memories and short-term thinking, particularly as your most potent infliction upon your country - your family - can hang around to fight over the carcass for years to come

Queueing Theory

2009-12-21T16:38:00.000+05:30

Has anyone analysed the basic ability to form and honour a queue as an indicator of a country's level of development - or just plain education?

We Sri Lankans can't queue for toffee (in fact, if you plan to offer a toffee, stand back and be ready to call for ambulances and riot police), which, taken as a proxy for "education," would clearly show the difference between literacy (oh what wonderful - declining? - literacy rates we have!) and education.

"The trouble with markets is..." unintended consequences in slum resettlement

2009-12-21T08:27:00.001+05:30

The last para of this article is a sobering reminder that markets don't always behave as we expect them to. I've heard of similar experiences in Sri Lanka too. Nothing wrong with it in principle, right, with individually profit-maximizing actors/families. Just doesn't move people out of the slums for long. Maybe some of them are used to conditions well enough to much prefer tolerating the slum while enjoying an additional (year-round, stable) stream of income. I'd even guess (there must be research on this) that many slums spring up because they're the cheapest accommodation close to certain labour markets.

I remember driving past Kibera while working on the automation of the Nairobi Stock Exchange's Depository & Settlement System. I also remember wordlessly watching from my electric-fence-and-guard-dog -protected flat window the silent flood of humanity that begins at the crack of dawn as low-wage workers start their sometimes hours-long treks in to work, too poor even to afford a matatu bus/minivan.

Postcards from the Base of the Pyramid

2009-12-19T19:42:00.000+05:30

Snapped this on my phone in October, found lying in a pile of rubbish (not cool) in Magam-Tissa, between Kirinde and Bundala/Hambantota.

Technical digression: Two-stroke three-wheeler/autorickshaw/tuk-tuk engines need the right amount of 2T engine oil mixed into their petrol/gasoline tanks (no separate lubrication cycle etc). Hence the extra pollutants spewed into the atmosphere too.

Back to BoP stuff: In urban petrol/gasoline sheds you see a "buddy" Coke bottle sitting on an engine oil dispenser next to the petrol pump. This is precisely to measure out the amount of 2T engine oil needed when a three-wheeler/autorickshaw/tuk-tuk driver pulls in to pump some gas.

Well someone at the state-owned Ceylon Petroleum Company has either used his brain (hooray) or stumbled upon a clever BoP marketing strategy (ok, not so great for the environment, like the sachets etc the soap companies sell). The sachet holds 40ml of 2T engine oil, apparently, according to the packaging, the right amount to per 1 liter of petrol when topping up your cheap-and-cheerful three-wheeler - the BoP's ubiquitous, do-everything, go-almost-everywhere workhorse.

Digression on sachets and BoP marketing - I keep asking people I know at Unilever whether anyone has figured out the environmental impacts of all those Lifebuoy river-baths and Sunlight laundry days in our nation's waterways, lakes and tanks/reservoirs.

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Luckily for my bank balance, it's not GSM...

2009-10-23T09:47:00.000+05:30

I haven't been following the handset market, but this sure looks like a winner. I personally liked the RAZR and used it for years - it did was it was supposed to do, and well - but looks like Engadget doesn't

Powerful words

2009-10-22T00:50:00.000+05:30

Wow... Pay attention to ~03:50 onwards especially (Thanks Senura)
Reactions? Comments?

Conclusive proof he's a Sri Lankan

2009-10-09T12:24:00.000+05:30

At least the London Bobbies made a fast (excuse the pun) buck out of this one.

The boy would have fit right in with the local university strikers leaving the taxpayer-funded lecture halls - but not their stomachs - empty.

Wolverine goes green

2009-10-08T17:45:00.000+05:30

Join the band wagon? Why not - it's the only game in town

2009-10-07T11:46:00.000+05:30

Just found out that the club I play water polo at - Otter Aquatic Club (map) - is another victim of the hoopla around the Army Tattoo at the nearby Bandaranaike Memorial International Conference Hall (BMICH). The entire stretch of main road - around 1km by my estimate - had been closed off to all traffic since the shindig started. I had seen a notice inside the club that parking restrictions at the club would be tighter during the event (it's a nice little perk to be able to park one's car there and stroll over to the more popular events).

Today I hear the entire club has been sealed off - no practices, let alone boozing, snooker, squash, tennis, badminton, rustifying (did I mention boozing?) or anything else that usually goes on there.

The Rubicon had its uses...

[unpublished from 3.5 months ago] A future more like a past I barely knew

2009-10-07T10:15:00.000+05:30

[I was looking another draft when I realized I hadn't published this, started June 19th 2009. Will not edit it further. General idea I had at the time: returning home after some tumultuous times, hoping things can return to something close to what they were]

One week more before we get on a plane back home - back to Sri Lanka. Finally some downtime after the treadmill of Business School; the fire hose is finally down to a trickle.

Hanging out at my aunt's place in Los Altos Hills, lucky to have my parents around too as well as my wife. Finally back to being able to read for pleasure alone. Of course it's a chance to devour some of the modern Sri Lankan literature lying around here, that four years of undergrad, five years of work and two years of business school made it too easy for me to never get around to.

Shyam Selvadurai's editor (Cinnamon Gardens) needs to be fired of course - how could he have let Galle Face Green - and Colombo, by extension - be moved lock stock and barrel to the East Coast, for Annalukshmi to watch the sun rise over the sea?!

I'd started Michael Ondaatje's Running in the Family on a rare break at a friend's place in LA (for those who know him, never expected Sajith W. to have literature on his shelves - other than maybe the variety with yellow pages!!) and immediately felt a strange nostalgia for a time before my own, for an ideal, not even a country, that represented some of the best of our enchanted isle.

Google Ads starting to scare me

2009-10-07T10:11:00.000+05:30

I just mentioned fumes from kerosene lamps in my last post - and Google Ads served a link to a toxic gas sensor. Cue spooky music...

Sri Lanka on the BBC World Challenge short list again

2009-10-07T08:35:00.000+05:30

A few years ago it was the elephant paper project, now it's the safe kerosene lamp project. Makes for an interesting comparison with D.Light. On one hand you could say D.Light leapfrogs the issues such as continued reliance on kerosene, fumes, remaining probability of fires; on the other the bottles would be cheaper to produce/sell/sponsor/distribute and require almost no behavior change.

If you needed a reason to do your job properly...

2009-10-03T20:21:00.000+05:30

The present government made a big fuss about clawing back some of the bus transportation system some years back, painting them in the government coalition's livery. The main colour on the buses is red - the colour of the nationalist/Marxist/whatever-sells-right-now minority parties, embellished with a blue stripe in the "main" Sri Lanka Freedom (maybe not for much longer the way we're latching on to China and Iran) Party's colour. The tail wagging the dog? Not that unusual among Sri Lankan canines.

Translation of the text on the back of this state-owned bus: "The employees of the Sri Lanka Transport Board's Udahamulla Depot rehabilitated this bus in honour of His Excellency (you know who)'s completion of two years since ascending to his position."

Nice to know they still have reasons to do their jobs.

Another picture I wanted to take is of the row of such buses - more than 10 - parked along Green Path, obviously commandeered to transport large numbers of people for some political purpose. Turns out they're entertaining people in the thousands - driven up, not to mention fed and watered, at state expense - at the official First Residence ahead of the provincial elections coming up Down South. Talk about distorted political markets. One would want to avoid a possible rout in one's home province, after all - despite the shenanigans that don't seem to have been working too well.

My wife saw me writing this and "please don't get taken away."

Schumpeter (column in The Economist): The pedagogy of the privileged

2009-10-03T19:56:00.001+05:30

Surprising they didn't mention Stanford GSB and the New Curriculum; Particularly when they mentioned Nick Bloom and John Van Reenen's work (I took their class on their research, which I'd followed since I sat in on Nick's presentation ahead of SAIL 2007 (that's me front extreme left in the picture with the Infosys pyramid!)

Schumpeter: The pedagogy of the privileged | The Economist

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Pulling the ladder up after them

2009-10-03T11:20:00.000+05:30

State-educated (free ride all the way) doctors laying siege to the University Grants Commission demanding that the new private medical school project be denied (the buildings are already up opposite MillenniumIT in Malabe).

Expand opportunity to a wider base, overcoming the funnel into limited State universities that distorts the education system - if not the entire economy? What horror! What would become of the Chosen Few, such Brahmins as these, insulting their white coats as they hang on fences?

"Should people working in development have developing country experience?" Not even a question, to me

2009-09-23T18:47:00.000+05:30

Ken Banks asked the question, and I had to add my two cents' worth (in comments).

"YES to developing-country experience for development workers - ideally in the same countries/regions they will work in - and with the demographics they will be working for (note I didn't say "with"). I firmly believe you need to feel the mud between your toes and get to know at least a few members of your demographic on a personal level. That empathy and depth of understanding can change what you do - and how you do it." Maybe it just seems more obvious to me because I come from a developing country myself - and have seen too many projects that fail to account for even the most basic local appropriateness - e.g. in Sri Lanka, lovely, airy buildings with tiled floors and wood panels - which become roosts for hundreds of crows, in the intense heat and humidity end up with warped grouting and paneling, and come the two monsoons, cannot be navigated without gumboots and umbrellas. The saddest thing about that example is that just because you donate a building, should not mean you cannot hire a local architect at least as a consultant, if not your main architect.

Ideators - Apprentice-style show with some twists

2009-09-23T18:27:00.000+05:30

As I type I'm watching British and Sri Lankan university students in a Sri Lankan Apprentice-style show sponsored by the British Council (on ETV, for those in SL).

Yes, I cringed, more when watching the old-school corporate guys trying to tune in or - alas - communicate (through no fault of their own - will save that for a later rant).

But hey, they were out there on the streets, the corporate guys obviously had to wrap their minds around something new, and the presentations seem to have had some good analysis behind them - profit margins, demographic preferences, lateral thinking. The Sri Lankan students more than held their own - and this experience will hopefully stay with them as they go out into the workforce - hopefully the Sri Lankan workforce (separate rant alert)

Beating malnutrition - it takes a village

2009-09-23T11:39:00.000+05:30

Nicely done video, although it's focused on India - which makes sense I guess, if you apply the Pareto rule.

Question is, why is Sri Lanka, which is the best among the worst (see the graph) sliding back up in the numbers for stunted growth?

Welcome to a country with first-world health indicators and third-world "leadership." I only hope we can prove conclusively that maintaining good health indicators is not an either-or choice for a developing country while it gets the rest right. Along with all the other interventions (Embrace is part of it, as are the many nutrition efforts) increasing incomes - sustainably - has to be one of the ways to help break the nutrition trap at the bottom of the pyramid.

http://go.worldbank.org/YKEOSEOAQ0

Community-Driven Development

2009-09-23T11:25:00.000+05:30

We've had a name for it for a long time - "Shramadana" (lit. "donating one's labour") but it's good to see that people still see it as an option. Of course it can get messy and political, but that's a function of the group involved and how serious they are about the issue that needs fixing. A little principled leadership wouldn't hurt, though that seems a precious commodity these days

http://go.worldbank.org/QYYSWHNBP0

Save him from the White Vans

2009-09-23T10:11:00.000+05:30

One could laugh at the "hypothetical" situation of the minister of agriculture controlling the biggest rice mill, or the opposition protesting fiscal responsibility and a balanced budget... but for how long?

http://www.lbo.lk/fullstory.php?nid=1359486271

Sabbe Sattha Bhavanthu Sukhi Tatta - May all beings be happy

2009-09-19T14:03:00.000+05:30

I was heading home after an early morning friendly water polo match today. My wife wanted me to pick up 2 'Maalu Paans' (triangular buns with a fish-based stuffing) for the daily help who would be coming to help clean house. As it was on the way and, I thought, an opportunity to feed someone without perpetuating the cycle of killing some poor animal to replace the flesh I might otherwise have to buy, I stopped at the hole knocked into the wall of the All-Ceylon Buddhist Congress (ACBC) on (of course) Baddhaloka Mawatha ("Buddha's Light" avenue).

Diya Rakusa: You have veggie stuff, right?
Salesperson: No, everything's non-veg except for the seeni sambal buns.
Diya Rakusa (after taking a step back to check the shop sign): This is the Buddhist Congress, right?
Salesperson: Yes, but evryone asks for fish...

Of course if that shop is supposed to make any money for the ACBC they must respond to the market. Right? But what about the basic principles of non-violence or the First Precept of not taking life? I don't consider myself any great Buddhist - I'm still working on the basic first five precepts - but shouldn't the patrons of that ACBC shop think twice before going there looking to lock not only themselves but the salespeople, bakers and fishermen into the same karmic cycle that they then spend a good amount of time and money trying to pray their way out of?

Don't even get me started on the buses proclaiming "mey Bauddha deshayai", the clerics who don't seem to preseve the first five precepts let alone their stricter super-set... Wake up and smell the holy abattoirs

Start somewhere!

2009-09-19T13:22:00.000+05:30

Been too long avoiding blogging etc - felt it a distraction from what I should be doing but something happened that I thought deserved a little rant.

As an update, back in Sri Lanka for ~2 months now, working on a Social Innovation Fellowship from Stanford's Center for Social Innovation. More on that later - when we're out of stealth mode.

The Thinking Man’s Rapper

2009-05-19T09:17:00.000+05:30

Spring Quarter of my second year, and Stanford GSB outdoes itself again. M.C. Hammer guest-lecturing in the Building Innovative Brands class – how do you outdo that?

Hammer was extremely approachable and gracious, taking photographs with everyone and joking around as the earlier class trickled out v-e-r-y s-l-o-w-l-y, until Prof. Aaker had to call a group photo and get us in our seats (That's me behind Hammer's right shoulder :-)

Hammer just impressed me so much with how on top of things he is, and how strategically and thoughtfully he approached every aspect of marketing – starting with his early days launching his first album in 1987, selling records out of his trunk. I was eight years old at the time (!) Hammer may well have come through GSB Executive Education, he seemed to hit on every major point Prof. Aaker has been taking us through all quarter – this guy is just a natural Social Media marketing machine. 2 Legit 2 Quit.

Takeaways and priceless quotes:
Every thing you do can be used to craft your brand, to “create and control…perception.” E.g. his first song, “Let’s Get it Started,” answered in the first verse who he was and why he was there – “put on the Hammer” and he would help you p-a-r-t-y. His first video was as much a “commercial” for the Hammer brand as anything else. He looked outside the industry to find a hot new director who would understand Hammer’s desire to capture the energy of his moves.

Get ahead of the curve. Hammer got curious about the Internet early (’94-’95) and went looking for whoever would help him realize the vision he saw for it. Silicon Graphics, Apple, YouTube (when it was two computers above a pizza place), what have you.

Web 2.0 gives you an important tool - the ability to humanize yourself, reach your audience without intervening layers, and immediately and directly counter less direct forms of negative media.

The way to push your brand is to put it in the hands of very creative people. Create a groundswell, word of mouth.

“Every superhero must have one” – Hammer on Will.I.Am’s song for President Obama

“I have 20/20 vision – I didn’t need glasses – I wore them for you to see me better” - Hammer on why he wore glasses when performing

“Never apologize for your success. Just tell the other guy he’s gotta work harder”

Google Street View: Isn't this guy jaywalking?

2009-05-15T05:33:00.001+05:30

I remember an article about police using Google Maps to arrest someone in the UK. I was trying to see what the Embarcardero MUNI station looks like in real life (backstory - bought cheap tickets through the GSB Athletics Club for the SF Giants-NY Mets game, taking wife and parents right after wife's graduation ceremony) and I see this guy immortalized on Google Street View - at least until the next refresh...

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Farmers First Foundation

2009-03-19T04:52:00.001+05:30

Had an interesting chat with Amandeep Gill, a founder of the Farmers First Foundation, Indian Foreign Service (been in Sri Lanka for a while) and a fellow at the Center for International Security and Cooperation at Stanford. Check them out.

View my page on Farmers First Foundation

Lahore violence against Sri Lankan cricketers

2009-03-03T12:10:00.000+05:30

What a cruel blow to Pakistan and cricket fans everywhere. Just a couple of hours ago I left a speaker event on Pakistan with optimism for its future. My Pakistani classmate Osman Khan emailed me, the first I knew of it, saying "I am sorry about what happened in Lahore today. It is sad that my country has come to a point when friends of Pakistan are being attacked. When no one was ready to tour the country, the Sri Lankans came-and this is what happened."

A dark day for all concerned.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/7920272.stm

The Grandmaster hits the Blogosphere

2009-03-02T04:15:00.000+05:30

Andy Chan, the Grandmaster of Career Advice and Wizard of the Career and Life Vision seminar, has hit the Blogosphere. Oh, and he's also the GSB's original Ricecake :-)

ZipCar

2008-11-19T13:03:00.001+05:30

Bit the bullet, signed up. Let's see how it goes.

Why am I talking about New Orleans, you ask

2008-09-12T16:20:00.000+05:30

I was part of the Stanford GSB Service Learning trip to New Orleans (or NOLA as we fondly call it) last Spring. Was an amazing experience, extremely intense. The New Orleans 100 list I referred to earlier lists many of the organizations we visited.

the GSB's primary contact is with The Idea Village, a non-profit that works with entrepreneurs. Daryn Dodson, a GSBer at the time and now a full-time Idea Villager, started the tradition by taking a group of classmates to help with the cleanup. Subsequent worked with entrepreneurs and surprised them with some cash grants to get them going with their work.

See our trip's official blog as well. We first visited the Upper and Lower 9th Wards, and met other entrepreneurs, social and otherwise, working in the area, including New Schools for New Orleans, NOLA 180, Make It Right, Global Green etc, all listed in New Orleans 100. One of the most powerful visits was to Hope House where Sister Lillian Flavin happened to be one of our trip leaders' aunt. The film Dead Man Walking is based on the character of one of the nuns who worked there. Sister Lillian read us something she had written about her own epistolary relationship with a death row inmate. There wasn't a dry eye in the house. Jonika's and Patrick's stories too were almost unreal, and left us spinning, thinking of so many things at the same time. I loved the story-telling relationship between Patrick and the gentleman (can't believe I've forgotten his name!) who drew his story out. Such strong people.

Most of our work was with four entrepreneurs with plans to return to the Upper Ninth. That phase of the project was even more exhausting, but everyone put in so much effort, and we all felt so good after it was done.

One of the articles about our trip: http://www.neworleanscitybusiness.com/viewStory.cfm?recID=30598

Bye bye Pune, Namaskar Bangalore

2008-09-12T16:06:00.000+05:30

Tomorrow a.m. I fly to Bangalore to take part in the Stanford and India Learning exchange program (SAIL to its friends). Been a nice month in Pune, been eating far too much though because the food is just so nice compared to my choices in Kyrgyzstan (or New Orleans for that matter..!)

We have a packed schedule in Bangalore (only two hours to ourselves, on the last day!), and I am glad to see that my suggestion we visit a National Park has been snuck in - we're going to Bannerghatta baby!

The New Orleans 100

2008-09-11T16:00:00.000+05:30

Good things are happening in New Orleans. Don't believe me? See for yourself. Spread the word.

That air crash in Kyrgyzstan

2008-09-09T19:01:00.000+05:30

Finally looked up the recent air crash in Kyrgyzstan. Sad story. My uncle and a good friend of mine had for a moment wondered if I had been anywhere near it, but I was in India by then. Been maxing out on the local National Geographic Channel variant most evenings in the flat. Did you know that more people get killed annually by mules and donkeys than in air crashes? Stay away from that ass!

Final week in Pune, finishing up the report and presentation. Looks like we'll be presenting ahead of schedule, tomorrow evening in fact, to make room for everyone's schedules and time zone differences.

Wrapping up here in the office for today. Some kid next door seems to be having his birthday party, lots of high-energy music pumping out, got me tapping my toes and swinging my conference chair in here :-)

As the old dude in the MotoYuva ad says, "Cheeeyaooooo!"

An assault on the senses

2008-09-08T18:37:00.000+05:30

Ah, India. Your first real sensory experience if you don't count sweating in the humidity and heat is the heady mix of incense, dust and cow dung that invades your nostrils. The food briefly drowns out all else as you immerse yourself in the spices, reveling in the thick gravies and ghee-soaked naans, rotis and rice. And then, you have the monsoons. I already wrote about that, an immersive experience in its own right :-)

Today as we were brushing up our final report in the conference room that is our office, we heard the gleeful beating of drums announcing yet another Ganesh street parade as another small sangam escorted their own Ganesh idol down Prabath Road. We rushed out with our cameras and spent a few minutes soaking in the sounds and taking in the spectacle. I loved the fact that the backup (as if they needed it) to the enthusiastic brass band in their smart uniforms came in the form of an electric keyboard and those snazzy electric drumpads, powered by a generator and all housed in a colourful Mahindra jeep.

a gaggle of sweaty young men danced their hearts out ahead of the procession, mugging for all they were worth for the cameras. The young bass drummer had a little help with his drum in the form of a couple of friends balancing it for him off the back of a motorbike. Incense filled the air, the sun directly behind the statue filtering through the smoke served to create a suitably impressive effect for the photograph.

Ganesh's modern vahane was of the three wheeled variety, with sturdy attendants to ensure He stayed on even keel up their on the roof. I love this country!

Indian ads

2008-09-06T11:50:00.000+05:30

More funny Indian ads

The CondomCondom campaign to demysticize and promote condom usage. Unfortunately the website doesn't seem to really work when you try to download the ringtone :-(

The CondomCondom song set to some old Amitabh Bhachchan clip :-)

There's another really nice one by Reliance Mobile - the pilgrim hotspots one where a girl calls her grandmother to hear the bells ringing at some temple. I love the little old lady and her expression at the end. Big sop that I am...

Hilarious Indian TV ads

2008-09-05T16:13:00.000+05:30

I love some of these Indian TV ads. Used to be that in the newly liberalized market the guys didn't seem to know what to do with all the airtime - resulting in toe-curling, usually sickly sweet epics that took up more time than whatever you were paying good money to watch.

Obviously the market has matured a great deal, and competition does wonders of course. I love these two ads running on cable right now - and a good thing too, since you can easily see them about every 10 minutes if things are on tight rotation.

Tata Sky Aamir Khan ad: You don't need to know the language to keep cracking up at this one

Motorola MotoYuva ad: Hilarious, universal - I think the phone is pitched straight at the Indian teeny market, but everyone knows their father must do this at home, they just haven't caught him yet...

Still think it isn't a small world?

2008-09-05T16:09:00.000+05:30

Ben Maritz, GSB '08, who backpacked through Central Asia last summer was very helpful in guiding me towards interesting reading, and a source of great tips, before I went to Kyrgyzstan. Today he emails me, and I quote, "Hey I just met your sri lankan water polo buddy who went to wharton - he is starting at mckinsey in london with me. Small world!"

Ganaka was in my class in high school and kept goal on our water polo team. Haven't seen the guy in years, though we exchanged an email or two while he was at Wharton.

Oh, and then last week another dude who used to swim with my sister and me way back when turned out to be working in Mumbai - I swear I hadn't spoken with the guy in at least 15 years, closer to 20.

I rest my case.

Monsoon mayhem, idol chatter

2008-09-03T15:05:00.000+05:30

Been pretty hectic these last couple of weeks, lots of bumpy busrides to far away places. Today's a public holiday as the first day marking Ganesh Chathurti. Lord Ganesh, the jovial, pot-bellied, elephant-headed god of learning, homes, etc etc is invited into homes in statue form. the festival culminates in 11 days when the idols are bathed in rivers.

It's interesting watching all this from the sidelines. Many people are pushing for a return to eco-friendliness (these religions were so close to nature until just a few decades ago) with non-polluting paints and materials for the idols, particularly as they'll be immersed in the highly polluted rivers unless people can bring themselves to substitute a bowl of water for the deed. One newspaper was running a poll as to whether people prefer a slimmed down, keep-fit Ganesh to the traditional image - which could be a problem since thw universe is supposed to reside in his belly, held together by a snake for a belt. Slimmer waistline => more overcrowding?

My great-aunt Ena simply adores Lord Ganesh - you find all kinds of statues around the house and in the Matale Heritage Centre's workshops. She would have loved being here right now - though she did spend a lot of time in India when they were both much younger.

Yesterday evening Pune received half its average rainfall for September - in the space of 3 hours. I was supposed to go see my parents at Le Meridien hotel which is some ways away from JM Road (Jangli Maharaj Road - these guys love to abbreviate everything - MG Road is Mahatma Gandhi Road and RBM Road where the hotel is, is really Raja Bahadur Mill Road!)

I ended up wading most of the way down JM Road - which turned out to be a good thing as I passed card, rickshaws and motorbikes stalled in the water that was waist-high in places. Gangs of youths were feeling under the muddy water for the sewer grates that had got hopelessly clogged with all the rubbish people liberally scatter as they walk. One group had found and opened a grate - but I didn't see any drainage taking place...

Finally flagged a rickshaw down at usurious rates (rain PLUS nightfall?? jackpot!) and made it - but I think many people did not get too far; the whole thing took me at least 2-3 hours for a trip that usually takes 15-20 minutes in traffic.

Thunder in the offing, and the skies are darkening, time to head back to the flat while I still can! Challo!

Diya Rakusa in Pune

2008-08-20T13:10:00.000+05:30

Landed in Pune on Sunday after an exhausting series of flights from Bishkek. Moscow airport is the pits - all the more ironic considering all the buzz about BRIC and the super luxury brands advertised and on sale.

Pune is a nice place, reminds me so much of Sri Lanka as well as the other places I've been in India. I'm in a shady, green area on Prabhat Road, the flat is two lanes down from the Lend-A-Hand India office.

No water since I arrived - on the fourth floor, which is the maximum number of storeys one can build before installing an elevator. After several days of this my landlady apologetically explained that there just was not enough pressure to send water through my taps. Ah well, back to bathing off one bucket of water - good for the environment (and the back and leg muscles from the carrying) if nothing else. Think this may be better than moving into the hotel nearby - at least this way I can cook myself a humble dinner of instant noodles once in a while.

Went to Vigyan Ashram yesterday - beautiful countryside, hard to believe that's what a rain shadow looks like, though it's the rainy season these days. Met a successful graduate of the DBRT program (class of 1986) in the village of Pabal just before we went to VA.

Had a scenic picnic lunch on a hillock just outside the compound - the same that everyone at the Ashram has (delicious chapati, rice and curries) - with some of the instructors. They fed a dog and crow that didn't try to sneak off with our food but waited patiently for the hand outs.

Met Mrs. Kalbag, widow of Dr. Kalbag - a very calm and philosphical encounter. Today I leave in the evening with Yogesh Kulkarni, now head of VA, on a seat-of-the-pants field trip to Yavatmal. Return on Saturday morning.

Love the food though - Pulaos, all kinds of curries... yumm... off to lunch now! :-)

On Navel-Gazing

2008-08-14T09:32:00.000+05:30

My dear Sainted Aunt (no, really, she's a candidate for sainthood AND a Nobel Prize for organization) reminded me recently of my scornful dismissal of blogging as an excuse for much feckless navel-gazing and blathering. This was, of course, a while before I started blogging in earnest :-)

So let me modify that: blogging can still be an excuse for outpourings of mindless drivel, but it can also be used for good. Ref. some of the blogs I've been linking to on Facebook and here. It just depends on what you use it for, just like with guns I guess.

Now Twittering, that seems totally off - unless you know exactly what the Twitterer is talking about. Even the Slate Twitters on the Olympics are way too cryptic for me, cut off from most coverage as I am.

Hopefully this is the first and last inward-looking post for a while, as I try to keep this blog about my experiences during my internships, the second year at Stanford Business School (if I have the time - not likely), and maybe as I try to change the world just a little bit in the field of development.

My Next Assignment

2008-08-14T09:25:00.000+05:30

Lend-A-Hand India works with Vigyan Ashram in Pabal, Maharashtra (close to Pune) on spreading the school-based Introduction to Basic Technology curriculum under Plan 100 (to 100 schools).

If you have an hour or so, watch this. I may be a big softie, but I got teary-eyed at least twice.

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J-Lo on the Jailoos

2008-08-12T09:58:00.000+05:30

Well, not quite. But Ms. Lopez, as well as Ms. B. Spears and some others do make the occasional appearance. Even on chocolate wrappers. Ah, progress.

By the way, Jailoos are alpine meadows.

Where I'm headed next

2008-08-12T08:25:00.000+05:30

Check out this video by Lend-A-Hand India. I arrive in Pune this weekend.

PLAN 100 - A Silent Revolution from Lend-A-Hand India on Vimeo.

Did Jaws come from Central Asia?

2008-08-08T13:10:00.000+05:30

I mean the character in The Spy Who Loved Me. So many gold teeth around here, it takes a while to get used to. Only the youngest and most educated seem to have a full set of their own teeth. Combination of diet, personal hygiene (or lack thereof), and the water too, I think.

I've spotted a few dental clinics around, they don't seem to be that well off. Surprising.

"Wear you wealth" redefined.

"What's a Diya Rakusa, anyway?"

2008-08-08T13:01:00.000+05:30

Translated literally, Diya Rakusa means "water demon." I tend to get a little, shall we say, stern, during water polo practise, whether I'm in the water or on the deck. One of my team mates at Otters called me Diya Rakusa and I quite like the handle. Also the name given to the pirate captain in the Sinhala-dubbed cartoon Dr. Doolittle. I can do the voices, too :-)

Central Asia's fountain head - down to a trickle

2008-08-07T16:00:00.000+05:30

Kyrgyzstan is poor in just about every natural resource except water. It happens to sit at the source of most of Central Asia's supply of the wet stuff - but this year has been a particularly dry one, and the rumblings may already be beginning.

With water and mountainous terrain, hydro electricity was a no-brainer of course - but with the Toktogul resevoir drying up, that's a two-fer in terms of resource shocks.

The huge, obviously inefficient gas- or elecricity-powered heating systems in urban and rural housing and in public buildings - nothing more than 3-5 inch pipes running along the walls - were a stark contrast to the energy issues plaguing this country. Mains electricity supply comes and goes. Other energy sources are prohibitively expensive in this land-locked country - forget about solar, heating oil, gas and petroleum are almost completely imported, along with the generators that would burn them.

Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan import Kyrgyz water and export gas and oil respectively - and tensions are always simmering. Mirgul, my translator, says Uzbekistan's president recently complained that water comes from God and should be free, whereas gas is pumped out by man, very expensivley at that.

Add to this summer temperatures of 30-40 degrees Celsius, versus -20 to -30 in the winter - I can barely get my tropical, coastal-dwelling head around the problems racking up for this country.

Hospitality vs wealth

2008-08-07T15:34:00.000+05:30

Is hospitality inversely related to a person's, or society's, affluence?

In Dilli Haat in New Delhi, in December 2006, a poor street performer/mendicant from Rajasthan removed the tunic and turban my great-aunt Ena had been admiring and gifted them to her with great ceremony; "from my body, to yours" he said.

People in Kyrgyzstan are unfailingly hospitable and incredibly, heartbreakingly generous. Strangers met on the street, striking up a conversation after giving directions, invite you to their home for plauf. Guests are highly respected, in true Islamic tradition, and hardly allowed to move a finger besides eating and making conversation. The questions are unending, sometimes childlike but always sincere and stemming from great curiosity about lands beyond the mountains and the former USSR.

Random people stop in the street and ask if I'm from Pakistan (the closest to a sub-continental most can immediately think of). When I say "men Sri Lanka-dan Keldim" I'm greeted with sheer delight at my smattering of Kyrgyz, and great compliments on my country's tea - the only reason people here know of Ceylon at all.

Do we have water melons in Sri Lanka? Rain? How often? What do people eat? Vegetariansky?? How on earth do I survive at home, let alone in meat-loving Kyrgyzstan?

Olyn, olyn - please, eat some more! Life revolves around food, preferably consumed lazing on a chaikana in a shady orchard, with great ceremony around breaking the bread with one's guests - sharing the naan that looks like a huge doughnut with a thin membrane of dough left where the hole should be - and plying them with chai

Visitors always remark on Sri Lankans' hospitality, and I'd say that hospitality increases with each mile travelled away from the bustling cities into the poorer hinterlands. Is there a link?

Central Asia's Soviet hangover

2008-08-07T14:07:00.000+05:30

Old people here still talk fondly of Soviet times. It's quite a toss-up trying to figure out when people were better off. The giant planned economy allowed monstrous factories to spring up that supplied people thousands of miles away, and no one had to worry about getting paid of course - that had nothing to do with their salaries.

The few rotting carcasses of abandoned factories that get used these days are home to photo studios, clothes shops, small workshops. Most just lie empty. Parks and the grounds of public buildings are encroached by chaikanas and small shops. One of the beneficiaries has started a greenhouse and chicken farm in the shadow of Lenin's statue in an old park. Apparently people got the opportunity to buy public land, in some places in return for maintaining the parks for an entrance fee.

"Grandfather" Lenin is everywhere, many of the statues in better state than the towns and villages decaying around them.

One of the beneficiary businesses had been lucky. The old Soviet printing press the owner bought over had been simply abandoned, without the usual looting or vandalism. A babushka operating one of the old offset presses proudly declared that Lenin himself must have used the machine in his time. The 18-colour, A3-format highspeed Rizograph machine in the airconditioned office is an uncomfortable (but very profitable) anachronism. Hooray for disruptive technologies though, this printshop outsources the printing of five local newspapers - and starts their own rag next week.

Marshrutka, Matatu... a boneshaker by any other name

2008-08-07T13:53:00.000+05:30

Just like matatus in Kenya, most of urban Kyrgyzstan travels in "marshrutkas." We used to have more vans plying the shorter/narrower routes in Colombo too, but bigger Lanka Ashok Leyland buses force their way down most roads in Colombo now. Just like back home, marshrutkas obligingly stop for anyone anywhere, and I've seen with my own eyes (didn't expect Bradt's Kyrgyzstan to come alive in this way) a marshrutka abandon its route to drop the last passengers of the day off somewhere else.

Marshrutkas here mostly "imported" Mercedes goods vans or relic Soviet vans (I swear I saw one with a badge saying "Latvia" on its grille - no idea if that's the real name - most of them don't have any grilles or badging anymore, makes comparison a tad difficult)

The big sliding door on the side is welded shut, and people have to climb in through the passenger door. This allows another row of seats and helps the driver manage fares, I guess - at least when his son/nephew/brother/cousin is not sitting on a seat made of old wire milk crates. Metal piping is bolted on to the roof for handrails. I always manage to knock some poor babushka or aksakal in the head when I'm moving around.

Business innovation has been on my mind what with the project I've been working on. I was quite pleased to see innovation in the second marshrutka in as many days today - a little magnet stuck on the dashboard to catch all the coins sliding around. Notes are tucked into A/C grilles, in the sun visor, in the cubby holes... The guys should give the vans a good cleaning before they dump them, to snag all the spare change that must be knocking around in there.

Today's marshrutka actually had all its dials working - a first as far as I've seen here. Progress! I hear that Bakiev, the president, has just banned marshrutkas in favor of buses in Bishkek, the capital.

Driving a desk again

2008-08-07T13:43:00.000+05:30

Gah, the day I don't lug my camera and lenses to work, there's an unusual cloud formation outside. Looks like Aurora Borealis, maybe another KC-135 dumped its fuel today.

Cranking out the reports on my internship - an evaluation of the Cluster Endowment Fund (CEF), an interesting program under MercyCorp's Collaborative Development Initiative (CDI). Funded by USAID.

Testing one... testing the other one...

2008-08-07T09:57:00.000+05:30

Let's see how this stuff works, then.

Ok, enough kidding around, bye bye MSN and Facebook pseudo-blogging, hello Blogger.

Stardate August 7th, 2008. Day 26 in Kyrgyzstan.

I'm here in Osh, Kyrgyzstan on my Global Management Immersion Experience (GMIX) internship with MercyCorps. Halfway through my MBA at Stanford's Graduate School of Business.

Been working on an evaluation of a project here in Southern Kyrgyzstan. Involves a lot of travelling by Lada Niva, and opportunities to take lots of photographs - though I usually feel too bad to get the obliging drivers to stop everytime I see a nice composition - definitely not hardcore enough to be a serious photographer.

Why start this blog only now, with just over a week left in my internship? Well, I was in the field most of the time before, plus we were behind pretty draconian firewall policies most of the time I did make it to regional offices. The IT guy here (shared with Kompanion - more on that later, hopefully) finally relented as I need to get to so many shady sites like the Stanford student systems etc.