Your race is on your face
Dear loved one's back home,
Wish you all a very happy festive season! This is my forth month here and all newness of the place is thoroughly worn off. Unlike my earlier monologues, there is really nothing to say about Hong Kong. I guess Its time for another change !! All of us in the class are looking forward to go to London/Columbia and are very kicked about how things are progressing on that front. For starters we had a LBS (London Business School ) faculty talk last weekend. What she said at the end of the lecture was quiet profound. LBS is so diverse that no one nationality is a majority. "In a 60 student class there typically is almost 40 nationalities, that's almost like a U N general assembly meeting. Oh sorry !! The Indians usually are the majority, do we have any Indians in this class ? 10 of us raised our hand !! A little bewildered she asked how many of you are there in this world, are you sure its only 1 billion ? I am not too sure. " If sources are to believed then there are more Indians in LBS than all the whites put together.We were a little unsure as to how we are supposed to interpret the remark, but nevertheless we left it at that.
HKU MBA
It is needless to say that I am quiet enamoured by Prof. Ali's teachings in "Creativity and Business Design". Yesterday was the last class of his course and he surmised the class like this " The biggest Impediment to learning is what you have already learned." In other words your knowing something is a big reason why you don't know many things. Another classic Quote was " In times of crisis be like a duck, be calm and unruffled on the surface, but paddle away like crazy underneath " I was quiet overwhelmed by these and many other comments just for its philosophical value. The course itself has not made me more creative than before except that I can come up with many quotable Quotes. I hope my dear readers don't think I have gone Kaput.
Your race is on your face
I knew this was always coming so I am not too surprised of the racial slurs that other Indian students are complaining about. During a discussion in the Marketing class the talk suddenly weaned to whether HK has racism. To further precipitate it , the Prof. asked Indians whether they feel discriminated. There was a deafening silence in the class for a few seconds before we vaguely nodded our head and said no. In the nodding No's some of the Indians were trying to say yes under their breath. There was a china day last week and some Shanghai students organized a Chinese dinner and surprise surprise, the Indians did not get an Invite. Not that it mattered to me at all and I was too comfortable in my den with my curd rice but others who had earlier gone out of the way to network with other students were left a little high and dry. I have always reconciled to this fact and make no bones about not feeling included, but we are as much to blame as others are. Personally I am too comfortable with my other Indian students and relax my guard and get on to a normal chatty mode , but that is usually not the case with others. Often when the Indians are in a chatty and boisterous mood and suddenly a Canadian or a Chinese walks in, we get a little awkward. There is no common points to talk about. Even though I have come out of my comfort zone and chose to come to Hong Kong, I find this Innate need to go back to my ppl(Read Indians) after the initial conversations with others. Don't read too much into it though, I have a made a great Chinese and Dutch friend with whom I often find myself talking about world politics. In my earlier trip to the US and UK, the whites were my boss and I would bend over back to please them. Now I find the whites at the same level and that's some how different!!
Unite and Divide
MBA students are usually divided into teams, my team is as diverse and as difficult as it can get. An Italian, Brit, 1 Canadian HK, 1 Chinese and 2 Indians. Everybody gets a little pensive and edgy during the meeting and you really would see us fight over silly things like when to schedule the next meet !! The chinese have a dinner time at 6:00, The Italian has to go to the bar at 7:00, The HK girl has to go home after 8:00, The Indians have a cricket match to watch later in the day (This was during the 20-20). The atmosphere is absolutely rotten that I feel drained after the meeting. My friend suggested that it would have been easier if they were all from the same nationality. That is so far away from truth. Humans have this primal need to club and differentiate themselves and will always figure out a way to segregate. You are a Hindu or a Muslim, You are south Indian or a north Indian, You are an Iyer or an Iyengar, you are a Shia or a Sunni. It is quiet ironical that we always fight over something we had no control to choose. We fight over religion, we fight over nationality but both of these were shovelled onto you. You did not choose it !!!
I will stop my charade here, I went a little longer than I should have. Nothing gives me more joy than hearing about your views.
Wish you all a very happy festive season! This is my forth month here and all newness of the place is thoroughly worn off. Unlike my earlier monologues, there is really nothing to say about Hong Kong. I guess Its time for another change !! All of us in the class are looking forward to go to London/Columbia and are very kicked about how things are progressing on that front. For starters we had a LBS (London Business School ) faculty talk last weekend. What she said at the end of the lecture was quiet profound. LBS is so diverse that no one nationality is a majority. "In a 60 student class there typically is almost 40 nationalities, that's almost like a U N general assembly meeting. Oh sorry !! The Indians usually are the majority, do we have any Indians in this class ? 10 of us raised our hand !! A little bewildered she asked how many of you are there in this world, are you sure its only 1 billion ? I am not too sure. " If sources are to believed then there are more Indians in LBS than all the whites put together.We were a little unsure as to how we are supposed to interpret the remark, but nevertheless we left it at that.
HKU MBA
It is needless to say that I am quiet enamoured by Prof. Ali's teachings in "Creativity and Business Design". Yesterday was the last class of his course and he surmised the class like this " The biggest Impediment to learning is what you have already learned." In other words your knowing something is a big reason why you don't know many things. Another classic Quote was " In times of crisis be like a duck, be calm and unruffled on the surface, but paddle away like crazy underneath " I was quiet overwhelmed by these and many other comments just for its philosophical value. The course itself has not made me more creative than before except that I can come up with many quotable Quotes. I hope my dear readers don't think I have gone Kaput.
Your race is on your face
I knew this was always coming so I am not too surprised of the racial slurs that other Indian students are complaining about. During a discussion in the Marketing class the talk suddenly weaned to whether HK has racism. To further precipitate it , the Prof. asked Indians whether they feel discriminated. There was a deafening silence in the class for a few seconds before we vaguely nodded our head and said no. In the nodding No's some of the Indians were trying to say yes under their breath. There was a china day last week and some Shanghai students organized a Chinese dinner and surprise surprise, the Indians did not get an Invite. Not that it mattered to me at all and I was too comfortable in my den with my curd rice but others who had earlier gone out of the way to network with other students were left a little high and dry. I have always reconciled to this fact and make no bones about not feeling included, but we are as much to blame as others are. Personally I am too comfortable with my other Indian students and relax my guard and get on to a normal chatty mode , but that is usually not the case with others. Often when the Indians are in a chatty and boisterous mood and suddenly a Canadian or a Chinese walks in, we get a little awkward. There is no common points to talk about. Even though I have come out of my comfort zone and chose to come to Hong Kong, I find this Innate need to go back to my ppl(Read Indians) after the initial conversations with others. Don't read too much into it though, I have a made a great Chinese and Dutch friend with whom I often find myself talking about world politics. In my earlier trip to the US and UK, the whites were my boss and I would bend over back to please them. Now I find the whites at the same level and that's some how different!!
Unite and Divide
MBA students are usually divided into teams, my team is as diverse and as difficult as it can get. An Italian, Brit, 1 Canadian HK, 1 Chinese and 2 Indians. Everybody gets a little pensive and edgy during the meeting and you really would see us fight over silly things like when to schedule the next meet !! The chinese have a dinner time at 6:00, The Italian has to go to the bar at 7:00, The HK girl has to go home after 8:00, The Indians have a cricket match to watch later in the day (This was during the 20-20). The atmosphere is absolutely rotten that I feel drained after the meeting. My friend suggested that it would have been easier if they were all from the same nationality. That is so far away from truth. Humans have this primal need to club and differentiate themselves and will always figure out a way to segregate. You are a Hindu or a Muslim, You are south Indian or a north Indian, You are an Iyer or an Iyengar, you are a Shia or a Sunni. It is quiet ironical that we always fight over something we had no control to choose. We fight over religion, we fight over nationality but both of these were shovelled onto you. You did not choose it !!!
I will stop my charade here, I went a little longer than I should have. Nothing gives me more joy than hearing about your views.
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