Weekly Update I

(Written on May 18, 2018)

I am sitting in Columbia's Lehman library preparing a presentation.

Really.

When I left my consulting life, I told myself that one of the things that'll transpire would be the prospect of eschewing the making of presentations. After all, while it's perfectly understandable why the consultant needs her slides it was, at least to my naive past self, somewhat obvious that an academic need only worry about getting her work convincing, novel and useful.

Well, I am sitting here making my fourth presentation in a month, well past 25 slides, and not finding an end point any time soon. 

I can bore you with the nuanced differences between presentations made in this life and my last one but I know you'd care about it as much as Spurs' chances of winning Silverware next season so let me not torture you.

I can talk about tennis. I guess I can only talk about tennis these days. In my free time and when I am tired but need to continue working I switch on my TennisTV and have a match playing in the background. This isn't very different from the last two years of my schooling though I suspect I was not too sincere about the balance between work and sport back in my teen years.

******

I am reading The Demon-Haunted World by Carl Sagan these days. Sagan represents the ideal skeptic for me - he carries a certain maturity about the limitations of human sentiments; that we cannot all go about expressing profound doubts on all that we come to believe in our daily lives. At the same time, he unleashes a spirited attack on the proliferation of what he calls pseudo-science and how it causes people to be led to "easy" beliefs about the way the world works. He's worried - this is in the 90s - by the growing market of peddlers of pseudo-science and his exasperation is endearing.

******

Among the macro-literature that I am exploring these days is about "bunching" and its use in finding deep structural (that means used in economic theories) parameters such the elasticity of intertemporal substitution. This is part-attempt to learn something fascinating and part-desperation in trying to finish a course safely but it's not time wasted. And that, at least, is a relief.

This will be the last class of my life in a must-pass setting. And I never thought I'd say it but here it goes.

I am relieved.

Getting Fresh – III

(Written on June 8, 2019)

It’s been a while. Honestly though, it too me a while to fill up the pot again. I want to be vain at this point and tell you it’s because I upgraded to a much much bigger pot and I’ve been on a quest to make sure I add content over bluster and also that I have tried to rise above the melee again except that this time it’s more difficult because 30 is a little more than a year away and as anyone who is close to the cliff (or who has fallen off) can tell you it’s that much harder switching gears to a brand new field, especially if one refuses to eschew old habits – classical literature, classical music, physics, math, and deep suspicion of the social sciences.

The pot is full again. And with that milestone I must confess I have missed blabbering into the open on this blog. I am free to talk with myself once more!

What must be said first up is the reality of the gauntlet thrown at me by…me. Last semester meant 5 more subjects (for credit) and work for 4 professors in different capacities. Plus the onerous requirement to produce original research. Plus my own quest to go for research that was more than incremental. Some teaching work which everyone else does. And lastly, making sure I realize that research is a game – play it but don’t depend on it.

Yup, I could be vain like that. Except I will be throughout this post.

Research is very strange. Social science research is even stranger. The utility function is the ultimate non-falsifiable hypothesis. Theory is progressively becoming how you can use fancy math to produce counter-intuitive results that, these days, are as likely to be testable as building a particle collider that can detect strings. Empirical research is interesting but worryingly liable to fraud and more worryingly a case of looking for your keys under the street lamp while you house languishes in darkness. There are very few rules that apply in every context. And no good textbooks.

It’s not all bad. Then again most of it is so I’m not going to be overly-optimistic.

Let’s get on with this collection of moments from my pensieve.

*****************

I am in Banaras (Varanasi). It’s where my paternal grandmother lives and from where effectively my father’s side of the family hails. Benaras is one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world. Standing at Dashashwamedh Ghat, one of the most frequented riverside banks in this city, one can only lapse into deep philosophical ruminations while looking at the holy Ganges. Dashashmedh Ghat is so heavily frequented because it is in some ways in the most religiously and spiritually significant part of this already very holy city, a stone’s throw away from the Kashi Vishwanath temple. It also happens to be a stone’s throw away from where we live.

Varanasi is well known these days for being India’s Prime Minister’s constituency. People ask me if I see progress there. My first response is that this is not an easy task. Benaras is by its very nature a city of narrow lanes and winding alleys. And the people living in the corners and choked streets have been there for a hundred years or more. So you can’t just throw them out. As far as all these aspects are concerned there has been little or no change. The streets are still very dirty and the roads are still crumbling. People are no better off.

It’s where tourists visit that there has been change. This is somewhat related to the previous point – there’s a lot more scope to do stuff in these places. And by stuff I mainly mean roads. Indian leaders are poor at changing administrative systems and in completing soft targets – mortality indicators, employment, or even sanitation. They are much better at building one time infrastructure. And for our PM, roads have always been a way to show he’s doing work. In that vein, the road to the airport is fantastic. The posh locale of Ravindrapuri is posher. Assi Ghat, which was mostly jungle earlier, has been cleared and converted to a hip place where people can sit and relax. Old timers have a hard time seeing this metamorphosis of Assi Ghat. It’s really a great place to visit.

More than that, this PM has managed to grant people the most rare of feelings – he has instilled in the people of Benaras (and I imagine in many other places) a sense of hope. People believe more substantive changes will be made.

For what it’s worth one can only hope they are right. Progress will be progress. And much respected and loved.

*****************

Change

(Written on March 14, 2021)

Where to begin? This is the penultimate March of PhD life but it may well be the last one of note. I've been juggling multiple possible job market papers and it seems nothing is truly clicking. I do have more ten papers in some stage of being written and I think at least half of them will be top quality so it's not all bad. Whatever else that may happen, I'll get out with some genuine research in my name.

This is easily the longest I've spent away from home. Sure, COVID is a good reason to stay put. But the mental health costs of staying essentially in the same room for 14 months and counting are huge. Work has progressed but the mind has suffered. The quest has been undertaken but it has been more lonely than first imagined or bargained for.

In the next six months, I will try to produce a paper of some note. If I make it, then phew. If I don't my degree will be complete and I will see what pastures await a person who can think through anything under seconds but is not research material. What am I meant to do?

(Last post in this series)

Back Home

This morning while I lay in bed blinking away my jet lagged eyes I took a moment to savor the familiar chirping of the birds and the energy of a Delhi street; I involuntarily relaxed knowing I was back home. The tranquility was short-lived. Sirens punctuated my state of bliss. Once. Twice. Far too many times. We're living through hell in India. The only thing that makes me feel better is that I am here too.

Sailing

 The great thing about this blog is that hardly anyone reads it. It has never been picked by search engine crawlers nor has it been associated with my name. And that's good because it gives me a chance to maintain a simple journal without the pressure of entertaining an audience.

I've been working like a maniac this year. It hasn't been smooth sailing. Most times I've underperformed and I've taken a long long time to get to an acceptable standard of performance. Research is hard and it's harder when you have the broad span of interests I insist on pursuing.

I have spent the past two and a half years on a grand quest to tame something I have only begun understanding. My mind is working and it is squeezing a month's worth of work every 10 days. And still it isn't enough. I need to do more.

This year is almost ending though there are quite a few days left in December still. I will persevere and I will push myself all the way. If nothing else, I feel the excitement of this phase, the imminence of facing the music, and some measure of power pulsing through my veins.  

Allez, I guess.

A New Decade

I turned 30 this month.

I have a reliable test when it comes to judging what I've done in life. I always hark back to the time when I was 14 or 15. I imagine myself -- indomitable, unconquerable, uncompromising. And I ask myself if that young adult would've approved of whatever I have achieved today.

It would not be incorrect or harsh to say he would be sorely disappointed. In the three decades I have spent on this planet, I have ended up wasting most of my time in the last one. I have burnt myself over ambitions that deserved no attention; I gave my soul to these endeavors. I paid a heavy price.

It is disconcerting to know I am now supposed to be an adult. It is distressing to imagine the roads that are closed off to me, most temporarily but some permanently, simply because I made some fundamental mistakes.

So what's next? A painful retreat or a glorious charge into the melee once more?

You know what I am thinking.

Change

Third year of PhD draws to a close. There's massive amounts of work to be completed and yet, I feel as if I have crossed a bridge and reached the other side. In my time at Columbia, I have taken 27 or more courses. The driving force behind this madness was simply an insatiable desire to feel comfortable in the field in which I will seemingly be called an "expert." I paid the price. Walking a deadline tightrope meant 3-4 hours of sleep, innumerable anxious moments, and extreme concentration.

The mischief is almost managed. The courses are no longer needed. Research, in all its effervescent glory and macabre anxiety, awaits. I am six months behind where I needed to be.

I said earlier I have reached the other side. That entails eschewing the morbidly familiar and plunging into missteps and dead-ends.

I wouldn't want it any other way.

I have changed.

(Last post: https://haarisian.blogspot.com/2016/10/change.html)

Exams

There's something about exams that's hard to pin down with ordinary run-of-the-mill feelings. Stress? Fear? Irritability? That's the school boy essay writing set that'll come in along with the occasional "excitement" thrown in to speculate on some counter points.

As I study in the East Asian Library of my University with a huge stack of lecture chapters, problem sets, recitation notes, supplementary research papers, previous examinations and H Is for Hawk (a man has to read after all) I only feel numb.

The boring question, "Should I begin from the first chapter or start from the end," seems resolutely intangible. I don't feel like preparing for this. There's so much more fun in staring down the barrel with one Matrix move to save yourself. Being a PhD student does mean taking these exams seriously.

Back to work.

The Greats

I like to follow the actions and achievements of the Greats across all fields spanned by humans, in the present and from the past. What amazes me constantly is how they managed to balance out their focus across different areas of self-improvement. That kind of judgement is rare.

In the midst of the three M's, I am spending days and nights together to get there. Not sure if I will. Each small let-up costs a lot.

The dream lives on. 

Change

For the first time in my life I am training to be properly good in a subject. And I have to cover a lot of distance. A lot of it. It reminds me of the time I was in the 9th grade and I had to teach myself more chemistry after a sizable jump in effort was demanded. Thankfully, things smoothed out eventually back then. Yet to see what happens this time.

Maybe it doesn't matter.

Ithaka, here I come.

(For the previous post in this series: http://haarisian.blogspot.com/2016/04/change.html)

Change

IIM Ahmedabad deserves a longer post. Till then, I let J R R Tolkien do the talking:

Farewell he bade to his free people,

hearth and high-seat, and the hallowed places,

where long he had feasted ere the light faded.

Forth rode the king, fear behind him,

fate before him. Fealty kept he;

oaths he had taken, all fulfilled them.

- Riding of the Rohirrim, The Return of the King

(For the previous post in this series: http://haarisian.blogspot.com/2015/03/time-for-some-change.html)

Time for Some Change

An academic year ends at IIM Ahmedabad. With the last group assignment, I can finally move on to newer fields. It still brings a shudder to my soul to compare the conditions under which I entered the institute. And though the wounds have healed, the scars still remain.

Frankly, the whole PGP1 thing is hype but I like to keep a track of numbers. So:

3 terms. 6 slots. 10 months.

31 courses. 38 exams. 42 quizzes.

49 assignments. 241 cases. 527 sessions.

Boy, I'm beat.

(For the last post in this series: http://haarisian.blogspot.com/2014/10/change.html)

Change

Ah, the beast awakens once more.

Time then, to turn it up a gear or three.

界王拳

(last in the series)

A Balanced Budget

(A follow-up to the post Fiscal Crisis)

There comes a point in every man's life when he must confront his past.

For some weeks in May every single day, I boarded a time machine. The dust-filled, at times soggy and almost always heavy trips took me as far back as 5th April 2013. I was sorely tested... at times stretched to the limits of crazy self-flagellation.

Let's talk about the mathematics of the situation. If you read my last post, you would find an estimate of some 150 newspapers piled up in a neglected and inconspicuous corner of my office. It seemed a decent guess back then.

With an inflated assumption of 180 I guessed the entire series could be wrapped up with 12 a day (I get 4 newspapers daily). Elementary maths. And so it began. I was diligent in completing my daily target.

There was just this small problem. The pile wasn't coming down.

I increased my paper intake. I raised the bar to 20. I toiled for a fortnight with the revised strategy. My challenge soon unfolded, the denouement a sinister joke around my infantile obsession. A series of revised estimates told me a depressing and demoralizing fact.

There were 800 newspapers in there.

It seemed a worthless struggle. I could have done better with that time. But deep reluctance in throwing away all that knowledge to the kabaadi was too much to bear - I held on.

After the tenth day something remarkable happened. On a pure whim, I upped my intake to 30 a day. And a few days after I completed 50. Something clicked. I was on fire.

My personal highest?

One Hundred Sixty Seven. In a Day.

Yeah. I did it.

Addiction

It disrupts my essence today - a precursor to inevitable future regret. Riven by guilt and haunted by fear I stay...impossible to escape this cesspool of depravity. My addled state delays the inevitable pain that is mine to bear. I run. I aspire to aid my convalescence by an ephemeral balm of sensory amnesia. It is hopeless.

The sins of the present will be paid with interest in the future.

The procrastinated pursuit of predestined purpose will prove to be mere pusillanimity.

Normative logic and a sense of severe urgency scream at me senseless attempting to overturn the tide of desperation building in me. It is useless. It is pointless. I walk down the damned and dreaded avenue towards refuge.

I shall reason on the morrow.
Knowing I reasoned every morning before the one that is to come.

Fiscal Crisis

Every year for the past three years I have made a simple straightforward resolution. I restrict my ambitions to this one aim and fervently hope to abide by the solemn vows taken on January 1. The stifling, restrictive environment of my room is the primary reason I have lost out on that promise once more. That's what I tell myself. It's a sorry state all right...

The past few months have seen several peculiar challenges faced by the eccentric author of this blog. The most gripping and clearly the most critical of these has been what I call the surplus problem.

Now, most governments in the world are stuck in a recessionary gap and are struggling to generate enough demand and buoyancy in their countries to revive their economic fortunes. Our own country has been beset by a nasty slowdown. The elections may throw up any radical Prime Minister with vision, strength and character. Nothing will improve for the next three years as I see it. But I leave that for another post.

No, the reason why I allude to these worldly problems is my own crazy predicament of a huge surplus. That's right - I am in an inflationary sprawl and this is how the current situation looks like:

Forget those boxes. That stack of newspapers has to be read.

Needless to mention, I must read all of the 150 newspapers or so that are awaiting my scrutiny. Within a month. If I don't then I risk causing great damage to my plans of upgrading from 4 newspapers a day to a far cooler 5 per day (don't ask).

H

The exciting conclusion to the crisis of the century!
http://hamstersqueaks.blogspot.com/2014/09/a-balanced-budget.html

Change

Less than a month remains before I wrap up my two year sojourn at a job.

I can study again.

(Last part in this series: http://haarisian.blogspot.in/2014/02/change.html)

Change

Looking back on the past 6 years, from the moment I joined college to the point where I sit on a gadda in a cluttered, semi-dark room with Arvind Kejriwal's voice blaring from a room next to mine, having eaten some over-buttered pav bhaaji and wondering if I'll relieve myself of the stress consuming my senses, I realize one simple, depressing fact.

I have changed.

Update: The last post in this series. 

The Search for a New Superhero

I know of friends who feel disoriented and depressed without keeping a crush. The harmless sort; the ones way above your league and who can hardly reciprocate the same frantic breathlessness that they experience in the chosen crush's proximity. Some of the idiots I know have managed to get hooked irreversibly to the said seemingly unreachable target - often a tragic outcome of completely misjudging (1) their own true level or (2) the desperation of the guy/girl who had been a single loser for years.

I like to invoke a similar shameful obsession, and that's to think of my idols.

My list is not unique. I am certain friends in my own circle share my favourites. And I have written about them occasionally not only on this blog but also on other media. On days when I feel down or when I really don't feel like going out or reading a book, when I don't feel like expressing my views on the latest debate on facebook (that's the state of affairs these days), I close my eyes and recall...an exquisite off-backhand from Roger, or a flick of the hand from Michael, or an on-drive from Sachin's bat or a birdie from Tiger at the US Masters, or the beauty and layered complexity of Artemis' ingenious plan or the fine strokes of genius on Leonardo's notebooks or a jugalbandi between Bhimsen Joshi and Rashid Khan or a Bach composition or some immortal lines from Byron...for that time, whether sprawled on my bed after a hard day at the office or sitting in a boring routine party, I lose track of time. I lose track of the world. I feel ecstatic and almost constantly belittled.

It's only natural that the heroes you grow up with rear their ugly imperfections sooner rather than later. In the case of sports persons, there is a power decline that is painful to watch. The older maestros retain their magic but it's difficult to extract a sense of exhilaration or addictive climax. And then, they will retire. I envy the people who support teams in the various football leagues for this reason. Even if United fans eventually face the heartbreak of becoming a mid-table team, they can live out their lives with a love that was borne out of passionate romance in the time of great success. Yeah, it actually works like that.

(As I write this piece, Roger is losing, somewhat expectedly, to Rafa Nadal. Nadal is rock solid as usual but it's Roger who's making the crucial mistakes)

Michael Jackson is long dead and Artemis Fowl has run his course on the print circuit. I need someone who can surprise and inspire me again.

The GOAT

So, who's going to be my next living idol?

Change

For far too long have I carried the insufferable burden of the past.

I have punished my senses incessantly over my transgressions. Subjugated my true nature in the name of compromise. For far too long have I concealed the evils that have beleaguered my life. Misfortunes have plagued me; I refuse to rot in the muck anymore.

Pain is a wise teacher. It is a cruel teacher. It is when you are an inch away from dementia and permanent neurosis that you receive the lesson which disengages your mind from the fiction of urgency. From the illusion of goodness.

I have found myself again.