The cuckoo song

I have many audio memories from childhood. The 90's Bollywood songs that mother played on the tape recorder, the morning beep of the milkman, the calling of the waste collector (‘kabaadi wala’) on weekends, the steep shrill of the balloon seller; each and every such instance is embedded as part of…

Mental block in the face of deadlines

I love deadlines. Period.

Too much has been said and written about deadlines. They serve as an opportunity for procrastinators to finish work. They enable the doers to redefine their goals and finish more work than expected out of them…

Why do I find beauty salons intimidating?

There is something about beauty salons in India. The way these people make you dislike attributes about yourself is outrageous. That said, I am do not demean myself, but simply fail to understand the need to red mark all that they think is not good enough…

Remnants of a graduate student’s bag

I am a Master’s student and like millions of others, I have a huge bag which is my pet at graduate school. It is my survival kit and I trust it to pull me out of any issue that I face in my academic life. Yesterday, as I was rummaging through my bag to find a pen…

Success does not make you happy, happiness makes you happy

It has perhaps been the most revealing of thoughts this weekend for me, as I struggle to write down my first TED talk style speech for a class. One inspiring moment in your life that changed the way you think. I struggled…

Racing against the wrong competition.

We are all running. Running against time and running against each other. In the past one week that I have returned to grad school, I see a mad race amongst some fresh faces who want to out do the others around. A defining goal that someone else sets and you work to achieve that. It is…

When in doubt, clean!

‘Cleanliness is next to Godliness.’ A saying we’ve all heard and read since childhood; however we all have sometimes or more times than not been guilty of not following this. I am a tidy person. My sister finds it irritating enough, since I derive pleasure from neat and clean spaces. When…

Tirelessly writing — Day 1

I began writing on medium on 25 July, if I remember correctly, and continued the tradition until I arrived in Singapore, for my second year at graduate school. I thought, I will write everyday, and then thought maybe skipping a day or two is fine., and finally, realised that it’s…

When do you know, you’ve earned enough?

An interesting incident happened yesterday. My brother went to the cobbler to collect a pair of shoes, which needed fixing. The cobbler initially told him that it would cost Rs. 70 (US$1.04 approx.). As my brother told me later, he only charged Rs.50. Why, I…

What is it like to be taught by influential professors?

My day today at grad school has not yet ended, and I have already taken two classes by highly valued professors in public policy academia. My morning started at 09.00 at a session with Prof. Danny Quah. After sitting through three hours of his class, I was blown away by…