Go green, and fight the cars

The news nowadays has always been disturbing. But for the past few weeks, there has been a shift in focus. Instead of reporting news of religious conflicts, political interference, and greedy corporations; the focus is now on : the changing climate.

There was a (?) nationwide strike in Australia's cities last week, people standing up for a greener future. Against un-controlled climate change. Greta Thunberg's climate activism has got people talking. Scotland has become the first country to declare a climate emergency. There are petitions being signed, videos and audioblogs being shared.

And I have been listening to the war on cars podcast. Australia loves its big, huge cars. And they get touchy when the topic comes to parking.

Some strongly support market prices—except for parking. Some strongly oppose subsidies—except for parking. Some abhor planning regulations—except for parking. Some insist on rigorous data collection and statistical tests—except for parking. This exceptionalism has impoverished thinking about parking policies. If drivers paid the full cost of their parking, it would seem too expensive, so we expect someone else to pay for it. But a city where everyone happily pays for everyone else’s free parking is a fool’s paradise.

For the first time, I see some hope for this planet. The war against cars has started.

Heres hoping for a greener future.

Calling it 95%

Trending news this weekend: the apparent failure of ISRO's moon lander. Surprising: almost every media outlet, and majority of mansplainers on social media are calling it a success. 99% success.

When the Vikram lander’s autonomous descent manoeuvre didn’t go as planned, scientists of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) looked surprised and dejected at once in the mission control room in Bengaluru. There was the gentle, thoughtful reminder at the back of everyone’s minds, ready to prance at the first outward sign of sorrow, that the Chandrayaan 2 orbiter was still functional and whose scientific payload could still salvage the mission’s dignity.

Sending a spacecraft to another planet/moon, inserting it into orbit, and landing a rover…these are all  the extremities of research and engineering. To be able to just take off from the earth is feat in itself. Success should be celebrated, rightly so. But nationalism bubbling over means people are not able to call a spade a spade.

A private Israeli mission named Beresheet attempted and failed to soft-land on the Moon in April this year.The Americans and Russians have together tried around 20 soft-landings and succeeded 16 times. On the flip side, these two countries pioneered the technologies required to achieve this feat at an accelerated pace during the Cold War space race, so perhaps an adjustment must be made for the failure rate.

The lander failed, plain and simple. There will be ways to study the moon remotely, from an orbitter, but the lander was crucial to gather data from the physical surface.

And as we do in our field, go back to the drawing board. Learn what went wrong,  and try and fix it the next time.

Arrived

I sometimes catch myself stalking some of my old coleagues agin. Now and then,  I check upon them. To keep track of where they are, but mostly just to feel better. At the the beginning of my career, I wanted to do a lot of things, travel to a lot of places, visit , and meet people. I thought my career in IT would allow me these rare opportunities to see a little more of this world. And I worked hard towards that goal. But I was working under bad managers, and was plagued by terrible management. One of the many reasons I decided to migrate out. And it was not an easy decision. So, I try to imagine, where would I be, if I had decided to stay. And continue to suffer. Would my life have changed for the better ? Could I have stayed on and still achieved a  little more ?

The answer, thankfully, is NO.

If I had stayed, I would have been pummelled by meaningless, tedious, repeating tasks, increasing frustration, and a feeling of uselessness. And I know this because everybody else I worked with back in the day, are still where I had last left them.

My old team at e*, that company in Bangalore where I worked for 3 years. They are all still stuck in that same job, working in an over-crowded, pollutted city. None of them got that chance to travel abroad.

Poor little P is still doing data entry jobs. And that SB is still making them work. S and S are holding on for dear life. V has put on more weight, must be all that late night snack they have been having.

My old, sick, demeaning managers. Well they have done pretty good, actually. Feeding on the blood of innocent subordinates, they have become more successful. At least , thats what I infer from their shortening designations.

And my competition, yes , I had a lot of that. To be fair, we were all struggling in the same , dwindling, putrid pool of meaningless work, so we all wanted to escape somewhere. I gave up easily, and moved away. While for most of them, the struggle continues.

Competition is fierce in India's private job market. And with only a few guidelines set by the government, companies play a one sided game of micro-management. While emloyees in the sector do have the option of unions, they also understand that live is much better for them in the tech sector compared to the others. So they let it go. People work for years chasing that elusive 'onsite' opportunity, that one chance to make some money, tax free, which will enable them to buy a home in one of those crowded cities. And also , the chance to see a different country, with the company footing all the travel bills.

Choosing to move to Australia was the best decision we had taken in a long , long time. With a lot more professionalism, flexibility and wage, ones problems seem to dwindle away. For the first time, I have a good balance of professional and personal life. Last year, my manager here came to me and told me to take a few days off. Leave. For real. And he really meant it. That was an amazing feeling, which I had never experienced during my time in India. That instruction came from years of having mentored subordinates, and the employee-friendly laws of this country.

I hope more people get to see such professionalism, and kindness. But they wil have to travel away to experience that. As for me, I am living the dream.

Birds in the city

It is spring time in the city. After a particularly stretched winter, I can now hear bird sounds in the morning again. Not just simple chirping charping. Melodius, long , complex bird songs !

Always a good sign, the birds are the first to know of the changing season. The next few months are going to be pleasant , cool and a little rainy (hopefullly), until we get fried by the harsh Australian summer.

Not looking foward to that. Summer is the worst part of the year.

Satirical governance

It is that time of the year again. Half way through,we Indians get this opportunity to observe the anniversary of the day India won its independence. Today is mostly a day of political buffoonery. Speeches, promises, lies. But a great day for flag-sellers. As children, we used to be proud observing this Independence Day, today the meaning of those words is truly lost.

Today, most of the country is drowning in flood water, caused by unprecedented torrential rain, but the actual destruction caused by uncontrolled development, and destruction of natural resources. More than 150 people have died. This after the country reeled under a summer heatwave, droughts, and its cities running out of drinking water. So now one half of the year is time of drought, and the rest if the time for floods.

Multiple reports seem to point to the economy being in severe distress, especially since the date the last budget was announced. Manufacutring, specially automobiles, has nose dived. There are still religion driven atrocities being reported from all over the country. Attacks and molestation on women continue. And the decision to abrogate the special status provision for one if India's own state has now put the nation on the nation's watch citing human rights violation.

The British might have left decades ago. But India still has not learnt to properly govern and run itself. Is there a reason to be happy about any of this ?

Governance has become a joke. And its not even funny.