Amanpour and the Drones

As we were now finished with all the official work in Ahmedabad, Annikki decided to attend her Sabbath Day church service.



On the way we crossed the mighty Sabarmati river, on which stands 12 bridges from one end of Ahmedabad to the other. Ahmedabad and Gandhinagar, the commercial and political capitals of Gujarat, were established on the banks of Sabarmati river. The legend is that Sultan Ahmed Shah of Gujarat, resting on the bank of Sabarmati, got inspired with the courage of a rabbit to chase a bully dog to establish Ahmedabad in 1411. During India's independence struggle, Mahatma Gandhi established Sabarmati Ashram as his home on the banks of this river. (Wikipedia)



The church was located at the other end of Ahmedabad and it was packed. I had to sit outside in the compound.



On our way back, we stopped for Annikki to have a cup of coffee in the now famous Coffee Day, a chain of Cafes started by the present Indian Foreign Minister, S. M. Krishna's son-in-law, who hails from a coffee growing family in Chickmaglur District in Karnataka, a place which has very pleasant childhood memories for me. S. M. Krishna, is of course from Sommanhalli in Mandya District, a place much remembered by Annikki, the children and me!

Then it was time to relax at the service apartment. We decided to watch some TV. Christiane Amanpour, CNN's chief international correspondent, was talking about the drones, which the American's are using for "targeted killings" or shall we use a mundane group of words - "murder of innocents"!



Whenever the Americans war machine does something, they justify it as if they have the right to do it. I remember the huge fuss when they made when it was suggested that Saddam Hussain intended to use this technology to attack America - I think they called it "a weapon of mass destruction"!

Remember what they found?

The Americans are so stupid, as they have developed another $100 technology which is going to bite them. Based on originally sophisticated, but now common computer game and model aircraft technology, and some common-place solar powered technology, these toys that the Americans have developed as robotic killing machines will, in the not so distant future, be making the rounds attacking Americans on their own soil. Targeted killings, their invisible enemies will shout. Murder, the Americans will yell.

But, of course, when the Americans use it and kill innocent civilians, it is just unfortunate collateral damage.

It is rather unfortunate that in what was otherwise a comprehensive interview, that Christiane Amanpour did not raise this aspect of what would happen when others use this technology.

Just one such drone has to fall into the hands of the enemy. This is not much of a problem, as now these drones are operating out of Pakistan, where security is probably as sound as having this WMD placed in a refugee camp of dissidents!

In July 2009 William Saletan wrote in The Slate, in an article entitled "Troops Out, Drones In - Policing the world with remote-controlled aircraft":

Drones, as I've said before, are the future of warfare. The tactical reason is that they don't bleed. They let us hunt enemies abroad at no risk to ourselves. The political reason is slightly different: They spare us the difficulties of an official troop presence. Pakistan's government doesn't have to approve or explain our incursion into northwest Pakistan on Sunday night, because, strictly speaking, we weren't there.

So when America's enemies use this on Americans - what is going to be the woeful cry, Mr. Saletan, Ms. Amanpour?

Does anyone now remember who bred and armed the Taliban and Al Qaida?

Annikki finally got rid of the biscuit crumbs she has been carrying around since we left Finland. She found a stray dog to feed it to. The dog decided to follow its chums around for the rest of the evening.

When we went for a walk last night, we had an ice cream each at a local ice cream parlour. There was a little child and his father, who was selling balloons, looking hungrily at all the rich enjoying their ice creams and dinner in the pizza parlour next door. At Annikki's bidding, I bought a cup ice cream and gave it to the child's father. First, he told me that the child did not like it. When I insisted he feed it to the little boy, who stood no taller than half the cycle wheel, the child kept opening his mouth for more.

However, before long, the poor man was the target of attack of the waiters of the Pizza place next door as they did not want to have him feeding his child "on the public road" in front of their restaurant! As we left, the waiter came running after us to suggest that maybe we had lost a pocketbook to these poor people!

An act of kindness from Annikki towards a poor hungry little boy - but probably to the poor twosome, a whole heap of trouble! What a world we live in!

What is talent?

(Also posted on Seventh Heaven and Kooler Talk Blogs.)

I usually do not have much time for TV except to throw off my shoes, put my feet up, watch a comedy or detective play and sleep through half of it!

One programme, however, that I have come to like is GPS hosted by Fareed Zakaria on CNN International, late on a Sunday evening.

Zakaria has some fascinating guests. He runs his interviews which do not show his personal bias.

Today was a show in which he had a discussion with an author, Malcolm Gladwell.

Gladwell has written a book called "Outliers". Although I have not read the book and will probably never will, I was fascinated by the discussion and interview.

The main thrust of the view of Gladwell was that "Talent is the Desire to Practice".

I immediately sent this message to several young friends of mine. I wonder how many of them will see this message in all its significance and glory.

The key word is "Desire".

To succeed in anything one must have that "Desire".
To reach that "Desire" one must "Work Hard".
The Hard Work is what we call "Practice"
And Practice leads to "Talent".

Gladwell gave the example of the Beatles, who in 1959 worked 8 hour nights in a strip club in Hamburg playing music. This is enormously hard work. It was this hard work which resulted in the moulding of the most famous Pop Group in the world.

Gladwell made very significant points about the influence of culture on failure or success and also about the development of reading aboilities at a young age which results in the possibility of success.

This statement took me back to the days when Annikki was writing her thesis about the Montessori System of Education. What I heard today was the restatement of what Maria Montessori said 7 decades ago when she noted that a small child will continue to repeat a task till he / she masters it. The outcome is talent, in small steps.

I go back to my school days where I used to watch a dear friend, Elijah Elias, more commonly known to all of us as Ooky, come to school at some unearthly hour and keep on bowling at the nets to achieve pace and direction. That was the talent of Ooky in cricket! But it is this Talent born out of Desire and Hard Work achieved by Practice which has made him succeed in his career in later life.

I take the example of our grandson, Samuel, who at the age of 12 simply loves reading - a book a day.

If his reading is focused correctly, Samuel could be outstanding in his career.

I only hope that in his school in England they realise this. I hope at least one of his teachers has read the book, "Outliers" by Malcolm Gladwell or knows the principles of the Maria Montessori Education System!

Thank you Mr. Fareed Zakaria.