How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, Got Wild and Got A Life

Title: How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, Got Wild and Got A Life

Author: Kaavya Viswanathan

Publisher: Time Warner 2006 (First)

ISBN: 978-0-7515-3742-0

Pages: 314

A notable work from a young Indian student at Harvard, published when the author was just eighteen years old! This young adult novel portrays the travails of an Indian girl named Opal Mehta whose ambition was to secure to get in to Harvard, but was rejected on the first attempt because she was not having a social life. The book presumably contains biographical perspectives, as the similarities between the author and the lead character is unmistakeable. Both are of Indian origin, have doctor-parents with the mother abandoning her practice for mentoring the child and so on. Written in an easy going style and effortless narrative, the work is thoroughly enjoyable. Beyond revealing the life and ambitions of a typical girl which are tightly controlled by her parents, it also sheds light on the stereotypical identities some students have to assume, to be known as ‘cool’ to their school mates. Opal Mehta’s social life is also planned in detail by her parents, with flow charts, to-do lists and check lists and she is only allowed to execute the details like an automaton.

The Mehtas’ plans at socialization go awry because of some inevitable bunglings in its performance. Instead of becoming the star attraction of the school, Opal turns into the laughing stock as her plans and check lists are mailed to every student by a jealous friend. She withdraws into her shell and through selfless sacrifice of own interests, wins the heart of some of her friends back. In the end, all is well as she is admitted to Harvard and solves the Fermeculi formula, which was said to puzzling the physics community for several decades.

Though the novel is good to read and neatly structured, it met a tragic death in the U.S. at the first publishing itself. Critics observed too many similarities between her work and those of Megan McCafferty, Salman Rushdie, Sophie Kinsella, Meg Cabot and Tanuja Desai Hidier. Her book was pulled from publication after the plagiarism was revealed. Her book and movie deals were dropped. Only because the novel was not part of her academic work, Harvard took no action against their student. Kaavya apologized and said any similarities were ‘completely unintentional and unconscious’. She accepted the accusations and justified that she was having a photographic memory which might have prompted her unknowingly to copy parts of the works. From comparisons produced in Wikipedia, it is obvious that her work was heavily indebted to Megan McCafferty, whereas the other comparisons are weak and somewhat stretching the imagination a bit too much.

The work also gives out a peep into the social life of the American Indian community. Having no roots on the soil, they try to imitate the festivities and celebrations at home in their adopted homeland, by throwing extravagant parties and superficial merrymaking. The author portrays a community which is rich and socially accepted by their white neighbours. No incidents of discrimination or sub-par treatment is given, while at the same time omitting all mention of African-Americans. It is curious to note that Opal Mehta doesn’t come across any black person in her life, as if they don’t simply exist! The book comes from an author hailing from an upper middle class community who doesn’t find the need to look past her comfortable social background. In that sense, it may be said to be a hyped-up portrayal of an expatriate family with designs to project it as a life worth emulating.

As an aside, the death of both of the author’s parents in a plane crash in June 2011 would have been heartbreaking for her.

The book is recommended.

Rating: 3 Star

Fault Lines

Title: Fault Lines – How Hidden Fractures Still Threaten The World Economy

Author: Raghuram G Rajan

Publisher: Collins Business 2010 (First)

ISBN: 978-81-7223-973-2

Pages: 243

A really splendid book from an author of Indian origin. Raghuram G Rajan is a Professor of Finance at the University of Chicago’s Booth School of Business. He was the Chief Economist at the IMF from Sep 2003 until Jan 2007. He was an economic adviser to the prime minister of India. This book is a thorough analysis of the financial crisis and depression which rocked American and world economies in 2008, the clutches of which the world still struggles to get free. The crisis came as a surprise to many, since the renowned economists in the U.S. and abroad couldn’t see it coming. Since the day of globalization dawned in the 1990s, the financial systems of every country is intertwined and the trouble signals in one part of the world soon gets transmitted to far off regions. This is particularly so in the case of U.S. economy which leads the global financial business. Naturally hence, the reasons for the sudden downfall is a topic of interest to readers everywhere.

Rajan begins from the 1980s when the growing inequalities of income of American households became noticeable. This disparity is attributed to lower levels of education which put them at a disadvantage in an economy increasingly tilted towards the employment of cutting edge technology. With the growth of new-age industry, higher education was mandatory. This unbalance gradually became a political issue a decade later. However, politicians always try to find out a quick wayout which was impossible in this case. Growth of education takes several years, spanning several presidencies, making the issue difficult to encash in an election. This forced the Clinton and Bush administrations to come out with a palliative in the mean time. Easy credit was extended to poor and lesser income households for buying houses. The increased purchasing power masked the income disparities temporarily, but the financial institutions were forced to extend credit to people whose properties were sub-prime, that is, those which fell below the minimum credit-worthiness standards. To help private banks and insurance companies which jumped on the bandwagon, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which are federal institutions absorbed the high-risk home loans to these subprime creditors. Securities were issued based on the loans.

While the American economy was firing up, the rest of the world fanned it. Newly industrialised and world-war ravaged countries like Germany and Japan tried an export-oriented path to progress. Domestic consumption was frowned upon, with state spending limited to providing organisational capability for export. As long as surplus labour thrived in agriculture, industrial wages were low, giving the manufacturing sector a definite cost advantage. When such agri-surplus dried up, wages rose. Manufacturing went looking for poorer states. Germany and Japan grew to be world’s 2^nd and 3^rd largest economies for a time, but they had a dismal domestic sector. East Asian countries like Malaysia, Indonesia and Thailand began investing in a huge scale at the end of the 1980s. However, the money was not flowing from domestic savings, but from international lending. Foreign lendors, however, didn’t intervene directly. They issued credit to local banks, who had to return the money in foreign currency, while disbursing it in local currency to investors. These short-term loans flew from the country at the moment it became clear that many of the projects were not viable. The Asian tigers were brought to their knees and was extricated from the mess through IMF loans, which came attached with humiliating conditions. The economies were sound though, and the restructured system began producing large savings, which had to be invested abroad. This money found an outlet in the U.S. housing securities.

Just after the dot-com bust om 2000, U.S. reduced short-term interest rates making bank deposits unattractive and real-estate deals very promising. House prices boomed, but was offset with easy loans to those who applied. As long as the prices were going up, the music sounded good, as the borrowers could refinance their loans, thus postponing repayments. These loans were in fact sold to overseas investors, backed with mortgage based securities which were highly rated. Banks heavily invested, even though they knew that the practice was unhealthy. Everyone was counting on the bailout the government would offer to save large, systemic enterprises which couldn’t be allowed to fail one fine morning. When the soaring prices, however touched the ceiling, all hell broke loose. Refinancing dried up and repayments were defaulted. Many borrowers couldn’t even pay one single instalment. The securities based on these loans became not even worth the paper on which they were printed. The system collapsed in which many institutions were bankrupt and many were rescued by the government with taxpayer’s money.

Rajan lists many suggestions to avoid such recurrings in the future. Transparent regulators are an essential requirement. Government should not give the impression to rogue traders that whatever may happen, their enterprises would be bailed out. This encourages audacious managers in large, systemic institutions to expose themselves to undue risk taking. On the other hand, the basic problem of lower education standards must be addressed quickly. Educational reforms should be put in place to ensure access to the less-privileged. Americans need to spend less and save more, a piece of good advice they might find extremely irritating! To address global economic inequalities, multilateral agencies like the IMF should pay a greater role by addressing directly to the people, instead of dealing only with financial ministers of those countries. Current technology offers many platforms through which the people of a country may be exposed to financial information from such agencies.

The author then moves forward to examine the road ahead for India, which is on the verge of fast economic progress. Land acquisition is identified as a cause for concern. However, the reason given does not seem to be valid in India’s case. Rajan proposes the poor maintenance of land records as the root cause of the problem, which is far from the experience. Even though most of the offices are not computerised, locating a land record is not a hard deal, in my opinion. If you bribe the clerks, they would mine any record, however old, in no time! Also, the universities must regain their credibility. Reining in corruption should be India’s prime priority by providing more transparency in government dealings and also empowering proper NGOs.

The book is superbly researched and bear the marks of the hand of a very knowledgeable person. The structure is splendid and logical. All the aspects of the problem at hand is expressed in good detail and the reasons are elucidated in magnificent detail. On the negative side, it may be said that the financial terms strewn everywhere in the text with little regard to the lay reader’s background of financial ideas.

The book is highly recommended.

Rating: 3 Star

Hot, Flat and Crowded

Title: Hot, Flat and Crowded

Author: Thomas L Friedman

Publisher: Allen Lane 2008 (First)

ISBN: 978-1-846-14163-8

Pages: 412

A hot, environmental piece! As the climate is warming and sea levels set to rise, we indeed require books like these to warn and gently goad us into action, at least those whom, whose actions would make a change. Friedman is a foreign-affairs columnist for the New York Times, is a three-time Pulitzer Prize-winner and the author of a number of books on environmental issues. With the clarity of presentation which typifies an accomplished journalist, Friedman covers various aspects of the mess into which the globalized world has got into. Due to global warming, the world has become HOT, fruits of globalization has levelled the barriers which existed between societies, thus making the world FLAT, and the burgeoning population make it CROWDED! The logic behind the title is exemplary.

Energy conservation is not at all an issue for Americans, both public and politicians alike. Immediately after the oil shock of 1973, there were some measures in this direction, particularly the requirement of a minimum mileage of 27.5 miles/gallon. But, these half-hearted measures were quietly sidelined in the mid-1980s when oil prices plummeted. Globalization has ushered in a new era where many parts of the world, China, India, Brazil being some of them are rapidly progressing in industry and wealth. Soon, they may achieve comparable living standards as the Americans. However, if the emergent societies are bent on imitating the wasteful style of the U.S. society, trouble awaits them at every corner. There are five issues arising out of increased consumption. They are, 1) growing demand for scarce energy supplies and natural resources 2) massive transfer of wealth to oil-rich countries and their petro-dictators 3) disruptive climate change 4) energy poverty and 5) accelerating bio-diversity loss. The world should focus more on fuels from heaven, such as renewable sources like wind and solar whereas fuels from hell, like coal and oil should be phased out.

We have moved into a new era by 2000 which may be called the Energy-Climate era. Our years are numbered on this era which also spells out the imperative for us to be vigilant to extravagant use of natural resources. The author emphasizes that Code Green, the initiative to make cleaner, cheaper and abundant technologies are mandatory. A new system should be put into place in the place of the dirty fossil fuel economy where three components would predominate, 1) ability to provide clean, abundant, reliable and cheap electricity 2) increased energy efficiency so that inputs can be minimized and 3) improved conservation measures. The passing buck would stop first on electricity utility companies, which should set the stage for revolutionizing the outlook on energy. Instead of investing in large, fossil-fuel powered plants to provide anticipated spikes in power, these companies should increase energy efficiency in their customers’ premises by utilising smart energy meters which would one day be able to communicate to the utility as well as consumers’ household equipments to reduce or reschedule power consumption. Such smoothing of load curves would obviate the need for starting more power generation infrastructure. The onus needs to be shifted from the supply-side to the demand-side. The market is a good regulator and should provide incentives for such green companies. The reluctance exhibited by utilities in investing heavily on green power alternatives is the anxiety of the profitability of these new decisions, should oil price again came down to low levels. Friedman suggests that the government should step in to alleviate such fears by declaring a floor price, such as $100 per barrel of oil. Such a high base price would prompt the companies to boldly plunge into new technology.

The author lists out some green initiatives from GE Transportation and Texas Instruments. However, these efforts are rather voluntary and not by the force of regulations which would have arm twisted other companies also to invest in energy efficient technologies. Such actions and partners celebrate a green party, instead of indulging in a green revolution which would change the entire face of the industrial world. As spelled out with examples, customers stand to benefit, both socially and economically by adopting green technologies. Such projects can’t be outsourced and Friedman exhorts that U.S. stands to gain from more such initiatives. In fact, greener measures would soon dominate the industrial scenario that soon after, the norm will be green and non-green measures would be made news and subjected to public attention. Renewable energy generation techniques also imply conservation of natural habitats which harbour the fragile bio-diversity of planet earth. The case of Indonesia is an apt illustration. This archipelago, consisting of more than 17,000 islands, which constitute just 1.3% of the earth’s land mass, is home to 10% of the global tropical forest cover, 20% of all species of flora and fauna, 17% of all bird species and 25% of fish species. In truth, 10 hectares of land in Borneo contains more tree species than the entire North America. Such pristine beauty is now challenged by the Indonesian government’s decision to fell a large area of the forest cover to provide wood as raw material to China and also to produce palmoil from the newly claimed land. Protests against such rapacious pillage of natural resources must originate locally, as they are the people who stand to lose the most with the loss of natural habitats in the neighbourhood. However, their efforts must be ballasted by funding from global agencies and resources. In any conservation measure or green activity, the poor and the underprivileged must be included to make the projects appeal to the masses and to obtain more respect from politicians who look forward only to the votes they stand to gain from such actions.

Friedman ends the book with a special chapter devoted to China, which would overtake the U.S. as the world’s largest economy by 2030. Even though earlier the Chinese seemed to be ignorant and careless about the environment and concentrated only in GDP growth, rising pollution causing health risks to their own populations has prompted the communist leaders to bring in more green regulations to bring the menace under control and still being competitive to foreign industry. America can work as a model for the Chinese in developing cutting edge energy saving technologies. He goes on to speculate that the increased boldness of local groups in taking up environmental issues would one day result in the dawning of freedom of speech and multiparty democracy in China, which seems a little far fetched. In an enlightening comparison of the two countries, Friedman identifies the basic problem with both these countries. In the U.S., the administration is extremely hesitant to formulate a policy, law or guideline, but once it is in place, concerned civic groups would kick in and ensure that the policy is aggressively put in practice. In China, things are the other way round. The government is quick and ruthless in formulating policies or rules, but they are often not interested in its implementation. Friedman actually wish the U.S. to be China for a single day – not a single day more – that the green laws can be put in place.

The book is a must-read for environmentally minded readers (which should include all of us!). Lots of titbits and statistical pieces are presented in a structured way. Some bits are really curious and insightful. Did you know that a typical cow releases 600 litres of methane a day, or that the world population is expected to reach 9 billion by 2050? The book also is a treasure trove for slogan seekers for environmental issues as the author gives many of them in his comprehensive survey of activists, politicians and people connected to green issues. Two nice ones are, “Think Big, Start Small, Act Now” and “We have enough time, starting now”!

On the negative side, it may be argued that the book is written with only the American reader in mind. Friedman surveys world economy and draws heavily from his vast experience in international conservation measures and travels, but all of them are presented from an American’s point of view with the hope of gaining something for the U.S.

The book is highly recommended.

Rating: 3 Star

The Rise and Fall of Communism

Title: The Rise and Fall of Communism

Author: Archie Brown

Publisher: Vintage Books 2010 (First published 2009)

ISBN: 978-1-845-95067-5

Pages: 617

A very good book touching on the demise of a social order which sought to dominate the world on its self-proclaimed merits. There was a time, immediately after the second world war when it seemed that the world, particularly the new countries freshly liberated from the imperial yoke were leaning towards a communist system under the active support of the Soviet Union. Until Mikhail Gorbachev put in motion the first domino which would unleash a wave of frenzied people reclaiming their personal freedom and self respect, nobody even in the U.S., thought that this stumbling block to global progress would be decimated so soon. Ephemeral was its rise, the downfall was also likewise.

Origins of communism can be taken back to writers in the industrial revolution era in Europe. Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels envisioned a society where the force of state didn’t prevail. What stung these luminaries into action was the grave situation in which the industrial workers in England, where both the writers had sought asylum. Lenin led the Bolsheviks to power through a bloody war in 1917 in Russia. The country in fact accepted them as one more party ruling a country in the grip of instability for many a decade. The Bolsheviks could secure only 25% of the popular vote in the election immediately after taking over. But once they stabilised their power, harsh repressive measures stymied every voice of dissent. Lenin’s secret police, the Cheka was as terrifying as the Tsar’s Okhrana for the common man. Joseph Stalin assumed office after Lenin’s death and his ‘reign’ was brutal in every aspect of the word. The world has never seen a more devilish mass murderer than him and Mao Zedong. Stalin killed his opponents, his party members, his friends and even those who had the ability to be of resistance to his ambitions in the future. Collectivization of farms caused widespread famine, killing 17 million people. His purges of 1937-38 killed off 70% of the Communist party’s central committee itself! He made secret pacts with Hitler, but turned against him once Hitler attacked Russia.

After the war, the Soviet army was victorious in a number of countries in the eastern Europe. Soviet style communist governments sprouted in those countries. There were three states, however, namely Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia and Albania where the local communists could gain power through their own means. The belligerent neighbours in eastern Europe made the world gradually slide into a cold war. Mao directed the Chinese communists to power in 1949. This may be said to be the crescendo of communist power, for it only diminished thereafter. Stalin’s death in 1953 made Khrushchev the ruler of USSR. His secret speech at the 20^th party congress in 1956 enumerated the brutalities of stalinist regime and opened the floodgates of dissent to be poured out in party fora. Though his rule coincided with massive Russian strides in space science, Khrushchev’s style of functioning alienated many in the party and the central committee expelled him in 1964.

Popular revolt against dictatorial regimes in eastern Europe began to find voice. Hungary revolted in 1956, which was militarily crushed by Soviet troops and the Hungarian prime minister Imre Nagy was hanged. Mao’s hundred flowers campaign, great leap forward and cultural revolution decimated an approximate 30 million people. Uprisings in Czechoslovakia in 1968 (Prague Spring), in Poland (1980) and China (1989) upset the communist bretheren. Opening up a part of iron curtain after the Helsinki agreement in 1975 resulted in more people from communist states visiting western democracies and getting real ideas about their countries and the depths to which they were sinking into.

Gorbachev assumed power in 1985, unanimously within the Communist party. Glasnost and Perestroika were introduced. Through these measures, the country was practically a European social democracy by 1989. Many books, which were banned previously, found the light of the day. Warsaw pact countries utilised the opportunity by dismissing their oppressionist partymates. Hardline communists in Russia attempted to oust Gorbachev in a coup in August 1991. The coup failed after three days, but that was sufficient to frighten away Soviet republics. The USSR perished in september 1991.

Brown lists out the salient features of a communist state, which is very interesting and insightful. There are six defining features, which are as follows

a)      the monopoly of power of the communist party

b)      democratic centralism – where the decisions taken at higher fora are binding on the lower organs of the party

c)      non-capitalist ownership of the means of production

d)      presence of a command economy

e)      declared aim of building communism as the ultimate goal

f)        existence of, and sense of belonging to, an international communist movement

The book is really entertaining and resourceful and is highly recommended.

Rating: 3 Star

Unweaving the Rainbow

Title: Unweaving the Rainbow

Author: Richard Dawkins

Publisher: Penguin 2006 (First published 1998)

ISBN: 978-0-141-02618-3

Pages: 334

The master is at it again. One of the great popularizers of science of our times has come out with one more elegantly written piece to illuminate some of the lesser known, or lesser understood, rather aspects of science. This book is a collection of essays on how and why science must make good poetry and why poets should look to science for captivating ideas which they can weave on to the magic they produce in literature. The famous poet, Keats once accused Newton of taking away the sense of mystery around a rainbow by dispersing a beam of light through a prism and explaining how it was produced. Dawkins’ main argument is that the mystery, or aura of beauty surrounding a rainbow is still intact even after its mechanism of origination lay unwoven before the people. He lists out several recent concepts in science which can be woven into superb pieces of literature if only gifted poets and authors turn their attention to science.

The general populace and some influential literatteurs too display a skewed orientation to science, often feigning ignorance of even well established facts. They adopt a distant attitude to it, safe in the assumption that they won’t be taken to task for this. Such attitudes to science is unwarranted. It is so useful and wonderful that any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. DNA, the fingerprint of life in this vast universe is so intriguing, yet so exciting! Artists and poets should be more versed in science which will only make their works more appealing.

Dawkins goes on to sketch a detailed mechanism of how the rainbow is formed, in part to do justification to his selection of the title. Electromagnetic spectrum and fraunhofer lines are discussed, but one gets the impression that he is walking on a tight-rope as physics is not his forte. Exactly how the splitting of the spectrum into its component parts in the human brain brings out the truth behind the perceived differences between various parts of the spectrum. Genetic analysis using DNA leading to spinoffs in forensic science are also introduced.

An enlightening deliberation on superstition and paranormal beliefs follow. While condemning most of the modern junk, he cautions against being a dogmatic sceptic, citing examples of Lord Kelvin who thought that radio waves would soon be useless, at the end of the 19^th century. Excellent advice on the usual pitfalls of soothsayers and miracle workers are given, by providing a fine discussion on statistical significance tests. The author asserts that our minds are even now calibrated to small village communities where miracles based on statistical averages are rather rare and people readily believe what their acquaintances claim. Our present age, in which the entire globe is just one village, presents statistical possibilities which occur rather frequently, considering the huge populations involved. We should be vary of readily falling into the traps such a large sample provides.

Scientists can, sometimes resort to bad poetry to emphasize their points, with one prominent example of Stephen Jay Gould, as claimed by Dawkins. His arguments about independent origin of many species in the cambrian era invites ire from the author. Several proofs and supporters are arrayed against Gould, but one is led to suspicion by such tirade that the author’s real intention is to tarnish Gould’s works as bad science, rather than bad poetry! Overdependence on the concept of gaia, first put forward by James Lovelock also gets a beating. Coevolution and coadaptation can explain most of the symbiotic appearances of gaia. The running speeds of prey like antelopes and predators like cheetah is a good case of coevolution. There seems to be a biological arms race going between these two totally unrelated species. When the running speed of antelopes goes up, an equivalent increase in pace of the hunter also seem to happen in the real world.

The author puts forward the view that the world we perceive through our eyes is really a simulated picture made out by the brain, based on inputs from retina. By citing several illusions where our eyes are tricked into seeing differenct objects, the argument is strongly established. This also makes the sightings of apparitions, angels and divine beings as plausible in the cases of people who were suffering from illnesses, brain damage, psychological problems, or fasting. The veneer of many a poet stands exposed from this illuminating chapter.

There are very few points which goes against the quality of the work. What this book is a general discussion of current scientific philosophy and not enough justification of the title is achieved. To make the link with the literary world substantial, he resorts to extensive quotations from many works. Another drawback may be the promotion of the author’s concept of the ‘selfish gene’, put forward through a book bearing that name. Dawkins sometimes appear to be unduly harsh to his critics.

The book is eminently recommended.

Rating: 3 Star