The Times We Live In!
The years from 1960s to 2001 was a period when United States established a period of phenomenal economic expansion. The Boomers were a product of the post war era and lived through a period which was probably the best period in US History in terms of Quality of Life. The opportunities were abundant and anyone with a fire in their heart and willingness to grind it out, could make it big! There were no big wars or calamities, except regional conflicts although of a relative smaller size, but they were byproducts of the Cold War.
I am sure it was a great time to be alive, it was a good time to be a bon vivant, it was a time to be a dreamer..... it was a time of plenty.
Not so in 3rd world countries. There we were going through birthing pains. A lot of the families in India struggled to meet ends meet, even in this period of relative peace. India saw a few full scale wars too; one with China and a few with Pakistan. I was born a few years after the last full scale war that India fought in 1971.
Often I picture myself in the future, sitting with my grandkids around me, with me in my twilight years and narrating my story to them and if if I had to describe the times that I lived in, what would I tell them?
Should I tell them -
Should I tell them -
- That I grew up in times before the advent of Smart phones or Computers; a time when I had 20 or more friends to play with every day, a time when playing in the rain or sitting on a wall and chatting away with a circle of friends till the darkness of night enveloped us were our idea of having a good time?
- That I grew up in the 1990s and 2000s when a liberalized India transformed itself from a third world country into a massive economic giant and when computers went from a total 5 in the world to one in every hand?
- That I survived the times of emergency in India and witnessed the falling of the Twin Towers, survived the Housing Market Collapse and that we witnessed the Corona Pandemic with over a couple of million people being killed and the end of the fossil fuel industry?
Or
- Will I be apologizing to my grandkids, that my generation did nothing as Climate Changes ravaged our planet and made it inhospitable for Humans to survive and that my selfish generation is the reason why they cannot go out and play without feeling suffocated by the unbreathable air outside.
I lived the 1st 15 years of my life without a Television Set or a Phone (even an analog one). Now I have six electronic devices in my room including one on my wrist, which can connect me to the world! Yet, I could give anything to go back and live a few hours from those 1st 15 years of my life.
What contrasting time frames have we lived through and how remarkably the world changed, especially for me! How these events have shaped my childhood, youth and now my middle ages?
Marcus Aurelius, the Roman Emperor once said - "Time is a river, a violent current of events, glimpsed once and already carried past us, and another follows and is done. How ridiculous and how strange to be surprised at anything which happens in life."
Couldn't have imagined a few days back that the entire world would go into a lockdown. The small things we once took for granted like taking a vacation or playing a game of soccer at the park with the kids or eating at our favorite restaurant would now be something to eagerly look forward to. and yet, here we are... The world now stands at the crossroads and it will be interesting to see which path we take.
But whatever path we chose or wherever we go from here, we have a chance to put the right foot forward. I just hope we do not mess it up all over again! I hope to tell my grandkids that, this is where humanity made a course correction and we turned things around and made this into a beautiful world that you always deserved.
Globalization needs to be re-booted and re-characterized, with the biggest economies and democracies coming together to forge an alliance against autocratic systems like China, Saudi, Russia etc. The Globalized World Economy cannot be left at the mercy of tyrants, rogues and charlatans. The big nations like USA, UK, Germany, France, Japan, India, Australia, Israel and Singapore etc., will need to strike an Economic and Military alliance and bring together smaller players like Vietnam, Taiwan and other smaller European nations. It needs a strong leadership across these countries and hope the world finds these men and women. The world now needs visionaries and men who can lead through a crisis, those who can take strong decisions and lead us from darkness into light.
Will we find them? Only time will tell, but our whole existence could be predicated on finding them.
Meanwhile, hundreds of thousands of people have died from this virus. In a span of 4-5 months, that is a huge toll. When we look at it, these look like mere numbers, but it is anything but numbers. These were actual people, some of them probably just retired and looking forward to some quiet and solitude after a lifetime of hard work. Some just born to never see the world, some too young to go, many mothers and fathers who will never see their children grow up to graduate or to see them fall in love and get married and who will never see the first smile of their grandkids.
What a great human tragedy! But these are the times we live in and this is what we have done to ourselves. Can progress of humanity be decoupled from their demise yet?
Marcus Aurelius, the Roman Emperor once said - "Time is a river, a violent current of events, glimpsed once and already carried past us, and another follows and is done. How ridiculous and how strange to be surprised at anything which happens in life."
Couldn't have imagined a few days back that the entire world would go into a lockdown. The small things we once took for granted like taking a vacation or playing a game of soccer at the park with the kids or eating at our favorite restaurant would now be something to eagerly look forward to. and yet, here we are... The world now stands at the crossroads and it will be interesting to see which path we take.
But whatever path we chose or wherever we go from here, we have a chance to put the right foot forward. I just hope we do not mess it up all over again! I hope to tell my grandkids that, this is where humanity made a course correction and we turned things around and made this into a beautiful world that you always deserved.
Globalization needs to be re-booted and re-characterized, with the biggest economies and democracies coming together to forge an alliance against autocratic systems like China, Saudi, Russia etc. The Globalized World Economy cannot be left at the mercy of tyrants, rogues and charlatans. The big nations like USA, UK, Germany, France, Japan, India, Australia, Israel and Singapore etc., will need to strike an Economic and Military alliance and bring together smaller players like Vietnam, Taiwan and other smaller European nations. It needs a strong leadership across these countries and hope the world finds these men and women. The world now needs visionaries and men who can lead through a crisis, those who can take strong decisions and lead us from darkness into light.
Will we find them? Only time will tell, but our whole existence could be predicated on finding them.
Meanwhile, hundreds of thousands of people have died from this virus. In a span of 4-5 months, that is a huge toll. When we look at it, these look like mere numbers, but it is anything but numbers. These were actual people, some of them probably just retired and looking forward to some quiet and solitude after a lifetime of hard work. Some just born to never see the world, some too young to go, many mothers and fathers who will never see their children grow up to graduate or to see them fall in love and get married and who will never see the first smile of their grandkids.
What a great human tragedy! But these are the times we live in and this is what we have done to ourselves. Can progress of humanity be decoupled from their demise yet?
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