prasad1
Active member
Whether we like to admit it or not, mediocrity is the new order of the day. The ‘chalta hai’ attitude has become so pervasive that we are left to wonder if this veneration of the mediocre can be reversed at all, writes Jahnavi Barua.
There was a time, when before the school session started, children set about furiously covering their textbooks and exercise books with brown paper. Some schools still follow this ancient practice, but many have relinquished it, opting for books with ready printed, sometimes laminated covers, instead. In those old days of frantic brown papering, my grandfather sat down one evening and taught me how to cover a book the correct way with brown paper.
As he showed me the steps, the foldings and the cuttings and the final satisfying tuckings in, he also told me that any job worth doing was worth doing well.
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Interesting sometimes, laughable at others, immensely infuriating mostly, this culture of cutting corners, skipping steps and indulging in the cult of the mediocre can be. The lists of jobs botched, of dangers created, and of mindless wastage in this poor country are endless and remarkable. Consider the road gang at work on repairing a section of a road at night: late at night they wind up work, leaving the still unfinished section unmarked and vulnerable.
A two-wheeler coming that unfortunate way takes a spill and a man dies. A man who is a son and husband and a father and the only earning member of the family. The lack of thought, the lack of discipline and the shoddy style of work of the road gang thus leads to an avoidable tragedy. Yet, this same tragedy does not create the slightest ripple in the collective lives of the citizenry of a country, for two critical things have happened.
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Citius, Altius, Fortius.
Swifter, Higher, Stronger.
The motto of the modern Olympic Games says it all, and says it better than anything else can. Only when we strive for the best can a certain degree of quality be achieved. Everyone will not win, every aspiration will not be met, but then, that is not the aim anyway. Everyone cannot win, but in the run-up to getting to the top, one will end up somewhere near the pinnacle, and very far from the bottom. And if everyone adopts that attitude, then the quality of life in this once great nation will surely rise, and rise above the abyss it seems permanently wedged into now. Some may say heroics are not for everyone; joining active politics is not for everyone. True, but making an effort in everyday lives, doing the best in every small task is not a difficult thing at all. The shoelaces can be untied with minimum effort, but the rewards from that tiny act are so immense that they are beyond imagination.
Deccan_Herald
There was a time, when before the school session started, children set about furiously covering their textbooks and exercise books with brown paper. Some schools still follow this ancient practice, but many have relinquished it, opting for books with ready printed, sometimes laminated covers, instead. In those old days of frantic brown papering, my grandfather sat down one evening and taught me how to cover a book the correct way with brown paper.
As he showed me the steps, the foldings and the cuttings and the final satisfying tuckings in, he also told me that any job worth doing was worth doing well.
.......................
Interesting sometimes, laughable at others, immensely infuriating mostly, this culture of cutting corners, skipping steps and indulging in the cult of the mediocre can be. The lists of jobs botched, of dangers created, and of mindless wastage in this poor country are endless and remarkable. Consider the road gang at work on repairing a section of a road at night: late at night they wind up work, leaving the still unfinished section unmarked and vulnerable.
A two-wheeler coming that unfortunate way takes a spill and a man dies. A man who is a son and husband and a father and the only earning member of the family. The lack of thought, the lack of discipline and the shoddy style of work of the road gang thus leads to an avoidable tragedy. Yet, this same tragedy does not create the slightest ripple in the collective lives of the citizenry of a country, for two critical things have happened.
...............
Citius, Altius, Fortius.
Swifter, Higher, Stronger.
The motto of the modern Olympic Games says it all, and says it better than anything else can. Only when we strive for the best can a certain degree of quality be achieved. Everyone will not win, every aspiration will not be met, but then, that is not the aim anyway. Everyone cannot win, but in the run-up to getting to the top, one will end up somewhere near the pinnacle, and very far from the bottom. And if everyone adopts that attitude, then the quality of life in this once great nation will surely rise, and rise above the abyss it seems permanently wedged into now. Some may say heroics are not for everyone; joining active politics is not for everyone. True, but making an effort in everyday lives, doing the best in every small task is not a difficult thing at all. The shoelaces can be untied with minimum effort, but the rewards from that tiny act are so immense that they are beyond imagination.
Deccan_Herald
