We are What We Consume: The COVID effect ?

It is June 3rd, 2020. This is a part 2 of  "We are what we consume". 

USA has come a long way in last 50 years: It is probably the only nation that has achieved the racial unity most expeditiously.  

1960: Muhammad Ali

Cassius Clay, Ali traveled to the 1960 Rome Games to compete in the light heavyweight division. Despite being only 18, he won all four of his fights easily. In the final he defeated three-time European champion Zbigniew Pietrzykowski to win the gold medal.

A Black American born in Louisville, Kentucky, was the young Olympian who brought pride to the great nation of USA. Yet, Ali was refused service at a Louisville restaurant after he returned home as an Olympic gold medal winner.

America was segregated. 

1971: The beginning of de-segregation

April 20, 1971 | Supreme Court Rules That Busing Can Be Used to Integrate Schools.

The movie: Remember the Titans - captures it very vividly. 

Fast forward to 2008:

America gets its first Black President. 

President Obama wins in a landslide election with Voters turnout the highest since 1960.

Today:

So why are 40+ cities of this great nation in distress over the same issue that those in 1971 experienced. (hopefully not that intensely)

May be it even feels worse than that to many, because majority of Black population, alive today, did not experience the era before 1971. They do not expect to be ill-treated or assumed criminal for their color. 

Why are the protests, specifically about illegal, ill treatment of black victims, turning into a White Vs Black ?

Why is a person living in the most racially integrated cities like NYC, inherently believed that she can call cops on a Black person and punish him for him being black ?

Note: Amy Cooper worked from Franklin Templeton, a 6 billion USD giant, guaranteed to have a periodic training about diversity and inclusion. 

Point being - Amy, is well informed, well exposed and privileged enough to evolve beyond the color of the skin of fellow human. She clearly understood her privilege that she can hurt a black person and get away with it.

May be ... just may be ... it is about what we (as the nation) have been consuming in recent years. Are we asking the correct questions - are we making sure that we promote only the good and nothing but the good - are we letting our guards down, standards lowered, just because ....

America is great because Americans are the most fair, honest and hard-working humans on the planet. Let us strengthen our beliefs and reject every idea, every person, every act, every behavior, every speech, everything ... that promote hate. 

Let us restore decency, fairness, quality, decorum and leadership.

Economy is function of Unity, let us not allow a small minority of humans who has an agenda otherwise, to ruin it all. Recognize them, reject them, defeat them.  

The Tesla Effect

A wise person has said "'Those who do not learn from the history are doomed to repeat it.'.

1996, it was amazon. 
The Wall Street Journal, Barron's and all the pundits of stock market abused Jeff Bezos' vision, focus on the customer value and his conviction. 

2019, the word shopping is replaced by Amazon.
There has been many of those "online shopping platforms" attempting to mimic amazon. 
Amazon's AWS created a brand new industry of cloud services. 

This is what we may call "The Amazon Effect". 

2003, it was Tesla. 
The history is repeated. 
The computer on the wheels was yet another talk of the town. 
Many times with disbelief and perceived failures. 

March 31, 2016
Model 3 received 325,000 reservations.

July 28, 2017, First Model 3 were delivered. 
Yet it was many many months behind.
The promised 35K vehicle was still not in sight. 
Many continued with the disbelief and perceived failures. 

2018: Tesla's Model 3 became the most sold electric car with 139,782 units delivered.

Then it all changed, the history repeated itself, again. 

August 06,2019
Jay Leno says: ‘There’s almost no reason to have a gas car’https://www.cnbc.com/2019/08/06/jay-leno-on-tesla-electric-cars-are-the-future.html

August 08, 2019
Ford CEO brags about Electric F-150 to be ultimate disruptor.
https://insideevs.com/news/364143/video-ford-ceo-warns-tesla-of-reputation/

August 19, 2019
CNN Reports: - The great electric car race is just beginning
https://www.cnn.com/interactive/2019/08/business/electric-cars-audi-volkswagen-tesla/

Tesla legitimized the electric car as a superior choice over ICE vehicles. 

Tesla established, that it is smarter, cost effective and responsible to own an electric.

The history repeated, again. Tesla replaced the word "Electric Car". 
Tesla changed the conversation from - This is will never work .... TO ....
We will beat Tesla ... 

THIS, is Tesla Effect. 

Assimilation: a height of disconnect ?

A learned colleague and I landed up discussing the Immigration and assimilation. Of course, the context is The United States of America. The setting where this discussion took place was on a man-made Navy island in the deep south state of Mississippi.

It all started with a complement from my esteemed colleague (a 3^rd Generation European American) saying “Not many 1^st generation immigrants can communicate and articulate as well as you do”. My response was long but in short – "I had an opportunity to work for consulting industry where I had no choice but to engage with individuals from many parts of the world and many walks of life." 

As it goes – you become what you do (consume) and get exposed to.The abilities are result of one's exposure to the America and what they do. 

That triggered a common complaint “Immigrants should assimilate”.  The response was my story and then some, about the immigration and immigrants: here in a very summarized write-up:

I came to USA to make money, with a goal to go back in 2-3 years. With an early assumption, that there is no way this (money) can last and that, what else USA can offer beyond money. 

These two aspects of the thought process – 1. Goal to make more money and 2. “what else the America can offer more than my own country” defines majority of immigrants, at the beginning. Many continue with this exact same feeling even after multiple decades! :(

A primary objective of any immigrant as they land in USA is to get settled. It is easier to do so when you can communicate easily, and in many cases, preferably using your own language.

A human tendency is to do what is easier. That drives immigrants to communities where they find people from their own countries / regions. Italians to Brooklyn, Indians to Jackson Heights, Rich people to upper east side and so on. 

Point being “assimilation” is not even on their “To-Do”. That is not something that immigrants perceive of any value. Unless they must work in an industry like consulting, that some of us do.

I did shorten a longer debate that we had, but hoping that it could drive the point home, that “expectation of assimilation” is one very misplaced expectation and measure that is, in lack of better words, a “self-inflicted wound”.  Immigrants have no idea that locals expect assimilation and locals have no idea that assimilation is least of immigrant’s problems.

Unspoken / undefined expectation of  Assimilation by the natives and mostly oblivious immigrants about this expectation are something like these:

   

Having said that - Assimilation definitely has a value and should be nurtured. May be a better approach (or question) would be to think “What can WE, the natives of America, do, that help an immigrant value assimilation that they can benefit from." In turn we all will be happier and assimilated. 

Is there a solution? – yes, there are many: one idea that may help: every new immigrant (or Non-Immigrant) should be introduced to Volunteering. Introduce a requirement for all new residents of USA that they should spend 40 hours (as an example) in their first year, participating in any volunteer opportunity of their choice. Upon completion of doing so they should be celebrated and awarded somehow.

How? - Someone smarter than I, would sure have a solution or two.

Let us add Assimilation on OUR "To-Do". 

Relearning Indian Heritage by practicing Yoga

My wife has been practicing yoga (one may say an American Version) at a local Yoga Studio called Yoga Tribe for few years now. A local group, developed by a gentleman named Jason, who is trained by big names like Bikram Yoga.

It started as a gentler alternative to Boot-camp routine. Honestly, it took me a while to digest the idea of Caucasians teaching Yoga 😎. Finally, I managed to start few months ago.

My experience has been pleasant, humbling and most importantly learning.
Learning was not what I had expected or even sought. Yes, that was naive.

It is incredible how the teachers at this studio has embraced the yogic everything and have achieved an expertise where they, very successfully, are imparting a training for.

Purpose of this blog is to capture some of the learning, not in any particular order or connection.

• Almost every session starts with child pose or Corpse pose, and literally every session ends with Savasana. While I did not question it, our teacher today, Jenna (a flight attendant by profession) described it vividly. 
• Savasana is a representation of being dead. 
• Balasana is of being a child
• A symbolic representation of living a life (in that hour): From Death to Death, may be a representation of a belief of reincarnation. 
• OR a symbol of a one's life: from birth of a child to death, a circle of life.

• Once a session ends in Savasana, You wake up in fetal position (Parsva Savasana) a symbolic move of being 're-born'. 

• And finally you express gratitude for everything that you have and prepare for rest of the day. 

• It is like hitting a re-set and aligning yourself to the goodness of being a human.

Interestingly many of the reasons that take me back to a yoga session are the same reasons why I used to visit "Ramkrishna Ashram at Rajkot".

• Amazing positive energy.
• Celebration of individual and internal strength.
• Celebration of humans as we are.
• A strong foundation of "We are all same, equal". 
• An absolute rejection of ideas of comparison, material and anything evil. 

I am re-learning the heritage that I took it granted for and I have to thank my teachers at Yoga Tribe for. 🙏

A revelation, a re-learning :
Yoga is probably the strongest description of what is being a Hindu means. There is no "ism" in it, no rigid commandments, no directives, just one simple suggestion - Be Human.

Side note:
The main hall @ Ramkrishna Ashram, an incredible architecture to induce peace and calm.

We are what we consume!

The National Museum of African American History and Culture is an amazing reminder of our (human) barbaric past. Slavery: The concept of Human Trade, was at the foundation of  the industrial revolution.

One may ask: what triggered a 'need', if you may, for slavery. The reason will sure astound you. It was our need to consume: sugar, tobacco, coffee, cocoa, and later cotton. 

Slaves provided the very fundamental labor force, without which, the trade, shipping, plantations may not have flourished as they did.

A conventional wisdom says that, if, information was available, about the facts, that "the sugar I consume enslaves a family for life", one may not have consumed it.

Question is, would you really have 'not' consumed it?

Fast forward many decades and talk about iPhone and FoxConn, just as an example, nothing against Apple or FoxConn, per se.  We worry about less human, if not inhuman, labor practices of China or (un)Fair trade practices in South America or Africa or India or child labor!

As this is being written, this was a week were White Supremacist raised their heads (in US), again. Where do they get an idea of being superior? May be, just may be, slavery had something to do with it!?

Think bit harder, do you really know or guarantee that what you consume does no evil? Ironically, we live in an information age.

The world, today, has many more forms of consumption, TV, Vehicles, Media and most importantly your very own, precious, perishable time.

A conscious consumption, is indeed a guarantee that a fellow human will not be ill-treated.

We are what we consume: let us consume to be Human. It is a long journey between human being and being human, let us travel together.

Tesla Vs. B-Class

Since our purchase of our first electric vehicle and experiencing it first-hand, we have gathered some more parameters of comparisons an electric car.

Specifically speaking Tesla. The key question remained - why would I spend $1300 a month to lease Tesla vs $300 a month for B-Class. ?

Here is a short comparison:

All wheel drive vs. Front wheel drive: as you may have guessed the key reason for Tesla's electric performance (pun intended) is the fact that it has two engines (models of 2015 above), so to speak, which drives all wheels.

Double the size of the battery: B-Class comes with 31 KWh battery pack vs. Tesla's base model S comes with 60 KWh.

Chargers: Tesla comes with four charging options including its super fast charging option. B-Class has only two AC options which gives you the fastest speed of full charge in 4-5 hours. B-Class does not even come with an option of DC Chargers which some others has an option of.

Free Charging: while free charging is still an option via many free chargers in our area, Tesla offers free pubic charging options to all their customers. This means, literally, FREE GAS when you buy Tesla. - A value of at least $200 per month.

No dealer hopping: Tesla is bought online, just like you would buy toilet paper. No haggling, no shopping no dealers cash and none of that. Interestingly you can now by pre-owned Tesla too.

In Summary: It is an individual definition of value which will decide if Tesla's high performance, long range, quick charging options, free charging, simple clear transparent buying process without any feeling of "I may have paid more! :)) - is worth $1300 a month.

You may also be interested in my other posts:

From MPG to MPKWh

From MPG to MPKWh

Since Tesla announced that they will be launching a model for $49K, electric car had been an option we were trying to exercise. Tesla did not deliver their promise of 49K Model S but they indeed created a huge demand for Electric Cars. As I write this there are 335,125 electric cars on the road, only 10% of them are Tesla. The sales of electric cars are growing at 150% year-over-year.

Still, 336,500 is meager 0.5% of 50 Million light-weight-vehicles on the roads of America.
[ Visit - Chargepoint for latest count ]

It was Sunday, around 8 PM; we received delivery of our very first Electric car, Mercedes Benz B-Class. Our first ride home, some 20 miles, subscribed us to a new mileage term – we got 3.5 miles per Kilo Watt Hour (KWh). That intrigued and triggered a series of questions and intense research for next one week, as time permitted.

Kilo-watt-hour is also referred to as “Juice” as gasoline is referred to as “Fuel”. It feels like we went from junk food to natural, raw, organic healthy food! Wink! Wink!

1 KWh is also called a Unit, if you monitor your electricity bill. Our cost of 1 unit of juice is 15 cents or 19 cents depending upon the consumption that month. Thus to drive a mile, at say 19 cents, it will cost us 19 divided by 3.5 = 5.42 cents.

Our gasoline car, Camry drives 30 miles per gallon. Current gas cost is $3.60 per gallon. Thus to drive our Camry a mile, it costs, 3.60 divided by 30 = 12 cents.

B-Class comes with a battery bank of 28 Kilo-Watt-Hour capacity. Thus at 3.5 miles per KWh it would have a range of 28 x 3.5 = 98 Miles. 98 miles is when it will run out of juice if not charged. This of course assumes you drive without AC or any other juice consuming amenities!  

Thus it is likely that we will be saving around 50% of transport cost by going from Miles per Gallon (MPG) to Miles per Kilo-Watt-Hour (MPKWh). Not to count the carpool advantage and pride of helping the environment! again ... Wink! Wink!

Please look out for the next installment of Juice – “The freedom and choices of juicing it up”.