Nepalese Christmas and Momos

This is not special about Christmas but any holiday where a few Nepalese people gather outside of Nepal and try to celebrate. 90% of the time, what we do is make momos and eat and then do the remaining things what we do. Momos has become synonymous to the national food for nepalese. 

Some information about momo. It’s actually originated somewhere in Tibet. Tibet and nepal being nearby, migration and trade was common from long back. So the food also migrated and eventually modified to fit Nepalese tase, and for the better. Nowadays it’s really popular in Nepal and many people serve momo in the menu. Different varieties, veg, non-veg, pan fried, steamed, fat less , soup momo etc etc. My all time favorite is Veg fried C-Momo. When I was working in Nepal, I used to have Momos as lunch like  60% of the times. And I think it’s not just me. I remember so many times, I would be determined to try something different today, but after looking at the menu for like 10 minutes or so, I would settle for a plate of Momo. And so would my friends. It’s that popular. 

Now that we are in America , it’s little less available and so it’s has more value. It has become one of the compulsory dishes for gatherings. I have taken in to my office for pot locks and functions and to my surprise everybody loved it. Americans, Indians, Pakistanis, Chinese, Ethiopians everybody loved it. And the most important thing people loved was when they tried it with the tomato sesame soup. People would never get tired eating it, and it’s on the healthy side of things. But it’s also on the expensive side of things as well. 

Now that we know, it’s on the expensive side of things, people with normal salary don’t go on a restaurant to have Momos on a regular basis. Especially when there are so many fast food restaurants with different cheaper varieties of food. I often think whether it’s possible to open a momo frenchise. The main problem with it would be the cost. It’s not an easy process to prepare the momos. But it’s definitely healthy compared to the cheesy and processed products of other frenchise that is so much unhealthy and contributes to the obesity and health problems. Can we bring it to the “$5 per plate of ten with sauce” mark. Because I think that would be an awesome price point that can make it a success. But definitely there are some problems.

• Frozen Momos are not as tasty 
• No automation devices available 
• It’s time consuming to wrap the momo stuffings
• Nepalese are concentrated on certain states more
• Materials are not so cheap

With mass production and a little bit of automation I don’t think that is an impossible mark to reach. But the risk of failure is definitely there and as any startup, it’s going to take a lot of effort to make it a success. But then, imagine a world where you can have a plate of healthy and super tasty and nutritious meal for $5. The possibility of such a future definitely deserve the time and effort of somebody.

How to keep pushing the envelop

Its very easy to be default.
Its very easy to be scared of uncomfortable situations.
Its very difficult to take action.
Its very difficult to think about what action to take if you decide to do so.

Let me explain.
Almost all people have a default reaction to certain category of situation or action. When you are put in a situation, you realize that and start acting on it in a certain way. If you are not prepared to handle such a situation or you have never thought of such situations, and you are not a super person who can think very fast and analyze all the outcomes or can process and easily handle any situation with ease, you handle it in the way which you think is the most easiest way out of the situations, without causing much stress to you and without making any more conflict then it already made in your mind.
This behavior is called default behavior.
Its very common.
Most people handle it this way.
What they don't realize is that, in trying to find the easy way out, they choose the path of long term harm.

Yes, being default helps you handle the situation in a mediocre way and you get out without thinking too much about the situation, and taking much damage to your self esteem. What also happens sub-consciously in your brain is the following things.

• You take a mental note to avoid situations like this in the first place
• You decide not to go to the gatherings where you might have to talk to difficult/unknown/new people or some big-shot people or some people you may have some/any difficulty connecting with
• You think of easy ways to handle the situations and feel comfortable

These default behavior makes you just comfortable enough, so as to avoid any desire in you to be better than what you are. You will never brain storm how to better handle the situations and try to make a major impact in those kind of situations. And yes you can convert those uncomfortable situations into an opportunity to grow, an opportunity to meet new people, opportunity to get introduced, opportunity to impress and leave your impact on people, opportunity to communicate to a mass rather than a being in a boring and uncomfortable situation. And if you notice around you, there is always somebody who is doing this. Every situation which is a default situation for you, is an opportunity situations for some people. People can start saying Hi and then start sharing a story of them in the morning or how the lady in the Starbucks' was pronouncing her name or how the people in the road were driving, anything. If you have the ability to notice what is going in your life or in the world in general, and can narrate it in an interesting way, the world is your stage. Every situation is an opportunity. If you don't have that skill, develop it. Start noticing the way people pronounce your name, or start remembering the way you guys used to have fun in colleges, how you used to bunk colleges, and that situation when you got in trouble, start noticing what is happening in the lives of people around you, start connecting the events that are happening to them to the events you know about , either about you or someone you know, start noticing the jokes people tell, and don't be afraid to share another one that is related to the first one, start noticing some difference in the way people look because of a new haircut - or a new necklace they are wearing, don't hesitate to throw some funny sarcasm if you find a relevant one to somebody's action or behavior. That's how you can take any situations to a ride and take advantage from it, that's how you grow and be the master of the situations.

And at the end, always plan what you are going to say when you meet someone new in a meeting, plan what to say when someone says "have a good one", or even "good morning", At least make a list of few simple situations that can happen in a daily basis and plan your answers, and say it out loud without any hesitation. Say something more than you are comfortable saying. And if they don't like it, be ready to say sorry it blurted it out, or I don't mean it. But don't be afraid to keep pushing the envelop all the time. That's the only way you are going to be comfortable with the world you live in.

Just a thought!!

Work pressure vs creativity

I was wondering whether there is any correlation between pressure to deliver versus delivering creative work. What do you think? Before you read it, let me make myself clear that there were no real research done or data analyzed before writing this article other than my own experiences and imaginations.

I am going to analyze myself first. I work five days a week and have two days of holiday. This works perfectly fine. I feel i am just enough busy and have just enough free time to unwind and relax and do something i want to do, well, if I have to do. Now from my past experiences, I have notices that If I need to do something, and I really want it to be done, the five working days are just enough for me to get the things done. Unless the nature of work is such that it requires dedicated amount of time and travel and it is totally not possible in the working days. Other times I am just lazy and just thinking that I need a weekend to do the same job (ie. say write an article, or edit a vlog etc) then I couldn't do it on those five days. Not because it can't be done, but because, i don't want it bad enough.

Its the reality of life. If you don't want it bad enough, if your inner mind gives up on it, then it can't be done. Unless somebody pressures you to do it, somebody constantly keeps bugging you and asking you about it, criticizing you for not completing it, in that case your inner mind gets motivated enough to get it over with. Whatever may be the motivation, the work is done. You did it. The question is "How do you keep yourselves motivated?".

People think straight that they can keep themselves motivated and they can have a strong will power to do so, and they will do so. But who are we kidding really? By analyzing my life and analyzing the habits of people that I know, people around me, I can say that 80% of the time, people fail to do so, or do it partially. I have always notices that people get more motivated in a group, maybe with the desire to show off to the group that they did it. Some people also keep themselves motivated by bragging a lot. Tell some people near to you that you are going to do something in certain amount of time. Keep the work be realistic and achievable. If its a really interesting work that the people are curious about, it will motivate you to do it. You may not have done it if it was you all alone. But because you are motivated not to fail in front of those people whose opinions of you, you care about, your inner mind tells you to get motivated and do it. Its all about how to force your inner mind to keep you motivated, or deceive your inner mind to keep you motivated.

Also, I think a constant amount of pressure is necessary to keep you motivated to deliver things, thus keeping you productive. In my case, if I have a long holiday, the simple things that I have kept without doing, I end up not doing it in the holiday as well. Because of lack of pressure and too much free time I don't know what to do with, I end up spending all of it in un-productive tasks. However, it there is some very complicated task that requires a lot of thinking and brainstorming, constant pressure prevent's me from realizing that amount of creativity that is required to do that task the best way possible. In those cases, I require a huge chunk of free time without any pressure on me what so ever. 80% of the times I end up taking much less amount of time then want I thought I would take, but if I didn't have that huge chunk of time to begin with, it creates some kind of pressure in my inner brain and stops me from being creative. It's that strangest of phenomenon I couldn't really understand.

Example:
I always wanted to create some videos. Even though I am not a good video maker or anything, I had never made any videos (at least not a proper one) until 2018. I would simply shoot some videos from my phone, put some transitions, some titles, some sound effects etc and just post it. Just couple of minutes long, simple and easy. Nothing complex. My inner mind wouldn't even allow me to explore what more could be done, how far could be reached with it. I wouldn't spend some time thinking and planning anything big that i can do, or anything complex. I met with this guy who has similar interest and wanted to make Vlogs. I talked with him and instantly connected. We talked a lot about videos, music videos, Vlogs, Cinematic steps, What this guy has done in youtube, How this guy Vlogs, What are the unique things about that guy, What this Vloggers style is, How this guy makes funny videos etc etc. Every day we met, we talked about those things. That motivated both of us to push further our boundaries and explore more. My inner mind explored, in its imagination, how things are done by others, and how things can be done. After those thought and imagination experiments that I gained with those conversations, I was more confident. And then finally on the long holidays we challenged (not officially) each other to create a Vlog, whatever we could create. The whatever part eased my mind to try even if I had the doubt "What IF, I am not good enough?". I wanted to make something which gives some sense what it is about and it should not be too bad. That was my criteria. And I allocated myself a month, thus eliminating the time pressure that my brain feels and gives up before it even starts. I completed the work on about a week with the weakest of laptop that i had. That felt like breaking a big barrier. A barrier not made of hard bricks and stones, but a barrier much stronger, made by self doubts and weakened will power. Skill is secondary. Some people are too good at somethings while others can do it just enough. To find out what your still is to do something you have to try to do it first. And there comes the weak will power and self doubts, working together, intimidating you, threatening you that you will loose some time to do something unproductive, trying to do something productive and stressing out not going to do it well enough. When logically thinking about it, its not something you would get scared, but in the blurred and out or focus areas of your minds, these blur and unclear thoughts seems to have a huge effect in your will power and decision making to explore the unexplored potentials of your mind.

Android vs Iphones

Well here’s another random thought occupying my mind these days.
This blog is regarding a change of opinion, and in the journey of changes, a   Conflict  of ideas within - one of many perks of being a human.

The problem is I guess How do you choose to build something, or thinking as a consumer How do you decide which type of product you prefer. Both looks the same. Both are equally popular. There are plenty of people who admire each of the product. What would your thought process be to choose one over the other. I guess you should try see the philosophy of these.

First philosophy says that make it good enough but never put a lot of effort to make it best. Make it cheap. Lure your consumers with many but not properly baked features because there are many who will join you this way. The second philosophy is, be the best. Make sure whatever you are providing is the best in market. If something is faulty, don’t release it. Make it the best finished product even it means the development and testing cost will be higher and the end consumers have to pay a higher price for it. Not cheap price but excellence will prevail.

Personally, as a costumer, it was difficult to see unless you experience it and provided you use most of the features, to make your mind to choose one over the other. It’s the journey of having no money and choosing the most features with low price to not having to worry about money too much and money and wanting to experience the excellent finished product.

What is life anyway

Somehow in this vast wilderness of nothingness, some disturbance happens and disturbance ends of creating a source of positive and negative energy. Something happens again and those energy ends up creating particles, electrons, protons, neutrons, and then molecules, rocks, planets and the whole universe in an infinite amount of time. Now something amazing happens in this dead universe where in a planet called earth, something Goldilocks condition happen and the molecules react with ideal temperature and ideal molecules form which are able to remember some patterns to replicate themselves. In a matter of several millions of years those molecules grow to be more complex and create a combination of even more complex molecules which seem to show some kind of intelligence, search their own food, move towards favorable conditions, create more entities like themselves. And thus the so called Life was eventually formed.

Today those beings have become so smart that one of those is writing this blog, and someone else is reading and comprehending the idea thus communicating while being miles away. Think about it. Life is something that just happened by several small things.

When I was small (like 5-10 years old), I used to feel that I am way smarter then other people. Well that may be because I was the only person I know very well. Now that I am old, I think I am not so smart after all. OR am I. When I used to think about life back then, I was always meaningless but full of potential. I think I was always more inclined to the view that everything at the end is meaningless.
There are two ways you can see life. One way is that everything is obvious, things are the way they are because they are, and they always have been. You and I exist because obviously we do, why are you so amazed by the fact that we do exist. But on the other way of looking at life is that everything about it is amazing. Everything that happened from the beginning of the Universe, to make us possible is just mind boggling. Its overwhelming to see about the vast complexity of everything so simple. Even the simplest of things are beyond comprehension. We are living in this IN-Between some Goldilocks condition, If we start digging the very deep detail of something, anything, we will be lost.

Once I was having a philosophical discussion with my friend, and I was on good mood, so I was on the side that life matters. He told me, why go through so much trouble when at the end life is meaningless and nothing matters. I said exactly because life is meaningless at the end and it will only be what you make of it in your lifetime. Why be sad in life when life does not mean anything and we have to die at the end, life a happy life and die. What's the point of being sad and dying ? Both arguments were equally valid, and some people choose to pick one side or the other depending on what the series of events they have faces on their life.

So what is life? Ignorance is bliss. Just live the life that makes you happy. Be humble, and remember that one time you were saved from trouble because somebody else was humble and kind to you. Now its your turn to be kind and return the favor. Find a meaning in life and help create a meaningful world out of this nothingness. Be positive and spread happiness, because the world needs it.

Well, Its a never ending topic to I'm just stopping all of a sudden.
Thank you for reading.
Have a blessed Life!..