Thursday, December 30, 2010

The Golden City

There's something about being sick that makes exploring all the more cinemagraphic. The colors seem more vibrant, the smells more intense, the noise ringing through your ears. Such is the day we had exploring Jaisalmer yesterday.

I never expected to be in a constant state of freezing -- in India of all places! And not that it's even all that cold -- about 55-65 degrees... but when there are zero heaters and the entire city is designed to keep cool in the intense desert heat of the summer, it's really that cold! (or maybe we've both just turned Indian?) For the last two nights, we've been sleeping with our winter hats on!

We explore the fort and its grounds, learning that Jaisalmer was founded in 1156. The city underwent "jauhar" 2 1/2 times. Jaihar is the ancient Indian tradition of honorary self-immolation of women and children, followed by the men going out to die in battle, to avoid capture and dishonor. We learn that this happened twice -- once after defending the city for 12 years, and another only twenty years later. Then there's the "half", where they essentially were too rushed to make the proper holy arrangements for self-immolation, or self-burning. Therefore, before going into the battlefield, the men slit the throats of their wives and children themselves to prevent dishonor by the enemy. Wow.

We learn a lot from our hotel-keeper, Lois, an Australian woman who has lived in Rajasthan for the past 11 years. She married Chanesar, a local Rajasthani from a 300-person village located 30 kilometers from the Pakistani border. Even as a resident, she cannot go there without getting the magistrate's permission, due to its proximity with Pakistan. The residents have stone houses, many without roofs, as it hardly rains here (our audio tour said that a child can reach its 7th birthday before seeing its first rain!) The main source of income is livestock, primarily goat and sheep.

Some scenes from the fort:



Wednesday, December 29, 2010

Colorful Jaisalmer

It may be the Golden City of sandstone forts and palaces, but it's still India in all its color!




Scenes from the Thar Desert

Blending into the desert-scape, Bara Bagh (which means "Big Garden") is the royal cenotaph, or cemetary, for Jaisalmari kings. The golden sandstone is intricately carved.


In the distance, wind turbines harness power for the Indian army stationed nearby. Jaisalmer is 100 kilometers away from Pakistan; the city's airport closed a few years ago, to be used exclusively by the army.

With its majestic fort (lauded by residents as the world's oldest living fort) and winding cobblestone streets, the city certainly rewards travel weary tourists, who spend at least 5 hours on a bus or train to get here. The "Golden City" feels much harsher than Udaipur - the lake city, which feels like a magical fairyland. Jaisalmer is a bit like the wild west -- windy and dusty, with more aggressive habitants of the town. But regardless, a blast to explore.

Tuesday, December 28, 2010

Camel Trekking in the Thar Desert



A few hours later, and we're starting to feel better. The Australian hotel-keeper has pity on us, and instead of putting us on camels right off the bat, we go exploring the desert by jeep. The views are amazing -- sandstone color palette, punctuated by Persian-style arches or a Jain temple.

We reach the sand dunes in time to watch an incredible sunset. Our guide, Kareem -- a gregarious 27-year old who's the nephew of the hotel owner -- sets up camp for the night: a lone Rajasthani tent and delicious dal, chana (garbanzo beans), vegetables, chapati, and rice. It's our first meal of the day and it's quite possibly one of the best Indian meals I've had. We sit by the bonfire and see the most incredible shooting star, and marvel at the international space station gliding up above.

The night is long, cold, and sick... but we're up at 8:30am for our morning camel ride. We've missed the sunrise, but the morning is beautiful -- clean, crisp air; and camels ready to go. There's Lucky, a five-year old girl; and Babalu, a ten-year old male. As we learn, a pair of camels cost Rs 1 lakhs each, or about $2500. Our guides are Ali and Saleem; Ali is uneducated but has learned English well through all the tourists he comes across. He proudly points at his North Face, which keeps him warm, and which a German tourist gave him after a camel ride.

The camels themselves seem almost other-wordly, with their one hump, long necks, multiple knees, and lower hump that allows them to rest on their stomach. Getting up and down is quite awkward -- with their front-half of body rising first, followed by their back-half -- almost robotic-like.

The trek itself is gorgeous -- seeing various types of terrain, and passing through a small gypsy-esque village, with small girls dancing as we pass. We trot a bit (we're told they can reach speeds of 35-50 km/hour, which is a bit hard to believe)

Quite a magical morning!






Monday, December 27, 2010

A Rude Awakening

As we soon learn, staying in a 500 year old Haveli has its disadvantages: it's freezing (no heat and the few throw blankets they've provided haven't helped much), the stone walls seem to magnify sounds all around us (outside, inside)... it's 6am and it sounds like a Medieval Fair is going on outside, except that it's real life.

Most of all, we're both sick and thinking about a camel safari today only makes us head for the bathroom quicker.

Turns out, you shouldn't have any water from a 500 year old Haveli, even if you're just using it to brush your teeth.


Stepping back in time: Jaisalmer

We arrive in Jaisalmer after a five hour bus ride so crammed with people (sitting, standing, laying -- over two bunks of a bus and the aisle in between) that it feels like we are being smuggled somewhere. It's 8:30pm and we're tired.

A clean-cut man in his twenties meets us on his scooter -- he gets an auto for us to take us back to the hotel. As we ride, I slowly wake up, in awe of the majestic fort in the distance, which we're heading right towards. Not realizing where our hotel is located, we marvel at the fort, and then presume we're headed elsewhere.

But no! -- the auto proceeds through the giant gates of the fortress itself! -- we meander through tiny old stone streets. The solitary street lights add to the feel that we are heading deeper and deeper into a medieval town. We're inside the fortress, into what feels like a magical castle.

We get out of the auto and follow our guide through the windy stone streets. It's the most surreal and incredible experience, walking through these streets that must not have changed much in the hundreds of years they've been in existence. The buildings we pass are just gorgeous -- such intricate detail to the carvings. We meander through hundreds-of-years-old Jain temples, which our hotel is nestled in between.

Hotel Suraj was originally the residence of a Brahmin family, who still owns the residence today. It was built in 1526, as both a residence and a school. We can't quite believe it -- we're staying in a 500 year old Haveli (noble's house)!!

Anxious to explore, we start walking through our "neighborhood" once we settle in. It's about 9:30pm, but we're the only ones on the street, in a magical are-we-still-in-India kindda way. The road ends and we climb up some rocks to see why -- we're now on the very edge of the fort, looking down at the city below!

We end the evening with dinner on the roof of a nearby hotel, overlooking the city and desert.






Breakfast with a View


We end our stay in Udaipur with breakfast at our hotel's rooftop restaurant -- a perfect place for a final look at the Lake Palace upon Lake Pichola.


Sunday, December 26, 2010

Monsoon Palace

Easily one of the highlights of Udaipur, the Monsoon Palace sits regally atop a hill in the distance.

We explore the palace at sunset, and then decide to get a better view, away from all the crowds.

We find a little trail in front of the palace and find one of the most spectacular sunset views.

Afterwards, we go to a crafts fair and then find a rooftop restaurant to watch Octopussy, the James Bond movie with the evil villain who lives in the Monsoon Palace.

Saturday, December 25, 2010

Scenes from Udaipur





On Christmas Day, On Christmas Day

Turns out Santa does make it to Rajasthan on Christmas morning!


We find a cute little church...


...and sing Christmas carols. Tyler's a bit of a rockstar, with everyone (from Santa to children) wanting to shake his hand and wish him Merry Christmas.

Friday, December 24, 2010

Breakfast in Udaipur

Our vacation begins!





Thursday, December 23, 2010

LifeSpring Foundation

In the two hours since Good Morning America showed a piece on LifeSpring Hospital, there have been over $5000 in donations raised for the Foundation! It's amazing going on our Global Giving page and seeing the birth sponsorships rising by the minute. What a tremendous feeling to know how many women living below the poverty line will benefit from these sponsorships! I even got an email from a nurse living in Iowa, asking whether she could come and volunteer at our hospital.

To see the LifeSpring segment that aired on Good Morning America, click here.

For Jacqueline's ABC interview about LifeSpring, click here.

ABC has also featured our hospital on its saveone.net website.

And to think, this hasn't even yet aired on the West coast yet!

Twas the night before the night before Christmas

Yes, this is our Christmas tree...



Stockings straight from California, already stuffed with presents from Santa and his elves! Guess Rudolph does fly to Delhi.

Tuesday, December 21, 2010

Good Morning America this Thursday

It's confirmed: LifeSpring will be on Good Morning America this Thursday, hosted by Elizabeth Vargas.

ABC's "Be the Change: Save a Life" campaign is really quite amazing: a one-year focus on global health across various ABC shows, such as 20/20, Good Morning America, Nightline, and World News tonight. Last Friday's 20/20 episode launched this campaign (see pretty cool video promo clip here). Its site, saveone.net, shows stories broken out by global health topics (such as maternal health, malaria, etc.) and across geographies.

They have partnered with Global Giving to track all donations that come in through the program. With the Foundation officially started one week ago, we've already raised over $3000 from just the saveone.net and Global Giving pages (and of course, my amazing friends on Facebook)!

To see all the other great organizations partnered with "Be the Change: Save a Life", click here.

Ho Ho Ho!!

Christmas brunch at the Embassy in Delhi... don't think you can get more American than that. Tyler's colleague invites us over for brunch. There's pancakes and sausages, biscuits and gravy, chocolate croissants and Christmas cookies.

And of course, Santa!


Jacob and Dora, 4 1/2 year old twins, don't have a Santa wish list -- they ask him for "anything in your sleigh." And 6-year old Zoe's wish for Santa? "Toys for all the street children."

It certainly seems to be a dichotomy -- young children who know more about the world than some adults I know (as evidenced by Jacob's passionate stories about his trip to Paris last year, when he was 3!) And then at the same time, walking around the American compound seems like a time warp back to the 1950s. Doors and garages wide open; children running outside to jump on their bicycles. Sheltered, suburbia feel.

300 families work in the Embassy, so it really is a community of its own. Softball field, bowling alley, ice cream shop... and of course a grocery store selling all you can possibly want from the US!

It was a fun Sunday, and we left with some good ole' Christmas cheer.

Monday, December 20, 2010

LifeSpring and the White House



Photos we've just received, taken when our CEO, Anant Kumar, met President Obama in Bombay in early November to discuss US-India business partnerships and social entrepreneurship.

The Jury?

And the outcome of last night's first foray into Indian cooking?! Success!!

By far, one of the best parts of the meal was going out and buying the ingredients. We walk five minutes to our neighborhood "grocery" -- a row of tiny stores tied together uniformly by big government-standardized signs. We ask the first place for dal. They don't have any, but instead of scoffing at us for the silliness of our question like other places do, this store clerk leads us a few stores down. It's so tiny that I've never noticed this place before -- looks more like a tiny storeroom than a shop itself. We stand at the tiny counter, pulling out our list of ingredients.

We ask for 1 kg of yellow dal, and he brings out about five different types. We point to taur dal, and he keeps bringing out more. OK, yellow and black dal it is! Next is rice, which he brings out with the same efficiency, albeit fewer choices. We then ask for about five more ingredients -- cumin powder, chili powder, dried red chilies, etc... he's quick and no-nonsense, and we like him a lot! As he finds us the various spices, I look around his shop. On the ground, he has about a dozen enormous bags almost overflowing with various types of lentils. The tiny shelf space is utilized amazingly efficiently, stacked almost to the ceiling.

We pay for these supplies, which will likely last us a month's worth or more of cooking. Rs 375, or about $8!

Before reaching home, we get a lesson in Indian entrepreneurship. Realizing we need small containers to store all the open spices and lentils, we stop by a small kiryana shop. They realize what we need, but don't actually sell it. So they rummage through their shop, finding anything that resembles this, and sell it to us for about 10 cents each!

Back home, we're ready to start. The pressure cooker takes a while to get used to (note: there's a reason for the arrow on the lid!), and takes more time than expected (note: it helps to put the flame on high!). Meanwhile, the rice has overcooked (note: it doesn't take very long to cook rice!) But the dal is delicious, and we've added some sauteed mushrooms as well.

All in all, a successful Indian meal. Already excited to experiment some more!

Sunday, December 19, 2010

Chili Leaves and Mustard Seeds

Two months ago, Tyler and I bought a pressure cooker and a rice maker. With visions of culinary prowess and domestic bliss, I envisioned learning a new Indian dish each week.

Fast forward to now, and the pressure cooker and rice maker have yet to be properly broken in. All that's about to change tonight!

Inspired by the goal-orientation of the "Happiness Project", we set three culinary goals to master before year's end: salsa, dal tadka, and hummus. Salsa was the event of the evening yesterday. We had our friends, Tomo and Jenny, over for salsa and beer. We made guacamole (a real feat considering it's not yet avocado season!), fresh tomato salsa, mango salsa, and cheese/salsa (okay, that last one basically consisted of heating Tostidos fake cheese and salsa out of a jar).

Not to brag, but the mango salsa was incredible, if I do say so myself! Using two Thai mangos, we made up the recipe as we went along: mangos, tomatoes, red onions, cilantro, and lemon juice. Can't wait until mango season starts in India!

As for tonight: dal tadka. The recipe?

1) Put oil, onion, cumin seeds, green chilly in pressure cooker. Heat until onion gets glossy transparent/gold color
2) Put all the spices/masalas
3) Add tomatoes and heat until tomatoes get pulpy
4) Add the yellow dal and water
5) Close pressure cooker and wait to whistle 3 times
6) Add coriander green leaves

Ingredients:
  • Taur dal: 1 cup
  • Water: 2 cups
  • Oil: 1 teaspoon
  • Tumeric powder: 1 teaspoon
  • Chilli powder: 1 teaspoon
  • Salt: 2 teaspoons
  • 4 green chillies
  • 2 tomatoes
  • 3 onions
  • Coriander leaves
  • Optional: garam masala (1 teaspoon); chat masala (1 teaspoon); sabji masala (1 teaspoon)
Then, for tempering:
  • Onion - 1/4 cup, chopped fine
  • Garlic - 3 pods crushed (optional)
  • Jeera/cumin seeds - 1 tsp
  • Dry red chillies - 3-4, halved
  • Mustard seeds - 1/4 tsp
  • Oil - 2 tsp
Heat oil in a pan and add ingredients for tempering. Once the mustard seeds start to pop and the onions turn transparent, add the cooked dal.

Et voila!

Friday, December 17, 2010

Stay tuned (just don't know when!)

Ah show business! In the same day I see the 20/20 press release for this Friday's broadcast:

Elizabeth Vargas reports from India, where nearly 2 million die each year before they reach the age of five. Innovative programs are keeping infants alive: a portable baby warmer created by four American grad students and a bold new entrepreneurial approach creating specialized maternity hospitals in slums.

... I find out that we may not be on that segment after all.

But in exciting news, looks like we may be on "Good Morning America" instead - with over four million viewers! It will be hosted by Elizabeth Vargas, the same correspondent who came to LifeSpring a couple weeks ago. Apparently, they wanted to make the segment longer than the time alloted for 20/20, which is nice to hear.

You should definitely still watch 20/20 tonight (10pm Eastern and Pacific time), where ABC kicks off a one year focus on global health (partly funded by Gates Foundation). The episode will focus on maternal and child health.

And then stay tuned for "Good Morning America" -- either next Thursday or Friday.

Concurrent with the on-air episodes, ABC is also promoting "Be the Change: Save a Life" -- to inspire people not only to learn about global health challenges, but more importantly, to act. www.saveone.net. There are beautiful videos and the website allows the user to search by topic and geography. Really cool, and just in time for the holidays.

Happiness is...


... a clean inbox!!!

After all of fifteen minutes, my gmail inbox has gone from over 22,000 messages (or was it 22,000 unread messages?) -- to zero.

Since my first email in college (Telnet!), I have always diligently filed messages into folders and deleted any that were no longer relevant. And then gmail comes around, circa 2004, advertising: "With all the free space you'll have, never delete a message again!" and "With our incredible search functionality, never file into folders again!".

They said it, and I listened. And six years later, I now begin to periodically see messages of the previously unthinkable: "You have reached 96% of capacity. Delete emails now to prevent future emails from bouncing back to sender."

I feel duped.

Going down into memory lane, I begin to delete emails I no longer want or need. The process goes slowly; I barely get usage down to 95%.

And then at once, a clean start. Tyler archives my entire inbox (which, to be fair, he's been nudging me to do for a while now). Zero messages!!!! So clean! Relevant labels on the left, perfect for filing!!

It's amazing the momentum that a fresh start creates. No vendor is safe. The stores are the easiest -- wine companies, Bloomingdales, Fortunoff's (aren't you already out of business?), David's Bridal.

The whole unsubscribe process almost tells me as much about the company as the products themselves. Some vendors are no fuss and make it quite easy (Jet Blue). Others are a bit more manipulative, hiding the unsubscribe button and instead pushing you to switch from a weekly email to a monthly one (NYC event planners). Yet others can't believe you possibly wish to unsubscribe at all (David's Bridal: they don't just let you unsubscribe, but first they make you complete a survey for why you'd like to unsubscribe. Top on their list of checkbox options? "My wedding was postponed or called off." -- as if there is no other reason I possibly wouldn't want weekly reminders of random wedding to do's and sweepstakes like "win a free bachelorette to Vegas!")

The random email updates are harder... of COURSE I don't need Bon Jovi updates, especially here in India. But as I scroll down the email to unsubscribe, I find out he has a Foundation and he's been appointed by President Obama to serve on the White House Council on Community Solutions for his foundation's work on affordable housing. Where else am I going to get that information?

And then there are the aspirational email subscriptions -- newsletters around the latest business trends, strategic thinking, and going-on's in the microfinance world... the electronic versions of all the New Yorkers and Wall Street Journals lying around unread in my old apartment in NY. Different content, same guilt. The type of person I aspire to be would diligently read all of these mind-expanding articles each and every day. But that just doesn't happen in the busy-ness of day-to-day. Rather than feel guilty about this, in NY, I started to just rip out the articles that looked interesting (sacrilege!) and bring them to the gym. Felt a lot better than having unread issues piled up next to my bed. My friend Hunter said he'd always feel guilty the moment he picked up a magazine from his mailbox, because he knew he just wouldn't read it. My email inbox began to feel the same way. And so I applied my same thinking from NY. I starred all the ones that looked interesting, and deleted all the rest. I unsubscribed to most groups. The momentary pang of guilt was replaced by a feeling of empowerment.

A fourth category was anything NY related: Time Out NY, Daily Candy, you name it -- I originally wanted to keep these to continue feeling tied to NY. But I realize that all it did was increase the cognitive dissonance in my head. As much as I love Daily Candy, reading about the latest trends for poodle wear felt out of place with the work I do day-to-day. So those went too.

The result? 24 hours later, ten filters created and old messages labeled and archived. New messages (real messages) responded to right away and then immediately filed.

An empty inbox. It really is so beautiful.

Thursday, December 16, 2010

A new way of seeing things


"Language is empowering."

It's a statement one shouldn't be surprised to hear their Hindi teacher make. Yet I couldn't stop thinking about it during the auto drive home this evening.

Because it's so true.

My relationship with India fundamentally begun shifting from antagonistic to collaborative once I really started taking Hindi lessons in earnest. Rather than constantly getting frustrated, daily interactions became much more fun -- for each party involved.

I could finally begin to hear from our customers themselves why they chose LifeSpring -- rather than relying on a translator, who I always knew made the sentiment much more high-level, missing the intricacies of meaning and tone.

Humans are social creatures, and almost by its very definition, knowledge of a language moves one from an outsider to an insider.

Yet in the auto, I started thinking about language much more broadly than I ever have. I thought about my friend in business school, who was an actor on Broadway before he decided to apply to Columbia. I'll never forget his approach to corporate finance -- a class which definitely intimidated those without a business background. He said: "It's just like any other language. I just need to study the vocab and figure out how all the rules work." (he also approached his McKinsey interview like any other audition he's had, with high success).

Worlds away, a friend who was in a gang in high school said he was good at it -- "because I spoke the language well. I was good at all the slang and knew what to say to be persuasive and powerful."

And the more I thought about it, the more I realized this framework of "language" can really be applied to anything: venture capital, medical school, wine tasting, IT... we used to joke that consultants had their own language -- putting everything into "buckets", creating "decks" and adding "-ize" to just about every noun in order to implement key recommendations (as in, operationalize, systematize, etc). But much more than just industry jargon, this approach of seeing all knowledge as the pursuit of a language is empowering, in that it's demystifying. The Wizard appears from behind the curtain.

Before this, "language" was always bi-polar to me... Either I didn't speak a foreign language well enough, and it was a constant source of frustration... or I knew my own language too well that I was always noticing grammatical mistakes everywhere I looked (fewer vs. less has always been a pet-peeve, as well as Americans' refusal to use adverbs). The Indigo Girls' "Language of a Kiss" was always just poetry to me -- not an actual framework of thought.

But with that one three-word sentence in Hindi class, my worldview just got a whole lot more interesting. If only all teachers could do that.


A Successful Launch

While a pooja (religious blessing) was being performed in HLL Lifecare headquarters in Trivandrum, Kerela at the auspicious time of 11:30am-12pm yesterday, LifeSpring Foundation held its first executive committee meeting in Noida.

With senior management from LifeSpring, HLL Lifecare, HLFPPT, and Acumen Fund present, the first executive committee meeting discussed partnerships with HLFPPT to fundraise internationally, as well as more mundane but crucial matters such as the Foreign Contribution Regulatory Act (FCRA).

The highlight of the launch was showing an internal video of the Foundation, along with a demo of our website and page on Global Giving. Our Chairman, Mr. Ayyappan, was the first to pledge a sponsorship -- immediately sponsoring the first woman on our website, C.H. Radha, whose delivery date is this month. Her story?

I am 23 years old. I am a migrant from Nepal who moved to India looking for better opportunities. I now work as the sweeper for the nearby government elementary school. My husband comes from Nepal too; he works with cables. We have two sons. The first was a home delivery and the second was delivered at a government hospital. Our oldest son, Kartik, is five years old. We can't afford school fees, so he has not been to class in four months. My husband's salary is not stable, so that's why we can't always afford school fees. On average, we make around Rs 100 per day. Our rent for this house is Rs 800 per month.

Soon after Mr. Ayyappan's personal pledge, the CFO of HLL Lifecare pledged to sponsor ten women on behalf of HLL. After the meeting, another HLL executive handed us our first check to sponsor one woman. We are also grateful to Acumen Fund, who earlier had pledged Rs 10 lakhs (~$22,000 USD) for institution-building of the Foundation.


Wednesday, December 15, 2010

Launch of LifeSpring Foundation

In exciting news, we are launching LifeSpring Foundation today! Through its Sponsoring Births Initiative, LS Foundation allows donors to sponsor the delivery of women below the poverty line. Living in households earning less than $2 per day, these women have had previous deliveries at home or in an under-resourced government hospital.

When we've spoken to these women in their homes, we hear the same dreams that resonate around the world: They want a better life for their children. Many of the pregnant women did not go to school past the age of 14; therefore, education for their child is a top goal for them.

As Bilkis, who is 6 months pregnant in Vanasthalipuram says: "My dream is to give my children a healthy life and a good education."

Sri Laxmi, who is 4 months pregnant in Moula Ali says: "My first daughter was born in my mother's house. I want this baby to be born in a hospital."

Through its Sponsoring Births Program, LifeSpring Foundation is altering the way women such as Bilkis and Sri Laxmi experience a basic human right: to have a safe, healthy, and dignified childbirth.

Join us.

US donors can sponsor deliveries through our partnership with Global Giving (www.globalgiving.org) on its LifeSpring Foundation page.

Indian donors will soon be able to choose individual women to sponsor through our website at: www.sponsorbirths.org.

LifeSpring's Chairman, Mr. M. Ayyappan, will be inaugurating the Foundation this morning, at the auspicious time of 11:30am in HLL Lifecare's corporate office in Noida.

Tuesday, December 14, 2010

"Behind Afghan's Veil"

Up at 4am this morning to fly to Delhi. Usually I'm fast asleep as soon as I board the plane, but this morning I'm wide awake, consumed by a hauntingly powerful photo journalist essay in this month's National Geographic.

Titled "Veiled Rebellion," the photos tell the story of Afghan women -- their plight as merely "possessions" of men, but also seeds of hope. Interestingly for me, the photographer was on a mission to photograph maternal health and mortality issues; one of the first photographs of the essay shows Noor Nisa, age 18; her husband, whose first wife had died during childbirth, was determined to get her to the hopsital in Faizabad, 4 hours from their village. (87% of all deliveries happen at home, without a skilled birth attendant) Their borrowed car broke down, so the photographer ended up taking Nisa, her mother, and her husband to the hospital, where she delivered a healthy baby girl.

The other photos are not so happy. One shows 2o year old Bibi Aisha, whose husband beat her since she married him at age 12. One day he beat her so badly that she ran away to escape. To punish her for leaving without permission, her husband cut off her nose, ears, and hair, while his friends held her down. A haunting statistic on top of the photograph reads: "In eight out of ten cases, a family member is responsible for a violent attack on a woman."

Another shows 22 year old Maida Khal, imprisoned for "moral crimes" -- a.k.a. asking for a divorce. When she was 12, she was married to a paralyzed 70-year old, whose brothers beat her for being unable to carry her new husband.

But yet, hope. One photo shows female graduates of Kabul University's Class of 2010 on graduation day, wearing hijabs under their mortarboards, and faces proudly uncovered. While the Taliban had banned the education of women, classes resumed after the regime fell in 2001.

This all makes me think of my friend, Mir, a fellow Improvement Advisor student with IHI. His project is on reducing maternal mortality and morbidity in Kabul. His wife, a doctor herself, trained in Russia and returned to Kabul after the Taliban defeat. I remember working on a project with Dalberg during grad school -- being so struck by our work with UNFPA and learning that shockingly, expected life span for Afghani women is only 42 years (one of the lowest in the world and about twenty years under the global average). It's a vicious cycle -- a sick woman cannot be seen by a male doctor (unless a relative), but at the same time women were banned from studying to become doctors in the country.

Coupled with this, almost half of all deaths of Afghan women between 15 and 49 are caused by childbirth. At 1600-2200 per 100,000 live births, the maternal mortality rate (MMR) in Aghanistan is the highest in the world (the second highest is Nigeria, at 1,100. For comparison, India is 450; US is 11). To make matters worse, half of all Afghan children die before they reach the age of five due to lack of access to healthcare (source: UNDP MDG Progress Report).

Despite this, Mir and his colleagues in Kabul's public hospitals remain optimistic. There's progress, for sure, but still a long way to go.

Monday, December 13, 2010

Swingin' Hyderabad

Sadly, a good friend of mine is leaving Hyderabad this week. But her last weekend here ended in a bang -- or I should say, in a swing!

Tracy conducted an incredible swing dance workshop last night at Beyond Coffee in Jubilee Hills. With the class focused on the lindy hop, I now have "rock step triple-step, rock step triple-step" ingrained in my head. It was quite a crowd for the Hyderabad scene -- most folks were local and many seemed to be hard-core dancers, as evidenced by bringing their own dancing shoes.

We learned the basics of connection and footwork, focusing on an eight-step swing-out. Not quite up to the flips, but something to aspire to here!


Sunday, December 12, 2010

Brunch Revival

"You know it's a good day when the worst thing that happens is that a pomegranate exploded." - Tyler

Saturday, noon. Molly hosts a legend brunch at our apartment -- ricotta pancakes with strawberries, bananas, and of course - pomegranates. The hit of the party is clearly Molly's maple honey butter, which people eat plain by the spoonful. Rob and Stephanie make delicious eggs. Tyler plays bartender with spicy bloody marys. We break out red velvet cupcakes, from our favorite nearby bakery. Our balcony overlooking the giant rocks and tall trees, which I've totally been taking for granted, now plays hosts to our guests -- about 15 friends from the Acumen universe. I forget how good Sula champagne can be -- we have it with pomegranates and grapefruit juice. Tyler and I dance to Christmas carols in our head... and a fairly competitive game of Pictionary ensues.

Bit by the Christmas bug, Tyler and I duck out of a game of Celebrity and head to Ravindra Bharati near Birla Temple. There's a performance by a Christmas choir, color-coordinated in alternating red and green saris and accompanied by a keyboard and stringed instrumentalists. The last part is by far the most fun -- a Christmas sing-along with words projected on screens on either side of the stage.

We end the night at 1857, a new-for-us restaurant on Hussain Sagar lake. Amazing ambiance -- outside under a white tent with plush white sofas and good drinks.

We return home to find that afternoon brunch has turned into a twelve hour affair! Now that's what I call brunch!






Friday, December 10, 2010

On Her Majesty's Service

It's not the type of letter that one gets everyday. A plain brown envelope, no stamp, with the words "On Her Majesty's Service" on top.

It's a thank you letter from the head of DFID India, thanking me for taking the time to meet with the UK Secretary of State for International Development, Andrew Mitchell MP.

Of course, it's ironic I should be the one thanked, considering what an incredible opportunity it was to attend. It was a small lunch with Mitchell and his team; on the other side of the table, I was joined by five CEOs and managing directors of private equity firms in India. On DFID's part, Mitchell asked us ways in which DFID could better engage the private sector in investing in the poorest states of India. It was definitely a fascinating conversation -- both from the perspective of hearing how DFID itself is thinking about change, as well as hearing the perspectives of leaders in the field.

In a speech on wealth creation at the London School of Economics this past October, Mitchell spoke about the need for DFID to innovate. It's humbling to think that our small chain of hospitals can serve as a model worldwide, not only for social enterprises, but for governments and traditional aid organizations as well:

"I want DFID to learn from business. I want to explore how we might enrich DFID's own talent pool with a series of short-term secondments from the private sector in order to inject new, business-savvy DNA into the department.

I also want the new department to bring together representatives from business in ad hoc, time limited groups, being bold and finding creative solutions to development challenges. That, after all, is what business does so very well.

Let me give you just a few examples of the sort of creativity that private sector companies in their core business have already shown.

In India, the health company, LifeSpring, plans to provide quality ante and post-natal care for 82,000 women at some 30 to 50 percent of the market rate through specialisation in maternal healthcare, optimal use of resources and cost-sharing of ambulances, laboratories, and pharmacies. In doing this, it will also help to build capacity in the health system by employing more than four thousand doctors, nurses, and outreach workers."


Thursday, December 9, 2010

DVR Alert - Next Friday, Dec 17th

Earlier this week, our hospital played host to Elizabeth Vargas and 20/20. ABC and 20/20 are kicking off a one-year focus on global health, partly funded by the Gates Foundation. Their kick-off show for this initiative will focus on maternal and child health. Criss-crossing geographies (part of the show will contrast an American woman in her 9th month of pregnancy, with an Afghani woman in hers), part of the show will feature Indian organizations, including LifeSpring and Embrace.

Our head of clinical quality, Dr. Rama, was a rockstar, taking the show's host through the communities where our hospital works. Explaining the context of maternal health, Dr. Rama also took 20/20 on a tour of our newest hospital in Chilkalguda.

While I thought I was safe on the sidelines, I ended up being interviewed by Elizabeth Vargas as well! -- the show's producer was apparently fascinated at Priya's and my decision to turn down traditional jobs in NY and come here. (one of her questions was how often my parents ask me to come back home) I'd be shocked if that clip ended up on the show, but it was fun nonetheless.

So set up your DVR: Friday, December 17th, 10pm EST - 20/20 on ABC! (the full episode will also be available on their website).

Tuesday, December 7, 2010

It takes 28 days to form a habit

Taking inspiration from Gretchen Rubin's The Happiness Project, in which she focuses on twelve different happiness-boosting resolutions over the course of one year, I decide to do something similar. Tyler and I already have our own project before the wedding -- taking one topic each month to explore with role models, and then discussing ourselves (our first two have been finances and communication). So I decide to add on my own mini-project as well.

I've already partly resolved to stop making resolutions (which I only feel guilty about not keeping), but Gretchen's book has inspired me to try once more... or at least, this time, be armed with tools. I laughed out loud reading about her "Resolutions Chart", where she printed out all her resolutions in order to give herself a gold star daily, but it does resonate with the business school maxim of "what gets measured gets improved." I've done the big things: followed my passion and moved to India, engaged in a ten-day silent meditation... Now I wanted to focus more on the mundane: things I know I should be doing, but don't.

So with exactly three months until my 32nd birthday, here's my own mini-happiness project:
December (body): goal = Boost Energy
January (mind): goal = Reignite my Passion
February (soul): goal = Cultivate Gratitude

December: Boost Energy
1. Laugh out loud and stop taking things so seriously (one of the most interesting factoids in Gretchen's book: on average, a child laughs 300 times per day; an adult? 17!)
2. Sing in the mornings
3. Practice yoga each day -- even just a few poses and stretches
4. Do sit-ups and push-ups everyday (this has been a resolution since high school to no avail until now!)
5. Get more sleep
6. Drink three water jugs each day
7. Take my vitamins (mom was right about these)
8. Eat three *proper* meals
9. Tackle a nagging task
10. Reward myself with a monthly massage

January: Reignite my Passion
1. Cultivate and practice leadership "presence"
2. Study innovations in global health
3. Complete all my Hindi flashcards (thanks Giselle!)
4. Join ToastMaster and speak at a TEDx
5. Reconnect and be better about staying in touch
6. Organize physical and e-clutter

February: Cultivate Gratitude
1. Meditate every day (even five minutes)
2. Start a happiness and gratitude journal, writing about the happiest part of each day
3. Don't expect praise and appreciation; stop nagging
4. Create something that wasn't there before
5. Be truly present
6. Spread joy
7. "There is only love."

Reading The Happiness Project prompted me to re-examine my "mission statement" -- my own personal purpose. I'm finding it resonates just as much with me now, as when I created it four years ago in 2006:

To live passionately and courageously,
To see life as an adventure,
To laugh often and love much,
To dance with the universe,
To live a magical life --

This is my purpose.