A Stradivarius Leader

"A Stradivarius Leader-

On the passing of His Excellency Lee Kuan Yew, one of the most extraordinary and visionary leaders of our time, I convey my deepest condolences and those of the people of Bhutan”  

describes His Majesty King Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck who is in Singapore to pay his respect and condolences to the Country’s Founding Father. His Majesty the King is also accompanied by Her Majesty Gyaltseun Jetsun Pema Wangchuck.   

His Majesty the King and Her Majesty the Queen paying tribute and condolences   (Source: click LINK)

(Condolences expressed in Dzongkha by His Majesty) Source: Click LINK

The Late Lee Kuan Yew popularly revered as the founding father of modern Singapore was the first Prime Minister of the country. Within a span of a single generation, the Late Lee Kuan Yew has transformed that little shrugging island with no resources to the first-world status. Besides being the nation’s idol and a popular figure, Late Lee Kuan Yew was an asset to the neighbouring nations and the entire globe for his clean and transparent political model.  On 23^rd March, he has peacefully passed away leaving Singapore like a living monument of his accomplished vision and print of legacy in economy and politics. 

As history will remember Late Lee as a truly selfless leader, I join His Majesty the King and Her Majesty the Queen in offering our deepest condolences to the entire Singaporean family for the loss of their nation’s gem.

May his soul Rest in Peace. 

  “Leadership is not a title. It’s a behavior. Live it”- Robin Sharma

Why Winning Matters?

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Winning and losing is an integral part of any competition just as success and failure for every human endeavour. Though neither of the two is eternal and final, humans have already defined a transparent jurisdiction. And because of these territorial distinctions, the gravity of value that we place for both differs enormously.

Winning is not permanent and failure is never final, they say. But when it comes to collective societal approval, it is the winning that gains the whopping appreciation. Therefore, winning in our life certainly matters.   

       

If winning is not in the heart of our mind, what is there in running a race or a contest? We believe (even I believed) that being a loser, we identify an approach that does not work at least for that moment and get a chance to innovate a strategy to win in the next challenge. But think! What will the winners do? Certainly, they are never standing water. If we contest for the sake of participation and winning is never in the cockpit of our aim, we are without a doubt taking a path having less resistance. Such kind of premature and primitive attitude will bottle up and contain our growth of growing tall and thinking big. That’s why winning matters!

Winning means gaining a position. Be it employment or an interview, examination or marathon, only the winners can occupy the vacant chair or receive a coveted trophy of high recognition. Should we still snooze with a belief that, even if I fail in this interview or contest, I will gain a chance to win in the next? That’s OK but the question is, when is the expiry date of that so-called next? So, it is always that winning matters!  

Winning creates a legacy. Legacy is after all that matters for the historians to read it as an epitaph to remember or economists to use it as radar to measure might and success. No matter what size of energy and determination we invest, unless we win that event, none cares. Take an example of the recent victory of the World’s Worst Soccer Team sealing the fate of the team which was 36 places above it in the 2018 World Cup qualifying match. Infantile Bhutan’s national soccer team, branded as the world’s worst team unfortunately in the nomenclature of the football’s biosphere, had never caught the front pages of international media until recently it won by 3-1 on aggregate from Sri Lanka. Some might argue on the basis that it was just a stunning performance from the worst team but that stunning performance is what we call winning. 

Similarly, when the first New Zealander Edmund Hillary conquered Mount Everest with Tenzin Norgay Sherpa of Nepal, he is vividly remembered to have said, “No one remembers who climbed Mount Everest the second time”. Or Walter Hagen’s captivating statement is worth sharing when he said: “No one remembers who came in second”. Other than the person who came second or someone who stood third does always remember but certainly not the mass, not even the history sometimes. So it is winning that matters!  

Winning is a compass. From the onset of that particular victory, we get to know the direction of our energy and hard work. We identify that there is only one direction and that direction is to head forward. Once we win, even our timid heart matures to be undeniably stronger and our head becomes the workshop of innovation which, is a golden key for progression. That’s how our Yellow Dragons (National Soccer Team) proclaimed that they will win the second leg of the World Cup and which they did, despite being an infant team furnished with very scanty resources and capitals. After their astonishing victory, their adrenalin was boosted with a high level of confidence to set into the right direction so that they ignite their capacity to its optimum level. So winning matters!  

Although winning matters, it is inevitably full of friction. It is a gruelling and arduous journey that needs to churn calories of our energy. It is everything that matters particularly in this 21^st century where the world is dominated by the beat of Charles Darwin’s ‘Survival of the fittest” impulse. But it will definitely be determined by the way we face and escape that ill-fated natural selection. And that only way is by winning. So it is winning that matters!    

 

“Winning is the most important. Everything is the consequence of that”- Ayrton Senna

A Classic Song

I am in love, No! Just with a song

A typical classic, but quite long

And I love even if I sing it wrong

As I don’t want to memorize or prolong

Music’s pure; guitar, piano and a metallic gong

At times, as loud as hitting a prong

Yet, I feel no noise, so I get it along

For it robbed my heart, and to it, I belong

With it, I feel halcyon, great and strong

As if I grew characters of the famous Mao Zedong

Or reached the famed Temple Street Market of Hong Kong

So I say I liked it to sing aloud but Jong!

It’s lengthy, yet the romance to my heart does it throng

Is one thing, I realized shall remain, lifelong.

 “Your heart is just a beat box for the song of your life”- Sandi Thom

The Yester-Recall

For a pleasant past, we crown, ‘Old is gold’

But for awful episodes, we always blindfold

Not to dirty our mind from those memories so cold

And fall sick of consequences manifold;  

Humans always want only the good to be told

Not how a weak enemy came roaring to scold

Or skinny bullies caught us and hold;

For such lesser memories, we believe, will fold

Words into gossips and thus, disgrace in turn enfold

That synthetic dignity we tried to uphold

And showed the world to be brave and bold

But have we tried to carefully behold?

That our good old days are better sold

With bad memories that are rather untold

“Good times become good memories and bad times become good lessons”- Anonymous

My Silver Ring

One of my cousin sisters once gave me her silver ring. It was special not just because she gave it to me, but because it had a unique design that was not widely seen at the time. Everyone envied me for having it. 

One day, I met a girl and we became friends for a while. She saw my ring and asked if she could wear it for a few days. I trusted her and gave it without even having a second thought. 

A week later, I came to learn that she moved to the capital city, Thimphu in search of a job. 

Exactly after decade later, I saw her on Facebook with a different and unique name. I am still not sure if she kept the ring, but the pain of losing it lingers. I also feel guilty for lying to my sister, telling her that I lost the ring during a volleyball match where I had to remove all my jewellery for safety reasons 😭.

I saw that lady who took my silver ring

Yet I never had the urge to sing

The same old tired lines to let her bring

My modest but the most treasured thing

Though decades passed since she took it in spring

My heart still suffers an aching sting 😩

Each moment I hear it's gentle ting

My mind still dream to wear it like a king 👑

 

“A ring is a halo on your finger”- Douglas Coupland

An Open Secret

The report in The Telegraph and The Guardian has it that the longest-held US prisoner was granted a clearance after finding him wrongly imprisoned. A man who was wrongfully convicted for slaying a businessman had almost served a sentence for circa four decades. He is now entitled to a compensation of about $1m. 

 

Such an incident which was painfully secret for almost 39 years when suddenly opened to social media ignited a tsunami of criticisms beyond measure. 

 

But for me, I didn't have the nerve to criticise nor intentions to do either. However, after scrutiny about this wrongful conviction, I remembered one of the most hostile moments of my school life.

 

This secret of mine is opened here in my blog with no intentions of damage or impairment or whatsoever in any case. So, the reader’s discretion is necessary. 

 

It was back then in 2000, more than a decade ago when I was in grade nine that the head of my school almost dismissed me from the school on a similar incident: a wrongful conviction. One of the student representatives (commonly known as captain) had already drafted a memo against the head to be dispatched to the higher authorities. 

 

During those days, I used to maintain clean and legible print handwriting in my notebooks. Seeing this uniqueness, I was asked by the captain to copy from the draft letter which he has already written. Captains during those times were so powerful like that of Charlemagne of Western Europe or Genji's Khan of the Mongol Empire. In the hope to escape from uninvited bullying and victimization, I had to, thus, submit to his feet and do as he ordered: copying into the final draft to be sent to the higher authorities. 

 

Unfortunately, before the letter was sent to the higher authorities, it has already reached the principal office - which later I knew that it was taken by our roommates. Knowing that the letter has been taken from his box and is already in the hands of the principal, the captain who ordered me to copy it from the draft has fled the school that fateful midnight.

 

But nobody knew why he went missing in the school.  Neither has the principal doubted him for writing that complaint letter. 

 

But the search in the school has already begun. Students of all the grades who maintained print handwriting in their notebooks were called to the office. 

 

After a month-long search, I was called to the office, and I was interrogated for almost two days. Having done nothing other than just copy it from the draft, I justified that it was not my plan but to no avail. I was dismissed from school.

 

But that evening, as I was about to leave the school, I met my class teacher who was an Indian national. He took me to the office and after an hour-long justification by him, I was allowed to continue my stay in the school. 

 

The days thereafter was a living hell for me. Since my classroom was located on the ground floor of the office, every time the principal would be turning the pivot of her eagle’s eye to detect me. Fearing such humiliations for no reason, I would not even visit the toilet during recess time. But that cruel hour ended after a few months when the principal left abroad for the studies. That brought a lot of joy to my mind since I thought it would allow me to erect and hold my head high. 

However, that was just an assumption. The newly arrived vice principal was already infused with those stories and his prejudice was so strong and even distasteful and suffocating. Even by scoring 83 marks out of 100 in Economics, the subject he taught us and that happened to be the highest amongst all was not adequate to win his heart. My living at that point was utterly doomed.

 

A few years later, I escaped from the clutch of their cruel humiliating treatment. I even met that school representative 5 years later while I was participating in the local sports tournament. These people are never to be forgotten for they gave me lifelong lessons that I shall never forget. 

 

Getting wrongly convicted for doing nothing is not only painful but we start to humiliate our own life. Suicide was one solution where I even tried to seek solace and escape that living hell.

 

“The killing of innocent people are always wrong”- Unknown

 

Happiness Squared

Remember this day? 
Geographers will remember this day as summer equinox. It is on this day that the daytime and night are circa equal.  

Similarly, United Nations (UN) office will observe this day as an annual International Happiness Day after it earmarked on Bhutan’s proposal to include happiness as the 9^th Millennium Development Goal on 12^th July 2012. 

The UN General Assembly has noted that the globally used economic indicator popularly branded as Gross Domestic Product (GDP) was handicapped to sufficiently display the happiness and wellbeing of the people living in the country. Thanks to our 4^th King Jigme Singye Wangchuck with whose farsightedness stirred the world to believe that happiness is never a naïve or a utopian idea but is an entity that can be measured. Also thanks to Bhutan’s first democratically elected Prime Minister Ex-Lynchoen Jigme Yoezer Thinley for marketing it to the global level.

But more than anything else, I will remember this day in the entire phase of my life: the day where I have efficaciously defended my postgraduate thesis examination titled, “Development of a guided inquiry laboratory to enhance students’ understanding of the law of mechanical energy conservation”. It is the greatest triumph in my life and making me achieve this dream uncalculatedly on International Happiness Day has rather squared my happiness. 

Getting started to present my findings 

Explaining the working mechanism of the developed hands-on model

Still in the process of narrating the dull story of my work  

Dr Paisan Kanthang (Co-advisor), Dr Ekgapoom Jantarakantee (Chair), Me, Dr Monamorn Precharattana (Advisor) and Dr Khajornsak Buaraphan (Co-advisor) 

A team of friends and staff from the Institute for Innovative Learning 

Panelists seriously engrossed

But the success of my work owes to many people. I was so fortunate to have embarked on this thesis under the loving supervision of a caring cohort of advisors. Dr Monamorn Precharattana, Dr Paisan Kanthang and Dr Khajornsak Buaraphan who were the beacon of my inspiration owe all my success and motivation. 

I also thank all the professors and staff of the Institute for Innovative Learning and Biophysics group, Faculty of Science, Mahidol University for their insightful academic and professional guidance. 

I would not forget to remember Sonam Tshomo, my significant other, for enduring this aching separation with patience. Thank you for believing in me. 

My heartfelt gratitude is also for my terrific parents and siblings for rendering me the ultimate and genuine support while undergoing this professional drill. Your emotional support and encouragements have always bolstered me and beefed up my courage and therefore, this success is truly the blessing of you all. 

As well, to my mates and others (particularly Mr Muttakeen and Ms Chatachadaporn), who helped, encouraged, and made the work more enjoyable than it otherwise would have been, and to whom I, therefore, wish to script my thanks. 

All great achievements require time”- Maya Angelou