The Middle Eastern Korean

It has been a very busy 2 weeks. I was so busy that I did something that is extremely uncharacteristic of me : I forgot to inform somebody I respect that I will not be able to make it for a conference call. It may sound like something small but not for me. If you can’t make it for a meeting or a call; you HAVE to tell the other party/parties. I apologized and this person graciously accepted it and brushed it aside as a non-issue. It is to me.

I have been itching to write of course. And, I was actually planning to write something on how employees will be viewing the state of affairs in 2010 and what business leaders should do to manage, what I suspect will be, very high expectations. But that will have to wait because I heard something from somebody recently which I just had to put in writing. I am being vague here…with all these ‘something’ and ‘somebody’, I know. But, you know the reasons for that. And, this IS a true story albeit all the names and characters changed.

Imagine a Korean couple adopting a middle eastern child when he was only a few months old and this child growing up so oblivious of the fact that he is, by all accounts, not a Korean. He eats, sleeps and plays Korean. He thinks like a Korean and chooses Korea and all that it stands for just as passionately as a ‘genuine’ Korean child. He thinks Korean girls are the most beautiful and he loves Michael Jackson just as all his compatriot Koreans do. The only thing is, he is NOT a Korean. He is of a different stock. He comes from an entirely different civilization and in his veins an entire cultural genome is running freely as that of his ‘people’ in the Middle East. Yet, he is Korean. At least for him and for those who love him, he is.

Being a Buddhist Koraen, he shuns beef. He goes vegetarian on most days. Now that he is a teenager and can understand his unique situation, he goes about his life as if nothing has changed. He still behaves like a Korean. He still avoids beef products and he is still a Buddhist. It seems like the ancient blood of his ancestors just can’t fight a far more superior force in this world. You can be born of any race or religion. You can come from any proud clan or genetic pool. Yet, there is one powerful force in this world that you can’t fight. That is the force of Socialization.

Not too long ago, I posted a poem that I was inspired to write after listening to an extremely myopic, close minded and homophobic individual. It frightened me then that there are so many of us who by all accounts are kind and good hearted but deep within us we fail to see and appreciate that this world was never created to be of one colour. It was always intended to be a tapestry. The message that I wanted to get across in that poem was that “ don’t be so damn sure of your self and your beliefs”. The gods and prophets you worship may not even want you in their presence as your belief was one of self aggrandizement. Not one of Faith. And, what we think to be true and honorable are nothing but the results of mankind’s socialization over the millennia. I am going reproduce that poem here as it brings new meanings to me now after hearing this story that I have just illustrated above. In fact I feel vindicated as I have always believed that what we are is nothing but a chance happening determined by where we are born and brought up.

The following was what I wrote then:

There are as many colours as there are words to describe them
There are as many stars as the numbers can count them
There are as many truths as the hearts that believe them
There are as many Gods as Man can worship them
There as many rhythms as the sounds that make them.

This is a world
nay
a universe of differences
of every imaginable kind.
The colour of your skin.
The language of your ancestors.
The choice of your tastes.
The pleasure of your love.
The height of your intellect.
The 'truth' of your convenience.
The God of your birth.

But
when compressed
all of these is as big as a green pea.

Thats how big we are.
A green pea!

Don't kill for that
Don't hurt for that.

Atoms, protons and bosons maketh us
The God particle forms us
But its us....just us
maketh hate!

We are separate
but we are one

I will wait for you
my brothers and sisters
at the gates of heaven
and I will welcome you
into my home as if we were born of the same womb

But, indeed we are.



What we are right now is not WHO we are. It was nothing but a result of our socialization with the world around us. What we consider to be truth is nothing more than just a ‘truth of our convenience’.

Who are we then?

Nothing. Just dusts of the universe. A very Conscious dust though.


Krishnamoorthy…if you are reading this, remember that you are the Universe's way of reminding us that we are not whom we are so proud to say we are. You and those who have similar histories like you are living labarotaries that constantly reveal the REAL truth of this world.

God bless you.

Note : Krisnamoorthy was somebody I knew when I was doing my undergraduate studies. He will know what I mean though I doubt he will ever read this. But then the world is indeed small and stranger things have happened.
AND....I am loosing my patience with those who can't see further than the courtyards of their temples, churches, mosques and synagogues. I literally feel repulsed by their words and deeds. The only thing that helps me tolerate them is the fact that they are also part of this tapestry that makes up this world.

Farewell Enke

The pain is gone
no need for justification
no clarification required
be happy now
with your little princess.

I know...your kindred souls
weep
for if only you paused.

But then again
You are happy.Now.

Farewell Robert Enke.

The Wall

Tomorrow marks the 20th Anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. Though I would prefer to call it as the ‘dismantling of the Berlin Wall’ lest future generations think that the wall just came tumbling down by it self due to poor construction materials used – Malaysia style. No. It was dismantled by the Germans who years earlier plunged the world into a war and then with this single act brought it together again; of sort.

Thomas Friedman identifies the fall of the wall as one of the 10 or so global movements that brought about the flattening of the world. It was indeed a momentous event. At the very least it removed a monstrosity from the heart of Berlin and at its very best, it heralded the end of the cold war and the demise of the Soviet empire and with it its Communist apparatus. The world was indeed a different place then.

I remember words like ‘glasnost’ and ‘perestroika’ which were probably the most loved and used words coming out of the old Soviet Union. The other was probably the Red Army and of course for the wrong reasons. The fall of the wall not only reunited Germany, ended the cold war and unleashed a new economic dynamism, it also brought forth a new Russia. I can only imagine what the Russians would have felt as they watched their empire crumbling before their eyes. Suddenly the Kremlin was not that imposing nor the communist menace that dangerous – if at all it was a menace. I remember reading some years back where, this was one of the busiest and exciting time for the world’s secret services. Every intelligence organization in the world was on tenterhooks as they just did not know what was going to happen to Russia. Nobody could say with any level of certainty what will the fall of the Soviet Empire bring about. One thing was sure though : The architect of this amazing change – Mr. Mikhail Gorbachev was well protected and the governments of the free world headed by the United States had probably readied a small army and armada to whisk him away from the Kremlin if things had gone out of control. Such was the man’s importance to what Americans had been dreaming for decades. To see the end of the ‘evil empire’ of the Soviet Union. Interestingly, there are also reports saying that Margaret Thatcher and Francois Mitterrand were not that happy about the re-unification of Germany. I suppose it brought some bad memories to them. They can be forgiven because Germany has a habit of getting the world into disorder. But then again, Margaret Thatcher could also have found her match in the towering figure of Helmut Kohl. Strange names indeed in the era of Obama-mania. But these were the ones ruling the world at one time. With Bush the senior of course.

As the world celebrates this event tomorrow, I am hoping that we are also conscious that as leaders in our respective organizations, we are tasked to bring down walls too. We need to break down the walls of indifference, apathy, lack of focus, disregard to customer value, meltdown of organizational values, misalignment of vision and mission and a general disregard for good corporate governance, the deadening dearth of innovation, the stupor of complacency and the paralyzing short-sighted and myopic corporate planning and strategy. Indeed, we have these walls to break down by not shovels and metal roads as the Berliners did 20 years ago but through our determined and honest leadership practices. This is the time for courageous leadership and it is the responsibility of every CEO to allow for this type of leadership to emerge at every level of the organization. And, this is the type of CEOs that the corporate boards need to have in place. 2010 will be a defining moment for most of our organizations as we will come head to head with a single choice : Do we change the way we did business or do we do things the way we did? If the answer to this is change than we have multiple walls to break down fast.

And as citizens of this country, lets also remember that over the last 20 years, as the world came together politically; we have grown apart internally. There are invisible walls running through the very fabric of our society. The tapestry that once made us strong is being strained at the seams. All the while divisive walls are being erected by both words and deeds. As one columnist said in a local paper, its hard to imagine that a wall can running through in the heart of our beloved KL. But I think there are many already dividing us.

Remember that one young man died bleeding in no man’s land while trying to escape the former East Germany while the West Germans just stood by and looked helplessly. Such are the consequences of a wall. Whether one in our political landscape or one in our organizations.

The question is : Are we breaking down walls or are we erecting more in our daily interactions with our people and stake holders?

Happy anniversary Germany!