How Effective Is Duolingo?

I’ve been using Duolingo to improve my French language skills. As I have mentioned in my previous posts on Duolingo, I started learning French sometime in 1999 and have been learning it on and off. As for Duolingo, I started using it in March 2019, used it for three or four months, found it very addictive, but had misgivings about how effective it actually is and gave it up until November 2020, when I went back to Duolingo, more because of the absence of any other feasible option that would help me learn French during my work commute.

I still have mixed feelings about Duolingo. On the plus side, the grammar exercises in Duolingo are very good, and though they don’t cover all tenses, help improve one’s grammar. On the flip side, Duolingo has not improved my ability to converse in French. If at all, I find myself hesitating more, compared to the past, when  I used to rattle off with my limited French vocabulary, unconcerned about my grammatical mistakes. 

These days, I constantly feel that I am not learning as much on Duolingo as I should be, considering I spend around 30 minutes on Duolingo every weekday and sometimes on weekends too. I feel that when I learnt French in a classroom, I learned a lot more. My vocabulary is composed almost entirely of words I learnt in 1999-2001 and later in 2002-2003 in a classroom where the teacher used a textbook (with pictures in it) to teach. I can easily remember a number of phrases from that learning. What I learn on Duolingo is more like water off a duck’s back. The new words I learn on Duolingo, I remember them for a few seconds afterwards and then I forget them. Vocabulary building is one of the places where Duolingo falters though Duo claims to teach so many new words every day. I feel that in a classroom, one creates associations between the newly learnt  words and the surrounding environment (such as the joke cracked by a fellow student or a  rebuke from the teacher), which makes it easy to remember the newly learnt words. 

Ultimately, online learning cannot hold up a candle to classroom learning, I feel and Duolingo is a case in point.

 

Book Review: Elijah, by Susy Matthew

A few weeks ago, I had read Susy Matthew’s In A Bubble Of Time and really enjoyed it. So much so that I wanted to read Matthew’s second novel Elijah, but couldn’t find it on Amazon or any other store. So, I contacted Matthew who was kind enough to let me buy a copy from her.

Elijah revolves around Prophet Elijah who is believed to have lived in the territory that is now Israel/Palestine, in the 9th century BCE. At that time, Israel/Palestine consisted of the northern kingdom of Israel and the southern kingdom of Judah. During the time of Elijah, the Kingdom of Israel was ruled by King Ahab. Ahab’s wife Jezebel was the Head Priestess and, according to the Bible, Jezebel, with her husband’s support, promoted the worship of Gods such as Baal and Asherah. Jezebel also suppressed Yahweh and Yahweh’s prophets. In the relatively smaller southern kingdom of Judah, Yahweh held sway, though Baal and Asherah were not unknown. Elijah fought against the promotion of Baal and Asherah and stood his ground against Ahab and Jezebel.

Just as she did In A Bubble Of Time, Matthew uses the historical setting to tell us the story of Elijah and his sister Ruth. Ruth, who later metamorphoses into Lilith, occupies as much space in Matthew’s book as the Prophet himself. Sold by her wastrel father to the royal household to be a Qedesha or a sacred prostitute, Lilith rises through the ranks of the Qedeshot after some initial hesitation and resistance. Lilith is taught to harness the powers of Baal and Asherah and go beyond the common man’s world, into supernatural realms, from where things and situations in the common man’s realm can be accessed and controlled. She then falls with love with Jehu, a common soldier and out of that love, conceives a child. It is not unheard of for a Qedesha to bear a child, but when Lilith conceived she had already made an enemy of Jezebel and someone betrayed her secret before she was ready to reveal it. Consequences follow.

Matthew writes well, using simple English that does not act as a barrier to the reader’s enjoyment of this spiritual thriller. From the time Eli and his mother struggle against Eli's father’s tyranny, to Lilith’s struggles as a Qedesha to her big fight against Jebebel and Elijah’s battles against Ahab and those who favour Baal and Asherah, Matthew has you at the edge of your seat as she takes you on a grand, pulsating and adrenalin-filled 370-odd page ride.

One of Matthew’s strengths is in her ability to describe situations, something she does with aplomb, whether it be Lilith’s duel with Jezebel (spanning across metaphysical realms) or Elijah’s demonstration of Yehweh’s prowess and superiority over Baal and Asherah. The best thing about Elijah is that it transports the reader to that particular epoch in time and one feels one is living in the semi-arid desert region of Israel and Judah. When Matthew describes a blood sacrifice for Baal, one can sense and smell the gore and fear and pain, just as much as the blind faith that called for the sacrifice. Some of the descriptions are quite gory, but Matthew never loses her artistic touch and her deft handling makes this book such a compelling and unputdownable read.

SPOILERS AHEAD

Ruth/Lilith is a complex character and is actually much more interesting than her brother Elijah. Unlike Elijah, Lilith has a dark side and Matthew brings out the contrast very subtly. Some of those close to Lilith, such as her first caretaker Rebecca and her closet friend Alissa, who possibly betrayed her, are at the receiving end of her experiments and wrath. Lilith refuses to give up her status as a Qedesha and runaway with her lover Jehu, something that seems to make sense, but actually doesn’t. When she catches King Ahab’s eye, Lilith does not give away the opportunity to get close to him, gain his confidence and try and get what she wants. Does she succeed? No, I’m not going to divulge more. 

Go on, get hold of a copy of Elijah and read it. I highly recommend this book. To contact the author for a copy, please refer to her website.

Book Review: In A Bubble Of Time, by Susy Matthew

In A Bubble Of Time is a period novel written by an Indian origin Malaysian author based in Bengaluru, which is set in Judea, during the time of Jesus Christ. Historical fiction carries the tag of fiction, but it requires an extraordinary amount of background research to get it right. Further, the creator needs to also spin a good yarn without messing with historical facts. So, I was quite skeptical when I started reading Susy Matthew’s In A Bubble Of Time. By the time, I was mid-way through, I realized that I was reading a masterpiece, one on par with The Robe.

In A Bubble Of Time is a feminist novel. Its protagonist Deborah is a woman far ahead of her time. A Jewess who hobnobs with the elites of Caesarea, Derorah fights back against cruel fate after her wheeler-dealer father forces her to marry Daniel, a Jewish freedom fighter (against Roman tyranny) and a traditional male chauvinist pig. Deborah’s meeting with Marcus, a Roman officer, could be called destiny. Marcus isn’t your typical Roman and he wins Deborah’s heart. Do the lovers manage to beat the mores and ethos of those times and be together? Do please read this excellent novel to find out. 

In A Bubble Of Time is a beautifully crafted historical novel. Matthew must have done an extraordinary amount of research to get the historical settings right. From page one, I was effortlessly transported back in time and I could imagine myself in the fields of Judea and in the streets of Ceasarea and Jerusalem. It is generally accepted that many of the events mentioned in the New Testament, such as the census taken by Augustus Caesar did take place, though it’s no one’s case that the Bible is a history book. Some of the characters in the New Testament are well-known historical characters. However, some events like Herod’s Massacre Of The Infants may not have taken place at all. In Matthew’s hands, all her characters, whether they really existed or not, come to life. Herod is diabolically clever and Salome is indeed a schemer. Chuza and Joanna, Bartimaeus, Barabbas, Herodias, the Centurion and his servant and many others find a place. The Zealots and the Pharisees are alive and kicking In A Bubble Of Time, which  starts off around the time of Jesus’s birth and concludes just after his death.

Matthew gets the relationship between Rome and Judea just right. Ruled by Herod, a Client King, Jews could follow their customs and the High Priest Caiaphas and his council handled the day-to-day affairs of the people, with the Roman Procurator Sabinus and the Prefect Pontius Pilate, who both lived in Ceasarea, not interfering much. However, In A Bubble Of Time goes a bit beyond history. For example, Barabbas is not  a mere thief (who was meant to be crucified, but was set free by Pontius Pilate as per custom, though innocent Jesus was much more deserving of the customary Passover pardon), but a Jewish rebel who fights the Romans, steals from rich travellers and gives to the poor.

In A Bubble Of Time is a work of fiction. Many of the characters are undoubtedly fictional and so-well crafted. If Deborah is a feminist, Joanna is cut from an old rock and is very conversative and traditional. However, both women, though poles apart, are very real. Elkanah, a crippled beggar, who lived in the vicinity of the Jerusalem temple, took care of the footwear of devotees and was healed by Peter and John after Jesus’s death, is, to the best of my knowledge, not named in the Bible. However, Matthew not only names him after the father of the famous Samuel who lived many centuries before Jesus, but also makes him a three-dimensional human being with anger, pride, jealousy, arrogance and much more. To be honest, Matthew does this with all her characters In A Bubble Of Time.

In A Bubble Of Time is a Christian novel. The Author’s Note makes it clear that Matthew is a believer who drew on her Christian faith to write the first draft of this beautiful book over four years.

Matthew writes in simple, unadorned English, which makes the 630-page tome easy to read.  Her descriptions of crucifixions are in particular excruciatingly beautiful - pun intended. In A Bubble Of Time was published in 2012. I don’t think In A Bubble Of Time has got the publicity and recognition that it deserves. Yet.  Do please read this excellent novel to find out if you agree with my assessment. 

Book Review: The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida, By Shehan Karunatilaka

 

It took me over two weeks to read Shehan Karunatilaka’s latest novel, though I had actually purchased it just before the Booker Prize was announced. The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida was the only book I ordered from out of the short list and I started reading it immediately after it was delivered by Amazon. However, I found the going tough and not just because of external diversions and lack of time. Seven Moons is brilliant piece of writing, satire coupled with tongue-in-cheek humour, used with devasting effect to show the brutality that pervaded Sri Lanka in the late eighties when the IPKF was deployed in the north and the JVP was active in the south. Human brutality is what slowed me down, not the ghosts who abound in the novel. Though I have a pretty good idea of how bad things were then in Sri Lanka, it wasn’t possible for me to digest Seven Moons with any degree of speed.

Maali Almeida the protagonist, at the commencement of the story, has just ceased to be. A brave (and possibly foolhardy) photojournalist with a gambling addiction and a homosexual to boot, Maali works for anyone who hires him to take photographs, from media houses, to the Sri Lankan army to human rights organisations. His profession makes Maali a witness to the brutality of the Sri Lankan civil war and the JVP insurrection. Maali has even managed to snap a photo of a government minister who literally stood by and looked on while Tamils were being slaughtered during the riots of 1983, not to mention numerous portraits of dead bodies, bound and gagged, of journalists and activists who fell afoul of the government.

Immediately after his death, Maali passes through some very bureaucratic red tape, something reminiscent of a third world country’s government offices and with difficulty, he gathers that he has seven moons (a moon a day), to figure out how he ended up dead, which would prepare his spirit for eternity with The Light. Maali watches his corpse being chopped up by goons with a cleaver, before it is dumped in Lake Beira, which doesn’t help him much.

As each of his seven moons is used up, Maali flies around Colombo, surrounded by other phantoms, many of them victims of the Sri Lankan violence. Some of the spirits are friendly and many are not. Maali decides that he needs to get his secret cache photos, that have the potential to bring down governments, published. Maali knows where these photos are - underneath a bed in his family home and mixed up with some erotic stuff.  Soon everyone who is anyone in Sri Lanka (the Sri Lankan Army, the LTTE, the JVP, the IPKF and international black-market arms dealers) is also hunting for the same cache and their negatives.

Karunatilaka’s writing has an effortless quality which adds to the dark beauty of the story. One barely takes note of it, as one drowns in the narrative. Almost all the others characters in Seven Moons are as exotic as Maali, who has a Singhalese father and a Burgher-Tamil mother. Maali’s lover Dilshan and his flat-mate Jaki are not run-of the mill Sri Lankans. They are the cream of Colombo, though they too are victims. Dilshan’s father Stanley Dharmendran is a Tamil Parliamentarian who hobnobs with the powers-that-be in Colombo, yet he finds it difficult to find out what happened to Maali after “he was disappeared”. 

For those interested in the LTTE’s history and growth, Gopalaswamy Mahendraraja (aka Mahattaya), who used to be second-in-command to Vellupilai Pirabhakaran, till he fell afoul of his Supremo on suspicion of betrayal,  has a significant role in Seven Moons. Karunatilaka calls him Colonel Gopallaswarmy(sic). Further, the LTTE’s use of child soldiers. is acknowledged by Karunatilaka in his signature fashion. 

 Karunatilaka’s first novel, “Chinaman: The Legend of Pradeep Mathew,” the rambling story of an alcoholic Sri Lankan sports journalist tracking down a missing cricket star had appeared around ten years ago, to critical acclaim. I think I 'enjoyed' Chinaman more than Seven Moons, though Seven Moons has left left a more profound impression on me and it will take me more than seven moons to recover from the trauma.

Book Review: Best Intentions by Simran Dhir

‘Gayatri will also get married, Nina,’ Ashok Mehra tells his wife consolingly on the day Ashok and Nina’s second daughter Nandini gets married. This opening line immediately transported me to a different world, in a different era, when Rupa Mehra told her second daughter Lata 'You too will marry a boy I choose' on the day that the older daughter, Savita, married Pran Kapoor. Much later in the book, it is revealed that Gayatri is a big fan of A Suitable Boy, as is Akshay, but that revelation isn’t a surprise since Simran Dhir’s debut novel Best Intentions reminds one of Vikram Seth’s magnum opus right from the start, time and again. Just as Seth uses the political and economic landscape of post-independence India as a back-drop to his story, Dhir uses the explosive growth of India’s religious right wing as her canvas, as she tells us the story of how Gayatri navigates the social pressure to get married after her younger sister Nandini settles into matrimonial bliss. Best Intentions does not use up as much paper as A Suitable Boy, around one-fourth I think, but manages to just as successfully spin a good and realistic, romantic-socio-political yarn.

Stop! Isn’t it so wrong to review a novel solely by comparing it with another, even if the comparison is with what’s possibly the finest novel to have come out of India? You bet it is. So, let me say this. Best Intentions is an excellent novel, very well written, gripping till the end and, if it didn’t run to 348 pages, would have been unputdownable. I read it over a single weekend though.

Best Intentions is full of lawyers, of all hues. Nandini is a corporate lawyer, a partner at a leading law firm. Her husband Amar Grewal is also a partner in the same law firm, but with ‘a shitty practice in an area that requires you to be a robot, no thinking whatsoever’, one who gets his deals because of his father. Dhir does not tell us what exactly Amar specializes in, other than imply that it does not call for the same degree of rigor as her specialism. Amar’s relatively poor performance at his job, as compared to Nandini, gives him an inferiority complex, which in turn has a toxic effect on his marriage. Gayatri, the lead protagonist, is a lawyer turned historian, one with an anti-right-wing bias, which causes her to hate Akshay, Amar’s pragmatic brother, who is a litigator just like his father Gyan Singh Grewal. Neelam Bedi, an escapee from a broken marriage, who is generously accommodated by Gyan in his office, is a lawyer too. 

Since all the lead characters (barring Vikram Gera, an investment banker) are lawyers, there is no dearth of confrontations despite the best intentions. However, Dhir’s lawyers, their friends and families are mostly good at heart and learn, adapt, improve and on the whole, make the world a better place. Dhir’s standout achievement is her ability to show both sides of an argument, without harming the yarn being spun.

Dhir’s characters are realistic, too realistic and each of them comes in 5D. Dhir’s English is effortlessly good, though it is never lyrical or flowery and the occasional Hindi is not translated. Often times, Dhir’s characters speak desi English and it just adds to the overall atmosphere.

There are writers who believe in Karma (who make sure the baddies get their comeuppance and the good people their rewards) and there are others who leave karma to God and keep it out of their books. Which way does Dhir’s Best Intentions go? Please do read Best Intentions to find out for yourself.

As many other reviewers have already said, there’s a new writer on the horizon and am anxiously waiting for Dhir’s next novel.

SPOILERS AHEAD

Vikram and his London based boss Akhil Tandon are colourful characters, pirates actually, who form the perfect counterfoil to the various lawyers in the book. Vikram is willing to go to any extent to get what he wants, in this case, getting into Delhi’s moneyed social circle, even if it means he has to string ‘may-get-married-if-all-stars-are aligned’ Gayatri along. One keeps wondering why Gayatri can’t see through Vikram and even Akshay is annoyed on this account. Dhir is so good at making her reader dislike someone and then do a slow flip.

Gayatri sees everything in black and white, but towards the end of the book, we see her appreciating the other side’s arguments and recognising that most people and ideas have a lot of grey in them. The bad ones, who tormented Gayatri and others working at the Indian History Review, are maybe not so bad after all? I found myself nodding in agreement more than once.  

Gayatri initially detests Akshay who she finds very arrogant and snooty, though rather good looking, with a bit of grey around his temples. Towards the middle of the novel, as we've been taught by countless Mills and Boon novels, some sparks start to fly between them. However, after Nandini and Amar crash their marriage, it is inevitable that the embers around Gayatri and Akshay are bound to die, or is it? 

Book Review: How Gourango Lost His O, by Sanjoy Ghose

What happens when a lawyer practicing in Delhi, locked down at home due to Covid – 19, sets out to write a book of fiction? Well, the reading public gets to know, How Gourango Lost His O. Purportedly a work of fiction, How Gourango Lost His O features a number of lawyers, clients, their families and most importantly, court clerks, for every lawyer worth his/her salt knows how important court clerks are to the smooth functioning of courts. The characters in How Gourango Lost His O come in all shapes, sizes and ages. Some are good, many are clever and a few (like Narendra Biswas aka Nasty Naru) are downright nasty, because fate had been unkind to him ‘and compassion and kindness had left him years ago’.

How Gourango Lost His O had been on my reading list ever since it came out many months ago, but it was only very recently that I managed to read it. I read it in one go, since I found it unputdownable. The best thing about How Gourango Lost His O’s cast is that everyone is real. Real as in, I’m sure the characters either existed or continue to exist, somewhere in India, most probably in the vicinity of various chartered High Courts and the Supreme Court. Since the author Sanjoy Ghose is a lawyer who practices in various courts and tribunals in the NCR region, including the Delhi High Court and the Supreme Court, it is possible that the main protagonist Gourango might bear some resemblance to Ghose and some of the characters in How Gourango Lost His O (like Gourango’s senior Indumati Khilani) might remind the reader of well-known lawyers who grace the corridors of courts in Mumbai and Delhi. However Ghose doesn't offer any clue as to where facts end and fiction begins.

Noor Malik is forced to litigate when the government frames a new rule that would prevent him from being the headmaster of the Madarassa where he teaches. Enter (no, not Gourango at this stage) Keshto Bannerjee, a Kolkata lawyer who is decent enough to not hold out false hopes to his clients. Ghose tells us from the beginning that Noor Malik does not have a strong case and that the odds are stacked against him. However, Ghose builds up the reader's sympathy for Noor from the beginning and there is always a glimmer of hope.

Wasn’t it George Orwell who said that the best books are those that tell you something you know already? As someone with more than a passing familiarity with courts and lawyers, How Gourango Lost His O told me a lot of things I already knew about lawyers and courts, but in a nice way, tickling my funny bone quite frequently, but more often than not, it brought in a flood of memories.

Ghose writes in limpid, but elegant prose, which makes it all the more easier to turn the pages of this finely crafted, not-too-thick, not-too-thin storybook.  How Gourango Lost His O has at least fifteen significant characters and for each of them, Ghose paints a fine portrait, in the most economical manner. For example, we are told that Keshto’s clerk Jobu is someone who has made himself indispensable to Keshto and also ensured the sacking of four juniors who made the monumental mistake of miscalculating that Keshto was the boss of his own office. In contrast, Ghose would have us know that Parambrato Basak, a ‘service judge’ was not a compassionate man. However, while serving as a district judge in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, two judges of the Calcutta High Court visited him to hear appeals against Basak’s orders. Basak was at the aerodrome, to receive the judges, as per custom. Mrs. Basak hosted a lavish dinner for them on their first evening on the island. The judges go back to Calcutta with stories of Basak’s honesty and industry. Within weeks, Basak is promoted to the High Court!  

Does Noor receive justice from the Indian legal system? Do kind, capable and not-so-expensive lawyers like Keshto Bannerjee and Gourango find answers to Noor Malik’s prayers? Please do read this excellent novel to find out more.

MINOR SPOILERS AHEAD

How Gourango Lost His O is divided into three parts. In Part 1, Noor Malik fights his case in the Kolkata High Court where Keshto Bannerjee is his lawyer. Later, in Part 2, he takes his fight to the Supreme Court, where Gourango is his counsel. But after Judgement Day, the last chapter in Part 2, Noor disappears from the book. In Part 3, Ghose introduces a number of new characters, ranging from Naren Gujjar, a landlord from Greater Noida and an original inhabitant of Delhi, to Rajesh Aggarwal, who gamed the Indian legal system so judiciously and Mohandas Chaddha, a corporate litigant who was, unusually, fighting for his honour. All of these characters come with their own story packs and Ghose dispatches them with the same efficiency as he presumably would, a plate of kosha mangsho and half a dozen piping hot luchis.

Cultural Appropriation – Or Is It Cultural Appreciation?

 Cultural appropriation is a term that I came across rather late in life, a few years ago, to be honest. Initially, I brushed it away. As a child growing up in India, it was common for us to wear attires from different regions once in a while. Come Onam, everyone wore Malayalee clothes. For Navratri, if you are lucky enough to be invited to a Garba, you wore Gujarati clothes. During the school annual day, there would be so many regional songs and dances in which everyone participated. Surely, it’s a matter of pride if someone from a different culture copies your attire or style or even name?

Well, it’s not as simple as that and it took me a while to appreciate it. The cultural appropriation that one objects to is apparently when members of a dominant culture – for example, white Americans or white Australians – take elements from the culture of an ethnicity or racial group they have typically oppressed – e.g. Indigenous peoples – and use them for themselves. That is, they appropriate a culture that is not their own. And it’s most problematic when that appropriation occurs for reasons of power or profit.

Now I do see where the objection is coming from. There is no law in the world which says you can’t copy the culture of someone else. There are Caucasians who immerse in Japanese culture, so many Indians and other Asians are anglophiles and everyone in Asia and Africa has adopted a lot of western customs and traditions, not to mention attire. So, is it a big deal if a Caucasian wears a bindi or a Maori dress? The objections seem to be that, until two generations ago, your people oppressed mine saying we are inferior, now how dare you wear our clothes or adopt our hair style? The objection becomes more vehement if a white model wears a native Indian or Maori dress or has dreadlocks, because the model is profiting from the attire. I do understand the objection, but my heart says this is not such a big deal and  appreciation of the culture of those previously oppressed by former oppressors should be welcomed. You can be sure that two generations ago, white men and women did not dress up as native Americans or as Maoris. Times have changed! Isn’t it time to move on?

Going Back To Duolingo To Learn French

And so, I went back to Duolingo after a 8 month break, mainly because its so convenient to use and suits my lifestyle. If I could attend an in-person class, I would do that, but my French learning is restricted to the time I spend commuting to work by taxi. I don’t drive myself, mainly so that I can practice French on Duolingo. I avoid the normal black and yellow taxis since they are usually noisy and stick to airconditioned Uber taxis, whenever possible.

I found the following changes in Duolingo from the time I signed off in July 2021.

• Earlier, when there was one blank and two choices, the correct answer was always the second one. This is no longer the case now - the correct answer is often the first choice.  Did Duolingo change this after reading my previous post? I wonder!
• Duolingo French had only 9 Units, but now a 10^th Unit has been added
• In each Unit, there is a 6^th or legendary level. Earlier there were only 5 levels.  To clear the Legendary Level, one needs to complete four challenges without any hints or tips.
• The number of Duolingo Stories seems to have increased. There are 72 Sets and each Set has 4 stories. Right now, I’m at the 61^st Set.

I found these changes to be for the better.

As in the past, I am constantly prompted and encouraged to maintain my Streak and I am in some Leaderboard or the other. I am doing my best to not get distracted with such stuff and focus on my language learning.

Book Review: Limitless: The Power of Unlocking Your True Potential, by Radhika Gupta

 

When steel is heated in a forge and beaten into shape, it becomes stronger. When faced with setbacks, if you draw the right lessons and move forward, you are bound to achieve success. Radhika Gupta, the current MD & CEO of Edelweiss  AMC, had more than her share of drawbacks in life, but bounce back she did and she happily shares her experiences, mostly professional and a few personal, through her newly released book Limitless.

Born in Pakistan when her father, a career diplomat, was posted there, Gupta grew up in a variety of countries, ranging from Nigeria to Italy, until she went to college at hyper-competitive Upenn. In 2005, when she was just twenty, Gupta took to heart seven consecutive rejections from consulting firms during campus placements at UPenn and tried to commit suicide by jumping off from the 19^th floor of a building.  Luckily for us readers, she did not succeed though the reasons aren’t fully spelt out. She also drew the right lessons from her desperate action and went on to become a business leader and an inspiration for many across the world.

Accept difficult feedback gracefully, Gupta tells us, citing a number of examples of feedback that she did not initially accept or was happy with, but which added value to her professional life once she was able to gracefully accept them.

Take risks, but do so sensibly. Gupta refers to Dr Arokiaswamy Velumani’s example to buttress this point. Dr Velumani, the founder and MD of Thyrocare, one of India’s largest diagnostics companies, went from having just ₹500 in his pocket to seeing his idea develop into a public listed company with crore market cap in excess of a RS. 5,000. Dr Velumani was able to throw everything he had into his venture, comforted by the fact that his wife could get a reasonably well paying job easily, if his venture flopped.

It is important to get started. Take small steps if needed, but do get started. This one resonated with me.

What’s the best thing someone who is just graduating from college or is in the early years of their career, especially women, can do? They ought to ask for opportunities, a task which is not very easy to undertake when one suffers from lack of confidence However, if you don’t ask, you usually don’t get. What’s the worst that can happen if you ask for an opportunity? When Gupta started her corporate career, a family friend told her that those who speak up always get more than those who stay silent. There are no points for being shy. Those who ask end up getting the bigger promotions, the raises, the better projects, because they keep vocalizing their needs. Gupta tells us that this advice made sense only many years later, but she swears by it now.

Change is always constant. One has to accept it and take it in one’s stride. Gupta quotes lyricist Javed Akhtar who used the ‘my mother’s cooking is better than my wife’s’ dialogue at the Jashn-e-Rekhta Urdu festival in 2017, to explain this. ‘Why does every man, when he gets married, tell his wife, you make good dal, but not quite as good as what my mother made? Has the quality of dal in India just deteriorated over 1,000 years?’ It hasn’t! We need to accept today’s dal – one slightly different from the one we grew up with – as our reality and move forward.

Let go of the past. Gupta tells us that she always tells new employees at Edelweiss Mutual Fund that if they want to have a chance at succeeding in their new organisation, they have to embrace it and let go of where they came from. One is certain to face problems after a job change and it is so tempting to look back to one’s past organisation with nostalgia, but if the rose tinted glasses are taken off, chances are there was no shortage of problems at the previous organisation either. If one were to take an honest count, one will find that there is no shortage of problems anywhere. A guaranteed way to fail at a new organisation is to focus on the problems in the new environment and compare them to the positives of the past.

Be adaptable. Charles Darwin theorised that the most important factor for survival is neither size, nor intelligence, nor strength. It is adaptability. Gupta fully agrees with Darwin. Gupta uses the example of the Kakapo to buttress her point. Honestly, I hadn’t even heard of the Kakapo until I read Limitless. Gupta mentions Kunal Bahl, the co-founder of e-commerce giant Snapdeal, as an example of a person who built a successful business by adapting and pivoting, based on feedback.

Gupta firmly believes that the job market is fair and very little arbitrage exists in it in the long term. In today’s information-rich world, one gets paid what one deserves. If you feel you are getting a lot less than someone else doing the same job, the most likely conclusion is that that someone else has a lot more experience doing that job in a larger organisation with a much larger profit and loss statement. I was reminded of the stock market, though Gupta doesn’t use this comparison and I am not sure if this would be a good comparison, since the job market doesn’t have to content with insider trading, for starters.

Everyone has his or her imperfections and these imperfections that set you apart from your peers and make you what you are. Gupta repeats the story of the ugly duckling, based on the fairy tale written by Hans Christian Andersen, who, after being teased and taunted by fellow ducklings, decides to throw himself at a flock of swans, assuming he will be killed. He forgets that he has grown up and matured into a beautiful swan and is finally welcomed by his fellow swans. Gupta wishes for a new version of this story, one where the duckling owns his imperfections, where he understands that it’s his imperfections that set him apart from his peers and make him who he is, where his happiness does not depend on becoming a swan. Who defines what ‘ugly’ is anyway? Gupta wonders aloud and I found myself nodding my head. ‘Self-confidence comes from accepting yourself, rejections and imperfections included’ Gupta advises.

The ability to reach out for help and to confide one’s problems in others is an important life-saving skill, something Gupta did not always have, but had to develop over a period of time. Gupta divulges a very personal story, one very traumatic, that took place just after she started working at Edelweiss. Either on account of her insecurities or the fear of judgement, she felt trapped. Though she had an incredibly kind team and an incredibly kind boss, she was unable to be honest and reach out to them during one of the toughest moments of her life. I’d rather not divulge the actual event in this review. Do please read this excellent book to find out for yourself. Five years later, an internal restructuring impacted the financials of Gupta’s division and Gupta just couldn’t wrap her head around the situation. Finally, she forced herself to ask for help from three very senior members of her team in sales, strategy and marketing. The end result? Gupta found herself out of the morass pretty quickly.

I’m going to wrap up this review, lest this become a summary of the book. Gupta has a lot of advice on investing in education, relationships, finding a mentor(s), work-life balance etc., all of which made a lot of sense to me. Do please read and find out for yourself.

A google search tells me that Gupta has a permanent tilt to her neck due to certain birth complications, but she doesn’t discuss this disability in her book, except for occasional references to her “broken neck”. There is a brief mention of a personal tragedy (in the context of her inability to reach out to her colleagues for help), a short but sensitive description of the day she and her partners sold their start-up to Edelweiss, took the signage off the door of their Worli office and crossing the Bandra–Worli Sea Link as they drove to the Edelweiss office in Kalina. The personal references are just right, as a percentage of the whole book, and make Limitless more wholesome and readable, without making it an autobiography.

They say that corporate organisations are glass pyramids, designed to make people slip off the smooth sides, as they gain experience and grow older. Despite all the risks and challenges that lurk ahead, hundreds of thousands of men and women pursue an education, usually an MBA, that sets them on course for a corporate career and then jump into the corporate well quite happily. If anyone falls of the pyramid, it is usually on account of an inadvertent slip-up in tactics or a defect in long term strategy. Limitless is a treasure trove of advice for all career-minded and ambitious folks and will definitely help all readers who imbibe its wisdom to avoid many of the pitfalls that befall many as they progress in their careers. Gupta writes in simple English, that is classy, easy to read and doesn’t force the reader to ponder over the language at the cost of her narrative. I highly recommend this book.