1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:15,320 Hi, welcome back. 2 00:00:15,320 --> 00:00:20,720 And I have another guest, another profession. 3 00:00:20,720 --> 00:00:27,200 And today is someone from my edge of the woods, advertising. 4 00:00:27,200 --> 00:00:30,000 Narayan is a copywriter. 5 00:00:30,000 --> 00:00:33,280 At least that's what he started out as. 6 00:00:33,280 --> 00:00:35,960 And like most writers have seen, there 7 00:00:35,960 --> 00:00:39,320 is no course that gets you into copywriting. 8 00:00:39,320 --> 00:00:44,840 So without further ado, let me bring Narayan on board. 9 00:00:44,840 --> 00:00:46,120 Hi, Narayan. 10 00:00:46,120 --> 00:00:47,240 Hi, hi. 11 00:00:47,240 --> 00:00:51,720 Yeah, it's been quite a journey for you. 12 00:00:51,720 --> 00:00:55,400 And it's only over the past couple of conversations 13 00:00:55,400 --> 00:01:00,040 that we had that I realized that your interests extend not just 14 00:01:00,040 --> 00:01:05,520 to writing and to audio. 15 00:01:05,520 --> 00:01:06,520 Guitars as well. 16 00:01:06,520 --> 00:01:08,000 Web design is, of course, something 17 00:01:08,000 --> 00:01:09,840 that you completely blew me away with. 18 00:01:09,840 --> 00:01:12,120 Because when you look at it, writers are not 19 00:01:12,120 --> 00:01:14,360 supposed to become geeks. 20 00:01:14,360 --> 00:01:19,800 Another one of the unconventional choices 21 00:01:19,800 --> 00:01:21,920 you've made. 22 00:01:21,920 --> 00:01:25,120 Yeah, maybe my choice of advertising as a profession 23 00:01:25,120 --> 00:01:28,200 itself may be a good starting point. 24 00:01:28,200 --> 00:01:30,240 Great place to start, absolutely. 25 00:01:30,240 --> 00:01:35,400 So like you said, I was doing my MA in economics. 26 00:01:35,400 --> 00:01:38,800 And at the end of it, I surprised myself 27 00:01:38,800 --> 00:01:40,760 by being the second in the university. 28 00:01:40,760 --> 00:01:42,520 But that's a different story. 29 00:01:42,520 --> 00:01:47,960 But while after I had finished giving the exam and all that, 30 00:01:47,960 --> 00:01:51,880 I was not at all clear what I was going to do. 31 00:01:51,880 --> 00:01:55,040 I knew that everybody got a job doing something or the other 32 00:01:55,040 --> 00:01:57,480 and therefore I would be doing some job. 33 00:01:57,480 --> 00:01:58,440 But I had no clue. 34 00:01:58,440 --> 00:02:00,200 In fact, the very reason for doing MA 35 00:02:00,200 --> 00:02:02,720 was because I'd finished BA and I had the same problem. 36 00:02:02,720 --> 00:02:04,960 And I said, let me study more. 37 00:02:04,960 --> 00:02:06,560 And therefore I thought it was OK. 38 00:02:06,560 --> 00:02:08,160 I think a lot of us have that problem. 39 00:02:08,160 --> 00:02:09,240 Yeah. 40 00:02:09,240 --> 00:02:12,720 So I mean, these days, of course, people 41 00:02:12,720 --> 00:02:15,680 are very different and probably from the 10th standard 42 00:02:15,680 --> 00:02:17,720 onwards, people seem to know why I'm 43 00:02:17,720 --> 00:02:20,280 going to become an interior designer or a dentist 44 00:02:20,280 --> 00:02:21,000 or whatever it is. 45 00:02:21,000 --> 00:02:22,240 They seem to be pretty clear. 46 00:02:22,240 --> 00:02:23,680 And that's a nice thing. 47 00:02:23,680 --> 00:02:26,320 But in my time, at least, I wasn't that kind. 48 00:02:26,320 --> 00:02:28,320 And I had no clue, absolutely, what 49 00:02:28,320 --> 00:02:30,280 I was going to do with myself. 50 00:02:30,280 --> 00:02:32,040 A visit to the Connemara Library, 51 00:02:32,040 --> 00:02:33,920 it's one of those ancient libraries. 52 00:02:33,920 --> 00:02:38,320 And I was walking past some, I don't know, 53 00:02:38,320 --> 00:02:40,880 it was a legal section or something 54 00:02:40,880 --> 00:02:43,640 like that with all those leather bound tomes 55 00:02:43,640 --> 00:02:45,800 and gathering dust and something like that. 56 00:02:45,800 --> 00:02:47,560 I was on my way to somewhere else. 57 00:02:47,560 --> 00:02:51,360 But as I was passing by, something caught my eye. 58 00:02:51,360 --> 00:02:53,760 And there was this very attractive book hid 59 00:02:53,760 --> 00:02:57,560 between those cobwebbed kind of old tomes. 60 00:02:57,560 --> 00:02:59,320 And naturally, I saw them and said, 61 00:02:59,320 --> 00:03:00,960 what is that doing there? 62 00:03:00,960 --> 00:03:04,440 Because it seems some oddball thing standing out. 63 00:03:04,440 --> 00:03:05,360 So I pulled it out. 64 00:03:05,360 --> 00:03:08,160 And it was a book called The Craft of Copywriting 65 00:03:08,160 --> 00:03:09,920 by Alastair Compton. 66 00:03:09,920 --> 00:03:11,000 I remember that. 67 00:03:11,000 --> 00:03:13,480 I haven't seen that book later. 68 00:03:13,480 --> 00:03:16,840 I haven't heard anybody mention that book. 69 00:03:16,840 --> 00:03:18,400 So I don't think it's a great book. 70 00:03:18,400 --> 00:03:19,520 I don't know what it is. 71 00:03:19,520 --> 00:03:21,560 But it is not a recognition. 72 00:03:21,560 --> 00:03:23,680 It's not certainly David Ogilvie's Confessions 73 00:03:23,680 --> 00:03:25,840 or Bernbach's book or anything like that. 74 00:03:25,840 --> 00:03:27,960 So it was some random book. 75 00:03:27,960 --> 00:03:29,840 But it was very actively produced. 76 00:03:29,840 --> 00:03:30,840 And it was a Britisher. 77 00:03:30,840 --> 00:03:33,080 And obviously, somebody had put it 78 00:03:33,080 --> 00:03:36,040 in the deliberately wrong section of the library 79 00:03:36,040 --> 00:03:37,920 because they must have used up their tickets. 80 00:03:37,920 --> 00:03:40,040 And they must have said, I'll hide it here 81 00:03:40,040 --> 00:03:41,400 so that the next time I come, I'll 82 00:03:41,400 --> 00:03:43,480 take it from this unlikely place. 83 00:03:43,480 --> 00:03:45,880 But unfortunately for them, I was walking at that time. 84 00:03:45,880 --> 00:03:48,480 And that very incongruity of that setting 85 00:03:48,480 --> 00:03:49,760 caught my eye. 86 00:03:49,760 --> 00:03:52,240 So it was probably a wrong move on that guy's part. 87 00:03:52,240 --> 00:03:54,040 And therefore, I pulled out that book. 88 00:03:54,040 --> 00:03:55,520 And I just flipped it through. 89 00:03:55,520 --> 00:03:56,400 And there was something nice. 90 00:03:56,400 --> 00:03:57,840 I mean, today I know it is the design 91 00:03:57,840 --> 00:03:59,560 of the book and the typography and all that. 92 00:03:59,560 --> 00:04:00,800 I'm able to say it now. 93 00:04:00,800 --> 00:04:03,920 But those days, not just typography and design, 94 00:04:03,920 --> 00:04:05,560 I didn't even know what copywriting was. 95 00:04:05,560 --> 00:04:06,160 I wasn't sure. 96 00:04:06,160 --> 00:04:07,880 I vaguely thought it was that guy who 97 00:04:07,880 --> 00:04:11,560 sat under the judge and wrote stuff down. 98 00:04:11,560 --> 00:04:15,520 Which is what a lot of people still think copywriters do. 99 00:04:15,520 --> 00:04:17,400 Yeah, I don't know what the connection is. 100 00:04:17,400 --> 00:04:18,840 So I was very curious. 101 00:04:18,840 --> 00:04:21,320 But it was so attractively laid out. 102 00:04:21,320 --> 00:04:23,160 And I said, OK, I think you were allowed 103 00:04:23,160 --> 00:04:24,960 to take three or four books on your tickets 104 00:04:24,960 --> 00:04:25,960 those days or something. 105 00:04:25,960 --> 00:04:29,040 So I made this as one of the books that I took. 106 00:04:29,040 --> 00:04:30,160 And I took it home. 107 00:04:30,160 --> 00:04:32,840 And I was there by 5 PM. 108 00:04:32,840 --> 00:04:35,800 And something was so engrossing about that book. 109 00:04:35,800 --> 00:04:38,000 I read it over the next four or five hours, 110 00:04:38,000 --> 00:04:40,440 allowing some time for some food and all that. 111 00:04:40,440 --> 00:04:42,160 And I finished by 10 o'clock. 112 00:04:42,160 --> 00:04:44,000 And by the time I went to sleep, I 113 00:04:44,000 --> 00:04:46,560 was so certain that I'm going to become a copywriter. 114 00:04:46,560 --> 00:04:47,880 It was so good. 115 00:04:47,880 --> 00:04:49,520 That book did its job, honestly. 116 00:04:49,520 --> 00:04:55,000 I mean, it's not like I've had that kind of some feeling 117 00:04:55,000 --> 00:04:55,640 ever again. 118 00:04:55,640 --> 00:04:57,560 I have not read or listened to somebody 119 00:04:57,560 --> 00:04:59,480 and made some instant decision like that. 120 00:04:59,480 --> 00:05:02,840 But it was so clear that I should be doing so. 121 00:05:02,840 --> 00:05:05,200 And I was vaguely thinking, maybe in India, 122 00:05:05,200 --> 00:05:07,960 there must be advertising agencies too. 123 00:05:07,960 --> 00:05:10,400 And if somebody is willing to pay money 124 00:05:10,400 --> 00:05:13,800 for doing this kind of stuff, certainly I can attempt this. 125 00:05:13,800 --> 00:05:17,240 This seems to be a nice way to get paid. 126 00:05:17,240 --> 00:05:19,400 Then, of course, being in that academic frame of mind, 127 00:05:19,400 --> 00:05:21,360 I was thinking, who teaches this stuff? 128 00:05:21,360 --> 00:05:23,200 Is there somewhere you need to go? 129 00:05:23,200 --> 00:05:26,720 And it so happened that the very next week, my cousin 130 00:05:26,720 --> 00:05:27,760 was much older to me. 131 00:05:27,760 --> 00:05:30,280 He had a family in Delhi and all that. 132 00:05:30,280 --> 00:05:32,920 And just as we were talking, he said 133 00:05:32,920 --> 00:05:35,080 that there is a new institute there called the Indian 134 00:05:35,080 --> 00:05:36,440 Institute of Mass Communication. 135 00:05:36,440 --> 00:05:38,560 It's become pretty famous now. 136 00:05:38,560 --> 00:05:42,120 It was in its fledgling days then. 137 00:05:42,120 --> 00:05:44,960 And he said that I think they have a course on advertising, 138 00:05:44,960 --> 00:05:46,880 but I'll get my secretary to check it out. 139 00:05:46,880 --> 00:05:49,080 And if there is something, I'll let you know. 140 00:05:49,080 --> 00:05:51,000 So then his secretary checked it out. 141 00:05:51,000 --> 00:05:53,640 And then we exchanged mail, meaning 142 00:05:53,640 --> 00:05:57,120 what is called snail mail today, actual letters handwritten. 143 00:05:57,120 --> 00:05:59,680 And you send it and wait for so many days and all that. 144 00:05:59,680 --> 00:06:02,360 And therefore, he did find out that there 145 00:06:02,360 --> 00:06:03,400 was a course like that. 146 00:06:03,400 --> 00:06:05,360 And then it was a matter of the next few months. 147 00:06:05,360 --> 00:06:07,280 I joined there, basically. 148 00:06:07,280 --> 00:06:08,280 So that is how. 149 00:06:08,280 --> 00:06:10,640 And that was a nice course because it was conducted. 150 00:06:10,640 --> 00:06:13,560 It was coordinated by a professor from inside. 151 00:06:13,560 --> 00:06:16,800 And most of the lecture, practically all the lecturers 152 00:06:16,800 --> 00:06:20,120 were from the industry, the advertising industry in Delhi. 153 00:06:20,120 --> 00:06:21,920 And some pretty good luminaries were there, 154 00:06:21,920 --> 00:06:25,440 copywriters, art people, creative directors, and everybody. 155 00:06:25,440 --> 00:06:27,360 And it was nice to know from practitioners. 156 00:06:27,360 --> 00:06:30,040 And therefore, you could show the stuff that you created. 157 00:06:30,040 --> 00:06:33,760 And they'll give you their very frank appraisals and so on. 158 00:06:33,760 --> 00:06:35,680 So it was quite something to be able to learn. 159 00:06:35,680 --> 00:06:38,440 And we spent about 10 months or something in that course. 160 00:06:38,440 --> 00:06:42,000 And they gave me some scholarship. 161 00:06:42,000 --> 00:06:43,520 And I got back all the money that we 162 00:06:43,520 --> 00:06:45,920 paid for that course also, which wasn't much. 163 00:06:45,920 --> 00:06:48,600 So therefore, and I stayed with my cousin. 164 00:06:48,600 --> 00:06:50,720 So therefore, it was a bit of a jolly time. 165 00:06:50,720 --> 00:06:51,960 There was nothing for me to do. 166 00:06:51,960 --> 00:06:55,200 I was left in his house and went, caught a bus. 167 00:06:55,200 --> 00:06:58,280 And probably my only expense was those bus tickets or something. 168 00:06:58,280 --> 00:07:00,320 So therefore, it was all pretty cool, 169 00:07:00,320 --> 00:07:02,720 made some new friends, and all that. 170 00:07:02,720 --> 00:07:05,800 And from there, of course, I did my internship 171 00:07:05,800 --> 00:07:07,640 in Delhi at Ogilvy at that time. 172 00:07:07,640 --> 00:07:10,280 It was called Ogilvy, Benson, and Maitha. 173 00:07:10,280 --> 00:07:12,480 Later on, it became Ogilvy and Maitha. 174 00:07:12,480 --> 00:07:14,440 And then it became O&M. 175 00:07:14,440 --> 00:07:16,560 What is the process for getting an internship? 176 00:07:16,560 --> 00:07:19,200 Was it much simpler than? 177 00:07:19,200 --> 00:07:21,600 It was because the university, or it's not, sorry, 178 00:07:21,600 --> 00:07:26,040 our institute wrote to, they asked us to choose. 179 00:07:26,040 --> 00:07:28,960 And me and somebody else, I think, chose Bombay as the place. 180 00:07:28,960 --> 00:07:30,520 And he chose Linthas. 181 00:07:30,520 --> 00:07:33,240 And I chose Ogilvy. 182 00:07:33,240 --> 00:07:34,760 Therefore, we could both be in Bombay, 183 00:07:34,760 --> 00:07:35,960 although in different agencies, we 184 00:07:35,960 --> 00:07:38,840 could meet during lunchtime, because both the offices were 185 00:07:38,840 --> 00:07:40,080 in South Mumbai and all that. 186 00:07:40,080 --> 00:07:43,640 So that was nice to have somebody there. 187 00:07:43,640 --> 00:07:48,640 And therefore, the course director wrote to these people. 188 00:07:48,640 --> 00:07:50,240 And it was somewhat simple, I think. 189 00:07:50,240 --> 00:07:52,520 I don't know what happened, because we were told that, yes, 190 00:07:52,520 --> 00:07:53,320 it's been accepted. 191 00:07:53,320 --> 00:07:56,480 And we were taking some midnight train from Delhi to Mumbai. 192 00:07:56,480 --> 00:07:57,200 And we were there. 193 00:07:57,200 --> 00:08:00,240 So I spent a month there, beautiful time. 194 00:08:00,240 --> 00:08:02,720 I learned a lot, asked a lot of questions, 195 00:08:02,720 --> 00:08:05,880 probably made an ass of myself, but learned a lot. 196 00:08:05,880 --> 00:08:09,200 And yeah, Mani Iyer, he was the name of that. 197 00:08:09,200 --> 00:08:11,520 He was a big doin' of the advertising industry. 198 00:08:11,520 --> 00:08:15,040 And he's no more. 199 00:08:15,040 --> 00:08:17,320 I mean, they were all very, very accomplished people 200 00:08:17,320 --> 00:08:18,480 and all that. 201 00:08:18,480 --> 00:08:20,400 So you got to meet him. 202 00:08:20,400 --> 00:08:22,200 On the first day that you went, he 203 00:08:22,200 --> 00:08:23,840 spent about 15, 20 minutes with you. 204 00:08:23,840 --> 00:08:25,880 And in the last day that you were leaving, 205 00:08:25,880 --> 00:08:27,920 he spent again 15, 20 minutes with you. 206 00:08:27,920 --> 00:08:30,000 And he also got up to walk with you 207 00:08:30,000 --> 00:08:32,800 to this well-furnished, huge cabin. 208 00:08:32,800 --> 00:08:35,480 He came up to the door to open the door for you 209 00:08:35,480 --> 00:08:36,960 and wish you good luck and all that. 210 00:08:36,960 --> 00:08:38,320 I mean, these are all things that you 211 00:08:38,320 --> 00:08:41,960 don't forget decades later because we knew that it 212 00:08:41,960 --> 00:08:44,560 was some PR thingy at some level. 213 00:08:44,560 --> 00:08:46,560 And you know that it was all done. 214 00:08:46,560 --> 00:08:47,960 But it is a nice thing. 215 00:08:47,960 --> 00:08:49,520 They don't need to have done it, though. 216 00:08:49,520 --> 00:08:50,880 Trainees and students, they really need to have done it. 217 00:08:50,880 --> 00:08:52,600 Just one thing. 218 00:08:52,600 --> 00:08:54,440 In terms of writing, are you saying 219 00:08:54,440 --> 00:08:57,720 that before you read the book, you had never really 220 00:08:57,720 --> 00:09:00,280 looked at writing as one of your strengths, 221 00:09:00,280 --> 00:09:04,000 or you had explored writing in some form? 222 00:09:04,000 --> 00:09:04,840 Actually, no. 223 00:09:04,840 --> 00:09:06,720 I had not written anything. 224 00:09:06,720 --> 00:09:11,520 But one of those vague things like, 225 00:09:11,520 --> 00:09:13,840 it's not exactly dear diary kind of stuff. 226 00:09:13,840 --> 00:09:17,440 But my father used to say, read the Hindu, 227 00:09:17,440 --> 00:09:19,880 or read the statesman, or read something 228 00:09:19,880 --> 00:09:23,320 which has got quality editorials in it and all that. 229 00:09:23,320 --> 00:09:25,040 And half the things you didn't understand 230 00:09:25,040 --> 00:09:27,120 because it was all about some war somewhere 231 00:09:27,120 --> 00:09:29,280 or some famine in Bihar. 232 00:09:29,280 --> 00:09:31,160 And at that time, you didn't know anything much 233 00:09:31,160 --> 00:09:31,800 about these things. 234 00:09:31,800 --> 00:09:33,080 So you had no particular context. 235 00:09:33,080 --> 00:09:35,200 And TV was in its infancy. 236 00:09:35,200 --> 00:09:39,000 So therefore, there was not much to read or something. 237 00:09:39,000 --> 00:09:41,080 But they were very clear that, no, if you want to write, 238 00:09:41,080 --> 00:09:42,600 then write of a certain standard. 239 00:09:42,600 --> 00:09:44,320 That much I understood. 240 00:09:44,320 --> 00:09:45,920 And therefore, I used to just pick up 241 00:09:45,920 --> 00:09:49,360 stuff that interested me and oddball, not continuously, 242 00:09:49,360 --> 00:09:54,320 now and then, all told, maybe 20 pieces of some prose 243 00:09:54,320 --> 00:09:56,760 I must have written over two years, 244 00:09:56,760 --> 00:09:59,880 not in any organized way, not in a, what shall I say, 245 00:09:59,880 --> 00:10:02,280 not in some Sunday I will sit down and do this, 246 00:10:02,280 --> 00:10:04,560 not in that sort of, there was no timetable to it. 247 00:10:04,560 --> 00:10:06,080 Just a free flowing thing. 248 00:10:06,080 --> 00:10:08,320 But barring that, I was not the guy. 249 00:10:08,320 --> 00:10:10,200 People say I have a book inside me. 250 00:10:10,200 --> 00:10:11,440 I was not that guy. 251 00:10:11,440 --> 00:10:12,960 I didn't write poetry. 252 00:10:12,960 --> 00:10:16,080 I didn't write short stories. 253 00:10:16,080 --> 00:10:21,760 Or I didn't submit anything to magazines or newspapers 254 00:10:21,760 --> 00:10:23,160 or stuff like that. 255 00:10:23,160 --> 00:10:24,800 But yet, when I read that book, I 256 00:10:24,800 --> 00:10:28,000 felt that I could be doing that. 257 00:10:28,000 --> 00:10:29,640 It's quite a leap. 258 00:10:29,640 --> 00:10:33,320 So you finished your internship at Ogilvy 259 00:10:33,320 --> 00:10:37,280 and then looked for a job straight away? 260 00:10:37,280 --> 00:10:37,840 No, no, no. 261 00:10:37,840 --> 00:10:39,720 I went back to Delhi to complete the next two 262 00:10:39,720 --> 00:10:41,320 months of the course that was there. 263 00:10:41,320 --> 00:10:41,840 OK. 264 00:10:41,840 --> 00:10:42,320 OK. 265 00:10:42,320 --> 00:10:46,120 And then, since I had my elder brother in Bombay, who 266 00:10:46,120 --> 00:10:48,520 was who during the internship told me, come here. 267 00:10:48,520 --> 00:10:50,520 Bombay is the place in whatever field you want. 268 00:10:50,520 --> 00:10:51,840 And he was right. 269 00:10:51,840 --> 00:10:53,080 And you have my house. 270 00:10:53,080 --> 00:10:55,440 So again, I got food and residence 271 00:10:55,440 --> 00:10:57,080 in somebody's house. 272 00:10:57,080 --> 00:11:01,000 So I went there, and actually, the most inexplainable part 273 00:11:01,000 --> 00:11:03,440 of my life, it was the next two months 274 00:11:03,440 --> 00:11:07,760 that I spent from April to May or maybe even till July, 275 00:11:07,760 --> 00:11:09,600 where I sat in my brother's house. 276 00:11:09,600 --> 00:11:11,520 And he had a small kid. 277 00:11:11,520 --> 00:11:12,520 And I used to play. 278 00:11:12,520 --> 00:11:14,800 She's still my favorite, my niece. 279 00:11:14,800 --> 00:11:16,720 And I was just playing with her every day. 280 00:11:16,720 --> 00:11:19,400 I didn't attempt to get a job at all. 281 00:11:19,400 --> 00:11:21,680 Because two conflicting thoughts were running in my head. 282 00:11:21,680 --> 00:11:25,240 One is, why will anybody give you a job? 283 00:11:25,240 --> 00:11:26,440 Not in a very negative way. 284 00:11:26,440 --> 00:11:28,800 As in a very factual, clear-headed manner, 285 00:11:28,800 --> 00:11:30,320 I was thinking. 286 00:11:30,320 --> 00:11:30,880 Nobody knows. 287 00:11:30,880 --> 00:11:32,120 You have no experience. 288 00:11:32,120 --> 00:11:33,360 And you're saying, I'm coming to Bombay. 289 00:11:33,360 --> 00:11:35,880 And I couldn't see any reason why anybody should give somebody 290 00:11:35,880 --> 00:11:36,920 like me a job. 291 00:11:36,920 --> 00:11:38,240 That was one. 292 00:11:38,240 --> 00:11:43,280 And the other thing was, maybe I should do something about this, 293 00:11:43,280 --> 00:11:45,040 but I don't know what. 294 00:11:45,040 --> 00:11:47,360 Therefore, the thing happened that in these long 295 00:11:47,360 --> 00:11:50,560 conversations, the two of my friends in Delhi 296 00:11:50,560 --> 00:11:55,480 with this snail mail business, I think all of them, 297 00:11:55,480 --> 00:11:57,440 all the other students who were mostly in Delhi, 298 00:11:57,440 --> 00:11:59,880 and some of them were from Calcutta and somebody else 299 00:11:59,880 --> 00:12:03,840 from Bangalore, I think, they all had been placed, so to say. 300 00:12:03,840 --> 00:12:07,240 And a couple of my close friends got a little worried, 301 00:12:07,240 --> 00:12:08,560 more than me. 302 00:12:08,560 --> 00:12:10,440 And they went and told the course director 303 00:12:10,440 --> 00:12:11,920 that this guy is not doing anything. 304 00:12:11,920 --> 00:12:13,760 And why don't you speak to somebody? 305 00:12:13,760 --> 00:12:15,280 My course director spoke to somebody. 306 00:12:15,280 --> 00:12:18,440 And I got a letter in the mail from Shilpi Advertising 307 00:12:18,440 --> 00:12:23,880 saying that if you're interested in a copy test with us, please. 308 00:12:23,880 --> 00:12:25,280 I remember that language. 309 00:12:25,280 --> 00:12:28,080 Contact the undersigned, that's what it said, 310 00:12:28,080 --> 00:12:29,240 in that much officialese. 311 00:12:29,240 --> 00:12:34,680 And it had some rock parrera, the creative director 312 00:12:34,680 --> 00:12:37,000 of Shilpi saying, if you're interested, come. 313 00:12:37,000 --> 00:12:38,800 I can give you a copy test. 314 00:12:38,800 --> 00:12:40,240 So I went for a copy test. 315 00:12:40,240 --> 00:12:42,040 And it was a remarkable copy test. 316 00:12:42,040 --> 00:12:45,080 I mean, those days, we had, I don't know what it is now, 317 00:12:45,080 --> 00:12:47,160 but we had a lovely copy test. 318 00:12:47,160 --> 00:12:48,000 I quite enjoyed it. 319 00:12:48,000 --> 00:12:50,440 I spent about two, two and a half hours in their office 320 00:12:50,440 --> 00:12:51,520 doing the copy test. 321 00:12:51,520 --> 00:12:53,600 They had questions like, how will you 322 00:12:53,600 --> 00:12:57,960 explain how to tie your shoelaces to a blind man, 323 00:12:57,960 --> 00:13:01,240 for instance, that means you have to use only words to explain 324 00:13:01,240 --> 00:13:02,760 what you're supposed to do. 325 00:13:02,760 --> 00:13:05,560 And it described a spiral staircase in 50 words 326 00:13:05,560 --> 00:13:08,920 without using the word spiral or staircase, for instance. 327 00:13:08,920 --> 00:13:09,480 And so on. 328 00:13:09,480 --> 00:13:11,200 So it was a very, very interesting thing. 329 00:13:11,200 --> 00:13:13,360 But one thing that caught my eye was the very last thing, 330 00:13:13,360 --> 00:13:15,440 which was an attached thing of proofreading, 331 00:13:15,440 --> 00:13:20,520 a page of maybe about 800 words with all deliberate mistakes 332 00:13:20,520 --> 00:13:22,200 and this and that. 333 00:13:22,200 --> 00:13:24,720 And for some reason, I was very good at that, 334 00:13:24,720 --> 00:13:26,880 even though I did my MA in economics. 335 00:13:26,880 --> 00:13:31,840 And I needn't have been that specific or pedantic 336 00:13:31,840 --> 00:13:33,160 about the language. 337 00:13:33,160 --> 00:13:34,080 But I always was. 338 00:13:34,080 --> 00:13:36,240 I had that streak in me that somehow if you're writing 339 00:13:36,240 --> 00:13:37,560 or doing it, do it very well. 340 00:13:37,560 --> 00:13:40,680 Don't write like an ass or don't assume 341 00:13:40,680 --> 00:13:42,000 that you're good at something. 342 00:13:42,000 --> 00:13:44,560 Just make sure that at the very basics, 343 00:13:44,560 --> 00:13:45,480 the grammar is right. 344 00:13:45,480 --> 00:13:48,800 And after that, your content is correct or entertaining 345 00:13:48,800 --> 00:13:49,800 or whatever it's meant to do. 346 00:13:49,800 --> 00:13:50,600 It's a separate issue. 347 00:13:50,600 --> 00:13:54,080 But let's, I mean, it's like your dress up or get up 348 00:13:54,080 --> 00:13:54,880 or whatever it is. 349 00:13:54,880 --> 00:13:56,640 Make sure that some basics are right about it. 350 00:13:56,640 --> 00:13:58,480 And of course, finally, people will judge you 351 00:13:58,480 --> 00:14:00,400 by the substance in any case. 352 00:14:00,400 --> 00:14:02,400 So I had that thing in me. 353 00:14:02,400 --> 00:14:03,040 And I wrote that. 354 00:14:03,040 --> 00:14:04,480 And I forgot about it and went back. 355 00:14:04,480 --> 00:14:06,200 Within about 10 days, I got another letter 356 00:14:06,200 --> 00:14:09,640 in the post saying that regarding your application 357 00:14:09,640 --> 00:14:12,400 for copywriter, can you come and meet the undersigned? 358 00:14:12,400 --> 00:14:14,840 So I went and met that gentleman, 359 00:14:14,840 --> 00:14:17,040 oldish, very old, polished gentleman 360 00:14:17,040 --> 00:14:19,400 and excellent English copywriter. 361 00:14:19,400 --> 00:14:21,840 Some of those people of those days were practically, 362 00:14:21,840 --> 00:14:23,000 they were excellent. 363 00:14:23,000 --> 00:14:24,640 They were seriously excellent. 364 00:14:24,640 --> 00:14:26,200 So he made me sit down. 365 00:14:26,200 --> 00:14:27,720 And I think I told you this before. 366 00:14:27,720 --> 00:14:29,280 And that's why you got the idea also 367 00:14:29,280 --> 00:14:30,920 of this whole business of proofreader. 368 00:14:30,920 --> 00:14:34,520 Because I was thinking whether, I mean, if he's calling me, 369 00:14:34,520 --> 00:14:36,600 I had enough sense to know that he wouldn't call me 370 00:14:36,600 --> 00:14:38,960 all the way and tell me you're not getting this. 371 00:14:38,960 --> 00:14:40,400 Doesn't make any sense. 372 00:14:40,400 --> 00:14:42,240 So I knew that I had got the job. 373 00:14:42,240 --> 00:14:43,800 So all I was thinking in my mind, 374 00:14:43,800 --> 00:14:45,000 how much money should I ask? 375 00:14:45,000 --> 00:14:48,440 And I somehow decided I think I should ask for 1,000 rupees. 376 00:14:48,440 --> 00:14:49,280 I have no idea. 377 00:14:49,280 --> 00:14:50,480 But I got four figures. 378 00:14:50,480 --> 00:14:52,840 1,000 rupees is a big, big sum. 379 00:14:52,840 --> 00:14:55,640 And just ask, let's see. 380 00:14:55,640 --> 00:14:56,840 I mean, at the most, what will happen? 381 00:14:56,840 --> 00:14:57,680 He'll say no. 382 00:14:57,680 --> 00:14:58,520 So let's see. 383 00:14:58,520 --> 00:15:00,600 That was the only idea I had about that interview. 384 00:15:00,600 --> 00:15:03,600 And when I met Rok and he looked at my test, 385 00:15:03,600 --> 00:15:05,720 he had brought out the test and he said he liked, 386 00:15:05,720 --> 00:15:08,520 first thing that he did was to go to the last page. 387 00:15:08,520 --> 00:15:10,440 And he said, this proofreading, 388 00:15:10,440 --> 00:15:13,560 and he showed me that he had written with pencil, 389 00:15:13,560 --> 00:15:15,400 he had ticked all those little, little places 390 00:15:15,400 --> 00:15:17,400 and he had written zero defect. 391 00:15:17,400 --> 00:15:20,600 And not seen this kind of a test in a long while. 392 00:15:20,600 --> 00:15:22,400 So you're very good at it. 393 00:15:22,400 --> 00:15:23,480 Normally, and then he said, 394 00:15:23,480 --> 00:15:26,080 normally people miss this and miss that and miss that, 395 00:15:26,080 --> 00:15:28,200 but you've done this, whatever. 396 00:15:28,200 --> 00:15:29,120 I was more eager to know, 397 00:15:29,120 --> 00:15:31,000 what about all that creative stuff before? 398 00:15:31,000 --> 00:15:33,560 I've written pages and pages of stuff. 399 00:15:33,560 --> 00:15:34,880 And he said, yeah, okay, that was nice. 400 00:15:34,880 --> 00:15:35,720 This is nice. 401 00:15:35,720 --> 00:15:36,760 And he didn't pay that too much. 402 00:15:36,760 --> 00:15:40,880 In his mind, maybe because they had a lot of these public 403 00:15:40,880 --> 00:15:42,800 issue offering kind of clients. 404 00:15:42,800 --> 00:15:45,240 So for him, this proofreading was probably, 405 00:15:45,240 --> 00:15:48,000 now I didn't know. 406 00:15:48,000 --> 00:15:48,840 So he was really- 407 00:15:48,840 --> 00:15:50,640 You were literally manna from heaven. 408 00:15:52,640 --> 00:15:54,360 I can see that now, but at that stage, 409 00:15:54,360 --> 00:15:56,440 I was a little underwhelmed to see, 410 00:15:56,440 --> 00:15:58,200 why is he reacting less than, 411 00:15:58,200 --> 00:16:01,120 I mean, I put in a lot of effort and I thought it was nice. 412 00:16:01,120 --> 00:16:04,040 It was pretty creative and nice and nice imaginative answers. 413 00:16:04,040 --> 00:16:07,280 But his focus was on this whole copywriting business. 414 00:16:07,280 --> 00:16:09,320 I'm sorry, the proofreading business. 415 00:16:09,320 --> 00:16:11,480 And he kept on and on about it. 416 00:16:11,480 --> 00:16:14,640 And then he said, how much do you expect to be paid? 417 00:16:14,640 --> 00:16:18,240 So since I was prepared, I said, I want 1,000 in, 418 00:16:18,240 --> 00:16:19,920 I want 1,000 rupees. 419 00:16:19,920 --> 00:16:21,720 So he said, no, I have your package ready. 420 00:16:21,720 --> 00:16:22,960 And he showed it to me. 421 00:16:22,960 --> 00:16:27,960 And then he said, listen, it's not exactly coming to 1,000 422 00:16:28,080 --> 00:16:30,520 because after the deduction for this, that and the other, 423 00:16:30,520 --> 00:16:34,200 you will be getting 975 in your hand. 424 00:16:34,200 --> 00:16:36,560 But if you take it to the cash that we will be giving you 425 00:16:36,560 --> 00:16:38,680 for library books or something like that, 426 00:16:38,680 --> 00:16:41,760 it'll come to 1,012 or something like that, he said. 427 00:16:41,760 --> 00:16:43,880 Some number just above 1,000. 428 00:16:43,880 --> 00:16:46,560 So I thought, wow, I mean, this is worth it. 429 00:16:46,560 --> 00:16:48,360 And he had already had the thing in. 430 00:16:48,360 --> 00:16:50,600 Nothing to do with my asking, sorry. 431 00:16:50,600 --> 00:16:53,600 No, I'm saying that the universe almost conspired, I said. 432 00:16:55,200 --> 00:16:56,040 Right from the- 433 00:16:56,040 --> 00:16:57,800 This is something that is happening. 434 00:16:57,800 --> 00:16:59,800 And of course it also conspires against, 435 00:16:59,800 --> 00:17:01,680 but it sort of evens out. 436 00:17:01,680 --> 00:17:05,320 It was one of those times when somebody actually had that. 437 00:17:05,320 --> 00:17:07,040 So that is how I got my first job. 438 00:17:07,040 --> 00:17:10,640 And what happened in the first six months was basically, 439 00:17:10,640 --> 00:17:13,480 I was, and I was not called a trainee copyright. 440 00:17:13,480 --> 00:17:15,960 I somehow hold that as a matter of great pride. 441 00:17:15,960 --> 00:17:18,000 Because I know that since, 442 00:17:18,000 --> 00:17:20,080 everybody comes in as a trainee first, 443 00:17:20,080 --> 00:17:21,720 and then they become a junior writer, 444 00:17:21,720 --> 00:17:22,840 and then they become a copywriter, 445 00:17:22,840 --> 00:17:25,680 and then they become a senior copywriter, and so on. 446 00:17:25,680 --> 00:17:28,160 And I was not called a trainee copywriter. 447 00:17:28,160 --> 00:17:30,200 I was called a copywriter. 448 00:17:30,200 --> 00:17:31,040 Copywriter. 449 00:17:31,040 --> 00:17:33,080 There's no junior, trainee. 450 00:17:33,080 --> 00:17:36,000 So that, whatever that formal letter that you got 451 00:17:36,000 --> 00:17:38,000 as a letter of appointment, 452 00:17:38,000 --> 00:17:40,560 appointed me as a copywriter in Shilpi Advertising. 453 00:17:40,560 --> 00:17:41,960 And for some reason, 454 00:17:41,960 --> 00:17:43,640 I posted to my brother saying, 455 00:17:43,640 --> 00:17:44,840 see, they're not calling me trainee. 456 00:17:44,840 --> 00:17:47,600 And he was, he was in atomic energy or something, 457 00:17:47,600 --> 00:17:50,720 and he had no idea of anything of this. 458 00:17:50,720 --> 00:17:52,040 So he said, yeah, okay, fine, cool. 459 00:17:52,040 --> 00:17:53,160 Whatever you say. 460 00:17:53,160 --> 00:17:56,440 So that way, that was a learning experience 461 00:17:56,440 --> 00:17:59,560 in terms of, you know, checking reams and reams of copy. 462 00:17:59,560 --> 00:18:02,040 Because those days, these public issue, 463 00:18:02,040 --> 00:18:03,600 I mean, people may not know these days, 464 00:18:03,600 --> 00:18:06,880 but a lot of what is called IPO now, I think. 465 00:18:06,880 --> 00:18:09,120 But then the government required you to do 466 00:18:09,120 --> 00:18:12,320 a certain kind of declaration of all kinds of information. 467 00:18:12,320 --> 00:18:14,240 Therefore, many companies were forced to take out 468 00:18:14,240 --> 00:18:18,120 huge newspaper full page ads, 469 00:18:18,120 --> 00:18:20,400 which means that contained what, maybe 20,000 words 470 00:18:20,400 --> 00:18:22,440 sometimes of the closely written copy, 471 00:18:22,440 --> 00:18:24,160 but it's all handset. 472 00:18:24,160 --> 00:18:25,560 And therefore, you know, 473 00:18:25,560 --> 00:18:27,960 and you couldn't afford to make mistakes, 474 00:18:27,960 --> 00:18:29,720 like some agencies, 475 00:18:29,720 --> 00:18:34,720 this silly mistake of public issue without the letter L, 476 00:18:34,960 --> 00:18:37,600 which means, you know, something else altogether. 477 00:18:37,600 --> 00:18:40,840 You know, there were terrified people in agencies 478 00:18:40,840 --> 00:18:42,520 where you didn't want those kind of 479 00:18:42,520 --> 00:18:44,640 idiotic mistakes to happen. 480 00:18:44,640 --> 00:18:47,080 After the senior people and the copywriter 481 00:18:47,080 --> 00:18:49,880 and the croc himself had checked it, 482 00:18:49,880 --> 00:18:52,160 it would come to me for a final check. 483 00:18:52,160 --> 00:18:54,120 So I was given this privilege of, 484 00:18:54,120 --> 00:18:56,000 Has Narayan signed on this? 485 00:18:56,000 --> 00:18:59,200 So, I mean, a bit of an important kind of stuff to do, 486 00:18:59,200 --> 00:19:00,840 but it's very tedious. 487 00:19:00,840 --> 00:19:03,440 I mean, I know that I still love profiling. 488 00:19:03,440 --> 00:19:04,640 I still like it. 489 00:19:04,640 --> 00:19:06,200 It's a lovely thing to do, 490 00:19:06,200 --> 00:19:08,600 to be careful about one's piece and cues 491 00:19:08,600 --> 00:19:09,440 and all the rest of that, 492 00:19:09,440 --> 00:19:11,000 but it was tedious. 493 00:19:11,000 --> 00:19:12,600 I mean, you can't do it for six months like that. 494 00:19:12,600 --> 00:19:13,800 Yeah, it is tedious. 495 00:19:13,800 --> 00:19:15,880 Yeah, so at some point, I mean, 496 00:19:15,880 --> 00:19:19,400 I also got some campaigns to do and it all went off well. 497 00:19:19,400 --> 00:19:21,480 So that was what my first job was, 498 00:19:21,480 --> 00:19:23,720 mostly proofreading and some creative work 499 00:19:23,720 --> 00:19:26,280 and being called copywriter rather than a trainee. 500 00:19:27,640 --> 00:19:31,080 But by this time, I think apart from a change of agency, 501 00:19:31,080 --> 00:19:33,880 you are fairly clear that advertising 502 00:19:33,880 --> 00:19:35,920 is where you want it to be. 503 00:19:35,920 --> 00:19:36,760 That didn't change. 504 00:19:36,760 --> 00:19:39,040 Yeah, I think so. 505 00:19:39,040 --> 00:19:42,280 I think I was pretty clear because when I made friends 506 00:19:42,280 --> 00:19:43,960 and I was figuring out what people were, 507 00:19:43,960 --> 00:19:46,680 see for me, I don't know, maybe for everybody it is. 508 00:19:46,680 --> 00:19:47,520 I don't know. 509 00:19:47,520 --> 00:19:49,480 For me, money was quite an important thing. 510 00:19:49,480 --> 00:19:51,880 So I couldn't at one level believe 511 00:19:51,880 --> 00:19:54,480 that they pay you for this. 512 00:19:54,480 --> 00:19:57,840 See, I don't know if it's snacks of naivety 513 00:19:57,840 --> 00:19:59,440 or arrogance or what, I don't know, 514 00:19:59,440 --> 00:20:02,040 but I was thinking, they give you money to do this. 515 00:20:02,040 --> 00:20:03,560 This is not that hard. 516 00:20:03,560 --> 00:20:06,880 I mean, I was yet to meet all the multinational clients 517 00:20:06,880 --> 00:20:08,720 and this and that, all that comes in the future. 518 00:20:08,720 --> 00:20:11,360 But in the first, I'm not sure it is. 519 00:20:11,360 --> 00:20:13,240 It's like this is money for jam. 520 00:20:13,240 --> 00:20:15,760 I mean, you're just doing something which is happy 521 00:20:15,760 --> 00:20:19,640 and there is nothing much to really strive 522 00:20:19,640 --> 00:20:20,960 and struggle and all that. 523 00:20:20,960 --> 00:20:23,440 This comes naturally and there are other people around 524 00:20:23,440 --> 00:20:25,680 and you get company and you can sit with the art guys 525 00:20:25,680 --> 00:20:29,320 and figure out things and working later was not a problem. 526 00:20:29,320 --> 00:20:33,320 And I was also unmarried and it is all sort of a nice thing 527 00:20:33,320 --> 00:20:35,360 to be happening and then to think that, wow, man, 528 00:20:35,360 --> 00:20:37,200 somebody is paying you for this. 529 00:20:37,200 --> 00:20:39,720 You felt like you were conning somebody kind of thing 530 00:20:39,720 --> 00:20:40,680 and why not? 531 00:20:40,680 --> 00:20:43,320 And if somebody wants to pay me for this, fantastic. 532 00:20:43,320 --> 00:20:47,280 So yes, therefore I think I fell in love with advertising 533 00:20:47,280 --> 00:20:48,840 not so much for this or that. 534 00:20:48,840 --> 00:20:51,600 It was basically that I could earn money 535 00:20:51,600 --> 00:20:52,920 and good money at that. 536 00:20:52,920 --> 00:20:55,640 When I asked senior writers how much they were earning 537 00:20:55,640 --> 00:20:57,480 and then creative directors and they would say, 538 00:20:57,480 --> 00:20:58,880 not just me, this is what I'm earning, 539 00:20:58,880 --> 00:21:00,400 but somebody is earning that much. 540 00:21:00,400 --> 00:21:01,240 I would say, what? 541 00:21:01,240 --> 00:21:03,000 They paid this much money at that time? 542 00:21:03,000 --> 00:21:05,880 Wow, so which means I could see that in four or five years, 543 00:21:05,880 --> 00:21:07,680 I could very well be earning that kind of money 544 00:21:07,680 --> 00:21:09,680 and I did too. 545 00:21:09,680 --> 00:21:14,680 And it was always, and I've never felt that I needed more. 546 00:21:14,800 --> 00:21:16,800 At every stage in my life till even now, 547 00:21:16,800 --> 00:21:18,920 I used to feel vaguely that I'm being overweight. 548 00:21:18,920 --> 00:21:20,440 I don't know if that is a common thing 549 00:21:20,440 --> 00:21:22,000 among other people or not. 550 00:21:22,000 --> 00:21:23,840 I always used to think that. 551 00:21:23,840 --> 00:21:26,680 I'm scared that I'm somewhere and they are paying me 552 00:21:26,680 --> 00:21:28,960 and I've never asked for a raise ever. 553 00:21:28,960 --> 00:21:31,840 I've never asked for a raise ever because I didn't need to. 554 00:21:31,840 --> 00:21:34,120 I don't know, I felt they were paying quite a lot 555 00:21:34,120 --> 00:21:36,560 and every time you changed, they gave you 20% more, 556 00:21:36,560 --> 00:21:38,320 sometimes 25% more once or twice 557 00:21:38,320 --> 00:21:40,360 and then you said, okay, cool. 558 00:21:40,360 --> 00:21:42,160 So there was no, I don't remember negotiating 559 00:21:42,160 --> 00:21:45,840 with anybody, I don't, or maybe at the end of the day, 560 00:21:45,840 --> 00:21:47,400 once you have a certain amount of money, 561 00:21:47,400 --> 00:21:50,880 my temperament has always been, it's enough. 562 00:21:50,880 --> 00:21:55,040 I wanted that money, but my travel and various hobbies 563 00:21:55,040 --> 00:21:59,600 at various points in time, but otherwise it was okay. 564 00:21:59,600 --> 00:22:01,360 I had no complaints about on the money front. 565 00:22:01,360 --> 00:22:03,960 So how did the next move happen? 566 00:22:03,960 --> 00:22:07,440 See, I was about almost to the date I was there from, 567 00:22:07,440 --> 00:22:12,280 for a year in Shilpi in Bombay and there was a call 568 00:22:12,280 --> 00:22:17,280 and there is the studio, it's like a line of artists 569 00:22:17,720 --> 00:22:20,440 with their artboards in front of them, no longer a site. 570 00:22:20,440 --> 00:22:21,560 Nowadays, everybody has. 571 00:22:21,560 --> 00:22:24,080 No longer the case, yes, I know exactly what you're talking about. 572 00:22:24,080 --> 00:22:26,400 Yeah, so people of a certain generation may know 573 00:22:26,400 --> 00:22:27,560 that there were these boards 574 00:22:27,560 --> 00:22:29,320 and there were these half broken blades, 575 00:22:29,320 --> 00:22:31,600 Bharat blades for cutting and thing, 576 00:22:31,600 --> 00:22:32,760 and they had cardboard underneath 577 00:22:32,760 --> 00:22:34,080 so that the blade didn't cut through 578 00:22:34,080 --> 00:22:35,240 and spoil the wooden furniture. 579 00:22:35,240 --> 00:22:37,440 And the smell of that solution, 580 00:22:37,440 --> 00:22:38,280 there was some solution which is- 581 00:22:38,280 --> 00:22:40,560 The upper skills, I can remember that smell. 582 00:22:40,560 --> 00:22:42,840 And yeah, and they had to paste the artworks and all that. 583 00:22:42,840 --> 00:22:44,440 So there were a line of four or five artists 584 00:22:44,440 --> 00:22:45,280 in the line that I sat. 585 00:22:45,280 --> 00:22:47,920 I sat at the very back and there was a Hindi copywriter 586 00:22:47,920 --> 00:22:49,800 and somebody else and then me. 587 00:22:49,800 --> 00:22:52,120 And to my left was the very senior copywriter 588 00:22:52,120 --> 00:22:53,680 whom I know to this day. 589 00:22:53,680 --> 00:22:56,920 This row went on about eight or nine deep. 590 00:22:56,920 --> 00:23:00,560 And at the end sat the master of the whole thing, 591 00:23:00,560 --> 00:23:01,880 which was the studio manager 592 00:23:01,880 --> 00:23:05,280 who was in most agencies, the very, very powerful guy. 593 00:23:05,280 --> 00:23:08,360 The accounts guys dreaded to go to these kind of guys 594 00:23:08,360 --> 00:23:09,600 because they were the traffic managers. 595 00:23:09,600 --> 00:23:11,880 And they'd say, no, tell your client this, get out. 596 00:23:11,880 --> 00:23:13,200 I don't do all this thing here. 597 00:23:13,200 --> 00:23:14,520 They would say anything. 598 00:23:14,520 --> 00:23:16,520 And because they were very clear their jobs, 599 00:23:16,520 --> 00:23:17,520 they couldn't be touched. 600 00:23:17,520 --> 00:23:19,000 And they generally knew everything. 601 00:23:19,000 --> 00:23:21,040 His name was Mr. Malam. 602 00:23:21,040 --> 00:23:23,880 Everybody's was, it was a advertising agency. 603 00:23:23,880 --> 00:23:25,840 So everybody was encouraged to call. 604 00:23:25,840 --> 00:23:28,200 Even as a trainee, I could call the MD of the agency 605 00:23:28,200 --> 00:23:31,560 who was a Roger Pereira and everybody called him Roger. 606 00:23:31,560 --> 00:23:33,680 And there was this rock who was called Rocky 607 00:23:33,680 --> 00:23:35,400 and so on with Nandita. 608 00:23:35,400 --> 00:23:37,560 And so everybody was, although they were all many, many, 609 00:23:37,560 --> 00:23:40,160 I mean, they were all very senior people to me. 610 00:23:40,160 --> 00:23:41,880 Everybody was called by their name, 611 00:23:41,880 --> 00:23:43,960 but the studio manager was Mr. Malam. 612 00:23:43,960 --> 00:23:45,440 You'd never said Malam to him. 613 00:23:45,440 --> 00:23:46,280 I don't know why. 614 00:23:46,280 --> 00:23:47,120 You don't play around with that. 615 00:23:47,120 --> 00:23:49,040 Very, very forbidding. 616 00:23:49,040 --> 00:23:52,760 So now Mr. Malam was the guy with the black telephone 617 00:23:52,760 --> 00:23:55,320 and he got a call. 618 00:23:55,320 --> 00:23:57,080 He said, Narayan. 619 00:23:57,080 --> 00:24:00,800 So I was sitting, I hadn't given the number to anybody. 620 00:24:00,800 --> 00:24:03,640 So there's no reason for me to give the studio manager's 621 00:24:03,640 --> 00:24:05,440 number to anybody at all. 622 00:24:05,440 --> 00:24:06,640 So I thought it could be a mistake. 623 00:24:06,640 --> 00:24:08,600 And I went there and there was somebody who was saying, 624 00:24:08,600 --> 00:24:11,000 I'm the finance director or somebody. 625 00:24:11,000 --> 00:24:13,560 It was Mrs. Sista of the Sista's organization, 626 00:24:13,560 --> 00:24:15,720 which later on became Sachi. 627 00:24:15,720 --> 00:24:16,880 And she said, I've heard about you 628 00:24:16,880 --> 00:24:18,360 from some as a mess something. 629 00:24:18,360 --> 00:24:19,680 We are looking for a senior writer 630 00:24:19,680 --> 00:24:21,280 for a Bangalore office for Sista's. 631 00:24:21,280 --> 00:24:23,320 Would you be interested? 632 00:24:23,320 --> 00:24:25,600 So I said, yes, just on the spot. 633 00:24:25,600 --> 00:24:28,280 I mean, I hadn't thought of anything. 634 00:24:28,280 --> 00:24:30,440 But if somebody's calling, I don't know. 635 00:24:30,440 --> 00:24:32,600 I didn't know why I should say no. 636 00:24:32,600 --> 00:24:33,920 And Bangalore seemed like a nice city. 637 00:24:33,920 --> 00:24:35,720 I'd never been to Bangalore before. 638 00:24:35,720 --> 00:24:37,160 And I was by myself. 639 00:24:37,160 --> 00:24:39,480 I mean, of course, with my brother and family. 640 00:24:39,480 --> 00:24:42,160 Otherwise, there was nothing much. 641 00:24:42,160 --> 00:24:44,640 And I was sure that obviously there'll be more money. 642 00:24:44,640 --> 00:24:45,480 They're calling you. 643 00:24:45,480 --> 00:24:46,760 They'll give you something more. 644 00:24:46,760 --> 00:24:49,600 And so I said, yes, on the phone. 645 00:24:49,600 --> 00:24:52,840 And I put it down and Mr. Malam said, you got a job offer. 646 00:24:52,840 --> 00:24:56,120 That man knew everything. 647 00:24:56,120 --> 00:24:57,920 You couldn't get past him. 648 00:24:57,920 --> 00:24:58,920 So I said, no. 649 00:24:58,920 --> 00:25:00,320 What makes you think that? 650 00:25:00,320 --> 00:25:01,680 Boss, I've been here. 651 00:25:01,680 --> 00:25:02,200 I know. 652 00:25:02,200 --> 00:25:03,560 I know all that. 653 00:25:03,560 --> 00:25:06,080 So I told him, Mr. Malam, you're mistaken this time. 654 00:25:06,080 --> 00:25:07,040 Or something like that. 655 00:25:07,040 --> 00:25:08,240 I said, and I walked away. 656 00:25:08,240 --> 00:25:12,240 And I was thinking, this man is a magician or something. 657 00:25:12,240 --> 00:25:14,000 I don't know what he was. 658 00:25:14,000 --> 00:25:15,640 Obviously, he's been there for years. 659 00:25:15,640 --> 00:25:17,240 He's given enough of these phone calls 660 00:25:17,240 --> 00:25:19,640 to people from strange people asking for things. 661 00:25:19,640 --> 00:25:21,640 But how did it land up at his? 662 00:25:21,640 --> 00:25:24,040 Normally, the receptionist would get it, right? 663 00:25:24,040 --> 00:25:27,080 How did it end up at Mr. Malam? 664 00:25:27,080 --> 00:25:29,240 I don't know why it didn't at the receptionist's phone. 665 00:25:29,240 --> 00:25:32,400 I can understand because you could get it off the phone book. 666 00:25:32,400 --> 00:25:34,120 I don't know if people know that there used 667 00:25:34,120 --> 00:25:36,520 to be a telephone book which was this. 668 00:25:36,520 --> 00:25:37,480 Yeah, exactly. 669 00:25:37,480 --> 00:25:39,400 You can kill somebody if you threw it 670 00:25:39,400 --> 00:25:41,240 at their head or something. 671 00:25:41,240 --> 00:25:42,200 It's no longer there. 672 00:25:42,200 --> 00:25:44,480 But those kind of books were available. 673 00:25:44,480 --> 00:25:47,480 And if you searched under S and you turned the pages, 674 00:25:47,480 --> 00:25:49,080 you could read Shilpi Advertising 675 00:25:49,080 --> 00:25:50,280 and you could call that number. 676 00:25:50,280 --> 00:25:51,360 It was freely available. 677 00:25:51,360 --> 00:25:54,800 But for some reason, I thought that the creative department, 678 00:25:54,800 --> 00:25:57,880 which was attended to by Malay. 679 00:25:57,880 --> 00:25:58,840 So that's the way. 680 00:25:58,840 --> 00:26:00,720 And then I went and met his sister. 681 00:26:00,720 --> 00:26:02,760 And she said, I can give you this package offer. 682 00:26:02,760 --> 00:26:06,160 And it was some 2 and 1 half times what I was earning then, 683 00:26:06,160 --> 00:26:09,000 even after an increment from Shilpi at the end of one year. 684 00:26:09,000 --> 00:26:10,600 So there was nothing for me to think. 685 00:26:10,600 --> 00:26:12,760 I said, yes, I'm going now. 686 00:26:12,760 --> 00:26:13,280 Yeah. 687 00:26:13,280 --> 00:26:15,840 No, I am saying one thing that's missing from everything 688 00:26:15,840 --> 00:26:18,320 that you've said so far is something 689 00:26:18,320 --> 00:26:20,920 that young people today face an enormous amount of, 690 00:26:20,920 --> 00:26:23,040 which is pressure on the job. 691 00:26:23,040 --> 00:26:24,960 You talk to anyone and they're at stress. 692 00:26:24,960 --> 00:26:28,360 But you're like, you're breezing through. 693 00:26:28,360 --> 00:26:29,080 So what? 694 00:26:29,080 --> 00:26:31,080 No, it appears like that. 695 00:26:31,080 --> 00:26:33,720 I know that it probably appears like that. 696 00:26:33,720 --> 00:26:35,320 I think about it sometimes. 697 00:26:35,320 --> 00:26:37,720 There must have been stressful days. 698 00:26:37,720 --> 00:26:41,560 It is just that I know I've come across people later 699 00:26:41,560 --> 00:26:42,560 in my career also. 700 00:26:42,560 --> 00:26:45,040 And I feel that the way I could have been, 701 00:26:45,040 --> 00:26:48,800 and I have been useful to many of these people, 702 00:26:48,800 --> 00:26:52,120 is to encourage them to get a life of their own 703 00:26:52,120 --> 00:26:54,440 outside of the office, god damn it. 704 00:26:54,440 --> 00:26:56,440 That's all that's been my life. 705 00:26:56,440 --> 00:26:59,200 Nothing is worth that much. 706 00:26:59,200 --> 00:27:02,640 See, once I know that my money needs are met and I have a job, 707 00:27:02,640 --> 00:27:04,440 that's about it. 708 00:27:04,440 --> 00:27:07,280 Like my mother's, I'm sorry, my wife's mother, 709 00:27:07,280 --> 00:27:09,200 she used to tell my wife long ago, 710 00:27:09,200 --> 00:27:12,480 before I came into their lives, that when you come back 711 00:27:12,480 --> 00:27:15,520 from office, she told her daughter, 712 00:27:15,520 --> 00:27:19,560 like you discard your shoes or slippers at the doorway, 713 00:27:19,560 --> 00:27:23,600 leave your work there when you enter the house. 714 00:27:23,600 --> 00:27:25,920 I think that is a very sensible way of looking at it. 715 00:27:25,920 --> 00:27:27,960 Very sensible at times. 716 00:27:27,960 --> 00:27:30,200 Probably more valid even today, because people 717 00:27:30,200 --> 00:27:33,000 are so tied up in their own definitions and identities 718 00:27:33,000 --> 00:27:34,680 and whatnot. 719 00:27:34,680 --> 00:27:37,560 Why should some, it's something you do for money. 720 00:27:37,560 --> 00:27:39,600 It doesn't mean that you're disrespecting it. 721 00:27:39,600 --> 00:27:42,200 It doesn't mean, I used to work on some of the better 722 00:27:42,200 --> 00:27:43,680 campaigns and all that. 723 00:27:43,680 --> 00:27:46,560 I really don't want to get into all that, but some probably 724 00:27:46,560 --> 00:27:48,440 very, very big brands that all of you guys know, 725 00:27:48,440 --> 00:27:50,080 I've worked on all of that. 726 00:27:50,080 --> 00:27:52,560 So it's not like I was shirking and actually scanning people 727 00:27:52,560 --> 00:27:53,760 and taking money and doing nothing. 728 00:27:53,760 --> 00:27:54,360 I was not that. 729 00:27:54,360 --> 00:27:58,000 I was getting my 100% and I've done my hard yards, 730 00:27:58,000 --> 00:28:00,600 I've done my midnight oil and all the rest of that. 731 00:28:00,600 --> 00:28:01,120 So there is no... 732 00:28:01,120 --> 00:28:02,840 Don't let you have. 733 00:28:02,840 --> 00:28:05,800 But I was also doing other things. 734 00:28:05,800 --> 00:28:07,560 This was not the be all or end all. 735 00:28:07,560 --> 00:28:11,360 I have, this is one thing that used to strike me those days 736 00:28:11,360 --> 00:28:14,000 in my mid-career when I used to be sent to Amsterdam or New 737 00:28:14,000 --> 00:28:16,760 York or whatever some conference, this or Hong Kong, 738 00:28:16,760 --> 00:28:19,000 especially the Europeans and the Americans. 739 00:28:19,000 --> 00:28:20,920 And the thing that you learn from them, 740 00:28:20,920 --> 00:28:24,600 even if you had a project during a normal work day 741 00:28:24,600 --> 00:28:27,080 as a workshop, there would be, you know, 742 00:28:27,080 --> 00:28:28,920 you are put with three other strangers. 743 00:28:28,920 --> 00:28:30,880 So 20 people in a room, say the creative directors 744 00:28:30,880 --> 00:28:32,880 from different countries are all meeting together. 745 00:28:32,880 --> 00:28:36,720 There's some one head honcho holding the workshop and saying, 746 00:28:36,720 --> 00:28:38,680 why don't you guys take a theme of, you know, 747 00:28:38,680 --> 00:28:41,720 water scarcity in the world or some such thing, you know, 748 00:28:41,720 --> 00:28:44,800 or women's issues or something and come up with something. 749 00:28:44,800 --> 00:28:47,480 And so you'll all be separated into four or five groups, 750 00:28:47,480 --> 00:28:48,320 et cetera. 751 00:28:48,320 --> 00:28:49,920 And also everybody was new to everybody. 752 00:28:49,920 --> 00:28:52,240 And you're given just half an hour or 20 minutes sometimes 753 00:28:52,240 --> 00:28:53,480 to do this part of the exercise, 754 00:28:53,480 --> 00:28:55,560 that part of the exercise and all that. 755 00:28:55,560 --> 00:28:59,560 And it was quite, you know, on the one hand nervous, 756 00:28:59,560 --> 00:29:00,960 it made you feel, but on the other hand, 757 00:29:00,960 --> 00:29:04,320 it was also energizing because you're meeting with other 758 00:29:04,320 --> 00:29:05,800 people from different countries, 759 00:29:05,800 --> 00:29:07,160 but essentially the same kind of, 760 00:29:07,160 --> 00:29:09,960 when you find out that it's just about the same thing 761 00:29:09,960 --> 00:29:11,400 everywhere, it's not like, you know, 762 00:29:11,400 --> 00:29:13,760 they are sharper, better, greater or anything. 763 00:29:13,760 --> 00:29:15,080 It's the same thing. 764 00:29:15,080 --> 00:29:16,280 Yeah. 765 00:29:16,280 --> 00:29:19,880 Yeah. But the striking point was everybody was exactly 766 00:29:19,880 --> 00:29:23,560 finishing at 20 minutes because at five, five 30, 767 00:29:23,560 --> 00:29:25,720 they are in the speech resort. 768 00:29:25,720 --> 00:29:27,320 They want to go out surfing. 769 00:29:27,320 --> 00:29:28,240 They want to go out swimming. 770 00:29:28,240 --> 00:29:29,080 They want to go out something. 771 00:29:29,080 --> 00:29:30,480 They've got their girlfriends or boyfriends 772 00:29:30,480 --> 00:29:32,880 or the significant other or whatever it is. 773 00:29:32,880 --> 00:29:34,400 And they want to get out. 774 00:29:34,400 --> 00:29:38,040 Whereas first Indians, I've got everything in mind. 775 00:29:38,040 --> 00:29:39,400 This is, I, what do I have? 776 00:29:39,400 --> 00:29:40,520 I don't have anything to do. 777 00:29:40,520 --> 00:29:41,840 I mean, this foreign country, 778 00:29:41,840 --> 00:29:45,640 I don't swim and I don't certainly surf. 779 00:29:45,640 --> 00:29:47,600 I don't know anything of these things, these guys do. 780 00:29:47,600 --> 00:29:49,360 So I was waiting for dinner, eat food, 781 00:29:49,360 --> 00:29:51,040 read some book and go to sleep. 782 00:29:51,040 --> 00:29:52,200 So when you come back to India, 783 00:29:52,200 --> 00:29:53,800 I had a lot of hobbies, but when, 784 00:29:53,800 --> 00:29:56,040 when you come back to India, 785 00:29:56,040 --> 00:29:58,680 I used to tell all these guys, just get a life of you, 786 00:29:58,680 --> 00:30:02,680 be interested in something else so that you don't think, 787 00:30:02,680 --> 00:30:05,320 most of the Indians think that the evening is there. 788 00:30:05,320 --> 00:30:07,360 No, night is there. 789 00:30:07,360 --> 00:30:10,600 Therefore, you know, the whole day they waste, 790 00:30:10,600 --> 00:30:12,800 they don't do anything much because to the back 791 00:30:12,800 --> 00:30:13,640 of their heads, they know, 792 00:30:13,640 --> 00:30:15,880 are a seven o'clock means eight o'clock. 793 00:30:15,880 --> 00:30:17,120 It's there. Yeah. 794 00:30:17,120 --> 00:30:18,760 Kind of some company, 795 00:30:18,760 --> 00:30:19,600 they are eight o'clock. 796 00:30:19,600 --> 00:30:21,360 You also get dinner on the house. 797 00:30:21,360 --> 00:30:23,440 So, you know, all these things, 798 00:30:23,440 --> 00:30:25,000 because you don't have anything else to do. 799 00:30:25,000 --> 00:30:27,360 And especially the younger people who are not married 800 00:30:27,360 --> 00:30:28,880 and they have no particular things. 801 00:30:28,880 --> 00:30:30,760 And sometimes even the guys who supposedly 802 00:30:30,760 --> 00:30:34,160 had these responsibilities, somehow work was all, 803 00:30:34,160 --> 00:30:37,400 they probably didn't intend it to be that way, 804 00:30:37,400 --> 00:30:38,920 but work consumes them completely. 805 00:30:38,920 --> 00:30:40,800 Therefore their friends, who are their friends? 806 00:30:40,800 --> 00:30:43,040 Their friends are at the workplace. 807 00:30:43,040 --> 00:30:43,880 Yeah. You know, 808 00:30:43,880 --> 00:30:45,640 we used to have friends in the house 809 00:30:45,640 --> 00:30:47,120 and their colony where we stayed. 810 00:30:47,120 --> 00:30:47,960 Right. Right. 811 00:30:47,960 --> 00:30:49,400 Of course you also need some friendships 812 00:30:49,400 --> 00:30:51,960 when you're working, but friendships at work are 813 00:30:51,960 --> 00:30:54,520 at some level competitive, I think. 814 00:30:54,520 --> 00:30:57,320 It's not pure friendship in practice. 815 00:30:57,320 --> 00:30:59,560 It has, you know, if you are at your home friends, 816 00:30:59,560 --> 00:31:00,840 somebody is an accountant, 817 00:31:00,840 --> 00:31:03,280 somebody is doing something else completely. 818 00:31:03,280 --> 00:31:04,600 So you won't tell a person, 819 00:31:04,600 --> 00:31:06,200 like, I got rejected, man. 820 00:31:06,200 --> 00:31:08,440 My client got, you know, damn angry and all that. 821 00:31:08,440 --> 00:31:09,280 The girl will listen to you and say, 822 00:31:09,280 --> 00:31:11,480 I got to go eat some chaat or something. 823 00:31:11,480 --> 00:31:13,440 So they don't understand you. 824 00:31:13,440 --> 00:31:15,120 And it's a nice thing. 825 00:31:15,120 --> 00:31:16,960 If you tell your colleague that this guy, 826 00:31:16,960 --> 00:31:17,920 this client behaved badly, 827 00:31:17,920 --> 00:31:20,280 you're going to get significant stories from them 828 00:31:20,280 --> 00:31:22,920 two times per hour and two times versa. 829 00:31:22,920 --> 00:31:24,200 So it never ends. 830 00:31:24,200 --> 00:31:27,160 Therefore I always tell people, 831 00:31:27,160 --> 00:31:28,720 work has its place. 832 00:31:28,720 --> 00:31:29,840 Please keep that in mind. 833 00:31:29,840 --> 00:31:31,520 It has its place, yeah. 834 00:31:31,520 --> 00:31:34,560 What is your method or did you arrive 835 00:31:34,560 --> 00:31:37,160 at a way of getting an idea? 836 00:31:37,160 --> 00:31:38,320 Do you ever think that, 837 00:31:38,320 --> 00:31:41,160 oh, I have to crack it by this time and this is what... 838 00:31:41,160 --> 00:31:44,520 So did you have certain ways of working, 839 00:31:44,520 --> 00:31:48,000 of taking the brief and then seeing how you would come up 840 00:31:48,000 --> 00:31:48,960 with the idea? 841 00:31:48,960 --> 00:31:51,200 See, the thing is, between various clients, 842 00:31:51,200 --> 00:31:53,040 especially when you work with multinationals 843 00:31:53,040 --> 00:31:56,600 like Unilever and Procter & Gamble then, 844 00:31:56,600 --> 00:31:59,760 and even Godrej and the more Tata's, 845 00:31:59,760 --> 00:32:02,040 a certain kind of, what shall I say, 846 00:32:02,040 --> 00:32:04,200 enlightened companies with a lot of layers 847 00:32:04,200 --> 00:32:06,520 and of management and this and that, 848 00:32:06,520 --> 00:32:10,920 they had processified this whole business of giving briefs. 849 00:32:10,920 --> 00:32:13,520 So which means that, even their managers 850 00:32:13,520 --> 00:32:14,960 and product managers and all that 851 00:32:14,960 --> 00:32:17,040 were supposed to get some internal approvals 852 00:32:17,040 --> 00:32:18,960 and therefore there was a system to it. 853 00:32:18,960 --> 00:32:20,680 And therefore there was also a system 854 00:32:20,680 --> 00:32:24,520 of evaluating advertising that does the creative. 855 00:32:24,520 --> 00:32:27,880 It's like a non-creative person's way 856 00:32:27,880 --> 00:32:29,360 of appraising creative. 857 00:32:29,360 --> 00:32:31,320 It's like having a checklist. 858 00:32:31,320 --> 00:32:32,160 Is it surprising? 859 00:32:32,160 --> 00:32:33,000 Is it this? 860 00:32:33,000 --> 00:32:33,840 Is it brief? 861 00:32:33,840 --> 00:32:34,680 Is it something? 862 00:32:34,680 --> 00:32:35,520 Will my target... 863 00:32:35,520 --> 00:32:37,200 So it was all that and then you did one checklist 864 00:32:37,200 --> 00:32:38,040 kind of stuff. 865 00:32:38,040 --> 00:32:39,040 That is on the one hand. 866 00:32:39,040 --> 00:32:41,080 On the other hand, you could meet businessmen 867 00:32:41,080 --> 00:32:43,200 who just went by gut and you said, I like that. 868 00:32:43,200 --> 00:32:45,600 Let's go with it kind of stuff or I don't know. 869 00:32:46,800 --> 00:32:49,240 So then there was a in-between kind of... 870 00:32:49,240 --> 00:32:52,440 So there was a whole range of completely processified guys. 871 00:32:52,440 --> 00:32:54,960 So you learn to work with, for example, 872 00:32:54,960 --> 00:32:56,680 when I used to work with De Beers 873 00:32:56,680 --> 00:33:00,240 and it was a very, very British stultified system 874 00:33:00,240 --> 00:33:03,040 of saying this brand is like this all over the world. 875 00:33:03,040 --> 00:33:05,840 It will use shadows, which was a creative technique 876 00:33:05,840 --> 00:33:09,240 of only showing not real people, but only showing shadows. 877 00:33:09,240 --> 00:33:11,440 So if a couple were to meet each other 878 00:33:11,440 --> 00:33:12,440 and embrace or something, 879 00:33:12,440 --> 00:33:14,720 then it would happen as shadows on the floor. 880 00:33:14,720 --> 00:33:16,760 Because I mean, there was a reason it was all in black 881 00:33:16,760 --> 00:33:18,880 and white and then the diamonds stood very well 882 00:33:18,880 --> 00:33:19,800 against black and white. 883 00:33:19,800 --> 00:33:22,320 So there was an aesthetic reason for doing that. 884 00:33:22,320 --> 00:33:23,320 But no need to make it a rule 885 00:33:23,320 --> 00:33:26,000 because in somewhat emotional countries like Asia 886 00:33:26,000 --> 00:33:29,600 and then for example, Mexico and few other countries, 887 00:33:29,600 --> 00:33:32,200 emotion sells and these kind of, 888 00:33:32,200 --> 00:33:35,840 you can't design shadows and say that, 889 00:33:35,840 --> 00:33:37,400 you've got something happening in India. 890 00:33:37,400 --> 00:33:39,440 So I had to fight with them for about two years, 891 00:33:39,440 --> 00:33:40,880 but they got it. 892 00:33:40,880 --> 00:33:42,720 And we did the shadows, we did the shadows. 893 00:33:42,720 --> 00:33:46,360 You have to do it also and tell them 894 00:33:46,360 --> 00:33:47,240 and within the shadows, 895 00:33:47,240 --> 00:33:51,040 I made the Indian gesture of a bride bending down 896 00:33:51,040 --> 00:33:54,240 in shadow form to touch the elders feet, 897 00:33:54,240 --> 00:33:55,360 her own father or whatever. 898 00:33:55,360 --> 00:33:57,240 And all those little Indian things we introduced 899 00:33:57,240 --> 00:33:58,640 and the music was there. 900 00:33:58,640 --> 00:34:01,120 But I told them, listen, you can go far more than this. 901 00:34:01,120 --> 00:34:04,040 They went by numbers and research in a big way, 902 00:34:04,040 --> 00:34:07,320 not silly research and not over small sample sizes, 903 00:34:07,320 --> 00:34:10,880 really serious, big quality they used to do. 904 00:34:10,880 --> 00:34:12,720 And they understood the point. 905 00:34:12,720 --> 00:34:13,840 In two years, they changed round. 906 00:34:13,840 --> 00:34:15,240 India was one of the very few countries 907 00:34:15,240 --> 00:34:16,400 where we started using. 908 00:34:16,400 --> 00:34:18,360 We still stuck to black and white, of course, 909 00:34:18,360 --> 00:34:21,400 because it actually shows up the diamond 910 00:34:21,400 --> 00:34:22,640 without any distracting colors. 911 00:34:22,640 --> 00:34:24,400 But we had little distracting 912 00:34:24,400 --> 00:34:25,600 and the stories became something else. 913 00:34:25,600 --> 00:34:28,000 And of course, we used Aishwarya Rai for the first time 914 00:34:28,000 --> 00:34:30,040 before she became the Aishwarya Rai 915 00:34:30,040 --> 00:34:32,320 in the launching of Nakshatra diamond. 916 00:34:32,320 --> 00:34:34,200 And it took off all places, 917 00:34:34,200 --> 00:34:37,080 some place like Coimbatore on the map, 918 00:34:37,080 --> 00:34:38,760 the sales map of the world sales map. 919 00:34:38,760 --> 00:34:41,440 There was a New Delhi and there was a Mumbai 920 00:34:41,440 --> 00:34:43,080 and there was a Hong Kong and there was Japan 921 00:34:43,080 --> 00:34:45,040 and there was some place in, I mean, Tokyo 922 00:34:45,040 --> 00:34:47,280 and some place, Shanghai and of course, New York 923 00:34:47,280 --> 00:34:48,120 and all those places. 924 00:34:48,120 --> 00:34:50,720 And suddenly there was one Coimbatore. 925 00:34:50,720 --> 00:34:52,240 One of the directors there was asking me 926 00:34:52,240 --> 00:34:53,400 when we went for some briefing 927 00:34:53,400 --> 00:34:55,640 or some campaign presentation, 928 00:34:55,640 --> 00:34:58,200 where is this Coimbatore or something. 929 00:34:58,200 --> 00:34:59,360 So they were very surprised. 930 00:34:59,360 --> 00:35:04,160 So suddenly this Nakshatra changed their fortunes. 931 00:35:04,160 --> 00:35:07,680 So therefore the process depended on different clients 932 00:35:07,680 --> 00:35:11,080 and working with them and then working as a team within 933 00:35:11,080 --> 00:35:12,200 and saying, you know, can we, 934 00:35:12,200 --> 00:35:14,800 because our job is to one, I see, 935 00:35:14,800 --> 00:35:17,320 not to be rude, to accept what it is. 936 00:35:17,320 --> 00:35:19,080 But don't accept it 100% 937 00:35:19,080 --> 00:35:20,840 because something is telling you that, you know, 938 00:35:20,840 --> 00:35:22,160 we can go further than this. 939 00:35:22,160 --> 00:35:23,840 There's nothing wrong with this, 940 00:35:23,840 --> 00:35:26,040 but surely we can go further than this. 941 00:35:26,040 --> 00:35:28,800 And therefore you give them an alternative way, 942 00:35:28,800 --> 00:35:29,960 which feels better. 943 00:35:29,960 --> 00:35:33,080 And sooner or later, I find people listen to it. 944 00:35:33,080 --> 00:35:35,880 More often than not, people are reasonable 945 00:35:35,880 --> 00:35:38,400 because they understand that you're not doing 946 00:35:38,400 --> 00:35:39,640 that creative tantrum bit. 947 00:35:39,640 --> 00:35:41,600 Nobody wants that, you know, I'm creative and I say, 948 00:35:41,600 --> 00:35:43,080 you know, this, that kind of thing. 949 00:35:43,080 --> 00:35:46,000 That's the way it is. 950 00:35:46,000 --> 00:35:48,120 That's an amazing bit of, 951 00:35:48,120 --> 00:35:51,760 I think even though you were bound by processes, 952 00:35:51,760 --> 00:35:55,880 you never sort of allowed that to become kind of wall 953 00:35:55,880 --> 00:35:57,600 that was erected in front of you. 954 00:35:57,600 --> 00:36:00,840 You sort of try to get through to the client and then say, 955 00:36:00,840 --> 00:36:04,560 okay, make them understand why culturally 956 00:36:04,560 --> 00:36:06,520 something like this may not work here 957 00:36:06,520 --> 00:36:09,440 rather than, you know, be definitive about it. 958 00:36:09,440 --> 00:36:10,640 No, this is not gonna work. 959 00:36:10,640 --> 00:36:12,040 I'll tell you what works. 960 00:36:12,040 --> 00:36:16,120 Because you can't be absolutely sure. 961 00:36:16,120 --> 00:36:19,080 And like you said, it's a process of working through 962 00:36:19,080 --> 00:36:19,920 with the client. 963 00:36:19,920 --> 00:36:22,840 It would have meant taking one step at a time, 964 00:36:22,840 --> 00:36:26,040 coming back with the client is going against the face 965 00:36:26,040 --> 00:36:28,760 of whatever, you know, his processes. 966 00:36:28,760 --> 00:36:31,760 So it's a long journey for them also to accept 967 00:36:31,760 --> 00:36:34,920 that something which has worked in other markets, 968 00:36:34,920 --> 00:36:39,600 I have to take this chance here is not an easy thing to do. 969 00:36:39,600 --> 00:36:44,200 Yeah, so it took two years in their case. 970 00:36:44,200 --> 00:36:46,800 So sometimes, you know, you need to be, 971 00:36:46,800 --> 00:36:48,080 it's a long game. 972 00:36:48,080 --> 00:36:50,400 It's, you know, you need to sort of be patient 973 00:36:50,400 --> 00:36:52,240 because you know where they're coming from. 974 00:36:52,240 --> 00:36:53,400 They have their disciplines. 975 00:36:53,400 --> 00:36:54,840 They're not doing it to spite you. 976 00:36:54,840 --> 00:36:57,240 They're not doing it to criticize your creative 977 00:36:57,240 --> 00:36:58,400 or anything like that. 978 00:36:58,400 --> 00:37:00,240 They're doing it because they have, 979 00:37:00,240 --> 00:37:02,280 before long before they met you, 980 00:37:02,280 --> 00:37:05,800 they had their own processes anyway set in place. 981 00:37:05,800 --> 00:37:06,920 So just because they meet you, 982 00:37:06,920 --> 00:37:08,520 they don't have to change their whole system 983 00:37:08,520 --> 00:37:10,320 of working or something like that. 984 00:37:10,320 --> 00:37:13,520 The question of being a little realistic about these things. 985 00:37:13,520 --> 00:37:17,120 And I don't know, I probably was successful 60% of the time 986 00:37:17,120 --> 00:37:18,880 and not successful 40% of the time. 987 00:37:18,880 --> 00:37:20,800 You can't always win this. 988 00:37:20,800 --> 00:37:23,280 So now that you've spent time, 989 00:37:23,280 --> 00:37:26,200 I'd like to now explore a bit about what it means 990 00:37:26,200 --> 00:37:30,160 to be a creative boss, because you started off as a writer. 991 00:37:30,160 --> 00:37:34,640 Then how do you ensure that you're able to give direction? 992 00:37:34,640 --> 00:37:37,080 Because ultimately you move towards creative director 993 00:37:37,080 --> 00:37:41,680 and you know, up the ladder and then your job is, 994 00:37:41,680 --> 00:37:44,960 how do you ensure that you get people to deliver 995 00:37:44,960 --> 00:37:47,480 and get them to understand what you're really looking for? 996 00:37:47,480 --> 00:37:49,400 How would you give feedback for example? 997 00:37:49,400 --> 00:37:54,400 Yeah, it's a very valuable or a very strong part 998 00:37:54,720 --> 00:37:56,640 of being creative director, 999 00:37:56,640 --> 00:37:58,560 that you have to one, make judgments. 1000 00:37:58,560 --> 00:38:01,200 And second, it's not going to always be 1001 00:38:01,200 --> 00:38:03,000 in the favor of the person. 1002 00:38:03,000 --> 00:38:05,040 And I mean, because you know, 1003 00:38:05,040 --> 00:38:08,080 your allegiance is to the consumer finally, 1004 00:38:08,080 --> 00:38:09,080 not even to the client. 1005 00:38:09,080 --> 00:38:11,840 I would say your allegiance is to the consumer finally. 1006 00:38:11,840 --> 00:38:13,920 And certainly not to the people working under you. 1007 00:38:13,920 --> 00:38:15,480 It doesn't mean you're treating them or something, 1008 00:38:15,480 --> 00:38:20,400 but they know that you are trying to evaluate on behalf. 1009 00:38:20,400 --> 00:38:22,760 It is a responsibility like anything else. 1010 00:38:22,760 --> 00:38:25,040 What helps what I'm finding then, 1011 00:38:25,040 --> 00:38:28,000 what I found then and what I found later also, 1012 00:38:28,000 --> 00:38:32,880 is that if a creative director with roughly, I don't know, 1013 00:38:32,880 --> 00:38:35,640 12 to 15 years of experience, 1014 00:38:35,640 --> 00:38:37,560 who's gone through various brands, 1015 00:38:37,560 --> 00:38:39,720 worked with various teams, both on the client side, 1016 00:38:39,720 --> 00:38:42,560 inside with very good planners, very good account directors, 1017 00:38:42,560 --> 00:38:44,440 very good other creative people, 1018 00:38:44,440 --> 00:38:48,280 you can go only so far singly and in the big brands. 1019 00:38:48,280 --> 00:38:49,400 There are too many people involved 1020 00:38:49,400 --> 00:38:50,600 in many of these decisions. 1021 00:38:50,600 --> 00:38:54,000 It's very difficult to go too far just by yourself. 1022 00:38:54,000 --> 00:38:56,640 So anybody with any creative director 1023 00:38:56,640 --> 00:39:00,360 with 12 to 15 years of creative direction, 1024 00:39:00,360 --> 00:39:04,040 I have a feeling with this kind of a background, 1025 00:39:04,040 --> 00:39:09,040 will have a certain amount of, what shall I say, gravitas. 1026 00:39:09,600 --> 00:39:12,000 They can look at an idea submitted by anybody 1027 00:39:12,000 --> 00:39:14,360 and they look at it and say, no, man. 1028 00:39:14,360 --> 00:39:15,960 It's not arrogance, it's not anything. 1029 00:39:15,960 --> 00:39:19,840 That experience comes all into that moment. 1030 00:39:19,840 --> 00:39:22,240 So I would take anybody with 15 years experience 1031 00:39:22,240 --> 00:39:23,680 or 20 years experience or whatever, 1032 00:39:23,680 --> 00:39:26,520 with honest experience of working on brands and stuff. 1033 00:39:26,520 --> 00:39:29,160 And they view that as you've been through those struggles. 1034 00:39:29,160 --> 00:39:30,360 You've been through those late nights, 1035 00:39:30,360 --> 00:39:31,760 you've been through those difficult clients, 1036 00:39:31,760 --> 00:39:33,480 you've been through all those phases. 1037 00:39:33,480 --> 00:39:35,360 And if I can judge in 10 seconds 1038 00:39:35,360 --> 00:39:36,480 and if we can tell somebody, no boss, 1039 00:39:36,480 --> 00:39:38,240 this is not gonna work. 1040 00:39:38,240 --> 00:39:40,080 I don't know, there's a chance that it may still work. 1041 00:39:40,080 --> 00:39:41,400 I don't know, but if I say so, 1042 00:39:41,400 --> 00:39:43,480 or if anybody in that position says so, 1043 00:39:43,480 --> 00:39:45,080 I would listen to them. 1044 00:39:45,080 --> 00:39:47,400 Because they are not saying it just like that. 1045 00:39:47,400 --> 00:39:49,000 It's just coming from somewhere. 1046 00:39:49,000 --> 00:39:50,440 It's coming from their own experience. 1047 00:39:50,440 --> 00:39:51,400 That is one part. 1048 00:39:51,400 --> 00:39:53,960 The other part, which I've not really shared with anybody, 1049 00:39:53,960 --> 00:39:57,040 okay, one first for Venus Sportcast maybe, 1050 00:39:57,040 --> 00:40:00,480 is that this thing about having an internal evaluation, 1051 00:40:00,480 --> 00:40:02,200 which I always for some reason kept secret. 1052 00:40:02,200 --> 00:40:03,240 I don't know why this. 1053 00:40:03,240 --> 00:40:06,880 It is to do with as an observation as when I was in school, 1054 00:40:06,880 --> 00:40:09,960 I don't know, I wrote about it last year sometime 1055 00:40:09,960 --> 00:40:14,960 on LinkedIn about the invention of what you call 1056 00:40:15,520 --> 00:40:18,320 those nicknames for other students and teachers, 1057 00:40:18,320 --> 00:40:20,600 especially by schoolboys. 1058 00:40:20,600 --> 00:40:23,600 And I don't know, maybe 10 or 15 people may have read it. 1059 00:40:23,600 --> 00:40:26,560 So I'll take the liberty of assuming nobody's really read it. 1060 00:40:26,560 --> 00:40:29,560 And there I had gone through this thing of saying 1061 00:40:29,560 --> 00:40:31,120 that kids are very inventive. 1062 00:40:31,120 --> 00:40:31,960 They are of course cruel. 1063 00:40:31,960 --> 00:40:35,280 So I won't get into the ethics of whether 1064 00:40:35,280 --> 00:40:37,440 it's right to nickname somebody or not. 1065 00:40:37,440 --> 00:40:40,320 I'm coming in from purely the creative aspect of 1066 00:40:40,320 --> 00:40:43,320 how some people can do this kind of nicknaming 1067 00:40:43,320 --> 00:40:44,360 and other people can't. 1068 00:40:44,360 --> 00:40:46,440 And that's a good sign, for example. 1069 00:40:46,440 --> 00:40:48,680 Like we had a kid in school, 1070 00:40:48,680 --> 00:40:50,080 I don't know when we were very young, 1071 00:40:50,080 --> 00:40:51,160 you know, who used to for some reason 1072 00:40:51,160 --> 00:40:53,480 keep sweating profusely much after the, you know, 1073 00:40:53,480 --> 00:40:54,680 game spirit was over and all. 1074 00:40:54,680 --> 00:40:57,240 He used to keep sweating, his face was always glistening. 1075 00:40:57,240 --> 00:41:01,400 And some local genius in that class called him Dalda, 1076 00:41:01,400 --> 00:41:03,200 which is of course a one-off cookie, 1077 00:41:03,200 --> 00:41:04,640 which also glistens and you know, 1078 00:41:04,640 --> 00:41:06,920 it's some cheaper substitute for ghee 1079 00:41:06,920 --> 00:41:08,120 or something like that. 1080 00:41:08,120 --> 00:41:10,600 Very common in many middle-class homes. 1081 00:41:10,600 --> 00:41:13,160 I mean, at one it works fine, it brings him down. 1082 00:41:13,160 --> 00:41:16,040 But the thing is, he didn't have to explain. 1083 00:41:16,040 --> 00:41:17,440 Everybody knew that guy. 1084 00:41:17,440 --> 00:41:19,160 In fact, I remember his face after so many years, 1085 00:41:19,160 --> 00:41:20,920 but I don't know what his real name was. 1086 00:41:20,920 --> 00:41:22,880 The word Dalda stuck to him. 1087 00:41:22,880 --> 00:41:26,160 So, as we went from school day to night, 1088 00:41:26,160 --> 00:41:27,080 he stayed in school. 1089 00:41:29,080 --> 00:41:29,920 Yes. 1090 00:41:30,840 --> 00:41:32,680 So, his name became Dalda. 1091 00:41:32,680 --> 00:41:35,280 And therefore, the fact, 1092 00:41:35,280 --> 00:41:37,720 I don't know who that fellow was who coined this, 1093 00:41:37,720 --> 00:41:40,080 but that is, I'll connect this up with what I mean 1094 00:41:40,080 --> 00:41:43,560 by creative evaluation in a second or in a minute. 1095 00:41:43,560 --> 00:41:47,240 But that was, so let's say Dalda is the first example. 1096 00:41:47,240 --> 00:41:50,840 Second example is there was a Sanskrit teacher of ours 1097 00:41:50,840 --> 00:41:53,600 who lived a little further away across the playground 1098 00:41:53,600 --> 00:41:54,960 in front of our school. 1099 00:41:54,960 --> 00:41:56,600 And then behind it was a rubbish dump 1100 00:41:56,600 --> 00:41:57,960 and to the right of it and left of it 1101 00:41:57,960 --> 00:42:01,160 was also a continuous municipal rubbish dump of some kind. 1102 00:42:01,160 --> 00:42:03,920 And the city used to deposit all its plastic bags 1103 00:42:03,920 --> 00:42:06,040 and paper and waste and all kinds of nonsense 1104 00:42:06,040 --> 00:42:07,720 used to be piled up over there. 1105 00:42:07,720 --> 00:42:10,000 And this guy lived beyond that was a main road 1106 00:42:10,000 --> 00:42:12,480 that Dalda went across. 1107 00:42:12,480 --> 00:42:15,160 And he lived in one of those lanes across the main road. 1108 00:42:15,160 --> 00:42:18,600 So that Sanskrit professor used to take the shortcut 1109 00:42:18,600 --> 00:42:21,320 of crossing that main road, getting into that dump, 1110 00:42:21,320 --> 00:42:23,600 going past the playground and then entering the school. 1111 00:42:23,600 --> 00:42:24,760 Otherwise, if you took the main road, 1112 00:42:24,760 --> 00:42:26,240 he would have to go like that 1113 00:42:26,240 --> 00:42:28,520 and come all the way around. 1114 00:42:28,520 --> 00:42:30,400 Which would have meant another 15, 20 minutes. 1115 00:42:30,400 --> 00:42:32,560 And he was already in his late 50s 1116 00:42:32,560 --> 00:42:34,040 and had a big stomach and everything. 1117 00:42:34,040 --> 00:42:37,280 And he had his dhoti and his cloth bag and all that. 1118 00:42:37,280 --> 00:42:39,720 And he used to come down that dump. 1119 00:42:39,720 --> 00:42:42,560 And in Ascades around 1030, 1040, 1120 00:42:42,560 --> 00:42:43,720 when a certain period ended 1121 00:42:43,720 --> 00:42:46,480 and the next period was about to start, 1122 00:42:46,480 --> 00:42:48,000 a few of us used to hang around 1123 00:42:48,000 --> 00:42:50,360 in the back of the class where the window oversaw 1124 00:42:50,360 --> 00:42:52,800 this whole expanse of rubbish. 1125 00:42:52,800 --> 00:42:55,000 And we would see this guy almost religiously 1126 00:42:55,000 --> 00:42:55,880 walking over there. 1127 00:42:55,880 --> 00:42:57,680 He would get down, see a mound of dirt, 1128 00:42:57,680 --> 00:42:59,000 which was pretty solid, 1129 00:42:59,000 --> 00:43:00,280 but there would be pieces of grass, 1130 00:43:00,280 --> 00:43:01,960 damp grass, wet marsh. 1131 00:43:01,960 --> 00:43:05,520 So every day all that, the topography changed marginally. 1132 00:43:05,520 --> 00:43:07,880 So he had to make a decision at every mound 1133 00:43:07,880 --> 00:43:09,640 that, okay, now I will jump over there. 1134 00:43:09,640 --> 00:43:11,120 And then he would jump on that. 1135 00:43:11,120 --> 00:43:12,600 And then he say, okay, next one over there. 1136 00:43:12,600 --> 00:43:15,120 And then he, so we would watch this guy doing this, 1137 00:43:15,120 --> 00:43:16,640 making these little decisions 1138 00:43:16,640 --> 00:43:19,280 and probably in seven, eight minutes he reached the school. 1139 00:43:19,280 --> 00:43:21,840 And some guy chose to call him Armstrong. 1140 00:43:22,840 --> 00:43:25,240 This was a reference to Neil Armstrong 1141 00:43:25,240 --> 00:43:27,880 of that first man in the moon sailing. 1142 00:43:27,880 --> 00:43:30,040 Where they did that little hop skip 1143 00:43:30,040 --> 00:43:31,640 on the moonscape. 1144 00:43:32,720 --> 00:43:34,040 That is the second example. 1145 00:43:34,040 --> 00:43:35,680 That was brilliant. 1146 00:43:35,680 --> 00:43:38,840 And the thing about either this Dalda or Armstrong 1147 00:43:38,840 --> 00:43:40,600 or the third one I'll tell you shortly 1148 00:43:40,600 --> 00:43:43,360 is that that guy didn't have to explain. 1149 00:43:43,360 --> 00:43:45,000 It is lateral enough, 1150 00:43:45,000 --> 00:43:47,280 but he didn't have to say I'm calling him Armstrong 1151 00:43:47,280 --> 00:43:49,120 because if you have to explain the creative idea, 1152 00:43:49,120 --> 00:43:50,240 it's not a creative idea. 1153 00:43:50,240 --> 00:43:51,880 When you say it enough people say, 1154 00:43:51,880 --> 00:43:53,880 hey, I get it and they start laughing. 1155 00:43:53,880 --> 00:43:55,640 Then you know that it's working. 1156 00:43:55,640 --> 00:43:57,600 I'm seeing something and I'm hearing you saying, 1157 00:43:57,600 --> 00:43:59,240 I'm saying, wow, brilliant. 1158 00:43:59,240 --> 00:44:00,360 That's perfect. 1159 00:44:01,360 --> 00:44:02,760 Like I said, I'm not getting into the ethics 1160 00:44:02,760 --> 00:44:04,400 of whether we should be nicknaming 1161 00:44:04,400 --> 00:44:07,040 or whether it's really cruel or not to be able to, 1162 00:44:07,040 --> 00:44:08,240 address your elders as such. 1163 00:44:08,240 --> 00:44:09,120 It's a separate subject. 1164 00:44:09,120 --> 00:44:09,960 I'm not getting it. 1165 00:44:09,960 --> 00:44:11,600 I'm looking at it purely from the field of. 1166 00:44:11,600 --> 00:44:16,480 So the third example was when I was talking about this 1167 00:44:16,480 --> 00:44:19,560 during a cricket match to a fellow player 1168 00:44:19,560 --> 00:44:20,800 from another school, 1169 00:44:20,800 --> 00:44:23,240 that guy laughed at when I told him they call him Armstrong. 1170 00:44:23,240 --> 00:44:25,560 And he gave me an example of somebody then he had, 1171 00:44:25,560 --> 00:44:27,320 it was a Tamil teacher of some kind, 1172 00:44:27,320 --> 00:44:31,080 who used to wear that dhoti tied in that very traditional way 1173 00:44:31,080 --> 00:44:31,920 with that, I don't know, 1174 00:44:31,920 --> 00:44:33,800 in the form of loose pajamas that goes, 1175 00:44:33,800 --> 00:44:35,920 something goes between the legs and it's in the back 1176 00:44:35,920 --> 00:44:36,800 and all that. 1177 00:44:36,800 --> 00:44:41,560 And that guy had during some part of that class, 1178 00:44:41,560 --> 00:44:45,600 he kept bending down and maybe that part of the dhoti 1179 00:44:45,600 --> 00:44:48,800 was going over some itchy part of his ankle or something. 1180 00:44:48,800 --> 00:44:52,960 So he used to go down and then scratch his ankle, come up. 1181 00:44:52,960 --> 00:44:56,120 And he used to go down, scratch his ankle and come up. 1182 00:44:56,120 --> 00:44:59,320 And some guy from that moment named him auto rickshaw. 1183 00:45:00,360 --> 00:45:03,240 Okay, no, this will only make sense to people 1184 00:45:03,240 --> 00:45:05,840 maybe before 2000s when the self-stowage 1185 00:45:05,840 --> 00:45:07,320 in the auto rickshaw were not there. 1186 00:45:07,320 --> 00:45:08,160 Exactly, yeah. 1187 00:45:08,160 --> 00:45:12,080 So this was a solid metal rod at the bottom of, 1188 00:45:12,080 --> 00:45:13,440 next to the driver. 1189 00:45:13,440 --> 00:45:14,920 And if you got inside in that man, 1190 00:45:14,920 --> 00:45:15,760 turn that meter and all that, 1191 00:45:15,760 --> 00:45:18,520 and he bent down and he yanked it twice or thrice 1192 00:45:18,520 --> 00:45:20,080 or before to get his lot. 1193 00:45:20,080 --> 00:45:21,240 That's right. 1194 00:45:21,240 --> 00:45:23,800 And then, the whole class burst out laughing 1195 00:45:23,800 --> 00:45:25,240 when this guy said after the guy had gone, 1196 00:45:25,240 --> 00:45:27,000 not in his ear shot of course. 1197 00:45:27,000 --> 00:45:29,360 So if I take these three examples, 1198 00:45:29,360 --> 00:45:31,440 if you look at Dalda first, 1199 00:45:31,440 --> 00:45:33,440 I mean, if I want to seriously look at it, 1200 00:45:33,440 --> 00:45:34,840 then if I look at Dalda first, 1201 00:45:34,840 --> 00:45:36,400 then it's the glistening of the face 1202 00:45:36,400 --> 00:45:38,520 versus some kitchen item at home. 1203 00:45:38,520 --> 00:45:41,120 Okay, you made a connection 1204 00:45:41,120 --> 00:45:42,720 between two really unconnected things. 1205 00:45:42,720 --> 00:45:44,320 Somebody's face glistening 1206 00:45:44,320 --> 00:45:47,040 and some oil that glistens at cooking at home. 1207 00:45:47,040 --> 00:45:49,320 So from somebody's face to cooking, 1208 00:45:49,320 --> 00:45:50,200 you've covered a distance. 1209 00:45:50,200 --> 00:45:51,360 So we can call that lateral. 1210 00:45:51,360 --> 00:45:53,240 To my mind, that seems like, okay, 1211 00:45:53,240 --> 00:45:56,080 if a creative guy can come up with those kinds of ideas, 1212 00:45:56,080 --> 00:45:58,240 maybe he earns a salary, fine, good. 1213 00:45:58,240 --> 00:46:02,000 I think we can pay him, it's good. 1214 00:46:02,000 --> 00:46:04,720 He must be able to do at least that much. 1215 00:46:04,720 --> 00:46:06,720 On the other hand, if somebody was periodically 1216 00:46:06,720 --> 00:46:09,560 or very regularly doing the Armstrong ones, 1217 00:46:09,560 --> 00:46:12,800 where somewhere, you look at one guy walking 1218 00:46:12,800 --> 00:46:15,160 in some landscape and can go all the way to the moon 1219 00:46:15,160 --> 00:46:16,760 and say this resembles something, 1220 00:46:16,760 --> 00:46:17,920 the distance is even further 1221 00:46:17,920 --> 00:46:19,440 between some astronomical detail 1222 00:46:19,440 --> 00:46:21,680 and some playground in front of you. 1223 00:46:21,680 --> 00:46:23,440 And if somebody is making those kinds of, 1224 00:46:23,440 --> 00:46:26,280 that means the distance of the jump is much further 1225 00:46:26,280 --> 00:46:27,560 than the distance between the face 1226 00:46:27,560 --> 00:46:29,440 and the cooking oil, for instance. 1227 00:46:29,440 --> 00:46:30,640 This is really far out. 1228 00:46:30,640 --> 00:46:32,240 Then you say, man, watch out, 1229 00:46:32,240 --> 00:46:33,360 this guy deserves a promotion 1230 00:46:33,360 --> 00:46:36,560 with this guy or girl or whoever is doing that kind of stuff. 1231 00:46:36,560 --> 00:46:37,680 Then you say, wow, that's good. 1232 00:46:37,680 --> 00:46:41,520 So I used to, and if somebody went auto rickshaw, 1233 00:46:41,520 --> 00:46:42,600 that is brilliant. 1234 00:46:42,600 --> 00:46:43,840 I mean, that is like absolutely, 1235 00:46:43,840 --> 00:46:45,760 I mean, somebody is scratching their ankle 1236 00:46:45,760 --> 00:46:47,680 and you can connect it with some, 1237 00:46:47,680 --> 00:46:49,840 we know teachers, we know their dresses, 1238 00:46:49,840 --> 00:46:51,640 we know their habits on the one hand, 1239 00:46:51,640 --> 00:46:53,720 and we've all traveled at an auto rickshaw 1240 00:46:53,720 --> 00:46:55,920 at another time, completely unconnected. 1241 00:46:55,920 --> 00:46:58,920 So therefore, this business of connecting 1242 00:46:58,920 --> 00:47:01,560 unconnected worlds and the distance 1243 00:47:01,560 --> 00:47:05,000 of the unconnected worlds matters in creative work. 1244 00:47:05,000 --> 00:47:06,440 The further people can travel, 1245 00:47:06,440 --> 00:47:07,480 and I don't know why, 1246 00:47:07,480 --> 00:47:09,240 but some people are able to do this 1247 00:47:09,240 --> 00:47:10,080 better than other people. 1248 00:47:10,080 --> 00:47:12,480 And I'm not a sociologist or psychologist or something. 1249 00:47:12,480 --> 00:47:13,320 So I don't know the person, 1250 00:47:13,320 --> 00:47:15,640 why is somebody able to do it, others, 1251 00:47:15,640 --> 00:47:17,040 I take it as they come. 1252 00:47:17,040 --> 00:47:20,560 When these people do it and the distance is huge, 1253 00:47:20,560 --> 00:47:23,000 is better, then in my mind, I always evaluate, 1254 00:47:23,000 --> 00:47:24,800 this is the secret I was telling you that, 1255 00:47:24,800 --> 00:47:26,880 you know, even my own ideas, the next day, 1256 00:47:26,880 --> 00:47:28,440 at the time of creating any idea, 1257 00:47:28,440 --> 00:47:29,920 everything seems fantastic, in any case, 1258 00:47:29,920 --> 00:47:31,320 within the next five minutes. 1259 00:47:31,320 --> 00:47:33,000 But when you give it some pull off time 1260 00:47:33,000 --> 00:47:34,280 and they see it the next morning, 1261 00:47:34,280 --> 00:47:36,240 you feel like, what was I thinking? 1262 00:47:36,240 --> 00:47:39,600 So sometimes your own ideas and other people's ideas, 1263 00:47:39,600 --> 00:47:42,120 I've noticed that, is this, you know, 1264 00:47:42,120 --> 00:47:43,200 Dalda kind of idea? 1265 00:47:43,200 --> 00:47:46,240 Is this Armstrong kind of idea? 1266 00:47:46,240 --> 00:47:48,120 Or is it really an auto kind of idea? 1267 00:47:48,120 --> 00:47:50,560 Because many people think that being lateral 1268 00:47:50,560 --> 00:47:51,560 is what it's all about. 1269 00:47:51,560 --> 00:47:54,120 It's not, it has to also make sense, 1270 00:47:54,120 --> 00:47:55,960 which means the clarity must be so clear. 1271 00:47:55,960 --> 00:47:57,840 Like I said earlier, if other people, 1272 00:47:57,840 --> 00:48:00,800 you have to explain, see, I'm calling it an auto rickshaw 1273 00:48:00,800 --> 00:48:02,880 because then it doesn't work. 1274 00:48:02,880 --> 00:48:03,720 It's no longer a creative idea. 1275 00:48:03,720 --> 00:48:06,360 Creative idea means you went far, 1276 00:48:06,360 --> 00:48:09,280 you did the distance, but the listener makes no effort 1277 00:48:09,280 --> 00:48:11,000 in understanding what you're intending. 1278 00:48:11,000 --> 00:48:14,120 So basically it's your hard work or your thinking 1279 00:48:14,120 --> 00:48:16,960 or whatever it is of finding that lateral connection. 1280 00:48:16,960 --> 00:48:18,200 But the connection is made simply. 1281 00:48:18,200 --> 00:48:19,960 That's why, you know, I don't care for people 1282 00:48:19,960 --> 00:48:22,240 who can make just lateral connections. 1283 00:48:22,240 --> 00:48:23,480 It doesn't make any sense. 1284 00:48:23,480 --> 00:48:25,160 You know, I can think of this and I can think of that. 1285 00:48:25,160 --> 00:48:26,400 That is rubbish. 1286 00:48:26,400 --> 00:48:29,680 You still have to solve some problem, deliver some promise. 1287 00:48:29,680 --> 00:48:32,200 It still makes sense somewhere. 1288 00:48:32,200 --> 00:48:34,800 So therefore that has its own kind of clarity. 1289 00:48:34,800 --> 00:48:37,400 So I've always been on the one hand telling people, 1290 00:48:37,400 --> 00:48:39,320 be clear what you want to say. 1291 00:48:39,320 --> 00:48:41,600 And on the other hand, the opposite thing of saying, 1292 00:48:41,600 --> 00:48:44,800 listen, go far away from the direct kind of clarity. 1293 00:48:44,800 --> 00:48:47,600 Find some imaginative way of being clear. 1294 00:48:47,600 --> 00:48:49,640 Anyway, I've been taking maybe too much of the time. 1295 00:48:49,640 --> 00:48:53,680 That's, I know, I think this is one of those deep lessons. 1296 00:48:53,680 --> 00:48:58,160 And I hope somebody who's listening understands this. 1297 00:48:58,160 --> 00:49:01,920 You're not simply saying an idea should be good, better, best. 1298 00:49:01,920 --> 00:49:04,720 You're actually giving people reasons on 1299 00:49:04,720 --> 00:49:07,160 or ways in which they can evaluate something 1300 00:49:08,320 --> 00:49:10,160 and then figure out where it goes next. 1301 00:49:10,160 --> 00:49:11,960 So from whatever you've just told me, 1302 00:49:11,960 --> 00:49:14,160 I think there's an element of culture. 1303 00:49:14,160 --> 00:49:16,480 There's an element of context. 1304 00:49:16,480 --> 00:49:19,640 And there's an element of shared experiences. 1305 00:49:19,640 --> 00:49:20,480 True. 1306 00:49:20,480 --> 00:49:23,680 So if it goes across all of these things, 1307 00:49:23,680 --> 00:49:25,840 then to a large extent, you can tell people, 1308 00:49:25,840 --> 00:49:27,080 hey, I get it. 1309 00:49:27,080 --> 00:49:31,320 I don't, I can use that shorthand in a film scene. 1310 00:49:31,320 --> 00:49:33,960 I can use it in a preset. 1311 00:49:33,960 --> 00:49:36,680 I can use a sound from one of these things. 1312 00:49:36,680 --> 00:49:40,000 Just start that off and then say, okay, you know, 1313 00:49:40,000 --> 00:49:42,320 just exploring where this thing could go. 1314 00:49:42,320 --> 00:49:45,800 Explore how somebody who's into advertising 1315 00:49:45,800 --> 00:49:49,720 actually decides that he wants to learn Ruby on Rails, 1316 00:49:49,720 --> 00:49:53,240 which if I was told learn a programming language, 1317 00:49:53,240 --> 00:49:55,200 I'd run a hundred miles in the other direction. 1318 00:49:55,200 --> 00:49:58,240 I'm very happy exploring things that I understand. 1319 00:49:58,240 --> 00:50:01,000 But if it means that I have to put in, 1320 00:50:01,000 --> 00:50:03,880 I have to understand another foundation altogether. 1321 00:50:03,880 --> 00:50:05,920 So how does one get to that? 1322 00:50:05,920 --> 00:50:09,280 Yeah, I think these kinds of things are the many things 1323 00:50:09,280 --> 00:50:12,080 that you don't really plan for, 1324 00:50:12,080 --> 00:50:13,560 at least in my life it's been like that. 1325 00:50:13,560 --> 00:50:16,320 I've just stumbled into things. 1326 00:50:16,320 --> 00:50:19,760 So this programming business is also one of those things. 1327 00:50:19,760 --> 00:50:21,000 Maybe there's a background to it, 1328 00:50:21,000 --> 00:50:22,080 if at all it means anything. 1329 00:50:22,080 --> 00:50:25,080 Somewhere in the 90s, you know, America was flooded. 1330 00:50:25,080 --> 00:50:28,840 This is the pre-Apple, pre-Microsoft days of early days 1331 00:50:28,840 --> 00:50:32,360 of home computers of some, I mean, 1332 00:50:32,360 --> 00:50:35,120 the computers were there, but they were in offices. 1333 00:50:35,120 --> 00:50:38,000 Computers being at home was not yet a thing then. 1334 00:50:38,000 --> 00:50:40,000 And there used to be these reduced versions 1335 00:50:40,000 --> 00:50:43,160 of something called Commodore 64 in the US 1336 00:50:43,160 --> 00:50:44,960 and an Amiga or something or the other. 1337 00:50:44,960 --> 00:50:46,800 They were not popular in India, 1338 00:50:46,800 --> 00:50:48,440 but there was a British equivalent at the time 1339 00:50:48,440 --> 00:50:52,760 in the late 80s, early 90s called ZX Spectrum. 1340 00:50:52,760 --> 00:50:54,880 And that was a small computer. 1341 00:50:54,880 --> 00:50:57,080 And we had a client called ComputerPoint, 1342 00:50:57,080 --> 00:50:57,920 which was launching its- 1343 00:50:57,920 --> 00:50:59,200 ComputerPoint, I remember this. 1344 00:50:59,200 --> 00:51:00,640 I remember this company. 1345 00:51:00,640 --> 00:51:01,480 Yeah. 1346 00:51:01,480 --> 00:51:02,320 Yeah. 1347 00:51:02,320 --> 00:51:04,480 So, and then we got into it and then, you know, 1348 00:51:04,480 --> 00:51:06,000 me and a friend got into it so much 1349 00:51:06,000 --> 00:51:08,080 that we used to play those very simple oddball, 1350 00:51:08,080 --> 00:51:10,320 but extremely addictive games. 1351 00:51:10,320 --> 00:51:11,480 And in the name of telling the client, 1352 00:51:11,480 --> 00:51:13,120 no, no, we have to understand the product 1353 00:51:13,120 --> 00:51:14,280 and all that kind of stuff. 1354 00:51:14,280 --> 00:51:16,760 We used to land up in their office 1355 00:51:16,760 --> 00:51:18,320 and with only the security guard there, 1356 00:51:18,320 --> 00:51:20,120 play till one o'clock in the night and all that, 1357 00:51:20,120 --> 00:51:22,160 mad times, but we used to play. 1358 00:51:22,160 --> 00:51:25,480 And therefore, then later on I bought one also 1359 00:51:25,480 --> 00:51:26,320 and it was there at home. 1360 00:51:26,320 --> 00:51:28,080 And then I bought books about what it is. 1361 00:51:28,080 --> 00:51:29,640 And then I realized that one of the things, 1362 00:51:29,640 --> 00:51:32,800 besides games and little things that it could do stuff 1363 00:51:32,800 --> 00:51:35,960 like, you know, your home accounts and very simple stuff. 1364 00:51:35,960 --> 00:51:40,400 And it taught you the basic language as in B-A-S-I-C, 1365 00:51:40,400 --> 00:51:42,680 all caps, it meant some acronym, I think. 1366 00:51:42,680 --> 00:51:43,520 Yeah. 1367 00:51:43,520 --> 00:51:44,360 And that was a language before, 1368 00:51:44,360 --> 00:51:45,600 I think it was there with COBOL 1369 00:51:45,600 --> 00:51:48,000 and all those languages and no more anywhere. 1370 00:51:48,000 --> 00:51:52,280 And so I had something I must have read somewhere. 1371 00:51:52,280 --> 00:51:53,120 I said, let me try. 1372 00:51:53,120 --> 00:51:55,280 And I used to write very basic programs. 1373 00:51:55,280 --> 00:51:56,600 You could make one little dot move 1374 00:51:56,600 --> 00:51:58,600 from right side of the screen to the left side of the screen 1375 00:51:58,600 --> 00:52:00,800 because you put in some little code 1376 00:52:00,800 --> 00:52:01,680 and all that sort of thing. 1377 00:52:01,680 --> 00:52:03,440 I found it fascinating. 1378 00:52:03,440 --> 00:52:05,440 If I had taught myself that this is maths 1379 00:52:05,440 --> 00:52:06,600 and arithmetic, I would have stopped. 1380 00:52:06,600 --> 00:52:07,440 But for some reason it didn't feel like it. 1381 00:52:07,440 --> 00:52:10,640 It felt more like a logic and stuff. 1382 00:52:10,640 --> 00:52:12,280 And therefore I got it. 1383 00:52:12,280 --> 00:52:14,320 So maybe there was some background there 1384 00:52:14,320 --> 00:52:16,720 because when I came to around 2010 1385 00:52:16,720 --> 00:52:21,720 and Apple, I was a Mac user from around 2001 till today. 1386 00:52:21,960 --> 00:52:24,880 And therefore I think I used their web program 1387 00:52:24,880 --> 00:52:26,400 to score something then. 1388 00:52:26,400 --> 00:52:28,680 And that again had this aspect of programming 1389 00:52:28,680 --> 00:52:29,880 and creating stuff on your own. 1390 00:52:29,880 --> 00:52:32,600 And Apple of course made everything so easy. 1391 00:52:32,600 --> 00:52:35,040 And then I got into something called Drupal 1392 00:52:35,040 --> 00:52:37,880 which was actually a content management system 1393 00:52:37,880 --> 00:52:38,840 which is there till today. 1394 00:52:38,840 --> 00:52:40,480 And of course WordPress beat it hollow 1395 00:52:40,480 --> 00:52:42,000 and now WordPress exceeds it. 1396 00:52:42,000 --> 00:52:44,800 And of course the Drupal aficionados said 1397 00:52:44,800 --> 00:52:47,920 that WordPress is just a blogging platform and all that. 1398 00:52:47,920 --> 00:52:49,200 But it's not. 1399 00:52:49,200 --> 00:52:52,680 WordPress is today a proper content management system 1400 00:52:52,680 --> 00:52:54,080 as much as Drupal is. 1401 00:52:54,080 --> 00:52:56,320 And somewhere while Drupal was there, 1402 00:52:56,320 --> 00:52:57,840 I'm not sure when it happened. 1403 00:52:57,840 --> 00:52:59,600 Like I said, I stumbled upon Ruby on Rails. 1404 00:52:59,600 --> 00:53:02,240 But given my background of not being a stranger 1405 00:53:02,240 --> 00:53:04,440 to this field, I read some book on, 1406 00:53:04,440 --> 00:53:06,200 actually a printed book ordered from Amazon 1407 00:53:06,200 --> 00:53:07,720 and said, what's this all about? 1408 00:53:07,720 --> 00:53:09,360 And I felt this is sheer logic. 1409 00:53:09,360 --> 00:53:11,760 It's a very, very beautiful language. 1410 00:53:11,760 --> 00:53:13,360 And I said, I can pick this up. 1411 00:53:13,360 --> 00:53:15,680 Within a month I was there, in the next three months, 1412 00:53:15,680 --> 00:53:19,520 I devoted two, three hours after lunch every day at office, 1413 00:53:19,520 --> 00:53:21,640 not to meeting clients, not for looking at work, 1414 00:53:21,640 --> 00:53:23,360 but to just create a program. 1415 00:53:23,360 --> 00:53:25,040 I just became a little mental about it 1416 00:53:25,040 --> 00:53:29,840 and I started doing stuff to create a workflow, 1417 00:53:29,840 --> 00:53:31,720 not the financial workflow, but work. 1418 00:53:33,000 --> 00:53:34,880 When the client briefs, what are the suggestions? 1419 00:53:34,880 --> 00:53:36,120 What is the meeting? 1420 00:53:36,120 --> 00:53:37,640 Who's the person handling it? 1421 00:53:37,640 --> 00:53:39,200 How does it go through the account system? 1422 00:53:39,200 --> 00:53:40,520 Which copywriter, which director? 1423 00:53:40,520 --> 00:53:41,440 Who's the studio guy? 1424 00:53:41,440 --> 00:53:42,760 When is the invoice go? 1425 00:53:42,760 --> 00:53:44,160 When is the estimate come? 1426 00:53:44,160 --> 00:53:46,480 And sort of at some point it went off 1427 00:53:46,480 --> 00:53:49,000 into the financial accounting of the accounts guys 1428 00:53:49,000 --> 00:53:49,840 and all that. 1429 00:53:49,840 --> 00:53:51,640 It was a very elaborate program, 1430 00:53:51,640 --> 00:53:53,960 all written in Ruby on Rails over the next three months. 1431 00:53:53,960 --> 00:53:56,160 And they used it for three, four years. 1432 00:53:56,160 --> 00:53:58,480 It was called metalbackstage.com. 1433 00:53:58,480 --> 00:53:59,960 And then we could, it had only, 1434 00:53:59,960 --> 00:54:01,960 obviously with only internal usage. 1435 00:54:01,960 --> 00:54:04,520 So it came about, it seems like a surprising thing 1436 00:54:04,520 --> 00:54:05,720 if you look at it like that, 1437 00:54:05,720 --> 00:54:09,840 but if you look at the various steps taken at various times, 1438 00:54:09,840 --> 00:54:11,520 it seemed to have fallen in place. 1439 00:54:11,520 --> 00:54:13,760 And then suddenly I stopped everything 1440 00:54:13,760 --> 00:54:17,080 and said from 17, 20, 17, 20, 18, 1441 00:54:17,080 --> 00:54:19,680 somewhere there I said WordPress is it. 1442 00:54:19,680 --> 00:54:21,640 And I've been doing a lot of WordPress. 1443 00:54:21,640 --> 00:54:22,680 I love it. 1444 00:54:22,680 --> 00:54:24,480 Okay, wonderful. 1445 00:54:24,480 --> 00:54:28,280 If there is a young person getting into copywriting today, 1446 00:54:29,320 --> 00:54:32,960 so a lot of people think that it's full of pressures, 1447 00:54:32,960 --> 00:54:35,560 it's full of, there's no fun in the job. 1448 00:54:35,560 --> 00:54:37,680 Whereas when you and I joined, 1449 00:54:37,680 --> 00:54:39,680 I don't think we ever looked at this as like, 1450 00:54:39,680 --> 00:54:42,600 is it someone is actually paying you to do it. 1451 00:54:42,600 --> 00:54:44,600 So what would you look at? 1452 00:54:44,600 --> 00:54:45,800 How would you look at, 1453 00:54:45,800 --> 00:54:48,440 describe advertising to someone today 1454 00:54:48,440 --> 00:54:50,240 in the context of today's world? 1455 00:54:51,400 --> 00:54:53,360 See, the thing is, whether it's today or yesterday, 1456 00:54:53,360 --> 00:54:55,960 the value of a good advertising creative person 1457 00:54:55,960 --> 00:54:58,400 or even a servicing person or whatever, 1458 00:54:58,400 --> 00:55:01,840 lies in their exposure to life outside of advertising. 1459 00:55:01,840 --> 00:55:03,800 You don't become a good advertising 1460 00:55:03,800 --> 00:55:06,320 by advertising, I've been studying more advertising. 1461 00:55:06,320 --> 00:55:08,240 Now that may be true of in civil engineering 1462 00:55:08,240 --> 00:55:10,400 or some other fields where you know, 1463 00:55:10,400 --> 00:55:11,560 learn more of civil engineering 1464 00:55:11,560 --> 00:55:12,480 and you become a better civil engineer. 1465 00:55:12,480 --> 00:55:14,080 I presume, I don't know anything about the subject, 1466 00:55:14,080 --> 00:55:17,520 but not in copywriting and in creative direction 1467 00:55:17,520 --> 00:55:21,000 and in artwork and in creating creative ideas for a brand. 1468 00:55:21,000 --> 00:55:22,520 You have to have a life of your own. 1469 00:55:22,520 --> 00:55:23,920 You should know how people are. 1470 00:55:23,920 --> 00:55:26,520 You should know what aunts say to aunties. 1471 00:55:26,520 --> 00:55:29,080 Like once I actually saw a woman looking at herself 1472 00:55:29,080 --> 00:55:32,000 because in the reflection of a glass, 1473 00:55:32,000 --> 00:55:33,680 just as an example, 1474 00:55:33,680 --> 00:55:36,480 because some guy in a shop where I was visiting, 1475 00:55:36,480 --> 00:55:39,760 the shopkeeper called her auntie 1476 00:55:39,760 --> 00:55:42,520 and she looked at herself at her own reflection in the mirror. 1477 00:55:42,520 --> 00:55:46,320 Now that I made into a thing for an ad for Godhrij dye, 1478 00:55:46,320 --> 00:55:48,000 for hair dye for example. 1479 00:55:48,000 --> 00:55:49,600 Have you become an auntie too soon? 1480 00:55:49,600 --> 00:55:51,080 You know, is that first trans of... 1481 00:55:51,080 --> 00:55:52,920 You know, those kind of things. 1482 00:55:52,920 --> 00:55:55,360 Therefore, if you're observing life around you, 1483 00:55:55,360 --> 00:55:57,080 there is enough happening. 1484 00:55:57,080 --> 00:55:59,080 But if you just say, I'm studying ads 1485 00:55:59,080 --> 00:56:02,040 to become a better ad person, it doesn't work. 1486 00:56:02,040 --> 00:56:04,200 Of course, you need to learn the craft, all that. 1487 00:56:04,200 --> 00:56:06,320 But I would say just get out of it. 1488 00:56:06,320 --> 00:56:09,760 Just go on travel, do something else, find out something else. 1489 00:56:09,760 --> 00:56:11,560 Get out of yourself. 1490 00:56:11,560 --> 00:56:12,520 Get out of your head. 1491 00:56:12,520 --> 00:56:14,160 Go and see how the world lives. 1492 00:56:14,160 --> 00:56:16,160 How your uncles and aunties are, how your friends are, 1493 00:56:16,160 --> 00:56:18,920 what elders are all about, what is the 60 plus thinking? 1494 00:56:18,920 --> 00:56:21,840 Whatever, get out, find out, be curious. 1495 00:56:21,840 --> 00:56:25,280 Like Dorothy Parker said, the best cure for... 1496 00:56:25,280 --> 00:56:27,800 She said the cure for boredom is curiosity. 1497 00:56:27,800 --> 00:56:30,480 And there is no cure for curiosity. 1498 00:56:30,480 --> 00:56:33,280 So, believe that. 1499 00:56:33,280 --> 00:56:37,960 I don't think I could have summed it up better, Narayan. 1500 00:56:37,960 --> 00:56:42,760 I don't think there is anything that I need to do to add to this. 1501 00:56:42,760 --> 00:56:46,440 It's been an exhilarating conversation. 1502 00:56:46,440 --> 00:56:52,040 And I'm so glad that you agreed to come on so early in the thing, 1503 00:56:52,040 --> 00:56:54,880 because I would have loved to probably have you in again 1504 00:56:54,880 --> 00:56:57,960 at a point when hopefully this thing will grow a little more 1505 00:56:57,960 --> 00:57:00,080 and we'll take the other parts of your life. 1506 00:57:00,080 --> 00:57:01,080 Okay. 1507 00:57:01,080 --> 00:57:02,400 Thank you very much. 1508 00:57:02,400 --> 00:57:03,400 Thank you very much. 1509 00:57:03,400 --> 00:57:04,400 Thank you very much. 1510 00:57:04,400 --> 00:57:05,400 Thank you. 1511 00:57:05,400 --> 00:57:32,400 Bye-bye.