This morning I went for a swim. I had planned to actually go to the gym to do Calisthenics but then I had to visit the Post Office to deliver a post for my mom. I know its ancient but snail mail is still relevant in India. They also have investment schemes here in the post called RDs or Recurring Deposits which give you returns over a period of time. But the requirement is that you deposit money once a month into it and there is a limit to how much money each RD can have. There are no limits on how many RDs you can have but the returns are taxed so investing in them long term is probably the wiser choice. Banks provide them too but at a lower interest rate. The Post is a federal government agency so they have bigger subsidies compared to banks. They are aware that eventually private companies will try to take over the Post so they gave them these powers to keep them relevant and affordable for the common public. Let me know if there is anything similar in your countries.

I went to deliver a package to my aunt who lives in our native state of Goa. Since tomorrow it is Sunday and the Post is closed on Sundays I went there today. Surprisingly the telegraph service which was a big part of the Post Office was still working until recently(2013) in India. I know because my Grandfather(mom’s dad) worked in the telegraph office in Kolkata(then Calcutta) during WW2 for the British army. The sole reason he was hired was because he could speak English fluently and was a scholar student. My grandfather got his degree in Economics from Pune University. He then went on to finish his Master’s Degree and his PhD in Economics from Memorial University, Newfoundland, Canada. His PhD thesis was related to housing in the city of St John in the 1970s. He did all of this on a full scholarship and he supported his family, his brother’s families and his sisters during that time. After that he came home and worked as a professor at Pune College of Engineering, Pune University, Maharashtra. I still have a copy of the recommendation letter he got from his mentor from Memorial University.

Until the 90s my grandfather’s books were required reading for all students in Pune University and some of his students are engineers, authors, journalists, politicians and popular actors. He lived a great life and I felt like I needed to dedicate at least a paragraph to him on my website. I do what I do because I know I am like him. He too had a very rigid nature and was slightly on the stubborn side. He loved to hunker down and get to the root cause of the problem. He did everything for the family and despite all his flaws and mistakes he tried to do right by everyone. Everyone respected him.

My mom says I am a lot like him and my linguistic range comes from him. He too had a love for the English language and spoke it fluently in a British accent. Beyond that he spoke Konkani, Kannada, Marathi, Hindi, Bengali and Gujarati fluently. His methodical nature and the ability to follow procedure according to the law has been engrained into me genetically. He also had an ability to study systems and find the flaws in it so he could fix them. He literally thought in systems!

Apparently he was terrible at mathematics but he kept practicing until he got it right and made sure it did not become a hinderance for him during his PhD. I too am terrible at mathematics. But I have a genetic reason hehe. Jokes apart I have to admit that all of these qualities are in me because of him and I can’t deny that its a legacy I have to carry forward and do my best to make him proud. I met him maybe a few times in my life and he always got me cakes, biscuits and toast. I may not have known him well personally but I am a version of him so I feel obligated to know more about him by learning more about myself. I can compare notes with my mom if I discover something new. This journey of self improvement shall continue forever. Stayed at home in the evening. Day 59 was a success!