Transcript
And we are live. So, gentlemen, when I sent the topic round last Friday, I put on my WhatsApp that I was shocked that I don’t have anything on my bucket list. And then the German delegation in our round wrote back a message saying that, let me just bring up this WhatsApp, “I think it is a good sign when the list is empty at your age. Think about it.” So, I am only a young, sprightly 62, Mr. Tyson. Would you like to explain your words a little more in detail before I send you off into oblivion, that is outer space, for such a comment?
I didn’t want to be impolite, but maybe you interpreted it a little bit as impolite, but I meant this really positive. Because if there are not so many things, and I know you are a young person with around 60, but if there is a complete full list at this age, you did something wrong in your life. That was my thoughts to this.
Well rescued. Well rescued.
I am a diplomat, you know.
When you want to be, you can be. Very diplomatic, yes.
Moments are far and few in between, but they do occasionally come up, yes.
So, the shock on my side was actually real, because, of course, I do have a bucket list, but it is rapidly emerging into something very, very different. And it is just another sign of how the last six months have really impacted my life and my thinking. But I think I am reducing the amount of traveling on my bucket list and wanting to increase the possibility to try and influence the way we do things in society now. And getting away from computers and computers telling us what to do and how we do things and when we do things, as I have experienced in the last six months with the police and the medical services and chalala. And actually sort of getting back to a human interaction and having people to actually talk with each other when there is something serious going on and not, well this is what the computer says so we can’t do anything about it. End of discussion. Go to hell.
So, that is my new emerging bucket list. I do hope to put in a spot of traveling every now and then. But it is amazing, these bucket lists do have a habit of being very flexible and changing.
Anyway, so, Ritesh, let me just continue. The beauty of tonight’s podcast is that we are actually four gentlemen sitting in four vastly different countries. And as Sebastian so kindly pointed out, of ever so slightly differing age. From our late 20s to our early 60s. So, I think talking about a bucket list from our own unique perspective will be a fantastic opportunity. And Ritesh, the youngest in the group, the furthest away in the most populous country on this planet, a country that is moving forward rapidly, full of confidence. What is on your bucket list?
Frank to be frank, I don’t have any bucket list as of now. I think about the things and try to finish things and do things. But this is like, it is moving such a fast that you don’t run towards what you are looking. You are just surviving things. You are going around certain things and you are running. You don’t create certain specific things and go behind that. So what I look at is that life has become repetitive things. You do things and you don’t care about other things. You don’t create new things. So sometimes there are some plans which you want to feel, know things, achieve, but it’s very limited scope to have a list of things to know. So as of now, nothing is just, so as there was a plan to get engaged or marry in this 2024, so things is very good. But it was not a plan like I have to finish in this time. So it happened and happened. So it is like that. So there’s nothing on a strict timetable and no things.
Okay, I suppose the positive side of that is that the room to be disappointed is smaller. That you are probably the most realistic at this stage. You have a very realistic perspective on what is possible and what is not possible and that you accept this realism. And maybe that is actually a certain freedom in itself that you are content with what is possible and one doesn’t have to be everywhere, everywhere all the time. It’s quite a healthy attitude to have. Going through life, you see that your plan never works. So what you wanted to do, achieve and everything. What you do, you enjoy whatever you do. Try to find happiness in whatever you do. You don’t have to postpone your happiness for a given time or moment. You work hard and you want to go for a vacation for a few days. I don’t, it was like that when I was studying. But what I see that every day you can find certain times, certain hours and you enjoy your times. You don’t have to wait to postpone your happiness for a longer duration or a specific time. You have the potential of being a guru. You know this, don’t you? With this kind of attitude.
You know that being a guru is better to be working in the IT and the store because you have a lot of freedom and money as well. People are there to give you. I don’t have to work. I think that you don’t have to create things and run behind that.
All right, let’s move to the other side of the planet, Isma. You are a couple of months older, no younger than I am. So we can see the horizon at the end. Do you have a bucket list still?
After your question, I have written some items on my agenda, but I forgot my agenda in the car. It’s some meters away from me. But I would say something. Since 2008, I had the intention to visit Australia and New Zealand. And in 2019, I almost went there, but my nephew got married. I couldn’t. Then I postponed to 2020. We had pandemics, but now I still intend to go to Australia, but I don’t know when. But maybe it’s one of my old plans. Can I use old for this? Yeah, one of my earlier old plans or earlier plans. Maybe it’s my oldest plan about the trip. And as you know, I like to travel, but I haven’t been traveling for some years. Because by my juries as a son, one of other is to keep health because I think I’m in a general idea I’m health and to keep on fit as well. After I was 18, I just gained three kilograms. I think it’s all right.
Wow. What’s the secret?
I don’t know. Of course, some people who expect can be healthy. It doesn’t exactly an obligation, an obliged relation and weight and health. It doesn’t help. And some other plans are to go deeper on the field of study that is interesting more is literature, English, French, and maybe a little bit of Spanish. I hope I can improve all of them. And as I told you, sometimes I try not to forget that my motto is to be a better person today than I was in the past. First for me, but for the world in general and people around me. And if I get to do a lot of this plan, I think it ‘s alright. But of course, I’d like to travel to some other place, maybe to Europe again. India is a little complicated because I would have to learn at least some words in Hindi. Yeah, every Dutch. I don’t think so. You can manage English so people can understand it.
I had some other items on my list, but I forgot them. Maybe three or four more. If I forgot them, that’s because they aren’t important now.
Okay. Well, the motivation to travel to India is, of course, greatly increased because there seems to be some wedding preparations or planning or thoughts going on. And I think the three or four words of Hindi that might get you through passport control and to a place to have a cup of tea or chai or coffee or something like that. I’m sure Ritesh would be very pleased to give us some Hindi lessons should English not help you any further. So, I think you can put India on your bucket list. It might be a little complicated, but not for the reasons that you think. So we could do this. So, that would be a plan. We have a whole reader community meeting up for Ritesh’s wedding in 2024.
But I have a question for you, Frank. Do you think that it’s always important to have a bucket list?
I’m going to postpone the answer to that question because I want to get Sebastian’s input on his bucket list. I’m not quite sure what to expect on this one. So Sebastian, two questions. Do you have a bucket list? And if so, what is on this list?
I don’t have a bucket list at the moment. So, I think maybe I have one, but not an official one. So, for me, I thought about it when the meeting started. So, I wasn’t prepared. I had the time to prepare something and think about it. So, my thoughts to this were feeling better with all my problems at the moment that I have. That’s priority number one, because all other things are not important. And what comes really close to that is the birth of my daughter, that everything goes well and everything is okay. That’s the two priorities that I have at the moment. And if I’m able to achieve both of them, we can talk about another goals and different things that I want to achieve. But these are the main goals I have for next month. That’s it.
Okay. So, I’m going to answer your question, Isma, before I throw it back at everybody else. Is it important to have a bucket list? Yes and no. In my opinion, one should have dreams or aspirations that one should try and fulfill. But I think you have to also remain very realistic about it and categorize them as dreams. It would be nice to do this, but it’s not going to be the end of the world if I don’t do that. And I think 99% of all bucket lists are travel lists, destinations where people want to go. And when I look at when Mary does her traveling, the amount of planning that is involved and the amount of sheer unpleasantness that is associated with traveling, I mean, I have to say as much as I would like to, I don’t know if I want to. And secondly, you hear stories of destinations which are now so popular that these destinations are looking for ways to reduce mass tourism. And in Europe, we speak of Venice, Barcelona, Lisbon, Porto. These four cities are very popular tourist destinations and the cities are suffering. I was in Rome a couple of years ago and it was horrible. It was absolutely horrible. Just columns of tourists with tour guides in front waving their flags so that no one gets lost. And I think you can actually get, if you want to see a site, you can probably get more information and a better view of it by looking at some pictures or going to YouTube and finding some videos on that. I don’t need this whole mass tourism bit.
So, I think a bucket list is also important in that you have goals to work towards or something that you want to achieve in your life. And maybe the world is becoming a little bit more modest and by saying, well, I don’t want to do this, I want to do this, but I’m happy if I have a healthy baby and that I can raise this child to become a well-balanced member of society. I’m happy that I have a job, that I can raise my family, that I can support my family, that I’m healthy and that I can become a better person intellectually. So, I think that is a direction that we’re heading to. Is that normality? Isn’t that what we should be doing in any case? Or is that something that has now become so special because the life that we lead is becoming more complicated, in certain cases more unpleasant, more difficult, and that needs to change?
So, in answer to your question, Isma, bucket lists, yes, but. That’s the bottom line for me. Sebastian, your bucket list, if it is such one, is a very modest one by comparison. It’s a realistic one. Do you think bucket lists are important?
I would like to start a little bit earlier. If you want to achieve or build up such a list, I think you have to separate it. What you said, maybe in different categories. At the end, you’re not putting everything together, different locations you want to visit or destinations. For me, that has all something to do with develop yourself. That means in business, private life, traveling. So, if you’re doing something like that, I think you have to separate it and categorize it. And that means also, and I never did that, that you have to think about. That’s my understanding. Where are you good in? What would you like to improve? And what are the goals that these improvements leading to? And that means you have to spend time to think about you. And that’s, as we all know, not really easy. And everybody, not everybody, but a lot of people postponing these things, including me. So, I think more as a complete project as at the end, you know, to categorize having an idea, where do you want to go and what you have to do to achieve these goals in the different categories?
I know long answer, as you said. You can have a bucket list with different destinations. So, a travel list. That’s really easy. And I’m not sure if it makes you happy at the end.
Yeah, well, that sort of brings me to a very macabre question, but it’s a variation of this theme. And I’m going to throw it to Isma first before I throw it to Ritesh. And I want you to accept this question in the positivity that I am thinking it, even though the question itself is actually very macabre. And I certainly do not wish this on anybody. But if you were to suddenly die, and your past thought, your last thought was, did you have a good innings? Did you have a good life for the duration that it lasted? Would you be able to say yes, Isma? You need to unmute yourself.
I have just two answers. Yes or no?
Well, then maybe elaborate a little bit.
According to the opportunities I have, according to my capacities, I think I tried to do my best. And to have a different life, I think I should be a different person. Then, according to my conditions, I think I lived the best I could. But not what I would like to do in general. For that, as I said, I would have to have more different conditions or maybe some more higher skills. For example, as I mentioned to you, I’d like to be a personality person. I don’t know. I’d like to be more sociable. I know I am not. I consider myself unsociable. And it’s not good for this world because, in general, it depends more and more on each other. Although people think in a different way that they are very independent, but not. We are very dependent on other people. That’s why it’s important to be very sociable.
So basically, the answer to your question, to the question I just asked you would be basically yes, but it would be jolly inconvenient because you haven’t finished your path yet. You haven’t achieved everything that you want to try and achieve.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Ritesh, you’re a generation or two younger. And the general culture in which you were raised and have grown up in and that forms the Indian psyche. There is a strong belief in the afterlife. And everything is cyclical. But I’m going to ask the same question to you with the respect that I have to you. Not the macabreness of it, but if you were to suddenly find yourself at the end of the road, would you say that the last 28 years were good innings and that was okay?
Yes, Frank. I feel like whatever I have got, I’ve got the best because the background I’m from, people just compare with your friends, your family, and everything. And I feel that I have achieved a lot during these 28 years, and it is getting more and more. So, if I have to go away from this earth at this age, I will be very happy to see that I have achieved a lot. I have done many things. I have seen many things, and it will be, I will be happy.
But I see one more thing like it depends on the mood also. Sometimes you start comparing with yourself right now with your surroundings. But when you compare with yourself at originally where you were and where you are right now, so it gives a lot of happiness to see that or to feel that I have done, I have got something, and it is enough that I have achieved something.
And in that context, I wanted to bring that overall in India, people are getting unhappy. And if you look at the happiness index, India is lower in this list. And people, why they are happy? If you consider 20 years old, before 2020, at 2000, people were poor, but they were happy. But now people have money, but they are unhappy because they started comparing themselves with people who are above them, not the people who are below or the people who were in their circle. And this is the main reason for unhappiness in Indian society, especially a lot of people from the below poverty line, they have moved to the middle class. And there’s a lot of section in the middle class. Some people are upper middle class, or some people are middle in the middle class, some people are just above the poverty. And people, they want to achieve a higher level, but they are not enjoying the level they are. So this is the level of happiness. But for me, I feel I’m happy with what I have achieved in this time.
I would have loved to have been educated in India, really, because, I mean, Australian education was pretty good. But sometimes what I hear coming from you is so much more balanced and so much more wise. Because you just, I think, hit the nail on the head. For me, the question, and I’m going to throw this one to Sebastian, is, can you remember, Sebastian, if you cast your mind back 20, 25 years, do you think your hopes and aspirations, and let’s not call it a bucket list, but your hopes and aspirations and what you want to achieve, how different were they to what you said you would like to do and have at the age of 43?
First, I want to comment on Ritesh’s comments. That’s what’s going to happen if capitalism hits a country at the end. What you now see in India, maybe that is my impression, is that the country gets richer. Maybe some people get richer, and then they start comparing each other. And that, at the end, leads to what you described, Ritesh. That was just a comment on the side.
So, if I compare what is important for me with 40, let’s say 40 to 20, there are, so with 20, you try to achieve different goals: to, let’s say, find a good job, earn a lot of money, drive a big car, and all these material things you are looking for. And I think we achieved that, Claudia and I, for example. So, we have enough money to live more than other people, but I’m not happy at the moment, with different things in my life. And that shows that money is not everything. But on the other side, I agree, you should be happy about what you achieved and what you, that your life is okay, that you don’t need to look after, if we go to a shop, we just buy it. We don’t have to look when we go shopping for food, groceries. We don’t need to look at the prices, for example. I do that, but we don’t need to do it. And if I want to buy something today, I just buy it. I don’t care about it. And you get used to these material things really fast, but if it goes to the other direction, then you know that it’s not a standard, you know, and it’s easier to go in this direction to go in the other direction. But at the end, for example, that’s also something I mentioned over the last years. If you go out into nature, in spring you see when things are starting growing. For example, that’s something I never saw with 20. I never realized at this age. So yeah, I think at the end, you know, at the end it comes, if I try to melt it down to really important things, what is important? Love, that you are loved, that you can eat something, that you are not hungry, and you want to be loved at the end. I think that’s the key, I don’t know how to say it, the key goals for a human being at the end. Does it need a lot of money for that? No. Okay, it is easier if you have it, but at the end, there are, so look around you, if you look on TV, all these millionaires, billionaires, are they happy now? A lot of them are not happy.
Yeah. It’s not a new, I can’t miss.
Yeah, good question.
It’s nothing new, it’s nothing new. Nothing new, everybody does it.
But I want to say, I think just 70% of the people are not able to find a way through life in a happy way. Because you have to work on it, you also need to see things or realize things that, yeah, you have to look for it and be happy about it and realize and think about it, what is good in your life, and not always focus on the negative side. And that’s really easy because you are surrounded. We talked already about it, about media and so on, but it’s also on you too.
Yeah.
Okay. And that’s not easy, I think that’s not easy, but it’s in your own hands at the end. It’s an easy sentence, but it isn’t easy.
Well, it’s actually an interesting thought. And so to the two people who do not live in Europe amongst us, a lot of people are jealous of what we have in Europe, to the point that they undertake long dangerous journeys to find the pot of gold that they think exists in Europe. And they want to seek a material life, they want to have security, they want to have a decent income, they want to provide for their family, they want to have something that they cannot get in their own countries. Isma, do you think that the image of Europe that you have and Ritesh that you might have as well, Isma, do you think the image of what we have in Europe is worth aspiring to from your perspective, from your Brazilian perspective? And Ritesh, the same question goes for you as well, but from your Indian perspective. So, Isma first.
Suppose that from tomorrow on I will be living in Europe with the same standard of life that I have in Brazil. For sure, I live in a worse condition. But if I were younger, probably I will be able to achieve maybe the same standard of living that I have now or maybe better. I’m not sure if you understood me. And then for me, if I receive a visa for free to go to more for Europe with the same asset that I have, I think it wouldn’t be a good option because I think that I can live better in Brazil. But if I have a condition to have more assets or a better material life in Europe, probably for my intention, it would be very nice. For example, I could practice more English in English or in Malta and France, in Switzerland or France or Belgium for my intention. And it would be nice and even if we study literature in some good and very ancient universities. Then it depends. It would be another framework. But in my real condition, it wouldn’t be good for me to live in Europe.
OK. Ritish, what about you? We have this image projected into the world. Is it worth aspiring to?
If you had asked me the same question five years before that, I should have said that yes, I would love to be in such places. But right now, I’m very well informed about the situation, condition in America or European Union. And people generally, most of the people from India, they go to Canada and then they go to USA. So what people feel that the person goes to these places and they give money back to their home. This money creates a lot of standards in the village or their hometown. So everyone thinks that this place is very good and it can go and earn a lot. They don’t want to be there. But in recent years, we have got a lot of information about the situation, how they are living there. So I have seen, I think I said this one in a couple of episodes back, that most of the students, they go from India, they took loan from the government or the private banks. They go there, they study and they do some jobs like they will go for KFC, McDonald’s and they are earning some hourly hours. They are earning hourlies and they are giving money back or they’re paying their loans and everything. So it feels more, but the condition, living condition is not good.
OK, same thing, I will not go in India. People will not allow, my parents will not allow that. They said, why you need something to do that you you don’t have to do all the things. Generally, when we were in college, no one used to go in this McDonald’s, KFC and do work. These same people, they go to other countries and they do the same thing. So this is a lot of good lifestyle. But they want to do something better for their family or their they want to just, if you can say that so that you have done something that you are suffering and then you are saying that no, I’m good. So this is not a good thing. And there’s a lot of education about this. But people don’t because they they can see that some people, some people who was who is Microsoft CEO, who is my Google CEO, they have gone there and they have achieved something. But it is not like that their parents were well established in the society and they can help their children to reach that level. But people, they compare that if I change the place, then I will get better.
So in India perspective, people are still they want to go and be in a bad, bad condition and they want to help their family and they want to achieve something. So I don’t think so. I can I have good image in mind because see, if I have certain amount, I can have this. It is not possible in USA or EU, but people can come and help you in your home. You can give little money to cook and they can cook you in Bangalore. But same thing you can’t find in America or EU that someone can come to your house and cook for you. So living condition is not good, according to me, but it’s still a richer country and you can get a lot if you want to achieve something.
I remember speaking to a person a few years ago who lives in France, but he came from Iran with his family. And he said that economically, he was worse off in France than he was in Iran because, yes, the numbers might have been higher, but the taxes and the deductibles were also much higher. And his net salary in comparison, the purchasing power of his net salary was lower in France than the purchasing power of his net salary in Tehran. And he said economically, it was not a good move to leave Iran, but, of course, politically and being able to think freely and act more freely, that was for him the motivation, it still is. But in terms of quality of life, it was actually more difficult for him to live in France. And I suppose, Sebastian, we could ask ourselves the question, and it’s a rhetorical question, but maybe Ritesh can lift some light on it in future discussions.
What would it be like, Sebastian, if we packed our bags with our families and moved to India for several years, to find would the cliches that we have, would they be confirmed or would we be surprised to see that maybe because the comparisons are so severe that it might actually be much nicer to live in India than it is to live in Europe. And there’s a film to that effect, The Best Marigold Hotel or The Second Best Marigold Hotel, which tells the story of British pensioners leaving the United Kingdom and setting foot in Jaipur in northern India and actually saying, OK, it was chaotic, but the richness of life and the intensity of life is absolute priceless.
So, Sebastian, say to Claudia, we’re moving to India, say to your bosses, bye-bye, I’ve got a job in India, I know one person out of 1.3 billion people and he’s going to help me. Sebastian, last word on this subject. CSC is also active in India, so maybe I can have a volunteer year in India for CSC. What would your wife say?
Well, a really, really low question. Where should I start? In two minutes. I think it’s a complete different world. I was never in India, so one of my best friends were in India, for example, a few years ago. And they said to me, and they were, you know, traveled, they traveled around the world, they were everywhere. And they said, we will never travel to India again. I said, OK, why is it, what was the problem? They said they were absolutely. I tried to express it correctly, Ritesh, sorry if I’m not able to find the right words. There were situations when they traveled around in India which are so different to Europe. They explained some situations there and with people, for example, really poor people that were on the street with wounds, for example. I think these are the negative things maybe. Yeah, but they are sort of positive things, but they were really overwhelmed. How poor somehow this country is to see people suffer, for example. And you also have this in Europe, maybe. But I’m not sure if this is comparable.
But I also had, and that’s something I also want to say, years ago when I started, when I had my education for my job, I had a colleague who was traveling to India three months per year, you know, every year, because he said it is so much, so this world there is much more. Good question. So he loved it, you know, and that’s, I think at the end, because he lived there for a long time, he loved the purity of the people, how nice they were, how polite they were, how they tried to help each other. So at the end, you have to find out. But I think it’s come back to the beginning. I think you can’t compare it to Europe. And it is also, it would be also for Ritesh, really tough to live here, I think, because how people act, how the behaviour is, is so different, I think, to India, for example. So it’s another world for both sides at the end, and you have to decide if it fits to your…
I think it boils down to, and Ritesh, Ritesh has emphasized this quite often in all our meetings. And this is the one defining thread through all of this. It doesn’t matter where you are in this world. If you have the right people around you, life can be fantastic. And it doesn’t matter what the physical surroundings are like. If you have the right people and the right attitude amongst all of this, then everything else is absolutely unimportant. And as you said, we have a lot of, a too high standard of living here in Europe, and the majority of people are not the happiest on this planet. And we look at other countries where the standard of living is significantly lower, and we hear the same message. People are happy, or they are more content, or they are more satisfied if we don’t want to use the word happiness. So there it is. It all depends on people. Gentlemen, interesting discussion. Thank you for your input and your wisdom.
Ritesh, a last word from your side?
Yeah, so just whatever Sebastian mentioned that it is true, you can find people, especially the tourist destination, that you can, people, generally the government try to control them and they say that they try to, they are only for there to take money and all the things. And the government cannot control because they try to send them to the hospitals and everything, but they come back because they can earn more like that. And it is there. There’s a lot of people, poor people in India. It’s absolute root. And you can find, but generally that if you have some money and you want to come in, come to India, live in a good society, build places like Bangalore, you want to buy a villa, that will be an awesome thing because you can’t have higher purchasing power than what you can do in Europe. So in that context, it can be good. But generally, if you look at in a different, if you try to look at the society, there will be a stereotype and many things. So, yeah, people are poor and that can have a lot of impact on your, the way you think about the society and everything. India is, Europe is an individualistic society. There you depend on your family, not even the, we call families, my brother, my father’s brother, my grandpa and everything. But you consider family as a husband, wife, children. So there is, there can be a different type of scenarios. But it is true that we have poor people and they do things, certain things, especially what you mentioned that they are handicapped and they go to certain places and they ask money and everything.
On this note, gentlemen, I will see you all at the respective times and places in the next 23 hours or in the next couple of days or next week. Gentlemen, thank you very much. It was an interesting conversation and we’ll continue next week. OK, thank you. Bye-bye.