Welcome to The Marketer Who Went Off Consumption! Subscribe to my RSS feed in a feed reader or by e-mail and you'll never miss any chapters from my year-long blog-as-a-book experiment on why we choose to consume, or not.
I have many virtues, but modesty isn’t one of them.
I’m not at all apologetic about being smart or successful because I have had to fight against, and overcome, great odds to become who I am.
So, before you judge me for being far too fortunate, let me introduce you to some of my less fortunate selves.
You have already met the fat, ugly, awkward twelve year old boy I once was. I studied in a Hindi-medium government school in Patna, read Chacha Choudhary comic books in Hindi, and struggled to put together one coherent sentence in English. I wore thick glasses in a cheap plastic frame, hand-me-down ill-fitting too-short shorts, and white-and-blue rubber slippers from Bata. I watched Chitrahaar on Doordarshan and third grade Hindi movies on a black and white TV with my parents and half a dozen neighbors. I sucked at sports, stammered when I spoke to girls and was endlessly bullied by my classmates for being the teachers’ favorite. Even today, I feel jealous when a precocious twelve year old tells me about growing up with his parents’ collection of Hollywood classics or sixties jazz, because I grew up with nothing at all.
Patna is a terrible place for a teenager, and I never really had my teenage years. I wore my father’s old shirts over cheap terry cotton trousers and rode a dhoodhwalla type black Atlas cycle to intermediate college. I had rather strict parents, who considered it their duty to shield their studious son from all distractions, so there was a scene every time a girl called me at home. I had almost no pocket money to pay for a date, and you couldn’t really go out on a date in Patna, in any case, so it isn’t really surprising that I hadn’t even held a girl’s hand (in that way) until I was seventeen.
I survived three years of graduation in Delhi on Rs. 3000 per month ($60 then) and that included rent, food, travel, clothes, books, and long distance telephone calls to my girlfriend. Delhi is not particularly nice to those who can’t pay to partake in its pleasures, and those years were perhaps the worst years of my life. I lived in a PG accommodation close to the slums of Shahadra, watched movies at Shakuntalam Theater for Rs. 6, and bought second hand books for Rs. 10 each from the second hand book market at Daryaganj every Sunday. At the beginning of my third year, my girlfriend of three years asked me if I had thought about how I’ll feed her, before breaking up with me.
Even last year, after two years at an IIM and five years of earning and spending more money than I had ever thought possible, I felt a sense of deja vu when my girlfriend asked me if I had thought about where I’ll keep her, before breaking up with me.
So, I know firsthand that it isn’t easy, or nice, to have less money than you need. I have been there myself and I have seen what it does to people and to relationships.
I also know that you, and only you, can define what is enough for you.
So, after six years of buying too many things to make up for not having enough for twenty odd years, I have decided that I finally have enough more than enough.
Which is why, when my IIM batch mates are buying their first BMWs, I have decided to stop buying things, and become the marketer who went off consumption.
Comments (13)
Know what you went thru in your teenage years! Dad raised hell if a male classmate called, and there was curfew. Had to be home by 7 pm latest and going out for the movies in a group that had guys was a no-no! But such were those times! And our parents, well, their generation was so different!
Wow… I love the way this has been written… everyone likes to root for the under-dog but quite frankly, you have earned mine.
PS: am not calling you a dog… not at all
This is the first post on this blog that I really liked. Nearly as much as I liked your old blog (not diary, the old, old one on Wordpress).
Your deja vu made me wonder if you remembered what I said about your proposed dollarless dates.
Whether, or not…I still hope this year to come turns out to be good for you in every way you wish.
I’m inspired.
I’m just a spoiled single child nerd who lately dreams about buying a BMW, whenever he gets stuck in traffic using public transport.
Frugal living FTW.
They say success is not so much where you’ve reached but what you’ve overcome to get there.
One of your better posts, G.
@Kay: It’s funny how little we learn from our parents’ mistakes. I’m a little worried that I’ll be a total control freak as a father.
@Asfaq: Thanks. I like being the underdog.
@Anonymity: I remember what you said about my zero dollar dates —
Three zero dollar dates later, I’m happy to say that it isn’t so.
@Vimal: Don’t be hard on yourself, my friend. Consumption follows a marginal utility curve and each one of us are on a different curve.
@Blr Bytes: That’s what I say to pull myself up every time I feel I haven’t done enough with my life.
@Blr Bytes/ Anonymity: Thanks. It was a difficult post to write. In fact, it happened after almost a week of reluctant start-and-stop writing. It’s always difficult to acknowledge your demons.
This is the first really interesting post on this blog. So, here’s some honest feedback for you!
This post explains some things I winced at earlier–I’m not a big fan of hype, unless it’s backed up by substance.
I’d like to see more like this, because, to me, living economically in India is not an unusual enough occurence to warrant interest. Your zero-dollar dates, for example, are not different from the outings of many middle-class people. I think it might be good if there more of your own ruminations/struggles rather than specific entries. It’s not so much what you did as how you felt doing it.
On a technical note, I wish you’d use less self-referential hyperlinks as it disrupts the flow a bit. Also, it’s a bit hard to use the category tags to navigate–your tag pages seem set up to only show one post. For example, try clicking on Zero Dollar Dating. It’s a bit hard to figure out how to then navigate to your first post on the subject.
this was an honest, touching post. it gave me context to your experiment, and helped me understand the reasons a little bit better. i agree with suchi - the best posts are those that include your ruminations/struggle/challenges.
I’m almost never glad to be proven wrong. This is one of those exceptions. And I kick myself for not remembering your photographic (verbal?) memory for doomsday prophecies.
@Suchi: I’m glad you liked the post.
As I have said before, there’s no virtue in ‘not having’ something in the first place; the only virtue is in ‘giving up’ something you already have.
So, yes, I know that most Indians are still coming to terms with consumption, but that’s not the point. The point is that I see an emerging sub-culture — primarily in Europe, but also in North America — in which well-to-do people are saying that they are ‘tired of’ consumption. I hope you see that not being able to consume is different from being tired of consuming. This sub-culture hasn’t become visible in India yet, but it will, in less than 10 years. That is the trend that I’m trying to explore with my experiment.
Yes, the theme has also evoked extreme reactions, as the rest of the blog. Some like the extreme simplicity, some don’t. I do see that it is difficult to navigate, and I intend to do a little tweaking very soon.
@Riddhi: Thanks for the kind words and the great article.
@Anonymity:
I’m surprised you even bothered to respond to that post. Sounded like a lot of sour grapes to me.
I enjoyed reading your response though =)
I survived three years of graduation in Delhi on Rs. 3000 per month ($60 then) and that included rent, food, travel, clothes, books, and long distance telephone calls to my girlfriend.
This is not bad at all. Having to wear your Dad’s shirt probably is. Having to wait until 17 before holding a girl, doesn’t sound too late. You are making a big deal of nothing. When you are a student you have less money. When u start earning u have more. You were middle class before and now upper middle/ upper class now. Whats the big deal.
@Ace: Thanks.
@X: Well, fortune is a relative thing. I’m sure $60 a month is enough for a lot of people. I’m also sure that $10,000 a month is not enough for a lot of people. So, I don’t know if I am making a big deal out of nothing.
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