Spending time with a friend’s young daughter not only brought back flashes of my childhood but also some food for thought. As I saw the little girl draw a house in her book, I realized she was sketching a building with a steep sloping roof. In middle class India today, not many live in homes with sloping roofs – heck, the girl herself lives in a flat on the sixth floor! I had an uncomfortable thought: is she reconstructing a lesson from memory instead of drawing from what she can see? Are we teaching our children to draw a reconstruction and not what is visible? I find it easier to sketch buildings and geometric shapes because I am reconstructing them from memory; I would struggle to sketch a person sitting in front of me. Are we discouraging learning by observation and encouraging repetition of taught matter? Is this why an architecture student who uses a toilet every day, draws it too small in a submission drawing? This is alarming.

“There are so many similarities in feeling love and sorrow, because it is the peak of what you can possibly feel.”

If you’re a great home cook, where does that figure in your CV? What would a housewife’s CV look like? Would it be a valuable one? There are so many skills to pick up in life, but somehow not all raise your worth when it comes to getting paid. Why is that? I have been spending the last couple of months in the kitchen, with world cuisine exploding in my head, visiting country after country by its food. It has been ridiculously eye opening – I am beginning to understand the power of unique combinations of flavour. And even though it makes me intensely happy, it won’t help me in a job interview as a design strategist. I find it a bit odd. Is personal skill exclusive of work excellence?