Half-full or Half-empty?

An optimist views a cup as half-full while a pessimist sees it as half-empty. What one sees as a risk, the other sees as an opportunity. You can either be afraid of change, or you can embrace it. These oft-heard phrases and more point to that lens with which you see the world: your perspective. Whenever I get a chance to travel, I have been amazed at how my own perspective changes everytime. India is a country moving along at such a frentic pace throwing up kaleidoscopic images with a sea of changes, making one's imagination and ancitipation run wild. But this is not about me, this is about how the world seeing India has discarded its old lens in favor of a bright and more colorful one, how liabilities can quickly turn into assets. These are some thoughts on the power of perspective.
Probably a decade ago, all of India's woes could be traced back to one word: population. How could the government possibly provide for all the essential needs when the consumers of those very needs are rising at an exponential rate? Fast forward to today and the word "population" has been replaced with the word "market". Car makers, cell phone providers, technology giants, fashion moguls, advertising bigwigs and the list goes on....have all made India home due to the very presence of this growing "market". Movies and cricket, the country's 2 main lifelines have comfortably followed suit. Bollywood is no longer a nomenclature rip-off of the international movie scene, it now hosts some Oscar-winning talent. There is an explosion of interest around the world in understanding the nuts and bolts of this country, with media, columnists, writers, and publishers descending on a regular basis, not worried about the stereotyped image of the country as a dust-bowl filled with traffic congestions, animals on the road or the extra spicy food levels causing a flutter or two in the stomach. I am yet to hear a single word of complaint from any international cricketer playing in the Indian Premier League. On the contrary, some of the words effused by the players on the on-field conditions, accommodations and such would have given Lord Byron a run for his money. Even Shane Warne seems to have summoned enough courage to leave his can of pasta at home, and place his trust in the local food, if its good enough for the corporate heads and the Bollywood stars, it cant' be that bad, can it? Business and perspective definitely mix very well, with one outdoing the other in checking where the grass is "greener".

I must be off now, time to give my glasses a good polish.