Pre Pandemic Normal: You are not focused, you do so many things at the same time Moni. You have a diverse cv so where do we place you?

Pandemic Semi Normal: You have done so many things Moni, moved across countries and industries Moni. Can you tell us how to navigate change Moni?

It takes grit to move contexts, and take losses as data points. CV is a reflection of the past and certainly not a blueprint for the pandemic present.

As a writer and entrepreneurial doer, we start from a blank screen, and the article or the business is a zero to one journey always.

The Great Indian Dream. Remembering Siddhartha Deb’s book out of which his chapter was smudged out in the Indian Edition. My hard copy was purchased in Singapore.

Luck finally ran out of a person who at one point exemplified the post liberalisation small town global aspirations.

History informs me the silences to write voices in to the voids and Ethnography tells me how to detail the texture of the story. Writing is as much about workmanship as about the big idea. The big idea is all written up, however there are ways to write the small.

We need a more productive definition of who belongs to the region in these radical times of pandemic peace.

The chatter in the Singaporean Digital Public Sphere of residency and visa categories is vociferous bordering viscous, legit keeping the fear about livelihoods. I got talked down when I called out an unreasonable comment with a counter being caste, which is not really a great quid pro quo, as I am not the one supporting any sort of discrimination.

All said and done, the fear is palpable and I do care as a person who supports Singapore wholeheartedly. The uphill task for job creation and maintenance is not the Fallen Talent or the ungrateful PR who will take away the rightful job of the Son of the Soil, the second generation citizen onwards. In this era of remote work almost all service and IT sector work can be done in other parts of Asia at a fraction of a cost.

As a professional who helps run a policy consulting remote ensemble through digital value chains, i can offer more insights including a book chapter that i am writing.

The battle for the future of work is truly underway.

Reading Ulrike Freitag on Hadrami Diaspora in the Indian Ocean. Her podcast with @Ahmed_Yaqoub is excellent.

My book project trudges on one resource at a time on the Subaltern Gulf.

If there is a publisher, would be happy to speak as Gulf is more than orientalist tropes.

#thoughtleadership #gulf #writing #indianoceanhistories