Milton Friedman and teaching.

Today I watched the lectures, Q&A sessions and interviews of Milton Friedman on Youtube. If I say I was impressed by his knowledge, power of arguments and control it would be an understatement as Friedman was no ordinary person but one of the most influential economists of all times, proponent of free market economy, defender of capitalism as a necessary (not sufficient) system for development. He was lauded by many as a remarkable teacher and when I heard this I felt very good that being a teacher was not considered any less qualification than say economist. I know that teaching is a noble profession but through out my career as a teacher I have been asked pinching questions why I chose to become a teacher (thanks those who were asking these questions didn't question my volition for teaching profession) when I could otherwise had gone to join any MNC. Here I see the praise for Friedman as teacher and feel sky is the limit. What pulls me towards teaching is a continuous exchange of ideas in classrooms between students and teacher. What I like best is the interaction with hundreds of new students every year and making connection with them on the basis of knowledge. Understanding of each student to a level where he or she can understand the current theory and then challenge it in a way where I can see the student is applying his or her thinking skills. I try to keep it simple. When I say simple it means I want to communicate the crux of the theory in as simple way as possible and when theory is understood I try to give examples from the daily life or better I ask students to give examples from their own experiences. Even a joke is not out of the point if it helps in understanding the idea. Sometimes I start with examples and then give theory later on. The objective is to talk, communicate and reach to the students in a language that they understand. Teaching is intertwined with art of communication and at the heart of communication lies understanding of the audience and you cannot understand them until you get out of your own insecurities and you can get out of your own insecurities only if you know truly what you are talking about. Knowledge is power and it makes you humble as you know that being humble doesn't mean being weak and on the contrary being bullish or aggressive means something is lacking that you want to hide in the posture of being intimidating. If you can listen to the questions patiently that means you are giving your audience respect and you know you are confident to give the answer even sometimes the right answer may be " I don't know". I never heard Friedman saying " I don't know" ( he might have said it, but the videos I watched in that he never said" but what I heard was always a confident, in depth and passionate answer.

In the memory of Dr. Ishqi

The city of Hyderabad once famous for literary and intellectual gatherings is now deprived of such events. When one of the learned Professor of English told me about the organization of a gathering in the memory of Dr. Ilyas Ishqi I decided to attend it. Last night I went to the function and found very few people attending it. There were hardly 50 participants in a city of more than 2 million. Dr. Ilyas Ishqi was no ordinary person. He was an intellectual giant. Born in Jaipur in 1922 he migrated to Pakistan in 1948. His professional association was with Radio Pakistan but his areas of expertise were literature, language and music. He was an expert on Urdu literature. The aspect that inspired me most was his command over many languages of Pakistan. He was fluent in Sindhi, Punjabi and Seraiki. He was one of the top most literary figure who was seen as the expert in Sindhi language especially on Shah Latif though his mother tongue was Urdu. Persian and Hindi were other languages in which he expressed himself in the form of poetry. He devoted his life to spread love among the dwellers of Pakistan especially Sindh. His first and last love was books. He passed away on 12 January 2007. I am lucky to know him as a close friend of my father. Dr. Ishqi came to our home many times to spend time with my father. Hyderabad has lost one of its greatest patron of knowledge. One of his verse is below with my attempt to translate it.

" Harf ki qeemat bay payan hai, harf kay hain imkaan bohat
harf ko zinda karna seekho phir chahay taqdeer likho"

" The price of word is infinite, the possibilities of words are countless"
learn how to make word alive, then write your own fate".