Homecoming, another word for respite

    Under the warm, wet blanket of a Virginia summer's eve, I am standing on the curb at the airport arrival terminal, awaiting my ride home after a few weeks abroad.  This is where I love to be.  I have renewed my faith in mankind by viewing the countless happy reunions inside the terminal and, now, I am waiting on my own.  My wife will be here soon - she's caught in traffic.  After years of traveling for a living I still love this evolution and I have seen all forms that it can take.

Bazaar in Lahore Pakistan (Author's collection Copyright 2019)

    Parades and receptions have been the recent form of fanfare for returning heroes but that wasn't always the case.  Homer tells us that after twenty years of war fighting and mis-adventures, Odysseus returned only to find his home being ravaged, his wife being pressured to leave him and his kingdom on the brink of collapse.  Luckily, this most cunning man had the wherewithall to unmask and dispatch his enemies in one well-orchestrated stroke.  On the other side of Greece, in Mycenae, Agamemnon wasn't so lucky.  His wife and her lover killed him in his sleep.
    Perhaps, Agamemnon was delivered from himself in this tragic event: saved from a future that he couldn't see because of his desire to return home. Tennyson has followed up with an exploration of this sentiment.  Through the ageing eyes of Odysseus who, after fighting his way to the underworld and back with the sole purpose of regaining his home had become bored and longed for the adventure of travel once again.

...For always roaming with a hungry heart 
Much have I seen and known; cities of men 
And manners, climates, councils, governments,... 

Erg Chgagah, Morocco (Author's collection copyright 2015)

Travel is a heady concoction that plays on the senses like a highly addictive drug; eventually seducing you into what you try to rationalise is your last time.  Tennyson's Odysseus understood this intrinsically when, despite his advanced age, he stated his intention to turn his kingdom over to his son and roam the wine-coloured seas in search of adventure.

Japanese garden icon (Author's collection copyright 2019)

...Come, my friends, 
’Tis not too late to seek a newer world. 
Push off, and sitting well in order smite 
The sounding furrows; for my purpose holds 
To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths 
Of all the western stars, until I die. 
It may be that the gulfs will wash us down: 
It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles, 
And see the great Achilles, whom we knew. 
Tho’ much is taken, much abides; and tho’ 
We are not now that strength which in old days 
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are; 
One equal temper of heroic hearts, 
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will 
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield. 

So, I load my bags into the car and hug my Wife as though I haven't seen her in a lifetime.  We kiss and try to make up for lost time on the way home catching up on all the happenings since our separation.  Yet, although all this electrifying human interaction is genuine, it is perhaps made sweeter by the quiet realisation that this homecoming is really just another respite.

Aquarius Habitat, Key Largo, Florida, USA(Author's collection copyright 2015)

Disney Wasn't the First

    My Daughter and I love to go to the cinema.  It is our go-to for our Daddy/Daughter date night.  After the film, we will talk for hours over burgers and chips discussing the subtle nuances of our most recent film.  In fact, our discussions often continue for days on this subject until we have begun to explore new ways of telling the same story and delved into fresh ideas about the meaning of the film and the intentions of the creators.

ZamZamma in front of the Lahore Museum (Author's collection, copyright 2019)

    I was recently in Lahore Pakistan and no visit there is complete without a stop at the Zamzamma and the Wonder House, in front of which it stands. These terms are, of course, from Rudyard Kipling's Kim and like every twelve year old boy prior to the eighties, I spent some of my time buried in the pages of that amazing book.  So, while I was at the Wonder House last week, I purchased a copy of Kim as an homage to a writer whose works helped shape my outlook on life.  Through those pages, I was delighted to, again, travel by te-rain through India and pursue Russians through the high passes of Afghanistan.

The facade of the Wonder House, Lahore (Author's collection, copyright 2019)

    The strange thing is that as I read the story for the first time in decades, I saw things from my adult perspective - not that of a twelve year-old boy who had never left the farm.  Here was a story I hadn't read before.  A story of intestinal fortitude and intrigue as its own reward that could have been placed anywhere in the last twenty years of the Wars on Terror.  The boyish fantasy which I remember was still there, but I didn't remember the extent of deep underlying foreboding and impending doom, as well as the heavy emphasis placed on personality assessment and exploitation.  I started to realise the depth of the storyline in this book and, over the course of the week, my internal monologue about this book started to sound like the post-film discussions I have had with my Daughter all her life.  Somewhere around 0230 yesterday, I realised that Kim was the fore-runner of the Disney-Pixar films.  These films have delighted families since 1995 by providing relevant, multi-dimensional entertainment for the entire family.  Children and parents alike were excited to go to these films because there was something in them for all and, in the end, there were hours of conversation stimulated by the cinematic experience.
    That is exactly what Kipling did with Kim.  Families discussed their interpretations of the subject matter because India is a foreign land to most Westerners; not to mention the unique and nebulous nature of the Great Game.  At the end of all this ruminating, I realised that Disney-Pixar - though incredibly talented and creative as a group - wasn't as innovative as I thought they were all those years ago.  They merely employed an age-old, proven technique for mass entertainment that had not been used for some time, so the novelty was palpable.  Rudyard Kipling made great use of this one hundred years before Disney in his timeless classic, Kim, as it is a vibrant and riveting story for children of any age that explores and challenges the instincts of us all.

Alexander Who?

    Alexander the Great was the master manipulator of his own image but time has been more than kind by nurturing and honing his reputation as well.  Plutarch, Arrian and Rufus each used existing resources to write their biographies of Alexander which are denied to us by time.  These original resources were written by Alexander’s contemporaries and undoubtedly contained vital information, both good and bad,  that we will never recover.  We have a good idea of their contents thanks to our “intermediary” biographers but that means we also have to access that information through their filter; in short, their “why” for writing.  No one has ever written for the sake of writing - they always have a reason: as in all art forms, there is a muse.  Our intermediary biographers were Romans and the Romans were, above all things, organised.  Rome stopped at nothing in order to systematically arrange a society that supported the state completely, so the Empire was consolidated and safe.  Additionally, the Romans built things to last.  Don’t believe me? Just look at the width of railroad tracks in the United States today and the liturgy in any Christian church.  The width of wagon tracks and the standardisation of Christianity through the First Council of Nicaea are all products of Roman regulation that we feel the effects of today.  So perhaps our interpretation of Alexander the Great has been regulated too. 

Mosaic of Alexander at Issus (Author's collection copyright 2013)

Arrian - 2nd century AD: Roman citizen by father’s status as a Roman Administrator. 

Quintis Curtius Rufus - 1st century AD: borne into one of the original Roman noble families.
Plutarch - 1st century AD: a naturalised Roman Citizen.

    As shown above, each of our biographers had a reason to write for Rome. Whether to uphold a family name or ingratiate themselves to the Republic, their writings could easily mean their demise if not presented properly.  The Pantheon of gods was still the religion of state in the second century AD so any presentation would need to include references to this in order to be legitimate and that is exactly what we find in their writings.  Why else would obscure references to the god’s favouring Alexander be included in their accounts.  After the battle for Xanthos in Lycia (modern day Turkey), an inscribed tablet was found in a nearby spring.  This ancient tablet apparently told of a prophesy of doom for the Persians at the hands of the Greeks - which was meant to be Alexander and his army due to the timing of its discovery.  Whether in Greece, Turkey or Libya, we are told that Alexander actively sought out oracles or tried to full-fill prophesies through his actions.  He was deified by the Egyptians and his ascension as the Persian King brought with it a hint of godly status as well, because the house of Cyrus was descended from gods.  Never mind that Alexander himself was called the Son of Zeus and had long claimed Heracles as an ancestor.

    Why then, would these seemingly obscure references to exaltedness be included in the biographies by our Romans?  If they were writing for Roman knowledge alone, these items would have been left out as the drivel of ancient and unsophisticated historians, yet, they were included and perhaps amplified in importance.  The answer lies in human nature.  Our biographers were trying to ensure their status within a very forgetful and ungrateful Roman society by producing comprehensive works that not only entertain and inform but also teach lessons in a moralistic manner.  

    In these works, Alexander was a god on earth.  He conquered most of the known world.  He survived countless battles and court intrigues by the dozen.  He was impetuous and emotional, yet brilliant and benevolent.  Capable of great chivalry and even greater acts of violence.  When presented with problems, Alexander met each one head-on with a singleness of purpose that always saw him through successfully.  To our biographers, Alexander is, in short, Rome.  

This would not have been lost on Roman audiences reading these works and the more subtle message therein would also have been received well.  The morality tale spoke of this great individual who traveled too far from home too fast.  A man who, despite all his perfection, was seduced by foreign ideas and customs and became, increasingly, distant from his true purpose; living hedonistically as savages do.  He was eventually reminded of his purpose by his countrymen but by the time he realised his errors and tried to return, it was too late.  He could never go home.

    This part of their tale, above all, was their greatest legacy for Rome.  An inverted roadmap for personal and empirical comportment by highlighting the negative aspects of failure to comply.  In doing this, our authors have ensured their place in history not by writing great works on a historic general, but by creating a hero for all time who was old enough to win the world and young enough to lose it.

Keeping the Media at Bay

Image of Alexander's Sarcophagus(Author's collection)

    What to do with a precocious child who meddles in adult's business?  Today, I'm not sure but I know in my childhood, an immediate and severe beating would ensue coupled with some sort of long term misery was the prescription.  In fourth century BC Macedonia, he was made a king.  At least that's what happened to Alexander, son of Phillip II.  Although this precocious child went on to conquer the known world he was still meddlesome in his youth and erratic in his behaviour.  Of all the topics Aristotle taught Alexander, it seems that he learned one lesson very well; how to control his image with the public.
    We know from contemporary biographers that he was creative in his reports back to Macedonia but this is all second-hand speculation as not one of those biographies is extant today.  We are forced to rely Arrian and Plutarch and Rufus - all of which were writing hundreds of years after the fact but cited these originals as their sources.  Could it be that today's generals could take another, more subtle, lesson from Alexander's playbook?
    By all accounts though Alexander was a master of perception management and it would seem that this has extended through the years.  Despite many indicators that Alexander was impetuous and emotional, his reputation today is that of a great leader who managed his meagre resources superbly.
    This was achieved by limiting the exposure outlets that were available to the public and controlling them completely - Callisthenes (an embedded biographer) didn't make it home alive.  Centuries later, the worst that chroniclers could do was to highlight the ire of Alexander's troops over his tendency to "go native" but not one of these writers has acknowledged the need for Alexander to ingratiate himself to the recently defeated and still restive native populations that surrounded him and his small band of Macedonian soldiers.  Additionally, our writer's have never been placed in perspective themselves; they were spinning a moral tale for a specific audience in their own times.  This story became cautionary over time towards their own leaders - An intrepid westerner is seduced by the vices of the East which eventually kill him.  In other words: don't be like Alexander, cling tightly to your Roman values while serving the Republic in far-flung corners of the realm (their audience was Rome).  It would seem that the media has been a tool of the ruling elite for quite some time.

Alexander against Darius III at Issus. A 1st century BC floor mosaic from Pompeii, Italy. (author's collection copyright 2013) 

    It is readily apparent to me that today's media - in their self-driven 24/7 need to produce information for and grab ratings from an lethargic and saturated audience - has dug deeper into our military's conduct than they need to.  Our general's today should take a lesson from Alexander and keep them at bay - feeding them the relevant stories for public consumption instead of allowing these embedded reporters to dig up the worst and most irrelevant rumours to report as facts to an already naive public who doesn't understand what war fighting is all about.

MBA Notes from an Assassin (Part two of two)

    The Assassin's name was Bu Tahir Arrani and, unknown to anyone in the crowd on that October day in 1092, he was a Nizari Ismaili - an adherent to the sect of Hassan-i-Sabbah.  Sabbah had selected Arrani as the first of many highly trained assassins to disguise himself and travel alone from their stronghold deep in the Alborz Mountinas, north of Qazwin, on a secret mission of political intrigue.  This single man, working alone in the enemy's backyard, using only his wits and single-minded drive brought about a decade of relief for his persecuted sect by plunging Sabbah's rivals into leaderless confusion.  On the day that Arrani completed his mission, Alamut - his castle and home- was under siege by the Saljuq Turks.  Nizam himself had authorised the destruction of the Ishmaili headquarters because of their status as heretics (within the Saljuq Empire).  The year prior, Sabbah - with apparent knowledge of the impending siege, had launched Arrani on his one-way mission.
    Soon after Nizam's death, the siege of Alamut was lifted and within the year the Sultan had also died which plunged the Saljuq Empire into years of internecine struggle.  A struggle in which cousins and brothers were actively trying to murder each other in an attempt to rule - meanwhile, the Ishmailis were left alone in their mountain hideaway to enjoy their peace and quiet.

18th century sketch of Hassan-i-Sabbah

    This is a cautionary tale about market destabilisation and control of available marketshares.  Today, businessmen are trying to do more with less in an ever-increasingly erratic global economy but they seem to be changing their plans to fit the prevailing situation.  Conversley, Hassan-i-Sabbah used his business intelligence to create a far-reaching strategy that was simple, yet effective for the long term.  His desire was to create overall market instability by effecting the smaller composite markets through hostile intervention.  This, in turn allowed him to increase his control over the outcomes and, ultimately, control his marketshare.  He additionally created a niche market that in the long run provided unforeseen dividends through political manipulation.  All this was only possible through his absolute commitment to his well crafted business plan.  A plan which was set in motion more than a year before any results could materialise.  This is the true genesis of the Blue Ocean Strategy.