Some of the most inspirational men I have met till now are scientists. The prejudice here is only due to the limitation of opportunity to meet a lot of others. Sydney Altman (catalytic RNA- Nobel in chemistry, 1989), Craig Mello (RNAi nobel 2006), Anders Naar, Anindya Dutta, Ashok Srinivasan and Ahmad fakhoury. There is nothing common about them. I did not see the "burning passion" in their eyes or a tremendously dynamic personality in them. What I saw was an "I work for myself" attitude and a bow-down in complete obeisance humility towards science. They were good spokesmen, excellent thinkers and had a down to earth attitude when speaking to 20 something young minds. There were two things that clung on to me that were blog-worthy. One, when a bright young bulb piped to prove his interes in making conversation with anindya asked "how do you define a good student?", without a second thought he replied, "Just do what you love". It was not altogether about the statement. It was more about its timing and the momentum with which it came. "When someone has to tell you, you need to put in more work, you are a lost case." I found a strict teacher, a chronic workaholic and a man ruled by his mind in him.
Second, small talk with Anders Naar lead to a conversation about learning. "What is all this hue and cry about love-to-learn, enjoy everything you do attitude? It just doesnt make sense. How are you going to understand or appreciate this world if you have to learn only what you love?". Maybe crudely put but very true. I did not like calculus, strongly loathed high school probability and could not understand what the hec was bernouli's theorem. I hated mugging the multiplications tables and strongly disliked homework in any shape or form. But I have reached a point where multi-disciplinary is absolutely essential and now appreciate myself for having that knowledge.For even being just a molecular biologist requires atleast once a week of complex math solving. Everything is not fun or cannot be made fun, but sometimes its required to bite the bullet and swallow it. And once the head is set right, it just amazes you how much you can take in so easily and how much you fall in love with learning.
