Round Pizza in a Square Box

Excerpt from Chapter 1 – Still a Student

1991 was for many Indians the date of India’s true emancipation. On the verge of bankruptcy, India’s then Prime Minister and Finance Minister called for an emergency meeting. Neither man slept until they had systematically identified and reversed the country’s failing policies, which included boldly opening India’s borders to international markets. Overnight, the ailing land took its first gasp of fresh air as an unrestrained nation, making a dramatic turnaround towards a bright and healthy future.

India’s upward progress in the 90’s nourished the economy’s sunken belly as businesses grew, cities flourished, and India once again earned a competitive foothold in the global economy. It was in this decade that I finished my MBA and began a career as a business consultant.

It has been a pleasure these last twenty years watching India continue its ascent into the twenty-first century, but I also find the country to be at a critical crossroads. With all of its recent advancements, there now exist two India’s – a rich India and a poor India. While India’s affluent cities are home to many residents who speak English, hold college degrees, and earn good jobs overseas, seventy percent of India’s population of over seven hundred million people, live in substandard conditions in India’s smaller cities and villages. Almost half lack adequate travel routes, medical centers, and accessible education.

Photo credit: The Women's International Perspective

While India boasts magnificent universities and technical schools, producing one million engineering graduates each year, an estimated thirty-five percent of children and forty percent of women, are still unable to read or write because the government-run primary schools are failing. This problem is compounded in villages where poverty is often so extreme that children have to forego school altogether to work alongside their parents.

While India is home to some of the wealthiest businessmen and women in the world, hundreds of fathers with swollen feet pull rickshaws for miles, working harder than their lives give license yet earning barely enough income to feed one meal a day to their starving families. The United Nations writes that India is today home to more than a third of the world’s chronically malnourished children.

And while a number of India’s wealthy corporations prosper through municipal bribes and illegal favors, local entrepreneurs continue to struggle through a maze of bureaucratic offices and old, restrictive policies, in their efforts to earn honest incomes.

When I read books and newspaper headlines that talk about the rising India, I cannot help but ask, “Rising for whom? The fifteen to twenty-five percent who speak English and live in the cities?” For the rest, there is nothing rising about it.

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Round Pizza In A Square Box

Excerpt from the Introduction

In 2010, I was invited to give a guest lecture to the students at Northwest University in Kirkland, Washington. Nearly a year later, on January 19th, 2011, I was reflecting upon my lecture while taking a shower at my house in Canada. As soap streamed through my hair and washed over my eyes, the entire outline for a new book came suddenly to my mind. I wrestled with the shower handles and called out to my wife Susan to come quickly with a scratch pad and pen. Stifling a smile, Susan took a seat on the lid of the toilet and patiently began taking notes on my ramblings. The steam wetted and wrinkled her makeshift outline, but by the end of my shower, we had what I needed to call Bethany and begin a journey with her to pen another story. Having begun with my first memoires, Chilies in an Indian Curry, it was time to move on to the next item on the menu. It was time for pizza.

Not many weeks later, Northwest University unwittingly confirmed my book idea when they informed me that following my 2010 lecture I remained the highest rated of all their guest speakers. I took courage from this. It was time to take spoken words and put them into writing. Meanwhile, I accepted a second invitation to speak to Northwest University’s students. This time, my brother Sanjay Singh joined me in sharing a second perspective about India viewed through the lens of our shared upbringing and his unique academic and work experience in a context and country so different from the land of our origin.

The day of our presentation, Sanjay, currently serving as Vice President at Starbucks, and I shared with the students a simple, yet important message concerning good-intentioned people working for empowerment and change on behalf of disadvantaged societies and people groups. Taking turns sharing our collaborative experiences through two different work and life contexts, we demonstrated that there needs to be a change in the way that we go about philanthropy. Whether a not-for-profit advocate, donor, or volunteer, it was time now to take a second look at how we are utilizing our time, money, and skills to make a change in this world. “How can we turn our good intentions into powerful action strategies?” we challenged.

Click here to purchase your copy of Round Pizza in a Square Box from Westbow Press.

Round Pizza in a Square Box

Excerpt from Acknowledgements:

In the early 2000’s, I had the honor of serving as a Facilitator at the UNDP Deputy Resident meeting held in Bangkok, Thailand. Those few years proved to be a rewarding time in my life as I traveled in my role as consultant to various cities across the globe and provided training and consultancy.

In 2004, my canvas widened when I accepted a role as Director of Financial Services for a non-profit in Colorado Springs, exercising financial leadership for over two hundred and fifty projects in nineteen countries. When one of history’s deadliest tsunamis hit Sri Lanka later that year, over one hundred children in nine of our projects died or went missing. The following weeks proved to be some of the most impacting in my life as I worked around the clock responding to desperate calls for help from Project Leaders in India and Sri Lanka, while raising emergency support for a first-response medical team. Having been born and raised in Calcutta, I had seen vast poverty, but never experienced a crisis like this.

In 2008, I had the privilege of assisting University of Utah staff Lorraine Wood, Faculty Advisor in the English Department, and Sara Barclay at the Lowell Bennion Community Service Center, in helping their students with an integrative service project that led to the development of a volunteer program handbook. The project allowed me to work with young people from many North American universities with whom I traveled and engaged in cross-cultural learning in a South Asian context.

It was during this time that I met with Nancy Heuston, founder of The Waterford School. Her faculty and students frequently traveled to India armed with a passion to understand the challenges related to global education. I accompanied them to Thane in Mumbai and The Waterford School in Salt Lake City, Utah, to gain a greater understanding of the online education model that they had developed. My discussions with them, as with Snehal Pinto, a leading educator from Mumbai, and Srijna and Inderjit Labana, online education developers in Delhi, helped me discover the feasibility of such a model for disadvantaged children who cannot participate or maintain regular attendance in traditional schools. I am also indebted to Ruhi Zamaan, Michael Grey, Jean Hicks, Kari Westland, and Jobin Sam for guiding me through the technicalities of an online education curriculum.

Those who have impacted me the most will forever be the hundreds of volunteers and leaders who have traveled from the United States, Canada, England, Australia, and Hong Kong to India. As we lived and worked together, I inevitably learned. My greatest insights came from my association with Morgana Wingard and Jenny Kim from the studio of Annie Leibovitz; firefighters from Boulder, Colorado; students and faculty from the Global Health department of Des Moines University and Azusa Pacific University; and some of my favorite outstanding volunteers such as Brian Bushway, Dan Kish, Maria Petersen, Chad Kohn, Vida McCracken, Midhuna William, Lynette Grubbs, Matthew Price, Christina DeCamp, my nephew Rishabh Singh, Dr David and Diane Cionni, Danielle Valimont, and Bethany Talbert.

I still break out in a smile when I think of some of the volunteers who fell sick when visiting India because they did not conform to written safety rules. They have taught me more from their confidence in an unknown terrain than I would have ever learned on my own. I still wish they would have listened!

My greatest lessons came from project leaders in India, women sex slaves inside the red light area of Sonargachi, and hospitalized children and their parents.

Click here to purchase your copy of Round Pizza in a Square Box from Westbow Press.

Watch my interview with Grace TV regarding the release of my newest book, “Round Pizza In A Square Box.” Tune in to Grace TV on Monday, February 18th, 2013 at 9 p.m.

Round Pizza In A Square Box Is Now Available!

For all those who have been waiting patiently for your copy of my latest book, Round Pizza In A Square Box, I am excited to announce that it is now available through Westbow Press. Click here to purchase your copy.

I do hope you all enjoy reading it. In the months that follow, I will be posting excerpts from each of its chapters as a little sneak peak inside the story.

“Round Pizza in a Square Box reads like a movie script–entertaining, but also insightful.  This book is filled with principles that will motivate and inspire.  Amitabh Singh has served the poor for many years and has committed his life to challenging others to do everything they can to serve those in need.  His message is both timely and compelling.”

– Hal Donaldson

Round Pizza In A Square Box:

India is an ever-evolving country. While democracy inspires innumerable achievements in the arts, education, technology, and business, in rural and impoverished India, the gulf between the rich and poor grows increasingly wider. Amitabh Singh in Round Pizza in a Square Box shares a number of hard-learned lessons that have inspired him to over 25 years of service on behalf of India’s impoverished men, women and children.  His message encourages even the most distant reader, showing that with the right mindset and a strong dose of compassion, they too can make an immeasurable difference in this world.

Click here to purchase your copy of Round Pizza in a Square Box from Westbow Press.

Free Preview from Westbow Press - Chapter 4: No Politics, Please:
I always liked a poster that hung on the wall of my friend’s office in Calcutta. It featured a lion with the caption, “No Politics, Please.” I must admit, I have never been a fan of politics, especially those where an individual’s actions are determined by their personal interests rather than by absolute principles. In my line of work, politics of this kind tends to frustrate good programs and ultimately cause more harm than help to people.

In 1998, my wife, nine-month-old daughter, and thirteen young people accompanied me to India’s Tribal and Coastal Orissa. Over a period of thirteen days, we visited the districts of Bolangir, Sambalpur, Hirakund Dam, and Jharsuguda, and became very familiar with what are known to be some of the poorest places in India.

One morning we happened upon a children’s home. At the entrance hung a welcoming sign that identified its partnership with a very well-known organization. On the inside, the building was empty. There were no beds, tables, staff, or children. Rumor had it that money was being raised for the home’s children, sent for the children, and yet there were no children. It looked as though the money were just evaporating somewhere.

Not all politics are so subtle. Calcutta is home to one of Asia’s largest red- light districts called Sonagachi. I spent many weekends as a child playing at my grandfather’s house only a few lanes from the district, but for years my parents kept me from any knowledge of it.

Despite being only one-mile radius in size, Sonagachi is home to ten thousand sex workers. Poverty drives many women to the area while others are trafficked in from neighboring countries, such as Bangladesh and Nepal. The “Sonagachi Lane” main street begins a few hundred paces from Liberty Cinema Hall on Chittaranja Avenue. Every evening, rickshaws vie with one another to enter the illicit roadway, weaving their passengers past mounds of rubble and sewage streams to begin a night of sordid entertainment.

I caught my first glimpse inside Sonagachi when as a hospital Board Member I agreed to assess its medical needs. I was appalled by what I saw.
The district’s main street gave way to a clumsy patchwork of dark alleyways on which hundreds of dilapidated, multi-story brothels caressed each other in close proximity. The brothels’ ancient walls crumbled and split like broken seams, exposing supporting iron rods. The buildings’ highest floors creaked and leaned precariously into alleyways, ensnaring in their crooked grasp a thick aroma of dirt, sweat, and hot garbage.

Brightly-adorned women in tightly wrapped saris leaned seductively against the decaying outer walls, making obvious the offered services. Men, young and old, circled the women, following them unashamedly into the open doors of the brothels. Fifteen minutes later, the pairs emerged again, the men disappearing around the nearest corners and the women resuming their places alongside the street.

There was nothing nice about the area. It brought to life all the deplorable stories I had heard about it.

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About the Authors:

For over a decade, Amitabh Singh has served as a motivational speaker, certified business coach and consultant, and author to a number of books. Having served for several years in Calcutta, India, he and his family are driven by the passion to see disadvantaged children given the opportunity to rise above their circumstances and pursue their dreams. Amitabh, today, provides leadership as Executive Director of a Canadian not-for-profit. He lives in Toronto, Canada with his wife, Susan, and two daughters. To connect with the author, visit www.amitabhsingh.com.

Bethany Talbert is a freelance writer who graduated from Pepperdine University with a degree in Religious Studies, before writing professionally for a number of companies and charitable organizations. Since 2008, she has enjoyed the privilege of working with Amitabh Singh to help spread the word and raise support on behalf of the poor. Bethany has authored three books with Amitabh and is working with him on two more that are slated for release in 2015. Bethany currently resides in Oregon with her husband, Andrew, and two sons.

“Round Pizza in a Square Box reads like a movie script—entertaining, but also insightful. This book is filled with principles that will motivate and inspire. Amitabh Singh has served the poor for many years and has committed his life to challenging others to do everything they can to serve those in need. His message is both timely and compelling.” – Hal Donaldson, President of Convoy of Hope, Inc.

Meet Nick Vujicic

I have dedicated my book Round Pizza in a Square Box to three individuals who have inspired me to live and think differently.

Nick and Amitabh

One individual is Nick Vujicic, whom I met in Salt Lake City, Utah, as he prepared for a flight to Calcutta. Born without arms or legs, Nick inspires people worldwide with his drive and passion for life (www.lifewithoutlimbs.org). Here is his story as written in Round Pizza in a Square Box.

Nick Vijucic features the following quote on the homepage of his website: “Imagine being born without arms. No arms to wrap around a friend; no hands to hold the ones you love; no fingers to experience touch; no way to lift or carry things. How much more difficult would life be if you were living without arms and hands? Or what about legs? Imagine if instead of no arms, you had no legs. No ability to dance, walk, run, or even stand. Now put both of those scenarios together… no arms and no legs. What would you do? How would that affect your everyday life?”

This quote is a mere rhetorical thought for almost every person walking this earth, but for Nick, it is concrete reality. In 1982, he gave his parents and doctors a shock when in Brisbane, Australia, he entered the world without arms or legs.

Nick’s childhood was as normal as it could be. He attended school and struggled like any other child to make new friends, dodge bullies, and develop healthy self-esteem. “Why do I have to be the one child who does not have arms or legs,” he wondered. “What purpose does it serve? Does it serve any purpose at all?”

As years passed, Nick’s faith in God helped him replace feelings of depression and loneliness with strength and contentment. “I found the purpose of my existence, and also the purpose of my circumstance. There’s a purpose for why you’re in the fire,” Nick exclaimed.

 Nick finished high school, then college, and embarked on a career as a motivational speaker. His taught a simple message: God changes lives. He changed my life and gave me hope and a future. The struggles we encounter have purpose, and can be overcome with the right attitude and trust in God.

In 2007, Nick moved from Australia to California becoming President of Life Without Limbs, a non-profit organization devoted to sharing the message of Christ with students, teachers, youth, businesses, and congregations all around the world. “If God can use a man without arms and legs to be His hands and feet, then He will certainly use any willing heart!” Nick professed.

I count myself blessed to have personally met Nick during his visit to Salt Lake City, Utah. Though not yet thirty years old at the time, he had accomplished more to encourage and bless people than most individuals accomplish in a lifetime.

Round Pizza in a Square Box will be released early 2013. To preorder your copy, email your name, address, and phone number to amitabhsingh.info@gmail.com.

Meet Michele Struss

I have dedicated Round Pizza in a Square Box to three individuals who have inspired me to live and think differently.

Michele Struss

One individual is Michele Struss, who was born with a form of dwarfism. As a talented painter, she auctions her artwork and organizes fundraisers to provide medical care to disadvantaged children in Calcutta (www.hispaintbrush.com). Here is an excerpt from her story as written in Round Pizza in a Square Box.

I happened to meet Michele Struss at a charitable trade show in Denver, Colorado. She sat behind a booth showcasing a number of detailed watercolor portraits. At first glance, Michele seemed to have some physical challenges as reflected by her posture and unusually small stature.

Upon introducing myself, Michele shared with me a bit about her life, beginning with her birth when doctors diagnosed her with a form of dwarfism called SED Congenita. This rare genetic disorder affects a person’s bone growth and mobility resulting in a shortened trunk, neck, and limbs, easily fatigued muscles, and potential vision and hearing difficulties.

From day one, the condition caused Michele much physical pain, requiring multiple surgeries to help straighten bones and ease pressure on joints. Neurological damage from a compressed spinal cord left her reliant on crutches to walk at the age of fourteen, yet she longed for the day when she would no longer need them. Thirteen years later, before a delighted assembly of friends and family, Michele hurled her crutches into a bonfire and afterward walked using only a cane.

Amid her childhood struggles, Michele discovered the joy of art, taking up pencils and brush. Her most basic sketches demonstrated a level of creativity beyond her age, a skill she continued to develop throughout elementary and high school. Come time for college, she enrolled in an art program with a graphic design concentration.

Michele enjoyed her time in college learning how to create advanced digital graphics, but at the same time, she could not shake her deep desire for the more basic artistic mediums. Rather than applying her finished degree towards the digital arts, she chose instead to stay true to herself and paint beautiful watercolors.

Michele was almost thirty years old when she experienced a sudden change in enthusiasm. Though her art showed great skill, she felt it lacked significance. “There is no purpose to my work. They are just pretty paintings.” she thought. Dissatisfied, she asked God to ignite in her a passion through which she could use her talents in a meaningful way. Her answer came through a quote by artist Ron DiCianni, “What makes you weep when you are on your knees before God? That is what you are supposed to address in your work!”

As the words penetrated her spirit, a vision began to form: to paint underprivileged children, depicting their inner beauty and strength. Michele clung to her newfound desire, but she also felt afraid. It was not easy to paint people using the unforgiving nature of watercolor coupled with her realist painting style. The combination felt nearly impossible. In retrospect, she recalls, “Through an intense journey of obedience and trust, not only has God enabled me to fulfill his call, but He has traded my dread for passion.”

When I met Michele at the tradeshow, she had on display photo-like paintings of impoverished children from around the world. One look into the children’s eyes evoked a warm compassion for those in need. “Have you considered painting an Indian child?” I asked her.

Three years later, she did just that. The finished work entitled “Overcome” attracted worldwide attention, and to this day, proceeds from its sales provide free medical care to needy children in Calcutta. In a single selfless and artistic gesture, Michele demonstrated that everyone has something to give to those in need, regardless of their personal situation. One does not have to fly around the world to make a big difference. He or she can use their God-given talents and passion to raise awareness and support right where they are.

Round Pizza in a Square Box will be released early 2013. To preorder your copy, email your name, address, and phone number to amitabhsingh.info@gmail.com.

Meet Brian Bushway

I have dedicated Round Pizza in a Square Box to three individuals who have inspired me to live and think differently.

Brian Bushway

One individual is Brian Bushway, whom I first met in Pasadena, California. Brian is blind, yet he traveled to Calcutta to teach blind children how to see beyond sight through echolocation (www.brianbushway.com). Here is an excerpt of his story as written in Round Pizza in a Square Box.

For the first fourteen years of his life, Brian viewed the world with typical 20/20 vision. One unassuming day in the seventh grade, Brian found he was having a difficult time reading the blackboard from his back row seat in the classroom. The problem resolved when he moved to the front, but it was not long before the chalky words became fuzzy again. In just a couple of weeks’ time, the writing metamorphosed into one, big nebulous cloud.

Brian knew something was not right and asked his parents for an appointment with the eye doctor. Neither he nor his family expected anything more than a pair of contacts or corrective reading glasses, but a series of eye tests revealed a more distressing diagnosis. Brian’s eyesight was rapidly deteriorating. The optic nerves connecting the back of his eyeballs to the brain had begun to disintegrate due to a rare genetic condition. “There is nothing we can do to reverse it,” the eye doctor admitted. “It will not be long before Brian loses his sight altogether.”

Come summertime, Brian entered total darkness, forever closing the door to life’s wonderful sights and colors. All at once he found himself having to relearn how to do life, from walking to the bus stop to eating meals.

While few could imagine themselves in Brian’s new shoes, he surprised family and friends when he threaded the laces and tightened the knots. His blindness became to him no more than a unique personality trait, a detail no less significant than any other about him.

Brian did not just carry this mindset, he lived it. One day, he gave his parents a scare when he mounted his bicycle and rode down the driveway into a nearby cul-de-sac. When Brian hit a curb and toppled to the asphalt, he simply brushed himself off and remounted. In high school, when his cross-country buddies jogged through the neighborhood in preparation for a big meet, he ran alongside them, keeping even pace with the stampede of tennis shoes upon the pavement. Brian had a particular fondness for music, so he took up the bass guitar, later joining a band that graced many stages with the sweet sounds of bluegrass mixed with a generous splash of rock n’ roll.

Providentially during his college years, Brian became friends with Daniel Kish. Daniel was born completely blind, but from an early age resolved to experience life like any other child. Daniel taught himself how to “see” with sound through echolocation. Echolocation is just like sonar used by bats to navigate the dark and by dolphins to pinpoint a single fish amid a school of hundreds.

Brian admired Daniel’s unique ability to move from place to place with minimal use of a cane. Under Daniel’s tutelage, he learned how to use echolocation not only to know when to step onto a curb and open a door, but also to enjoy a wide variety of sports, including mountain biking.

I first met Brian during a trip to Pasadena, California, and then again when he and Daniel flew to Calcutta. They had come to conduct a weeklong mobility workshop for a group of children from a local school for the blind.

The one-week workshop stressed a “no-limits philosophy” helping children ages five to eighteen to rethink the stigma of their disability while moving from basic to advanced mobility skills. “Everyone is broken in one sense or another,” Brian taught. “There are always obstacles in life. They may be emotional, or whatever. It is about transcending one’s limitations and obstacles. If you set high expectations, even if society has low ones for you, you will rise up and meet them.”

In a week’s time the children made great strides in this new direction. They learned the technique of echolocation, practicing to differentiate between reverberations off of brick walls, rocks, and fellow classmates. By day seven, they applied their newfound skill to a festive game of cricket, using a series of clicks to hit the ball and tag the wickets.

Brian left Calcutta the same way he arrived–in complete darkness, but he left behind a generation of young people realizing God’s good grace in their lives. Brian taught through example that happiness is not dependent on what one has or does not have, but on the conviction that life is worth living.

Round Pizza in a Square Box will be released early 2013. To preorder your copy, email your name, address, and phone number to amitabhsingh.info@gmail.com.

What’s In A Name?

From an early stage in the writing of Round Pizza in a Square Box, I came up with its title, feeling that it provided a great analogy to the thesis of the book. I would like to share a little bit of that analogy with you.

As summarized in my previous entry, Round Pizza in a Square Box gives an account of my life’s personal journey, mistakes, and lessons learned so as to provide another perspective to a much larger discussion.

Through my years of charitable work in India, I have found that when visitors try to address a need in the East using a theorem or strategy from the West, they reap some results but not without a lot of wasted time, resources, and a fair amount of misunderstanding. It is like putting a round pizza in a square box. The pizza does not perfectly fit the package in which we place it, leaving a lot of empty, mismanaged, and unappreciated space.

For those of us who have taken business classes where most challenges are easily solved through box-like business plans, we soon discover on the field that our training does not provide all the answers after all. Around the world, there are a lot of “round pizzas” that simply cannot be labeled, catalogued, stored away neatly, or turned into easy-to-understand dashboards. What they require instead are a policy of patience, a program of flexibility, and most of all, a sweet, learning spirit.

This alternative approach becomes especially important when seeking to do something good for another country in need. Round Pizza in a Square Box demonstrates how a greater difference is made when we hold loosely to our Western notions and become sensitive to the cultures that likely function differently from our own.

Round Pizza in a Square Box will be released early 2013. To preorder your copy, email your name, address, and phone number to amitabhsingh.info@gmail.com.