It was a usual sunny (huh~! in my dreams) day in Glasgow.... when the talk of the town seemed to be the arrival of James Watson at Beatson Institute of Cancer Research (www.beatson.gla.ac.uk) for a special seminar! I, on the other hand, tried to gather up my enthusiasm in spite of having a very pre-occupied mind. Couple of weeks before when I first realized this, I kept reminding myself not to forget a sleek notebook for an autograph & a sleek camera for a cool picture with Jim (as with shortening of most names in Scotland) Watson :)
Around 10am, I see the director of the institute giving away her far-too-well practised tour of the labs to the man behind solving the mystery of life...DNA :) Jim of course shared the nobel prize along with two other pioneers, Harry Crick and Maurice Wilkins, for their amazing contributions leading to the discovery of the structure of the nucleic acids. Imagine, where would we be without knowing about the structure of DNA?!
The well advertised seminar was to begin in 30 min at noon and already the floor was flooded with people from the institute and outside. Chatter , chatter, chatter...laughter here & there...chatter, chatter, chatter is all one can hear in the excitement. I hurried to try & get a decent seating in the fancy auditorium, juggling my lunch box, water bottle and an important notepad for those not-to-be-missed notes from the talk !
Everyone getting seated slowly, I managed to nibble a few bites before the lights were turned down for showtime. Standing tall & 83 yrs old, Jim had a mixed up accent to begin with. Having lived in Scotland for the past 2 years, I have managed to pick up accents better than I ever used to. He began with a wee tribute note to all scots..being half a scotsman himself. Paying a cent percent attention, I began to decipher meaning beneath the blend of accents only to realize 25 mins later, he was still rambling about his personal & professional history! Not denying the fact that his professional history is too important to be not referred, yet, 25 minutes & on...the rambling continued. Me, being me...., I was trying hard to see if he was going to flip the very first presentation slide that read "Curing incurable cancer''. Having developed a keen interest on learning about cancer therapy, this topic was far too tempting.
Nearly half an hour later, the first slide flipped & I held the pen in my hands ready to set down my thoughts. Although his talk had an overall summary of his realization in curing cancer, much of it involved the audience reading slides rather than listening to the story being unwoven. Now, do I call this a disappointment? May be? or may be not.... standing tall at 83 yrs old, here was a man who has shaken the world with his interminable perspective... (as much as I am optimistic,I would not manage half of what he has done if I turn to be 80 one day!). So yes, although his tendency was to meander through the talk, I did take home something with me that day.
Passion for what you believe in !
For when passion exists, nothing is impossible..even if it means curing the incurable cancer....
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