Rohan Monteiro

Original answer I encountered on Quora can be found here   In the movie Pixels, there is a scene where Tetris blocks suddenly fall from the sky, arrange themselves on buildings in the real world and thus destroy them. Remember this image, for it’ll be your guide towards razor-sharp focus. Vladimir Pokhilko wanted to stay at a friend’s house in Tokyo for a week. There was only one problem: They had a brand new Game Boy. And Tetris. At night, geometric shapes fell in the darkness as I lay on loaned tatami floor space. Days, I sat on a lavender suede sofa and played Tetris furiously. During rare jaunts from the house, I visually fit cars and trees and people together. Dubiously hunting a job and a house, I was still there two months later, still jobless, still playing. What Vladimir Pokhilko learned in those two months changed how we view video games forever. Being a clinical psychologist, he became obsessed with the idea that Tetris must have an impact on our neural system. Some kind...

 Every time  I read a non-fiction book that I like, I make a few notes. Sentences, the occasional turn of phrase, bits that resonated with me.  I decided to start publishing some of them here so that the zero followers I have could also appreciate them.   The following excerpt is taken from 'Quit -the Power of Knowing when to walk away by Anne Duke. We view grit and quit as opposing forces. After all, you either persevere or you abandon course. You can’t do both at the same time, and in the battle between the two, quitting has clearly lost. While grit is a virtue, quitting is a vice. The advice of legendarily successful people is often boiled down to the same message: Stick to things and you will succeed. By definition, anybody who has succeeded at something has stuck with it. That’s a statement of fact, always true in hindsight. But that doesn’t mean that the inverse is true, that if you stick to something, you will succeed at it. Prospectively, it’s neither true n...

 Everytime I read a non-fiction book that I like, I make a few notes. I decided to start publishing them here so that the zero followers I have could also appreciate them. The following excerpt is taken from ' Paper -Paging through History by Mark Kurlansky'. Studying the history of paper exposes a number of historical misconceptions, the most important of which is this technological fallacy: the idea that technology changes society. It is exactly the reverse. Society develops technology to address the changes that are taking place within it. To use a simple example, in China in 250 BCE, Meng Tian invented a paintbrush made from camel hair. His invention did not suddenly inspire the Chinese people to start writing and painting, or to develop calligraphy. Rather, Chinese society had already established a system of writing but had a growing urge for more written documents and more elaborate calligraphy. Their previous tool—a stick dipped in ink—could not meet the rising demand. M...

 Went to a board gaming event at the Asian Civilization Museum - It was a really fun evening and I ended up meeting a group of board gamers here in Singapore.   I also played 4 games - 3 of which I had never played before - Chai Garam , a worker placement mechanic where you are running a tea stall to collect reviews; Century Golem where you build a gem collection engine - similar to Splendor but different mechanics & Secret Hitler which is a social deduction game. It was only the next day that wifey pointed out something I didn't notice at all - I didn't play any games exclusively with my daughter. Girl z is 8 and Boy Z is 10 - I tend to play games with him more often because he instinctively picks up and understands more complex games. Except, she still needs my attention. And I need to get better at recognizing it. Boy Z is cautious, careful, diligent, loves to read. Girl Z is a happy skipping lark who likes shiny objects. Boy Z takes time to open up. Girl Z will...

 https://asian-reviews.com/2025/03/11/fiction-mirrors-the-truths-emotions-and-complexities-of-the-world-we-inhabit-rohan-monteiro/   Fiction mirrors the truths, emotions, and complexities of the world we inhabit.” Rohan Monteiro By dhanukadickwella on 11 Mar 2025 • ( Leave a comment ) Q: Not everyone writes, nor can everyone write. Tell us what inspired you to pick up a pen and start writing, along with a brief introduction of yourself. A: It was 2014. I had just learned I was going to be a dad. I was at that point a research consultant in Singapore in a job and role that wasn’t going anywhere. I felt I needed to do something with my life that my kid (s) would look up to. Something that felt more meaningful instead of sitting in an office all day. That’s when I decided to write a book. My name is Rohan Monteiro, and my first non-fiction novel, ‘Keep Calm and Go Crazy’, was published in 2015 by HarperCollins. My most recent book was relea...

 

  Writing, requires the wearing of many hats. Its tempting to focus on honing your craft and leaving everything else to the professionals. It was one of those lessons hammered into us during our MBA days — outsource everything that isn’t a core competence and focus on what you are good at. The real world challenge, however is that we still need to find semi-competent sources to outsource the other processes to. Bear in mind, these are still essential processes, they are just not ones where we have an edge and so we tend to rely on those who claim they are good at their jobs. For ‘ Shadows Rising’ I chose one particular agency. In retrospect, I should have done a little more research before selecting them. But on the surface, they seemed good enough and I figured what’s the worst that could happen? Turns out, quite a bit. I worked with them for social media posts and Amazon Ads. I have no real complaints about the social media post aspects — there were challenges but nothing that c...