27.2.14

Social mobility vs social connection


Recently a friend of mine commented how "Khmer people live with the most basic of amenities, and they are the 3rd happiest people on the planet. How is it that the rest of us have designer clothes and luxury cars and still be grumpy all the time?".

Sentiments like these, we hear too often..



Also recently, as I was chatting with a few other friends of mine, I saw a theme emerge in those conversations... which was the exact other side of the above coin!
Some of these friends moved in a deliberate attempt to pursue better opportunities, more professional, material success, to make it "big" and all of them were generally disappointed with the inability to make meaningful social connections wherever they landed. Some blamed it on their age/life stage and others on the culture of the new place.



Connecting the two, I have come up with a hypothesis and also a simple mathematical logic that supports the hypothesis.