#122 Vaishali Lara Kathuria - On Being An Underdog, Building Character Instead Of Resume, US Vs Norwegian Culture And Emerging Markets Investing Blindspots

Basically, the whole life story.

But going back just a bit, because I want to talk about some concepts and pair them up together.

Can you talk a bit about that feeling of being the second generation in your country and the pressure tied into that and the need to get straight A's, etc.? Because many people say that they feel like their parents deserve that they're trying their best to achieve the greatest dreams, right? Can you just talk about that concept and how that...

reflects, you know, upbringing, education and that drive and ambition.

Yes, definitely.

I think, I mean, the kind of obvious, exactly what you're saying.

I think we do have this, as second generations make us aware of it too, how much they sacrifice to give us all the opportunities that you get when you grow up in Norway versus the countries we're from, right? The fact that education is free, which is something we in Norway take for granted, right? which is not something you take for granted other places.

And I think that it's also about leading by example.

So my mom, she is the youngest of nine siblings.

She's from a village, literally a village outside of New Delhi.

And she, during her lifetime, during her generation, have gone from being, you know, a rural working class Indian to upper middle class Norwegian, you know, just her.

And my dad has a similar story.

And You know, if that is who your parents are, you know, when people say, oh, Vaishali, you've been able to do so much at a young age, I say, you know, you should meet my parents.

I haven't really, you know, I haven't done half of what they have done during their generation.

You know, where you get that grit from, you don't take anything for granted.

And you have these people that are leading by example.

But then I think thirdly, and I think it's also a kind of underestimated aspect of being second generation is you always feel like an outsider.

Sometimes people make that very clear to you that you are other, as we say it, or you're you're very clear on it yourself.

I didn't grow up with a lot of people who looked like me.

And I think when you have that outsider perspective, you tend to be very underestimated and you're sort of like the underdog, right? And I don't know about you, but for me, I love being underestimated.

I think underestimated and being, you know, being underestimated is very motivating for me.

You know, I get, I get this like feeling, you know, I'm going to show you, you know, you think I can't do this.

Well, I'm going to show you that I can.

And, and I think that level of adversity that you feel because you're an outside people tell you, you can't do things.

It just, you just want to prove them so much that, And I remember, I mean, this is sort of a, I can't believe I'm sharing this on a podcast, but you know the LeBron documentary, More Than a Game? I don't know if you've seen that.