Culture Gaps

Culture Gaps: May 31, 2012

Yesterday morning (Thursday, May 31 in Pune) there was almost no traffic on the road. The city was oddly quiet in the middle of morning rush hour. My driver explains that the whole city is on a general strike to protest the unbearable spike in gas prices by the government controlled oil companies. By the end of the day the government has backed down, and gas prices have been lowered. Can you imagine that happening in the US?

At lunch a sumptuous spread of Indian food is provided: very tasty, but spicier than normal US Indian fare. I notice they serve a plate of raw vegetables: sliced carrots, green beans, beets, and cucumber, obviously as a cool balance to the hot food. Along with the dhal, rice, and who knows what else I have heaped on my plate I grab several carrot sticks and beet slices. The beans look wonderful, but because there are so few I only take two.  Sitting down to eat, I take several bites of the spicy delicacies, and then balance them with a few carrots. Ihen chomp down one of the beans. Surprise! It’s a chili pepper.

This morning, when I enter the training room at the hotel I see that one of the white boards containing the written work from yesterday has been replaced on its easel upside down. There is a brief flash of judgment, “For heaven sake, can’t they red?” Of course, I immediately realize the answer must be no. The young maintenance staff at the hotel can probably make no more sense of English than I can of Sanskrit.  On the other hand they probably know the difference between a green bean and a chili pepper.

Napa Valley in Bangalore: June 2, 2012

It’s Saturday morning June 2^nd. This is what I encounter on the way to the airport:

We come to the famous traffic light (the only one I’ve seen in Pune or Bangalore). This time it’s daylight, and I can see at the bend in the road, huddled behind the concrete safety wall, half a dozen little huts made out of corrugated metal sheets. When I say little I’m guessing they’re each about 6x10. That’s the space we have in our walk-in closets, but the corrugated metal sheets look brand new and shine mirror bright. More surprising still – each hut has its own Dish Network satellite receiver.

I remember being stunned by this same phenomenon several years ago in Mexico. We were driving down a dusty, dirt road in the middle of nowhere on our way to Tulum.  Eventually a collection of dwellings appear. They were mostly made out of cardboard. It looked like a village of refrigerator boxes, but right in the middle perched a huge satellite dish.  TV seems almost as coveted as food and water. I guess we need the stories.

After passing a few cows I see a beautiful tile mosaic adorning a towering stucco wall. It depicts a tank coming directly towards us with its cannon leveled. To the left is an imposing arched entryway announcing the Bombay Sappers. Inside the compound I see a battalion of men in crisp olive uniforms wearing dark blue turbans. I flash on Gunga Din or Charge of the Light Brigade.  A bit further down the road I see their barracks. They are long buildings, built by hand of round gray stones, a long time ago. It seems like a military envisioned by Masterpiece Theatre.

Then as we turn down the road that leads to the airport I see a billboard.

In front of a golden sunset sits an imposing jet fighter. In front of the plane is a phalanx of five smirking young men in flight suits and shades. They are marching towards us with the swagger of Tom Cruise in Top Gun.  “Join the Air Force.” This time it’s the military seen through the eyes of Bollywood. We start our wars imagining we’re in” Top Gun” and end them discovering we’re in “Born on the Fourth of July.”

I'm in the business of trying to help people change counter-productive behavior. Things like this remind me how unlikely an endeavor it really it is, but as long as they keep paying me, I'll keep doing it.

Okay, the plane is about to take off. So I’ll be signing off now. To the stars and beyond!

P.S.

As the plane was taking off I shut down my laptop, and took out their JetWings magazine to pass the time. I open the cover, and on the very first page I see pictures of elegant Mediterranean-style villas and town houses. The headline reads: "Nitesh Estates – expect more." The ad says, "Nitesh Napa Valley is where a resort experience becomes your life. California Villas – Now in Bangalore." I guess all these guys went to school at Stanford and Berkeley, and then went on to work in Silicon Valley. They came home and are recreating their vision of the high end, California life-style right here in India. It's a surprising world.

Hyderabad: June 2, 2012

I just got into Hyderabad. It's hot and dry, about 95 degrees, a lot like New Mexico. The driver tells me it’s the beginning of summer, and that in two weeks the monsoons will begin. How much longer will the weather be that predictable?

Everything here is new or still being built. The airport very modern, and the new US style freeways run uninterrupted from the airport to the Ista hotel. They have all been built in the last three years. Scrub desert stretches into the distance on both sides of the road occasionally interrupted by expanses of rock in shades of russet, grey, gold and white.  Now and then there are patches of habitation, modest but far removed from the third world poverty in Bangalore and Pune. Palm trees appear along with the people reminding me of the Big Island. Then the little concrete houses and palm trees disappear, and the southwest feeling returns.

But this is not the US, and one of the ways I am reminded of this most consistently is the care and concern for my wellbeing that people extend to me everywhere I go. Can you imagine a hotel in the US having a full-time employee stationed at the airport twenty-four hours a day to greet you when you arrive (even at one in the morning) and see to your every need? Back home, if the hotel is located more than ten minutes from the airport it’s unlikely they will even have a shuttle service. We’re rich and we have a reliable infrastructure so why should they go to that expense?  Even at our better hotels, where service is an important part of their business model, it tends to feel “professional” and a bit antiseptic.

Now remember the first time you came home after leaving for college: how happy your folks were to see you, to hear about your every experience, and make sure   your favorite foods were waiting for you. That’s what it feels like every place I’ve stayed in India. They make you feel like you’re coming home. True, like your mom, they can go too far at times.

At breakfast In Pune three different service people asked me if I would like tea or coffee because my cup was empty (I am not drinking caffeine). The third young woman who came by was so determined to be of service that when I told her I did not want any tea or coffee she asked if she could pour my little decanter of watermelon juice into a glass for me. I told her that wasn’t necessary. She smiled and proceeded to do so.

At the Taj in Bangalore, I was so tired from jetlag and a full day of training that I fell asleep fully dressed at eight o’clock.  A short time later I was awakened by a knock on the door. A young man wanted to check on the tea and coffee supply in the room. I told him I was fine, thanked him, sent him away, got undressed and ready for bed, turned off the lights, and turned in for the night. Fifteen minutes later, another knock on the door. I figured if I didn’t answer he would go away, but moments later he knocks again. I call out something like, “Not now” or “I’m fine,” at which point he rings the doorbell. I stumble out of bed, find a robe, and answer the door. He asks if I would like my bed turned down. I tell him “no,” and can see that he is deeply disappointed. I go back to bed. Ten minutes later the phone rings. Should they send someone over to turn down my bed? I fall back asleep. A little later, through the haze of a now forgotten dream, there is a knock on the door. I just remind myself how much these people want to make certain that I am happy and taken care of, and that feeling is worth every bit of the occasional over reach.

I live in a country where the audience, at a Republican presidential debate, wildly applauded the idea that someone without health insurance should just go ahead and die. Here, complete strangers, care whether my watermelon juice is poured or I am being sufficiently cared for. As they charge full speed ahead to replicate the wonders of the west over here, I sure hope they don’t go too far.