Ubiquitous Reciprocal Affinity

So far this week we’ve I’ve had two nights (8:30 pm - 5:30am local) with my new team. The six guys all seem very intelligent and they look to have a very diverse ethnic backgrounds. All of them have come to delhi to get jobs that were not avaliable in their home regions. We asked a “favorite place question as an “icebreaker” and got a slew of “my hometown” answers — even from my colleague who was having an admittedly heavy bout of homesick.

They asked us what our degrees were in and were surprised to learn that neither of their trainers had a degree in business/finance - although they seemed to perk up when it was mentioned that their other trainer was in school for MBA (we didn’t mention that his first class wont be till he gets back in Sept). These guys had studied computer programing, and marketing at their various institutions, but in a down economy had thought that getting time in with a global-outsourcing firm would look good on their CV’s and give them a leg up on competition when internal management positions become available. It sounds a lot like how I started at the Job almost 7 years ago.

I’m more amazed at the similarities in the cultures than at the differences, and if it’s not to patronizing a thing to say — looking a out at Delhi (I know I’m in a suburb but out trip into the city Sunday revealed not so different a landscape from the one outside my balcony) I see the US 120 years ago, perhapse the mash of social classes, climbers, entreprenuers, migrants, visionaries, and those just struggling to get by, that existed in the New York City at the turn of the 19th century.

Another telling answer to our icebreaker questions was the what would you do if you won the lottery — although lotteries have been banned here recently for reasons having to do with fixing and corruption, they all knew what we meant. (I suspect though that in his description of American lottery, my colleague made us all seem like wastrel gambling addicts - but no matter.) 5 out of the six had in mind a sort of charitable foundation to assist all their countrymen & women that the upheavals of the last decades seem to have left behind.

I doubt than American group would answer so selflessly, either out of cynicsm at the effects of charity; or because of a lack of knowledge on the full extent of the domestic needs. Conversely I think it noble but perhapse futile to think that one lottery winning will have an impact on the fortunes of an entire country. (It’s hard enough to coordinate the schedules/motivations of my family so hundreds of millions seems impossible.) Maybe I’m wrong (and a part of me hopes I am) but “poor” is a relative state and there will always be some among us that are less advantaged, our efforts at charity do more to help the giver feel good than it does the situation of the recipient.

The other thing that makes this group of trainees amusing is the degree of camaraderie that they show toward each other. I learned that these guys have been mentoring with the firm’s new business teams for the last month while we were delayed in getting here (damned visa issue) and so they seem already pretty familiar with each other. The first night of training we accompanied them to the the small food stand/pavilion that had been set up in the vacant lot next to the office tower, they offered to buy us food - as if we were paying for our food ourselves anyway.

The degree of back slapping, hand holding, horsing around and general physical affection on display would be unthinkable in the American workplace, it made my colleague wonder about the idea of “sexual orientation” in Indian culture. From my limited knowledge there is no such thing as a homosexual-Hindi (although if there were they would no longer be considered criminal by national law). I explained that it was typical in most gender separated societies (as most of the non-G8 countries are) the assumption of marriage and child rearing are so strong that any activity short of being caught by the paparazzi in a man-on-man-on-man orgy wouldn’t lead to suspicion. Not that I’ll be picking up boys at a bar while I’m here — sorry Brett & Paul.

Again I think back to the mores of 19th century America, where the future president could share a bed/house with his law partner and nobody would assume that they were “life-partners”. The question remains as to how this may develop as the country grows more affluent. Will they loose this expression of friendship as trying to out-macho each other becomes a symptom of competetion, or will the strides toward gay-rights in the US and elsewhere allow them to leapfrog past that stage in their economic growth.

More later. Tomorrow afternoon we visit the India division of the corporation.

After a few days in India I have what I think is enough information to form a first impression.  I hope these change over the course of these weeks here, but I want to get them down so I can  compare and contrast.

I suspect that these observations could apply to any of the rapidly-industrializing/post-consumerism-attempting economies of the world (BRIC, and the like) but there will be Indian specifics that will undoubtedly creep in. And my scope of view will likely be a bit limited due to the short leash I’ll be on given that I’m here to work.

I arrived at the Delhi in the dark but even as the driver sent to pick us up there were signs that the new wealth was not accruing to everybody evenly. There were people at the air port that wanted to help me with my bags for a small fee, but as I only had two small rollers there wasn’t much need — still they kept calling out, asking  if they could help me.

There were guards with rifles as we left the airport, and as we arrived at the gated residence complex (called Central Park — I assume that because once phase II is complete there will be gardens between the two sets of apartment towers)
and an unarmed desk clerk at the building entrance. With the number of security personnel you would think that the buildings were Trump-elaborate monstrosities of excess, but the furnishings were right out on a Ikea catalog (although not actually from the Swedish housewares giant, the style and construction techniques are definitely stolen from them) as I had predicted from looking at the photographs.

The one thing I hadn’t though through after looking at the photos was the house-man who lives here and does the cooking/cleaning/laundry for the people that are visiting the company’s India division. I’m not sure what time away from the apt he is afforded, nor his salary, but I have seen others like him walking around the complex, and I assume that a good portion of occupants have “domestics” (the promotional web-site for Phase 2 indicates that all units will have servant’s rooms) to help with all those things that I hate doing for myself.

With labor as cheap as it likely is - and most definitely is by comparison to the US — there is no shortage of hands to prepare food, do laundry and make my bed when I’m away. That’s just the thing that will likely be hardest the thing to get acustomed to, especially for a “bleeding heart liberal” like myself — my first any only twinge of rich-guilt. It comes as I’m riding down the highways and see the throngs of children, disfigured women and old men wandering alongside all the mini-vans, rickshaws and motorcycles. The last of those often carrying three people on it’s two wheels.

Tomorrow starts my work at the “night-office” as it’s affectionately known. I will  have more  after that. Till then I leave you with a picture of my morning view.