Chapter 4: So, where are you really coming from?

The following day I woke up early at 9am, with an upset stomach. It was a Sunday; we had planned to leave Alibaugh to head back to Bombay by noon as all my friends worked for multinational corporate and had to be at work on Monday morning. I was still annoyed with Rajiv, and lacked the will or the courage to initiate any form of communication. Being completely unaware about my temperament, Rajiv’s behavior was normal towards me and continued his train of questions on my American life. Since, I was already agitated, his accent started bothering me, the upset stomach, dry December heat was making me nostalgic. All I could think was the cool welcoming air conditioned - 30 Namdeep apartments. The thought of 4 hours long bumpy journey with Rajiv’s preconceived, sallow perception added to my melancholy. We started our trip back to Bombay at noon. I again took the front seat, this time to sleep. I slept for 2 hours to my surprise, as I have never been able to fall asleep or read in a moving vehicle. After my brief nap, I was fresh - but the heat and dust was still bothering me. It was the spicy Indian food, the dry December heat and the dehydration caused by the wine from last night had caused the nausea.

We stopped at a service area by the highway for lunch. As a precautionary measure, I opted out from having my lunch. The pungent smell of the chicken curry with all the Indian spicy Masala, was bothering me so much that, I sat on separate table, downloading pictures from the my digital camera into Vishal’s laptop, which he had brought on the trip; so he could reply to office emails from Alibag. We resumed our journey back to Bombay, which was now 2 hours away. This time around I took the back seat, sitting next to Rajiv. Still unaware of the apathy, Rajiv asked me questions on my encounter with American girls, my girlfriends, and my plans to settle in America; I replied to his curiosity, candidly. I was discrete wherever necessary, most of the times though I was frank and open. Back of my mind was strategizing to know ‘where Rajiv is coming from’, so I could decipher the reason for his admiration toward Hiter. At times I questioned him, in my own sarcastic way, asking questions loosely based on his perception of Bombay, the growth of the city and the country due to the booming IT industry, the rising cost of living in the Mumbai, why he is not in the IT field as rest of my other undergraduate friends etc. His answers failed to impress me, as I had received similar responses from my other friends in India.

But for some strange reasons his answers advocated - Bombay just for Maharashtrain, and people from other caste, religions, are mere taking advantage of the Bombay’s growth, natural resources. He said ‘They are washing their hands in the flowing Ganga.’ Ganga is considered the Nile of India, a perennial river that has brought prosperity to Indian agricultural revolution, and hence used as a metaphor for wealth. He meant, people who are not native to Bombay had no right to take advantage of the growth of the city. He continued ‘My family had to leave Dadar, due to the raising cost of living in Dadar area, and now we are staying Vashi, which is 2 hours way from f*cking downtown Mumbai…I don’t feel bad that we had to move to Vashi, as my house in Dadar was very small as compared to Vashi, also I like Vashi as it is well planned, the infrastructure is way better then Bombay. But my blood boils, seeing the new occupants of the building in Dadar, are non Maharashtrain.’

‘When I was growing up in Dadar, almost 100% of the population was Maharashtrain and today only 20 to 30% of them are Maharashtrain and the natives like us have to move to New Bombay. Dadar is main central suburb of Bombay and today very few native Maharashtrain stay there.’

He abruptly ended his conversation and looked at me for reasoning. He was breathing heavy, indicating that he was angry and emotional. I asked him if he or his grandparents where born in Mumbai, he replied with an Indian nod, indicating “No.” He said - his parents moved to Bombay, after their marriage from a small town, near South coastal region of Maharashtra called Malwan. This got me thinking, and I questioned him, ‘So how does that make you or your family native of Bombay.’ As I was asking him this, I started relating him to the character ‘Butcher’ from the film ‘Gangs of New York.’

As expected Rajiv, was not able to answer to my question, and gave me a perplexed look. Ashwin, who all this while was a silent front seat listener to our conversation , said to Rajiv ‘Did you know, Sabir’s great grandparents’ are from Bombay. He doesn’t have a native place.’ I nodded in agreement to Ashwin’s comment. ‘He is a true native of Bombay. His family is here since last 100 odd years when the city was a set of seven islands.’ Rajiv was surprised, and said ‘Being a native of this city, how can you tolerate that people from other parts of the country are monopolizing and ruling the financial and industrial sector of the city.’ I looked at Ashwin with a smirk, as he knew where exactly I was heading with my argument with Rajiv and I continued,

'Indian IT corporations like Infosys and Wipro, who are doing IT back office jobs for US and western countries, they more or less washing their hands in Western economy and bringing big dollars and growth to India?.’ He smiled in agreement. I continued, ‘So if these IT giants decide to keep to their strategic and intellectual property just to Bangalore, in their home town, will you like it?'

'This will result in growth of only Bangalore and not Bombay or India. Assume these IT powerhouses had kept their base Bangalore and did not allow any other caste, race or Indians from other parts of the India to work, do you thing we could have even afforded this lavish trip to Alibag, or would any us have had these high paying jobs. The fact of matter is, these powerhouses won’t even survive without support of other cities or states within India to be able to accomodate the growing demand of US Based companies for Business Process outsourcing.’

I continued my speech on globalization citing examples from Tomas Friedman’s ‘World is flat’ and ended saying,

‘Rajiv, you have to understand and think beyond the Maharashtrain community or Dadar. The world is changing faster then one can imagine, and it is only with collaboration we can be a part of this evolving globalization, so focus on the similarities and not differences. Both US and India are reaping the fruits of this changing world, the more you resist this change the more you will be affected. The sallow perception of singular ideology won’t help you, both in your economically and practical pursuits.’ After a long pause - Rajiv smiled and said ‘I agree. I was ignorant and maybe did not see this aspect, due to limited exposure and experience.’ Something told me this conversation had changed Rajiv’s prejudice attitude.

By now everybody in the car was tired from the bumpy journey, and was either resting or had gone off to sleep. I realized that I was talking too much and needed to curb my enthusiasm to change the world. I could tell Rajiv was also exhausted and was in no mood to listen or talk to me after my long speech. Since I had my power nap, I was relatively fresh and continued questioning Rajiv, asking him questions on the nature of his work, his family and plans to get married. He answered frankly and I took him at the face value, without dwelling too much on the answers. I learned, his father passed away 7 years ago, he was the only earning member in his family. Rajiv, carried the responsibility his 2 younger sisters now in studying at a university colleges in Bombay majoring in Computer Science and Economic and his mother had crossed 61 last year. Due to financial crises after his father’s death, Rajiv and his family had to leave their Dadar house and move to Vashi.

We reached Vashi, and everybody in the SUV got up, as the car stopped outside Rajiv’s apartment building. We got down, stretched out and hugged Rajiv, saying bye. While, parting he said ‘Next time when we meet, I will tell you where I am really coming from.’ I nodded unsure of what he meant but replied ‘Surely, we will meet. Please be my guest the next time you are in Ghatkopar or Syracuse, NY.’

Ashwin now took the back seat to give me company. Soon after we left Rajiv’s house, as the car heading toward the Mankur highway, Ashwin said ‘Did you know Rajiv’s father was killed by a mob during the Hindu – Muslim Bombay riots of ’98.’ Shocked, I replied, ‘No, I was not aware.’

I spent the rest of the journey in silence, pondering ‘Is this, the reason that made Rajiv to have - the ideology of singularity? If yes, then, was I right to lecture him on globalization, and shedding examples from some glamorous over hyped book, by a Pulitzer price winner author, not knowing where is really coming from. Did I really make any impact, by saying what I said about one world family, or clinging on to similarities and not difference? An impression of the dark side of social structure is already craved his mind and now, his perception is a reality. I know what I was trying to preach was right, but then who I’m I, to determine what is right or wrong. Should I continue to shade some of my perception of - flatter world, my perception that - love is truly the sixth element, binding the world together in unison, and information or Internet is playing an integral part in bringing people, ideas, cultures, traditions closer.’ That night I went to bed dwelling over my thoughts on - ‘what is good and what is bad,’ and my vision of spreading global wisdom.

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Lindsay is my good friend in Syracuse who is perusing her doctorate from Syracuse University’s Maxwell School in sociology, and loves India. Her dream is to educate all the kids in Bihar; and the topic of her thesis is ‘Educational structure in rural Bihar.’ Lindsay is known to throw dinner parties at her house, inviting over 20 odd students every week. Since I have been a student and spent over 4 years in Syracuse I know for a fact, it is taxing and expensive to invite a crowd for dinner, which she managed to do every second week including winters. When I asked her, attending one of such dinner parties, ‘Why you do this?’ She replied saying, ‘Sabir, the only one difference between American culture and Indian culture I noticed is hospitality and the joy one gets by sharing food.’ Being an Indian, I exactly knew where she was coming from.

Tejal, my ex-girlfriend, had got annoyed when I did not greet her uncle Mr. Mehta, in the traditional Indian ‘Namaste,' and instead chose to greet him with a ‘Hello Askok, how are you doing?’ This surprised me, as Tejal was an American Indian, and lived in US her entire life. Namaste to me is too traditional Hindu and also to some extent orthodox. Once again, I was beset by the ironies of my life. I was trying to create an impression on Mr. Mehta, showing that I am somewhere American by addressing him by his first name, so I don’t give an impression of being an uptight FOB (fresh of board), Indian from Bombay. Following this incident, I started my quest, to find where exactly Tejal, is coming from - Tejal’s parents moved to US, some 30 odd year ago, and had carried with them the traditional and cultural values followed by Indians in 1960’s. Tejal was brought up with these cultural values in America. To her Indian culture was traditions followed in India 20 years ago, which I termed as ‘orthodox’, and too banal to follow. Studying this anomaly, I wondered…. being just 22 days younger to Tejal, we were a generation apart, due to this cultural upbringing. Tejal never forgave me for my ignorance, and I was not able to express this disconnect in the right manner…..hence “ex.”

I started this story with a quote from the documentary ‘Tsunami’ on HBO by a Tsunami survival, who had lost her family. “Hope is all I have, believing in something that can’t be proven, but you are willing to trust, that it is there.” referring on God’s existence. She was helping other survivors, and trying her best to keep their spirit high, so they can help other survivors – who where questioning ‘God…why us?’

I have realized if I want to be an integral part of spreading global wisdom to this changing world, somehow I need to be more skillful and also articulate, by understanding ‘where one is coming from,’ and/or by expressing ‘where I am coming from.’ Also, not to carry pre-connived ideas – as the problem is not the ignorance, but the pre connived thinking.

There is no unifying through theme to these Chapters, there is at least a common thread running through the everyday application of – where are your coming from. It has to do with thinking sensibly about how people behave in the real world. This isn’t necessarily a difficult task, nor does it require super sophisticated thinking. I have essentially tried to figure out how Jim - an Engineer from China, Rajiv - a person who lost a dear one, Lindsay - a freak of Indian culture and Tejal - a first generation American Indian, have acted or reacted owing to their diverse non conventional backgrounds.

Will this ability to think about such thoughts improve your life materially? Probably not. Perhaps, you’ll listen to a Chinese guy more attentively or push hard to preach the power of love and acceptance to a people like Rajiv, understand the joy of giving like Linsay, or perhaps, accept first generation American Indian more willing then just labeling them confused. But the net effect is likely to be more subtle than that. You might become more skeptical of the conventional wisdom; you may begin looking for hints as to how things aren’t quite what they seem; perhaps you will seek out some data and sift through it, balancing your intelligence and your intuition to arrive at a glimmering new idea and some of ideas might make you uncomfortable, even unpopular. To claim, that the sixth element is love, or saying Namaste is too Orthodox way of greeting – would inevitably lead to explosive moral reaction. But ‘the fact of the matter remains that this style of thinking simply doesn’t traffic in morality.’ ^[1] So, my dear readers, 'where are you really coming from?’

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[1] Quote from Freakoomonics- by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dumber.