Regaining Perspective
I keep thinking about what to write next here. When I started to do this about a month ago, it was because I was constantly having these "this has changed", "oh, I forgot about that", or an "oh, you're back in India" moments. They were piling up so high in my head, I had to write as many of them down as I could. That's why this whole thing started in the first place. I still have a few unpublished posts which I am trying to clearly articulate, for instance there's about women and the dating scene (it’s a convoluted and confounding post currently, quite similar to the experience of dealing with the whole scene itself) but more on that when I can do it justice in words.
Then March rolled by and I find myself struggling to make the observations that were coming at a mile a minute last month. I keeping think about this web log, what my next entry should be, and nothing comes to mind.
I was reading my close friends Blog about her time newly arrived in Johannesburg, and what she had to say, it threw light on what was going on with me… she says,
"I have noticed that I feel so settled in now that it is somehow harder to comment on what is different here, or what is noticable, or remarkable. Before I came here, one of the anthropologists at Goldsmiths told me how the most important thing about writing field notes is that you initially note down everything that is new since after a very short while you won't notice anymore. I guess this is exactly where I am at now. From the banal, such as traffic or security, to the public, such as reading quality newspapers, and private, such as what people that I meet talk about - it has all become the norm. "
Is this what is happenning with me? Am I loosing that ability to 'notice', because my phoreign tinted glasses are now coated with a nice fine dusting of Mumbai? Oops, well, there goes the entire premise of this blog then! I should go to the airport stand with a sign as Indians come of their British Airways flight:
“Desi Returned from Phoerign for good? Wanna take over Blog of Normalised Phoreign Returnee?"
But, here's the interesting thing about self awareness. The second it hits you, like the fact that the newness about being back has worn off and that I’m adapting to my new ‘normalcy’, you can see past it. So now, I feel like I’m beginning to see things again, just , a bit more from within the system than outside it. Plus, you don’t really know a place (for the second time around) until you become part of it, do you? Please note blatant attempt to convince myself that its a good thing.
So, what’s this bit about reverting to form? Well, its linked into becoming one with the system.. so here goes, two posts for the price of one:
Reverting to Form
I was celebrating the whole coming back to a new customer service India, the one with people who do things as part of your service because surprise surprise, you’re the customer, and its their job!
I actually think the call center kids who work the Indian market seem nicer than all the desi call center operators I dealt with when I was in the UK. Oh, what great fun it used to be to hear them cringe at the very question I dread “So, where you from?” Tee hee. But Indian call center operators that exist for the local Indian consumer? I get the sense that they all seem to be working extra hard to do a good job so they can get the foreign call center gig, so we benefit, hugely. Long gone are the days of constantly phoning people to get the job done, sar pe betna or sitting on people’s heads (local idiom) seem a thing of the past. Its all good!
Or is it? In the last three days I have had to sort out a washing machine repair, a cable operator issue, a de-mat account. In each one, after initial wonderfully satisfying calls with their respective call centers and customer service agents, things were taking a bit longer than originally promised. I found myself needing to bypass the customer service people – who you just can’t get mad at ‘cause they are so nice – and head into old school getting things done mode. Chasing up the actual do-ers, the phone number of the technicians who actually had to come here and get it done, calling up the central distribution people, finding the manager of the local branch office, in one case going down to their office (a customer, here?!!?) and screaming through a window until someone came and sorted it out. This was old school mara-mari - things got done by actually pulling the entire chain of responsibility link by link, in the direction of your job number.
I hadn’t planned on any of the mara-mari bit. I was told by a friend when I was heading down to sort out the first job, “Don’t be your usual nice self, kick a little ass, it’ll get done.” Four years in the UK, where you were never anything but polite (and that could be more infuriating than you know, like when you had every right to impale the office-teller on a stake, and could at the very most only say “I really apologize for going on about this but…”). I have become politeness personified – the UK has trained me to treat everyone like human beings first, inefficient service providers last.
So while kicking a little ass and being ‘stern’ was how I used to deal with Mumbai and living here, it was something I was happy to escape from. Yet, I found myself slipping into the role so easily, like immersing into a nice warm bath. It felt so … right. Shouting, screaming, raving, ranting … cajoling, arguing, even sympathizing with their mountainous work load prior to adding, “But I will be the first thing you attend to right?”, skillfully using the entire melodramatic range of emotions to make them do my bidding, was all part of how to run this machine efficiently, and I there I was, working the machine! Washing Machine? Repaired. Cable? Sorted. De-mat? Done. It is all good!
Just because India's been given a lovely coat of customer service paint doesn’t mean the engine works any differently. What I can’t make up my mind about, is should I be upset about the fact that you still have to go ballistic to get things done? Or should I be pleased that I’m still able to do it rather well?
