Mr Cab Driver

When I first moved here I wondered why people like to sleep in their cars during the day. After a while I noticed that these daytime sleepers were usually dressed in white. Then I realized that they were men working as drivers catching up on sleep!

Recently I was in an airport taxi coming back from the airport. It was around 1am. There was almost no traffic and the road was clear. But I noticed the car was slowing down and then accelerating… slowing down and then accelerating again. I glanced at the driver and realized that this slowing down – speeding up motion was happening in tandem with his eyelids which were drooping shut and then blinking opening again. For the rest of the ride home we tried to keep a conversation going to keep him from falling asleep at the wheel! When we finally reached home safe and sound I asked the driver if he was going home to catch up on some sleep. He told me that he had two more airport runs to do before he could call it a night!

Later a friend told me that the driver of an airport cab she was riding in recently had fallen asleep and drove right into the central divider! Luckily they were not hurt but the brand new cab was a wreck.

Maybe the new airport has something to do with taxi drivers' chronic sleep deprivation. The new airport is 40km away from the city centre. Most international flights arrive and take off after midnight and early morning domestic flights are common. Two new taxi companies have managed to secure a monopoly at the airport. In a way, these shiny brand-new white and green Mahindra Renault taxis have revolutionalized transportation in Bangalore. They’re air-conditioned, have ‘tamper-proof’ meters, GPS systems, offer printed receipts and even the option of paying by credit card. They can be booked by phone or via the Internet. A confirmation is sent to the customer by sms with the driver’s name and phone number.

These drivers usually speak some English. I often ask them about their working conditions and whether this new taxi system offers a good deal to them. Drivers have to go through a rigorous selection process and a training period during which they learn how to treat customers, and how to drive safely (!). They have to pay a daily fee to the cab company of 950 rupees. This is in addition to fuel costs which are paid out of their own pockets. The car belongs to the company but after a set number of years the driver can become the owner of his cab through some kind of leasing system. Maintenance costs are covered by the company.

In order to cover his daily costs and make a minimum daily wage, a driver has to make at least 3 return trips to the airport. (He’ll make 600-700 rupees per trip.) Apparently this is not easy. This is why these cab companies are difficult to book for trips within the city: somehow they are only available for airport trips. Drivers often give their mobile phone numbers to customers asking them to call them directly if they need an airport drop instead of contacting the call centre. I have even heard that some drivers pay bribes to call centre staff so that they get more customers!

In order to cover their expenses and make a living, these cab drivers have to take as many customers as possible, again preferably to the airport. They tend to drive fast and often dangerously (the faster they drive the more trips they’ll put in?). Since the peak time for airport drops is between 10pm and 1am and 4am and 7am, many work during the night. Then there’s all the airport pick-ups during the day. No wonder they’re sleep deprived!

Images © Meru Cabs

Repair and reuse

My mixer-grinder stopped working. I was making hummus when the motor just gave up and the blade stopped rotating. The chick peas were only a half-ground mess. Time to get a new one, I thought… anyway one of the blades had broken into two and the handle of one of the jugs was about to fall off. But I didn’t rush out to buy a new one until not having a mixer-grinder started to become a real inconvenience.

A word here about mixer-grinders: no Indian household is complete without one. Each kitchen must have one – along with the compulsory pressure cooker and tawa (a flat pan used to make chappatis). A mixer-grinder is an integral part of every Indian kitchen, used to grind spices into powders, make idly and dosa batter and chop up coconut. You simply cannot live without one. Though I had managed to live without one before moving to India, my beloved mixie had become one of my most essential kitchen tools. Instead of grinding spices and mixing dosa batter though, I used mine to grind flax seeds and make hummus, amongst other things. The blender option is good for fruit smoothies. So when it stopped working I was at a loss.

I was on the way to the shop to look for a new mixer-grinder when I met my landlady. “Where are you going?” is one of her favourite questions. When I told her what had happened she was horrified: “How will you cook!?” she asked, aghast. I told her that since I’d had the mixer-grinder for three years, maybe it was time for a new one. She looked even more horrified. “Only three years? I’ve had my mixie for over 30 years and it’s still working! No, no, don’t buy a new one!” she begged me. She had a solution for me. “You can take it to the repairman!”

I had passed the little repair shops on the main road dozens of times where I’d see men tinkering around with screwdrivers and wires, but I hadn’t even thought of this option. Why? Because where I come from these little shops do not exist. If something breaks, you try to fix it. If you’re unsuccessful then you buy a new one. Why? Because appliances are usually cheaper to replace than to fix!

Not in India. India is the country of recycle, reuse and repair! So off I went to the repair shop. My mixer-grinder was not the only casualty. The repairman happened to be working on another mixie which seemed to be in far worse condition: the body had been opened up and a mess of wires was spilling all over the operation table. Mine was child’s play in comparison. The plastic disc which had worn out and stopped rotating was swiftly exchanged for another one. The broken blade was removed and replaced with an identical shiny brand-new one. Total repair time: 5 minutes. Cost: 70 rupees. My mixie was as good as new.

My landlady was happy my mixer-grinder had come back to life. “How much did you pay?” (another favourite question). “You see! I saved you 2000 rupees!” she told me proudly.

Read the sign II

(Above image courtesy of Kristin Allen)

India must of the country of quirky signs. Following Part 1, here is Part 2 of 'Read the sign!'

Counting heads

What costs 60 billion rupees, uses up 11 million tons of paper, concerns 240 million homes in 7000 towns and 600,000 villages and takes 11 months to complete by 2.5 million officials?

Answer: the 2011 Indian census!

India is the country with the second biggest population in the world (after China of course). Counting close to 1.2 billion people takes time, human resources and even paper.

Since April 1st, government officials and schoolteachers on their summer breaks are visiting each and every household in the country over the next 11 months to gather information for the 2011 census. From residential compounds to apartment blocks and shantytowns to footpaths, each of India’s 240 million households will be visited by an election official. They will be asked to answer 15 basic questions on their identity, date of birth, marital status, occupation, address etc., as well as 35 questions asking what kind of building material their homes are made of, if they have access to drinking water, electricity and toilets, and whether they have possessions like a mobile phone and personal computer.

Every person over the age of 15 will also be photographed and fingerprinted and given a national identification number.

Collecting and processing the personal details of over a billion people is no easy task. That’s why a sophisticated data electronic processing system is in place. Dr C Chandramouli who is in charge of the 2010 census seems to be proud of the Indian census which has been taking place since 1872:

“In terms of history, our census is the oldest. We were the first to use the Integrated Character Recognition Technology (ICRT) to scan the filled census forms and tabulate the data. We get delegations from countries like Indonesia, Bhutan, Bangladesh and Nepal. And many of our retired census experts go to countries like Sudan and Ethiopia as consultants. We don't need to go anywhere to get trained as our methods are largely followed across the world. In the developed world they don't go from house to house, instead, they mail the forms to people… This can work in countries where everyone has an address.”

There was much debate in parliament whether a question on caste should be included in the census with many right wing parties insisting it should be. Last month the home secretary declared that caste will not be included in the census. Only ‘scheduled castes’ and ‘scheduled tribes’ will be recorded since these groups fall under the reservation system.

Despite this, my friends A & S were asked to volunteer information on their religion and caste. When they asked why this information was being asked of them they were told it was mandatory!

In the meantime the caste debate seems to continue in the papers who are also calling the 2010 census “the biggest-ever census attempted in the history of mankind.”

Temple in construction

During our trip last December to Madhya Pradesh we visited a temple which had just been built. Sculptors and artisans were busy at work, creating sculptures and carvings out of the blocks of stone. These are images of the Bhaktamar Jain temple just outside Dhar.

Ding dong!

A friend who had spent some time in the US told me that she found it to be a quiet and lonely place. No traffic noise. No crowds on the streets. No one talks to you. And no one knocks on your door… I had to laugh because it’s true that in India the doorbell rings several times a day.

Ding dong! Who could it be?

It’s the maid.
It’s the newspaper man coming to collect his fees.
It’s the man from the cable company collecting payment. (This is how bills are often paid - the only bill we receive by mail is the phone bill.)
It’s the courier man. (Any important document is sent by courier and not by post.)
It’s the paper wallah coming to collect old newspaper.
It’s the dhobi wallah delivering my ironing.
It’s the man who washes the car.
It’s a salesman selling encyclopedias.
It’s a woman asking me if I want to subscribe to DNA newspaper (“Your neighbours have subscribed,” she tells me, thinking this will convince me.)
It’s a man with a garlanded bull playing a nadaswaram (a noisy reed instrument)!
It’s someone from the BJP who wants to give me an election flyer.
It’s a group of children collecting money for the Ganesha festival.
It’s a neighbour stopping by for a chat.

These are some of the people who show up at my door. Actually I’m lucky that the entrance to our home is at the back of the house, so I don’t get too much traffic. People who live in houses often lock their front gates to avoid the not-always-welcome guests. Or they have a security guard stationed there whose job it is to deter beggars and salesmen and welcome bona fide visitors. It’s a full-time job!

Now please excuse me… someone’s at the door!

Real India

Last weekend after a film premiere I found myself at a reception at one of Bangalore’s many swanky hotels. “This is not India,” I overheard a Frenchman remark, referring to the trendy bar we were in. Yes, this is India, I thought to myself. This is one facet of India. One of India’s many faces.

I think there are few foreign tourists who come Bangalore. There are expats, yes, but they are a different breed because they have come to India for professional reasons (and usually don’t like it). Travellers come to India (often every year) because they like it. That’s India. You love it or you hate it: passionately in either case.

Tourists and travellers are also different breeds. Tourists visit Rajasthan, the Taj Mahal and Kerala and stay in each place for a few days. Travellers go to places like Rishikesh, Manali, Varanasi, Goa, Tiruvannamalai and Hampi and stay for a few weeks, months or years. These places all have something of the ‘Incredible India’ about them, but they have also become travellers’ haunts overrun with Internet cafés, German bakeries, Israeli restaurants and banana pancakes. And annoying touts asking you if you want to buy hashish.

Travellers tend to avoid Indian cities. They are too big, too crowded, too polluted, too noisy. They are also too ‘modern’ and therefore not the ‘real India’. They don’t want to see things that remind them of home, like shopping malls, automatic teller machines or rapid transit systems. They want the elephants and snake charmers. They want the authentic experience. The real India. Cities are of course very much a part of Indian life and if you scratch the surface and emerge out of the usual tourist haunts, real India inevitably stares you in the face from every doorway and street corner.

What is India?

India is temples, pilgrimages and festivals.
India is shopping malls, mobile phones, and tech parks.
India is vada pav, masala dosa and aloo gobi.
India is Domino’s Pizza, Baskin Robbins and caffe lattes.
India is overpaid executives, underpaid domestic workers and overworked taxi drivers.
India is stylish bars, trendy nightclubs and 5-star hotels.
India is darshinis, dabhas and chai stalls.
India is doctors, engineers and IT professionals.
India is rag pickers, office peons and rickshaw wallahs.
India is Bollywood, Tollywood and Kollywood.
India is arranged marriages, dowry deaths and child labour.
India is high-end real estate and overcrowded slums.

India is many things. They are all real.