India - at first sight

India – my first point of view

I am all destroying death

And the origins of things that are yet to be

I am the gambling of rogues

The splendor of splendid

This tenth canto of bhagavt geeta when the God manifests himself in all his fullness describes India – a maximum country.

For rational and advanced west India is always been a mystic land. A land of Maharajas, queens, serpents and magicians.

Last year during December Times Square in New York was thronged with Amazing India campaigns. It conveyed meek and mild image of India promising tranquility and best hospitality.

At one end of spectrum it is a country where live a million people below the poverty line and one other end it is country with highest consumption of gold. A country that has the third largest pool of technical labor in the world but a third of its 1 billion people can’t read or write. Among the five emerging economies of the world, speculated to be a superpower and at the same time a country where more than 45% of land is under insurgency with shadows of terrorism killing peace everyday.

We are conditioned to learn facets of two coins but India has many facets and it gives jerk to plan of many foreign workers/ visitors to visit India. They gather information and more information in order to make a well informed decision but more information augments dilemma. To go or not go – they keep swinging like pendulum till they decide now it’s time to go.

That First Feeling

“I first decided to visit India when I was 19 inspired after reading Paul Theroux’s “The Great Railway Bazaar”. At that time some 25 years back, long before advent of internet boom, India was considered exotic, a country of palaces, temples snake charmers and other quaint but remarkably well educated characters, the country of Taj Mahal and the Delhi belly. Being able to go there was both scary and exciting.” Recalls Lamon Rutten, a Dutch national and CEO of Multi Commodity exchange in India, his first feeling of experiencing butterflies in belly when he was taking flight to India.

His source of motivation was writing of Paul Theroux, Vishnu Sharma’s tales of panchtantra and jungle book tempted Marc Traves from Newzeland to come to India. “While studying political science I got completely new perspectives about the political system of the country. Before flying down to world’s largest democracy I had a perception of mass poverty, a country enclosed economically and somehow static with a strong spirituality.” Recounts Travers now Director of Asia Pacific of Jones La Sangelle.

Contradictory to Travers, Chris Hunt from Australia was anxious about his domestic arrangements and preparing strategies to never seen but heard of poor infrastructure and challenges associated with basic logistics.

First encounter with India on Arrival

“When I first landed here I was exotic to Indians as India was to me. I was one of the last one to get off the plane but when I took my place in line for the custom procedures some passengers jostled and pushed me to the front of line – even the custom official came out from behind his desk to take me forward. The hospitality was overwhelming” recounts Lamon that it was tipping point when all notions that he was carrying for this country started blowing off on this encounter.

“Having moved from a country like Australia with a small population and wide open spaces, the sheer weight of humanity in India was overpowering, there are just so many people. The extremes of wealth and poverty that I first noticed about this country.” Says Chris that this extremes he found very awesome.

Love at First sight

A foreigner was amused to see the way cars and four wheelers drove on the road overtaking each other. Out of curiosity he asked his local guide the reason behind and guide explained that in some countries they drive left hand side and in some they have norm of right hand drive but in India they drive under shades.

“The most peculiar and thing to fall in love with is definitely driving and the roads, it is organized chaos; you would think to see a lot of accidents but it seems there are more in US (very good drivers know how to use the horn). The thing I loved most was understanding prevailing among drivers when they drive on the roads” says Armin Errbsland from USA. “Everyone I encountered here was so friendly, kind and willing to help or assist, very unlike in US. In the US people raise their voices much more often than in India, people are much easy going and relaxed. I had to learn to slow down and take life as and when it comes than stress killing me.” Explains Armin who came to India on an assignment for Zensar technologies.

People here are resilient and tolerant by choice not by force. When serial blasts in Mumbai local trains rocked the entire world taking toll on more than 200 lives people on the site demonstrated essence of being an Indian. After few minutes instead of pulling themselves from the site they were pulling dead bodies and lending helping hand to those who they never knew before and next day life came on normal tracks when people took same local trains heading to their offices.

“India is Indian, uncompromisingly so. It does not try to copy west. Indians adopt from other cultures, but their own culture is so deep that it can easily absorb these foreign influences. Discovering this culture, a different way of living, is a very exciting experience – it makes you more a complete human” elaborate Lamon Rutten his reasons for love for this country.

Those first techniques of adjustments

There is a popular saying that goes like this, in India taste of water change at end of every four miles but there is a change of language at end of every mile. Diversity is the beauty of this country like many flowers of different colors and odors put together in a vase and that vase is a common base that holds them together with glowing beauty.

“I tried to strike a balance between extreme patience and strong determination just after the break up of the Soviet Union, taught me a bit of it.” Disclose Marc technique he used to get acclimatizes to culture. “Try to understand what is to be a nation with more than a billion populations with massive challenges and opportunities growing parallel to each other. There is no single panacea or a silver bullet to working in any new country. You have to take time to understand what makes people tick. In business you have to be able to adapt to the fact that logistics in India are time consuming and that the day runs little later from start to finish but overall Indian businesses want best value and knowledge” admits Marc Travers.

“you need to learn to help other people going out of the way some time and cumulative effect you will see people going out of way to help you out in crisis and here you feel pleasure to get absorbed in a country’s culture” emphasize Armin.

I am here and now

“Listening and reading helps to understand better why things are as the way they are in India. The positive aspects I enjoy and negative I let it going out of memory lanes. When understanding is not enough to enable acceptance, you learn the art of tolerance and today I just relax and ignore things that go wrong. This is not easy for a westerner. We are brought up to try and set things right not to just tolerate them. But here I learn to fully enjoy the positive experiences and do not spend much time on pondering negative ones.” Confesses Lamon. “India is a country you should go with an open mind and open heart but at the same time accepting that world is not fair. Living in India was emotionally tough for me a as a foreigner than I learn shocking sights in everyday life should not blind us to the richness of the culture and all that we can learn from India. The country is moving ahead at full steam and finding its own solutions to its own problems – what more can we realistically ask for?” reveals Lamon Rutten under whose stewardship Multi commodity exchange in India is a licensed stock exchange spearheading for a global growth.

India is very demanding and exciting place and the opportunities for personal development and success are here for everybody but don’t get fooled by the outside environment, inside the clients want world class standards and world class work places” point out Marc Travers.

As a matter of fact westerners come here like a foreigner and live like a local and when they leave they carry a little India in their hearts.