please don't read this like a college essay

It's truly remarkable when you find someone born and brought up in a totally foreign culture who perceives the world so similarly. Friendships forged straight through differing backgrounds and retained despite geography based on true connections from great conversations mean quite a lot to me. I have one such friend from Japan, one from Mainland China, and one from Taiwan. Now I have one from India. [Note: anyone who's lived in the US for more than 2 years doesn't count in this point I'm trying to make]
That said, I have many other friends from each of these places (Taiwan excluded) whom I care about dearly. But only these amaze me at our similarities and our ease of getting along.
We spoke about how terrible the ASCI administration is and about how much we enjoy certain specific and types of people. She talks about her past pain, and I joke about both hers and mine. In a book I recently read and love, the author explains that one's own pain is the most precious thing he or she can share with another. Well, we've shared some.
On my last day, she produces two Kultas (traditional Indian shirts) that she'd bought for me. Luckily, I'd already given her two CDs that I put a lot of thought and time into crafting. She tells me to wear it and come join in the Puja for Ganesh, 2 hours before I have to leave for the airport. We walk down, and I immediately hope to disappear, trying in vain not to become the center of attention for what should be a religious ceremony. I screw up the part where you dot your own forehead, getting the paint all over my hands. Everyone around me laughs, not least the aforementioned friend. When the plate of fire comes by, its bearer hastily allows me only one pull of air from it. Only the aforementioned notices this subtlety. I get the joke too, but it annoys me instead of making me laugh. After this, though, everything goes pretty smoothly. I can lean over and quietly whisper requests for translation and explanation. And later, the fire's second bearer is nicer to me than the first.
It's staggering how little I understand of the ceremony, of Hinduism, and of India. But I do know that my friend is kind, perceptive, and strong, which I can appreciate anywhere.

a nice night, pt. 2

In the rain, I headed over to the City Centre mall, a "world class mall." I'd been hoping to get a shot at some Haleem (the food that takes a day to make and Hyderabadi Muslims eat each night during Ramadan) since before I arrived in Hyderabad, but first I wanted to pick up my power-shirts on the cheap (as in, $25 instead of $80). At Planet Fashion, where I'd reserved two shirts for myself earlier, I met Anthony Benjamin and his friend, who have longer shifts than I expected.
I walked out of the store with two shirts, unsure of whether I'd landed a great deal or been ripped off, in search of some Haleem. Then I realize that Anthony Benjamin and his friend may have something more to offer, and I walk back through security and into the mall. They point me in the right direction, and as I'm walking on the sidewalk next to the mall, Anthony Benjamin's friend cries down to offer me his guidance to the Haleem shop.
It turns out that the guy calls himself a "foreigner specialist." He loves foreigners' talent and intelligence, he says. Excuse me for my naiveté, but I believe that he honestly and earnestly opened to me. We walk down an alley, and seeing my slight flinch, he tells me not to worry, as I'm with him. Of course, I'm not worrying about anyone else. I tell him that I'm just concerned that we go the right way.
We're there in no time, all the while discussing how Muslims are treated in the US. I tell him that I really don't know, but that I'm sure there are some problems. He's happy and surprised that I have Muslim friends, and I assure him that plenty of Muslim communities exist in our cities, and he'd have no problems finding them. I'm making things up at this point, but I try to remind him at every opportunity how little I really know about what it would be like for him.
He's curious about and attentive to what I say. I'm not sure he understood my description of the project that brought me to Hyderabad, but I guess he got some of it. He's intensely out to prove his morality and good intentions, in part to impress that he's a man worth giving my American time to help later. He refuses to let me pay, and again, I believe only in small part because he's looking for favors later. The Haleem is actually a lot worse than what I expected, but I expected something on par with Hyderabad Biryani. That, in my opinion, it's not, but the flavor is still damn nice. And it probably tastes better when you haven't eaten all day. I'd stuffed myself recently, as it turned out.
My friend later tells me that I shouldn't have trusted this man – that first impressions can often be quite wrong. In my opinion, though, no risk leads to no reward. I learned a lot from my friend at Planet Fashion, and I will remember his kindness no matter what happens.

democracy

In China, Rasul Poora wouldn't be around anymore. It's a slum of people who settled close to the Hyderabad Airport – in fact, many of them on Airport-owned land itself. Now, Rasul Poora is a notified slum, which means that its people have a claim to the land they live on. Adjacent to Rasul Poora, and even closer to the runway (we're talking a couple hundred meters), sit a bunch more houses, some built of concrete, some made of plastic sheets and sticks.
Rasul Poora aside, the fact that this area, right next to the airport, is engaged in an ongoing legal dispute with the Airport authorities in court just plain amazes me. In China, the government wouldn't even blink before clearing out that area. Not a split second of thought. And in India, powerful local leaders pushed to get the matter into court, lest the voters in slums punish them for ignoring the people.
In India, Rasul Poora is far enough outside of the airport fence to get notified, but I highly doubt it would have made it in Beijing. In India, Rasul Poora has pretty mediocre water coverage – most people use public taps and borewells. In China, Rasul Poora (if it survived) might be better served. I'm really not sure. But the two countries are obviously driven by different types of politics, and the difference couldn't be starker than here.

a nice night

I learned more information about any of the enumerators in the hours I spent Friday evening with Praveen, who calls himself Kevin. Hospitable as anyone I know, Kevin had been offering and offering to take me around Hyderabad, his most recent offer being to take me to a place where I could get the haircut I so desired. I finally took him up on it, and Amy came to get Henna. During my haircut – a good one – Kevin and I spoke mostly about getting jobs and the religious and cultural makeup of India and the US. Which was pretty cool in itself – I hadn't had such an intelligent conversation with any of the enumerators before that.
Then the haircut ended, and we still had at least an hour to wait. So Kevin, Raj (who also came but whose English isn't great and tends to sit and text message and get call after call from someone or other), and I sat on a railing, then under an overhang in plastic chairs when the rain started. We chatted about movies, jobs some more, Hyderabad some more, the enumerators and their personal lives, and finally our own personal lives.
This might seem pretty mundane, but for me among the enumerators, it was a breakthrough. I really like these guys and girls, but our conversations usually feel somehow guarded and/or blocked to me.
Kevin helped us catch a cab each way, and his persistence was great to watch and take part in. We both stood out in the rain looking for the few cabs were empty and agreed to turn into our parking lot, laughing at the fact that even a foreigner wasn't enough to attract them. But one gave in to my moneyed looks eventually, and we had our ride home. Goodnight to Kevin and Raj, dropped Amy at ASCI, and I was off with my new driver to buy some expensive shirts in the rain.

Mr. Joseph and the Administrative Officer

There’s a man who works all day in a small office near the door to ASCI. You can see him anywhere, smiling his __ and proving to everyone that he’s harmless and only there to serve. His name is Mr. Joseph, and if you need anything, he’s the first line of defense after the “help desk,” which rarely lives up to its name. “Sir, Mr. Joseph may know.” “Sir, you should talk to Mr. Joseph.” “Sir, you need to get permission from Mr. Joseph.” “Sir, Mr. Joseph is taking his breakfast.”
And then there’s a man who works next door to Mr. Joseph’s office (which also happens to have two other desks with two other workers on its white floor). This man is the campus’ “administrative officer.” He is known only by his last name (or sir – usually both), and he drives in every day from his house a bit higher on the hill where ASCI itself lies. He pulls into his parking space, and three people await him. One opens his door and allows sir to walk out, one opens the back door and takes sir’s bag to carry in, and the other is there in case sir wants to talk with anyone on his way in. He usually doesn’t.
And the administrative officer enforces some serious rules. First, of course, no guests in rooms. That goes without saying. But, it is sometimes necessary to explain, co-workers on a project that ASCI itself is consulting for, and receives a huge amount of money from, certainly do not constitute an exception to this rule. Nor can such visiting co-workers use the library, which is reserved for the students who occasionally frequent it.
Back when he told me this, I thought the officer pretty damn annoying, and I didn’t think much better of him for graciously offering some of Mr. Joseph’s already cramped space. But over time, I’ve seen a kindness in this man. He stands up for his guests and his students. He enforces stupid rules, yes, but with a lot less rigid than many around him. I just wish he had more courage to stand up to those above him, those I never see.

brief note

I am no longer in Hyderabad, but I have at least 7 more posts to make. Pretend I'm still there. I'll spread the posts out.

some notes on water and sanitation

So I’ve been here for almost a month and a half, keeping a blog, and some of my closest friends and relatives still don’t know what I’m doing here. I’ll leave that to another post, but for now I will explain what I’ve learned about the water situation here. Suffice it for now to say that the project I’m working for involves using microfinance to provide access to improved Water+Sanitation.

Hyderabad has a great deal of slums, where people have settled but do not own the underlying land. Many of these slums are “notified,” which means that the government admits that they exist and therefore implicitly agree to take care of them and allow them to exist indefinitely. The idea is to move people along the path towards land ownership. Notification is the first step towards that.

And it also means that in those notified slums live some pretty important constituents for the local government. So it’s nice to see that in the past year and a half or so, the water board has bothered to give most of those people some semblance of water coverage. Not good for our project, but I doubt whether the residents here care whether they make good research subjects or candidates for an innovative water supply program.

The government’s implemented some “100 rupee schemes” (forgive me, but when I hear that word I can’t help but think of “my li’l scheme…of Marching UP and DOWN the square”), which means that residents only have to pay Rs. 100 ($2.50) to get a water connection. That beats any loan to pay Rs. 3000…

Anyway, a ton of people have their own connections, even if these only work every two days and for a half hour each of these days. People fill their pots and drums with whatever they can get, and stick it out for a while. But for these guys, waiting at home for the water to come isn’t that big a deal.

When water becomes scarce and people need more, government tankers are always there, driving around the city. I see them all the time – they say “Rs. 500 for 1000L.” It turns out that the tanker operators may be gouging a bit and charging 700 rupees, but you get the idea.

We’ve found pockets of communities without improved water access, but they’re somewhat few and far between. Of course, before we showed up, our data said nothing of the sort. Why? Someone who works for the MFI we’re partnering with here and I feel that I’m supposed to be working for, suggested that there may be some politics behind it. The idea goes like this: the slum-dwellers want special treatment from the government, and one way to get this is to remain officially a slum. So even when services improve, they prefer that the municipal corporation not update the statistics. And the municipal corporation seems to be obliging, thus far.

Either that or the new connections are just too recent. After all, everything takes forever here.