Working in IT for the last decade or so, all my work experience so far can be divided into well-defined projects. For every project, there is a mostly enthusiastic start and there is usually a satisfactory end, with lots of craziness thrown in between. I believe everyone in the project has their own version of their goals, no matter how miniscule they are, and trying to achieve those goals plays a big part in self-motivation. At least it does for me. One project ends and I start to think about the next one.
But there will come a time when I will retire - when there will be no more projects that will come my way through work. What then? I have realized that the amount of thought and planning that I put into any work-related project, I have never put into the long-term project that is life. Never have I stopped and asked myself, what will you do with your life when you are done with your final project at work? Granted that I have atleast 25-30 years of a working life ahead of me and it is a little too early to think about post-retirement plans, but these days for some reason, I can't help but think about it.
If your work is the only thing that defines you, all of a sudden after your last day at your job, won't you be lost? I know of friends who say that they will work at their jobs till they can't work anymore and I am happy for them. But personally, I somehow find that a waste of your time. As a child, you were happy playing games and generally not caring much about anything else. But did you do that permanently? At some point of time, you had to act responsible, get a job etc. So why should the phase of sticking to your job be permanent? Should you not move on to the next chapter of your life and do newer things?
Most people retire and do more or less the same things they did before, the only difference being that they have more time to do it. It kinds of makes me think that most people almost strive to be uni-dimensional when they really don't have to. Cliched and a little late it may be, but the world is their oyster. They can practically do anything they want. Just because you have stopped working does not mean you have stopped growing as a person.
As of now I have at least 2 things that are on my list of things to try out. I can't tell you exactly what it is because I myself am not very clear about it, but one of those things does involve travelling and teaching for extended periods of time, while the second idea involves cricket. Atleast these are my post-retirement plans when I am 35. We will see what happens when I am 60+. Some friends I have confided my plans to have asked me why I don't do those things now and why I have to wait till I retire. My answer is I have responsibilities now which I won't have when I am 60+. I am really looking forward to getting older! Are you?
Wednesday, June 22, 2011
Friday, April 15, 2011
Using Resources
Writing after a long time feels nice. I have no idea why I stopped writing. Today is Vishu, and I am glad I have chosen the New Year day to start afresh on my blog.
This happened when I was in Tanzania last year. Mzee and I were running some errands in the market area of Iringa(a beautiful town in the south-central part of Tanzania). We came across a cobbler and Mzee stopped there to get some repair work done on his shoes. The cobbler was an old man with a very kind face. He sat on the side of the road surrounded by his tools and lots of used truck tyres. A blue tarpaulin sheet above him supported by two wooden sticks protected him from the rain and sun. This makeshift arrangement was his shop. As Mzee was getting his work done, I sat down beside him on the side of the road. He was a pleasant man and we talked to each other in a mixture of rudimentary Swahili and English but mostly signs and gestures. Mzee would chip in with translations whenever things got too complicated. Just as he was almost about to be done with fixing Mzee's shoes, the shoemaker offered to make me some rubber sandals for 3000 Tsh (slightly more than $2). I said yes mostly because I was fascinated by the fact that he would be making these sandals from scratch and by his claim that it would take just 10 minutes. He took measurements of my feet and then leant over to one of the used truck tyres to cut open a slice of rubber from the softer parts of the tyre. Just as he claimed, in under 10 minutes, he had made my sandals.
And they felt quite comfortable as well. I mean not that comfortable that I would lounge in them the entire day, but decent enough that I would be able to walk in them every now and then. I moved closer to the tyre to see which tyre I would be wearing. And surprise, surprise - it said 'Ceat Tyres'. For those of you, who have never heard of Ceat Tyres, it is an Indian tyre manufacturing company, with a running rhino on its logo which says 'Born Tough'. I smiled when I realized that my sandals were going to be worn in the US, but they were made in Tanzania built out of a tyre made in India. 3 countries, 3 continents. A truly global sandal.
But more than this what got me thinking was how everything was used to the fullest extent possible. This is true recycling. This is use of resources until it cannot be used anymore. A few weeks back, at one of the campsites, when we had to fill diesel in the truck from a large can of extra diesel that we had, Mzee made a makeshift funnel out of a used plastic water bottle by simply cutting it in half and inverting it into the mouth of the gas tank. Simple solution but what a great use for something that would otherwise have been thrown away. I got inspired enough to use the other half of the plastic water bottle as a cup for shaving.
Thinking back , I came across quite a few examples of things being resued in contexts that I would never have thought of. Necessity does that. In the US, however everything is so readily available, that you don't have to think about reuse. The end result is that we use up so many resources when really there is no need to. The question I asked myself back then was would I even try to change my behaviour when I went back to the US. Would I change something as simple as using cloth instead of paper towels to wipe kitchen counters. I am ashamed to say that my behaviour has not changed since I still am sticking to the convenience of a paper towel which I can just throw away after use without the bother of washing it. It is sad but true that generally, people downgrade their use of resources only during necessity. Only a few minority are capable of doing this without the duress of necessity and unfortunately, I am not one of them. But I will keep trying.
This happened when I was in Tanzania last year. Mzee and I were running some errands in the market area of Iringa(a beautiful town in the south-central part of Tanzania). We came across a cobbler and Mzee stopped there to get some repair work done on his shoes. The cobbler was an old man with a very kind face. He sat on the side of the road surrounded by his tools and lots of used truck tyres. A blue tarpaulin sheet above him supported by two wooden sticks protected him from the rain and sun. This makeshift arrangement was his shop. As Mzee was getting his work done, I sat down beside him on the side of the road. He was a pleasant man and we talked to each other in a mixture of rudimentary Swahili and English but mostly signs and gestures. Mzee would chip in with translations whenever things got too complicated. Just as he was almost about to be done with fixing Mzee's shoes, the shoemaker offered to make me some rubber sandals for 3000 Tsh (slightly more than $2). I said yes mostly because I was fascinated by the fact that he would be making these sandals from scratch and by his claim that it would take just 10 minutes. He took measurements of my feet and then leant over to one of the used truck tyres to cut open a slice of rubber from the softer parts of the tyre. Just as he claimed, in under 10 minutes, he had made my sandals.
But more than this what got me thinking was how everything was used to the fullest extent possible. This is true recycling. This is use of resources until it cannot be used anymore. A few weeks back, at one of the campsites, when we had to fill diesel in the truck from a large can of extra diesel that we had, Mzee made a makeshift funnel out of a used plastic water bottle by simply cutting it in half and inverting it into the mouth of the gas tank. Simple solution but what a great use for something that would otherwise have been thrown away. I got inspired enough to use the other half of the plastic water bottle as a cup for shaving.
Thinking back , I came across quite a few examples of things being resued in contexts that I would never have thought of. Necessity does that. In the US, however everything is so readily available, that you don't have to think about reuse. The end result is that we use up so many resources when really there is no need to. The question I asked myself back then was would I even try to change my behaviour when I went back to the US. Would I change something as simple as using cloth instead of paper towels to wipe kitchen counters. I am ashamed to say that my behaviour has not changed since I still am sticking to the convenience of a paper towel which I can just throw away after use without the bother of washing it. It is sad but true that generally, people downgrade their use of resources only during necessity. Only a few minority are capable of doing this without the duress of necessity and unfortunately, I am not one of them. But I will keep trying.
Sunday, October 24, 2010
Small Talk
At any given instant in time, people in this world can be classified into two categories. The talkers and the listeners. Listeners of course can be sub-categorized into listeners who actually listen and listeners who pretend to listen while dreaming about more pleasant things.
Talking is a gift. Especially making small-talk. People who can walk upto perfect strangers and talk like long-lost friends are indeed gifted. But then they are very few of them. Most people are bad at small-talk, including yours truly. But I am glad there are some people in this world whose ability to do small talk makes me look like God.
A few months ago, at a dinner that I had to attend, I was stuck between 2 people, whose idea of small talk was listing all the countries they had visited. In fact both of them were trying to one-up each other and impress their largely uninterested audience. Person A would say, "when I went to Vienna, it was like this...." and Person B would interrupt and say, "Oh, when I went to Paris, it was not like that that all...". And it continued like that the entire time we were having dinner. Initially I had shown some polite interest towards them which slowly morphed into complete disinterest. Thankfully the food was good and I kept my mouth stuffed with chicken and naan so that any verbal acknowledgements from me were ruled out. Anyway my lack of participation in the conversation was no hindrance to either of them at all. At one point of time, I was shocked when suddenly out of the blue, with absolutely no relation to the current topic at all, person A looked at me and said "You know, I am a graduate from MIT." I could see that he was bothered when I seemed largely unimpressed and continued with my chicken and naan strategy. Later that evening, after the dinner, I told my friend MS about this. Both of us were of the opinion that when you are in a situation where you have to make small-talk, you are not gaining anything by speaking about yourself. You already know who you are. So just by saying things about yourself, you are gaining absolutely no new insights. But on the other hand, if you ask questions and listen to the answers, you might gain something new and useful.
This has been specifically my strategy of small-talk. Asking questions. But I must confess that I have chosen this strategy purely because of its ease and the minimal effort that it needs. Coming up with questions is so much easier than holding a discourse on a topic. But many a time, I have been guilty of asking a question and not paying attention to the answer and then asking the same question to the same person again. My wife has pointed this out to me a couple of times, when I have repeated my questions with strangers. But repeating questions is at least not as embarassing as the time, when I introduced myself to a person, who I was actually introduced to just 5 minutes before that by my friend. All the witty things that I could have said to make light of the situation sadly came to me the next day when I was at work.
But nothing can be more embarassing than the time I talked to a stranger and I did not even know that I was talking to him. Yes, that sounds strange, but it won't when I tell you that I was talking in my sleep. Before you wonder why I am sleeping with a stranger, let alone talk to him in my sleep, this happened in a flight - when I was flying from Tanzania back home to the US. I fell asleep as soon as the flight took off and I had a dream that I was camping in a tent in the jungles. Having spent the majority of my time in Tanzania doing precisely that, the dream was not entirely unjustified. I could hear the whirring noise of the engine because my seat was right above it. For the life of me, I could not figure out what animal in a jungle was capable of making this constant whirring noise outside my tent. So I expressed my doubts aloud, "Do you hear that sound? What animal is that?". Nobody answered me, so I repeated my questions again, slightly apprehensive that my talking might provoke the strange animal outside my tent. And that is when I woke up, and I found myself staring at the man across the aisle who had leant forward with a quizzical expression on his face. A proper British chap that he was, he said 'Pardon'. I just looked at him, shook my head, closed my eyes and never looked in his direction again. Thankfully there was no one else to witness this (I hope) since the flight was fairly empty and there was no one sitting next to me or him. Well, if nothing else, at least I can now proudly say that I can make small-talk even in my sleep!
Talking is a gift. Especially making small-talk. People who can walk upto perfect strangers and talk like long-lost friends are indeed gifted. But then they are very few of them. Most people are bad at small-talk, including yours truly. But I am glad there are some people in this world whose ability to do small talk makes me look like God.
A few months ago, at a dinner that I had to attend, I was stuck between 2 people, whose idea of small talk was listing all the countries they had visited. In fact both of them were trying to one-up each other and impress their largely uninterested audience. Person A would say, "when I went to Vienna, it was like this...." and Person B would interrupt and say, "Oh, when I went to Paris, it was not like that that all...". And it continued like that the entire time we were having dinner. Initially I had shown some polite interest towards them which slowly morphed into complete disinterest. Thankfully the food was good and I kept my mouth stuffed with chicken and naan so that any verbal acknowledgements from me were ruled out. Anyway my lack of participation in the conversation was no hindrance to either of them at all. At one point of time, I was shocked when suddenly out of the blue, with absolutely no relation to the current topic at all, person A looked at me and said "You know, I am a graduate from MIT." I could see that he was bothered when I seemed largely unimpressed and continued with my chicken and naan strategy. Later that evening, after the dinner, I told my friend MS about this. Both of us were of the opinion that when you are in a situation where you have to make small-talk, you are not gaining anything by speaking about yourself. You already know who you are. So just by saying things about yourself, you are gaining absolutely no new insights. But on the other hand, if you ask questions and listen to the answers, you might gain something new and useful.
This has been specifically my strategy of small-talk. Asking questions. But I must confess that I have chosen this strategy purely because of its ease and the minimal effort that it needs. Coming up with questions is so much easier than holding a discourse on a topic. But many a time, I have been guilty of asking a question and not paying attention to the answer and then asking the same question to the same person again. My wife has pointed this out to me a couple of times, when I have repeated my questions with strangers. But repeating questions is at least not as embarassing as the time, when I introduced myself to a person, who I was actually introduced to just 5 minutes before that by my friend. All the witty things that I could have said to make light of the situation sadly came to me the next day when I was at work.
But nothing can be more embarassing than the time I talked to a stranger and I did not even know that I was talking to him. Yes, that sounds strange, but it won't when I tell you that I was talking in my sleep. Before you wonder why I am sleeping with a stranger, let alone talk to him in my sleep, this happened in a flight - when I was flying from Tanzania back home to the US. I fell asleep as soon as the flight took off and I had a dream that I was camping in a tent in the jungles. Having spent the majority of my time in Tanzania doing precisely that, the dream was not entirely unjustified. I could hear the whirring noise of the engine because my seat was right above it. For the life of me, I could not figure out what animal in a jungle was capable of making this constant whirring noise outside my tent. So I expressed my doubts aloud, "Do you hear that sound? What animal is that?". Nobody answered me, so I repeated my questions again, slightly apprehensive that my talking might provoke the strange animal outside my tent. And that is when I woke up, and I found myself staring at the man across the aisle who had leant forward with a quizzical expression on his face. A proper British chap that he was, he said 'Pardon'. I just looked at him, shook my head, closed my eyes and never looked in his direction again. Thankfully there was no one else to witness this (I hope) since the flight was fairly empty and there was no one sitting next to me or him. Well, if nothing else, at least I can now proudly say that I can make small-talk even in my sleep!
Thursday, September 23, 2010
Racist/Sexist Dog
I went jogging a few days back after a gap of almost an year. This is part of my 'keep fit' endeavour for an ahem...'endeavour' (cannot disclose details now) that I am planning to attempt sometime next year with a friend of mine. Anyway I have never been a jogger nor have I been a gym-frequenter. I have always kept fit playing sports and I have been more or less proud about my fitness levels. That was when the Huntington beach incident happened. A friend SB was visiting and we went to Huntington beach. We were just kicking a soccer ball around when a group of people comprising of mostly girls in their early 20s passing by asked us if they could join us and if we could split into 2 teams. We agreed and what ensued was some 'total football' in which I was everywhere - I was defending, playing mid-field, playing forward. You name it and I was there. I was all over the place. It was some frenetic soccer. And it lasted 3 minutes. I could barely stand up after that. I realised this, when in an attempt to regain some breath, I stopped near our goal post and soon I found myself clutching the side of my stomach and falling over. I could barely breathe. And that is when a girl in our team offered me her goalkeeping job so that I could rest, while she went ahead and took care of a job that I clearly could not do. To say that I was ashamed is an understatement. That is when I realised that I could not measure my current fitness levels using statistics from 10 years back. And that is how my friends, I decided that I would run/jog every now and then so as to never embarass myself in this fashion again.
My layoff and subsequent travel out of the country for several months stopped my running for a while, but this endeavour that I told you about has given me the boost I need to start running again. Anyway when I started running again I realised that the dogs in my running path really don't approve of my exercise routines. Thankfully they are locked behind their fences. There is one particular house whose fences I am really grateful for. The dog here has a special dislike for me. While the other dogs are just happy to bark at me, most of them half-heartedly, this dog barks with unbridled vitriol and he hurls himself at the fence. I just hope that fence stays strong enough to withstand all his hurling atleast until I am running that way.
Now many of you might say "Of course the dog is barking. You are running, Stupid! What else can you expect? You are triggering the predator-prey instinct." To those I say, "This dog barks at me with the same hatred even when I walk in front of its house. Who's Stupid now?" And the interesting thing is when I am walking with my wife, it does not bark at her. If I walk with my wife near the fence and me near the road, there is no barking. But the moment we switch positions, the barking ensues. Ladies and Gentlemen, I think we have a racist and/or sexist dog.
I did a google search on 'racist dog' wondering if such a thing can actually exist and surprisingly a lot of other people have also pondered on this theory. Apparently there is a movie called White Dog made in 1982 which deals with the exact same theme.
Coming back to the dog in question, I really don't know if he is really racist or just sexist. Maybe his problem is just that he does not like men but is fine with women. The question as to whether this dog is racist or sexist has been bothering me for a while. The only way I can think of resolving this is by asking for volunteers. I need a White man or a non-White woman to walk in front of this dog's house and see how he reacts. If the dog barks at the man, he is sexist and if he barks at the woman, he is racist. And if he barks at both, he is racist and sexist. Of course, it might very well turn out that the dog is neither racist nor sexist and just singles me for out for special treatment. In that case, I think I will just change my running route.
My layoff and subsequent travel out of the country for several months stopped my running for a while, but this endeavour that I told you about has given me the boost I need to start running again. Anyway when I started running again I realised that the dogs in my running path really don't approve of my exercise routines. Thankfully they are locked behind their fences. There is one particular house whose fences I am really grateful for. The dog here has a special dislike for me. While the other dogs are just happy to bark at me, most of them half-heartedly, this dog barks with unbridled vitriol and he hurls himself at the fence. I just hope that fence stays strong enough to withstand all his hurling atleast until I am running that way.
Now many of you might say "Of course the dog is barking. You are running, Stupid! What else can you expect? You are triggering the predator-prey instinct." To those I say, "This dog barks at me with the same hatred even when I walk in front of its house. Who's Stupid now?" And the interesting thing is when I am walking with my wife, it does not bark at her. If I walk with my wife near the fence and me near the road, there is no barking. But the moment we switch positions, the barking ensues. Ladies and Gentlemen, I think we have a racist and/or sexist dog.
I did a google search on 'racist dog' wondering if such a thing can actually exist and surprisingly a lot of other people have also pondered on this theory. Apparently there is a movie called White Dog made in 1982 which deals with the exact same theme.
Coming back to the dog in question, I really don't know if he is really racist or just sexist. Maybe his problem is just that he does not like men but is fine with women. The question as to whether this dog is racist or sexist has been bothering me for a while. The only way I can think of resolving this is by asking for volunteers. I need a White man or a non-White woman to walk in front of this dog's house and see how he reacts. If the dog barks at the man, he is sexist and if he barks at the woman, he is racist. And if he barks at both, he is racist and sexist. Of course, it might very well turn out that the dog is neither racist nor sexist and just singles me for out for special treatment. In that case, I think I will just change my running route.
Sunday, August 1, 2010
Home
Growing up a middle-class kid in Bombay, a city with one of the highest population densities in the world, I knew that when I grew up, I would most probably end up living in a 1-bedroom or 2 bedroom or maybe even a 3-bedroom flat. The thought of living in an independent house (or single-family home as we call it in the US) never occurred to me. Only movie stars or extremely rich people could afford such houses in Bombay. Like everyone else in Bombay, my idea of a dwelling was limited to an apartment. That is all that would be needed to make me happy. I just did not picture myself living in anything else. An apartment seemed the most natural thing to live in.
After living in the US for the last decade or so, my idea of a dwelling for myself has changed. Very few people live in apartments (or condos as we call them here). Most people favour single-family homes compared to flats. Most of my friends who have bought a home here have bought an independent house and not a flat. And if I ever buy a home here, strangely I picture myself buying a single-family home as well and not a flat, which just years ago seemed like the most natural thing to do. It is not like I have bought a bunch of elephants and I need space to keep them. The size and volume of my possessions have not changed drastically, but a single-family home is what I thought would be a dwelling to make me happy.
After I got laid-off from my job in November 2009, I spent a few months in Tanzania. Most of the time during those 3-4 months were spent camping out in the jungles in a tent which was barely big enough for my wife and I to sleep in. But I was content. I was happy. The tent was as much of a home as a flat in Bombay, a big house in the US or anywhere in the world.
So how big a place did I or anyone need to call a home and be happy? All of us have heard of the 'When in Rome..' saying. That rings especially true in this context. We may not realise it but is the idea of 'our perfect home' a case of keeping up with our neighbours in a broader sense? Some might argue that our needs are directly related to the choices we have and can afford. I completely agree with that, but in the end, we are the ones who make the choice - to end up with a crippling mortgage payment for a large home for a substantial portion of our life or make a less expensive choice and spend the same money on other life experiences that we can now afford?
I may be wrong but I think whether you buy a large mansion or a studio apartment, like most of your other possessions, you are only super-excited about it for some time and then it becomes a a routine taken-for-granted thing. It just becomes home. So why not make a more rational choice? Because in the end, when we reflect back on our life, we are more likely to reminisce fondly about our family, our friends, the vacations and other life-experiences that we could afford than remember the size of our homes.
After living in the US for the last decade or so, my idea of a dwelling for myself has changed. Very few people live in apartments (or condos as we call them here). Most people favour single-family homes compared to flats. Most of my friends who have bought a home here have bought an independent house and not a flat. And if I ever buy a home here, strangely I picture myself buying a single-family home as well and not a flat, which just years ago seemed like the most natural thing to do. It is not like I have bought a bunch of elephants and I need space to keep them. The size and volume of my possessions have not changed drastically, but a single-family home is what I thought would be a dwelling to make me happy.
After I got laid-off from my job in November 2009, I spent a few months in Tanzania. Most of the time during those 3-4 months were spent camping out in the jungles in a tent which was barely big enough for my wife and I to sleep in. But I was content. I was happy. The tent was as much of a home as a flat in Bombay, a big house in the US or anywhere in the world.
So how big a place did I or anyone need to call a home and be happy? All of us have heard of the 'When in Rome..' saying. That rings especially true in this context. We may not realise it but is the idea of 'our perfect home' a case of keeping up with our neighbours in a broader sense? Some might argue that our needs are directly related to the choices we have and can afford. I completely agree with that, but in the end, we are the ones who make the choice - to end up with a crippling mortgage payment for a large home for a substantial portion of our life or make a less expensive choice and spend the same money on other life experiences that we can now afford?
I may be wrong but I think whether you buy a large mansion or a studio apartment, like most of your other possessions, you are only super-excited about it for some time and then it becomes a a routine taken-for-granted thing. It just becomes home. So why not make a more rational choice? Because in the end, when we reflect back on our life, we are more likely to reminisce fondly about our family, our friends, the vacations and other life-experiences that we could afford than remember the size of our homes.
Wednesday, July 7, 2010
Endurance
A few months back, in Tanzania, we were camping in Malinzanga - a death-ground for clothes. There are so many varied and very robust thorny bushes everywhere that no matter what material your clothes are made of, they don't stand a chance. Some of the thorns are so strong that they pierce through regular sneakers, so expecting cloth to be intact in Malinzanga is almost laughable.
Anyway, we set out on our walking transect at 7:30 am. I had not eaten very well in the morning primarily because eating left-over rice with peanut butter did not sound appealing in the morning (or at any time). I like rice, left-over or fresh. I love peanut butter. But I just can't accept the rice-peanut butter combination. It does not taste bad at all, but somehow psychologically, it just seems wrong. Anyway I still ate a little just so that I had something in me. Everyone else had seemed to have adapted to this strange combination of food. Maybe if you spend a long time in the bush, you tend to get less fussy about food. Maybe if I had spent a few more weeks in the bush, I would be devouring it by the mouthful.
Our walking transect consisted of walking 9 kms in a equilateral 3 km triangle. 9 Kms (less than 6 miles) does not seem a lot, but the terrain was such that it took us 9 hours to finish it. The terrain was the nastiest terrain I have walked over. We were constantly bending, kneeling and sometimes even crawling on our stomachs through thick bushes. The machete (Panga) was brought out constantly to cut down bushes and make way for us to proceed. And to top it all, most of the bushes were thorny- the nastiest thorns that I ever come across. And of course, the drinking water that we had taken fell short and we had to ration it. We had a few cookies with us because usually we would come back to the camp for lunch. But this had taken longer than usual and by the time we had come back, it was after 4. The hot sun blazed away, sapping the last drops of energy I thought I had. Just after noon, I started feeling nauseous. We had almost no water and I knew we were not even half-way through. I spent the next 4 hours thinking about all the water I would drink when we would reach the camp. I don't think I have ever concentrated on one thought for so long and with so much determination ever. I was feeling sick and ready to throw-up, but meditating on that reward of drinking water at the camp prevented me from stopping and got me through those final 4 hours. The others were miserable too, but none of them looked as bad as me.
As soon as we reached the camp, I grabbed a 1.5 litre bottle of water, went into my tent, laid down and just sipped on that sweet nectar for half an hour. I finished the entire bottle. I laid there for another 30 minutes, before I felt somewhat ok. Later when I emerged, Mzee said, "Bwana Jai, after this, you can walk anywhere for any length of time. No terrain can be as difficult as this". That felt good because I realised that it was not just me, who was having a tough time!
While I was laying in the tent with my water, I was thinking about how much part of endurance is purely mental and how much of it is physical. I thought about the farmer we met on the outskirts of Kitisi (another village), a few days back. We were on one of our walking transects there too. The distance was the same, but it was a much more pleasant walk. Mzee had stopped by to talk to the farmer. I noticed that the farmer had suffered a wound on his foot and it did not look good at all. It had swollen quite a lot and he was hobbling on his one good foot. But he was still working on his land. Partly because he did not have much of a choice and partly because he was mentally strong. I think a large part of the mental aspect of endurance is just a choice. Sometimes you make it for yourself and sometimes it is made for you. Either way, the choice determines what limits you can push your body to.
Anyway, we set out on our walking transect at 7:30 am. I had not eaten very well in the morning primarily because eating left-over rice with peanut butter did not sound appealing in the morning (or at any time). I like rice, left-over or fresh. I love peanut butter. But I just can't accept the rice-peanut butter combination. It does not taste bad at all, but somehow psychologically, it just seems wrong. Anyway I still ate a little just so that I had something in me. Everyone else had seemed to have adapted to this strange combination of food. Maybe if you spend a long time in the bush, you tend to get less fussy about food. Maybe if I had spent a few more weeks in the bush, I would be devouring it by the mouthful.
Our walking transect consisted of walking 9 kms in a equilateral 3 km triangle. 9 Kms (less than 6 miles) does not seem a lot, but the terrain was such that it took us 9 hours to finish it. The terrain was the nastiest terrain I have walked over. We were constantly bending, kneeling and sometimes even crawling on our stomachs through thick bushes. The machete (Panga) was brought out constantly to cut down bushes and make way for us to proceed. And to top it all, most of the bushes were thorny- the nastiest thorns that I ever come across. And of course, the drinking water that we had taken fell short and we had to ration it. We had a few cookies with us because usually we would come back to the camp for lunch. But this had taken longer than usual and by the time we had come back, it was after 4. The hot sun blazed away, sapping the last drops of energy I thought I had. Just after noon, I started feeling nauseous. We had almost no water and I knew we were not even half-way through. I spent the next 4 hours thinking about all the water I would drink when we would reach the camp. I don't think I have ever concentrated on one thought for so long and with so much determination ever. I was feeling sick and ready to throw-up, but meditating on that reward of drinking water at the camp prevented me from stopping and got me through those final 4 hours. The others were miserable too, but none of them looked as bad as me.
As soon as we reached the camp, I grabbed a 1.5 litre bottle of water, went into my tent, laid down and just sipped on that sweet nectar for half an hour. I finished the entire bottle. I laid there for another 30 minutes, before I felt somewhat ok. Later when I emerged, Mzee said, "Bwana Jai, after this, you can walk anywhere for any length of time. No terrain can be as difficult as this". That felt good because I realised that it was not just me, who was having a tough time!
While I was laying in the tent with my water, I was thinking about how much part of endurance is purely mental and how much of it is physical. I thought about the farmer we met on the outskirts of Kitisi (another village), a few days back. We were on one of our walking transects there too. The distance was the same, but it was a much more pleasant walk. Mzee had stopped by to talk to the farmer. I noticed that the farmer had suffered a wound on his foot and it did not look good at all. It had swollen quite a lot and he was hobbling on his one good foot. But he was still working on his land. Partly because he did not have much of a choice and partly because he was mentally strong. I think a large part of the mental aspect of endurance is just a choice. Sometimes you make it for yourself and sometimes it is made for you. Either way, the choice determines what limits you can push your body to.
Sunday, April 18, 2010
Tembo
One evening as we were relaxing at the camp, Mzee, the master story teller that he is, was telling us stories about the bush and he casually mentioned to me, "You know, Bwana Jai, you always have some chance of survival in the event an animal decides to attack you". After a deliberate pause, he continued, "Except when the animal in question is an elephant. If an elephant decides that he doesn't like you, you are most likely done for. You can't run because it will outrun you. You can't climb a tree because it will topple it. The only tree where you some chance of being safe is a Baobab tree but then the trunk of a Baobab is so wide and high that you can't climb it in the first place." So what I gathered from his little monologue about elephants was to stay clear of them.
My first run-in with an African wild elephant was in Ruaha National Park. My wife and I were standing in the back of the truck. Mzee and DE were inside. As we had finished our game-drive, DE was driving around the park just for fun and we were enjoying watching the animals like regular tourists. We came across this solitary bull elephant and DE stopped the car. The elephant was on the right-hand side of the vehicle, maybe 40-50 metres away. He looked at us and stared. Of course, we stared back, snapping away with our cameras. And all of a sudden, he started shaking his head and we realised that it did not like us standing there and staring. Had no one told us, staring was impolite? It did a little trumpet as if to shoo us away and DE drove away a little just to allay its fears and then stopped. All this time, I was asking my wife to get a good picture of me with the elephant in the background. I asked DE to stop and my wife was taking a few photos of me, when the elephant decided he had had enough and he kind of mock-charged us. He was not serious about it, but it was enough to terrify me. Being in the back of the truck, you feel completely exposed. Not that it would have made much of a difference if I had been inside the truck. But being in the back made mee feel so vulnerable. One swipe of the trunk and we would be history. All that time I was saying "DE, stop, stop." And then when the elephant started his mock-charge, all I could frantically say was 'DE, go, go go". We got away and the elephant barely ran a few steps towards us trumpeting loudly. I think it was playing with us, showing us who was boss. I, of course, had absolutely no doubts right from the beginning, as to who the boss was.
The next day, we had just come back from a round of sample collection in Ruaha and we were resting at the camp before we started processing the samples. My wife and I were sitting on the ground under a tree. Mzee was sitting on his makeshift inverted-bucket seat trying to put some tobacco in his pipe, when all of a sudden, an elephant walked up from the banks of the Ruaha river. It seemed startled to see us and so were we. It was hardly 15 metres away from us. We stayed as still as possible trying to convey that we were not at all a danger to it. It stared at us for a while trying to figure out if we were in any way a threat. The status quo continued for a couple of minutes and finally thankfully, it decided that we were harmless. It then started to rub its whole body against a thorny acacia tree and it was really amusing see it rub its body all over the tree. It was enjoying it a lot. I managed to captured that in video on our crappy camera.
The other elephant incident that comes to mind occurred in Kinyengesi. We were doing our walking transects and that involved walking 9 kms in a triangular transect, recording vegetation, animals and animal tracks. One of the transects passed through really thick foliage. Just as we were about to enter the thick foliage, Mzee called us all together and said, "This is elephant habitat. You can't see them from a distance because the foliage is so thick and they might very well be around a corner. Remember, elephants unlike other animals will not make noise or run away when they hear you. So we have to be as noiseless as possible as we move through this area. I will go ahead and when I raise my hand you stop wherever you are and if I gesture you to sit, you sit or crouch down as low as possible. They have a keen sense of smell, but their eyesight is not very strong. So if we come across an elephant, we will just have to move in a direction such that our smells are not driven to it by the wind. Just follow my movements, in case we come across one." Now I had never seen Mzee like that during my entire stay there. So pretty much, my level of comfort and ease in the bush has mirrored his demeanour. So when you see that Mzee is tense and cautious about something, you automatically take notice. I then turned around to see how MM and SM (our game scout) were reacting to the whole thing and that is when I noticed that SM had 2 explosive flares in his hand. I had never seen him like that before. Not in any of the other sites. I had no idea that he even had flares with him. Even my wife, who has gone out to these sites far longer than I have, had never seen both of them like this. This really made me realize the gravity of the situation as if Mzee's talk was not enough.
For the next 20-25 minutes, we moved as cautiously as possible. I winced at the snap of every twig I broke while moving through the foliage. But we were more or less noiseless. We stopped whenever we saw Mzee's raised hand. But his hand was mostly raised in caution than an actual elephant sighting. Those were one of the most thrilling 25 minutes of my life. I loved it. Soon we cleared the foliage without incident and we were out in a relatively open vegetation. Normalcy was restored and we started talking again. As we were walking with our heads down looking at animal tracks, my wife and I were debating over some animal tracks. MM joined us and Mzee was just about to give his verdict on the tracks, when suddenly SM shouted 'Tembo'. Tembo is Elephant in Swahili. We looked up and about 50 meters away, there was a large bull elephant standing under the shade of a tree. After coming out in the open vegetation we had dropped our guard and had been so engrossed in looking for tracks that we would have actually walked right into that elephant. Thankfully, SM, our expert game scout, who sees things that no one else usually sees , saw it this time as well otherwise we would have literally walked into quite a mess. We traced our steps backwards and stayed behind some bushes for a while. Soon the elephant walked away and we skirted its path, taking a larger detour keeping as far away as possible from it.
Elephants, like most animals, are most dangerous when they have babies with them. We came across quite a few of them driving in Ruaha as well as Serengeti. But thankfully, nothing untoward happened. They say, if you come across one on the road, you are supposed to put your gear in neutral and gun the accelerator a few times to scare them away with the noise. We did that a couple of times, but it did nothing. Finally we gave up and just drove as fast as possible besides them. Thankfully we were not chased.
Elephants are also responsible for knocking down most of trees in the parks. As Mzee says, 'that is the best way for them to get access to every part of the tree from the bottom to the top.' But for some reason, as I noticed, they seemed to be choosing to knocking down trees only near the roads thereby blocking them. One day my wife and I were driving in Ruaha as tourists and we came across 3 blocked roads because of elephants knocking down trees. We had to change our route 3 times. I was quite annoyed that the elephants did not have the decency to knock trees away from the roads. Maybe someone should take that up as a research project - elephants behaving badly.
I was really lucky that I got to see the African elephant in the wild. I have been around Asian elephants in India. But, of course, they were domesticated temple elephants. As a child, I have touched these temple elephants and even remember feeding one of them bananas once. After seeing the majestic African elephant, these gentle fearsome giants in the wild, I have promised myself that I definitely have to see an Asian one in the wild. And someday, I don't know when, I will.
My first run-in with an African wild elephant was in Ruaha National Park. My wife and I were standing in the back of the truck. Mzee and DE were inside. As we had finished our game-drive, DE was driving around the park just for fun and we were enjoying watching the animals like regular tourists. We came across this solitary bull elephant and DE stopped the car. The elephant was on the right-hand side of the vehicle, maybe 40-50 metres away. He looked at us and stared. Of course, we stared back, snapping away with our cameras. And all of a sudden, he started shaking his head and we realised that it did not like us standing there and staring. Had no one told us, staring was impolite? It did a little trumpet as if to shoo us away and DE drove away a little just to allay its fears and then stopped. All this time, I was asking my wife to get a good picture of me with the elephant in the background. I asked DE to stop and my wife was taking a few photos of me, when the elephant decided he had had enough and he kind of mock-charged us. He was not serious about it, but it was enough to terrify me. Being in the back of the truck, you feel completely exposed. Not that it would have made much of a difference if I had been inside the truck. But being in the back made mee feel so vulnerable. One swipe of the trunk and we would be history. All that time I was saying "DE, stop, stop." And then when the elephant started his mock-charge, all I could frantically say was 'DE, go, go go". We got away and the elephant barely ran a few steps towards us trumpeting loudly. I think it was playing with us, showing us who was boss. I, of course, had absolutely no doubts right from the beginning, as to who the boss was.
The next day, we had just come back from a round of sample collection in Ruaha and we were resting at the camp before we started processing the samples. My wife and I were sitting on the ground under a tree. Mzee was sitting on his makeshift inverted-bucket seat trying to put some tobacco in his pipe, when all of a sudden, an elephant walked up from the banks of the Ruaha river. It seemed startled to see us and so were we. It was hardly 15 metres away from us. We stayed as still as possible trying to convey that we were not at all a danger to it. It stared at us for a while trying to figure out if we were in any way a threat. The status quo continued for a couple of minutes and finally thankfully, it decided that we were harmless. It then started to rub its whole body against a thorny acacia tree and it was really amusing see it rub its body all over the tree. It was enjoying it a lot. I managed to captured that in video on our crappy camera.
The other elephant incident that comes to mind occurred in Kinyengesi. We were doing our walking transects and that involved walking 9 kms in a triangular transect, recording vegetation, animals and animal tracks. One of the transects passed through really thick foliage. Just as we were about to enter the thick foliage, Mzee called us all together and said, "This is elephant habitat. You can't see them from a distance because the foliage is so thick and they might very well be around a corner. Remember, elephants unlike other animals will not make noise or run away when they hear you. So we have to be as noiseless as possible as we move through this area. I will go ahead and when I raise my hand you stop wherever you are and if I gesture you to sit, you sit or crouch down as low as possible. They have a keen sense of smell, but their eyesight is not very strong. So if we come across an elephant, we will just have to move in a direction such that our smells are not driven to it by the wind. Just follow my movements, in case we come across one." Now I had never seen Mzee like that during my entire stay there. So pretty much, my level of comfort and ease in the bush has mirrored his demeanour. So when you see that Mzee is tense and cautious about something, you automatically take notice. I then turned around to see how MM and SM (our game scout) were reacting to the whole thing and that is when I noticed that SM had 2 explosive flares in his hand. I had never seen him like that before. Not in any of the other sites. I had no idea that he even had flares with him. Even my wife, who has gone out to these sites far longer than I have, had never seen both of them like this. This really made me realize the gravity of the situation as if Mzee's talk was not enough.
For the next 20-25 minutes, we moved as cautiously as possible. I winced at the snap of every twig I broke while moving through the foliage. But we were more or less noiseless. We stopped whenever we saw Mzee's raised hand. But his hand was mostly raised in caution than an actual elephant sighting. Those were one of the most thrilling 25 minutes of my life. I loved it. Soon we cleared the foliage without incident and we were out in a relatively open vegetation. Normalcy was restored and we started talking again. As we were walking with our heads down looking at animal tracks, my wife and I were debating over some animal tracks. MM joined us and Mzee was just about to give his verdict on the tracks, when suddenly SM shouted 'Tembo'. Tembo is Elephant in Swahili. We looked up and about 50 meters away, there was a large bull elephant standing under the shade of a tree. After coming out in the open vegetation we had dropped our guard and had been so engrossed in looking for tracks that we would have actually walked right into that elephant. Thankfully, SM, our expert game scout, who sees things that no one else usually sees , saw it this time as well otherwise we would have literally walked into quite a mess. We traced our steps backwards and stayed behind some bushes for a while. Soon the elephant walked away and we skirted its path, taking a larger detour keeping as far away as possible from it.
Elephants, like most animals, are most dangerous when they have babies with them. We came across quite a few of them driving in Ruaha as well as Serengeti. But thankfully, nothing untoward happened. They say, if you come across one on the road, you are supposed to put your gear in neutral and gun the accelerator a few times to scare them away with the noise. We did that a couple of times, but it did nothing. Finally we gave up and just drove as fast as possible besides them. Thankfully we were not chased.
Elephants are also responsible for knocking down most of trees in the parks. As Mzee says, 'that is the best way for them to get access to every part of the tree from the bottom to the top.' But for some reason, as I noticed, they seemed to be choosing to knocking down trees only near the roads thereby blocking them. One day my wife and I were driving in Ruaha as tourists and we came across 3 blocked roads because of elephants knocking down trees. We had to change our route 3 times. I was quite annoyed that the elephants did not have the decency to knock trees away from the roads. Maybe someone should take that up as a research project - elephants behaving badly.
I was really lucky that I got to see the African elephant in the wild. I have been around Asian elephants in India. But, of course, they were domesticated temple elephants. As a child, I have touched these temple elephants and even remember feeding one of them bananas once. After seeing the majestic African elephant, these gentle fearsome giants in the wild, I have promised myself that I definitely have to see an Asian one in the wild. And someday, I don't know when, I will.
Thursday, April 1, 2010
Humbled
It all started in Ruaha National Park. It was my first time going out on data collection, which basically involves walking around in the sun for a few hours. Depending on whether we were collecting antelope poop samples or doing a walking transect observing animals, animal tracks etc, we would end up walking anywhere between 4 hours to 8 hours. As we were leaving, my wife handed me a bottle of sunscreen after she was done using it, as if it were the most natural thing to do. I stared at the bottle and then back at her in part-disbelief and part-contempt. Had she forgotten how invincible I was against the sun? I, with the armour of melanin coursing through my skin? I, who had played cricket for hours on end under the blazing Indian sun my entire childhood. I, who had practically grown up mocking the sun and the only damage it had done in all these years had been a temporary darkening of my skin by several shades every now and then (which I later came to realise was what a tan was). My wife had handed the sunscreen to me a couple of times before in the US and she had been duly chastised because you don't ask Michael Jordan to wear shoes with bouncy springs in it to dunk basketballs. You don't give Sachin Tendulkar a wider bat to belt the cricket ball all over the ground. You don't give Lance Armstrong a motorcycle to win the Tour de France. Everyone knows they don't need it. My wife, recognizing the familiar look on my face just shrugged, shook her head and just said 'ok, suit yourself'. I smirked condescendingly.
Off we went on our data collection rounds. I was wearing these overpriced field shirts bought from REI with a flap stitched into the arms to hold on to your rolled-up sleeves. Well, if I was going to be in the field, I was going to look the part as well. So of course, my sleeves were rolled up and tucked under the flap and I had my explorer hat, worn stylishly tilted on my head, announcing to the world about the arrival of a great adventurer. I don't know what the others saw when they looked at me, but I saw Indiana Jones. And Indiana Jones set out into the sun with the rest of the team every day at 7 am sometimes returning at noon, sometimes later.
After a few days, one evening as we were relaxing at our camp, I told my wife, "I think I have may have brushed up against some wrong plant. Look at my forearms. Seems like I am having some kind of allergic reaction. My skin is turning white and it is peeling off in some places. It is itchy as well."
My wife looked at me in that way she looks at me when she thinks that I am acting stupid just to annoy her. And then she realised that I was being serious because this was my first ever sunburn and there was no way I would have known that I was sunburnt had she not told me. She laughed in that 'I told you so' manner which wives all over the world seem to master without any training and asked me, "So are you going to use my sunscreen tomorrow?". I nodded meekly, knowing that I was finally defeated by the sun after 34 years. Indiana Jones never showed up again because every day after that, my sleeves were worn long and my hat was pulled down straight trying to cover as much skin as possible. The sun in Tanzania had humbled me after years of unsuccessfully trying it in India and the US. Later on just out of curiosity, we checked the temperature one afternoon using a thermometer we had and it read 53 degrees C (127.4 degrees F). No wonder.
In the 1992 movie, White men can't jump, Woody Harrelson showed us that white men can indeed jump. In Dec 2009, I discovered something similar about brown men. Not about jumping because honestly speaking, when have you ever heard of a basketball star from anywhere between Iraq and India or even from Latin America? Never. So yeah, brown men still can't jump (or to give them the benefit of doubt, maybe they are not that interested in basketball) but brown men, as proved by yours truly, can get sunburnt.
Off we went on our data collection rounds. I was wearing these overpriced field shirts bought from REI with a flap stitched into the arms to hold on to your rolled-up sleeves. Well, if I was going to be in the field, I was going to look the part as well. So of course, my sleeves were rolled up and tucked under the flap and I had my explorer hat, worn stylishly tilted on my head, announcing to the world about the arrival of a great adventurer. I don't know what the others saw when they looked at me, but I saw Indiana Jones. And Indiana Jones set out into the sun with the rest of the team every day at 7 am sometimes returning at noon, sometimes later.
After a few days, one evening as we were relaxing at our camp, I told my wife, "I think I have may have brushed up against some wrong plant. Look at my forearms. Seems like I am having some kind of allergic reaction. My skin is turning white and it is peeling off in some places. It is itchy as well."
My wife looked at me in that way she looks at me when she thinks that I am acting stupid just to annoy her. And then she realised that I was being serious because this was my first ever sunburn and there was no way I would have known that I was sunburnt had she not told me. She laughed in that 'I told you so' manner which wives all over the world seem to master without any training and asked me, "So are you going to use my sunscreen tomorrow?". I nodded meekly, knowing that I was finally defeated by the sun after 34 years. Indiana Jones never showed up again because every day after that, my sleeves were worn long and my hat was pulled down straight trying to cover as much skin as possible. The sun in Tanzania had humbled me after years of unsuccessfully trying it in India and the US. Later on just out of curiosity, we checked the temperature one afternoon using a thermometer we had and it read 53 degrees C (127.4 degrees F). No wonder.
In the 1992 movie, White men can't jump, Woody Harrelson showed us that white men can indeed jump. In Dec 2009, I discovered something similar about brown men. Not about jumping because honestly speaking, when have you ever heard of a basketball star from anywhere between Iraq and India or even from Latin America? Never. So yeah, brown men still can't jump (or to give them the benefit of doubt, maybe they are not that interested in basketball) but brown men, as proved by yours truly, can get sunburnt.
Wednesday, March 24, 2010
Serengeti
We decided to go to Serengeti as tourists since none of us except Mzee, who had worked in Serengeti for a few years, had been there. We drove for about 10-12 hours during the day from Morogoro up north and rested for the night in a hotel in Arusha. We picked up our journey the next morning and drove another 4-5 hours to Serengeti National Park.
Serengeti is spectacular but expensive. Very very expensive if you are going in as a tourist and you are not a Tanzanian citizen. We had our first shock at the entrance of what is known as the 'Ngorongoro Conservation Area'. The road to Serengeti goes by the Ngorongoro Crater and whether you actually drive into the crater or not, the charge for just using the road with a view of the crater was $50 for non-citizens and 1500 Tsh (equal to just about $1) for citizens. And this charge is just one-way. Which means that you may not even see the entrance to the park, but your pocket will be lighter by $100 by the time you turn around and drive back home. If you actually want to drive in the crater, that will be an additional $200. We had not budgeted for the 100$ road-use charge and were a bit shocked by it. But having come all the way up north, we were not going to let a $100 per person fee stop us. So we coughed up the amount. While we were paying the fees inside the office, outside MM was warding off some very aggressive Olive Baboons who wanted to get into our stuff and steal food from the back of our truck. The fact that everything was tied down tightly with a tarp did not discourage them. One particularly aggressive female baboon was already on the task of loosening the ropes. MM tried to scare it away with a stick, but it tried to fight him. But soon enough seeing that it was getting nowhere near the food, it left for greener pastures or vehicles if you will. So on we went towards the park after paying the fees. We stopped at a point mid-way where you could view the entire crater. The breathtaking view convinced us that the money we shelled out for using the road was worth it.
The road was unpaved and full of ruts and for the next 3 hours until we reached the entrance of Serengeti National Park, every bone of our body was subjected to constant jarring. Here, we had to shell out another $50 each per day per person to camp inside the park. Compared to the $20 rate in Ruaha National Park (which as researchers in Ruaha we don't have to pay) for a non-citizen tourist, this seemed extorbitant. But in many ways we were lucky, because I heard that the rates were hiked up to $100 per day just a month or so after we visited. Once inside the park, we had to drive a few more kilometers to reach the campsites and we happened to chance upon 2 cheetahs on top of an abandoned anthill bathed in the soft light of the setting sun, looking into the distance at all the different kinds of antelopes and deciding what dinner was going to be like. They had absolutely no problems with our vehicle just about 10 feet away. They just did not care. The animals in Serengeti are far more relaxed around humans than in Ruaha. Probably because there are so many more tourists in Serengeti and poachers are also a lesser menace in Serengeti.
By the time we reached the camp it was almost 7 pm and the sun had set. We went to 2 different campsites but neither of them had any water. So we ended up camping in another very crowded campsite which had water. I looked around and realised that we were the only people camping there by ourselves. Every one of the other tents belonged to Safari Companies. As we were unloading in the dark, a group of young park officials came by and demanded gruffly to see our permits and they were yelling at us for parking in the wrong place. Mzee, who is generally a patient man, had enough of their rudeness. He just walked to them and asked them what their problem was. He told them that as far as he knew they were not breaking any rules and he should know since he had worked in Serengeti as a park warden for so many years. As soon as they heard his name and designation, their demeanour changed completely. They were literally grovelling before him and apologising. As soon as they left, Mzee translated his conversation with them into English for me imitating their mannerisms and we all had a good laugh.
The Serengeti is more famous than its fellow national parks for a reason. It's spectacular grasslands ensure that you can see until the horizon in any direction you look and so you are absolutely ensured of seeing animals because they have no foliage to hide in. You could easily go to Ruaha and not see a single animal. But that will never happen at the Serengeti. We were lucky to see the start of the wilderbeest migration. Millions migrate as you have probably seen on National Geographic. Mzee tried imitating their call and some of them responded to him. This only encouraged me to try the call out and add it to my already expanding repertoire of animal calls used primarily to annoy/amuse (more annoy than amuse) my wife. The wilderbeest migration season is also their birthing season. Mzee says that the hyenas are called midwives because they will follow pregnant wilderbeest females and then pull the baby out of the mother just as they are being born. The poor babies never even see a single minute of life before they become a meal.
We almost saw a Cheetah hunt in the afternoon. Three Cheetahs on top of an anthill were surveying the land before them and they decided to go after a reedbuck. They split up and 2 of them covered the flanks and lay in wait amongst the reeds while the third one went directly to the reedbuck to chase it into the waiting jaws of the other two. But the reedbuck was smarter than them and it ran away before the cheetah could get near it and it ran in a direction away from the other two. The Cheetahs gave up and walked right between the tourist vehicles to rest under the shade of the only tree for miles.
We saw a bunch of lions as well in a couple of places. One lioness was resting alone and our truck was the only one near it. None of the other tourist vehicles had reached there yet. Of course, I wanted a picture with the lioness in the background and as I was posing on the back of the truck, Mzee asked me to get down from the vehicle and pose. I thought he was joking and laughed. But then I realised that he wasn't. The lioness was a good 50 metres away and it was a very hot afternoon. So the chances of it moving to do anything 'mischevious' were absolutely none. So I got down somewhat hesitantly and stood a few feet away from the truck with my back to the lioness. My instructions to my wife were, just say 'run' in case of danger and I will be in the back of the truck in a second. Thankfully like the majority of females I knew during my bachelor days, the lioness was also not interested.
We saw a bunch of other animals in the Serengeti and I won't bore you with the details but I wish MM and I had seen the baboons who stole our pineapple from our closed tin trunk near our tent. The trunk was locked on one side with the bolt on the other side not quite shutting down. Although it was quite difficult to get into the trunk through this side, the baboons got into it. By the time we came back, the area near the camp was a mess of trash, earbuds, Mzees' tobacco and pineapple rind and we were heartbroken. MM and I over the loss of the pineapple, Mzee over the spilt tobacco. I hope the baboons got acidity from eating too much pineapple in one go.
When we signed out of the park, we happended to glance at the vistors book. It was filled with ridiculous comments. About security, condition or roads etc. There were also comments reprimanding those who had complained. It was very much like the comments section of a youtube video. But seriously some of the complaints were quite amusing. One of the complaints was that there were no security guards in the camp. I wonder if the people know that they are actually going into a national park, which is just another way to describe a jungle. If they want security guards, they should just visit the airport and camp there. Another person complained about how much money they had to shell out to use the badly rutted unpaved road. Which I agreed to somewhat but at the same time I can understand why the authorities would not want to build a tarred road to go to Serengeti. If they did that, the number of tourists going there would get blown out of proportion and that would just be bad for the park, the animals, tourism and just about everyone involved.
We stayed overnight at Arusha once again and that evening my wife and RC planned to eat at an Italian restaurant, while Mzee and MM were planning to eat Tanzanian food. I decided to accompany Mzee and MM and let the ladies have their Italian food. As Mzee and MM and I were walking in search of a place that Mzee used to frequent many years back, we found out that the restaurant was no longer there. In its place, there was a large building belonging to a Safari company. As we were waiting there wondering what to do, I saw a man, desperation writ on his face, most of his shirt buttons undone running towards us, as fast as his legs could carry him. There was another man running after him a few feet away and shouting 'Mwizi, Mwizi'. He was gesticulating towards us and I thought he wanted us to do something. I realised at once that something was amiss, but I had no idea what 'Mwizi' meant. I looked at Mzee and MM and they were just standing and staring, just like me. The man running in the front looked at us to see if we were going to react and then he was past us in a flash. Another guy crossing the road tried to trip him with his leg but the guy stumbled a bit and kept running. He suddenly changed directions and tried running into an alley close by. I just needed to confirm my suspicions and I asked MM if Mwizi meant thief and he nodded. The thief was eventually caught in the alley but we could not see him as he was surrounded by people. Next I saw a man running barefoot towards the crowd carring a large vicious looking knife with serrated edges in his hand. He was already holding it tight with his fist, tip pointing downwards, the way you would hold it if you were going to stab someone. We walked away and soon there were a bunch of people on motorcycles honking and going towards the crowd. The honking was quite disturbing. As if someone had just won a football game. Mzee said that if the thief was lucky, the police would arrive soon. Otherwise he was a dead man for sure. MM asked me if I had noticed that the man who was carrying the knife was running barefoot although he was quite well-dressed. I nodded. MM thought that the man must have been so angry and desperate to get at the thief that he must not even had time to put on his shoes. That night I went to bed hoping that the police had arrived soon or atleast that the thief's death was quick.
Serengeti was bad for my wife's vehicle partly because of the road and partly because of the hidden speedbumps all across Tanzania's highways. There were speedbumps at the most unexpected and unwanted places and sometimes without any signs. And in many places where there were signs for speedbumps, there were none. The very sharp speedbumps were definitely designed by a sadistic mind or by someone who gets a commission from all the car repair shops in Tanzania. Thankfully it did not cost a lot to fix the car and that ended our very very memorable Serengeti trip.
Serengeti is spectacular but expensive. Very very expensive if you are going in as a tourist and you are not a Tanzanian citizen. We had our first shock at the entrance of what is known as the 'Ngorongoro Conservation Area'. The road to Serengeti goes by the Ngorongoro Crater and whether you actually drive into the crater or not, the charge for just using the road with a view of the crater was $50 for non-citizens and 1500 Tsh (equal to just about $1) for citizens. And this charge is just one-way. Which means that you may not even see the entrance to the park, but your pocket will be lighter by $100 by the time you turn around and drive back home. If you actually want to drive in the crater, that will be an additional $200. We had not budgeted for the 100$ road-use charge and were a bit shocked by it. But having come all the way up north, we were not going to let a $100 per person fee stop us. So we coughed up the amount. While we were paying the fees inside the office, outside MM was warding off some very aggressive Olive Baboons who wanted to get into our stuff and steal food from the back of our truck. The fact that everything was tied down tightly with a tarp did not discourage them. One particularly aggressive female baboon was already on the task of loosening the ropes. MM tried to scare it away with a stick, but it tried to fight him. But soon enough seeing that it was getting nowhere near the food, it left for greener pastures or vehicles if you will. So on we went towards the park after paying the fees. We stopped at a point mid-way where you could view the entire crater. The breathtaking view convinced us that the money we shelled out for using the road was worth it.
The road was unpaved and full of ruts and for the next 3 hours until we reached the entrance of Serengeti National Park, every bone of our body was subjected to constant jarring. Here, we had to shell out another $50 each per day per person to camp inside the park. Compared to the $20 rate in Ruaha National Park (which as researchers in Ruaha we don't have to pay) for a non-citizen tourist, this seemed extorbitant. But in many ways we were lucky, because I heard that the rates were hiked up to $100 per day just a month or so after we visited. Once inside the park, we had to drive a few more kilometers to reach the campsites and we happened to chance upon 2 cheetahs on top of an abandoned anthill bathed in the soft light of the setting sun, looking into the distance at all the different kinds of antelopes and deciding what dinner was going to be like. They had absolutely no problems with our vehicle just about 10 feet away. They just did not care. The animals in Serengeti are far more relaxed around humans than in Ruaha. Probably because there are so many more tourists in Serengeti and poachers are also a lesser menace in Serengeti.
By the time we reached the camp it was almost 7 pm and the sun had set. We went to 2 different campsites but neither of them had any water. So we ended up camping in another very crowded campsite which had water. I looked around and realised that we were the only people camping there by ourselves. Every one of the other tents belonged to Safari Companies. As we were unloading in the dark, a group of young park officials came by and demanded gruffly to see our permits and they were yelling at us for parking in the wrong place. Mzee, who is generally a patient man, had enough of their rudeness. He just walked to them and asked them what their problem was. He told them that as far as he knew they were not breaking any rules and he should know since he had worked in Serengeti as a park warden for so many years. As soon as they heard his name and designation, their demeanour changed completely. They were literally grovelling before him and apologising. As soon as they left, Mzee translated his conversation with them into English for me imitating their mannerisms and we all had a good laugh.
The Serengeti is more famous than its fellow national parks for a reason. It's spectacular grasslands ensure that you can see until the horizon in any direction you look and so you are absolutely ensured of seeing animals because they have no foliage to hide in. You could easily go to Ruaha and not see a single animal. But that will never happen at the Serengeti. We were lucky to see the start of the wilderbeest migration. Millions migrate as you have probably seen on National Geographic. Mzee tried imitating their call and some of them responded to him. This only encouraged me to try the call out and add it to my already expanding repertoire of animal calls used primarily to annoy/amuse (more annoy than amuse) my wife. The wilderbeest migration season is also their birthing season. Mzee says that the hyenas are called midwives because they will follow pregnant wilderbeest females and then pull the baby out of the mother just as they are being born. The poor babies never even see a single minute of life before they become a meal.
We almost saw a Cheetah hunt in the afternoon. Three Cheetahs on top of an anthill were surveying the land before them and they decided to go after a reedbuck. They split up and 2 of them covered the flanks and lay in wait amongst the reeds while the third one went directly to the reedbuck to chase it into the waiting jaws of the other two. But the reedbuck was smarter than them and it ran away before the cheetah could get near it and it ran in a direction away from the other two. The Cheetahs gave up and walked right between the tourist vehicles to rest under the shade of the only tree for miles.
We saw a bunch of lions as well in a couple of places. One lioness was resting alone and our truck was the only one near it. None of the other tourist vehicles had reached there yet. Of course, I wanted a picture with the lioness in the background and as I was posing on the back of the truck, Mzee asked me to get down from the vehicle and pose. I thought he was joking and laughed. But then I realised that he wasn't. The lioness was a good 50 metres away and it was a very hot afternoon. So the chances of it moving to do anything 'mischevious' were absolutely none. So I got down somewhat hesitantly and stood a few feet away from the truck with my back to the lioness. My instructions to my wife were, just say 'run' in case of danger and I will be in the back of the truck in a second. Thankfully like the majority of females I knew during my bachelor days, the lioness was also not interested.
We saw a bunch of other animals in the Serengeti and I won't bore you with the details but I wish MM and I had seen the baboons who stole our pineapple from our closed tin trunk near our tent. The trunk was locked on one side with the bolt on the other side not quite shutting down. Although it was quite difficult to get into the trunk through this side, the baboons got into it. By the time we came back, the area near the camp was a mess of trash, earbuds, Mzees' tobacco and pineapple rind and we were heartbroken. MM and I over the loss of the pineapple, Mzee over the spilt tobacco. I hope the baboons got acidity from eating too much pineapple in one go.
When we signed out of the park, we happended to glance at the vistors book. It was filled with ridiculous comments. About security, condition or roads etc. There were also comments reprimanding those who had complained. It was very much like the comments section of a youtube video. But seriously some of the complaints were quite amusing. One of the complaints was that there were no security guards in the camp. I wonder if the people know that they are actually going into a national park, which is just another way to describe a jungle. If they want security guards, they should just visit the airport and camp there. Another person complained about how much money they had to shell out to use the badly rutted unpaved road. Which I agreed to somewhat but at the same time I can understand why the authorities would not want to build a tarred road to go to Serengeti. If they did that, the number of tourists going there would get blown out of proportion and that would just be bad for the park, the animals, tourism and just about everyone involved.
We stayed overnight at Arusha once again and that evening my wife and RC planned to eat at an Italian restaurant, while Mzee and MM were planning to eat Tanzanian food. I decided to accompany Mzee and MM and let the ladies have their Italian food. As Mzee and MM and I were walking in search of a place that Mzee used to frequent many years back, we found out that the restaurant was no longer there. In its place, there was a large building belonging to a Safari company. As we were waiting there wondering what to do, I saw a man, desperation writ on his face, most of his shirt buttons undone running towards us, as fast as his legs could carry him. There was another man running after him a few feet away and shouting 'Mwizi, Mwizi'. He was gesticulating towards us and I thought he wanted us to do something. I realised at once that something was amiss, but I had no idea what 'Mwizi' meant. I looked at Mzee and MM and they were just standing and staring, just like me. The man running in the front looked at us to see if we were going to react and then he was past us in a flash. Another guy crossing the road tried to trip him with his leg but the guy stumbled a bit and kept running. He suddenly changed directions and tried running into an alley close by. I just needed to confirm my suspicions and I asked MM if Mwizi meant thief and he nodded. The thief was eventually caught in the alley but we could not see him as he was surrounded by people. Next I saw a man running barefoot towards the crowd carring a large vicious looking knife with serrated edges in his hand. He was already holding it tight with his fist, tip pointing downwards, the way you would hold it if you were going to stab someone. We walked away and soon there were a bunch of people on motorcycles honking and going towards the crowd. The honking was quite disturbing. As if someone had just won a football game. Mzee said that if the thief was lucky, the police would arrive soon. Otherwise he was a dead man for sure. MM asked me if I had noticed that the man who was carrying the knife was running barefoot although he was quite well-dressed. I nodded. MM thought that the man must have been so angry and desperate to get at the thief that he must not even had time to put on his shoes. That night I went to bed hoping that the police had arrived soon or atleast that the thief's death was quick.
Serengeti was bad for my wife's vehicle partly because of the road and partly because of the hidden speedbumps all across Tanzania's highways. There were speedbumps at the most unexpected and unwanted places and sometimes without any signs. And in many places where there were signs for speedbumps, there were none. The very sharp speedbumps were definitely designed by a sadistic mind or by someone who gets a commission from all the car repair shops in Tanzania. Thankfully it did not cost a lot to fix the car and that ended our very very memorable Serengeti trip.
Sunday, March 14, 2010
Kitisi
Kitisi is a village just outside the Ruaha National Park. Since the animals don't know where the park boundaries end, they venture into Kitisi all the time. They usually keep their distance away from the houses and people, but they wander all the time into the farms which are mostly on the outskirts of the village. And that is where we were camping. Underneath a tamarind tree. In fact, twin tamarinds. It was quite a unique looking tree and we camped right below it.
Kitisi is the place which I had mentioned in my previous post about Mzee - the site where the lion walked by the tents and scared the hell out of NM, the place where the impala headed straight towards Mzee's tent in terror and leaped over it. Anyway when we reached Kitisi, it was a nice afternoon and we put up our camp rightaway. There were lots and lots of pesky flies and I had to improvise my attire (more on that later) using my hat, my glasses and a handkerchief to keep them away from my face, much to the disapproval of my wife who thought that I looked completely ridiculous. I ignored her negative comments and protected my face from the flies with my 'ridiculous-looking' improvisation till the evening, when the unsuccessful and tired flies finally called it a day and flew away to rest. We could hear a couple of lions in the distance and the trumpet of some elephants. All other animals were wisely keeping their distance from the village or maybe there were present but just not announcing it to us like the elephants and lions were.
Night fell and Mzee regaled me with the story of the visit of the lion when they had camped there last time. I was told that when a lion roars/grunts near your tent, your tent vibrates and you can actually feel the sound in your chest. Unfortunately none of the lions roared next to our tents when I was there. They roared from a respectful distance so as not to disturb my sleep. I think the real reason is that they might have seen scared of me after seeing me in the afternoon in my fly-proof improvised-attire.
The next morning, I did something I had not done for a long long long time. I think I was 19 and in Goa the last time I had done something like this. I don't know how to say it politely so I will just describe the something as 'crapping in the open without a toilet'. Not the best of topics, but it has to be addressed. Ruaha National Park, being a park had very good toilets, probably the cleanest camp toilets I have seen anywhere in the world. But Kitisi being just an unmanaged site outside the park, had no such provisions. So you took a shovel with you, dug a hole, squatted, did your business and covered all traces of it with the dug-up dirt using the shovel. However I saw 2 problems with the whole process:
i) The first day I dug up the hole in the morning and I did not like the time spent digging the hole, when there were more urgent matters to be attended to. My process-improving solution was to dig up 4-5 holes behind some bushes right that afternoon for use during the rest of our stay there. Everyone else in the camp thought that the idea of pre-dug holes was funny but I just thought it practical and even invited them to use it.
ii) The holes had to be far off from the camp for obvious reasons of privacy and cleanliness, but also not that far that you were no longer in the relatively safer area of the camp. Safety was a major concern because you did not want to become the next meal of a lion or or just be squashed by an angry startled elephant. This has to be one of the most embarassing ways to die. Even if you don't die and just try to escape, running from danger with your pants down is not only difficult but also quite ego-deflating. I had no solution for this, so I just hoped that I chose the distance of the holes from the camp wisely.
A few things at Kitisi remain stuck in my mind. When we went out on our daily data collection effort, we walked by a few farms and I noticed some pieces of cloth tied to the wooden rickety fences along the farms. On enquiring about it with Mzee, I was told that these pieces of cloth were soaked in a mixture of oil and a kind of crushed green peppers (called pili-pili in Swahili). They had been placed on the fence since that was the only thing that kept the elephants away. Elephants despised pili-pili. I thought that was quite a smart approach to protect your crops. I remember how much they sting. Once I was chopping some pili-pili for dinner and I accidentally wiped my face right after that and it burned. It burned for a few hours. Washing my face with water lessened the burning sensation very slightly. It just spread the burning feeling to the other parts of my face. Thankfully I had avoided my eyes. It could have been much worse. I am glad I did not pee rightaway either.
One day we were processing the samples in the afternoon. Test tubes, chemicals, centrifuges etc were all over the place around us. I guess we must have looked like people of some medical knowledge because a woman walked towards us with her baby on her hip. The baby was hardly a few months old and was fast asleep. The woman who looked quite distraught walked directly to my wife and said a few things to her in Swahili all the time pointing to her baby. I had no idea what was being said, but one look at the baby confirmed what I thought she was saying. The poor baby was covered in rashes. Its face,arms and legs were scaly and covered in rashes. At first glance, it looked like the baby had eczema. We felt so sorry for it. The woman said that she had taken the baby to the local dispensary but they did not have any medicines. The closest town, Iringa was about 3-4 hours away and she had not taken the baby there yet. We apologised, saying that we were not doctors and there was nothing we could do. But she was so desperate for help that she almost insisted that we give her some medicines. Seeing her so desperate was very very moving. My wife finally gave her a generic over-the-counter kind of topical cream for rashes that we had and told her that the cream was meant for adults and not for babies. So she had to be really careful to apply a very tiny quantity on a small area of the baby's legs to see if it caused any problems first, before using it elsewhere. The woman seemed very grateful to have atlast finally got some help. We never saw her again the rest of the days we were there. So I hope that the cream worked in some way in alleviating the baby's discomfort. I thought about all the tiny little things that we who live in cities rush to the doctor for and I felt ashamed. It felt really unfair that one section of the world's population had access to medical care more than they needed to have and another section had nothing at all.
We had the option of washing ourselves either at the Tungamalenga river or just bringing the water back to the camp and wash behind some bushes. I chose to wash myself at the river so that I had all the water I needed. I went there to actually look for a river, but what I found was a little puddle of water, barely 12 feet in diameter and it was surrounded by tall chest-high grass and some bushes. On a closer look at the puddle of a river, I realized that it had an underground source. The water was cool, fresh and had an aroma of the minerals in the soil. This was the same place where Mzee had scared NM during their last visit to kitisi. I stripped and started washing myself, when the thought that a lion could be lurking in the tall grass came to me. After all it was almost evening by then, which is usually the time they start to get active. In such a case, my only option would have been to to run naked. Quite embarassing. But not as embarassing as running away with your pants down like I described before. Atleast I would be clean if I got killed now. Although I had gone to the river to ensure that I had enough water to wash myself, I think that it was probably the fastest and least water-consuming wash that I have ever had. If any place has water shortages, all they need to do is prohibit inside bathrooms, and let some lions loose.
We left Kitisi and on the way out we had to sign out at the village ward office. The office was opposite a school and children were walking to school. All of us signed out in the village office's visitor-register and returned to the car except for Mzee, who kept chatting with the village ward officer. All of us patiently waited for him in the car and soon we found ourselves surrounded on all sides by the school children who were staring at us curiously. We waved and smiled. Some of them waved back, but most of them just stared at us. It was getting a little awkward with us just sitting there and about 50 odd school children standing a couple of feet away and staring. So I finally said 'Habari za asubuhi? (How are you this morning?)' to the closest boy and he laughed out loud and said 'Good morning'. I replied, "Good morning." I wish I had not opened my mouth because that set of a chain of the largest number of individual 'good mornings' that I have heard in a space of 5-10 minutes and of course, we could not be rude. So my wife and I kept saying Good mornings for the next 5-10 minutes to as many children as possible, praying that Mzee would finish his conversation and come back quickly. Even NM was getting antsy about Mzee not coming back. Finally he did, and we set off on our way back. The children running after our car and waving goodbyes frantically.
Kitisi is the place which I had mentioned in my previous post about Mzee - the site where the lion walked by the tents and scared the hell out of NM, the place where the impala headed straight towards Mzee's tent in terror and leaped over it. Anyway when we reached Kitisi, it was a nice afternoon and we put up our camp rightaway. There were lots and lots of pesky flies and I had to improvise my attire (more on that later) using my hat, my glasses and a handkerchief to keep them away from my face, much to the disapproval of my wife who thought that I looked completely ridiculous. I ignored her negative comments and protected my face from the flies with my 'ridiculous-looking' improvisation till the evening, when the unsuccessful and tired flies finally called it a day and flew away to rest. We could hear a couple of lions in the distance and the trumpet of some elephants. All other animals were wisely keeping their distance from the village or maybe there were present but just not announcing it to us like the elephants and lions were.
Night fell and Mzee regaled me with the story of the visit of the lion when they had camped there last time. I was told that when a lion roars/grunts near your tent, your tent vibrates and you can actually feel the sound in your chest. Unfortunately none of the lions roared next to our tents when I was there. They roared from a respectful distance so as not to disturb my sleep. I think the real reason is that they might have seen scared of me after seeing me in the afternoon in my fly-proof improvised-attire.
The next morning, I did something I had not done for a long long long time. I think I was 19 and in Goa the last time I had done something like this. I don't know how to say it politely so I will just describe the something as 'crapping in the open without a toilet'. Not the best of topics, but it has to be addressed. Ruaha National Park, being a park had very good toilets, probably the cleanest camp toilets I have seen anywhere in the world. But Kitisi being just an unmanaged site outside the park, had no such provisions. So you took a shovel with you, dug a hole, squatted, did your business and covered all traces of it with the dug-up dirt using the shovel. However I saw 2 problems with the whole process:
i) The first day I dug up the hole in the morning and I did not like the time spent digging the hole, when there were more urgent matters to be attended to. My process-improving solution was to dig up 4-5 holes behind some bushes right that afternoon for use during the rest of our stay there. Everyone else in the camp thought that the idea of pre-dug holes was funny but I just thought it practical and even invited them to use it.
ii) The holes had to be far off from the camp for obvious reasons of privacy and cleanliness, but also not that far that you were no longer in the relatively safer area of the camp. Safety was a major concern because you did not want to become the next meal of a lion or or just be squashed by an angry startled elephant. This has to be one of the most embarassing ways to die. Even if you don't die and just try to escape, running from danger with your pants down is not only difficult but also quite ego-deflating. I had no solution for this, so I just hoped that I chose the distance of the holes from the camp wisely.
A few things at Kitisi remain stuck in my mind. When we went out on our daily data collection effort, we walked by a few farms and I noticed some pieces of cloth tied to the wooden rickety fences along the farms. On enquiring about it with Mzee, I was told that these pieces of cloth were soaked in a mixture of oil and a kind of crushed green peppers (called pili-pili in Swahili). They had been placed on the fence since that was the only thing that kept the elephants away. Elephants despised pili-pili. I thought that was quite a smart approach to protect your crops. I remember how much they sting. Once I was chopping some pili-pili for dinner and I accidentally wiped my face right after that and it burned. It burned for a few hours. Washing my face with water lessened the burning sensation very slightly. It just spread the burning feeling to the other parts of my face. Thankfully I had avoided my eyes. It could have been much worse. I am glad I did not pee rightaway either.
One day we were processing the samples in the afternoon. Test tubes, chemicals, centrifuges etc were all over the place around us. I guess we must have looked like people of some medical knowledge because a woman walked towards us with her baby on her hip. The baby was hardly a few months old and was fast asleep. The woman who looked quite distraught walked directly to my wife and said a few things to her in Swahili all the time pointing to her baby. I had no idea what was being said, but one look at the baby confirmed what I thought she was saying. The poor baby was covered in rashes. Its face,arms and legs were scaly and covered in rashes. At first glance, it looked like the baby had eczema. We felt so sorry for it. The woman said that she had taken the baby to the local dispensary but they did not have any medicines. The closest town, Iringa was about 3-4 hours away and she had not taken the baby there yet. We apologised, saying that we were not doctors and there was nothing we could do. But she was so desperate for help that she almost insisted that we give her some medicines. Seeing her so desperate was very very moving. My wife finally gave her a generic over-the-counter kind of topical cream for rashes that we had and told her that the cream was meant for adults and not for babies. So she had to be really careful to apply a very tiny quantity on a small area of the baby's legs to see if it caused any problems first, before using it elsewhere. The woman seemed very grateful to have atlast finally got some help. We never saw her again the rest of the days we were there. So I hope that the cream worked in some way in alleviating the baby's discomfort. I thought about all the tiny little things that we who live in cities rush to the doctor for and I felt ashamed. It felt really unfair that one section of the world's population had access to medical care more than they needed to have and another section had nothing at all.
We had the option of washing ourselves either at the Tungamalenga river or just bringing the water back to the camp and wash behind some bushes. I chose to wash myself at the river so that I had all the water I needed. I went there to actually look for a river, but what I found was a little puddle of water, barely 12 feet in diameter and it was surrounded by tall chest-high grass and some bushes. On a closer look at the puddle of a river, I realized that it had an underground source. The water was cool, fresh and had an aroma of the minerals in the soil. This was the same place where Mzee had scared NM during their last visit to kitisi. I stripped and started washing myself, when the thought that a lion could be lurking in the tall grass came to me. After all it was almost evening by then, which is usually the time they start to get active. In such a case, my only option would have been to to run naked. Quite embarassing. But not as embarassing as running away with your pants down like I described before. Atleast I would be clean if I got killed now. Although I had gone to the river to ensure that I had enough water to wash myself, I think that it was probably the fastest and least water-consuming wash that I have ever had. If any place has water shortages, all they need to do is prohibit inside bathrooms, and let some lions loose.
We left Kitisi and on the way out we had to sign out at the village ward office. The office was opposite a school and children were walking to school. All of us signed out in the village office's visitor-register and returned to the car except for Mzee, who kept chatting with the village ward officer. All of us patiently waited for him in the car and soon we found ourselves surrounded on all sides by the school children who were staring at us curiously. We waved and smiled. Some of them waved back, but most of them just stared at us. It was getting a little awkward with us just sitting there and about 50 odd school children standing a couple of feet away and staring. So I finally said 'Habari za asubuhi? (How are you this morning?)' to the closest boy and he laughed out loud and said 'Good morning'. I replied, "Good morning." I wish I had not opened my mouth because that set of a chain of the largest number of individual 'good mornings' that I have heard in a space of 5-10 minutes and of course, we could not be rude. So my wife and I kept saying Good mornings for the next 5-10 minutes to as many children as possible, praying that Mzee would finish his conversation and come back quickly. Even NM was getting antsy about Mzee not coming back. Finally he did, and we set off on our way back. The children running after our car and waving goodbyes frantically.
Saturday, March 6, 2010
Mzee
AP, who is assisting my wife in her research as a tracker/botanist/wildlife-expert extra-ordinaire is referred to as Mzee (pronounced M-zay) by all of us. Mzee is a term used to respectfully address older people. Mzee AP is 64 years old but he has the energy and stamina of a 24 year old. Although small in stature and slight in built, he is fitter than the fittest person I have ever met. His endurance levels belie his age. His knowledge about flora, fauna and the bush in general is beyond comparision. You point out any plant, any animal to him and he will tell you it's name, it's latin name, its characteristics and how you can use that information to your advantage in the bush. He can tell you what bird it is just by hearing its call. He does not even have to see it. He still makes notes for himself on little scraps of paper about the plants and animals he encounters while he is doing his regular job, just because he likes to continously keep himself updated and that is because he is so interested in what he does. And because he is so interested in what he does and he likes what he does, he is the best.
Mzee started his career in the department of wildlife for Tanzania National Parks when he was 22. He joined the department as a Game Assistant and retired as a Chief Park Warden. He spent close to 40 years in the bush, working in almost every national park in Tanzania. During this period, he worked with many famous biologists and ecologists. But he is as modest as can be. He became a master at botany, tracking, research, survival in the bush, basically everything related to the jungle. But just focussing on his professional skills won't do justice to the portrayal of him as a person. Because he is much more than just his work.
Mzee is a very warm person. He knows everyone whether he is meeting them for the first time or if he is old friends with them. To see him talk with strangers, you would think that he has known them for years. He is a favourite amongst small children as well. Every time that we went to pick him up or drop him at his home, he was surrounded by his little followers who would run after him chanting 'Babu, Babu' (Babu = grandpa in Swahli). In many ways he is also a child at heart, because even now he does not shy away from practical jokes. Mzee is also a great entertainer and a master story teller. He tells his stories laden with voice inflections and sound effects and being in the bush for so many years, he has some great stories.
One day when we were camped outside the village of Kitisi, I noticed that he had put a bunch of thorny braches cut from an Acacia tree along both sides of his tent. He had not done that in any of the previous camp sites. So I asked him about it. He replied, 'Bwana Jai (Mr. Jai), last time when we camped at Kitisi, a lion was patrolling this area. He walked right next to the tents of NM and MM grunting in the territorial way male lions do. At that time, a few impala which were sleeping somewhere close by panicked and they ran - a few of them directly towards my tent. I could hear the sound of their hooves coming directly towards me and a couple of them jumped right over my tent. Thankfully the lion was not looking for a kill and did not chase them that night or he would have come straight at my tent. So these thorns are to discourage both impala and lion". He continued, trying to pull NM's (driver/cook) leg, "NM was so scared that time that he did not breathe for 10 minutes. He did not move his body one inch the whole night." NM of course laughed it off. But the truth is that NM seems scared more than the others and rightly so, because when we go off during the day to collect data, NM is alone at the camp. He has always said that he feels a lot relaxed when he sees impala grazing without showing signs of fear, because that means there are no lions around.
Mzee told me that after the lion and impala incident at Kitisi, the next evening each one of them went to wash at the river at some point or the other, but NM refused to do so. He just did not want to go anywhere away from the car. He definitely did not want to go to the river alone. The river had pretty much dried down and was more of an underground river with fresh water surfacing from a very small area. It was surrounded by long dry grass. So it gave you the privacy you wanted, but at the same time the bushes could easily have hidden a lion. So anyway NM refused to wash himself and Mzee kept teasing him about it. Finally NM decided to take the car to the river along with our game scout SM, because he needed to fill up water in the large buckets that we carried for cooking. When they got to the river, SM went into the water to wash himself and also fill up the buckets while NM refused to step out of the car. Meanwhile unknown to NM, Mzee had taken a short cut to the river and he had hidden himself in the tall grass near the river. From his vantage point, he saw where NM was and he crept close towards the car and started making some rustling noises in the grass. Mzee says NM was terrified and started asking SM what he thought the rustling was. SM assured him that it was probably some small animal. That is when Mzee started imitating the grunting roar of a lion. I have heard his lion imitation and it is pretty good. From a distance, it actually feels like a real one at a distance. That pretty much did it for NM and he ran out of the car in panic towards SM. That is when Mzee started laughing and stood up revealing himself. When Mzee narrated this to me, I laughed but I also felt sorry for NM, who usually comes across as a tough guy in town, but as a lamb in the bush. I was also amazed by Mzee having the energy to play practical jokes at his age.
Mzee has an unbelievable endurance and stamina. When we would go out during the day for data collection, we basically would end up walking for atleast 6 hours and sometimes 8-9 hours. Some days there would be small periods of rest and most days there would hardly be any rest. That meant 6-9 hours of continous walking in some of he harshest terrains possible under tha harsh sun. All of us except Mzee would finish our drinking waters way before we returned to the camp. Only Mzee would open his water bottle after he returned to the camp. It was almost a competition of sorts for him. It seemed like he was constantly challenging his body to endure as much as it could. He also smoked his pipe incessantly (more on this in a separate post). For someone to inhale all that tobacco for so many years and yet have this unbelievable stamina at 64 is really incredible.
There are so many other things about Mzee that can be told but this post is getting longer and longer and maybe I will split them into different posts. Mzee has also told us a truck load of stories, some of which I am going to chronicle in a separate post exclusively for his stories. Sorry for the abrupt end, but I will be back.
Monday, February 22, 2010
My first foray into the wild
To get to Ruaha National Park, we had to first get to the closest town Iringa, where my wife had rented a place. We went to Iringa from Morogoro (the University town) by bus, a 6 hour journey. Mid-way, the bus made its regular stop at the 'Al-Jazeera' restaurant. It was most likely a tribute to the Al-Jazeera TV channel, because unlike the US, the Al-Jazeera channel has a very good image in Tanzania, probably as good as the BBC has in the rest of the world. And rightly so, because from what I have seen so far, the Al-Jazeera English channel seems quite balanced in its news coverage. Unfortunately, in the US, the very words Al-Jazeera have negative connotations probably because of the way, the US news media have covered the stories of Al-Qaeeda sending their videos to Al-Jazeera. But all that not withstanding, I sincerely believe that Fox and CNN should take a leaf out of Al-Jazeera's news coverage and actually cover news instead of mostly having individuals (or commentators as they prefer to call them) mouth their own extreme opinions.
The next day we set off to the Ruaha National Park, accompanied by my wife's research assistants DE (a masters student from the US), AP referred to as Mzee (pronounced M-zay, a retired parks game warden and walking encyclopedia on all flora ,fauna and everything related to the bush ) and NK (driver/cook). We packed the back of the pickup with stuff needed for all the days that we were spending at the field site. Enroute to the park, we stopped at the closest village and bought tomatoes, onions and a pair of goat legs. Contrary to popular opinion, the goat legs were fine without refrigeration and we had goat for 2 days without anyone getting sick.
We reached the camp site at about 4 pm and set up our tents right next to the Ruaha river at the public campsites. Usually our team is all alone there but this time there was just one other elderly tourist couple camping about 50 metres away from us. The sun was about to set and some baboons were playing in the drying river in the small pockets of water left. Some impala and zebra were having their last fill of water before the onset of night. Soon the sun set and the nocturnal creatures started becoming more vocal. I heard something that I thought resembled the zipper of a tent. I was corrected by Mzee that it was a hyaena. By this time, the baboons had retired to their trees and were continuing their chatter up there. The hippo in the pool close by kept snorting every now and then. Far-off some elephants trumpeted. And then there was the unmistakable grunt of a lion. 2 lions. Each of them patrolling his territory and answering each other's grunts to keep the other away from his area. They kept grunting for a while with a few breaks in between to catch their breaths. It felt really close but I did not want to ask Mzee how close they were because I did not want to seem cowardly on my first day in the bush. First impressions stick.
That night, I kept waking up every hour or so, which is very unlike me. Usually when I go to sleep, I am as good as dead till the morning. I told myself I was jetlagged but I honestly feel that it was due to the fact that I was still unaccustomed to the nocturnal sounds of the jungle and every new sound woke me up. At about 3 am or so, I heard some rustling in the bush right behind us and then the footsteps of a big animal, a few feet away from our tent. I was absolutely certain it was a lion. I turned my head to see if my wife was awake. She was. She looked at me, smiled and put a finger on her lips asking me to be abolutely quiet and still. I had a small knife with me which I am sure would have been completely useless even if a stuffed toy had attacked us, but it provided me some comfort. The animal waited outside our tents for a while, moving back and forth. By this time, my body started to get stiff and I really wanted to move my muscles a bit. Of course as luck would have it, I had taken off my shirt before sleeping due to the heat and the rubbery mattress from REI that we were sleeping on had small depressions (like a golf ball), on which inevitably a vacuum had formed in some of the depressions due to my sweaty torso. As soon as I moved hardly half an inch, some of the depressions made a popping sound and I froze. My wife looked at me in irritation. I abandoned the idea of moving my body and let my sore muscles get even stiffer. My legs felt like they were losing sensation. I really wanted to uncross them. It is funny how these things work. In a normal situation, my legs would never be sore. Thankfully, whatever the animal was, it walked around for a few more minutes and then finally left. I decided right then that no matter how hot it was, I would always wear a shirt at night before going to sleep in the tent.
Very soon dawn scattered away the night and all kinds of birds had started their morning songs. This defintely has to be the best way for anyone to wake up. No more alarm clocks for me, just set a White-browed Coucal next to my bed.
In the morning, I asked my wife what she thought our animal visitor at night was and she seemed to think it was either a hippo or an elephant. I don't know why she did not think it was a lion. I really wanted to believe it was a lion. But when you think about it, all 3 animals would have been as dangerous as the next. The next few nights at Ruaha, I heard the same sounds of baboons, hyaenas, lions, elephants, hippos etc. But I went back to my old sleeping habits of going dead for the night. I guess I must have grown accustomed to the sounds of the jungle.
The next day we set off to the Ruaha National Park, accompanied by my wife's research assistants DE (a masters student from the US), AP referred to as Mzee (pronounced M-zay, a retired parks game warden and walking encyclopedia on all flora ,fauna and everything related to the bush ) and NK (driver/cook). We packed the back of the pickup with stuff needed for all the days that we were spending at the field site. Enroute to the park, we stopped at the closest village and bought tomatoes, onions and a pair of goat legs. Contrary to popular opinion, the goat legs were fine without refrigeration and we had goat for 2 days without anyone getting sick.
We reached the camp site at about 4 pm and set up our tents right next to the Ruaha river at the public campsites. Usually our team is all alone there but this time there was just one other elderly tourist couple camping about 50 metres away from us. The sun was about to set and some baboons were playing in the drying river in the small pockets of water left. Some impala and zebra were having their last fill of water before the onset of night. Soon the sun set and the nocturnal creatures started becoming more vocal. I heard something that I thought resembled the zipper of a tent. I was corrected by Mzee that it was a hyaena. By this time, the baboons had retired to their trees and were continuing their chatter up there. The hippo in the pool close by kept snorting every now and then. Far-off some elephants trumpeted. And then there was the unmistakable grunt of a lion. 2 lions. Each of them patrolling his territory and answering each other's grunts to keep the other away from his area. They kept grunting for a while with a few breaks in between to catch their breaths. It felt really close but I did not want to ask Mzee how close they were because I did not want to seem cowardly on my first day in the bush. First impressions stick.
That night, I kept waking up every hour or so, which is very unlike me. Usually when I go to sleep, I am as good as dead till the morning. I told myself I was jetlagged but I honestly feel that it was due to the fact that I was still unaccustomed to the nocturnal sounds of the jungle and every new sound woke me up. At about 3 am or so, I heard some rustling in the bush right behind us and then the footsteps of a big animal, a few feet away from our tent. I was absolutely certain it was a lion. I turned my head to see if my wife was awake. She was. She looked at me, smiled and put a finger on her lips asking me to be abolutely quiet and still. I had a small knife with me which I am sure would have been completely useless even if a stuffed toy had attacked us, but it provided me some comfort. The animal waited outside our tents for a while, moving back and forth. By this time, my body started to get stiff and I really wanted to move my muscles a bit. Of course as luck would have it, I had taken off my shirt before sleeping due to the heat and the rubbery mattress from REI that we were sleeping on had small depressions (like a golf ball), on which inevitably a vacuum had formed in some of the depressions due to my sweaty torso. As soon as I moved hardly half an inch, some of the depressions made a popping sound and I froze. My wife looked at me in irritation. I abandoned the idea of moving my body and let my sore muscles get even stiffer. My legs felt like they were losing sensation. I really wanted to uncross them. It is funny how these things work. In a normal situation, my legs would never be sore. Thankfully, whatever the animal was, it walked around for a few more minutes and then finally left. I decided right then that no matter how hot it was, I would always wear a shirt at night before going to sleep in the tent.
Very soon dawn scattered away the night and all kinds of birds had started their morning songs. This defintely has to be the best way for anyone to wake up. No more alarm clocks for me, just set a White-browed Coucal next to my bed.
In the morning, I asked my wife what she thought our animal visitor at night was and she seemed to think it was either a hippo or an elephant. I don't know why she did not think it was a lion. I really wanted to believe it was a lion. But when you think about it, all 3 animals would have been as dangerous as the next. The next few nights at Ruaha, I heard the same sounds of baboons, hyaenas, lions, elephants, hippos etc. But I went back to my old sleeping habits of going dead for the night. I guess I must have grown accustomed to the sounds of the jungle.
Monday, January 25, 2010
The case of the missing seat
In one of Sherlock Holmes' stories, I forget which one, he tells a visitor to his apartment that he knows that before taking the train to London, the visitor sat on the right hand side of a horse-carriage with one missing mudflap driven through the roads of some county etc etc etc. I forget the details but you get the picture. The vistor is astounded and wonders if Holmes followed him. In response, Holmes explains that it was just logical deduction since only the right side of the man's coat had tiny spots of mud etc etc etc. At the end of the explanation, both Watson and the visitor marvel at the genius of Holmes.
But I have a case which would stump even Holmes. There is absolutely no way Holmes could deduce my seat number on the bus from Dar-es-Salaam to Morogoro. In fact he could not even guess which side of the bus I sat on - even if I showed him my bus ticket with seat number 42 printed on it. Why? Elementary, my dear Watson! There was no seat number 42 in that bus. 40 yes. 41 yes. 43 yes. 44 yes. But no 42. I searched for it everywhere. I walked up and down the aisles thrice in the hope of catching a glimpse of the elusive 42. But no, there was just no sign of it. So I alighted from the bus and told the driver,conductor and their cronies, who were contently sipping some tea near the bus that there was no seat 42. So where should I sit? They seemed annoyed that I disturbed them during their period of rest for such a flimsy reason. "Sit anywhere, the bus is half-empty as you can see," was the retort.
So I boarded the bus again and sat on a seat which seemed empty and hoped that no one would board the bus on the next stop who had that seat. Of course at the next stop, only one person boarded that bus and he had been assigned the seat that I was sitting on. So I moved to the other side of the aisle. And to prove that Murphy's law was working overtime, at the next stop, I had to move again because my current seat had been assigned to the person who boarded there. By this time, I was slightly irritated and decided that I would not move again and just have the bus conductor solve the problem. Of course, after my firm resolve not to move, there were no more stops and the bus reached Morogoro without event.
So my dear Holmes, there is no way your extraordinary powers of logical deduction and reasoning could conclude what seat I sat on, because I myself don't know the answer. And what happened to seat number 42? Was it a seat-sign painter's mistake or was the seat abducted by aliens since everyone knows that the answer to the ultimate question of life, the universe and everything is 42. We will never know!
But I have a case which would stump even Holmes. There is absolutely no way Holmes could deduce my seat number on the bus from Dar-es-Salaam to Morogoro. In fact he could not even guess which side of the bus I sat on - even if I showed him my bus ticket with seat number 42 printed on it. Why? Elementary, my dear Watson! There was no seat number 42 in that bus. 40 yes. 41 yes. 43 yes. 44 yes. But no 42. I searched for it everywhere. I walked up and down the aisles thrice in the hope of catching a glimpse of the elusive 42. But no, there was just no sign of it. So I alighted from the bus and told the driver,conductor and their cronies, who were contently sipping some tea near the bus that there was no seat 42. So where should I sit? They seemed annoyed that I disturbed them during their period of rest for such a flimsy reason. "Sit anywhere, the bus is half-empty as you can see," was the retort.
So I boarded the bus again and sat on a seat which seemed empty and hoped that no one would board the bus on the next stop who had that seat. Of course at the next stop, only one person boarded that bus and he had been assigned the seat that I was sitting on. So I moved to the other side of the aisle. And to prove that Murphy's law was working overtime, at the next stop, I had to move again because my current seat had been assigned to the person who boarded there. By this time, I was slightly irritated and decided that I would not move again and just have the bus conductor solve the problem. Of course, after my firm resolve not to move, there were no more stops and the bus reached Morogoro without event.
So my dear Holmes, there is no way your extraordinary powers of logical deduction and reasoning could conclude what seat I sat on, because I myself don't know the answer. And what happened to seat number 42? Was it a seat-sign painter's mistake or was the seat abducted by aliens since everyone knows that the answer to the ultimate question of life, the universe and everything is 42. We will never know!
Thursday, January 21, 2010
Layoff
When I had started writing this blog, I had promised myself something. 72 virgins? No! It sounds appealing but could be somewhat of a logistical nightmare, plus it would not go down well with my wife; so I just promised myself something simpler - that my blog would not be a personal diary. But some events occurred over the last 2-3 months which I wanted to capture before my already failing memory became more fuddled. So this is my attempt to build a time-capsule for myself. Maybe in a few years from now, I will read this again and relive it all over again. Also, for my few friends who actually waste their time reading the useless drivel that I churn out every now and then, maybe it will provide a glimpse of what I was doing in the last 2-3 months.
On Thursday, Nov 12, I got an email from my manager's manager saying that he wanted to set up a call with me on Nov 13. For some reason, I was quite sure that it was regarding my promotion which I had been trying to avoid for the last few years for the very simple reason that my salary would go down if I got promoted. Yes, that is a strange compensation structure. Anyway, I spent some time on thursday thinking up arguments on how best to present my case. But the call that came on Nov 13 had nothing to do with my promotion. I had picked up the phone and had just said 'Hello', when my manager's manager told me that I was being laid-off and Nov 13 was my last day of employment. A large chunk of people from my department were laid-off that day, including my manager (which explained why my manager's manager had to do the unpleasant call) as part of a general reduction in force.
For some strange reason, I did not feel upset about it. In fact I felt no emotion at all. Maybe it was a consequence of knowing that it was only a matter of time before my number was up and the sputtering economy was going to get me. But atleast now, some day I can proudly boast to my kids and grand-kids that I lost my job during the big recession of the late 2000s.
The next thing I did that day was look up tickets to Tanzania and India. Within 36 hours, I had booked my tickets. I left for Tanzania in a week and there in commence the interesting parts of my narrative.
On Thursday, Nov 12, I got an email from my manager's manager saying that he wanted to set up a call with me on Nov 13. For some reason, I was quite sure that it was regarding my promotion which I had been trying to avoid for the last few years for the very simple reason that my salary would go down if I got promoted. Yes, that is a strange compensation structure. Anyway, I spent some time on thursday thinking up arguments on how best to present my case. But the call that came on Nov 13 had nothing to do with my promotion. I had picked up the phone and had just said 'Hello', when my manager's manager told me that I was being laid-off and Nov 13 was my last day of employment. A large chunk of people from my department were laid-off that day, including my manager (which explained why my manager's manager had to do the unpleasant call) as part of a general reduction in force.
For some strange reason, I did not feel upset about it. In fact I felt no emotion at all. Maybe it was a consequence of knowing that it was only a matter of time before my number was up and the sputtering economy was going to get me. But atleast now, some day I can proudly boast to my kids and grand-kids that I lost my job during the big recession of the late 2000s.
The next thing I did that day was look up tickets to Tanzania and India. Within 36 hours, I had booked my tickets. I left for Tanzania in a week and there in commence the interesting parts of my narrative.
Thursday, October 15, 2009
Career
A few days back, my wife , who is in Tanzania doing research on antelopes tried calling me on her cell phone, after a gruelling day in the field. In an attempt to get a cell phone signal, she climbed on top of a nearby hill and made the call. Just as we were speaking she told me that on the other side of the hill, she could see more than 500 elephants grazing ! 500!! After sharing her joy initially I grew a little jealous. The first thought that occured to me after the call was whether I was stuck in a wrong career. How many times would I get a chance to see something like that working away behind a computer? Probably never. How and why did I choose my career? How do most people choose what they do for a living? At any point of time, in the entire workforce of the world, how many people have always wanted to do what they are do for a living?
When I was a child, I wanted to a policeman. More specifically I wanted to be a Sub-Inspector and not an Inspector, because I thought that Sub-Inspectors were higher in the hierarchy. Well, Sub-Inspector has an extra word in front of it and 'Sub' in Hindi meant 'All'. So it was only natural that an All-Inspector was bigger than just a mere Inspector.
The inspector dream faded away soon and my next ambition was to be a cricketer. More specifically a fast bowler. I thought I was a decent fast bowler for my age. But the probability of being successful was next to zero. Imagine a cricket-crazy country with the second highest population in the world and only 11 players play for the country. Well, 14 if you count the substitutes. So you have almost a zero percent chance of making it. In those days, there was no money in the domestic leagues, and if you did not make it to the national team, you were as good as broke. So it was either success or nothing at all. There was no middle ground. And so cricket succumbed, giving way to the higher priority of making a decent living.
And then a close family friend became an engineer and that is what I wanted to become all of a sudden. The next several years were dedicated to that and since it was an achievable target, I graduated with an ngineering degree. I was quite proud of myself. Taking a few computer programming classes in college made me feel that programming was such an exciting field and my dream job would be something to do wiith programming. Lo and behold, after working in the civil engineering sector for 6 months, I switched to software and that is what I have been doing for the last 11 years. But I wonder now if it was something I really wanted or was it just an infatuation? I still love the challenges it throws up and right now, I can't think of anything else I would rather do, except for maybe watch 500 or so elephants from the top of a hill, or listen to lions growling a few hundred metres away as I lie in my tent trying to sleep.
Of course, I am only focussing on the glamourous parts of my wife's stories of seeing lions, hyenas, elephants, antelopes etc. in the wild, while clearly ignoring her daily struggles of doing even the simplest things that we take for granted; ignoring the stress of doing lab work against a deadline, when something as basic as electricity is not guaranteed. The huge amounts of paperwork to do research, the lack of timely funds, the lack of any monetary gain (monetary loss, in fact, inspite of being paid a salary), while ironically being stuck in a place where the common man thinks you have lots of money to spare.
Maybe that is it. The grass always looks greener on the other side. Nothing comes without drawbacks. No matter what you do for a living, there will always be something else which you think you would love to do for a living. Just like me, Usain Bolt wanted to be a fast bowler, when he was young. If not for his cricket coach who suggested sprinting as an alternative, he would or most probably would not ,seeing as the coach suggested a different sport, have made it to the West Indies Cricket team. And Jamaica would never have a son to make it so proud in the 2008 Olympics. And we would never be fortunate to see a man run as fast as the 'Lightning Bolt'. And to think, that his career was shaped just by a suggestion from his cricket coach. Since we are talking about Bolt, here is an amusing video of him playing in a charity cricket match and giving a send-off to the West Indies captain!
Maybe most people end up in their choice of a career just like that. By chance. By just plainly going through life and taking the opportunities that are granted to them and making the most of it.
When I was a child, I wanted to a policeman. More specifically I wanted to be a Sub-Inspector and not an Inspector, because I thought that Sub-Inspectors were higher in the hierarchy. Well, Sub-Inspector has an extra word in front of it and 'Sub' in Hindi meant 'All'. So it was only natural that an All-Inspector was bigger than just a mere Inspector.
The inspector dream faded away soon and my next ambition was to be a cricketer. More specifically a fast bowler. I thought I was a decent fast bowler for my age. But the probability of being successful was next to zero. Imagine a cricket-crazy country with the second highest population in the world and only 11 players play for the country. Well, 14 if you count the substitutes. So you have almost a zero percent chance of making it. In those days, there was no money in the domestic leagues, and if you did not make it to the national team, you were as good as broke. So it was either success or nothing at all. There was no middle ground. And so cricket succumbed, giving way to the higher priority of making a decent living.
And then a close family friend became an engineer and that is what I wanted to become all of a sudden. The next several years were dedicated to that and since it was an achievable target, I graduated with an ngineering degree. I was quite proud of myself. Taking a few computer programming classes in college made me feel that programming was such an exciting field and my dream job would be something to do wiith programming. Lo and behold, after working in the civil engineering sector for 6 months, I switched to software and that is what I have been doing for the last 11 years. But I wonder now if it was something I really wanted or was it just an infatuation? I still love the challenges it throws up and right now, I can't think of anything else I would rather do, except for maybe watch 500 or so elephants from the top of a hill, or listen to lions growling a few hundred metres away as I lie in my tent trying to sleep.
Of course, I am only focussing on the glamourous parts of my wife's stories of seeing lions, hyenas, elephants, antelopes etc. in the wild, while clearly ignoring her daily struggles of doing even the simplest things that we take for granted; ignoring the stress of doing lab work against a deadline, when something as basic as electricity is not guaranteed. The huge amounts of paperwork to do research, the lack of timely funds, the lack of any monetary gain (monetary loss, in fact, inspite of being paid a salary), while ironically being stuck in a place where the common man thinks you have lots of money to spare.
Maybe that is it. The grass always looks greener on the other side. Nothing comes without drawbacks. No matter what you do for a living, there will always be something else which you think you would love to do for a living. Just like me, Usain Bolt wanted to be a fast bowler, when he was young. If not for his cricket coach who suggested sprinting as an alternative, he would or most probably would not ,seeing as the coach suggested a different sport, have made it to the West Indies Cricket team. And Jamaica would never have a son to make it so proud in the 2008 Olympics. And we would never be fortunate to see a man run as fast as the 'Lightning Bolt'. And to think, that his career was shaped just by a suggestion from his cricket coach. Since we are talking about Bolt, here is an amusing video of him playing in a charity cricket match and giving a send-off to the West Indies captain!
Maybe most people end up in their choice of a career just like that. By chance. By just plainly going through life and taking the opportunities that are granted to them and making the most of it.
Thursday, September 24, 2009
Cheating the poor
About seven years ago, back in the days when I was still a bachelor, I was flying back to India from the US for my annual vacation in the motherland. I was going to give my parents a surprise because I was flying in a week before the date I told them I was coming in. I landed at the airport in Bombay at around 2:30 am and since no one knew I was coming in that day, my brother who usually picks me up from the airport was either blissfully asleep or working (depending on the shift he was working). I took a taxi at the airport, put my bags in and off I headed to home, sweet home.
The taxi driver, a man who appeared to be in late 40s, was silent for the first 5 minutes of the ride. But either out of boredom or to keep himself awake at 3 in the morning, he asked me in Hindi where I had flown in from. I answered him in Hindi, that I had flown in from the US, where I worked. He asked me if I was originally from Bombay and I said, 'yes, I was born in Bombay and grew up here.' Before he could ask me anything else, I told him that I knew that he was from Kerala. He was astonished, which is quite strange, because I wondered if he did not know that he had such a strong Malayalam accent while speaking Hindi. So I clarified matters by mentioning that his accent gave his roots away and I told him that I too had roots in kerala. From then on, the entire conversation was in Malayalam.
I asked him how long he had been in Bombay. That is when he proceeded to tell me the story of his arrival in Bombay. He came to Bombay about 16 years ago. But Bombay was not supposed to be his final destination. He had come to Bombay, like countless others before him and after him, to fly out to one of the UAE countries.
He was not doing very well in his native village. He had a part-time job as a driver and he did odd jobs to make ends meet. But he had a young family to take care of. So he decided to do what countless others from India, especially Kerala (where the policies of the communist state government made sure that the state with the highest literacy rate also remained one of the top states in unemployment) were already doing - finding a job in one of the 'Gulf' countries in the Middle-east. He had visited an agent who had taken his papers and a lot of money and promised him a full-time job as a driver in Dubai and a visa. He had mortgaged his house to get the money for the agent. It was after all an investment in his and his young family's future. So the mortgage seemed ok at that time.
The agent had given him the job offer letter and a train ticket to come to Bombay, the closest international airport in those days. He was supposed to stay in a hotel for a week, by which time he would get his passport stamped with his visa. There were a bunch of others like him from different parts of India. A few of them from Kerala too, whom he befriended, because just like him, they spoke only Malayalam and not much Hindi. One thing seemed common amongst everyone - almost all of them had either paid the agent using all of their savings or by taking loans or by selling their property or by some such drastic measure.
And in a few days, when there was no sign of the agent or the passport and visa, they knew they had been conned. These were people who had risked almost everything they had for a better job and a better life. Not everyone took it well. Some just resigned themselves to their fate and went back to where they came from. But one of his new friends, who had sold everything he had to come up with the money for the agent, was so devastated that he committed suicide. But the taxi-driver could not do that, because he had a young family to feed and he could not go back either because he had to repay the loan. So after a few days, with some luck, he found a job as a taxi-driver in Bombay. He could not afford to rent a decent home, since he had to pay his loan back as well as send money home to his family. So he just rented a small room in a slum, which he shared with 5 others. He only went there to shower or use the common toilet. He spent most of his time in the cab, even sleeping in it. I asked him if he ever visited his family in that time. He said he went to kerala thrice in 16 years. Not that he did not want to go, but he could not afford more frequent trips. His children had grown up and he barely knew them. A painful thought gnawed at me then that he had basically been given a life-sentence of hardships and forced solitude, when he was actually the victim of the crime.
Soon I reached home and I bid him good-luck and I sincerely meant it. I wish I could have done something to help him, but there was really nothing I could do. There are countless people like him in Bombay and some are even more unfortunate than him. One thing growing up in Bombay does is that it de-sensitizes you to the misfortunes of others. I mean even if you feel sorry, you know that you can't do much for them anyway. You tell yourself that and move on.
I wonder when your average conman cheats somebody of their money, do they realise what kind of an impact they are having on the other person's life? Or is their vision so myopic that the only thing that they can focus on is the victim's money? Maybe they can't or rather don't want to think about anything other than the money. Maybe this refusal to think about the consequences of their actions beyond the money is an extreme form of the indifference shown by the average human (more so in Bombay) to the misfortunes of others.
Some may argue that the taxi-driver was at fault too, since he was too gullible and maybe even foolish to have someone take advantage of him. He should never have taken such a risk. But that is like saying that it is alright for a stronger person to beat up a weaker person just because the weaker person is too weak to defend himself.
Stealing from someone whose life won't be profoundly affected can still be forgivable, but the worst kind of stealing according to me, has to be the one in which the monetary loss itself becomes secondary compared to the loss of hope and spirit. Such crimes break people down and chalk out the way they lead the rest of their lives or in some cases, not live at all. And that is right up there with the worst crime imaginable.
The taxi driver, a man who appeared to be in late 40s, was silent for the first 5 minutes of the ride. But either out of boredom or to keep himself awake at 3 in the morning, he asked me in Hindi where I had flown in from. I answered him in Hindi, that I had flown in from the US, where I worked. He asked me if I was originally from Bombay and I said, 'yes, I was born in Bombay and grew up here.' Before he could ask me anything else, I told him that I knew that he was from Kerala. He was astonished, which is quite strange, because I wondered if he did not know that he had such a strong Malayalam accent while speaking Hindi. So I clarified matters by mentioning that his accent gave his roots away and I told him that I too had roots in kerala. From then on, the entire conversation was in Malayalam.
I asked him how long he had been in Bombay. That is when he proceeded to tell me the story of his arrival in Bombay. He came to Bombay about 16 years ago. But Bombay was not supposed to be his final destination. He had come to Bombay, like countless others before him and after him, to fly out to one of the UAE countries.
He was not doing very well in his native village. He had a part-time job as a driver and he did odd jobs to make ends meet. But he had a young family to take care of. So he decided to do what countless others from India, especially Kerala (where the policies of the communist state government made sure that the state with the highest literacy rate also remained one of the top states in unemployment) were already doing - finding a job in one of the 'Gulf' countries in the Middle-east. He had visited an agent who had taken his papers and a lot of money and promised him a full-time job as a driver in Dubai and a visa. He had mortgaged his house to get the money for the agent. It was after all an investment in his and his young family's future. So the mortgage seemed ok at that time.
The agent had given him the job offer letter and a train ticket to come to Bombay, the closest international airport in those days. He was supposed to stay in a hotel for a week, by which time he would get his passport stamped with his visa. There were a bunch of others like him from different parts of India. A few of them from Kerala too, whom he befriended, because just like him, they spoke only Malayalam and not much Hindi. One thing seemed common amongst everyone - almost all of them had either paid the agent using all of their savings or by taking loans or by selling their property or by some such drastic measure.
And in a few days, when there was no sign of the agent or the passport and visa, they knew they had been conned. These were people who had risked almost everything they had for a better job and a better life. Not everyone took it well. Some just resigned themselves to their fate and went back to where they came from. But one of his new friends, who had sold everything he had to come up with the money for the agent, was so devastated that he committed suicide. But the taxi-driver could not do that, because he had a young family to feed and he could not go back either because he had to repay the loan. So after a few days, with some luck, he found a job as a taxi-driver in Bombay. He could not afford to rent a decent home, since he had to pay his loan back as well as send money home to his family. So he just rented a small room in a slum, which he shared with 5 others. He only went there to shower or use the common toilet. He spent most of his time in the cab, even sleeping in it. I asked him if he ever visited his family in that time. He said he went to kerala thrice in 16 years. Not that he did not want to go, but he could not afford more frequent trips. His children had grown up and he barely knew them. A painful thought gnawed at me then that he had basically been given a life-sentence of hardships and forced solitude, when he was actually the victim of the crime.
Soon I reached home and I bid him good-luck and I sincerely meant it. I wish I could have done something to help him, but there was really nothing I could do. There are countless people like him in Bombay and some are even more unfortunate than him. One thing growing up in Bombay does is that it de-sensitizes you to the misfortunes of others. I mean even if you feel sorry, you know that you can't do much for them anyway. You tell yourself that and move on.
I wonder when your average conman cheats somebody of their money, do they realise what kind of an impact they are having on the other person's life? Or is their vision so myopic that the only thing that they can focus on is the victim's money? Maybe they can't or rather don't want to think about anything other than the money. Maybe this refusal to think about the consequences of their actions beyond the money is an extreme form of the indifference shown by the average human (more so in Bombay) to the misfortunes of others.
Some may argue that the taxi-driver was at fault too, since he was too gullible and maybe even foolish to have someone take advantage of him. He should never have taken such a risk. But that is like saying that it is alright for a stronger person to beat up a weaker person just because the weaker person is too weak to defend himself.
Stealing from someone whose life won't be profoundly affected can still be forgivable, but the worst kind of stealing according to me, has to be the one in which the monetary loss itself becomes secondary compared to the loss of hope and spirit. Such crimes break people down and chalk out the way they lead the rest of their lives or in some cases, not live at all. And that is right up there with the worst crime imaginable.
Wednesday, September 9, 2009
To shut it or not
I cant recollect exactly where I read it. It was a very long time ago in one of those ancient stories. I want to say the Panchatantra, but I am not sure. Anyway the moral of the story was "When you are not sure about something, it is better to keep your mouth shut and let people assume that you are knowledgable rather than open your mouth and remove all doubts of your ignorance."
One of the greatest inventions in our lifetime has been the internet. But unfortunately, it has given a platform for every fool to voice his thoughts (including yours truly) to a mass audience on anything and everything. A decade or so ago, it would have been extremely difficult, if not impossible to convey your foolishness to the whole world. Only your near and dear ones and maybe your colleagues from work knew what an ignorant fool you were. But not anymore. With the advent of the easily accessible mass-platform of the web and its numerous forums, people have unleashed their verbal diarrhoea (the spelling is correct, just in case you are curious - another one of those British and American spelling words) on every unsuspecting reader who is passing by. So now everyone knows that you have 'clay in your skull' (my Dad's favourite phrase translated into English - sounds much better and funnier in Malayalam) instead of a brain. People who know you and people who don't know you, now know that you are an idiot. So if you have ever posted something online that you were not completely sure of but had to let it out anyway, do carefully notice the snide smile of the next person who walks by you. Maybe he knows.
The worst places have to be forums below news articles or youtube videos or any place which allows you to post comments. Before I proceed, let me say that this blog is not included in the above list and please feel free to post comments. All your comments are very intelligent and I love it because it boosts my ego that someone is actually reading the drivel that I churn out every now and then. Anyway, back to the youtube comments section and other such places - sometimes I cringe when I see some of these comments. I wonder sometimes if people really can be that stupid? Such forums have also given rise to the fastest growing sport in the world (UFC, beware) - 'arguing-like-idiots-on-the-internet'. No qualifications required, no training necessary. If you can type, you qualify. Don't have a brain, but have an opinion? No worries, you are a contender. I wonder if these people ever stop to think how stupid one has to be to come and check if somebody has insulted you and then respond hoping that the other persons comes back to see if his insult has been returned appropriately with another insult?
Although the internet has provided huge garbage dumps for people to express their ignorance, there are some folks who are still nostalgic for the old ways and let their mouths do the talking! I salute those folks because they restore my faith in humankind. They reassure me that maybe things are really not going downhill. They have always been downhill and the web is just making it more noticeable.
One of the greatest inventions in our lifetime has been the internet. But unfortunately, it has given a platform for every fool to voice his thoughts (including yours truly) to a mass audience on anything and everything. A decade or so ago, it would have been extremely difficult, if not impossible to convey your foolishness to the whole world. Only your near and dear ones and maybe your colleagues from work knew what an ignorant fool you were. But not anymore. With the advent of the easily accessible mass-platform of the web and its numerous forums, people have unleashed their verbal diarrhoea (the spelling is correct, just in case you are curious - another one of those British and American spelling words) on every unsuspecting reader who is passing by. So now everyone knows that you have 'clay in your skull' (my Dad's favourite phrase translated into English - sounds much better and funnier in Malayalam) instead of a brain. People who know you and people who don't know you, now know that you are an idiot. So if you have ever posted something online that you were not completely sure of but had to let it out anyway, do carefully notice the snide smile of the next person who walks by you. Maybe he knows.
The worst places have to be forums below news articles or youtube videos or any place which allows you to post comments. Before I proceed, let me say that this blog is not included in the above list and please feel free to post comments. All your comments are very intelligent and I love it because it boosts my ego that someone is actually reading the drivel that I churn out every now and then. Anyway, back to the youtube comments section and other such places - sometimes I cringe when I see some of these comments. I wonder sometimes if people really can be that stupid? Such forums have also given rise to the fastest growing sport in the world (UFC, beware) - 'arguing-like-idiots-on-the-internet'. No qualifications required, no training necessary. If you can type, you qualify. Don't have a brain, but have an opinion? No worries, you are a contender. I wonder if these people ever stop to think how stupid one has to be to come and check if somebody has insulted you and then respond hoping that the other persons comes back to see if his insult has been returned appropriately with another insult?
Although the internet has provided huge garbage dumps for people to express their ignorance, there are some folks who are still nostalgic for the old ways and let their mouths do the talking! I salute those folks because they restore my faith in humankind. They reassure me that maybe things are really not going downhill. They have always been downhill and the web is just making it more noticeable.
Friday, August 14, 2009
Second Chance
Imagine you are working in front of a bunch of your customers. One of your customers heckles you and you get angry. Very angry. So angry that you throw a very hard 5.5 oz. round object in his direction with all your might. But fortunately for your heckler and the other customers around him, it hits no one. You are incensed. So you pick up a metal spike, which is lying conveniently close to you, and try to use it as your next missile. But thankfully, you get taken down by people who think you have gone too far. You are handed a punishment, but life goes on.
A couple of months later, you are not considered for a new project by your biased employer, when you should really have been an automatic shoo-in for the project. So you whip yourself up into a rage again, get into your car, go to the office and burn the bloody office down. That will show your employers not to mess with you.
In a normally functioning world, it would be safe to say that the chances of your ex-employers hiring you back again would be as much as the Taliban hosting a Victoria's Secret fashion show in Kandahar. But if your name is Mark Vermuelen and your employer is the Zimbabwe Cricket Board, you will find yourself opening the batting for Zimbabwe in around 3 years after you destroyed the Zimbabwe Cricket Board's Headquarters and their National Academy building.
And just in case if you are thinking, how did he get away from 25 years of prison for arson? By pleading not guilty due to mental illness. To be precise, "partial complex epilepsy and impulsive behaviour disorder", brought on as a result of having his skull fractured by a cricket ball, during a match against India.
This is really not an attempt to judge the seriousness of his injury or judge how much that had to play a part in his actions thereafter. I do sympathise with him. I mean poor Vermuelen was so unlucky that he got hit by a cricket ball on the same part of his skull twice in a year, even after wearing a helmet. That is more than enough for brain damage. Granted he has had anger management issues even before the injury (uprooting the stumps and locking himself in the dressing room because he was given out), but then maybe the injury just exacerbated the problem. From what I have read about him, apart from his outbursts, he seems like a fairly nice guy.
But what amazes me is that the Zimbabwe Cricket Board hired him back. Especially with the kind of history the Board has. This is a board run by the cronies of Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe. A man whom history will definitely hold responsible for reducing Zimbabwe to what it is today. When the life expectancy of a people drops from 60-something to 30-something over a period of just a few years, you know that something is terribly wrong in the country. On one hand, you have a Cricket Board, which is just an extension of the policies of Mugabe's government and on the other hand, you have Vermuelen, who is as stereotypically a white Zimbabwean as they come. Tall, blond and from an affluent family. And he has definitely not endeared himself to the board by his actions. The very fact that somebody like him can get back into the team after what he has done baffles me. Whether it is a sign of desperation on part of the Board or whether it is change in policies, one will never know.
But good for him. I am glad atleast something is going right for him. I hope for his sake and for the sake of others, that his psychological issues are really over. Good luck Vermuelen and more importantly, good luck Zimbabwe.
A couple of months later, you are not considered for a new project by your biased employer, when you should really have been an automatic shoo-in for the project. So you whip yourself up into a rage again, get into your car, go to the office and burn the bloody office down. That will show your employers not to mess with you.
In a normally functioning world, it would be safe to say that the chances of your ex-employers hiring you back again would be as much as the Taliban hosting a Victoria's Secret fashion show in Kandahar. But if your name is Mark Vermuelen and your employer is the Zimbabwe Cricket Board, you will find yourself opening the batting for Zimbabwe in around 3 years after you destroyed the Zimbabwe Cricket Board's Headquarters and their National Academy building.
And just in case if you are thinking, how did he get away from 25 years of prison for arson? By pleading not guilty due to mental illness. To be precise, "partial complex epilepsy and impulsive behaviour disorder", brought on as a result of having his skull fractured by a cricket ball, during a match against India.
This is really not an attempt to judge the seriousness of his injury or judge how much that had to play a part in his actions thereafter. I do sympathise with him. I mean poor Vermuelen was so unlucky that he got hit by a cricket ball on the same part of his skull twice in a year, even after wearing a helmet. That is more than enough for brain damage. Granted he has had anger management issues even before the injury (uprooting the stumps and locking himself in the dressing room because he was given out), but then maybe the injury just exacerbated the problem. From what I have read about him, apart from his outbursts, he seems like a fairly nice guy.
But what amazes me is that the Zimbabwe Cricket Board hired him back. Especially with the kind of history the Board has. This is a board run by the cronies of Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe. A man whom history will definitely hold responsible for reducing Zimbabwe to what it is today. When the life expectancy of a people drops from 60-something to 30-something over a period of just a few years, you know that something is terribly wrong in the country. On one hand, you have a Cricket Board, which is just an extension of the policies of Mugabe's government and on the other hand, you have Vermuelen, who is as stereotypically a white Zimbabwean as they come. Tall, blond and from an affluent family. And he has definitely not endeared himself to the board by his actions. The very fact that somebody like him can get back into the team after what he has done baffles me. Whether it is a sign of desperation on part of the Board or whether it is change in policies, one will never know.
But good for him. I am glad atleast something is going right for him. I hope for his sake and for the sake of others, that his psychological issues are really over. Good luck Vermuelen and more importantly, good luck Zimbabwe.
Monday, August 3, 2009
Police
The recent controversy involving the arrest of a black Harvard professor in Boston made me think about the different kind of policemen out there protecting and serving us. Like in every other field, some are good men, the best you would want on the force, but there are always some who try their best, usually effortlessly, to sully the image that their brethren try so hard to shine. These are the jerks who nurture the general feeling of dislike of any kind of authority in the public to full-blown hatred towards the police.
Since writing good things about good people is anyway not very interesting, this post is dedicated to the jerk cop and not the good one. I have tried to categorize them as best as I can here, but this is by no means an exhaustive list, since my categorizations are based on first-hand experiences and second-hand accounts.
1. The economist
They are of the belief that any money on your person is present because of some mistake in the laws of distribution of money. But fear not, this mistake can be easily corrected. Very soon, you will find yourself taking money out from your pockets and handing it over to them. It does not matter how much the amount is, you should never have had that money in the first place.
I have had a few encounters with these type, but I vividly remember the first one. I must have been 19 or so. I was riding pillion on a motorcycle with my friend SN in Bombay. A 3-day college festival was in session and we were going to pick up something for some event. It was not SN's motorcycle and he was not very good at riding motorcycles anyway. So inevitably, the engine stalled at a traffic light and he just could not start it. Out of nowhere, a middle-aged cop appeared and pulled us to the side. This is how the conversation went:
Cop ordered SN in the local language (Marathi), "Show me your license."
SN replied in Marathi, "Here you go."
The cop looked at the license. "This is a learner's license."
SN smiled in agreement, "Yes."
The Cop turned to me and said in Marathi, "Show me your 'pakki' (meaning not learner's but actual full license) license."
I had no idea why he wanted my license since I was riding pillion. I was not aware that since SN had a learner's license, he was supposed to ride only with someone who had a 'pakki' license. My ignorance transformed into contempt and I replied with a slight hint of sarcasm in Hindi (which I am more comfortable in compared to Marathi), "I don't even have a learner's license let alone a 'pakki' license."
"Ok boys, I am going to have to impound the vehicle," smiled the cop.
We more or less had an idea where this was headed. So we started pleading. SN in Marathi and me in Hindi. We painted a picture as if the survival of civilization depended on our successfully obtaining the thing we were going to get.
The cop suddenly changed subjects and addressed me, "If you understand Marathi, why are you speaking in Hindi? This is Bombay and Bombay is in Maharashtra. This is Marathi-land. Speak in Marathi."
Although I wanted to carry on the fascinating discussion and point out the bigger picture to him that Maharashtra is in India and Hindi is the national language, so Hindi supercedes Marathi, I prudently desisted from it. Also, I had no idea what would happen if the boundaries of our discussion went beyond India. So I grovelled in Marathi, "OK sir. From now on, I will speak only in Marathi. Please let us go." If speaking in Marathi was what it took for us to be let go with the bike, then so be it.
With a sly smile, the cop said, "I can't let you go just like that. You have broken the law. You need to learn a lesson so that you remember not to do this in the future."
"We won't do this again sir. Is there some way we can be let go?"
At this time, all 3 of us knew what everyone was hinting at.
The cop continued, "I will have to fine you. Give me 200 bucks each."
"We don't have that much money."
"How much do you have?"
SN looked at his wallet and said "45 Rupees."
I said, "20 rupees."
The cop was disgusted. All this time had been wasted for 65 rupees when he could easily have spent his time much more effectively. But a man must make compromises. When life gives you lemons, you make lemonade. And he seemed to be one who would not only make the lemonade but also sell the seeds of the lemon to some farmer. He decalred, "65 rupees! OK, I am in a good mood. Hand it over and you can go."
If the cop was so shameless to take a measly 20 rupees from me, I had to one-up him on shamelessness. So I pleaded, "I need some money for the bus home. Can I get 5 back?"
I expected a verbal lashing for sure. Is it not against the protocol to ask for change when you are bribing someone? But surprisingly the cop still had some good in him. Shaking his head and giving me a 5 rupee note, he said, "Here you go. Now both of you scram and don't let me catch you again."
That was my first amongst a few other encounters with this kind of cop. I was suprised that he still took that small amount from us. But I guess it is the principle of the matter. He believed that it was never rightfully ours in the first place, so it must have been easy to take it from us.
I have not found this type of cop in the US yet, mostly because small-time corruption does not seem to be as prevalent amongst cops here as much as it is in India. I must say though that Tanzania, the other place where I have had a couple of encounters with cops and have also heard some stories from people, surpasses India in this matter.
2. The monarch
This kind is much worse than type 1 mentioned above. Type 1 looks like a harmless schoolgirl compared to the monarch. This type of cop belongs to the school of thought that a cop is the closest thing to a king. Unfortunately they also believe that their kingdom is mobile and radiates to about a few 100 feet from them in all directions, no matter where they are. These are the kinds who slap you first, swear at you and then ask you your name. If you are fortunate enough, after the slap, you probably will get a chance to file the complaint for which you had visited the police station in the first place. They look at criminals and non-criminals through the same jaundiced eyes. Readily found in all parts of India, at some point in their lives, I would like to believe that most of these power-trippers have their egos squashed underfoot by criminals as well as non-criminals. I know of atleast 2 or 3 incidents when this has happened. But I also know of many incidents where people were just abused for no reason and I have been present during a few of them. I am sure the power-tripper is also present in the US and I have been fortunate enough not to meet any. Especially since every cop here, unlike India, carries a gun.
3. The over-zealous bureaucrat
These are the kind who fail to see the larger picture and will go to ridiculous lengths to uphold the written word of the law, irrational though it may seem. It somehow seems difficult for them to keep things in perspective. I remember an incident a decade or so back, when a police van full of (sorry to disappoint you) policemen came to a neighbouring building and took away some 10-11 year old children because they were making too much noise while playing cricket. The van must have been filled with atleast a dozen cops. The way they got down from the van was quite dramatic - very commando-like. And when they took the children into 'custody', their mothers and everyone else, except the idiot, who had complained about the noise to the cops, were livid. The women gave an earful to the cops but the cops said they had to do this since someone had filed a complaint. That same month, there had been a spate of burglaries in the neighbourhood, and we had never seen any cops, let alone a police van, anywhere in the vicinity of our neighbourhood. Someone pointed this out to the cops as they were leaving. The cops were too shamefaced to reply. The parents eventually got the chidren released in a couple of hours, but I wonder what the cops were thinking. Was it necessary to take the children away? Were they not children at some point in their lives or did they become grown super-dumb cops right from their mother's womb?
4. The free-loader:
This type is a variation of the economist. Instead of hard currency, they just expect things to be free - right from a taxi ride to the mid-afternoon snack. After all they are protecting and serving you. Since you can't protect them, atleast return the favour half-way and serve them. This kind is usually found in India and very frequently found in Tanzania. I have not had the experience of meeting this type in the US, but if stereotypes are to be believed, they may be seen hanging around donut shops.
5. The blind cop:
A crime may be happening right in front of their eyes. But they don't do anything because they can't see it. Of course they may have some vested interest in letting the crime happen. I am very sure this kind is found everywhere in the world. I was shocked when I first came across this type. I must have been 13 and I was out in the open market with my father, buying vegetables. Open markets in Bombay (India in general) are chaotic. Lots of vendors, lots of people, lots of noise. As my father was buying stuff from a vendor, a few feet away, a local goon was trying to extort protection-money from another vendor. He was threatening the guy quite clearly and I could hear every word of what he was saying. A few feet away from him, there were 2 cops nonchalantly reading the newspaper. If I could see and hear the man, they could definitely see and hear him too. But they chose to do nothing. Maybe their duty was over and they were just chilling. Maybe they were going to get a share of the loot later on. Or maybe, they were actually 2 blind men reading the newspaper.
Like I said before, there are lot of good cops who do the uniform proud. But unfortunately no matter what they do, the bad ones will always be there to wipe out whatever goodwill they create in society. But again, if not for the bad ones, this post would not exist and I would not get to tell my friends that in India the cops swear at you first and then ask your name whereas in the US, they address you as 'Sir' and then ask your name. In either case, after the 'niceties' are over, in the end you are bound to get screwed.
Since writing good things about good people is anyway not very interesting, this post is dedicated to the jerk cop and not the good one. I have tried to categorize them as best as I can here, but this is by no means an exhaustive list, since my categorizations are based on first-hand experiences and second-hand accounts.
1. The economist
They are of the belief that any money on your person is present because of some mistake in the laws of distribution of money. But fear not, this mistake can be easily corrected. Very soon, you will find yourself taking money out from your pockets and handing it over to them. It does not matter how much the amount is, you should never have had that money in the first place.
I have had a few encounters with these type, but I vividly remember the first one. I must have been 19 or so. I was riding pillion on a motorcycle with my friend SN in Bombay. A 3-day college festival was in session and we were going to pick up something for some event. It was not SN's motorcycle and he was not very good at riding motorcycles anyway. So inevitably, the engine stalled at a traffic light and he just could not start it. Out of nowhere, a middle-aged cop appeared and pulled us to the side. This is how the conversation went:
Cop ordered SN in the local language (Marathi), "Show me your license."
SN replied in Marathi, "Here you go."
The cop looked at the license. "This is a learner's license."
SN smiled in agreement, "Yes."
The Cop turned to me and said in Marathi, "Show me your 'pakki' (meaning not learner's but actual full license) license."
I had no idea why he wanted my license since I was riding pillion. I was not aware that since SN had a learner's license, he was supposed to ride only with someone who had a 'pakki' license. My ignorance transformed into contempt and I replied with a slight hint of sarcasm in Hindi (which I am more comfortable in compared to Marathi), "I don't even have a learner's license let alone a 'pakki' license."
"Ok boys, I am going to have to impound the vehicle," smiled the cop.
We more or less had an idea where this was headed. So we started pleading. SN in Marathi and me in Hindi. We painted a picture as if the survival of civilization depended on our successfully obtaining the thing we were going to get.
The cop suddenly changed subjects and addressed me, "If you understand Marathi, why are you speaking in Hindi? This is Bombay and Bombay is in Maharashtra. This is Marathi-land. Speak in Marathi."
Although I wanted to carry on the fascinating discussion and point out the bigger picture to him that Maharashtra is in India and Hindi is the national language, so Hindi supercedes Marathi, I prudently desisted from it. Also, I had no idea what would happen if the boundaries of our discussion went beyond India. So I grovelled in Marathi, "OK sir. From now on, I will speak only in Marathi. Please let us go." If speaking in Marathi was what it took for us to be let go with the bike, then so be it.
With a sly smile, the cop said, "I can't let you go just like that. You have broken the law. You need to learn a lesson so that you remember not to do this in the future."
"We won't do this again sir. Is there some way we can be let go?"
At this time, all 3 of us knew what everyone was hinting at.
The cop continued, "I will have to fine you. Give me 200 bucks each."
"We don't have that much money."
"How much do you have?"
SN looked at his wallet and said "45 Rupees."
I said, "20 rupees."
The cop was disgusted. All this time had been wasted for 65 rupees when he could easily have spent his time much more effectively. But a man must make compromises. When life gives you lemons, you make lemonade. And he seemed to be one who would not only make the lemonade but also sell the seeds of the lemon to some farmer. He decalred, "65 rupees! OK, I am in a good mood. Hand it over and you can go."
If the cop was so shameless to take a measly 20 rupees from me, I had to one-up him on shamelessness. So I pleaded, "I need some money for the bus home. Can I get 5 back?"
I expected a verbal lashing for sure. Is it not against the protocol to ask for change when you are bribing someone? But surprisingly the cop still had some good in him. Shaking his head and giving me a 5 rupee note, he said, "Here you go. Now both of you scram and don't let me catch you again."
That was my first amongst a few other encounters with this kind of cop. I was suprised that he still took that small amount from us. But I guess it is the principle of the matter. He believed that it was never rightfully ours in the first place, so it must have been easy to take it from us.
I have not found this type of cop in the US yet, mostly because small-time corruption does not seem to be as prevalent amongst cops here as much as it is in India. I must say though that Tanzania, the other place where I have had a couple of encounters with cops and have also heard some stories from people, surpasses India in this matter.
2. The monarch
This kind is much worse than type 1 mentioned above. Type 1 looks like a harmless schoolgirl compared to the monarch. This type of cop belongs to the school of thought that a cop is the closest thing to a king. Unfortunately they also believe that their kingdom is mobile and radiates to about a few 100 feet from them in all directions, no matter where they are. These are the kinds who slap you first, swear at you and then ask you your name. If you are fortunate enough, after the slap, you probably will get a chance to file the complaint for which you had visited the police station in the first place. They look at criminals and non-criminals through the same jaundiced eyes. Readily found in all parts of India, at some point in their lives, I would like to believe that most of these power-trippers have their egos squashed underfoot by criminals as well as non-criminals. I know of atleast 2 or 3 incidents when this has happened. But I also know of many incidents where people were just abused for no reason and I have been present during a few of them. I am sure the power-tripper is also present in the US and I have been fortunate enough not to meet any. Especially since every cop here, unlike India, carries a gun.
3. The over-zealous bureaucrat
These are the kind who fail to see the larger picture and will go to ridiculous lengths to uphold the written word of the law, irrational though it may seem. It somehow seems difficult for them to keep things in perspective. I remember an incident a decade or so back, when a police van full of (sorry to disappoint you) policemen came to a neighbouring building and took away some 10-11 year old children because they were making too much noise while playing cricket. The van must have been filled with atleast a dozen cops. The way they got down from the van was quite dramatic - very commando-like. And when they took the children into 'custody', their mothers and everyone else, except the idiot, who had complained about the noise to the cops, were livid. The women gave an earful to the cops but the cops said they had to do this since someone had filed a complaint. That same month, there had been a spate of burglaries in the neighbourhood, and we had never seen any cops, let alone a police van, anywhere in the vicinity of our neighbourhood. Someone pointed this out to the cops as they were leaving. The cops were too shamefaced to reply. The parents eventually got the chidren released in a couple of hours, but I wonder what the cops were thinking. Was it necessary to take the children away? Were they not children at some point in their lives or did they become grown super-dumb cops right from their mother's womb?
4. The free-loader:
This type is a variation of the economist. Instead of hard currency, they just expect things to be free - right from a taxi ride to the mid-afternoon snack. After all they are protecting and serving you. Since you can't protect them, atleast return the favour half-way and serve them. This kind is usually found in India and very frequently found in Tanzania. I have not had the experience of meeting this type in the US, but if stereotypes are to be believed, they may be seen hanging around donut shops.
5. The blind cop:
A crime may be happening right in front of their eyes. But they don't do anything because they can't see it. Of course they may have some vested interest in letting the crime happen. I am very sure this kind is found everywhere in the world. I was shocked when I first came across this type. I must have been 13 and I was out in the open market with my father, buying vegetables. Open markets in Bombay (India in general) are chaotic. Lots of vendors, lots of people, lots of noise. As my father was buying stuff from a vendor, a few feet away, a local goon was trying to extort protection-money from another vendor. He was threatening the guy quite clearly and I could hear every word of what he was saying. A few feet away from him, there were 2 cops nonchalantly reading the newspaper. If I could see and hear the man, they could definitely see and hear him too. But they chose to do nothing. Maybe their duty was over and they were just chilling. Maybe they were going to get a share of the loot later on. Or maybe, they were actually 2 blind men reading the newspaper.
Like I said before, there are lot of good cops who do the uniform proud. But unfortunately no matter what they do, the bad ones will always be there to wipe out whatever goodwill they create in society. But again, if not for the bad ones, this post would not exist and I would not get to tell my friends that in India the cops swear at you first and then ask your name whereas in the US, they address you as 'Sir' and then ask your name. In either case, after the 'niceties' are over, in the end you are bound to get screwed.
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