First days in India

I had never been to India before, and certainly never imagined that I would come here before visiting Europe, yet here I am, sitting in a conference room in the suburbs of Mumbai, writing this blog.

I arrived in Mumbai on Saturday, July 7^th. June through August are monsoon season, and I experienced this almost instantly. The rain poured down like nothing I had seen before. On the drive to my apartment that first night, it was tough to even see out the front windshield. I saw a card that had completely flipped over, most likely because of a combination of the rain, and the overly aggressive habits of Indian drivers. While if you simply judged people based on their driving style, you would think it was every man for themselves, yet this was juxtaposed by the fact that ten vehicles stopped after seeing the overturned car and then jointly helped to flip it back so that it was on its wheels. Everyone then got back in their cars and continued driving as though nothing had happened. To me, it was all a little bit of a shock.

On Sunday afternoon, I, along with my two Italian roommates and several other employees at VIVA group, the company I am working for, left for a six-hour drive to Pune. Pune is the 9^th largest city in India, but that wasn’t why we were going. We were going for Pandharpur Wari, or Wari. Wari is a pilgrimage made every year by farmers who live in Maharashtra (the state that Mumbai is in) from their home town to the temple in Pandharpur. They walk all day, and then seek shelter at night from organizations and people who volunteer their space. My boss was funding a dinner, and so we went to help serve around 1,500 of these pilgrim’s food. It was fun to be a part of these people’s holy journey and know that we were helping them along the way.

The next day, we went and gave out soap and snacks to the farmers, in an effort to help them persevere. This event had less of a positive vibe. Since we were giving these things away for free, many people became greedy and tried to take more than what they were allocated, at times becoming violent. It really puts things into perspective when these people are struggling to afford something as simple as soap. We gave out items to a few thousand people, and then hung out for a few hours and simply watched people walk past. We then headed back to Mumbai.

The rain between Saturday and Tuesday was described by some of my coworkers as the “worst rainstorm they had seen in 15 years.” Roads were flooded, trains weren’t running, restaurants and offices were closed, electric and cell phone service were down, and the city shut down. It was truly incredible simply how much rain was coming down from the sky.

On Wednesday, I went in to the office and got to meet some of the employees, but many still were not able to make it to work because of work and train closures. In the afternoon, I took a trip downtown with my roommates, another intern who is here and two of my boss’s assistants. We went to the Gateway of India and got to see the Taj Mahal Palace, the most famous hotel in Mumbai. We got lucky in that it did not rain for the whole afternoon. We then went to a kebab restaurant for dinner.

The food here has been pretty good. I get provided breakfast, lunch and dinner every day by my office. It is usually coffee and biscuits for breakfast. Then for lunch and dinner we will have chapati or roti with a potato-based dip and a chickpea-based dip that you eat with the bread. It is filling and makes life easy when all I have to do is show up at work and I get fed.

The working environment is much different in India than elsewhere. Because most people have to travel a long distance to get to work, the office hours are 10:30 AM to 7:00 PM, Monday through Saturday. The employees in my office are all either family or friends and tend to be very close. While almost everyone speaks English, most meetings are held in Hindi. The office also has several assistants who will bring food or drinks to you at your request. I can bring my dirty laundry to the office and I will get it back in three days’ time, washed and pressed. It’s different, but it focuses largely on hospitality, which makes it a very inviting environment.

I have several weeks ahead in Mumbai, but so far it has been an incredibly cultural experience. I got to travel to another city, go to a temple, visit several landmarks in Mumbai and have managed to eat my meals solely with my right hand.