Part of learning new things is doing them wrong. Sometimes repeatedly. But too often, we celebrate our successes while cowering from our failures. Failures are valuable and deserving of appropriate recognition. Many have caught on to the idea of celebrating failures, as is evident with the astounding success of FAILBlog. Still, driving a car into an empty pool is somehow more forgivable than driving a relationship into the ground.
India has been a succession of failures for me—failures I’m proud of and want to share with others. Communication has been one of my biggest challenges. Ironic, considering I’m fluent in the local language. Maybe because I look Indian and think American, people are less forgiving of my cultural incompetence, rendering social and professional interactions both amusing and painful. The business transaction as it exists in the States does not exist here. Rather, every transaction is a kind of social ballet requiring grace and tact. To cope, I replay my clumsy social fumbles with more apropos endings, practicing for the next time. I call this Interaction: Revised.
Interaction 1: Tiffin Auntie
Context: I get a tiffin, a kind of bento-box lunch, from this auntie who lives down the block. Because Gujaratis put sugar in everything, I told Auntie I had diabetes. Instead of sugar, Auntie put potatoes in everything so I had to break it down for her.
Me: Auntie, potatoes don’t agree with me. Stop putting them in everything. Bye.
Auntie: [Sadface] Oh. Ok.
I get home to find she has put extra of everything in my tiffin so it’ll last me a few extra days. I feel awful.
Interaction: Revised
Me: Auntie, I love your food. I’m getting so fat because it’s delicious! The doctor has actually asked me to cut back on starches because of my blood sugar. Would you mind putting less potatoes in the tiffin?
Auntie: [Smiling] No problem!
Lesson: Treating people like business transactions doesn’t work in India. Everything here is reliant on a complex web of relationships. Tiffin auntie is your Auntie first, and your food source second.
Interaction 2: Slum Youth
Context: We did a group meeting with our youth from all over the city. They come from some of the roughest neighborhoods in Ahmedabad, and they are doing amazing things for their communities, like running health awareness campaigns and organizing youth activists.
Youth: Ma’am, now we’ll come to Foreign [the U.S.] to visit you. Because you’re there now we have friends and family there too.
Me: [Silence / Looking awkward.]
Interaction: Revised
Youth: Ma’am, now we’ll come to Foreign to visit you!
Me: What you want to go to Foreign for? Look at me, coming all the way here for a job! Stay right where you are, you can get a great job in Ahmedabad. [This is true. SAATH’s Umeed program trains and places slum youth in corporate jobs.]
Lesson: Be truthful, in a nice way. It’s respectful to the other person. This was a tough one for me because I don’t want to make false promises, but I feel the burden of the privilege I enjoy. SAATH empowers youth to lead the best lives they can right where they are, which is a sustainable solution.
Interaction 3: Landlady
Context: Our rent is pretty steep by local standards. Our landlady thinks that she has all the rights of a landlord and none of the responsibilities. Her husband, our landlord, has no say in anything. I think she castrated him shortly after conceiving their second child.
Me: Auntie, our flat is infested with ants. They’re coming from everywhere. It’s uncontrollable. You must call someone to spray. They’re biting us in the night.
Auntie: This isn’t America where you can just call someone to spray your house. How can I pay an exterminator a third of what you pay for rent in the month?!
Me: [hangs head]
Interaction: Revised
Me: Auntie, our flat is infested.
Auntie: We can’t do anything about it. Deal with it.
Me: Auntie, I’m sorry I need to bother you, but where else can I go? It’s a strange town, where will we go?
Lesson: Stand up for yourself, and do it smiling. A little deference goes a long way. By the way, the last time we had an issue with the apartment, I stood up to Auntie. Things got done.
Interaction 4: Sangeet Teacher
Context: I want to learn to sing. I miss music. Lipi, from my office, gave me the number of this guy Mihir who teaches voice.
Me: [on phone] Hello, May I please speak to Mihirbhai?
Auntie: Lady, what do you want to talk to Mihir about? He’s just at school this morning, he’ll be home at 1 to take lunch and finish his lesson.
Me: Uhh…maybe I want to talk to his dad?
[I explain that I’m here from America and I want to learn to sing blah blah…]
Auntie: Oh! Don’t worry, I’ll tell Mihir you called and he’ll definitely give you a call when he gets home. You must come home for dinner one day too and meet all of us.
Lesson: Know who you’re talking to. Or else risk betrothal.
For the overly independent, India is a lesson in interdependence. At SAATH, I’m working to broker relationships between a variety of stakeholders, and communicate the lives of slum dwellers to the outside world. In India, I’m working on my own personal communications and PR strategy, pulling myself out of my shell and extending a hand into the hot desert sun.
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Meghna Shah is at SAATH, an Ahmedabad-based NGO that uses market-based strategies for poverty alleviation. Meghna is working on a communications strategy for the organization, and learning to say no in a nice way to aunties who want her to marry their sons.
