I'll come to Finland tomorrow. I'll spend 20.12 - 23.12 in Tampere and the rest in Pori, and I'll return 27.12.
Why am I announcing it so late? Because this gig may end in January or in March, it is still being negotiated. I'd gladly skip a week of ice and cold should the gig end soon.
When coming here, they announced five (5) different dates to fly to India. Only the last one realized. Now they have announced 2 "final" dates when we should have hear how long this gig lasts, and neither has realized. Constant insecurity about future is one good reason to say no to offshore assignments. 80% of the announced dates won't hold.
perjantai 19. joulukuuta 2008
torstai 18. joulukuuta 2008
Work culture 3: GTD in India
For the first time since I read the GTD book, I have been unable to use it. Our work here is managed by a senior developer named Ajay. Typically, he delegates us tasks which take 1 - 3 days to complete. We have 1 - 3 tasks, we aim to close tasks which are not waiting anything.
Ajay actionalizes tasks for us, often giving very specific instructions on next actions. This reduces the need for to-do lists. We are also not supposed to remember much. My time perspective is usually 2 - 4 days forward. There's no point in maintaining to-do list, when I know that after completing the few actions in the list Ajay may tell me to do anything between heaven and earth.
This may sound stressful, but it's actually quite relaxing when you don't need to actionalize and prioritize all the time and you're not blamed for mistakes you forgot to fix a month ago.
First I had trouble adapting to this work culture and got some blame. Once I stopped caring everything started to go smoothly. Then Ajay delegated me two larger modules, which took weeks to complete. While writing those modules I was able to use GTD. Ironically, it was those periods which restored my reputation to normal levels.
Ajay actionalizes tasks for us, often giving very specific instructions on next actions. This reduces the need for to-do lists. We are also not supposed to remember much. My time perspective is usually 2 - 4 days forward. There's no point in maintaining to-do list, when I know that after completing the few actions in the list Ajay may tell me to do anything between heaven and earth.
This may sound stressful, but it's actually quite relaxing when you don't need to actionalize and prioritize all the time and you're not blamed for mistakes you forgot to fix a month ago.
First I had trouble adapting to this work culture and got some blame. Once I stopped caring everything started to go smoothly. Then Ajay delegated me two larger modules, which took weeks to complete. While writing those modules I was able to use GTD. Ironically, it was those periods which restored my reputation to normal levels.
Work culture 2: GTD and Finnish laissez-faire
In high school psychology books, they told about 3 management style:
In Finland I've seen many projects run in laissez-faire mode. The boss gives a high-level goal, and his underlings tell how their next actions help reach the goal. As long as the boss sees progress instead of slack, he doesn't interfere. There are two scenarios where this is especially common.
Firstly, trainees who do demos or tools are often left to their own devices. Especially if you are second year and know the habits of the house, the order can well be "Build a graphical user interface. Write a design document on how you would do that." When you submit the design document, you are told to implement it.
Secondly, in two late projects with a tight deadline the project was split into a well-run core and laissez-faire run perimeter. I was placed to the perimeter. The core employees had enough challenge doing their own work, and they appreciated that support tasks just got done and they could put full attention to the stuff that matters.
Laissez-faire requires that people are college educated, because that's pretty much the only environment for masses to learn laissez-faire. Also, people who pass the college filter tend to have enough future time orientation to understand the link between freedom and personal responsiblity, and to choose freedom and responsibility over slacking when they can.
When I first met laissez-faire, I found it confusing. I had just arrived from high school and army and a family where parents had unquestioned authority. I was unsure about myself and what was expected from me, and found lack of direct negative feedback (or any feedback) to be distrubing. Only after reading GTD I learned to love laissez-faire. With GTD, all you need is the high-level goal and you can actionalize the rest yourself. If you are unsure, just ask if the next actions on your list are what they should be. Running GTD is also enough to fill all reasonable productivity expectations that others pile on me.
- Hierarchical:The boss tells you what to do.
- Democratic:Workers discuss how to reach the goal of the team. Boss decides in absence of consensus and enforces consensus.
- Laissez-faire:Boss doesn't interfere as long as things go on.
In Finland I've seen many projects run in laissez-faire mode. The boss gives a high-level goal, and his underlings tell how their next actions help reach the goal. As long as the boss sees progress instead of slack, he doesn't interfere. There are two scenarios where this is especially common.
Firstly, trainees who do demos or tools are often left to their own devices. Especially if you are second year and know the habits of the house, the order can well be "Build a graphical user interface. Write a design document on how you would do that." When you submit the design document, you are told to implement it.
Secondly, in two late projects with a tight deadline the project was split into a well-run core and laissez-faire run perimeter. I was placed to the perimeter. The core employees had enough challenge doing their own work, and they appreciated that support tasks just got done and they could put full attention to the stuff that matters.
Laissez-faire requires that people are college educated, because that's pretty much the only environment for masses to learn laissez-faire. Also, people who pass the college filter tend to have enough future time orientation to understand the link between freedom and personal responsiblity, and to choose freedom and responsibility over slacking when they can.
When I first met laissez-faire, I found it confusing. I had just arrived from high school and army and a family where parents had unquestioned authority. I was unsure about myself and what was expected from me, and found lack of direct negative feedback (or any feedback) to be distrubing. Only after reading GTD I learned to love laissez-faire. With GTD, all you need is the high-level goal and you can actionalize the rest yourself. If you are unsure, just ask if the next actions on your list are what they should be. Running GTD is also enough to fill all reasonable productivity expectations that others pile on me.
Work culture 1: Background - Getting Things Done
Getting Things Done (GTD) is a systematic way to maintain to-do lists and to bring clarity to work. The system was first described in David Allen's book and it enjoys legendary reputation in self-help circles. The difference between Indian and Finnish work culture crystallizes in GTD, so I'll describe it in detail.
Suppose you need a doghouse to your summer cottage. You write a to-do list about things to remember next weekend when going to there:
GTD has some simple rules for each to-do item, and this list violates them all. First of all, you must list actions which you can execute. How do you "doghouse"? Same in the action form:
Secondly, GTD aims at closing to-do item by finishing them. It also wants to make it easy to start activity by forcing you to think difficult questions beforehand so that all you need to do is to execute. That's why each to-do item must have first action and end criterion:
At this point you remember that a friend of yours has a shed and construction equipment, and a hardware store near you had exhibition of playhouses. You have more options:
This illustrates the division actions into subactions. Actions get split into smaller and smaller pieces until the goal is reached or abandoned.
GTD also classifies the actions. Pending actions are something you can do anytime. Deferred actions require that something happens before you can do them. Non-actionable items lack either first action or end criterion. They need more thinking before they can be done. Delegated actions are given to someone else to execute. GTD also recommends dating actions, since it's quick and can prove useful:
Why do we have category non-actionable for badly thought to-do items? Because there is one more rule above all: The to-do list must contain everything you need to do to achieve the goal. If your relative has an unused doghouse outside his home and you consider asking him, then the list is incomplete. You can to desribe actions on high abstraction level where you know they need to be split - for example, building a doghouse - but it is not ok to leave actions unlisted. Getting a doghouse for free is not included in any of the actions in the prevous list.
GTD brings clarity to work by enabling you to concentrate fully to the task at hand. When reading assembly instructions you don't have a lingering doubt that maybe you really should just visit Bauhaus or ask your friend. You know that visiting Bauhaus and asking your friend stay in the list and you'll remember them because the list reminds you about them. So just keep reading the instructions so you can close one item from the list.
Action item: Something you can do and which contains the first action and the end criterion.
Actionable: A goal is actionable for you if you can affect it by executing or not executing action items. For example, "prepare for depression" isn't actionable for me at work, because my actions don't have any effect on my employer's abiliy to weather depression.
Actionalize: To split a goal into actions.
2-minute rule: If it takes less than 2 minutes, do it immediately. If it takes more, write it to the to-do list.
Time management Far too difficult...everything takes twice the estimated time (at least), deciding your next actions with GTD is easy and usually enough, and someone else sets the schedule anyway, so why bother.
What are the next actions? A question which you will start asking more often if you use GTD - non-actionable or non-actionalized goals become bullshitty and suspicious.
I've found GTD to be indispensable at programming work. When I don't quite know what I should do next and feel irresistible urge to procrastinate by browsing web, it's usually time to fire up GTD list and split the goal into more specific actions.
Often I have quite a lot of freedom on how to do my area of responsibility. Very often when programming, I notice that some spot of code is suspicious, looks potentially wrong or has far-reaching implications to other parts of the program. With GTD I no longer face the choice continuing what I'm doing or interrupting it. I simply list all things I need to revisit later, and I never forget them because things don't drop from GTD lists before I consciously remove them. Usually I have 20 - 50 actions, but once when I also was responsible for other people's work I had 200 items.
GTD's way of thinking fits perfectly to my analytic and textual mind, but it's not for everyone. Some people who have natural ability to get much done consider it snake-oilish. But I know that it struck straight to the weaknesses of my mind, and my reaction was "Why didn't anyone tell this before?"
Another crticism is that it doesn't matter how much you get done, since your wage depends on years of service, and your productivity only benefits people who do 6-hour work day and get paid double for it. This is a matter of attitude. Do you believe that the skills you develop at work will prove valuable to you? Answer no and GTD is a miserable and miguided effort of lifeless fools. Answer yes and you see productivity as the derivative of your skill (the more you get done, the more you see and learn) and with GTD you get more out of the time you have to do anyway.
Basics
Suppose you need a doghouse to your summer cottage. You write a to-do list about things to remember next weekend when going to there:
- ...
- Doghouse
- ...
GTD has some simple rules for each to-do item, and this list violates them all. First of all, you must list actions which you can execute. How do you "doghouse"? Same in the action form:
- ...
- Buy a doghouse if you find one
- Build a doghuose if they are expensive or hard to find
- ...
Secondly, GTD aims at closing to-do item by finishing them. It also wants to make it easy to start activity by forcing you to think difficult questions beforehand so that all you need to do is to execute. That's why each to-do item must have first action and end criterion:
- ...
- Find out how to buy a doghouse. First action: Search online for doghouse providers. Finished when you have a chart which lists most important sources (hardware stores, Huuto auctions, etc.) and their addresses.
- Find out how to build a doghouse. First action: Search for assembly instructions for a doghouse. Finished when you have read and bookmarked a page.
- ...
At this point you remember that a friend of yours has a shed and construction equipment, and a hardware store near you had exhibition of playhouses. You have more options:
- ...
- Buy a doghouse
- Find out online how to buy a doghouse. First action: Search online for doghouse providers. Finished when you have a chart which lists most important sources (hardware stores, auctions, etc.) and their addresses.
- Visit the local Bauhaus. First action: Get there. Finished when you know what's available in the doghouse section.
- Find out how to build a doghouse.
- First action: Search for assembly instructions for a doghouse. Finished when you have read and bookmarked a page.
- Ask Pekka how he would build a doghouse. First action: Raise the question next time you go to beer. Finished when he answers it.
This illustrates the division actions into subactions. Actions get split into smaller and smaller pieces until the goal is reached or abandoned.
GTD also classifies the actions. Pending actions are something you can do anytime. Deferred actions require that something happens before you can do them. Non-actionable items lack either first action or end criterion. They need more thinking before they can be done. Delegated actions are given to someone else to execute. GTD also recommends dating actions, since it's quick and can prove useful:
- ...
- Buy a doghouse [19.12.2008]
- Find out online how to buy a doghouse. First action: Search online for doghouse providers. Finished when you have a chart which lists most important sources (hardware stores, auctions, etc.) and their addresses. [19.12.2008] (pending)
- Visit the local Bauhaus. First action: Get there. Finished when you know what's available in doghouse section. [19.12.2008] (pending)
- Find out how to build a doghouse. [19.12.2008] (deferred until you have concluded that buying one isn't easy and cheap)
- First action: Search for assembly instructions for a doghouse. Finished when you have read and bookmarked a page. [19.12.2008] (pending)
- Ask Pekka how he would build a doghouse. First action: Raise the question next time you go to beer. Finished he answereds it. [19.12.2008] (pending)
Why do we have category non-actionable for badly thought to-do items? Because there is one more rule above all: The to-do list must contain everything you need to do to achieve the goal. If your relative has an unused doghouse outside his home and you consider asking him, then the list is incomplete. You can to desribe actions on high abstraction level where you know they need to be split - for example, building a doghouse - but it is not ok to leave actions unlisted. Getting a doghouse for free is not included in any of the actions in the prevous list.
GTD brings clarity to work by enabling you to concentrate fully to the task at hand. When reading assembly instructions you don't have a lingering doubt that maybe you really should just visit Bauhaus or ask your friend. You know that visiting Bauhaus and asking your friend stay in the list and you'll remember them because the list reminds you about them. So just keep reading the instructions so you can close one item from the list.
Fundamental concepts
Action item: Something you can do and which contains the first action and the end criterion.
Actionable: A goal is actionable for you if you can affect it by executing or not executing action items. For example, "prepare for depression" isn't actionable for me at work, because my actions don't have any effect on my employer's abiliy to weather depression.
Actionalize: To split a goal into actions.
2-minute rule: If it takes less than 2 minutes, do it immediately. If it takes more, write it to the to-do list.
Time management Far too difficult...everything takes twice the estimated time (at least), deciding your next actions with GTD is easy and usually enough, and someone else sets the schedule anyway, so why bother.
What are the next actions? A question which you will start asking more often if you use GTD - non-actionable or non-actionalized goals become bullshitty and suspicious.
GTD and me
I've found GTD to be indispensable at programming work. When I don't quite know what I should do next and feel irresistible urge to procrastinate by browsing web, it's usually time to fire up GTD list and split the goal into more specific actions.
Often I have quite a lot of freedom on how to do my area of responsibility. Very often when programming, I notice that some spot of code is suspicious, looks potentially wrong or has far-reaching implications to other parts of the program. With GTD I no longer face the choice continuing what I'm doing or interrupting it. I simply list all things I need to revisit later, and I never forget them because things don't drop from GTD lists before I consciously remove them. Usually I have 20 - 50 actions, but once when I also was responsible for other people's work I had 200 items.
GTD's way of thinking fits perfectly to my analytic and textual mind, but it's not for everyone. Some people who have natural ability to get much done consider it snake-oilish. But I know that it struck straight to the weaknesses of my mind, and my reaction was "Why didn't anyone tell this before?"
Another crticism is that it doesn't matter how much you get done, since your wage depends on years of service, and your productivity only benefits people who do 6-hour work day and get paid double for it. This is a matter of attitude. Do you believe that the skills you develop at work will prove valuable to you? Answer no and GTD is a miserable and miguided effort of lifeless fools. Answer yes and you see productivity as the derivative of your skill (the more you get done, the more you see and learn) and with GTD you get more out of the time you have to do anyway.
Indian work culture and GTD
The next 3 posts compare Finnish and Indian work culture. To sum it up, GTD is necessary in Finland but impossible to use in India.
keskiviikko 17. joulukuuta 2008
Movie review: Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi (2008)
Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi is a romantic comedy where a dancing competition (Dancing Jodi) play a big role. Surinder Sahni is a regular guy who works for Punjabi Power and leads monotonous life, a stereotypical beta male. Taani is a young woman who faces hardship as his prospective husband dies and his father gets a heart attack.
In his deathbed, Taani's father tells Taani and Surinder to marry, because Sur is the only man he can entrust Taani. Taani agrees, but tells that he can never love Sur. It's a romantic comedy which happens inside an arranged marriage.
Taani wants to join a dancing course, and Sur gives him the money. On a whim, Sur also goes to the dancing course but only after his friend Bobby talks him around to dress with a new haircut, fashionable clothes and playboy attitude, completely changing his outlook.
When dancing course participants are paired for dancing competition, Taani and Sur happen to get the same number, but Taani doesn't recognize him because of the vast difference in dress and flirty alpha male behaviour. This goes on and is the central tension of the movie.
In Western movies, there's no way a boring, hesitant 40-something beta male could marry a young dancing girl because of the difference in sexual market value. In this movie, Taani hates both "beta Sur's" lack of initative and atttitude, and also "alpha Sur's" pretentious macho role. The message of the movie is that a good Indian man should be a balanced combination of provider beta and flamboyant alpha roles. Women like men whose personality works for them in a wide variety of situations.
The movie is driven by the personalities of Shahrukh Khan (a huge star in Bollywood) and Anushka Sharma. The cinematic storytelling was great, the film was comprehensible despite being a Hindi movie without English subtitles. Dancing scenes were great and they expressed the joy of love and the tension of sexual market value difference better than any amount of Western-style close pictures about faces can. Western movies miss a lot by not including dance scenes. It could have been shorter though.
tiistai 16. joulukuuta 2008
The economics of 100-fold wage differences
Imagine that you could hire a worker for 25 euros a month, provided that you pay housing and a few meals. What consequences would it have?
Finnish mentality is that when you are at work, you should be doing some task which fulfills the goals of the organization (this includes being on watch for orders). If you're not, then the work is not well organized or you're lazy.
But if work is cheap, why bother about efficiency. Downtime and idleness are ok. For example, our auto driver waits in the hall for the 8-9 hours that we are at work. Since wage gap is so big, it's not a big hit.
Secondly, if you really need to get something done, you can afford to hire several people to do the job, and possibly even to supervise them. In many restaurants and guardspots in Hyderabad, you see disproportionate number or workers in a workplace. At extreme, a restaurant can have 10 people in the kitchen and at the table waiting without many customers being visible before we arrive.
Let's compare two ways to arrange auto rides. In "taxi model" you have highly independet drivers who drive for different customers. They may have schedules where they have to be at certain places at certain times. In "chauffeur model" you have a dedicated driver for each customer. The chauffeurs wait for their customers.
Suppose we have 10 groups who need transportation. Because of schedule overlaps, they would need 10 chauffeurs or 3 taxi drivers for their transportation needs. In the taxi model, the 10 - 3 = 7 remaining drivers would be free to do other work. Total utility would be higher in the taxi model, because in the chauffeur model nobody would do the work of the 7 more people who are reserved.
Also suppose that the customers are willing to pay equal amount for chauffeurs or taxis. In the taxi model each taxi driver would get x/3 money while in chauffeur model they would get x/10 money.
This way big wage differences cause big Pareto inefficiency in total utility. This does not mean that small wage differences are optimal either - in Finland, lots of valuable work which is nevertheless less valuable than minimum union pay is not done at all because you can't pay workers a lower pay which matches the value the job would create.
This inefficiency must be a huge factor in keeping India a developing country.
In army, serving is defined in terms of hierarchy rather than job task or area of responsibility. Soldiers do what they are told to do, rather than doing some specific tasks. They are serving successfully when they obey the orders of their superiors. If their superiors don't give them orders, then idling is ok.
Defining work by hierarchy is inefficient in most cases, because independent mindset enables workers to complete much more difficult tasks by using common sense and asking questions and spending time to finding out rather than just doing what they are told. Also people are willing to put extra effort when it enables them to get better control of their day. Control over own work is a big motivator.
Large wage differences make it affordable to put hierarchy above job tasks and areas of responsibility, since you can afford inefficiency. The result is a more hierarchical work culture.
When work is cheap, some of it is inevitably wasted. Guards are posted on locations where they know they don't serve any purpose and decorations are built on whim without much planning for beauty or visibility. This teaches people not to pay too much attention to the significance of work they do.
Another for of insignificance is replacability. People know they are insignificant if they are one in a big group doing identical things. If they know that monetarily and rule-wise it would be trivial to fire them but their track record of obedience and getting things done keeps them employed. In case of just following orders even track record may not carry much weight.
Yes, the difference between our wages is about 100-fold according to our best guesses. When we came to house, we didn't know that they include house servants. That's how little their wage is from the total rent. Their role is to clean our clothes, rooms and make breakfast.
We could tell them to do stuff, but I can't imagine much anything they could do for us. Upstairs they have told them to get booze from the wine shop but even that is easier done ourselves: we drive past wine shop everyday and when we shop ourselves we can see what's available and try new options.
The attitudes of the house servants are quite servile, they are ready to do things for us and understand the full implications of huge imbalance in economic bargaining power.
He doesn't speak much English so I can't effectively interview him. Cleaning and breakfast are done identically every day. I'm sure we would ask some different kind of breakfast sometimes if communication worked fluently.
Frankly, I have great problems understanding the need and existence of servant tradition, which is not even organized around the "taxi model" of one house servant going through a large batch or flats. Manoj, my Indan coworker in Finland described it in the following way:
"Having a servant or helper is not a strange concept in India. May be we got this culture from the British. But you know, there are little too many people there and all of them have to be in some jobs to make their living. Since the salary levels of servants are not high, many people can afford them. But this is not true in all places. In my home town in Kerala, getting a good servant for reasonable monthly payment is one of the most difficult task for most of the families. And there servants switch the jobs quite often as the demand for them is bit too high. Also those servants usually work in multiple homes as "time shifts", something like 2 hours in every home. They do various jobs like, cleaning, washing, cooking etc. It is bit similar to cleaners in Finland. One difference in Finland is that there are machines for almost everything and workers don't have to do lot of manual job and those cleaners might be permanent employees of some company and eligible for all social security benefits like any other employees, which is not the case in India. Also the salary levels of cleaners are so high that people in here can't think of their home cleaned everyday by cleaners, even if they don't want to do their job :)
The system of servant living in your home is not very common atleast in my place. They usually come and finish the work and go to their home. In Hyderabad and in some other big cities, there is the concept like servant and his/her family stays in a small out-house next to your home or nearby. This is because the servants are from a very far place from the city that they can't commute to their home daily. Some house owners like to keep a servant when he/she is giving his house or apartment for rent, for the reason that he wants to keep his house clean and well maintained. The owners think that the tenants don't maintain the house well, which is very often true. Especially with unmarried Indian males :)
Hope you can communicate with the servant in English. Some servants have a bad reputation of stealing money and valuable things. So keep your valuables locked. You can even lock your bedroom or other room, where you keep most of your valuables. People do that. I don't know if that is the reason that all Indian rooms can be separately locked too, unlike in Finland :) Then for cleaning that particular room, you can ask the servant to do it when you are present, on weekends for example."
(The emphasis on overpopulation comment was mine. In the agribusiness post, also Bandi agreed that India is overpopulated.)
If it's cheap, buy more than you need
Finnish mentality is that when you are at work, you should be doing some task which fulfills the goals of the organization (this includes being on watch for orders). If you're not, then the work is not well organized or you're lazy.
But if work is cheap, why bother about efficiency. Downtime and idleness are ok. For example, our auto driver waits in the hall for the 8-9 hours that we are at work. Since wage gap is so big, it's not a big hit.
Secondly, if you really need to get something done, you can afford to hire several people to do the job, and possibly even to supervise them. In many restaurants and guardspots in Hyderabad, you see disproportionate number or workers in a workplace. At extreme, a restaurant can have 10 people in the kitchen and at the table waiting without many customers being visible before we arrive.
Inefficiency
Let's compare two ways to arrange auto rides. In "taxi model" you have highly independet drivers who drive for different customers. They may have schedules where they have to be at certain places at certain times. In "chauffeur model" you have a dedicated driver for each customer. The chauffeurs wait for their customers.
Suppose we have 10 groups who need transportation. Because of schedule overlaps, they would need 10 chauffeurs or 3 taxi drivers for their transportation needs. In the taxi model, the 10 - 3 = 7 remaining drivers would be free to do other work. Total utility would be higher in the taxi model, because in the chauffeur model nobody would do the work of the 7 more people who are reserved.
Also suppose that the customers are willing to pay equal amount for chauffeurs or taxis. In the taxi model each taxi driver would get x/3 money while in chauffeur model they would get x/10 money.
This way big wage differences cause big Pareto inefficiency in total utility. This does not mean that small wage differences are optimal either - in Finland, lots of valuable work which is nevertheless less valuable than minimum union pay is not done at all because you can't pay workers a lower pay which matches the value the job would create.
This inefficiency must be a huge factor in keeping India a developing country.
Hierarchy over work tasks
In army, serving is defined in terms of hierarchy rather than job task or area of responsibility. Soldiers do what they are told to do, rather than doing some specific tasks. They are serving successfully when they obey the orders of their superiors. If their superiors don't give them orders, then idling is ok.
- They can never say "I competed my tasks, I'll go to leisure now."
- They can't effectively plan into future, because the don't know their superior's orders.
Defining work by hierarchy is inefficient in most cases, because independent mindset enables workers to complete much more difficult tasks by using common sense and asking questions and spending time to finding out rather than just doing what they are told. Also people are willing to put extra effort when it enables them to get better control of their day. Control over own work is a big motivator.
Large wage differences make it affordable to put hierarchy above job tasks and areas of responsibility, since you can afford inefficiency. The result is a more hierarchical work culture.
Insignificance
When work is cheap, some of it is inevitably wasted. Guards are posted on locations where they know they don't serve any purpose and decorations are built on whim without much planning for beauty or visibility. This teaches people not to pay too much attention to the significance of work they do.
Another for of insignificance is replacability. People know they are insignificant if they are one in a big group doing identical things. If they know that monetarily and rule-wise it would be trivial to fire them but their track record of obedience and getting things done keeps them employed. In case of just following orders even track record may not carry much weight.
Case study: Solomon the house servant
Yes, the difference between our wages is about 100-fold according to our best guesses. When we came to house, we didn't know that they include house servants. That's how little their wage is from the total rent. Their role is to clean our clothes, rooms and make breakfast.
We could tell them to do stuff, but I can't imagine much anything they could do for us. Upstairs they have told them to get booze from the wine shop but even that is easier done ourselves: we drive past wine shop everyday and when we shop ourselves we can see what's available and try new options.
The attitudes of the house servants are quite servile, they are ready to do things for us and understand the full implications of huge imbalance in economic bargaining power.
He doesn't speak much English so I can't effectively interview him. Cleaning and breakfast are done identically every day. I'm sure we would ask some different kind of breakfast sometimes if communication worked fluently.
Frankly, I have great problems understanding the need and existence of servant tradition, which is not even organized around the "taxi model" of one house servant going through a large batch or flats. Manoj, my Indan coworker in Finland described it in the following way:
"Having a servant or helper is not a strange concept in India. May be we got this culture from the British. But you know, there are little too many people there and all of them have to be in some jobs to make their living. Since the salary levels of servants are not high, many people can afford them. But this is not true in all places. In my home town in Kerala, getting a good servant for reasonable monthly payment is one of the most difficult task for most of the families. And there servants switch the jobs quite often as the demand for them is bit too high. Also those servants usually work in multiple homes as "time shifts", something like 2 hours in every home. They do various jobs like, cleaning, washing, cooking etc. It is bit similar to cleaners in Finland. One difference in Finland is that there are machines for almost everything and workers don't have to do lot of manual job and those cleaners might be permanent employees of some company and eligible for all social security benefits like any other employees, which is not the case in India. Also the salary levels of cleaners are so high that people in here can't think of their home cleaned everyday by cleaners, even if they don't want to do their job :)
The system of servant living in your home is not very common atleast in my place. They usually come and finish the work and go to their home. In Hyderabad and in some other big cities, there is the concept like servant and his/her family stays in a small out-house next to your home or nearby. This is because the servants are from a very far place from the city that they can't commute to their home daily. Some house owners like to keep a servant when he/she is giving his house or apartment for rent, for the reason that he wants to keep his house clean and well maintained. The owners think that the tenants don't maintain the house well, which is very often true. Especially with unmarried Indian males :)
Hope you can communicate with the servant in English. Some servants have a bad reputation of stealing money and valuable things. So keep your valuables locked. You can even lock your bedroom or other room, where you keep most of your valuables. People do that. I don't know if that is the reason that all Indian rooms can be separately locked too, unlike in Finland :) Then for cleaning that particular room, you can ask the servant to do it when you are present, on weekends for example."
(The emphasis on overpopulation comment was mine. In the agribusiness post, also Bandi agreed that India is overpopulated.)
maanantai 15. joulukuuta 2008
My beautiful neighbourhood
We live in My Home Navadweepa apartment complex. The quality is about the smae as your standard concerete subsurb in Finland, except for a few differences.
The area is surrounded by wall and guarded. Since work is cheap here, security guards are vastly more common than in Finland.
The walls are surrounded by barbed wire. In general, security measures do not mean that there is a threat nor that security would be very effective. Indians are chill, laid back and bribable folk, we haven't experienced any threat of crime against us, but neither do we put much trust on security organizations which would be impenetrable if run by Finns.
9 floors in 3 apartment blocks.
The area contains a small store, a gym, a barber's shop, a swimming pool, a playground, a tennis court and a badminton court.
The central square has celebrations on weekends. They play loud music and there is variable amount of people depending on the event. The most noisy and popular event thus far was a talent contest near Diwali where the occupants had prepared dance and song shows and there were also outside pro performers and food being sold.
Around the house there is a jogging track which is surrounded by delicately maintained flower beds on both sides. This level of detail simply wouldn't be possible in Finland because of the cost of work involved.
The rooms are a bit oldish by Finnish standards. The concept of a single-person room is still new to Indians, so there are double beds. The kitchens have microwave ovens and gas stoves. Air conditioning is present in every room, a necessity in hot Indian summer.
The public space.
Solomon, the house servant in our flat. When we signed the rent contract, we didn't know that the apartments include a house servant each. I'd love to include an interview of him, but he doesn't speak enough English. More about him in the next post.
- Only about 5% of Indians can afford to live like this, so people here correspond to Finnish middle class by their occupations and values.
- since work is cheap here, there are guards and intricate flower beds around the house.
- Thirdly, everything is tightly packed while in Finland there is lots of park around this kind of housing.
The area is surrounded by wall and guarded. Since work is cheap here, security guards are vastly more common than in Finland.
The walls are surrounded by barbed wire. In general, security measures do not mean that there is a threat nor that security would be very effective. Indians are chill, laid back and bribable folk, we haven't experienced any threat of crime against us, but neither do we put much trust on security organizations which would be impenetrable if run by Finns.
9 floors in 3 apartment blocks.
The area contains a small store, a gym, a barber's shop, a swimming pool, a playground, a tennis court and a badminton court.
The central square has celebrations on weekends. They play loud music and there is variable amount of people depending on the event. The most noisy and popular event thus far was a talent contest near Diwali where the occupants had prepared dance and song shows and there were also outside pro performers and food being sold.
Around the house there is a jogging track which is surrounded by delicately maintained flower beds on both sides. This level of detail simply wouldn't be possible in Finland because of the cost of work involved.
The rooms are a bit oldish by Finnish standards. The concept of a single-person room is still new to Indians, so there are double beds. The kitchens have microwave ovens and gas stoves. Air conditioning is present in every room, a necessity in hot Indian summer.
The public space.
Solomon, the house servant in our flat. When we signed the rent contract, we didn't know that the apartments include a house servant each. I'd love to include an interview of him, but he doesn't speak enough English. More about him in the next post.
maanantai 8. joulukuuta 2008
Diwali - the festival of light
At Diwali the air of Hyderabad is thick with explosions and gunpowder smoke.
It is one of the 3 big festivals here, and it is celebrated with firecrackers.
Firecrackers have pictures of illegally cute girls partying as well as cartoon figures, in clear contrast to Finnish winter war themed naming convention. They are not considered dangerous in the same way as in Finland, but are given to very young people.
The air is thick with smoke.
In our apartment complex there was a street where people were shooting firecrackers. They shot them within 5 meters of each others, and the whole length of the street was in use and bathing in light. In thickly populated Hyderabad everything is done in dense groups.
Also houses were decorated Christmas style.
In front of doors there were Diwali lamps.
It is one of the 3 big festivals here, and it is celebrated with firecrackers.
Firecrackers have pictures of illegally cute girls partying as well as cartoon figures, in clear contrast to Finnish winter war themed naming convention. They are not considered dangerous in the same way as in Finland, but are given to very young people.
The air is thick with smoke.
In our apartment complex there was a street where people were shooting firecrackers. They shot them within 5 meters of each others, and the whole length of the street was in use and bathing in light. In thickly populated Hyderabad everything is done in dense groups.
Also houses were decorated Christmas style.
In front of doors there were Diwali lamps.
sunnuntai 30. marraskuuta 2008
City pics
The area where these pics were taken is quite average in Hyderabad, but less clean than the place where we live.
Not so maintained buildings, drying clothes, people and vehicles everywhere.
Buildings in Hyderabad are either under construction or decaying. Decay starts as soon as the building is ready. This house is in the last stages of the decay cycle - it's often difficult to say whether such buildings are in use or being demolished.
Piles of rubble everywhere.
Not so maintained buildings, drying clothes, people and vehicles everywhere.
Buildings in Hyderabad are either under construction or decaying. Decay starts as soon as the building is ready. This house is in the last stages of the decay cycle - it's often difficult to say whether such buildings are in use or being demolished.
Piles of rubble everywhere.
torstai 27. marraskuuta 2008
Death is everywhere ... there are flies on the windscreen.
Yesterday one of us four got a medical shock, but recovered quickly.
It started in the gym. Me and Matti go to gym quite often as there is little else to do here. While doing foot press he joked "This is definitely gonna take life someday." After some heavy training he felt faint and lied down on a carpet for a few minutes, deciding to go to home to rest.
When I saw him next time down on the grass, after being alarmed by a bypasser, he was conscious but utterly red, dizzy and complaining about thirst and hotness. At that point, someone had already called an ambulance. He had called Sami, and soon Sami came from their common flat. The crowd increased gradually from 2 people to 20. Giving water to drink and sprinkling it on him made him better, so it was decided to wait for an ambulance rather than accepting generous offer to drive him to hospital.
The ambulance came in 20 minutes, and the drive to hospital took another 15. Luckily, drinking and sprinkling water always seemed to improve his condition. In the hospital, he started to feel ok first as long as he drank and didn't move, then all the time. After one hour they sent us back to apartment.
Today he went for examinations at 9.30, and they apparently found something as they want to keep him through the night there. I expect to hear more facts tomorrow.
The obvious explanation is that hard training and sweating caused liquid imbalance, but this is only part of the story. He had eaten an hour before the exercise, and he had a bottle of water with him. Also, he was an experienced gymgoer, who had also done some mistakes and felt the pain in his younger, crazier years. He did everything the correct way.
Now it seems that it was the first warning sign of something more serious: Why would they keep him in hospital if the tests didn't show anything strange? Why would a healthy young man who eats and drinks properly get such a shock in a regular gym exercise? It's shit that could have happened to anyone.
The locals were very helpful and did a lot for us. They realized that we may not know the ways of Indian healthcare system. Here's a short list of what they did:
When enough people spend enough months on a foreign assignment, it is inevitable that someone dies, since immortality vaccination isn't available. The only question is how.
On my fear list, accidents and health problems go way over terror strikes. The traffic here is chaotic, one of us is already taking blood pressure medication and another just underwent an attack.
Mumbai has 20 million inhabitants while Tampere has 340000. A terror strike which kills 100 people in Mumbai would increase overall death rate as much as a robber who kills 2 people in Tampere. If some psychotic junkie bank robber killed two hostages in Tampere before getting deservedly sniped by Karhu commandos, would you cancel your trip there?
Most hours of the full day we spend either at work or in the apartment complex. Neither is a "location favored by foreigners". Quite the contrary: We are the rare white niggers who draw attention wherever we may roam. In many tourist places people want to have a common photo with us. We seldom see others of our own race: In the rare days when I see a white-skinned girl I can't help staring for a moment. A strike against Westerners would be directed elsewhere.
Unfortunately, Hyderabad has also had its share of bomb strikes in earlier years.
Let's hope that Indian police reduces everyone's risk factors by giving the terrorists and their organizers what they deserve. That will also decrese the oppression of Muslims by crackpot fundamentalists.
Timeline of events
It started in the gym. Me and Matti go to gym quite often as there is little else to do here. While doing foot press he joked "This is definitely gonna take life someday." After some heavy training he felt faint and lied down on a carpet for a few minutes, deciding to go to home to rest.
When I saw him next time down on the grass, after being alarmed by a bypasser, he was conscious but utterly red, dizzy and complaining about thirst and hotness. At that point, someone had already called an ambulance. He had called Sami, and soon Sami came from their common flat. The crowd increased gradually from 2 people to 20. Giving water to drink and sprinkling it on him made him better, so it was decided to wait for an ambulance rather than accepting generous offer to drive him to hospital.
The ambulance came in 20 minutes, and the drive to hospital took another 15. Luckily, drinking and sprinkling water always seemed to improve his condition. In the hospital, he started to feel ok first as long as he drank and didn't move, then all the time. After one hour they sent us back to apartment.
Today he went for examinations at 9.30, and they apparently found something as they want to keep him through the night there. I expect to hear more facts tomorrow.
Shit happens
The obvious explanation is that hard training and sweating caused liquid imbalance, but this is only part of the story. He had eaten an hour before the exercise, and he had a bottle of water with him. Also, he was an experienced gymgoer, who had also done some mistakes and felt the pain in his younger, crazier years. He did everything the correct way.
Now it seems that it was the first warning sign of something more serious: Why would they keep him in hospital if the tests didn't show anything strange? Why would a healthy young man who eats and drinks properly get such a shock in a regular gym exercise? It's shit that could have happened to anyone.
Hospitality
The locals were very helpful and did a lot for us. They realized that we may not know the ways of Indian healthcare system. Here's a short list of what they did:
- Called an ambulance.
- Came to tell me about the incident.
- Produced a water bottle faster it takes to run to apartment to get one.
- Called the doctor of the housing complex, about which we didn't know.
- Followed us to hospital on the trails of the ambulance with their own car.
- Waited there for the whole hour that we were there.
- Haggled an autorickshaw ride of reasonable price back to apartment complex.
About the terror strikes
When enough people spend enough months on a foreign assignment, it is inevitable that someone dies, since immortality vaccination isn't available. The only question is how.
On my fear list, accidents and health problems go way over terror strikes. The traffic here is chaotic, one of us is already taking blood pressure medication and another just underwent an attack.
Mumbai has 20 million inhabitants while Tampere has 340000. A terror strike which kills 100 people in Mumbai would increase overall death rate as much as a robber who kills 2 people in Tampere. If some psychotic junkie bank robber killed two hostages in Tampere before getting deservedly sniped by Karhu commandos, would you cancel your trip there?
I'm still happy that I lack risk factors
Most hours of the full day we spend either at work or in the apartment complex. Neither is a "location favored by foreigners". Quite the contrary: We are the rare white niggers who draw attention wherever we may roam. In many tourist places people want to have a common photo with us. We seldom see others of our own race: In the rare days when I see a white-skinned girl I can't help staring for a moment. A strike against Westerners would be directed elsewhere.
Unfortunately, Hyderabad has also had its share of bomb strikes in earlier years.
Let's hope that Indian police reduces everyone's risk factors by giving the terrorists and their organizers what they deserve. That will also decrese the oppression of Muslims by crackpot fundamentalists.
sunnuntai 12. lokakuuta 2008
Agribusiness near Sathupalli
Sathupalli
Last Thursday was Dasara holiday, and an Indian friend of a friend kindly took us to his home village to watch the celebrations. The village is 300km from Hyderabad and the closest big town is Sathupalli.
Knowing that Andhra Pradesh is a backward agricultural state where people can't read, roads are bad, electricity is cut off regularly in those places lucky to have it and malaria kills people, we didn't know whether to expect modern farming or something out of stone age. They turned out modern.
The place where we slept had electricity, A/C (air coniditioning), running water and even water toilet. All roads there were paved with various materials.
The house had been recently renovated to the taste of two brothers who had been in offshore assignments to first world though, but still it demonstrates that the peak of civilization is just as high in the countryside as in Hyderabad.
In Finland, farmhouses are surrounded by farms and farms are very distant from each others. Near Sathupalli there is a village every 5km and people live in those villages. This village has about 6000 people. Almost all people who live here are farmers.
One consequence of close living is that, just like in Singapore, it is possible to watch people and enforce more conservative attitudes. That's more difficult in sparse population. For example, the brothers didn't smoke or drink in front of their parents. But it was difficult to distinguish famously conservative Indian attitudes, not knowing the language and being "white niggers" in a village which had not seen foreigners before.
Next, I'll show pictures about farm crops and animals. Then, I'll write about land ownership, labor and such things.
Crops
Rice is the main crop. In Sathupally they get one crop of rice a year. In the summer it is to hot to cultivate rice, they don't have enough irrigation water. (In a river delta in the same Khamman district there is enough water to get 2 crops.)
The roots are immersed in water. In Finland, farmers fear big rains in the autumn, becuse it turns fields muddy and prevent tractors from entering. The rice fields are usually drained and harvested by machine, but if it rains too much they have to be harvested by hand.
More rice paddies
Sugar cane.
Palm oil.
Mango garden.
Corn.
Wells
In the mango / palm oil garden, water comes from borewell, powered by passing power line.
Earlier, much bigger wells were used. The rotting biomass indicates that the well is not used anymore for anything.
During the rainy season, the area gets heavy rainfall. This well collapsed due to rain, taking part of the street with it. I don't know if borewells can collapse, but at least they won't suck surroundings with them.
Animals
Every house has some water buffalos for milk. In the morning they are taken to fields to graze. In the dusk, it's slow to drive by car when packs of water buffalos are herded back to villages.
Also lambs are common, and are herded to graze in the same way. I don't have a picture.
The two main meats in Hyderabad are mutton and chicken. The family owns a big chicken farm. The chickens eat corn feed.
In Sathupalli, they own a corn feed factory. It produces 15 tons of corn feed a day.
They grind the corn and mix it with other ingredients.
Land ownership and labor
Bandi and his family cultivate the land themselves. This means that they hire servants and supervise their work. Altogether around 50 servants work in their farms, gardens and factories. Land ownership is also power over people.
The price of farmland is really high, 6000e / acre (acre = 0.4 hectare). This is higher than in Finland. According to this article, in the most expensive district Finnish farmland only costs 3200e / acre.
Farmers don't pay taxes, and government supplies free electricity for them.
The expected lifetime is 10 years longer in the countryside than in the big cities, so I guess that even the landless have it reasonably good in the countryside, by Indian standards.
"Population is ruining India"
In Finland a few hundred years ago government wanted to expand population and granted long-term tax amnesty for everyone who moved to the north and made a new farm in the middle of forest. Indian land prices being what they are, why don't they do the same?
When I asked the question from Bandi brothers, I was told that they used to make new farms earlier but then Indian goverment got tough on deforestation. Also, Bandi said that while India has huge landmass, it has way less arable soil. The fact that they use the word deforestation to describe new farms tells something.
In India, it is common for middle-class people to have servants, and there are lots of service employees everywhere who seem to do little. Manoj commented about these people that "they have to go somewhere" as one justification for the servant tradition.
So it seems that even the locals think that India simply has too much population. One of the brothers commented that population is ruining India.
Small steps towards a much better future
Road connections must have been really bad 30 years ago. The roads of Sathupalli had not been paved when Bandi was young. You saw what monsoon rains did for the well. Imagine the same for roads. And without electricity, A/C isn't possible.
Bandi told that when he was young, they still used tow animals instead of tractors. We saw a long road where trees were planted on both sides to cast shadows: The government had planted this shadow corridor to make it possible to transport rice plants with bulls and wheelcharts despite scorching sun.
One sign of past underdevelopment was the fact that the family lived so closely, parents, uncles, sons and cousins in the same village. The parents had not gone to foreign countries, and had not seen foreigners before us. There must have been really big obstacles to moving and looking for marriage further away when they chose to stay in such close proximity. In the current generation, all 3 siblings (2 brothers + sister) have moved to Hyderabad, and both brothers have been in foreign assignments.
In the village we met a local politician, and I got the impression that they have every intention to keep kicking the progress until it moves its fat ass further, and they have relatively good goverment (by Indian standards) to work with.
Common background
Our host and guide, Bandi, was one of two brothers. Both brothers had gone from farming background to IT industry. They had been good at math from young age and had first gone from village school to Sathupally school and gradually to bigger technical insitutions. None of their cousins went to IT.
2/3 out of the Finnish participants had similar background. I'm a programmer by occupation. My brother graduated in chemistry, specialicing in datateknik, applying computing to chemistry. His Master's thesis was about mathematically modelling some process in a copper factory.
Juha-Matti had gone to databases from young age while his brother had done demo coding.
It was amazing how similar our background could be, but there was also a big difference: Bandi brothers were factory owners and local elite, they managed things and had power over people. We were middle class people, who don't have underlings but have reasonable independence: Our parents had independence working in their own farm (part-time), we have notable independence in professional roles.
I'm not sure whether the servant families had chances to similar social rise. Maybe they had, maybe not. I just know that in Finland everyone has the same opportunities, if genetic and environmental lottery gives enough mental ability, stability and work ethic.
Dasara celebrations
I asked Bandi what the celebrations were all about. He gave a bit messy description about big god Rama and some tree where he hid weapons before going to forest, and then admitted to not being a religious person.
In the village, we saw a religios procession. The people were playing some tune which bordered on noise, I'm not sure if it was improvised or just composed before modern multitonal music could set high standards. They paraded the god around the village and then took him to the temple for some ritual. We didn't follow.
Next to temple, within the same wall there was a volleyball field, and Bandi brothers and their cousins and friends had a tight volleyball match during the procession and rituals. The game and the procession had equal number of participants.
In general, visiting all the relatives in different places was the core of Dasara celebration. Religious rituals were secondary, just like in Finnish Christmas when people don't go to church.
torstai 25. syyskuuta 2008
A piece of USA teleported in the middle of India
Here is the 4-star luxury hotel where we sleep until the end of this week. We sleep in hotel until we find a rented apartment for the remaining months. In India, you don't want to rent an apartment remotely without seeing it first.
There are only few traces of India.
There are only few traces of India.
- There are lots of people employed at desks and guard spots and restaurants, doing little most of the time. This is the case everywhere in India.
- Restaurant has Indian menu.
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