From Delhi I connected via flight on the ultra-posh Jet Airways to Hyderabad. The contrast between the Jet plane and the overnight train were striking. Akin to 1st class on an American carrier, the economy section on brand-spanking new Jet plane featured deep leather seats, full news/movie/music personal station and doting attendants that brought around warm towels and a delicious salty lime juice. The attendant was shocked when I passed on the dinner, like a personal insult to a 5-star chef back at the terminal.
Arriving in Hyderabad, my friend Chris picked me up at the airport and instantly wow'd me with his Hindi while haggling with the ricksaw drivers- apparently there was some kind of strike that day over the meters the local government is forcing the ricksaw drivers to install. We settled on a price and dove into the intense Hyderabad traffic. The city has experienced an automotive explosion and the road system was bulging at the intersections with rickshaws, buses, bikes and a plethora of new cars.
Chris explains that the city is developing at a breakneck pace, fueled by the info and biotech sectors, and the government infrastructure projects are struggling to keep up. A few years ago the only cars on the road were the British-inspired Ambassadors but today foreign auto makers like Honda and Ford have established positions in the market through government-approved joint ventures with Indian companies. Chris points above our heads to a raised highway that just stops mid-air, an unfinished road to nowhere that ominously resembles Boston's Central Artery in its final days of deconstruction. "That wasn't there," he says, "before I went home a few weeks ago."
Chris has been living in Hyderabad for nearly 2 years working at SKS (http://www.sksindia.com/) an emerging Microfinance institution in India. The organization's mission is to provide financial services like small loans to Indian women, so far in mostly rural areas, to enable them and their families with the liquidity and fundamental capital to engage in basic income-generating activities like farming and fishing.
From their website-
Launched in 1998, SKS Microfinance is one of the fastest growing microfinance organizations in the world, having provided over $ 109 million (Rs 484 crores) and has maintained loans outstanding of $39 million (174 crores) in loans to nearly 379, 874 women clients in poor regions of India... This In the last year alone, SKS Microfinance has achieved nearly 161 % growth, with 98% on-time repayment rate.
Vikram Akula, SKS founder and CEO, is a former McKinsey consultant while the company's CFO is a recent Wharton grad. Chris is applying to pursue a joint-degree MBA and MPA. It's worth mentioning that Cornell and Johnson have large Sustainable Development programs, with incredible resources for developing innovations, like microfinance, to reach the 4 billion people, or Base of the Pyramid (http://www.johnson.cornell.edu/sge/bopinitiative.html), who live outside or between the boundaries of the developed world's economy.
Chris was a great host and his apartment, with hot water showers and marble floors, was a welcome break from the dingy hotels on the road. Our first night out we hit this Chinese restaurant by his place. It was underground, with no windows and dim red candle lighting, bamboo chairs and tables, and bow-tied waiters. In short, the kind of place that would fit nicely in a James Bond flick, with Odd Job lurking behind a bamboo screen. But, the place served beers, rare in Hindu & Muslim-dominated Hyderabad, and we had a great time catching up over Kingfisher's and sampling the Hyderabadi cuisine, which is renown for its spicy hot. Actually, I was a bit disoriented by one dish and popped a green chili into my mouth, thinking it was a cool green been. Seconds later Chris was exclaiming, "You ate that!", my face started to tingle like every nerve was firing awake from a 27-year slumber, my glasses were off and I was balling like a school girl with a skinned knee. Look out for the green chili. Even the waitstaff was impressed.
The next day right before Sunset and the evening Iftar, we visited the Charminar district which is the Muslim old city in Hyderabad. Charminar is a gigantic gate with 4 towering minarets and huge arches under which cart-sellers, children hawkers and ricksaw traffic swirl around a rotary. As we exit the rickshaw a boy holds up a handful of fake pearls, although Hyderabad is famous for the real stuff.
In the 12th and 13th C., various Muslim rulers based at the Golconda Fort nearby Hyderabad, ran powerful and wealthy dynasties that controlled the jewel and gem trade of the world.
The imposing Majid Mosque stands next door to Charminar. After taking off our shoes by the compound entrance, Chris and I circled the Mosque exterior past a cricket game, where he pointed out a stone that had brought from Mecca with the help of a local guy. The interior was whitewashed, with threadbare carpets lining the Mosque floor and a roof of domes. The place looked somewhat utilitarian, but as we sat in the nearby mausoleum and listened to the Iftar while men young and old ran up to the Mosque, I got a sense of how it was still very much a living part of the city, 300 years after consecration.
What's life like when you take time out to pray 5 times a day? It seems like that daily structure must add a necessary peace to hectic life in the old city.
After the sun goes down, Chris shows me around the streets. First we turn onto a row of wedding supplies merchants, whose walls are stocked with literally millions of glittering gold bangles, shining down the street like uninterrupted gold railings.
Chris buys two sweet wraps from a stall (non-nicotine, they're rolled in green leaves and sucked on like lollipops) but given my out-of-body green chili experience last night and a lingering sickness from the overnight trains, I've got to pass. Most of the Indians are impressed that he can speak Hindi, but Chris insists he only knows a few words. Back at the Mausoleum, he told me about the complexity of language-politics, with kids learning 3 or 4 languages at home and in school. For instance, in Tamil Nadu, people refuse to speak Hindi even though it's the national language and may know it, because it conflicts with their regional identity.
After the sweet wrap stall, we stroll under a bunch of tiny red banners hanging over an intersection, with the Communist Sickle & Hammer hanging oddly in earnest. I think the only other time I've actually seen this displayed is in a college dorm room. Chris comments that the Communist party must have a rally in this neighborhood recently. A few days ago I read an article how Indian PM Singh was surprised at how political factions (read: BJP) still had traction over their support for Saddam Hussein while at the same time India was taking an increasingly prominent role in the international community (read: to the West). Then we stroll past a Swastika in the 2nd story relief of an stone building and I learn that Hitler actually reversed the symbol, so as a cross-arms bent at right-angles.
We hop in a ricksaw and head home and then to Chris' friend's birthday party a chilled-out roof-top restaurant. Chris knows a bunch of twenty-something Indians and they're remarkably similar to the Silicon Valley-ites I hung out with last summer. One girl works for Google and is complaining about the superabundance of free food which is making her fat - this was the cause celebe last summer. But her job is not tech-driven; she reads the ad copy from Sponsored Links/Adwords to filter out inappropriate language, competitive bashing and illegal trademark use. Another guy works for Accenture developing for the .net site for a Microsoft JV. A couple of people are applying for MBAs in the US, but they plan to return with the degree. I get the sense that the India's surging growth is very real.
Hi Alex,
Loved your story about the chili pepper.... it made your Uncle and I laugh... I printed out some of your blog and Uncle Ed will read some of it to Gram today when he goes there. Sounds like you are having a wonderful experience. Enjoy.
Love,
Auntie Joan
Posted by: Joan Casabian | January 03, 2007 at 08:29 AM