Lemon & Ice

Moving to India: Four Stages of Cultural Adjustment

The Stages of Cultural Adjustment

When moving from one "culture" to another, individuals pass through definite stages of cultural adjustment.  This adjustment is an ongoing process as demanded by each new situation. The following discussion is based on a four-stage model as identified by Gregory Trifonovitch:

The Honeymoon Stage

Characterized by exhilaration, anticipation and excitement, the person is fascinated with everything that is new. An individual in this stage will often demonstrate an eagerness to please, a spirit of cooperation, and an active interest as you speak. These individuals are delightful to work with and to work for, BUT, in their enthusiasm to please they frequently nod and smile to indicate that they understand, when in fact, they have not understood.

When their misunderstandings mount up, they are likely to experience the second stage of cultural adjustment.

My honeymoon with India lasted about three months! See these posts Hello again, hometown! Gurgaon: A vision of the future, Random meetings with old friends

The Hostility Stage

This stage is characterized by frustration, anger, anxiety, and sometimes depression. Following the initial excitement is frustration with the bureaucracy. Sleep patterns may be disrupted and the individual may suffer from indigestion and be unable to eat. Sometimes these individuals react to this frustration by rejecting the new or predominant environment in which they feel discomfort. The internal reasoning might be, "If I feel bad it's because of them," thus blaming the external environment for the bad feelings.  Some of these hostilities are translated into fits of anger over minor frustrations, excessive fear and worse, complete withdrawal.

Moving to India: Making peace with the system

Its been a while since I posted here. Its been a busy summer. Over the last year and a half, I am slowly morphing into a Mumbaikar from a New Yorker, although the transformation is not yet complete. Coming from NYC, where the city's  streets make for a giant playground for its residents, the transition to Mumbai is tough. Mumbai's streets are overcrowded, the traffic is gnarly and the noise levels put the Who's decibel records to shame everyday. Mumbai's chaos is such is that the only way to cope with it is to embrace it and go with the flow. The city guarantees nothing, yet miraculously delivers most times while following no rational process! My first few months in India were exciting and euphoric at times as I savored my new life, discovered great new restaurants and clubs every week and caught up with friends.

As I moved out of my five star hotel and shifted to a residential apartment and began the task of setting up shop here, I hit a wall. In the west, we profit from squeezing out inefficiencies and show our intolerance for ambiguity by devaluing any situation or process where the outcome is uncertain. In India, inertia and uncertainty is a way of life. I found it really difficult to get stuff done initially as I was so polite about follow-up. Finally, I realized that everyone is operating on fire-fighting mode and I need to create 'crises' if I wanted anything to happen on time!! I also developed a system to 'check, re-check and cross-check; to ensure my work is done on time and efficiently. I will write more on that in a separate post.

For now, I seem to have made peace with the system here. I question less and accept more. I have learnt to endorse the 'Hindu' way of accepting disasters: 'There must be some good that will come out of this'!! Also, I have taken my local doctor's advice to heart: 'If you want to live long in India, don't bother to try and achieve perfection'! He's right. I have found that if you can hit 80-85% of your desired target, you should be happy. The system is not designed to deliver anything above that. Breaking your head for an additional 5-10% will cost you more than it cost you to get to the first 80%!!

If you are planning a move here, it's worth reading  Gregory Trifonovitch's four stage theory of cultural adjustment, which is my next post.

Mumbai Diwali: My Bang is bigger than yours!

I celebrated my first Diwali in India after a long time. I was planning to be home in Jamshedpur with my folks but I busted my knee last week so I was grounded in Mumbai. Luckily, I recovered enough by Diwali to step out into the streets and enjoy the festivities. I drove through Marine Drive where local Mumbaikars had taken their Diwali celebrations to the streets. The entire length of Marine Drive had turned into a street party with fireworks going off everywhere amidst loud bangs and explosions. The skyline was lit with spectacular fireworks funded with millions of hoarded rupees normally lying hidden under the mattress in rich Mumbai homes. Diwali is a competitive celebration amongst the rich in Mumbai where the message to the joneses is clearly 'My bang is bigger than yours'!

Home with a view

180 degree view of Mumbai from my new home in Colaba.

On the left I can see Nariman Point facing Cuffe Parade, in the middle is Mumbai's cityscape growing north and on the right is a view of the Arabian Sea.

Writing this blog is a therape utic experience for me, especially when I feel frustrated with the challenges of setting up a new life here. It allows me to take a step back from my life and examine it objectively. I was reading some of my previous entries here and I could sense my own transition from an outsider to a local in the last few months. As I spend more time here, the thrill of being back home in India has begun to fade away. The mundane aspects of daily domestic life in India are coming to the fore now. When I lived in NYC, my speed dial list was always reserved for hotties. Now, they have been replaced by mission-critical contacts like the electrician, plumber, cable guy, A/C repair guy, washerman, v egetable delivery guy, grocery delivery guy, maid, watchman.. the list is exhaustive. How my life has changed! Anything can go wrong anytime. I am beginning to believe that every device in my house has a temperament of it's own. Yesterday, I was a bit hungover and forgot to wish my shower head a very good morning before I turned it on. Like a woman scorned, it got upset and taught me a lesson by turning off the water just when I had soap all over my eyes. Sheesh, that's a low down trick if you ask me! Afer a couple more such inexplicable 'accidents' in my new house, I have become rather wary of the devices I live with. Today morning, I took the extra precaution of politely requesting my tea kettle if I could put it's bottom on fire to make my tea. It didn't seem to mind and made me a an excellent cuppa to start the day. I think I am getting the hang of living in Mumbai now. But I am getting ahead of myself. Let me first tell you how I found my new home.

Mumbai's teflon spirit

It's been a really rough July for Mumbai's working class. The month started with heavy showers that flooded the streets and partially crippled the city. Many office goers who live in the suburbs and work in 'town' (South Mumbai) got stranded after work and couldn't go home. However, absenteeism was surprisingly low during the weeklong floods in the city. Last weekend, some mischief makers had the bright idea of decorating the statue of a local politico's wife (Shiv Sena leader Bal Thackeray), with a garland of slippers. Shiv Sena supporters were quite upset and protested by burning a few buses and shutting down stores. The city was on edge all Saturday as memories of previous riots kept people at home.

When I learnt about the bomb blasts on Tuesday evening, I thought this would be a body blow on the city's teflon like spirit. I expected Mumbai to be semi-closed on Wednesday. As I rode in my taxi-cab to work, I observed that life had already sprung back to normal in Mumbai. All the local corner stores were open. The silver haired lady who has been selling bananas outside my apartment building for the last 15 years was at her usual place plying her trade. Little kids were running around the streets chasing imaginary balls and dodging traffic. It was as if the tragedy had never happened. Intrigued, I turned to the cabbie and asked him how he felt about the bomb blasts. He pondered for a second and then he explained, 'Sir, if your time comes, you can do nothing to avoid it'. There was no anger, just a resigned acceptance how powerless man can be against his destiny. At work, I met a couple of colleagues who are regulars on the affected trains and usually travel at the same hour when the blasts took place. They had been working late that fateful evening and inadvertently escaped the tragedy. Next morning, they were back on those very same trains commuting to work. One of them explained that he has no choice but to take the train since buses take forever and cabs are way to expensive at Rs 400 ($8.70) per trip. Not surprisingly, the trains were running packed as soon as they resumed their normal schedules.

South Mumbai Real Estate at Manhattan prices

I have been looking at 2 BR rental apartments in areas within 20-25 minutes of Nariman Point where I have my office. So I focused my search on Colaba, Cuffe Parade, Malabar Hills, Kemps Corner and Worli. I have seen about 15 apartments of varying quality and views. Most of the buildings I have seen are not luxury buildings since very few of them have come up in these areas in recent years due to scarcity of space. The quality of construction is below average by international standards and the apartment interiors need a lot of refurbishing. However, I am not complaining since I expected that. What is interesting is the wide range in prices for different buildings in the same location. Apparently, location is a key consideration but quality of construction and the type of 'gentry' living in the buildings play equally important roles.

Prime properties in Mumbai have almost doubled since 2004 and the landlords are doing their best to move up rents in tandem.

Mobile Phone Etiquette

Thought I would share some India specific mobile phone etiquette tips here:

'Missed Call': Once you are in India, you will soon realize that almost no one has activated their mobile voice-mail. I am not sure why but I think the local mobile operators may have over-charged their subscribers initially for voice-mail as a separate VAS. In any case, if you call someone and you don't get through, your 'missed call' with your number is considered as good as voicemail. I never used to call back a 'missed call' in the US, if I couldn't identify the number and there was no voicemail associated with it. However, I soon realized here that it is considered impolite if you don't return a 'missed call'.

Phone calls during business meetings: While you may go into an important meeting in India with your mobile phone on 'do not disturb' mode, don't be surprised at all if the other party deems it necessary to interrupt the flow of conversation to pick up phone calls. I have experienced this more with local businessmen and less so with I.bankers and consultants who are used to dealing with foreign clientele.

Connecting to the grid

There's been a telecom revolution here while I have been away. We have all read about it and I am now experiencing it. Telecom penetration has shot up to 5.5% from less than half a percent when I left India. I exprienced wireless local loop (WLL) technology for the first time here. WLL offers limited mobility within a city area and is a viable alternative to a landline or a mobile phone. It looks and works like a landline but it is not tethered to a socket in your wall. So if you move homes, you can simply carry the phone with you. Most carriers also offer internet access through the WLL connection, although it's usually narrowband.

Hello again, Hometown!

This is the beginning of my new life in India. I chose to start this journey at my family house where I spent the first 18 years of my life before I left for college. I have been here for a week and gotten over the jetlag with life falling into a languid rythm. I have 2 weeks to chill out before I jump into the fray again and I plan to make the best of it. I typically wake up around 7 or 8 am and join my mom for tea. Some days, I am lazy and my maid brings me tea in bed. Then, the local masseuse shows up to give me a one hour massage. He charges me Rs 30 and takes a Rs 20 tip only after much insisting. I wasn't too happy to get a male masseuse initially but when my mom asked me why I preferred a female masseuse, I dropped the topic quickly.