Just returned from a few days in Mumbai. What a mind-expanding experience! I was there to speak for an IBM conference for middleware vendors and customers.
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The contrast in living conditions for the very rich and the very poor is eye-opening—and I didn’t see the absolute extremes of either.
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I’ve never seen such vivid colors in all aspects of dress, decor, etc.—even the money is pretty.
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“Traffic safety” is an oxymoron. Luggage isn’t tied down on roof racks. People ride on top of trucks. I saw a family of four on a motorcycle. Having said this, I saw no accidents.
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Speaking of traffic, it can take two hours to travel fifteen kilometers there. If you have a choice, try to arrive on Saturday or Sunday. Speaking of arrival, I’ve never been to an airport that’s jam packed at 2:00 am.
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Computer connectivity is very good. Furthermore, I was amazed that my Verizon phone worked without a hitch. EVDO did not work, but it was only because of the lack of a roaming agreement.
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The food was fabulous. For example, I’ve had many a set-up day, pre-show, backstage meal, but nothing as good as what was at IBM’s conference the day before it opened. There was even a curry chef who would make curry to spec.
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I loved Indian pricing strategy: for example, 10 rupees for residents and 300 rupees for tourists at the Chhatrapati Shivaji Museum.
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I also appreciated the Indian carpet-sales strategy: “Come in and have a seat; I will get you some tea; let me show you a few carpets; we can fold these up so small that they will fit in your suitcase (and they really could have); these are made in Kashmir; everything is washable; they will not wear out; I’ll give you a special price…”
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IBM India has 43,000 employees. The conference was very well run and attended. It felt like a TIE event in Silicon Valley except that the food at TIE events isn’t as good because TIE inexplicably usually serves American cuisine like rubberized chicken.
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The place that most impressed me was Dhobi Ghat. This is an area where laundry workers wash and dry clothes. I can’t quite explain why it had such a profound effect on me. It was just surrealistic: bright colors in dark washing pens and flogging stones.
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India has its own version of Amazon.com. At two intersections, kids came up to the car to sell us paperback versions of current business books. We bought a copy of The World Is Flat for $3. Not sure if I should be happy or depressed, but The Art of the Start was not available.
If you’d like to see pictures from my trip, click here.
Re., especially, point 1, you might like to read this: http://www.beginningwithi.com/italy/living/ivsi.html
I lived in India from 1977-81 and 85-86, and have visited many times since 1996. It’s very exciting to see what’s happening there now.
Re the fascinating picture show: maybe there’s some subtle gender semiotics in the use of different apostrophes and they are indicative of males possessiveness being different from the female. Then again it could just be a mistake.
Re. the books, these are not necessarily pirated copies. Books are a lot cheaper in India, in part because they use very cheap paper. When my husband was a college student in Italy, some enterprising students imported Indian prints of their textbooks – much cheaper than buying those printed in Italy! But, 20 years on, the paper is sadly deteriorated.
best regards, Deirdré Straughan
oh, I usually attend most of IBM’s conference and this one when I could not attend, I had to missed you! Bad luck for me.
After reading the whole post, I’ve to add this more comments
1. Yes, that is something we like about our Mumbai, the rich and the poor co-exist and share equal rights at most levels. This may not be that true in the extreme curves but those are the extremes and let us ignore that.
2. Yes, India is a colorful country. It infact hard for me to get used to the US Dollar when I first saw it with its unicolor currency! (Refer – http://www.flickr.com/photos/brajeshwar/229258729/)
3. Well, an American who works with us (Bill) says that is is like Jazz, the rhythm at which we drive together. It is not just you but you have to know how your peer drivers are driving. And yes, we are very good with driving inch-to-inch, almost touching bumper to bumper even at good speed.
4. Lol! I’ve learnt not to drive around the International Airport route after 10:30 p.m. (though that is near to my home) as that is the start of the time when most international flights takes off and can be real sight and frustration even for people trying to just pass across the route.
5. Well, we even jump right over to G3 bandwagon.
6. No Comments on foods; they are mostly spicy highly masala-ed at all times.
7. Geeee, I never knew that but cool way of earning money and give importance to local people at the same time.
8. Never knew of this either.
9. I’m still thinking if I took the right choice when I gladly rejected the offer from IBM Bangalore (INDIA).
10. Never been to that place but seen it million times in the Indian Bollywood Cinemas.
11. Lol, this is the one where I got “How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, Got Wild, and Got A Life” when it was banned, no longer available at the book stores.
G
uy, i realy loved this post.Most excellent comments and flicks. From the size of the big as pipes in one of your flicks, i suspect they’re primary potable water and and return feeds.
So was the street food as good as it is in Singapore?
dude,
Jim Forbes
Hey Guy,
Whenever I see your name I always wonder if you’re related to Robert Kiyosaki from http://www.richdad.com. Are you or do all japenese people have similar names? ;)
Hey Guy,
I can’t see what’s wrong with the apostrophe in the “Groom’s Room” sign.. unless you’re implying that they have more than wedding on at the same time?
John
hahaha – actually ignore my last apostrophe comment Guy. I just clicked to the next photo and instantly realised what you meant! You know you are a Mac geek when……
John
Thanks for sharing/writing this. Glad you’ve been so kind to my home city :)
Have been looking forward to getting your book, in part because I’ve heard a few of the mp3’s on someone else’s machine. Believe your book is just out in the stores.
Yes, maybe there’s a sense of beauty in this hetrogeny. And loved the bit about the differential pricing – could you even imagine how well segmentation works here?
Guy,
I also was bowled over by my trip to Mumbai. It was in 1997 and we landed on August 14th, the 50th anniversary of Partition. I *loved* it! The colors, the filth, the teemingness, the splendor… and of course the poverty. In your face in a way that is hard to describe. Interestingly, I was with 50 members of my executive MBA class. Half fell in love with it; the other half couldn’t wait to get back on the plane. They hated it. We also went to Pune (just south – kind of a university town) and took a side trip up to Delhi where we saw the Taj Mahal. You have to go back! The Taj Mahal is even more magnificent than in photos.
Guy,
Apple sent me and a couple of colleagues from your old group (software evangelists) to India for a week a couple of years ago. Your description of the carpet-shop experience is about the same as the treatment I got in a silk shop in Bangalore. I only spent a couple hundred bucks, but you’d think I was buying the store from the way they treated me.
The biggest surprise I got on that trip though, is just how good tea can be. The stuff we get from Lipton here is swill!
BTW, the next time you’re in India, you really should take a side-trip to Agra and see the Taj Mahal.
-jcr
Guy,
As a hobby photographer, I thought those cloudy shots were hands down the best. You should patent a foggy lens filter and call it the “Fogasaki Lens.” But in the future to protect your camera, put it in a Ziploc Bag whenever you go from cold to warm. The condensation will settle on the bag, not your camera. As soon as your camera warms up to ambient temperature, you can take it out of the bag.
Jason Brown
Guy: People travelling on top of trains, buses are a common sight and quite normal in this part of the world. You bet…India will be at its colourful at this time of the year with a host of festivals around. Next time around, make a trip southwards to Bangalore, Chennai, Kerala, etc. You’ll love the food and hospitability. And when you are in Bangalore, be prepared for more traffic woes!
Great info, great photos. Very interesting :)
Hi Guy,
I missed you by one day, kind of colateral damage of IBM’s policy to send in their speakers in “just in time”. I would have loved to hear you talk.
I shared the same impressions you had. To feel it to the fullest I used Auto Riskshaw (or Tuk Tuk how you would call it in Thailand) for local transport and took a train from Pune to Mumbai. The most intreaguing difference to me over there was the spiced up smell (which I felt quite pleasant): whereever you travel in Mumbai there is the smell of Curry and Spices in the air.
:-) stw
Guy,
While you were there, did you learn what “Guy” means in Hindi? Hint: You already have a picture of what it means ;-).
Rahul
Guy,
I am traveling to Mumbai, for a week, on Friday. How did you keep from getting sick? Or did you just leave that part out?
Your photographs were excellent. I can’t wait to arrive, see the culture, eat some great curry and meet the wonderful people.
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When I’m traveling, I’m extremely careful because I cannot afford to be sick and miss a speech. Thus, I drink only bottled water and brush my teeth with bottled water. I eat only in five-star hotels–and not even fresh fruits and vegetables anywhere.
This does limit my true exposure and understanding of where I go, but I’m there on business, and it’s inconceivable that I tell an IBM that I’m sick so I cannot give the keynote speech it just flew me across the world and paid big bucks for.
Guy
I love IBM as they gave Microsoft an Operating System, Bill Hayden and Michael Dell an Industry Standard Architecture, and Oracle a Data Base. Now that is friendship!
Cheers to Big Blue!
I couldn’t find “The Art of the Start” in any of the brick and mortar bookstores I visited (around Tottenham Court Road). Too bad!
Hi Benjamin Strong,
> How did you keep from getting sick?
I’ll share the tip that our American collegue did while in India.
* Drink bottled or boiled water.
* Get an anti-malarial shot (something like that)
Great observations! Two things that don’t get across in words and pictures are smell and noise. Both of which are certainly a strong experience (good and bad) in Mumbai.
Great photos! FilmLoop should allow comments per image though.
I didn’t understand the apostrophe joke at first, but given the context–a series of juxtapositions–I should have.
The shot of the video camera recording a speaker was strange. The speaker being recorded is not the person speaking unless, of course, the speaker being recorded was already recorded and the camera was not recording the speaker currently speaking…
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Morgan,
FilmLoop does allow comments and captions on individual pictures. Why do you think it doesn’t?
The person in the picture is the person on the video camera. Not sure why you think she’s different too.
Thanks,
Guy
In the comment for Photo 55, you refer to the man as the “Indian Dizzy Gillespie”… this guy is playing a saxophone, not a trumpet….
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What do you expect from a Guy who doesn’t know who Beck is?
Guy
Only because you actually noticed the difference between ‘ and ’ (if these don’t get transformed in the posting process) and use em-dashes (from what my eyes can tell) in your latest blog entry, why are you using two hyphens in your page/site title???
[Hint: shift-option-“-“. Just in case, I am not “sniping” you. Your blog is much appreciated….]
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I use dumb apostrophes and dashes because RSS feeds turn smart ones and em dashes into garbage. It offends me, typographically, that this is so.
Guy
Just to put the folkloristic romantic notion of Mumbai traffic chaos into perspective: every given day an average of 3-4 people fall of trains or busses and get killed that way. Gives a new perspective on work competition.
Great pics. Reminded me of home–truly got the flavor of the place.
As for accidents, sadly Mumbai has 10 times the accident fatality rate of the U.S. Heard and experienced too many tragedies. My general rule when visiting is to get in the largest vehicle possible (thought it may not be the most comfortable). I frequently take the train around the city and a 2 hour car trip can be reduced to a 15 minute train trip. Trains can be hugely crowded in rush hour–sometimes first class helps.
Unfortunately the food in five star hotels is far from the best in the city–so I indulge in mid-tier restaraunts. My rule not to get sick is only eat hot food (prefer when I can see the kitchen), no ice, water straight from a sealed bottle (even brush my teeth with the stuff and am careful when I shower).
Next time you’re there have someone take you to Chor Bazaar (is it still safe??). Literally Thieves Market but you can find some interesting things if you look in the right places. I’ve bought some gorgeous Rolleiflexes there.
Regarding point 7, I think these pricing strategies are used in a lot of asian countries. At least in China, and specially in Shanghai, it is pretty much the same.
I have to agree with all your assesments. Though, my introduction was just Dehi, I came to many of the same observations.
Guy,
You wrote:
What do you expect from a Guy who doesn’t know who Beck is?
Guy
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Touché! Hey, at least your example was of a jazz musician. Don’t worry, once your kids get bigger you be innundated with music info, hopefully some of it tolerable to you…. ;-)
You also wrote:
I use dumb apostrophes and dashes because RSS feeds turn smart ones and em dashes into garbage. It offends me, typographically, that this is so.
Guy
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Thanks. That’s actually good to know. I don’t know if it is still true, but iTunes used to mess up smart quotes, etc., in its display of track info (at least for streaming music).
Regards,
Dave
Thanks for the travelogue, Guy. Now I don’t have to go.
Guy, I love the pictures. They reminded me of my hometown and made me slightly home-sick too!
Anyway, for more bright colors, you must visit places like the TajMahal and Jaipur!
Guy,
Welcome to India is all I can say after seeing those pictures. You have captured the vivid colors of the country very well. My kudos to you.
If Mumbai has captivated you, then may be you should drop into Bangalore next! :)
Cheers,
Nikhil
Guy,
You should’ve visited and written about the famed “Dabbawallas” of Mumbai..
Rams
Sounds like trip to my country was real fun. Thanks for putting all things is such wonderful perspective. Go around to places like Hyderabad, Kolkata and Bangalore, to get to know more about the real India. Its a wonderful Place.
Being in IBM India myself, I found it very strange that i never knew about this event. I would have surely made it to Mumbai, this was a oppotunity i would never have missed. Maybe next time…
Hi Guy,
Mumbai is a city of contradictions and you truely captured it.
Regarding point 11, “The art of start” or any of your titles are tough to get even in brick and mortar stores as there are no Indian editions. If possible, can you talk with your publisher on this?
I am sure.. a generation in India is waiting to read your books. I am definitely one of them!
Hi Guy,
Thanks for posting the pics. You were true to your word. I am the one with you in pic # 47 :)
Guy Kawasakis Mumbai Trip
Popular blogger and venture capitalist Guy Kawasaki was in Mumbai recently and he has some observations based on what he experienced in Mumbai:
4. Speaking of traffic, it can take two hours to travel fifteen kilometers there. If you have a choice, try…
Hi Guy,
Don’t forget to travel to any of the villages when you visit India next time. There is another face of India which you have not seen.
Nice to read this post,
This is actually a request, If it is possible that you will visit India again and where people can attend a conference or some thing like that I would love to attend and meet you.
Also how can these things be arranged? I mean if it is possible we can arrange some thing @Hyderabad (India).
Guy On Mumbai
Guy Kawasaki, a famous entrepreneur and blogger notes a few points of observation during his trip to Mumbai. Computer connectivity is very good. Furthermore, I was amazed that my Verizon phone worked without a hitch. EVDO did not work, but…
Review of Mumbai by Guy Kawasaki
Review of Mumbai by Guy Kawasaki posted at IndianPad.com
Dear Guy,
Have been an aderent fan of yours ever since i saw your TIE Video on The Art of The Start. Please let us know when you’d be next in India. Can we arrange a conference for the young tech enthusiasts?
Entrepreneurially yours,
Aadil Bandukwala
The Art of the Start is available in Mumbai book shops. I saw it in CrossWords – a book store in western suburbs in Mumbai. It costs about $20 though. :)
India Observations – Cultural Treasures
Guy Kawasaki describes a few days visit to Mumbai as a mind-expanding experience. He has a fun set of initial insights. As I read them I felt my first experiences all over again. Still some six months later that’s just…
The pipes carry water to Mumbai city. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mumbai%27s_water_sources
Guy, your insight on the Indian landscape are on the dot both in words and pictures. Your reaction of the Dhobi Ghat is reminiscent of Henri Cartier Bresson’s black and white prints.(1966, Ahmedabad)
BTW: even before you headed to Mumbai with your mantra. You’ve been quite a legend with your inspiring books and yes they can be found on the streets of India… I picked up my copy of “Rules for Revolutionaries” during one of my travels home.
Also, we need more Mac evangelists present there the devotion to all things Microsoft is unbelievable. Of course my retort to them is what will tech support/call centers do if everyone used Apples… and I just get blank looks.
Prahlad Kakkar (the ad guy in your pictures) is another legend and yes has a good likeness to Woz.
Thank you for bringing your lens on India. Spend more time there next time.
Darn. I should’ve become an IBM reseller or whatever it takes…anyhow, good photos, Guy!
You know, there’s that denseness of population in Mumbai and then places like this: http://www.deepakshenoy.com/gallery/displayimage.php?album=2&pos=5 where there’s nothingness for miles! It’s a constrast not explainable by bad roads alone.
Oh, if you didnt already know the Indian version of Amazon is probably www.fabmall.com, and in true Indian fashion they also sell jewellery.
And guess what, they have differential pricing (locals vs. foreigners) for hotel room rates; the Reserve Bank of India recently banned that practise and their strategy to “recover lost revenue” is to raise the “local” rates to match. Btw, Disneyland and Versailles have differential pricing too.
– Deepak
Guy Kawasaki on Mumbai !
Kawasaki a VC, visited Mumabi and lists out the his view on the City. eg: “Traffic safety” is an oxymoron. Luggage isn’t tied down on roof racks. People ride on top of trucks. I saw a family of four on a motorcycle. Having said this, I saw no ac
Guy,
I don’t think an Indian edition of Art of the Start has been released. But, among people I know, the TiE Art of the Start video is quite popular. After reading the first chapter at Creative Commons – I had to hunt multiple Delhi bookstores to find a copy for $20 (which by Indian standards is expensive – I am talking legal buys here). You should ask your publisher to do an Indian release – rest assured, there will be enough buyers.
Yeah.. “Art of the Start” is not available on ths streets. I stay in Bangalore. I couldn’t find it in any bookstore either :(
About the pricing of these books, if you know how to bargain you can pick up any book for as low as $1. The books are priced on how many pages the book contains and the demand for the book.
See Google earth forum “Huge and Unique” for the pipeline in your photos.
Mumbai pipeline
Anush, I own ‘The Art of the Start’. Feel free to borrow it from me.
Oh, and it is available at the Strand. I love Strand sales (I bought the book for ~ 10 USD, not 20). Turn green everyone who didn’t.
How can a country this poor steal high tech jobs from the richest nation in the universe? That is absurd!
The World is Flat is $17 at Amazon, and $3 in Mumbai. Just think how much a C# or JavaEE book costs in the bootleg world of Mumbai. Maybe $5. In the US, it is an average of $50.
So, please, how in the world can us Americans compete?
Hopefully, HTML works.
Quoting Bob:
How can a country this poor steal high tech jobs from the richest nation in the universe? That is absurd!
Think price arbitrage. It isn’t stealing, it’s just the free market in action.
The World is Flat is $17 at Amazon, and $3 in Mumbai. Just think how much a C# or JavaEE book costs in the bootleg world of Mumbai. Maybe $5. In the US, it is an average of $50.
Legitimate copies of books are available for between 20% to 40% of the price of US books. They are printed on lower quality paper, and are not meant for sale outside India. They are made available about 6 months to a year after the release of the corresponding US edition.
So, please, how in the world can us Americans compete?
Your cost of living has to come down. The energy usage of American citizens is horrendous.
Either that, or reskill into highly qualified technical jobs or management jobs.
http://in.today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=topNews&storyID=2006-10-11T020017Z_01_NOOTR_RTRJONC_0_India-271712-2.xml&archived=False
That should gladden your heart as well.
Quoting from the article:
“User-interface people are in short supply in India,” he said. “I have to actually transport people from here over there,” he said of the need to send U.S. workers to India.
Man, don’t the Indians just love you? But then again you are probably one of the best ambassadors for the American dream and all that it is imagined to be made of, although I must say speaking at an IBM conference wearing a tie is a little like a liberal (Democrat), who gets mugged once and turns conservative (Republican) in his middle age.. 8-)
Your pictures appear to suggest that you are probably more a traveller than a tourist.
Here are some thoughts that came to me as I saw your photos:
Photo 11- I think they are sewage pipes..
Photo 15 – you think THIS is bad? I know of several IIT and IIM graduates who will admit to travelling on the top of trains for a lark.. Some don’t want their parents to know.
Photo 22 – It is the Police Headquarters, not just the department, hence the grandeur..
Photo 24 – did you know that Indians believe that hanging a peacock feather in your room will keep lizards away? And the thought of the animal’s dusty colour and slimy look makes me want to hope this is true..
Photo 28 – Ah! The deep philosophical question is whether it was la vache sacrée (an ordinary sacred cow, physically speaking) or la sacrée vache (or the idiomatic sacred cow that symbolises the interesting undercurrent of religion in Bombay Politics?)
Photo 36 – Come on be fair about pricing strategies, Guy! Although you photo-shopped a big red circle, it appears to me that if you are a foreigner with ID you can get a discounted ticket too.
Photo 43 – Nice t-shirt!
Photo 56 – Did you notice that two of the women posing with you are wearing vermillion (red plumbic oxide powder) in their hair-partings? That ‘red light’ means they were married so any suitors better stop.. Another juxtaposition of the ancient versus the modern in India!
PS: What a way to spend Saturday morning – to be commenting on your blog when I could be working on mine (Shameless plug alert – after all YOU said never shy of promoting your blog:
http://obesityheadlines.blogspot.com)
A 1998 photo by Robb Kendrick that I came across today suggests those large pipes carry fresh clean water to the haves of Bombay and pass through the slums where have-nots live..
Guy,
an update to the caption of photo 52: running the Lotus devision of IBM was Ambuj Goyal’s previous job. In 2005 he was appointed as General Manager, Information Management Software, taking over from Janet Perna.
best regards, — stefan