A week in Delhi

It’s strange, but after all my travelling, this is my first trip to India. I’ve wanted to visit India for a long time, but never got around to it, so I was pleased to get the chance to make this first trip with my work. The visit was as usual mostly work, but I had the chance to get a little taste for what this great country has to offer. My boss Magnus has been working on this project for some years and now its time for more of us to get involved. The flight via Munich to Delhi was business class, so a little more comfort than usual, but I arrived with much less sleep than I needed on Tuesday morning in New Delhi. The hotel was centrally located and had quite a neat trendy design and the room was very comfortable.

Business wise, the week was very intense, with an almost continuous schedule of meetings with our Indian partners and the Indian Railways. The railway in India is the largest in the world and being the largest single employer in India and the world, it’s a big organisation to get to know and work with. It’s also a separate government ministry with a complex political and bureaucratic organisation. We made several visits to the ministry building to have meetings with the board members and ministers. It’s a large building where life revolves around finding room numbers and waiting patiently for people. The Indians have a special style when it comes to meeting procedures. Usually you enter their office and sit in a small sofa group, while the current visitor conducts their business. Then, when their finished, your invited to join him at his desk, or he might join you on the sofa to have a cup of tea. Drinking tea is a central part of almost every meeting in India, some times also with some food. Most of the senior staff have an army of assistants, who hurry in at the push of a button, to bring tea of food of documents or what ever is needed.

We had planned to try and meet a least one of the 3 government ministers for the railways. We had a good chance to meet one and he was in the parliament that day, which was debating an important amendment to a railway bill. His under secretary was a very nice guy and had helped us to meet people in the ministry during the week. He said the minister would return after the parliament, so we came back later in the afternoon, but we were then advised he had gone directly to his residence after the late session. The secretary asked if we would like to see the minister at his residence. Yes we said, a little surprised by the question. And so off we went with our taxi, which had waited for hours outside for us, which is apparently quite normal! At the ministers residence we were introduced to him and sat in his reception room where we were offered whiskey and small things to eat. He was very social and as we talked about our project and India. He explained a little about his political role. It’s expected that politicians in India are available to the people, and so such meetings were an everyday part of his job as a minister. It was quite an experience and key lobby meeting for us.

As usual we had very little time for our selves. We did manage to go for a walk one lunch time and visit the bazaar at Connaught Place, a sort of centre point for Delhi. It’s quite a run down area with shops and stalls and an underground bazaar. Having found some things to buy, it was fun to bargain and haggle with the traders and it seemed quite easy for us to negotiate down the prices. I also bought a pair of Levi jeans which were about half the price you’d expect in Sweden.

Not so unexpected...most things around the streets are very dirty and there are people sleeping at the side of the road and small children run along side you and beg for money. It’s hard to deal with this and feel comfortable with it while were living in our luxury hotel next door to all this poverty. There are still more than a third of the Indian population living below the poverty level, which is just 1 dollar per day! At the end of the week I am tired and looking forward to flying home. I will stop in Germany on the way and spend the rest of the weekend with Caroline in Köln…so much looking forward to this and to cuddling up beside her and sleeping.