First Month in Mumbai

Monday, July 17, 2006

Yesterday was my first month in Mumbai. Finally. Two more months to go.

I'm wondering how much my Indian counterpart has learnt from me. She hasn't even completed a single log and has been MIA for 2 and a half days. Her manager doesn't even know she didn't come to work.

We heard from Tina that Aditi has been saying that she doesn't need as many headcounts as we have in Singapore because Indians are smarter than Singaporeans. What a joke. I'm waiting for the day that she will take her words back. She doesn't know that we have been correcting all their mistakes for them since day 1. Not day 1 of my India trip but day 1 since the channel started. The channel is more than 1 and a half years old and still we are cleaning up their mess.

Many friends have also told me that they thought Indians are very smart. I agree to a certain extent but we can't assume everyone of them are. (Not that I am saying they are dumb or anything). Just like we can't assume all Singaporeans are smart.

What I'm trying to say is that their work attitude is really different from us. The official working hours are 9am to 6pm. But you can still see people strolling in the office at 10am or 10.30. They only start real work around 11am. Then at about 5pm, they start to relax and walk around or talk while waiting for 6pm. On Friday, you hardly see people working. Now I'm not surprised that they always take so long to reply to our emails, urgent or not.

It's different when they need something from you. They keep coming to your desk and asking you how you're doing and whether the thing they want is ready. How annoying is that?

*He just came in again to ask for the stuff*

Anyway, I have never seen anyone teach a newcomer log scheduling the way we do. When I just started this job 3 years ago, I was totally new. I didn't even know what scheduling was about. Yet, I was just thrown a guide on scheduling and told to produce my first log. Here, we are practically spoon feeding the Indian schedulers. (Are they really experienced?) We need to show them every single step and even sit down with them as they start to work on the log to make sure they do the right things. Smart huh?

Well, work aside, I'm enjoying my stay here. I'm making full use of my time to explore the city I think. My colleagues from other countries other than India have been really nice to us.

My biggest accomplishment so far is that I proved Tina wrong because I went to the gym last night. She bet that I wouldn't ever go just because she has been travelling with her gym equipment for twenty years and she hasn't been to the gym ever. Well, I'm different from her! Haha...

Yes. I'm looking forward to the day I go home but I think I will miss this city when the day comes.