The Lair

To the outsider who hasn’t bothered to find out anything about the country, it seems that India is this scary place which only eats rabbit food. To some extent, this is true. There are lots of vegetarian restaurants. In fact, in the unlikely event that I wanted to become a rabbit food eater myself; there probably isn’t a better country to live in.

But the problem is, I’m anything but a vegetarian.

The first hotel we stayed in for the night featured (as most hotels do) a comp breakfast. On heading downstairs, we were treated to a delicious repast of South Indian breakfast food. All good right? Well, the problem is that it was all vegetarian.

Although the situation has improved a tad, this is why I find Hats of Meat unbelievably funny. If you can’t look past the horrendous website design and you think this is like a domestic accident gone horribly wrong; then I’m sorry. But all I fixate on is the mound of meat.

In other news, the bombings in this here parts have compelled the hotel authorities to drag out two metal detectors and install them in the front lobby. Guests and visitors alike (there are lots of visitors to this hotel, there is a wedding reception on almost every night it seems) need to walk through the metal detector.

No one seems very concerned about monitoring the detector, or indeed, about a random beep when a metal detector wand is passed through a vehicle - but I guess it’s the thought that counts.

So, why am I away from Colombo? Because the client that I’m meeting thought that Sri Lanka was too dangerous to visit. In retrospect, I don’t blame the client. Random bus bombings tend to make anyone nervous, hell they make me nervous.

Which makes the news of a serial killer in the vicinity of the hotel all the more ironic. In a moody, murder and mayhem sort of way. No doubt sensing an opportunity, the guests at the hotel have been issued a mini travel-advisory of sorts. Do not, the advisory says in officialese, trawl bars in the region. Instead, patronize the inhouse watering hole. Also, reads the subtext in large lettering, don’t stagger around the streets drunk. In addition to drunkenly stepping on something that smells noxious, getting hit by an errant driver or tripping and falling over pieces of the pavement, a pedestrian is liable to have his head smashed in by a psycho.

So, cable TV and lots of nice facilities (and a comp mini-bar!) notwithstanding, I think we were all a bit bored with life this week. There is only so much drinking that can be done after a hard day of arguing about the nitty gritties of requirements; so everyone was feeling some degree of cabin fever. Even if it is a very large and luxurious cabin with a working ethernet port and super slowmo internets.

This is why the development manager in the client’s establishment and I were in the bar talking about the time honoured tradition of asking hotel staff for female company. Not that we were particularly inclined, of course - but we were in the company of a young, impressionable developer type who had gotten himself a free business class upgrade. “Easy”, we insisted. “Just walk upto reception and ask for some female company for dinner. We’re sure they’ll oblige you”. Wide-eyed, this little munchkin swallowed the story.

Strategically waiting until after we had all eaten dinner (so his motivations could hardly be mistaken), our hero sauntered upto reception and made his request. Until the very last minute, I thought he knew it was a joke. I only realized my mistake when I saw an emphatic head shake from the hotel staff.

Apparently that sort of thing doesn’t happen around here. Who knew?

As hinted earlier, I’ve been shunted to that large country up north. Having spent approximately a week here, I’m now qualified to make the following observations.

• Conference rooms across the world look pretty similar
• The streets (as seen from the interior of a thankfully airconditioned vehicle) look pretty darn dusty.
• These Chennai drivers are completely and utterly insane - I’ve started a hall of fear for the most extravagant, like some random driver deciding that he really needed to take an exit and proceeding to cut us off while both vehicles were travelling at about 80 klicks an hour.

Considering the hype about the accommodation that could have been on offer, I was (pretty justifiably, I think) a bit wary. I wasn’t kidding when I thought of packing a can of Baygon (insecticide, essentially) to keep the marauding vermin at bay. The first day we landed, we went to this serviced apartment block - like a hotel, but not quite. A quick inspection of the room revealed no vermin, reasonably clean sheets, reasonably clean towels. Thanking myself for small mercies, I settled in.

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No, really. It’s a scoping technique. I now need to find 5 other things to learn before breakfast.

I work for a company which has offices in other countries. Since most of the business is provided by people writing software for companies outside Sri Lanka; there is a reasonable amount of travel involved.

As is usual, people have a wide spectrum of reactions to being sent onsite.

Most like the idea of going out of the country for a while. Away from parental supervision, completely different country/culture, sometimes a bit of distance from the humdrum activities of living here. People like the idea of going on short term visits even more. All the fun of international travel, but none of the long term hassle. (Of course, there are those who demand long term placement in another office too. Different story).

However, international here means … umm.. Europe or the Americas. While we love India (we do, really), travelling there seems insufficiently exotic to appeal to many.

So in about two weeks, a bunch of people need to travel to India to meet and greet a client. Because you know, explody buses and other stuff make this country a bit unsafe so the client is refusing to turn up here.

I need to find a creative way to break the news to the folks who’re going to travel. I initially thought of a tasteless American Indian pidgin greeting to let them know that, yes, despite their hopes to the contrary - travel they must.

Any other creative ideas?