Persistence and Resilience : What makes an Indian Dreamer Stand Out

Persist : to go on resolutely or stubbornly in spite of opposition, importunity, or warning
Resilience : an ability to recover from or adjust easily to misfortune or change

As always, last week we were having a fuzool[wasteful] discussion about things to do, sitting in a friends balcony far away from hyderabad.. as usual, we were out smarting each other on which things would work and which wouldnt... u know how we normally used to do it in the US... his better half chimed in.. what you guys lack is the "Resilience and the Persistence" that Indian dreamers have. They are willing to take it on the chin and try it again and again and again.. we have always given up too easily.... She was right, the past few weeks have shown me the clear difference between a Non Resilient Indian ( NRI) and an Indian Dreamer / Doer.

Call it laziness or trepidation, I got too hooked into the prescribed Rat race that we learn to run in the US. Just as the credit card companies wanted, I learned to be happy with a fat paycheck, house, cars, bonus, 401K's, mutual funds, tax savings.. and all the BS that never get you where you want to be. As I look back.. I see how easily a bunch of us gave up on a few great opportunities we had in hand, including websites, consulting business as well as training business. The same opportunity if provided to an Indian dreamer would have been a multi million dollar enterprise now.

This week I had a chance to meet a partner of a Private Equity firm and he referred to the untapped potential of india and how PE funds are actively circling india with millions of dollars to fund and bring out the best from any corner of India. He was talking about how the future is all in the Indian SME's [ Small to mid size enterprises .. referred to as sme's in india ] which are similar to the proverbial garage in silicon valley.

His take was that Technology was already overvalued in India and that they are primarily focussing on Healthcare, Manufacturing and Retail Supply Chain that would take India to the next level in the global economy. Some stories he mentioned about the work coming out of 1 and 2 bed room apt's in Hyderabad, Bangalore and some unknown remote towns were amazing, the heroes were high school drop outs and particularly PHD's that still kept tutoring in the evenings to make their ends meet. Angels and PE's are now coming along and providing these folks the labs and money to make a comfortable living. Of course, his firm has a financial interest in it, but atleast the Indian Dreams are getting a chance to see the light of the day...

Now when I think back about the Dog Grooming Service in Jim Carrey's Dumb and Dumber, may be it was not a bad idea after all ..

Ganesh Chaturthi

Sunday was ganesh chaturthi and also the telugu calendar birthday of a few family members. Visited my parents, participated in the pooja and had lots of fun with kids, family and extended family after the pooja. Ganesh festival in hyderabad has been a special event with a number of pandals on the road that are organized by community and civic groups. This time the surprising thing was that i saw more activity from corporates and other groups within companies with a pandal in the campus of our own organization.

Nimajjanam is another story with High Court issuing orders not to use hussain sagar, and the politicians not willing to implement the same. Its a double edged sword and people are keeping quite for now, we have to see what will happen in a week. Some of the cool ganesha's this time included "Grage Ganesha.. made will grapes", "Laddoo Ganesh .. Made with all laddoos" etc., and dont underestimate their sizes, they were atleast 10 feet tall and 5 feet wide from what I have seen.

Sweets some how take over your diet during festivals in India. Payasam, Laddoos, Kajjakayalu.. and on and on..no more frozen stuff ;-).. I had a blast and am back to work today. This week is going to be very hectic with a few major tasks in creating the business plans for next year for my organization etc. So, my scribbles may be limited to a few sentences..

I miss the 30 day return policies

Folks, all of you sending emails that I am not reachable on my new cell.. hang in there for a few days.. its a combination of the cell provider's unplanned growth [ They keep on adding subscribers without having the bandwidth ] + troubles with my new phone that had all your numbers in it.

Bought a nokia n70 last week and after 2 days of usage, this phone is constantly rebooting when I am in a call. When I took it back to the dealer, she put me in touch with nokia care and it takes around 2 weeks to troubleshoot this phone and then provide me with a replacement in case they cant fix the issue.

A visit to nokia-care near panjagutta was the most discouraging part. There were tons of folks complaining, moaning and bitching about the issues they were having and the standard answer was "Go to input counter and turn in the phone, we will call you in 10 days..".. Input seems to be a term for checking in the phone for service.. I was able to leverage a contact I had at nokia to get a standby phone while my original phone is in service..

Since I am talking about phones, its amazing how much folks here spend on getting the latest handsets. Its considered to be a status symbol more than anything and most of the yuppy crowd is always flaunting the latest and the greatest in mobile technology. Without getting carried away, I chose one that had all the features I needed and was around 35%th percentile of the cost range available here... Yeah I know.. I am cheap ;-)

Quick Update : Hyderabadi Happenings

Disclaimer : Blog has been catching up with hits from many places.. also heard that there was a discussion around this in sunday's party in US.. got 50 unique hits on this day itself. Remember, these are just my ramblings and are my personal opinions, they in no way reflect the feelings of my employer or any one I am associated with... Had to do this to Cover My A**.. Also please ignore grammar and spelling.. since I am trying to dump my mind here without spending too much time..

Past weekend was the last chance for good muhurat's before the 3 to 4 month "soonya masam". Looks like there are no auspicious times till february and tv9 reported that there were 900+ marriages and 1000+ gruha pravesha's happening between 17 and 19th of August. I moved into my new rental house, It was fun to have the family around and everyone taking the interest in making the best of the occassion. Since this was at 3am I didnt invite anyone except my immediate family and pooja was done in a more serious fashion than what I was used to in the US... .

My container has not arrived yet in India. Visited the shipping agent and provided him the list of items with values attached to it along with copies of passport etc., and the expected date is around the 28th. So, until then I will be living in an empty house with the basic furnishings.

Saturday was fun filled with a dinner party @ an ISB Alumni house . Met the families of some old friends and we had fun enjoying the real hyderabadi delicacies along with the combination of chai+samosa[the real triangular kind .. not the aloo filled blobs we get in the US ].

At the end of the day I had to visit an injured team member. He was very critically injured when a passing mini bus hit him while crossing the road. Road accidents in hyderabad are so horrible that bike rides are no longer fun. There are atleast 3 to 5 bike related deaths reported in the paper everyday including lorries that have climbed over the bikes etc. He is still in critical condition, but the emergency response was very fast. May be since he was in the hitec area, the ambulance got him to the hospital in less than 15 mins and got him admitted for an emergency procedure. HR and Legal teams of my organization also reacted quickly to arrange for everything and I was really happy to see the emergency plans they have in place.

Sunday brought along visits to some interesting Real Estate ventures including the coveted medchal area. Geez.. if I have to pay the high rates so far away from hyderabad, I might as well come back to US and buy an acre on some of the lake communities. Land seems to be a bigger hype in the medchal and surrounding areas. Who knows, may be the next batch of suckers will double it for the next year.. herd mentality fuels the bubbles.. and the standard statement that everyone uses is "Land will never loose value.."

Sunday evening, we went for a party of the elite real-estate hyderabad crowd. I was not on the invitee list, but I accompanied a friend of mine. It was a pleasant surprise to see such big wigs and politicians not showing any arrogance .. and really they were down to earth.. I have to plead guilty for asking one of the big realestate guys where he thought the market was headed.. and his answer was "Its going to stagnate soon.. but who knows who will come along next and drive this further"... Drinks and Appetizers at the table, followed by a dinner buffet.. Food was excellent, followed by an awesome dessert bar.. you can guess where I spent most of my time..

Visited TMC to check out appliances, anything you get in US is available here too but at a small premium. The advantage is that you get full service and support. Word .. "Service" should be taken with a grain of salt, since its a pain to get anything done. ICICI pissed me off after making me go round and round.. I will cover the story in another posting.. went to HDFC and I was out in 10 mins with my work done.

Ordered cable based Internet from Beam and a Fixed Wireless line from Tata Indicom. The thing I am starting to get sick of is the concept of the marketing executive. Even if I call a company saying I need xyz.. they want to send a marketing person that comes and tries to sell the same thing that you are asking for. In both cases, I cut off the sales pitch and told them I am not willing to hear anything.. here is what I want.

Enough for now.. time to get to work..

Re-Initiation and House Rental

I titled this a re-initiation based on an old document on wikipedia about tribal initiation.. "An initiation is also a ceremony by which a person is introduced into a society, or other organized body, especially the rite of admission into a order."

The initiation ceremony with colleagues and team was with a long drawn out drinks and dinner at Zaffran Exotica on Rd12. Food was above average consisting of multiple rounds of appetizers and drinks, and then followed by a simple rice based main course and dessert. Blenderspride and Old monk still seem to be favourites in mid level restaurants in the town. Also, caught up with a number of friends and visited various joints including Ohri's, Deccan@Kakatiya, Little Italy etc..

Last week also brought along the long and boring KANK [ kabhi alvida na kehna ] making it my first movie at IMAX and in hyderabad. I expected a lot more masala and entertainment from Karan Johar than the boring infidelity story. God, rani was crying all through the 2nd half...Loved amitabh's role as "sexy sam".. Reminded me of Hugh Heffner from playboy... After the movie a stop at Ohri's for a midnight coffee and we headed to the "end of mid term" bash @ISB, which was in full swing at 3:00 am with booze and music in high gear.

On the home front, signed a lease in Jubilee Hills after a long search. For now I settled in a 2700 sqft house and plan to move out in a year into my own place. We have a nice family in the ground floor and they are going out of their way to make me comfortable etc.

Independent House Rental : When it comes to independent houses around jubilee, banjara, srinagar, prashashan nagar, hitec etc., they vary from 17k to 50K for 1700 - 4000 sqft and also the price goes up with amenities. Normally it goes around Rs100 per sqft in a good neighborhood with nice features etc. I liked this house since its a stones throw away from my kid's school, coffee day, food world, a couple of nice restaurant [ trying not to give away the exact location ]. Security is acceptable and my house is half a km from the main road making it more secure due to a lack of pass-through traffic. Second on my list was a beautiful house at the edge of a valley with a private lawn etc., but the drive was too long from where I intend to join my kids and from my office.

Apartment Rentals : On the apartment front, I felt claustrophobic in the big townships I visited. There were some major builders who divided up 1500-1700 sqft into a 4 bedroom apt and the bedrooms were smaller than my hotel room at ameerpet. IVRCL towers is a departure from the rest and is very well laid out. The only challenge is that its far away from the city for now, but as hyderabad expands, this area will certainly become a city of its Own. Its around 14KM from Jubilee Hills checkpost and 20 KM from Ameerpet.

Main city of hyderabad is saturated at this time. No growth in property values and everyone is running towards the outskirts. Sainik Puri, Tarnaka, HabsiGuda etc., are also good areas with low rentals, in the 8k to 15K range, but they are far away from the IT Centers and some of my team members take 1.5 Hour to 2 hours on a good day to get to Madhapur. Future may look very good once the ORR [ outer ring road ] is complete. There was a newspaper column yesterday interviewing a couple of folks that bougt acres of land 100 KM away from hyderabad... I doubt it will get to 100KM away from the center, but the city is certainly evolving into a world class and happening place with the new airport and the knowledge corridor being connected by an 8 lane, elevated expressway soon. [No Hype .. Real Facts ]

There are some new and very upscale townships being constructed by Jayabheri named Orange County, [.. wasnt that the county bankrupt at one time ?] as well as L&T in the knowledge corridor -aka- gacchi bowli. They are going around 3500-4000 per sqft and are looking like the next big towers that will come up in this area. Also heard that there is a 90 floor tower being constructed soon some where around here. While I was in the US it was very hard to believe the hype, and believe me, there is a lot of Hype .. but Hyderabad is a happening place.

Thats enough for now.. more later..

1st Week in Hyderabad

As expected, life was easy the first week. Left my sons with the grand parents and joined work 2 days ago. Hyderabad realestate is steaming hot and thats all people want to talk about. Doing my best to ask dumb questions about roads and areas to divert the topics but it some how ends up being a discussion about how the real estate is doing there.

I am put up at Rd#12 Banjara and everything is very accessible. Roads are in pretty bad shape compared to what they were during the congress plenary 6 months ago.. I think its due to the rains. Tried to visit Hyderabad Central and PVR Cinemas on a sunday evening and realized that it was a major safety hazard to even consider going in there at that times. People were packed in every floor and the only way in and out was through the main door [ update : Firemarshall has issued an ultimatum to Hyderabad central to fix the issues or it will be shutdown in 2 weeks ]

McDonalds opened its doors in Hyderabad recently at IMAX with a 20Rs Veg burger, 20Rs Softie and 6Rs fries etc. This is a big hit in hyderabad, and there are lines in front of this joint all day long. Heard some one complain that there was no cheese in the burger.. I dont intend to try it any time soon... Will keep you posted if I do.. Subways seem to be doing well, also a new concept called Yo!China is doing well. 3 More mc'y'd's and 2 subways are expected to open soon.

Some eye openers since my arrival.. [ mostly through newspapers or tv ]

1. Beggar mafia is REAL : Cnn IBN had a hidden camera expose that showed how doctors help beggars amputate their hands/legs etc., and some of the beggars that were forced into this profession by others

2. Internet based NRI marriages are not working : TV9 had a program in which they claimed that atleast 800 AP women are affected. Some cases were bad, one guy just left his wife in the US airport, took her passport and left; one family tried to kill her in India to avoid the issues they woudl face in US. Gist of the story was that India now has some sort of a domestic issue agreement with US and that they would be able to take action going forward.

3. Land Grabbing, Fraudulent Documents, Defrauding NRI's is at a peak. One realtor that was working with me to find a rental said.. and I quote him.. "Take this sir, belongs to an NRI and I have him in my pocket, I will get you what ever you want .. ".. decided not to deal with him any longer.

4. Refer to Wow Hyderabad .. to see whats happening around HYD and whats coming up. Focusses more on the high end happenings, but its a good start.