Jen and I are on our way to Visakhapatnam this weekend to attend the wedding of a coworker of hers. Both of us will arrive by train. I'll take 12 hours during the day tomorrow from Chennai. Jennifer will go overnight with other coworkers from Hyderabad. We'll meet Sunday morning.

After that we'll take a couple of days in the eco-tourism developed land of the Araku Valley. We'll be staying at a hill-station called Jungle Bells.

I haven't written much lately. I've done most of my contributing with pictures. However, I would like to share a bit more.

I was in Mumbai yesterday for a series of meetings at ICICI bank headquarters to get the project on which I'm working (evaluating the incentives of ICICI's Credit Franchises (CF's) through randomized trials) out of the deliberation-stage and into the implementation-stage. In addition, soon I'll be hiring a survey company to go and individually survey several hundred of the CF's across the country as they begin to become more numerous.

I had two circumstances yesterday where I got soaking wet. The first happened as I stepped of the plane in Mumbai. The monsoon season is upon the country, so Mumbai gets hit regularly with heavy rainfall. When I arrived in Mumbai, the rain was pouring. I fly Air Deccan airlines, the cheapest in the country, in order to keep research costs down. Air Deccan is the equivalent of Southwest Airlines in the states. One of Air Deccan's strategies is to not rent airport gate terminals. Instead they bus passengers to and from the terminal and airplane (to be fair, most airlines do this). This means that we passengers have to embark and disembark the plane using those large mobile staircases. While the staircase on which I disembarked yesterday had a canopy, there was a space about two feet wide between the plane and the canopy where the rain was getting through. To my dismay, just as I stepped out of the plane and into this swath of moisture, the crowd in front of me on the staircase stopped moving - the bus at the bottom had departed taking it's first batch of passengers to the terminal. It took me a full 15 to 20 seconds of pushing to get the crowd behind me back onto the plane so that I could get out of the rain. To make matters worse, the wind picked up at just that moment and started to push the rainfall into the plane, forcing me to try and get the crowd behind me to back up even farther while all the while continuing to get soaked to the skin. Eventually I was transported to the terminal. Luckily I had 3 hours before my first meeting. My flight had left Chennai at 5:30 am and had arrived in Mumbai just after 7. I hadn't gotten much sleep the night before, so I pulled up a chair there in the baggage claim area and slept myself dry. By the time I was ready to go to ICICI headquarters just after 10, I was dry and the sun was shining outside.

I won't go into as many details for the second case of getting soaked, other than to say that it involved a lot of walking in humid conditions to find a store that could recharge my prepaid mobile phone - a search that was frustratingly fruitless. It did, however, introduce me to another side of the Bandra Kurla Complex where ICICI has their building. If you clicked on the BKC link in the previous sentence, you will have read that it is in many ways the new financial district of Mumbai. But under the shadows and within the midst of these giant money and market-making bastions of capitalism lay pockets of extreme poverty. It was into this maze of slums across the street from ICICI that I ventured to try and recharge my phone. As I mentioned, I was ultimately unsuccessful in finding a store that could perform the recharge for me (I didn't venture too far into the area). Nevertheless, it gave me a first-hand look at an urban shanty town, a environment to which I hadn't personally been exposed for awhile. It isn't that I haven't been close - I've driven over and past them for two months now. I just hadn't been up close yet. It was an incredible (incredible in the sense of hard-to-comprehend) reminder that there are people that live among trash - literally as if they had taken up residence in a garbage dump. And it's right there, just across the street from ICICI, and tucked among the national stock-exchange, the Reserve Bank of India (India's central bank), and several other major financial institutions.

To contribute to the ability of people to be able to afford good housing is part of the reason Jennifer and I are here. It would be nice to be successful.

I CAN AT LAST READ OUR BLOG! The ban has been lifted as of this afternoon.

July 21, 2006

At some point, no matter how exotic and exciting the place you are living in seems compared to where you come from, you start to get settled into a routine. That is my current status. The television in my hotel room does me a disservice in some ways. I get home from work tired, sometimes missing home, so I have ended up watching way more dumb Hallmark Channel Specials than is good for me. It sounds stupid, I know. Go all the way to India to sit in a hotel room and watch the Hallmark Channel, of all things. But it is a bit of a security blanket, a way of connecting to home when I am alone without even Rock around. And I do it too often these days. Thus my dearth of blog entries. True confessions. Of course, what was before “exotic” and new is now more familiar, so I find comfort in other things as well. Which means it is time to turn off the TV.

Routine does not need to become “rut,” though, and I am determined not to have that happen.

Yesterday I went to a press conference for my organization because they had won a transparency award from CGAP. It was a neat experience. Five women who were members / clients accepted the award. These women were hilarious. I had some time to “chat” with them after the ceremony. It was a rather comical chat because I speak no Telagu and they speak no English, and even one of my colleagues from Delhi who speaks Hindi couldn't communicate with them because they speak no Hindi and she speaks no Telagu. Luckily, several of the organization's employees who speak both languages were around, so when we got stuck (every sentence), we could get someone to help us out. We laughed a lot. Mostly they laughed at me trying to remember and correctly pronounce everyone's names. I finally got it. But I then asked them to name a group of American colleagues in the room, and we all burst into laughter when they had as hard of a time doing it as I had had with their names. They invited me to come visit their shops and homes in their villages. I doubt I will be able to, but we had a good time.

I did finally do a field visit a couple of weeks ago, and it was a neat experience. It was a very rural town, two hours away from Hyderabad, and we had to drive over difficult muddy roads with holes in them to get there. During Monsoon season those same roads must be close to impassable. In some ways, I felt like I was back in rural Guatemala or rural Peru (except more-so), but instead of seeing a Catholic church in the center of town and pictures of Christ and the various Catholic saints in shops and homes, it was a Hindu temple and the Hindu gods--Vishnu, Gamesh, etc. I don't remember seeing a school. Seventy percent of India's population and three-fourths of its poor live in rural areas.

The town was tiny, smaller than most I've visited anywhere. The closest I can think of is maybe the town I once visited further above Patacancha in Peru. I think they said total population was 1200. It was raining when we arrived, so the meeting was held in someone's house. 50-ish women crowded into this home while the loan officer conducted the meeting. Each group of 5 women had a leader who would report on that group's status, how the businesses were going, etc. Payments on existing loans were made as required, and I even saw a loan disbursed – both the leader of the group of 5 and the leader of the overall group of 50 had to sign off on it. The leader of the group of 50 was probably in her 50's and had a neat presence and great confidence.

Afterwards, we all introduced ourselves and then mulled around the back yard. With permission, I took pictures with our digital camera. I had a kick being able to show the pictures to the women right away. We had a good time. After that, we walked the muddy paths of the village, visiting several of the homes / businesses of the women and their families. Several had invested in shops, some in crops, some in Water Buffalo. I thought one of the Water Buffalo (which resembled a bull) was charging me at one point until I realized he was just thirsty and I was standing in front of the water. These women's husbands were usually home too, and they too were excited to show us the family business. Family income often increases substantially upon access to finance.

And I thought, how neat that these women can feel like they are making significant contributions to helping their families realize their dreams. In a land where an estimated 7000+ brides in 2005 were burned because of dowry issues, what a quietly revolutionary way of empowering women. Many microfinance organizations focus on women not necessarily with the primary aim of empowering them – it just makes business and long-term socio-economic sense. Experience has shown that women are a better credit risk / more likely to repay and are more likely to spend profits on the family (education, food, health, etc.). But the empowerment, confidence and knowledge that “I am able to make fulfilling choices that are creating a better life for myself and my family, I am needed and valued” is a side effect. You could see it in their eyes.

And therein lies the power.

When the routine starts to settle in and the work begins to feel a little tedious in the head office, these are good memories to turn to.

Check out the following newslink I found on CNN.com.

It turns out that the reason I have been unable to read my own blog for the past 5 days (despite being able to post to it) is that India's government has blocked the entire www.blogspot.com domain (including yours truly rocknjen2003.blogspot.com) in an effort to stifle communal strife resulting from the Mumbai-bombings last week.

Violence touches you in different ways... I thought for sure that it was IFMR blocking the site for its students' sake.

An interesting website with information tracking the current situation.

Some more recent pictures from Andhra Pradesh.

A panoramic view of Rajahmundry, a small town Rock visited in north-eastern Andhra Pradesh.

Jen at Charminar, Hyderabad's iconic monument in the middle of the old part of town. Char-minar literally means "four minarets".

Rock in Rajahmundry disbursing the very first CF-loan in Andhra Pradesh. The young man on the left is the ricemill owner / credit franchisee who sourced the loan. The man in white is the rice farmer receiving the loan. The man on the right is the branch manager who took me around to visit the different CF's in the area. The woman behind me is an office employee who helps with the operations.

Pictures of Mumbai

(taken during our trip several weeks ago, described in earlier entries)

A panorama view from room #9052 in the Four Seasons Hotel, Mumbai

At the Gateway of India built to commemorate the arrival of a British monarch many years ago.

July 11, 2006
Mumbai Blasts

7/11 will be a day of infamy in India much in the way that 9/11 is in the States. Just want to let everyone know that Rock is in Chennai and I am in Hyderabad and we are okay.

It is sobering to know that we have both used the Mumbai train system at the rush-hour time of day it was blasted. Similar to how it was sobering to know, five years ago, that I had visited the Twin Towers less than a month before 9/11, and that I had flown on American and United airplanes even more recently.

I am incredibly grateful that Rock's work did not take him to Mumbai this week. The thought of an alternate reality if he had been there and had happened to take the train at rush hour today makes me weep as my heart reaches out to those people whose husbands, wives, fathers, mothers, and children were on those trains. Such pain.

A few pictures of Jennifer and Rock at Runway 9 - Hyderabad's version of Six Flags. We went last Saturday, July 1st, for a party with Jennifer's company celebrating a bunch of Area Managers receiving their first areas.

Jennifer ready to drive the go-kart

Rock excited to get his turn

Jen shooting archery

Rock taking careful aim

Jen taking even more careful aim

The group and the glass. This picture has a hilarious story to go along with it. This is a group of employees enjoying dinner. Notice the glass of water placed strategically on the floor in the entrance to the circle of the chairs. The group would invite to their circle an unkowning newcomer. Just as the person would reach the group, eager to join the crowd and start his/her meal, the group would unitedly shout in Telagu, "WATCH OUT!!" and point to the cup of water that the dupe would inevitably be about to knock over. Everyone would then burst out in raucous laughter and await the next victim.

7/2/06

Sunday, 1:00 PM, Hyderabad.

This week has been incredibly busy for me, with long hours at work. We spent a lot of time solidifying an organization structure and communicating it to employees, which took a lot of mental and emotional energy. Hopefully the org structure we chose will enable the organization to achieve its strategic growth goals. That is the aim. A huge challenge has been figuring out how to coach leadership to effectively implement the change and deal with the fallout from a few employees who were not given the positions they were expecting / hoping for because their bosses don't think they are ready yet.

This has been a really good growth experience for me.

Rock is here in Hyderabad with me over the weekend, as he will be in town for his research next week. It has been fun to introduce him to my coworkers and the city. Yesterday we went on a company outing, where we rode go-karts , tried our hand at archery and shooting, roller skated (just me, for about 2 minutes), and ate lots of yummy Indian food. It was a lot of fun and I was glad Rock could be there and get to know the people in my Monday-to-Thursday / Tuesday-to-Friday world. And now we can say we've been go-karting in India.

One of the employees told me last night that if I have only been to the metro areas of Chennai, Mumbai, and Hyderabad, I have not seen the real India. I think he is probably right. Rock has seen much more of that than I have.

Unfortunately, Rock got a bug in his travels in Maharastra earlier this week. It took a turn for the worse last night so he is taking medication and resting today. I got a bug when I was in Mumbai two weeks ago. It was not a fun experience. On my last night there (a Sunday night), I threw caution to the wind, caved to a craving and ordered a Caesar Salad at an unknown but reasonable-looking restaurant. Salads are a big no-no here and I knew better. (The Caesar Salad, it turns out, did not taste at all like Caesar Salad, but I love salads and hadn't had one in so long that I ate it anyway.) I started getting cramps that night. When I woke up to catch my 6 AM flight to Hyderabad, I threw up. I felt better after that and went to the airport, but just as the plane was on the runway taking off, the urge was overwhelming. I can now say I have used a “barf bag” on a plane and I am glad they are there. When I arrived to work, I was still a little queasy but not bad, but within in a couple of hours I had thrown up again and was using the bathroom every 20 minutes. The consistency of everything was like water. I was quickly dehydrating and reached the point where I could not stand up without fainting.

Happily, at that point one of my close co-workers had and gave me water with a special powder mix to restore the necessary nutrients my body had lost, contacted her father (who is a doctor), and got me the appropriate medication. I was feeling much better by the end of the day, and was completely myself within 2-3 days. When you get really sick with a bug, you quickly understand how people and especially children die from diarrhea / dehydration in developing countries if they don't have access to proper water and health care. Rock has not gotten that bad. We recognized that he had a bug so he started taking the medication before getting super bad. But he is not feeling well at the moment. So we will have to wait to see some of the mosques and Hindu temples we were hoping to visit until later this week, in the evenings. I am excited to be together during the week, as that has not happened for 6 weeks now.