Cultural Difference

She sees him almost everyday. He drives in to work at 8:30 a.m., parks in the same spot by the mailroom, always walks in with a grande something from Starbucks with his name written on the side.

A casual acquaintance for 10 months now, he and mom usually talk about reports and deadlines because they have to, but once in a while, something personal slips out - like the fact that mom thinks the Veg Out sandwich at Einstein Bros. Bagels is a little overpriced, or that she cannot listen to an audio book and drive at the same time because both activities require intense concentration.

On his part, the co-worker mentions his adopted children from Russia and China and family outings to the zoo or ChuckE. Cheese’s.

On the way to the restroom yesterday, mom saw him surrounded by a gaggle of cooing co-workers and two shy children clinging to his legs. Mom joined in the general coochie-cooing and smiled at the plump little toddler holding her dad’s hand, and her shy brother.

“I finally get to meet your children,” she gushed. “They’re adorable! Look at those pretty eyes and that bright smile. And they’re so tall!”

“Thanks,” he replied, pushing his son forward to say hello.

Mom shook the boy’s hand, straightened up, and peered over her co-worker’s shoulder. “Is your wife here?” she asked, curious about the kind of woman this Richard Gere look-alike was married to. “I’d love to meet her.”

Suddenly, the room became deathly quiet. The telephones stopped ringing; the fax machine stopped spitting papers; the clock on the wall stopped ticking; the computers stopped humming; the coffee in the kitchen stopped dripping; the gaggle of cooing co-workers sharply sucked in their breaths.

“Actually, my partner, Ken, is over there,” the man calmly pointed to a short, balding, bespectacled guy in baggy jeans. “I’d be happy to introduce you to him.”

Huh?

It’s three in the afternoon and you’re sitting in a dimly-lit conference room listening to your boss’s boss’s boss’s boss deliver a presentation that, quite frankly, is flying over your head.

You’re having a hard time staying awake after your aloo parantha-raita lunch, but the room isn’t dark enough for you to nod off. Besides, your co-workers seem to be all ears and are nodding brightly.

You steal covert glances at your watch willing time to move faster. You swallow simultaneous yawns and pick imaginary lint off your pants. You draw flowers on your notepad that gradually morph into stars that morph into tendrils that morph into arrows that look like cricket bats; you draw balls to go with the bats and color them in. One thing leads to another - the cricket bats start to look phallic, and your mind is soon filled with images of Halle Berry and Billy Bob thrashing around in Monster’s Ball, a movie you rented solely for that one scene. You hastily scribble over your doodle on company stationery and look at the PowerPoint slide show with unseeing eyes.

Across the gleaming mahogany table, your group’s admin. is seemingly unaware that her blouse is dangerously low-cut. You idly wonder how many pencils she can hold in her bountiful cleavage. At least three, you surmise. Maybe even four.

Apparently, the head honcho said something amusing because, suddenly, everybody laughs. You join in, even though you didn’t hear what he said, but don’t want to look like an idiot.

The presentation continues, and you jot down a grocery list on the margin of your notepad. “Upcoming baccha birthday this weekend,” you recall. “Buy gift.”

You suddenly remember that you forgot to call your cousin on her anniversary yesterday, even after your mother reminded you a half-dozen times. Now, this cousin will bitch about you to her mother, who will then update all relatives worldwide about the snob you have become.

“Any questions?" the big boss asks, interrupting your rêverie, and signaling the end of the 45-minute presentation.

“Just one,” you want to confess. “What the heck were you talking about?”

Grandma (to mom): “This Nilanjana Roy? Have you been to her blog? Show me how to get there.”
Mom (who suffers from foot-in-mouth disease): “Nilanjana? Oh, she and I were English lit. batch mates.”
Grandma (visibly impressed - not by the name dropping, but by Nilanjana’s literary stature): “And she's a writer today, eh? See?”

Somebody, just shoot mom.

How about Green Eggs and Ham?

Somewhere between reading The Cat in the Hat aloud for the 1,986th time and wiping Kuki front to back for the 9,362nd time, mom wondered if, perhaps, the phrase “spending quality time with my children,” was a tad overrated.

Goodness knows she had invoked the cliché for years, using it as an excuse for her supreme sloth and lack of motivation to find gainful employment. “I love shopping at Wal-Mart,” she’d tell herself, unable to afford Nordstrom, where even the shoe salesmen are dressed in suits.

Finally, after years of mooching off dad, mom looked at the price of daycare and decided she needed a job if she ever wanted to spend quality time with herself. And a few months later, a bewildered Kuki found herself in daycare, while her mother trotted off every morning to warm a swivel chair in a cubicle for the next eight hours.

The first few months, mom was so thrilled to be on a company payroll, she vowed never again to quit working just because she didn’t feel like it, or make some other lame excuse, such as:

• I hate driving more than 10 miles both ways
• My company has too many desis
• I can’t find a radio station I like during rush hour
• My car pool buddy passes gas and cracks corny jokes
• They’re paying me too much
• I’m the only vegetarian around
• My boss keeps looking at my boobs when she has a perfectly good pair of her own
• My in-laws are visiting and I have to do seva
• I miss Oprah
• My dog needs me

Lately, though, mom’s honeymoon phase might be tapering, especially as she finds that people younger than her are ascending the ladder quicker because they were concentrating on their careers while she was busy birthing babies.

And so, as mom congratulates a former co-worker on her newfound managerial status, and helps herself to another slice of celebratory cake, she idly wonders how many senior leaders in her company have read Dr. Seuss aloud 1,986 times.

On the one hand...

You’re glad you live in Sleepyville, where most calamities are rare and natural. Your Tuesday is as predictable as your Monday or Wednesday. The sun is shining, the birds are chirping, coffee’s brewing, you received a dinner invitation, your family’s visiting, you know people from Bombay but nobody in Bombay, and everything’s all right in your world.

On the other hand…

You devour news reports and feel useless that you’re sitting warm and dry in front of a computer terminal. You feel roused to action and want to sign up as a Red Cross volunteer - you should be donating blood or on the streets helping victims. You should've been a reporter writing meaningful stories that touch people’s hearts, instead of churning our corporate crap. You hope Hindu-Muslim riots don’t break out and that it stops raining.

You feel pathetic that all you can do is link to a Web site and thank god that your family’s safe and sound.