Friday, August 20, 2010

How much is too much?

Quoting

Activating Leadership

We lead by example and inspire leadership through our activities. We take full responsibility for developing the youth leadership potential of our members.

Demonstrating Integrity

We are consistent and transparent in our decisions and actions. We fulfil our commitments and conduct ourselves in a way that is true to our ideals.

Living Diversity

We seek to learn from the different ways of life and opinions represented in our multicultural environment. We respect and actively encourage the contribution of every individual.

Enjoying Participation

We create a dynamic environment created by active and enthusiastic participation of individuals. We enjoy being involved in AIESEC.

Striving for Excellence

We aim to deliver the highest quality performance in everything we do. Through creativity and innovation we seek to continuously improve.

Acting Sustainably

We act in a way that is sustainable for our organisation and society. Our decisions take into account the needs of future generations.

These are our AIESEC values. This is a sort of philosophy we live daily once we get to know AIESEC and it stays in our hearts, in our minds. This is what I have believed in since I joined AIESEC in 2007 in Almaty, Kazakhstan. I have gone through a beautiful profound life experience, made lots of strong friendships with young in mind and brave in heart people from all world regions, travelled to a few countries and lived for less than a year in Latvia. Logically, I decided to continue my AIESEC career aiming higher, I was looking for a professional upgrade, I was looking for challenges, I was looking for another exciting year in my life. You know why? Reasons are multiple. One reason is my beloved one: I want to be a cool grandmother. Yes, yes, the coolest grandmother ever that my grandchildren could have. Future projections.

Now, dreaming is great. My dear friends, dare to dream. Dare and make your dreams come true. It is a wonderful feeling.

However, we are now in present. Therefore, let me talk about what is happening NOW and HERE.

Owing to an international leadership experience back in AIESEC Latvia and in Kazakhstan, I have coordinated a national exchange programme. During our year in Latvia our team made a breakthrough: 40 talented young people caught the right opportunity and experienced Latvian culture as well as brought their innovative approaches in solving vitally importnat issues to the societies of Turkey, Kazakhstan, Bulgaria, Armenia, the Netherlands, Italy, Ukraine, Malaysia, Moldova, Peru, Colombia. This is our main product- AIESEC Experience. This is what we promise to our stakeholders and this what we should deliver. The better the service , the higher customer satisfaction we receive. Right? Or I am wrong?

My long term AIESEC experience showed to me that nothing is impossible. Nothing. You have a goal, you have resources- you will achieve it. You will taste success in the end. Definitely. Do not tell me you cannot make it happen. You just did not try hard enough to make it happen. You do not need to try hard. Play smart and results will come ultimately. Have some patience and have a positive attitude. Easy.

Right, it is easy. However, a disappointing fact ALL AIESEC interns face DAILY here with AIESEC India say it is not that easy.
My point here is simple: AIESEC India "leads" a totally different AIESEC philosophy. Odd AIESEC way.

Reception culture. After painful conversations with many young students that came to India for short term development internships from all over the world to improve illiteracy in outskirts of India or to drive Anti-HIV campaigns, etc I see tears and fears in their eyes. I see uncertainty and non confidence in themselves. After they landed in airports they are not picked up. They are not provided with accommodation at least for the beginning. Or if they are provided with accommodation, then this place may have a room, an AC, and a bathroom. It is an ideal case. I am encountering with these situations daily, in Mumbai and in Hyderabad. I question here the following: if you cannot manage fifty ( 50 ) interns on average in a quarter why do you keep bringing people here?

Legal issues. Management internship with TCS that I am in as well as most of my friends here requires a longer staying in India. Thus, it involves a legal registration of foreigners. While my staying in Mumbai, my friends and I had to CHASE AIESEC Exchange responsible members to assisst us in legal registration. After two weeks of a long procedure we got the stamps and we started working in the company. My question here is - you know your pipeline of incoming interns, you can project how many passports need to be registered, you know what promise you give to your stakeholders. Why do you complicate the processes?

New economy. Labour mobility is widespread nowadays. Though it concerns some governments, labour mobility's core is as old as the world: our ancestors migrated to have a better life, and current world population flows due to the same reasons. State of the art technologies give a room to practise a new economy : business can be done virtually and you do not necessarily need to be present physically in the office. Seems that AIESEC India is very progressive in these terms. Once an intern arrived, AIESEC India members forget about him/her. No or low interaction with him/her, no welcome parties, no cultural activities that build awareness about India, that break people's stereotypes. An intern just adds another number in an Excel sheet. I question a member from AIESEC in India: what reception have you received in another country during your internship ( if you had one ) ? Or what reception would you like to receive once you decide to go for minimum 2 months internship to any part of the world?

People. Eventually, we deal with young people in AIESEC India. An average age of an AIESECer in Western Europe is around 23-25. Our members in AIESEC Latvia and Kazakhstan are 20-25 years old. An executive member of AIESEC Mumbai, India is 17. When you are 17, you most probably care about education, social life, Facebook. A mate of mine has witnessed it in Mumbai: an intern arrived, and a reception coordinator was chatting with him in Facebook. Yes, it is a down to earth example. But we talk about people and their lives. We talk about EXPERIENCES - we just talk and we do not make any right actions.

It is very crucial- at least for my friends and me - to prevent these situations with future interns. A giant work must be done. First, it should be understood by every member of AIESEC India, and it shall be solved by executive members of National Board of AIESEC India. Show your leadership by managing your Numerical Desires in a right way.

I am extremely disappointed I know the answers. I feel ashamed when I see interns' tears and I cannot help. They love India but they hate AIESEC here.

My purpose of this post is not to destroy image of AIESEC in general or AIESEC India in particular. My aim is to give a voice of another numerical result, or a voice of an intern and ASK every single person from AIESEC India - what are you doing to improve your reality? How do you plan to manage your membership and impact young people's lives? What are those stories that we tell ? How will they determine the way we live?

Quality or Quantity

“You are not here to make a living. You are here to enable the world to live more amply, with greater vision, and with a finer spirit of hope and achievement. You are here to enrich the world. You impoverish yourself if you forget this errand.”
—Former U.S. President Woodrow Wilson

After a brief self analysis of my first 3 weeks here in India I came to a conclusion that I got stuck. Emotional Intelligence- oh yes, a lovely topic to discuss, a heavy weight to carry on your shoulders. Still, I understand I do not score high in EQ ( Emotional Quotinent ) and it is now one of the first priorities in my personal development, a few things practised by many of us here are very ridiculous. Yes, these are my perceptions. Yes, these are frustrations we all go through in life. Yes, life can be paradise or can be hell - in the end we are talking about people's attitudes. In fact, we are talking about responsibility. Self responsibility. Empathy. Self restraint. Relationships. Emotions and perceptions. Optimism and negative attitudes. Life in general and lessons that we take from it.

A few things that I have to deal with since my arrival to India keep upsetting me very very much. These matters are highly important for me as well as for many others being on exchange here.

I just wonder why we, human beings, do not walk the way we talk. I wonder why we prefer Quantity VS Quality. I wonder why material world has a bigger value than our relations and our lives. I wonder...

Along with that, I feel disgusted. I feel dirty. I lose faith. And I refuse to believe. Just refuse.

All these talks we have about leadership become meaningless for me here. I am sorry to say so but it is so at the moment. It does not mean I refuse my past life and my values and my beliefs too. No, no, not at all.

Priorities keep changing, right? Life is a change itself. And as we know, the only constant things in life is change. However, changes may stay unchangeable. A challenge to understand? Well, I see it this way now. I believe this opinion will be substituted by another one. The only thing my mind finds difficult is OverPromises and UnderDeliveries.

Keep walking. Learn. Apply. Enjoy. Life is beautiful.

Monday, August 9, 2010

Mumbai: 2nd week

Adaptation
Life in Mumbai is extreme. It is not bad, not good. It has its own path. It is very hectic, it is insane, it is sweet, it is lovely, it is filthy, it is so much international, it is spicy, it is ... diverse.

Mumbai Diversity - 1. If you happen to be in Mumbai you would probably commute by local train service. There are two classes: first class and second class. The difference is in cost of tickets in 10 times ( e.g. coupons for 2nd class may cost 40Rs, 60Rs or 80Rs = 120KZT, 180KZT, 240KZT or less than $1, 1Euro, $1,5 respectively ; now multiple by 10 and it will be a cost for 1st class ) and in seats. In 2nd class women/men compartments plenty of people can take a seat; in 1st class only 3 people are allowed. Taking a train to get to other parts of Mumbai is like a roller coaster. You get through so many emotional peaks of yours within one- two- three minutes.

In the beginning, I was feeling really uncomfortable commuting by trains here. It is difficult to describe, pictures won't say much and you gotta feel it. However, the situation is not that bad as it seemed to me in the beginning. Later on, I started noticing how women ENJOY trains. It is like a small society for them. Seems as if they can meet each other only on the trains, only during these sweating rush hours they chat as if they won't see each other in this entire world. They chirrup, they laugh, they argue, they live and enjoy their lives within 30-60mins of a trip.

Metric measurement. Guys, tell me something, in your countries, when you want to know where a building is located how do you measure distance? By meters, km, miles I suppose? We, Isnaldo, Elizabeth and I, it shall be like this. On the contrary, in Mumbai we were introduced a new measurement: 5- 10 min walk. Let me give you an example: we are looking for a particular known landmark, and we ask passersby its location, or how far it is, or what direction we shall go to. In reply we hear, " Go straight, then right, then straight and right again. It's not far, jsut 5-10 mins walk" :) Lovely. We got used to it and we reply the same to just arrived interns. Splendid :)

Mumbai Diversity - 2. Walking is one of my hobbies I truly enjoy. Alas, in Mumbai I am getting tired very quickly and walking in the city becomes more of a pain than a pleasure. For instance, due to heavy rains I started to wear yellow rubber boots. Quite comfortable to protect feet from dirt, and at the same time it is a total sauna for my feet. One day, three of us ( Naldo, Liz and I ) had decided to go around Mumbai. We visited the Haji Ali mosque and got totally wet from head to toe passing by the Arabian Sea shore. We then went to Mahalaxmi Temple dedicated to Mahalaxmi goddess, and got wetter. We have also seen the world's largest human machine Dhobi Ghat and got astonished, shocked, thoughtful and wet again. After all these imbalanced pictures and people's various lifestyles we took a taxi to Moshe's and satisfied ourselves with a delicious meal. Meanwhile, we were studying India book and decided to walk to Hanging Gardens or to TATA gardens. According to a map we used, it was not far, just 5-10min walk. So we took a deep breath and marched to the Gardens, also known as Ferozeshah Mehta Gardens. It was raining, of course. So, one of us is sleepy and sips take away coffee, another one whistles different tunes, third one is gazing at traffic and documents everything. On the way we saw the cheapest world's car TATA Nano and of course took a picture! ( We like TATA group too much :) So, after 5-10min walk we saw a park, or better to say an outdoor public area. Curious, we changed our way and we thought it was TATA Garden. In fact, it was Hanging Gardens. And here our astonishment has increased! Mumbai diversity, part 2! We could not believe our eyes such a peaceful clean cozy place could exist in Mumbai! We took lots of pictures, we laughed so loud, we were innocently happy and we did not want to leave the Gardens! Indeed, you never know what happens next. It is so true especially in Mumbai!


Cultural differences. We all have our individual standards we apply towards friendships we make, towards politeness and roughness, towards what's acceptable and what's not in one's society. By growing up, I have been learning and experiencing what it means to be tolerant, what to sacrifice in yourself to be open towards other cultures. Ultimately, what's acceptable in my society may shock a person from Tanzania, let's say. Here, in Mumbai I feel I am asked sometimes too much of being culturally sensitive. I am not saying I feel disgusted, or that I neglect these differences. The matter is in its frequency and weight of this tolerance is sometimes too heavy to carry on shoulders daily. I am grateful I have friends here I could talk to, and I feel relieved. Otherwise, I would go crazy I think. But what I understand is that I want to insist on learning and adjusting myself for Indian diversity, and I will work on myself. If this is one of my weaknesses at the moment, I shall work harder to prevent its further existence.

Locked. During these two weeks many stories happened, many places have been visited, a few parties have been attended, a few tears have been dropped, lots of laughter have been produced. However, only now I realise I could not reflect on what was happening to me every day since July 26 when I landed in Mumbai. The days have been Formula - 1 video clips. We rush, we sprint, we don't have time for 3 meals/day. Our stomachs have shrunk, and we cannot eat more than a meal a day. Otherwise, we feel sick and nauseous. As the result, I cannot recall any day from A to Z. If I had not my camera with me, I don't know what I would do. Memories are blocked as our work accounts used to be. Why is it so? Maybe because so many things happen at a time, and here you really need to react fast to changeable situations?

______________________________________________________________________
Resume

I never was missing my family so desperately as I do now.
Lesson to learn: I should surround myself with things I used to enjoy doing. They will help me. I need to settle down at last. I want to start working. As if I am asked to catch 10 rabbits with 2 hands. Who will win in this case?

Friday, August 6, 2010

Mumbai: Week 1

Survival

Not so long time has passed as I am jotting down a few thoughts after my first week in Mumbai, India.

Briefly about what happened before my rather spontaneous arrival at one of the largest cities in the world: I have simply enjoyed my time home with family, a very short and desirable time, a very miraclous and gorgeous time, the so much needed time with my family and close people. Yes, it's been short- just 2 months to taste "How is it being home?" and jump into a new life journey. An incredible journey, I believe, since India is now promoted as Incredible India and I get reassured by this message daily.
My hometown


You may have noticed this blog post is called Survival. Indeed, my first week in Mumbai has been a survival. Never ever have I witnessed such a tremendous growth and failure of one, never ever have I felt alone and surrounded by people going through the same challenges in their first week here, never ever have I got astonished and shocked simultaneously as it is happening in Mumbai with me. Never say never.

Imagine, you wake up, have breakfast, and getting ready to commute to work. Different countries have different means of transportation and different styles of commuting. I have not had any picture how it may look here though it is not my first time being in India. But now I understand that India is different. Not just diverse. It is different as two sweet similar apples. So if I was shocked by crazy traffic in Jaipur and subway culture in Delhi when I visited India first time a few years ago, I was paralysed by seeing train traffic in Mumbai. It takes me a lot of courage to open up myself and get all my inner strength to get out of my comfort zone. It takes me a lot of patience not to get broken in front of everyone and first of all, in front of myself. It takes me forget the life I used to live before and start absolutely a new life. A blank page.

Emotions. Week 1 gave me an impression I am in a movie. Not a Bollywood movie though. I am an actress. I am being acted upon by circumstances, by weather currents, by someone's laziness and immaturity. I was feeling very stressed, I have never felt so lost, so desperate, so lonely, so frustrated. On my 2nd or 3rd day I was so fed up with these consequences of Survival script that I decided to be a director of Survival series, and make it a sitcom. At least this idea worked out. In the end, regardless of all long awaited actions from the others and an insane traffic, my friends and I could nothing but laugh. Laugh histerically sometimess. We would be damn exhausted but we would keep on laughing. As it was the only remedy and support we could find at any time.
Our 1st morning journey together. Induction. Isnaldo, Elizabeth

Universal Time. Value of time is different everywhere. Moreover, it is different for every individual. I remember I would sometimes go crazy back in Latvian times when I was late for some important things in my life. At home I do not notice how time flows. It is so natural there, as it should be. Here, in Mumbai, my friends and I do not feel or see time at all. We leave our living places at 7.30am and come back home at 12-1 am, exhausted. During a day we can't understand what is going with time! It disappears!

Indian Standard Time ( IST ) However, when it comes to meet with anyone here in Mumbai people act according to IST. I have noticed, it does not matter whether you are local or an expat, everyone has a habit to do business, to meet with friends according to IST- Indian Stretchable Time. Kazakhs are not that progressive as Indians in being "accurate" with IST.

Monsoons. Oh Gosh, another discovery. Have you ever experienced fiercely raining cold water from heavens? Add to this a filthy street water mixed with litter and smog. Do not forget to put some colours of happy Indians being on a train, outside, at booking offices, and finish with colours of confused concerned faces of Westerners. A speechlees picture. Daily.
A photo taken in an autorickshaw


Friends. I am so glad, so glad I have my old friends here. I am so happy I have made new friends here with other interns. It adds super power and days do not seem so lonely.
Nastya, Feras and I
_____________________________________________________________________

Resume
Week 1 has been the bigest emotional challenge so far in my life. I have no feelings towards this condition yet. It does not mean I am afraid of living here or anything like that. It has been really really hard for me, I have not thought it would be that much hard. But I will manage. I will. I am not the first trainee here, nor the last one. Everyone has survived. So have I.
Lesson to learn: Forget your past life. Start an absolutely new one.