April 29 1998<\/p>\n
I want to share a few Bombay reductions with you.\u00a0 A reduction is a shrinking\u00a0 of something, lessening it from what you’d normally expect.\u00a0 Sometimes, a reduction takes\u00a0a thing\u00a0to its essence like boiling fruit to get jelly or corn mash to get moonshine.\u00a0 The first reduction comes from what I’m learning about people here who want a visa so they can enter and visit the United States.\u00a0 To qualify for one, an applicant needs to prove he or she has strong ties to a home outside the U.S.\u00a0 For most people here, that means in India.\u00a0 In order to prove that,\u00a0 applicants often bring reams and notebooks and binders full of paper.\u00a0 They bring birth certificates, death certificates, deeds to their flat (apartment) or bungalow (house), bank statements, bank books, tax forms, business agreements, savings certificates, and on and on.<\/p>\n
These documents are a reduction of a person’s life or identity to an actual stack of papers they carry with them to try to prove they have strong ties to India.\u00a0 I shake my head in wonder to think that a person can try to boil his whole life down and reduce it to some folders full of papers.\u00a0 Often, the papers they bring to the interview are quite valuable such as the fancy ones that represent Certificates of Deposit, a very popular way to save money here.\u00a0 One must feel like a voyeur or Peeping Tom looking into the lives of these friendly but total strangers applying for visas.\u00a0 How much money do you earn?\u00a0 Do you own a flat?\u00a0 What sort of car do you drive?\u00a0\u00a0 It must be sad when the person finds out he or she is not eligible for a visa even with the stacks of papers (their life reduced) all on the table.\u00a0 They must feel personally rejected.<\/p>\n
The next reduction I experienced just today.\u00a0 We finally got our car.\u00a0 Hurray!\u00a0 Hurray!\u00a0 Yes, the 1987 Toyota Van, which we dubbed the Bombay Mobile has arrived and I drove it on the streets of Bombay for the 10 minute drive from my office to our apartment.\u00a0 Let me tell you, traffic in\u00a0here is really something else!\u00a0\u00a0 Two lanes of traffic become three and three becomes five.\u00a0\u00a0 You should see it: the honking, the thick exhaust, the cutting in and out.\u00a0 However, there is so much traffic (especially at 5:15 when I drove home today), the pace is slow and here, my dear family and friends, is the next reduction.\u00a0 There was a point when I escaped a clump of heavy traffic and finally got going fast, or at least it felt that way to me.\u00a0 I looked down at the speedometer to check the tremendous rate of speed I was traveling.\u00a0 It read 25 miles per hour!\u00a0 The traffic here, though bad, goes so slowly that 25 feels fast.\u00a0 This is reduction number two, a reduction of speed and even a reduction of what I think is fast.\u00a0 For an American, familiar with 65 MPH on beautiful, wide, clear interstate highways, and even 35 or 45 in big cities, 25 here in Bombay actually feels pretty great.<\/p>\n
The final reduction I wanted to mention I experienced at a concert we went to a few nights ago to celebrate South African Independence Day.\u00a0 It was at the local 5 star hotel’s big ball room, and consisted of a string quartet and two singers, a tenor and soprano.\u00a0 The ensemble performed a couple of arias (reduced versions from the orchestral original, but still nice), Spring from Vivaldi’s Four Seasons (again, a reduction played by only a string quartet), and even some selections from Phantom of the Opera.\u00a0 The reduction I wanted to mention involved a performance of Scott Joplin’s Entertainer.\u00a0 I was reduced, in a subtle, quiet way,\u00a0 to tears hearing this familiar bit of American Culture.\u00a0 In the middle of Bombay, at a South African event, surrounded by Indians and colleagues, even the string quartet version of this song from my native land brought tears of homesickness and also pride to my eyes.\u00a0 Yes, I am an American!\u00a0 Yes, this ragtime, loosey-goosey music is a part of who I am and what my country is about.\u00a0 And yes sir, did it ever\u00a0 sound good, so good, I was, (but not quite fully since it was a public, formal event but enough to make it true) reduced to tears.<\/p>\n
I suppose there are other reductions I could share, but these three stood out.\u00a0 I promise, there will not be any more reduction of mail from us now that we have email at home.<\/p>\n
April 29 1998 I want to share a few Bombay reductions with you.\u00a0 A reduction is a shrinking\u00a0 of something, lessening it from what you’d normally expect.\u00a0 Sometimes, a reduction takes\u00a0a thing\u00a0to its essence like boiling fruit to get jelly … Continue reading
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