This is thrilling stuff, indeed. This extract is delightful in its anguished innocence.
But some problems remain problems. The Indians, whom Queen Victoria once called "a nation of clerks" retain paralyzing bureaucracy. I encountered it on arrival. None of my hosts had bothered to tell me that entry into India requires a visa. Since I've entered about 40 countries in the last decade only three of which required a visa of an American (The People's Republic of China, Brazil, and, inexplicably, Australia), it never occurred to me to ask if one might be necessary. I suddenly found myself beached at the border. At least they didn't stick me on the first flight back. Rather they incarcerated me for the night at the Bombay Airport and, while they were incredibly solicitous and sweet - I had a never-ending supply of cold Cokes and piping hot tea - I was examined by roughly twenty different officials, each of whom required me to give him exactly the same information. It felt entirely ritualistic. Process without purpose. On Wed, Oct 27, 2010 at 3:01 PM, Udhay Shankar N <[email protected]> wrote: > On 26-Oct-10 5:12 PM, Ramakrishnan Sundaram wrote: > > > About ten years ago, my then employer, a large telco, asked me to > > organise a series of lectures by "tech celebrities" to publicise the > > launch of a new ISP. I duly invited one such celebrity, a US citizen, > > and worked out dates and terms and so on. > > Both the description of the trip itself by said individual, and the > vigorous argument it provoked on this list, are entertaining. [1] > > Udhay > > [1] http://groups.yahoo.com/group/silk-list/message/3338 > > --
