:: Bombay Dreams ::

I tumbled out of the Bombay airport, a heap of frazzled nerves, anchored sorely by my luggage and a throbbing rage tucked neatly at the back of my head. The clinical comfort of home already seemed like a vague memory; here the air was thick with haze, and the foreign chorus of voices seep like sand into the blaring cries of traffic―ah, the call of an Indian summer.

I scanned the crowd outside the decidedly run-down terminal for my driver―I say this with the unfortunate ease and jaded assurance of someone used, already, to travelling for business. The late hours, the ungodly transit times, the stressful build-up to a meeting or a launch are compensated by classy hotels, timely pick-ups and the odd upgrade to first-class seats, or so you train yourself to believe.

'Ms. Tan?' said a pleasant voice. I looked up to meet the eyes of a good looking young man, dark and keen-eyed, with a toothy, cheerful smile.

'Yes,' I smiled back, handing over my luggage gratefully. My head continued its malefic monologue―throb throb throb.

'I noticed the Audi bag you were carrying,' he said conversationally, accented just so, guiding me through the crowd of people with practiced leisure.

'Very observant,' I replied, impressed: most hotel pick-up services are efficient but distant, their staff neither friendly nor hostile, usually outfitted with their starched-white uniforms and the plastic docility of hired help. Samir―I caught his name tag―appeared different though.

'I like German cars,' he said simply, as he popped opened the trunk of the hotel car―'good engineering.' I nodded in agreement―yes, we of the Vorsprung brand!―but I was distracted by a little girl a few feet away. She couldn't be more than six; a faded sari, once bright and pink, now hugged her malnourished frame with dirty defiance. I flashed a smile at her, but her eyes continued their lurid stare at me. She stuffed her sooty fingers into her mouth in a jerky, robotic motion: feed me, give me a dollar or two; so inconsequential to you, but so precious to me, feed me, feed me...

'Please get in madam,' Samir's firm words cut through my thoughts. 'And please don't give any money. Otherwise they will all come round,'

I bit my lip. Between her desperate proverty and my cosmopolitan wealth, there was only abject pity. I turned away―like we all do, don't we―and I got into the air-conditioned comfort of the car. As we drove into the chaos of the mainroad, I turned to see the little girl, now a mere speck of pink in the background, still jerking her spindly little arm up and down, up and down, and I sighed―the slumscape of India is such a bleak, blatant reality, yet I was there because my company saw the money rather than the misery, and I was to be the natural accomplice of such a trespass.

Samir noticed my subdued expression. 'They rent children around, you know,' he started conversationally. 'Families who don't have kids rent children from families who do, to beg―babies are preferred, as are little girls...they're part of a large syndicate of beggers.'

Organised grime, I thought on reflex. We plunged into a long debate about proverty and politics, and I continued to be impressed by Samir's wit and knowledge.

'I'm a technician by training madam,' he confided in me, as our car crawled like a phlegmatic bug through the jumbled lines of traffic. 'I have a diploma in engineering. But what do I do? I come to the hotel line, simply because there is more money.'

'Are you resentful?' I asked. We screeched to a halt at a traffic light. Large billboards―the hellion symbols of commercialisation―grinned like idiot gods, rising with unnatural artistry amongst ruins and slums. Express yourself! A mobile phone ad screamed with neon irony, just above a filthy dirt-road lined with make-shift tents.

Samir shrugged. 'There are 30 million people in Bombay, madam. Everywhere you turn there is a doctor, or a lawyer, or a technician by training. No one makes enough money doing what they do best. So we become drivers, or waiters, or receptionists, just so that we can continue staying in Bombay.' He met my eyes through the rearview mirror. Then, with a beatific smile, he said, 'But you know what's great about my people? We're always hopeful. Teekhar, as we like to say. Can do.'

I grinned back. Their reality may be as dark as their colour, but their cheerfulness and their willingness to live is as bright as the mocking lights of my five-star hotel, beaming like a random angel in Bombay's business district, and for that Samir and his people (I noted the note of pride when he made that statement) have my unreserved admiration.

'All the best, madam,' Samir said as I got off the car. 'Very nice talking to you.'
'Very nice talking to you too,' I said, shaking his hand and slipping some money into his firm handshake. He looked embarrassed for a moment, but then he quietly pocketed the money. 'Thank you,' he said.

I waved goodbye with a heavy heart―we must be of an age, but yet we were separated by the economic status of two vastly different countries. But of course, my work was just beginning, and I needed once again to remind myself that I was there for capitalism and not charity, that I was there to launch a car that could probably feed street after street of slum-citizens, and that, was that.

***

Now, my work is done, my car was launched, and despite the humid weather, clean air, treated water, orderly traffic, punctual people and clinical sentiments are all for my taking, in apathetic abundance. And yet, remembering the words of a media contact turned friend in Bombay―my city is a gem, Jean, and I will never want to live or work anywhere else!―I couldn't help but wonder, when was the last time a Singaporean, whose idea of poverty may be the disability to buy a Gucci bag or a new set of wheels, have said that?

If Bombay is a rough diamond, sparkling but clearly unpolished, then Singapore is probably a sheet of glass, neat, clean and precisely cut―but flat and merely reflective of a bunch of dispassionate voices, without the spiritual strength borne of daily struggle.