“Great job!” said Neo Jr, when Neo accidentally broke the Mikasa fruit bowl (the kind you get when you have no idea what to gift someone) into 18,433 pieces. It’s not like you need more proof that Neo’s son is smarter than yours, but come on, how gifted is a child who can be sarcastic at 4?

So Neo Jr’s 4th birthday party was mostly a success, but Neo was disappointed he couldn’t meet as many hot moms potential play-date partners for Neo Jr as he’d have liked – many kids arrived with a maid to watch them. Neo was a little offended and very amused when he found out that many of the moms had their own party, hanging out at a new Thai spa. (Offended because he wasn’t invited, and very amused that Mrs. Neo wasn’t!)

But yes, two years after moving to Bangalore, it’s been a “challenge” (don’t you just love euphemistic management jargon?) for the Neos to diversify their friends circle away from other US-returned people. (It’s getting tiring – there’s only so many times Neo can feign laughter at the “Oh let’s get cake from the Prolific Oven!”, “Oh right I forgot we don’t live in the Bay Area!, hahaha” genre of jokes.)

Neo’s neighbors (many of whom have never lived outside India), would be a great natural addition to his list of friends (and be a great source of convenient next-door play dates for Junior), but there are huge differences.

Here’s just one example: safety.

Neo’s neighbors are fine with a 1:6 adult:child ratio while going to a public park. Neo prefers a 6:1 ratio – he assigns one pair of Neo Jr’s grandparents to monitor the exits, the other pair of grandparents to set up a perimeter, while Neo pushes the swing. (Mrs. Neo, like the US government in almost any international crisis, helps by “monitoring the situation closely”.)

(Neo had equipped the Neo Jr Secret Service with their own wireless communication earsets, but abandoned the plan after the following security incident: Neo’s father-in-law figured out how to listen to cricket commentary on his earset, resulting in him gazing into space while a wayward frisbee landed  inside the 10-feet “no-fly” zone around Neo Jr.)

There are other issues too – Mrs. Neo abruptly terminated a play date at one of the neighbors’ when the neighbor brought out enough junk food “high-margin non-nutritive food products” to feed an army of teenagers low on self-esteem.

But for Juniors sake,  the Neos will try harder – there have to be more like-minded people in a city of 6 million (and it’s easy to meet them too, since all of them are currently on the same 2km stretch of road that Neo uses to commute home).

And finally, Neo Jr has to try harder too – when Neo’s elderly neighbor tried to distract Neo Jr from a bag of chocolates with “Hey look! there’s a rocket!”, Neo Jr gave the poor old lady his best bone-chilling, one-eyebrow-raised “are you frickin kidding me?” look!

But yes, Neo Jr has nothing on this kid:

(PS: Special bonus for those readers who thought they’ve finally seen the last of Neo’s tirades on religion: Did you know that Mrs. Neo prays every night ? Yes, every night after Neo Jr goes to bed, Mrs. Neo looks to the heavens and says “Thank God he’s in bed!”)

Mrs. Neo’s friend “Amit” in the Bay Area always tells the Neos to “stop sweating the details and look at the big picture”.

Amit’s “big picture” plan for returning to India starts with how the US-India nuclear deal and the crash of the US Dollar, coupled with the linking of the rivers project, and Shashi Tharoor’s inevitable rise to Prime Ministership of India in 2015 will cause the local economy along the Bangalore-Mysore highway to boom.

(Aside, if not Prime Minister, Mrs. Neo feels Mr. Tharoor has a good shot at Bollywood. “Just look at those dreamy eyes. And oooh the sideburns.”)

This boom will transform the area around Amit’s apartment into the next Dubai. Amit will sell the apartment at the peak and retire on the profits.(The peak has not yet occurred, though “Swaminathan’s welding shop and real estate agency” and “Jai Saraswati Mata bicycle tyre puncture repair” shops show much promise in jumpstarting the “Dubaisation”.)

In sharp contrast, while Amit spends all day coding reading weighty blogs and thinking about “The impact of the Lalgarh riots on the tax holiday for Indian IT companies”, Mrs. Neo wasted most of her first month in India literally “sweating” the small stuff, and canvassing door-to-door to find good references for maids.

Although, on the flip side, Mrs. Neo is now so well-known in the neighborhood, she would have a good chance of getting elected – if she wasn’t a US citizen.

But – Amit says by 2015 India will allow “dual citizens” to run for office, just in time for Mrs. Neo to join Prime Minister Tharoor’s cabinet!

(Neo is already looking for apartments in Vasant Vihar in South Delhi. The good ones go so fast!)

Not one to shy away from the occasional delusions of grandeur, Neo often gives his “we choose to move to India not because it is easy, but because it is hard” speech to the sundry relatives and friends who visit Neoville.

But last weekend, instead of giving him the usual blank expression and heading towards the food, one of Mrs. Neo’s cousins, “Preeti”, turned to Neo and said – “You aren’t living in the real India”.  (If Neo’s speech was inspired by JFK, Cousin Preeti’s reply was apparently inspired by Sarah Palin.)

Could Neo live in Cousin Preeti’s “real India” by moving to a village and riding to work in a bullock cart every day ? No – as it turns out, according to Preeti, Neo (and you!) could start living in the “real India” right here in Namma Bengaluru by doing the following:

1. Stop sending your kids to a fancy school.

Cousin Preeti nailed this one – sending Neo Jr to any school in India that has white kids in it will result in Neo Jr getting 5 women pregnant before he is 14 – and possibly even more women, provided he isn’t high on drugs on most weekends. Or doesn’t “become gay”.

Also, according to Preeti, all the porn that they show in these fancy schools will cause Neo Jr to “go in the wrong direction”, although Neo argued that the porn might actually help Neo Jr go in the “right” direction instead of having to fumble around the first few times.

No, it is far better to spend that money on a fancy car and instead send your kids to a “middle-class” “value for money” school, where Neo Jr can learn important stuff like “dumb girls should be forced to learn cooking”, “how to skip going to the bathroom for 8 hours because the bathroom is so dirty”, “how to use a pair of binoculars to find your teacher in the classroom”, and “how to fake being unconscious so the unsupervised giants from the last bench will stop hitting your head repeatedly with heavy objects for no apparent reason”.

2. Become more social.

Instead of having an intimate party with the ten people that Neo Jr actually cares about (which oddly does not include Preeti), Neo should invite at least 834 people for Neo Jr’s next birthday – so that Neo Jr can spend quality time alone watching the  Disney channel in his room, while Neo mingles with the local Amway e-commerce guru, his “I was a quarter-finalist in the Mrs. Jayanagar beauty contest” wife and their “professional TV watcher” son who apparently has a restraining order to be within 5 feet of high-calorie food at all times.

3. Stop being an American.

Neo should stop wasting money on “American stuff” like the commercial-free Worldspace Satellite Radio (which carries NPR). Even though Worldspace costs less than Preeti’s weekly haircuts. (Plus you gotta get the even more expensive hair-wash – because really, it’s incredibly tiring to stand under the shower for 10 seconds.) Besides, not having NPR/Worldspace allows you to seem smart because you can then bemoan the poor quality of FM radio in India with the other members of the fancy-haircut club.

Also, why buy everything in a convenient, everything-under-one-roof supermarket with transparent pricing when you can get the same thing for mostly higher prices (unless you bargain) at the local convenience store ? It makes no sense at all, unless you’re American.

4. Stop renting a fancy apartment.

Instead of wasting money renting an apartment 10 minutes away from the Neos’ workplaces and schools, Neo should pay thrice his current rent in “owning” a similar apartment in a ghost-town equidistant from Bangalore and Mysore, because, unless you own (a mortgage), you’re never really “settled down”.

Furthermore, imagine the increased job opportunities by being just 90 minutes away from two metropolitan cities! Yes the monthly payments (and fuel costs) are massive, but you’ll be done in just 20 30 40 years! By the time you’re done with those payments, who knows, there might even be a decent hospital close to your apartment – even more appreciation! And don’t forget – real estate only goes up, since they’re not making any more land!

Epilogue

Preeti gathered quite an audience that evening. She went on to regale the crowds with more gems like how Neo “wastes Rs. 100 more on Tata Sky” when he could be saving that money and complaining about the grainy pictures and frequent outages on Cable TV like everyone else.

But, by then, Neo had already slipped into his fake online world, reading up on the fake moon landing while listening to This American Life.

Neo was one of those lucky few who never had a “fresh off the boat” phase when he moved to the US. Any rumors about Neo walking through a Taco Bell drive-thru are completely false. (And even if he might have accidentally walked through a drive-thru, it was because he didn’t have a car, and didn’t realize that the restaurant was open.)

Needless to say, when he moved back to India in 2008, Neo was as smooth as when Mrs. Neo fell in love with him at the Indian Student Association’s Diwali party back in 1998 (she was such a good listener back then).

But, this post is for those who don’t always fit like a glove into every new situation. (Ignore Mrs. Neo if she suggests in the comments to this post that this is actually a list of 13 stupid things that Neo does repeatedly in India.)

1. Talking in Hindi – Its the subtle racism that happens “only in India”. You look at a person, and think “there’s no way this dude knows English”, so you ask him directions in your flawed Hindi – only to hear the reply in condescendingly flawless English (he then says something about you in Kannada to his colleague, and they both snicker). You are humiliated many times over (another reason Neo never asks for directions). But thankfully this only lasts a few weeks. Then you start talking to everyone in English – and everyone is happy.

2. Asking for the check instead of the bill, and then saying “oops hahaha” – Every waiter in India knows about the check and the bill thing. So pick either “check” or “bill” and stick with it. Or just raise your hand and make that “writing” gesture. They get it. There’s not too many things you could be asking for after your “death by chocolate” dessert.

3. Laughing when someone says “I passed out” instead of “I graduated” – Yes, its funny. But what’s even funnier is you trying to use Indian English (or worse, the Indian head waggle) to try and fit in. It’s like a Chinese guy with a bad accent trying to imitate Barack Obama (“Confucius say war not determine who is right, war determine who is left”.)

4. Asking “do you accept credit cards ?” – Almost any place you are likely to visit in India will accept credit cards. Asking whether someone accepts credit cards actually highlights your expat status and makes them want to mug you (not really – most expats are actually poorer than many of the local rich guys, who can afford to idle a gas-guzzling X5 for 15 minutes while they haggle with the traffic cop over a Rs. 100 ticket for running the red light).

5. Ordering bottled water at a cheap restaurant – Two things. First: Even bottled water is just “packaged drinking water” (i.e. filtered tap water), not mineral-infused H20 from fresh, white Himalayan ice that melted just minutes before being bottled. Second: The cheap restaurant that is likely to have bad water is almost certainly going to have fake bottled water. After Slumdog Millionaire, everyone knows how to seal those plastic bottles. If you are adventurous enough to go to a cheap restaurant, carry your own water!

6. Tipping too much – Almost no one tips 15-20% in India. 10% is almost always the maximum you should go. Going above 10% makes you seem excessively rich or stupid (usually both).

7. Taking an auto (only applicable in Bangalore) – Autos suck. Get your own car, get someone to drop you, call one of the three hundred cab companies in Bangalore, take the bus or even walk. Taking an auto and then complaining you had a bad experience makes you look stupid.

8. Saying you moved from Delhi (instead of the Bay Area) to avoid looking like a foreigner – The way you keep greeting everyone with a totally unnecessary and excessively gregarious “Hi” gives away your American origins instantly (not to mention your khaki shorts). People will wonder why you’re lying and make up conspiracy theories about your visa status in the US.

9. Looking for street parking – Stop looking for parking and drive straight up to wherever you are going. Chances are they have valet parking (on the same street where you were unsuccessfully looking for parking).

10. Making jokes about “Indian standard time” – Only Indians who are “fresh from the US” make jokes about Indian standard time, or Indian stretched time. Your plumber certainly won’t get the joke (and will come late anyway), and almost any other person will be offended. Threatening to ruin someone’s life if he’s late is a much more polite, effective (and common) strategy to make sure things get done on time in India.

11. Giving loans to your maids or drivers to earn loyalty – Neo’s neighbor (who also moved from the US recently) thinks he’s the next Muhammed Yunus. He’s given loans to more than 10 maids in the past one year – 10 out of 10 stopped showing up to work the next week. He still refuses to accept his losses and faithfully maintains his excel spreadsheet showing the low interest rate he offered them and the estimated payments that he’s going to receive (after all doesn’t Citibank do the same thing on a slightly larger scale?)

12. Ordering a non-fat latte – A Cafe Coffee Day or Barista seems so comfortably Starbucksy after a bewildering day in India – so you saunter confidently into one and order a “low-fat extra-hot double latte.” The girl behind the counter gives you that “look”, hands you the menu, and takes the order of the guy who’s behind you. Yes, Neo still hasn’t found a single good coffee shop in Bangalore that is Starbucks-lingo compatible (or even one that regularly offers non-fat or low-fat milk!).

13. Not having a cell phone mobile – Not having a cell phone (known in Indian English as just “mobile”) in India is like not having a social security number in the US – the customer service people just aren’t paid enough to want to deal with you. So do yourself a favor and get yourself a mobile phone as soon as you land – or at least save your dignity and say someone stole your mobile phone.

Epilogue: As Neo wrote this (sipping his full-fat Mocha at Barista’s), he observed an expat arguing with the auto rickshaw driver after being asked to pay Rs. 100 for a three minute journey.

The expat caved in when the auto driver said – “If you can spend Rs. 50 on a cup of coffee that actually costs Rs. 2, why can’t you give me a little extra?” (some expletives were removed for your protection from the preceding quote).

Neo also won the bet he made with Mrs. Neo – the poor expat proceeded to order a “non-fat latte”.

(via)