Mumbai Outsourced Blues

yes, I know it is upside down. 
It's from the other side of the world.

Mumbai Outsourced Blues
words by Your Intrepid Traveler -

(sung to the tune:
“London Homesick Blues”
with apologies to Gary P. Nunn)






If you're not where you wanna be
And you ain’t got a Rupee
In Mumbai, you’re are hopeless
Even the Taj Mahal has been taken down
And moved to Las Vegas
Now I know why
And I’ll confirm what they are saying. In India they are paying
Much less for the very same position
And they will dirty their air and apparently don’t care
It’s their country which they have to live in
                                                                                                                                                                                             Chorus                                                                                                                                                                                     We We wanna go back to full employment
To the days of work enjoyment that we had before
we were outsourced to New Delhi and to Bangalore
                                                                                                   
2nd Verse
Well, it’s hot over here, and I swear
I wish they owned an A/C
But they can’t under bid, and still provide what we did
All the comforts in the office and the shop floor.
It takes more than ten of their scrawny men
to equal an American workman
they have no payroll taxes, and no middle classes
So they can underbid our plan

Chorus                                                                                                                                                                                       
We wanna go back to full employment
To the days of work enjoyment that we had before
we were outsourced to New Delhi and to Bangalore
                                                                                                          
3rd Verse
Well, I decided to finally prove to you
That American products are better
We’ll compete with them and work hard again
Just like we did before we were outsourced
We will re-capture the prize that our Lefties despise
Some people call American know-how
Our productivity will begin to shine
And our market share will soon be fine
We’ll be on top again, now

Chorus
We wanna go back to full employment
To the days of work enjoyment that we had before
we were outsourced to New Delhi and to Bangalore                                                                        

DENIED



whoa!

DENIED

In my younger days, back in high school, I rarely dated.  I was very shy and could not stand the thought of approaching a girl and being rebuffed.  I think that is a common feeling since no one would want to feel the pangs of being rejected.

Fast forward a few decades.  I was scheduled to go to Perth, Australia for a large industry trade exhibition.  This event is held every other year and I missed out on being able to go last time. So, I was excited that I would finally get to visit Australia.  This was going to add another country to my list and also a whole new continent.  I would then only need to visit Africa and Antarctica and I would have gone to all the continents on earth.  That would be very cool.

I had our company travel agent book the flights, and made my plans.  I would be gone for more than two weeks.  No matter how excited I was in making this trip, 16 days is a long time to be away from the fetching Mrs. Intrepid Traveler, my dog, and my farm.  But sacrifices must be made.

A few days before departure, I went on an Australian government website to see what the weather would be like and what points of interest would be near my location.  It was going to be late summer in the land down under. Last year I got my scuba diving certification and I wanted to take advantage of some water sports while I was there.

On this website I found the entry requirements for the country.  And to my surprise, there are about six countries that need an entry VISA to get in to Australia; the United States being one of them.  Damn, who’d have thought the Aussies would have any restrictions for Americans to come down under for a visit?  No matter, I just had to fill out a simple online questionnaire and pay $20 for processing. 

When I was done, I was supposed to get an email with my confirmation number.  Instead, I got a message saying:  “Check back in 12 hours for the results”.  Twelve hours?  OK, but I leave in a few days, so I hope this does not become a problem.

I checked my email the next day and saw in the message the word:  DENIED.  I was denied entry in to Australia!  Whaaaaa?  There had to be a clerical error. Maybe I put a wrong digit in the credit card number or got a letter out of position on my name.  So I re-submitted and waited another 12 hours. But I got the same results.  Panic is starting to set in now.  The departure clock was ticking and I didn’t have an entry VISA. 

I called the Australian consular office in Washington DC.  A lady with a melt your heart Australian accent began working with me to get this issue sorted out.  We went thru the same questions I answered on line.  She could not understand why I had a problem before.  She asked if I was in good health?  “Yes”.   She asked if I was of good character?  (gulp. by who’s standards?)   I paused, then said “yes”.

She called me back several hours later and said she could not fix the problem because there were multiple attempts for me to register.  The system had me locked out.  ARRRRGHH. Of course there were multiple attempts.  I was trying to get an F-ing hall pass to go to F-ing AUSTRALIA, FOR GOODNESS SAKES!  She said my only way to get a VISA was to visit the nearest Consular office in person and get this resolved.  The nearest office to me was her office, in F-ing Washington DC! , which was halfway across the country and my flight was scheduled to leave Houston in 8 hours.  ARRRGH.

I finished packing, kissed the wife and dog goodbye and headed to the airport.  There had to be someone there who could fix this problem.  I was flying Singapore Airlines and a counter attendant listened to my quandary.  She got on line and tried to register me too.  She made several phone calls but no one could get in to the “system” to even find out why the VISA was denied.  This was way worse than that shy high school boy being turned down by the cheerleader to be my date to the prom.  I was just spurned by a whole country.  25 million people don’t want me!   But I am really a good person, why don’t they like me?

I gave up.  I threw in the towel. I know when I am not wanted.  I gathered my luggage, called the van service and had them take me back to my SUV in the long term parking.  On the long drive home, I started thinking about all the stuff I really didn’t want to do in Australia anyway.  I didn’t need to go diving and run the risk of being stung by a Lion Fish, or eaten by a Great White Shark.  I had no use for meeting an Australian Aborigine or buying a gallon sized can of Foster’s beer at a local pub. 

I feel stupid about all the hours I wasted in preparing for this trip.  I immersed myself in the Australian culture by watching hours of Crocodile Dundee movies.  I collected a dozen or more recipes on how to prepare fresh Koala.   And what am I to do with these croc skin boots and leather vest?  In the big picture of life, who really needs to add another country and a new continent to their list?  Who the hell is counting countries and continents visited anyway? 

Sadly, I am.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Big Sleep

The Big Sleep

At a recent medical exam my doctor was concerned about my daytime sleepiness.  I told him I was always sleepy.  He gave me a questionnaire to rate how sleepy I was on a scale of 1 to 3 with 3 being “very likely to”.  There were a dozen or so questions like “how likely are you to fall asleep while riding as a passenger in a car.  Or fall asleep in a work meeting, or while watching TV. Etc.  I did not finish the quiz because I think I nodded off.

He looked at my results and suggested I take a sleep study to find out if I had some abnormal sleep behavior.  A sleep disorder study is where you go to a medical facility at night and let a perfect stranger see you in your jammies as she sticks sensors and wires all over your scalp and body parts.  Then you are supposed to sleep without disconnecting any of the wires or strangling yourself.  And during the entire ordeal you are being watched and videotaped.  I don’t even like the idea of being watched at the drive thru bank, so having a stranger watch me try to sleep was a bit disconcerting.  The sleep study itself seemed like abnormal behavior. 

The night of my sleep study was wet and rainy.  The parking lot was empty and I grabbed my overnight bag off of the back seat.  I went in to the lobby of the building and it was completely vacant.  There was a sign that told me to go down the hall and take a left.  The glass doors closed automatically behind me, and I felt like I was in jail.  Gee, do I get conjugal visits?  Was I supposed to bring my own conjugator?  Is that even a word? 

I checked in.  The attendant was a friendly lady who put me at ease.  She gave me several forms to fill out.  I had to sign permission for them to call my next of kin in case of a major medical malfunction.  I noticed on the form that parts of it were already filled out in my wife’s handwriting.  The box was checked where it said “do not resuscitate”.  Hmmmm.   

The attendant had me change into my night clothes after we did the paperwork.  She used a measuring tape and a pencil to mark specific areas on my scalp to put each sensor.  My hair is rather thick, so she really had to dig in to my scalp to mark the spots for the electrodes.  It felt like she was carving a pumpkin up there.   The attendant said these sensors were to pick up brain activity.  I told her according to my wife; there is was no brain activity.  The attendant was not amused.  I also mentioned that the spots she was carving in to my scalp were becoming a bit tender.  She suggested that when I got home to have my wife massage my head.  I told her she did that regularly, usually with a rolled up newspaper.  The attendant was not amused.

The attendant started to wire me up.  She strapped two elastic bands around my chest that held on what looked like a transistor radio.  I really was not in the mood for music.  Maybe it was the remote control for the TV?  That actually seemed like a clever idea.  I am always losing the remote, so having it strapped to my chest would have benefits.  She ran electrical wire down each leg and connected them to my feet with tape.  She hooked up two more on my arms.  Then she globbed some sticky stuff on those pencil marks on my scalp and attached electrodes there too.  This reminded me of a moment in the movie “Back to the Future” where Doc had a vegetable colander on his head that was connected to a tangle of wires.  The wires were connected to a toaster and when he sneezed the toast popped up.  Maybe I am not remembering that part right.  Anyway, the attendant gathered up all the wires dangling from my body and scalp and plugged them in to that box on my chest.

I was finally wired up and ready for the study to begin.  It was still early so I watched a little TV before going to sleep.  The TV remote was apparently not working because no matter which button I pushed on my chest, I could not change stations.  I drifted off around 10pm.  I prefer to sleep on my side, so I knew that this box on my chest was not going to stay put for long.  And sure enough, several times during the night the attendant came in and had to re-plug in some of the wires that I managed to loosen.  At 3a.m. I woke up and could not get back to sleep.  But being a tight wad, I wanted to get my money’s worth, so I laid there until five.  

I was happy that the test was over and I could get unhooked.  I hope the Dr. will get some useful information from watching the video of me asleep.  I hope I didn’t do anything weird like sleep walk, or pee in the corner, or put the TV in to my overnight bag.  However, I did not feel rested at all, so I would not recommend this activity for anyone who has difficulty sleeping.  When I got home I told my wife all about the study.  I mentioned the suggested scalp massage.  She immediately looked around for the Sunday paper.   Hmmm, maybe I should go back and do another study.