Here’s what Mr. Bhagat told me about…
…getting ready for work at the call-center (8:31 pm):
“ Winter in Delhi is a bitch. I brushed my teeth and used the steel plates as a mirror to comb my hair. Shyam had turned into Sam and Sam’s day had just begun …I waved good-by to everyone, but no one acknowledged me. It wasn’t surprising. My cousins are all on their way to becoming doctors or engineers. You could say I am the black sheep of my family. In fact, the only reason people even talk to me is because I have a job and get a salary at the end of the month …With money in your wallet the world gives you some respect and lets you breathe” (Bhagat, 18).
How would I have found work in a nation where so many young people are unemployed? I probably would have still been a teacher, but what a different world that would have been. Rote memorization, chalk boards, and “the Sun is a big ball of gas” repeated 25 times over.
About…conversations on nights out at the disco:
“ “Come on, Vroom. I thought you said money’s a good thing. That’s how we’ll beat the Americans, right?” Priyanka said with the confidence that comes from drinking a Long Island Iced Tea in seven minutes…
“Yes, doesn’t money pay for your mobile phones, pizzas, and discos?” I asked.
“Yes, but the difference is that I’ve earned it. These rich kids, they don’t have a clue how hard it is to make cash…it takes me almost a full night of two hundred irritation Americans screaming in my ear to earn 300 bucks…We get paid well, fifteen thousand a month. Fuck, that’s almost twelve dollars a day. Wow, I make as much a day as a U.S. burger boy makes in two hours. Not bad for my college degree. Not bad at all. Fucking nearly double what I made as a journalist anyway.” Vroom pushed his empty glass and it slid to the other end of the table.” (Bhagat, 111).