I think I should start by saying that despite my degree in International Health, which is largely focused on the underprivileged, illiterate, and underserved populations of the world, and the fact that I am currently living in the developing world to help those people, there is nothing “developing” about the location of my practicum placement in Gurgaon, India.
Futures Group International, headquartered in Washington DC, has stationed their Indian office in a massive corporate complex filled with major international and American conglomerates like Google, Deloitte, Accenture, KPMG, Oracle, Canon, and Bank of America. Fittingly, this area is called Cybercity. It is a maze of glass skyscrapers full of suits in a hurry to get from point A to point B. I’ve seen other offices in the building and they look like seas of cubicles. I feel like I am working on K Street in DC or in Tysons Corner, VA – only everyone is Indian. (Actually though, isn’t everyone Indian at these offices in the US too?)
Gurgaon (pronounced Goor-Ga-Oh with a nasal inflection at the end) is a “satellite city.” Meaning it is a newly built extension of New Delhi that was bought from farmers by rich land developers (most prominently a company called DLF) for to build international branches and outsourcing centers in India for these well-known companies. The entire city of Gurgaon is speckled with similar mini- cities of offices like Cybercity, a few massive malls (also full of American and European shops), and gigantic billboards. Most characteristic about this part of India is the lack of infrastructure and planning that comes with the speed of building. While Cybercity must hold tens of thousands of employees and hundred of cars – maybe thousands of cars to be honest – there is a single-lane exit and a single-lane entry. As you can imagine, this makes for the most disastrous of traffic jams… WITHIN the office complex. Each day Cybercity’s parking patrol plays around with opening a new gate and closing an old one in an effort to find the most efficient system for the morning and evening rush. Honestly, after seeing absolutely no improvement, I think this is just a means for the guards to make their jobs more interesting.
Being placed in such a building, of course my office is beautiful. As you walk in, there is a modern reception area and library, a massive photograph collage of women and children from all parts of rural India, a circular fishbowl conference room, red walls, rows of glass “cabins” (executive offices), colorful cubicles, and two more gigantic conference rooms. The office includes a printing area that houses the attendants. We have about 5 office attendants. More colloquially, these are servants that act as coffee boys, printer boys (yes that was completely odd to me as well), and miscellaneous-I-need-help-with-mundane-tasks boys). It’s like what we call Admin, bought at dirt-cheap labor salaries. I have a faint feeling that my highly coveted position of “intern” is a step above the “printer boy.”
I’ll end with the kitchen. This place is fully stocked at all times: a party-size set of China, a fridge, a sink, a microwave, some new age see through fridge that is not really a fridge and I’m scared to put my food in it, a shelf specially designed for everyone’s lunch boxes, and two tables to eat on. Forget your usual coffee station and kitchenette. The kitchen that is probably as big as a conference room - which actually makes perfect sense because Indians really value their lunch break.
More on that later.
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