desk or table? baksheesh or namaste?

Desk search
The school furnished our apartment with a little student desk, which could be read either way: a little desk for a student or a desk for a little student. Neither of us like the size; not enough room for long legs to fold beneath the desk, nor enough area on the desktop to manage a laptop computer and some papers and reference books, let alone speakers and post-modern accessories. So we decided to buy another desk, actually two: a his & hers pair of big person’s desks. Of course this ought to be easy: go down to the local furniture shop and pick out a desk, pay, go home and await delivery… right? Wrong! Nothing happens smoothly in India. I went to several furniture shops where the concept of “desk” means “little student desk”. I looked on-line and found several other shops which sold little student desks. What do big students use to focus their big thoughts and compose their big papers? Eventually I stumbled onto a catalogue item called “office table” which was EXACTLY the “desk” I was looking for! Plenty wide, maybe even TOO deep, neither mama bear little nor papa bear huge, this desk looked baby bear perfect. It featured three drawers on one side and still lots of leg room. It even seemed to have little holes cut into it to allow printer wires and lamp cords and so forth. But the company which sells the perfect office table does not allow of payment on-line nor even over the phone; so we had to take a taxi way cross town to the Pan Office Furniture (no, I am not kidding!) showroom to make payment, sign papers etc. OK. We got lucky and arranged a lift in the school bus which was taking boarding school kids into town; this would make the taxi ride shorter and spare us from most of the diesel pollution which rickshaw taxis subject us to. So after we were dropped at MG road, we grabbed a cab further south along Hosur road near Electronics City. After a bit of asking around, the driver found the showroom of Pan Office Furniture. Hurrah! There we were facing an actual CHOICE of different models, instead of one type, possibly out of stock… a little squad of salesmen accosted us, wondering how they could be of service. Could they show us model AI 4000, the perfect office table portrayed in the catalogue? “Sorry sir, this model is not there. It may be available in four or five weeks.” Dang! Of course we want our desks NOW, not a month from now. We asked which models were in stock, so we could buy something which could be delivered the same day. “Sorry sir, nobody works in the go-down (Indian English for “warehouse”) today. We cannot say what is in stock.” Hmmm. So the very reason for our schlepping all the way cross town seemed to be null and void. Was there any model which they could say for certain WAS in stock? “Yes sir, I am sure the CT-450 is there. We can have it delivered on Monday afternoon.” So we decided to pay Rs. 8000 for desks delivered in two days, rather than Rs. 5000 for desks promised in four or five weeks, knowing full well that merchants’ promises are often estimates based in wishful thinking and good intentions. This is not the end of this little saga, but I am optimistic that Monday evening will find me and Hansa parking all of our gear and nicknacks on our shiny new desks, ummm, that is, our new office tables.

P.S. it is now Monday afternoon and I am in fact typing at my new perch in front of a swanky new office table with drawers that work, and even can be locked with a key! There are holes drilled into the surface to allow wires to bring 220 Volt electrical current to the speakers, printers and peripherals—they look great and work fine. It was all as smooth as going to Ikea: maybe even more so, because the delivery guys actually unpacked the boxes full of desk parts and assembled both desks, made sure they were placed in the correct part of the room and so forth. But then we didn't think about giving them a tip, so if we ever order more stuff from this company, we can count on inferior service. Tipping is an art form based on influencing the future rather than merely rewarding the past. Baksheesh! Baksheesh! One controls karma through generosity and through memory. Baksheesh! Baksheesh! One makes ripples of good will by dropping coins in the water of human kindness. Baksheesh! Baksheesh! We had actually front-loaded a bit of good karma by giving a generous tip to an autorickshaw driver just last night: he had quoted us a fair price from downtown Bangalore to our suburban apartment, rather than the normal procedure of quoting a ridiculously high price and forcing a bargaining war. We were impressed with his honesty and rewarded it with a big tip. Money has different value and serves several different functions here in India. And non-monetary interactions transpire in a richer coin of the realm; I am amazed at how much good will I can generate by a smile and a handshake. Namaste outweighs baksheesh in many circumstances.