How I Got a New Cat

This is the story of how I installed Leopard.
To begin, India doesn't have any Apple stores, and their few resellers are still selling products that were replaced a year ago, so I faced the fact that this story would begin with 80 hours of continuous downloading.
I awoke suddenly at 5:30 AM this morning, and instead of going back to sleep, I checked my computer. Finished! I put on some coffee and got started.

As I stared at 66 100 MB files, I realized I didn't know what to do with them. There was no instruction manual. I panicked... the first of many.
An hour later, I found the solution in a little-known program Split & Concat. This process took another hour to complete.
Having began the day with caffeine, I couldn't nap.. so I read the first few chapters of The Fountainhead. That Roark seems like a cool guy. I bet he would've used a mac, too.
I was then faced with a very large disk image (6.66 GB to be exact, and ominous) that I soon realized was meant for a dual-layer dvd. If I'm going to find one of those in Mysore it'll be at FabCity. I call a familiar auto-rickshaw driver.

"Hello, Murhli? This is Nathan."
"Yes, hello?"
"Are you for hire from my campus?"
"Yes I am already coming."
"Someone else hired you from here?"
"Yes, yes."
"Okay, that's fine, sorry to bother you. I'm not with them, goodbye."
"Yes, goodbye."

I soon realize I don't have a dual-layer burner anyway, so I decided to try another approach: delete unnecessary files from the image like printer drivers and international languages. After a long, painful process I had a single-layer disc burned and ready.
I boot from the CD, which takes 30 minutes to load up into the installer. I click through a few menus and it starts to verify the installer CD.
"Install failed: crucial files are missing on the installer disc."
Okay so this approach isn't going to work. I could try an external hard drive, but I didn't bring mine to India. I was borrowing one from my generous friend to backup my data... but using it as an install disk would mean repartitioning it and erasing all current data. He's fine with that, though, and I'm about to get started when my phone rings:

"Hello?"
"Hello. Murhli! I am at the gate."
"Oh, hello, you must be waiting for someone else."
"Yes, okay."
"I'll call them."
"Yes. goodbye."
So I call one of my coworkers who usually uses Murhli as a driver.
"Hey, are you going into town?"
"No, but Murhli just called me. Did you hire him?"
"No. Well, maybe. I thought he said he was coming for someone else."
"Hmm well it's not me. I think he's here for you."
"ah, great. well, I've gotta figure this out."
I put on some clothes and walk up to the gate, sign out, then call Murhli.
"Hello, Murhli? Are you at the gate"
"Yes, 5 minutes."

Okay, my plan is to just give him 100 rupees and send him on his way with an apology. I check my wallet, however, and I only have Rs 500 bills. 15 minutes later, Murhli arrives, and I just decide to let him drive me to FabCity.
Frustrated, I'm inside for 5 minutes. They didn't have dual-layer dvds, but I couldn't use them anyway... so I buy a pack of diet coke and get back in the auto-rickshaw and head back to campus.
Having wasted a copious amount of time, I guiltily reformat my friend's hard-drive and create a mac partition. I'm about to start the install, but I realize I have to be in the education center in 5 minutes to integrate my java project with my group.
I return 2 hours later remembering I have to re-backup all my data again, only this time my laptop won't recognize the hard-drive. So I attempt to reformat it again, but i get a message saying there's an I/O error. I've gotta stop messing around with this thing before I break it. I give it back to H.P. (luckily it works for him) and give up for the time being.

Four days later I'm in Singapore. Singapore has Apple Premium Resellers: Singapore has Leopard. I have Leopard.

Distractions

I came across a modern-english translation of "A London Provisioner's Chronicle". It's a collection of endless daily delineations of the city through the eyes of this ordinary citizen, Henry Machyn. I'm not sure why I found it all that interesting, but it might have to do with recent escapist tendencies.
I thought I'd share the historical happenings of London, 450 years ago this week:

The twenty-first day of October died my lady [Mary Fitzallen], the Countess of Arundel, at Bath Place in St. Clement's parish without Temple Bar.

The twenty-sixth day of October was a goodly hearse set up in St. Clement's parish without Temple Bar of five principals and with eight banderoles and a ten dozen pencels and four great escutcheons of arms at the four corners.

The twenty-seventh day of October my lady was brought to the church with the bishop of London and Paul's choir and the masters, the clerks of London. And then came the corpse with five banners of arms borne. Then came four heralds in their coats of arms and bore four banners of images at the four corners. And then came the chief mourners, my Lady Worcester and my Lady Lumley and my Lord North and Sir Anthony Sellinger.

Then came an hundred mourners of men, and after, as many ladies and gentlewomen, all in black, besides a great many poor women in black and rails and twenty-four poor men in black bearing of torchlights and many of her servants in black coats bearing of torches.

The twenty-eighth day of October was the Mass of Requiem sung and a goodly sermon. And after Mass, Her Grace was buried and all her head officers with white staffs in their hands and all the heralds waiting about her in their coats of arms. And my lord abbot of Westminster preached there a goodly sermon and my Lord of London sang the Mass. The bishop of … sang the Mass of the … and there was a … Mass said. And after, to my lord's place to dinner, for there was a great dinner.

Half-way.

On July 9th, 2007, I wrote the following:

Working for an Indian company will be a wonderful challenge. The amount of unknowns that remain, two weeks before I begin my first career, is staggering. Stubbornly desiring adventure is all I can do to keep from going crazy during preparation.

And now this "wonderful challenge" is halfway done. To be honest, the wonderful is often overshadowed by the challenge. The amount of unknowns not only remain, they have increased. And my stubborn desires for the motherland and its freedoms are all I can do to keep from going crazy during the adventure.

More than the bureaucracy, the chaos, or the lack of sanitation, I've been most frightened by my own humanity I've come to realize these last three months.

I still cannot believe the anger and desperation which brews inside of me whenever I'm given only the same rights and privileges offered to an Indian entry-level employee, even though it is usually the exception to the norm.
Then, of course, I have to deal with guilt on top of the obvious inconvenience of being a part of this country. Is it wrong to desire those freedoms and rights which I took for granted just three months ago?

But what of all the wonderful culture I should experience? I don't have an answer to that question. I can't claim that I've "seen it all" because of the limited duration. I can claim that I've seen enough to make an educated decision between two countries: Which one would I rather be a citizen of? Experiencing culture is for tourists: it's an objective look at only the best of a society. Three months has been more than enough time to be a tourist.

On the surface, I sound spoiled. At least, I know if I had read my current thoughts three months ago, I'd say I was spoiled. But I've seen some great hypocrisies in the Nate of three months ago: I found it much easier to speak nobly against inequality when I was enjoying its benefits. Here, thinking of myself becomes all-consuming.

And to mis-quote Gandhi, "We need to be the change we wish to see in the world." Well the changes I wish to see here now are already visible in the many forms of western media I now illegally download. If I could be more american, I would.
If moving to India was some virtuous sacrifice, I imagine I might feel different: I'm not here on a mission for charitable or spiritual ends. If I was, all discomfort would likely be less of a nuisance. Being stripped of my freedoms accomplishes nothing, however, but bolster the books of a $4 billion company built on the ability to pay people less for providing a similar effort.
Or, I'm just making excuses for my selfishness.

In an attempt to conclude, this wasn't a difficult post to write. It was a difficult post to publish. And I can't expect the guests of this pity-party to understand: you'd just have to be here... for three months.

Last May I pondered this dilemma:

I cannot answer why we were chosen for this prodigious existence, while the ordinary (half the world) lives on less than two frosty's a day.

But I've given up looking for that answer. For even if I could find it, I wouldn't trade my blue passport for the world.

EDIT (Oct. 24, 2007): Fixed spelling of "Gandhi"

Lunch at, let's say, Mysore

It's backdated, but I still make these.

Another Side of Mysore

Today was completely different.
Today, instead of getting up and lounging by the pool, I shadowed a Saint as she did her daily routine.

The home of the destitute

A single corridor extended from a roomy foyer with a television. Upon the Saint's entrance, the tenants transferred their attention from the program to a repeat-after-me prayer in Kannada. Caught off guard, my two fellow trainees and I quickly clasped our hands together. A touch to the forehead and blessing was administered to the more vigilant at the prayer mimicry, and one received a short english lesson.

"Jesus, I love you!" the Saint enunciated slowly.
"Jesus, eywe ou," the student offered.

It is a home for somewhere between 25-40 of the dying and the forgotten, run by 4 Sisters of some German-originated Order. The Saint continued her blessing of song and touch down the corridor as I watched faces brighten. The old, the polio-deformed, the burned, the disfigured, the aids victims. The Saint said later their time is very short in that corridor.
Peter should be an exception. At the age of 18, he became paralyzed after falling from a construction site. 3 years later, he lays on a donated waterbed watching the high turnover around him. The Saint has raised money for him to live elsewhere, but in this polychronistic culture, that might not be soon.

The nicer home of the old

Compared to the first location, the Little Sisters of the Poor home for the elderly was a resort. The 25 nuns and 25 workers kept the place spotless. The tenants were happy and well-fed. International funding plays an influence.

The home of the guilty until proven innocent

This was the hardest part of my day.
The Saint had received prior written permission to bring up to six charity workers from one of the wardens she has become friends with. Whether these charity workers were defined as being Americans, I don't know, but the Saint entered and we had to wait at the gate for 10 minutes before being allowed to enter, sans cellphones and cameras. The nervousness about our visit was understood soon after entering. After all, they wouldn't want anyone blogging to the world about their prison conditions.
We were accompanied by the female warden who signed our permission to enter. The prison contains just over 1000 inmates; she led us to the female hold, containing about 80 women and children.

Now, an aside.
The "Dowry Death Law" was enacted in the 1980s to prevent the horrible trend of the husband's family harassing the new bride for a greater dowry. When these demands aren't met, there are many cases of the bride being burned alive, allowing for another marriage and another dowry. The law states if a bride dies within the first 7 years of marriage due to the in-laws, the husband's family is to be imprisoned for minimum 7 years, maximum life. The Saint told us in many cases of natural death the bride's family has made this accusation and therefore there are many families in the prisons. Sadly, by these accounts, this replaced one tragic event with another.
Getting a trial in India can take around 5 years.
Those with life sentences or scheduled for the death penalty wear white tunics or saris.

We entered a courtyard of high, white cement walls. The ground was mostly the same material, with some shrub-ish trees interspersed. On the paved surface were sticks of incense: the warden responded that the workers get Rs. 10 for every 1000 sticks they make. I worked it out later that labor costs are just less than 0.9% of the selling cost of government incense.

There were four cells with iron-bar doors facing the courtyard, each containing around 20 inmates. Many of the women were in white. The warden opened the first cell, and we entered after the Saint. The floor space was just enough for each resident to lay a single bed mat. I swallowed hard, hardly comprehending the reality that these women faced. It didn't matter if they deserved their sentence, though I'm sure most did not. Time just stopped and I just stared.
The Saint asked everyone to sit, and then she began to sing, "God's love is wonderful..." We knew the words by now, and singing along would have been a supportive and ideal choice. A large portion of the inmates knew the song, too. I opened my mouth and joined in, however after a few unintentionally vibratic pitches I was unable to continue.
After singing, we passed out small biscuit packages the Saint had purchased. I gave two to a woman holding a child.

The home of the innocent

The final stop was the orphanage at St. Philomena's church. The Saint pulled out a tin of hard candy and handed it to me. I hoped this would make the kids like me, but it turned out the innocent needed no such bribe. This was home to 47 young boys who happily sang along to the Saint's songs, like the disfigured, elderly, and incarcerated before them. Other than the giddy, sugar-driven screams, there was something exciting about this place. Here was the less-fortunately born receiving food, shelter, and schooling; here was hope.