Minority Report

Growing up vegetarian in a meat dominated culture (and family), I’ve always been in the minority in at least one way. I was strange, different, weird. Excluding some friends who experimented with vegetarianism in high school, I knew no other vegetarians until I was 19 and living in Italy (Mormon vegetarians in Utah, it turns out, are very rare). By this time, my minority status was enhanced further as an American Mormon in a Catholic European country. Years later in Africa, I would often find myself as the only white person in a bustling, crowded market. Being vegetarian, Mormon, and from the West made me unique even in cosmopolitan Boston. Now, I am daily the sole non-Indian on a constantly overflowing bus as I travel the hour from Mugapair to Nungambakkam for work. Being always in the minority has taught me some important lessons and profoundly shaped my identity; my sympathies for minorities and underdogs go deep.

I wish that everyone could be in the minority at least once in their lives; what a different place this world would be if each individual could experience the powerlessness, isolation, distance, and otherness that often come with minority status. When you have been in the minority, it is easier to understand the tendency of immigrants and other outsiders to congregate together with those of similar backgrounds. To meet someone who is like you is very affirming and there is often an instant bond of trust and understanding amid the general incomprehensibility of society.

I believe the morality of a group can be directly and easily discovered by observing how they treat their minorities. Insecurity seems to lead to intolerance and demands that everyone conform to your way of thinking and doing things. Compassionate, dynamic cultures are characterized by their ability to learn from and incorporate the best of what their minorities have to offer while maintaining what is beautiful in their own traditions. After many years, I’ve finally realized that no matter where I go in the world, I will always be a minority on at least one dimension and likely on many dimensions simultaneously; my diet, religion, political leanings, skin color, and birth place virtually ensure it. I’ve come to accept this. I just hope that I can always be open-minded enough to learn from those who are different from me. And, more importantly, I pray that I will always be aware and conscious enough of the potential isolation of others that God can somehow use me to make them feel included in the larger whole.

Roadside market, Zambia 2003


Zambia, 2003


Zimbabwe, 2006


Zimbabwe, 2006


Sikochi brothers, Zimbabwe 2006


Not just veg (vegetarian), but "pure veg."


"High Class Veg" - as if there was any other kind!


These buses often have so many people hanging from the doors that the entire bus tilts to the left as it travels down the street.


A Christian church in Orissa. Christians are a small minority in this area and faced violence, vandalism, and other persecution in August and September of this year.


Christian church, Orissa 2008


An LDS church in Bangalore. Anti-Christian sentiment ebbs and flows in Karnataka (the state in which Bangalore is located). In September, 70 Christian churches were vandalized in the span of a few weeks. During this time period, two Mormon missionaries were abducted, beaten, and jailed. They spent two days and two nights in a prison with 5,000 other men, many of whom were incarcerated for murder. Several church members who tried to come to their aid were also accosted and persecuted. According to their leader, in such situations "fear is the real enemy, for it is the only thing that can defeat hope."

Sacred Puri

Orissa is one of India’s poorest states; the proportion of people living below the poverty line in the state is nearly double the country’s average. It is located on the eastern coast of India, just below West Bengal (Calcutta). In the far western part of the state, tribes still live as they did thousands of years ago. I spent December 16-19, 2008 in Orissa, flying into the state capital of Bhubaneswar (which I still don’t know how to pronounce correctly) and proceeding the 1.5 hours to the coastal city of Puri. The airport in Bhubaneswar is small with only a few airplanes on the ground at any one time and passengers walk the 400 meters across the runway to board their plane directly. Interestingly, this small semi-rural airport also hosted the strictest security I’ve yet seen in India.

Unfortunately, Orissa was marred in August and September by violence and vandalism against the small Christian minority after they were blamed for the murder of a Hindu leader and some of his followers (see here). The majority of Christians in the state are destitute, illiterate, powerless tribal people who make an easy target for the machinations of politicians.

In contrast to media reports from other parts in the state, the city of Puri was relaxed and welcoming. According to two different sources, Puri is one of the four most sacred cities for Hindus (although my sources were conflicting on which cities constituted the other three). The city is home to Jagannath Mandir, a temple dedicated to Jagannath, whom Hindus believe to be the Lord of the Universe and an incarnation of Vishnu (Krishna). Built in 1198, the temple attracts hundreds of thousands of pilgrims from all over India each year. Non-Hindus such as myself are not permitted to enter; however, according to my guide book, within the temple can be found statues of Jagannath, his brother Balbhadra, and sister Subhadra (see here for images). “The brothers have arms but no hands, while smaller Subhadra, sitting in between, has neither. Priests continually garland and dress the three throughout the day for different ceremonies. Incredibly, the temple employs about 6,000 men to perform the complicated rituals involved in caring for the gods. An estimated 20,000 people—divided into 36 orders and 97 classes—are dependent on Jagannath for their livelihood. The kitchen, with 400 cooks, is reportedly the largest in the world.”

Each summer, Puri is home to a huge festival, called Rath Yatra, in which the statues of the three gods are placed on huge cars and pulled through the city. Again, according to Lonely Planet, “The main car of Jagannath (origin of ‘juggernaut’) stands 14m high. It rides on 16 wheels, each over 2m in diameter—in centuries past, devotees threw themselves beneath the wheels to die gloriously within the god’s sight. Four-thousand professional temple employees haul the cars, which take enormous effort to pull and are virtually impossible to turn or stop…Hundreds of thousands of pilgrims (and tourists) swarm to witness this stupendous scene, which can take place in temperatures over 40 degrees C [104 degrees Fahrenheit].”

Puri is also home to a beautiful beach (much cleaner than the beaches in Chennai). Also unlike Chennai, hundreds of Indians frequent the beach for swimming and relaxing and a carnivalesque atmosphere prevails. As the city’s main attraction doesn’t permit the entry of non-Hindus, the city and the beach are surprisingly free of foreign tourists. I was content to be the only white person wandering down the warm beach Wednesday evening, although the lack of foreign tourists means that the local hotels and restaurants aren’t so great at catering to Westerners and few people speak English proficiently (the hotel where I stayed doesn't stock toilet paper, for instance, but was nice enough to buy some for me when I asked).

On Thursday, I took a three-hour round trip ride on the back of a motorcycle (don’t tell my mom) from Puri to the small village of Danda-Mukundpur. I’m now convinced that the best way to see rural India is from the back of a motorcycle. We stopped along the way to buy a fresh coconut (costing about 13 cents) on the side of the road; the vendor sliced open the green fruit with a machete and placed a straw inside so that we could drink the refreshing juice. Afterward, he cut the hull in half so we could eat the white, slimy coconut flesh inside. This was my first trip into rural India and I found it beautiful and the people very friendly.

An enormous temple which is a place of spiritual power for thousands of devotees, beautiful beaches, and welcoming people make Puri a great place to visit—definitely worth a return trip. Next time I’ll be sure to bring my swimming suit. However, as the only white person on the beach, I’ll have to be careful that my iridescent glow doesn’t attract too much attention.

A beautiful, warm beach in December!


A Krishna Temple down the street from Jagannath Mandir.


Jagannath Mandir.


As non-Hindus are not permitted inside, this is as close as I could come to seeing the interior.


The entrance of the temple at dusk.


Rural village of Danda-Mukundpur.


Playing cricket in the street.


Personification of village hospitality.


Playing cricket in the fields.

More pictures can be found here.

Bustling Bangalore, center of the flat world

If there is any place where the old India meets the new, it is Bangalore. Thomas Friedman wrote extensively about the city in his 2005 book as typifying the new “flat world.” Bangalore has been called the outsourcing capital of the planet and is full of IT companies and BPOs (business process outsourcing firms). It is home to the legendary campus of Infosys, a computer company started with $250 by seven individuals in 1981. It is now worth $20 billion and employs over 90,000 people. According to Lonely Planet, when you enter the campus (which isn’t accessible to the public) “it’s as if you’ve slipped through a wormhole into an alternative India, where neatly trimmed lawns sprout shiny glass and steel structures. The workforce (average age 26) cycle or use electric golf carts to get around the 32-hectare campus, passing five food courts (serving 14 types of cuisine), banks, a supermarket, basketball court, putting green, and state-of-the-art gyms. There’s even a hotel! The point of all this is to prove that Infosys (and by extension India) can compete on equal terms with the developed world—the level playing field of Friedman’s ‘flat world.’ And with bumper-to-bumper traffic crawling along the highway outside, nowhere seems to sum up the contradictions of modern India so succinctly.”

I visited Bangalore on November 15-18, 2008. The official name of the city is now Bengaluru, but unlike the Madras to Chennai and the Bombay to Mumbai name changes, Bengaluru hasn’t really caught on and everyone still calls the city by its colonial name, Bangalore.

This marked my first time flying within India and I was somewhat surprised by the lax airport security (compared to the U.S.). Not only did my shoes and belt remain on my body, but I didn’t even have to empty my pockets or take my laptop out of its case (on the return trip I did actually have to dis-encase my laptop but my shoes remained on my feet). I was also allowed to carry any liquids I wanted right onto the plane. While this was pleasant and convenient for me, it does make one a little nervous traveling in a country where terrorist attacks are not infrequent (as was recently tragically demonstrated in Mumbai). A substantial snack (bordering on a meal) served on the short one-hour flight was another pleasant surprise.

The beautiful, recently constructed international airport is a testament to Bangalore’s rise and new-found wealth. About an hour bus ride from the main part of the city, the airport is adorned with beautiful fountains, art sculptures, and meticulously manicured lawns. Although there is not much of historical interest in Bangalore, I’ve been told that it is a great place to live as you can find anything from anywhere in the world in the city’s trendy shops and restaurants. There is also an active social scene catering to the many young working professionals. I saw the city’s transformation firsthand as I wandered down a dilapidated old street and stumbled upon a beautiful new mall. The white granite structure housed several high-end brand stores which were much too expensive for me. An escalator led to the roof of the building where a terrace, populated with elegant restaurants and a beautiful multicolored fountain, overlooked the city.

The rise of the Indian economy is attributed, almost universally here, to the deregulation and government reforms of the early 1990s. These changes, coupled with a large, educated, English-speaking population, have unleashed Indian’s entrepreneurial potential. With starting salaries higher than those of their long-employed parents, young IT professionals and “call center yuppies” are fueling the rise of a large Indian middle class. The best IT firms now wield so much power that some have dubbed them the ITocracy. Jobs viewed with disdain in the U.S. confer substantial status and are highly sought here. With so many people in the country, competition for jobs at top companies is fierce; many applicants have special training in “American” English and advanced degrees from top universities.On the other side of the world, many Americans are increasingly frustrated as they try, unsuccessfully, to communicate with their credit card’s back-office support team in India. Next time you find yourself in this situation, struggling to make yourself understood, take a moment to reflect on the fact that the person on the other end of the line likely speaks three or four languages in addition to English, is probably more highly educated than you, and is working many, many hours each day to provide a better life for himself and his family. This may not decrease the level of your annoyance (I myself try to avoid using the phone here), but at least it will provide some perspective.

Iconic symbol of the West.


The beautiful Lalbagh Botanical Garden.


Temple within the garden.


Glass house at Lalbagh.






I found a family of monkeys in urban Bangalore near the LDS church.


View from the top of UB City. Unfortunately, you can't see the fountain so well.


City view from another roof-top restaurant.

More pictures.