What I Learned About Life & Business From Crossing The Road In Bombay
As some of you know, I grew up in Bombay, back when it was a relatively small city of about eight million people. Crossing the road-any road-was both high adventure and low comedy-the kind that leaves you breathless, with an ache under your ribs. Heart pounding with shaky gratitude at having made it across, alive.
Imagine that you’re walking to the bus stop along roads crammed with crazed taxi-drivers, honking horns, a million bicycles and motor scooters, cars belching oily smoke, handcarts piled high with teetering loads, faded red public buses with riders clinging to the roof and hanging from every door, pedestrians, trucks, beggars, thieves, and hawkers shouting their wares in half a dozen incomprehensible languages.
Imagine, too, an obstacle course of potholes big enough to swallow a car. A swamp of feces and other unidentifiable detritus squishing fetidly underfoot. Dog turds, cow dung, horse manure, garbage, gobs of spit and human waste ripening democratically under the tropical sun.
Now add dead rats, stray dogs, families camped out by the side of the road in makeshift shanties cobbled together from flattened tin cans and battered sheets of cardboard.
Throw in a small shrine of fruit and flowers under a dusty banyan tree. Some trucks rigged with loudspeakers blaring political slogans as they roar by. Old men drinking cups of tea and gossiping under the shade of a roadside tea stall. A couple of skinny sacred cows ambling from shop to shop, being fed banana leaves and bits of coconut.
Mix in pedestrians-several hundred thousand of them on this one road, heading in every direction. Women carrying impossible loads balanced on their stately heads. Naked, big-bellied kids playing, shrieking with laughter, in and among the crowds. Holy men with ash-smeared foreheads and fiery eyes making their way serenely through the chaos.
And then, you see the bus stop. It’s on the other side of the road.
You stand at the crumbling curb, a torrent of sewage gurgling sluggishly through the open gutter near your feet. You see the bus coming.
The Greeks had Chiron to row them cross the River Styx. You have-only yourself.
In that instant, you become aware of patterns in the chaos. You anticipate a slight opening in the thunderous traffic, a traffic light-often a mere suggestion, in these parts-turning red up ahead. The bus gears up noisily from its previous stop a couple of blocks away. It’s now or never.
You commend your soul to God, and step out into the road.
Your awareness expands outward to take in the flow of traffic, the patterns of movement, of closing and opening, the milling pedestrians, the cacophony pressing in from every side. You can’t calculate the odds-there are too many of them, and they are too unpredictable. So you rely on senses that go beyond the merely physical.
You swim through the swarm as if through a river, sidestepping feces underfoot, turning a shoulder this way to slide past that burly turbaned man to your left, bending at the waist and twisting sideways to avoid the load of bamboo balanced precariously on someone’s head.
You don’t run. You walk briskly, with trust, with confidence. Not because that river of honking cars and trucks will stop for you-it won’t-but because you know that, having committed yourself to this course, there’s nothing for it but to trust the gods to get you to the other side. Safely. Without ick on your shoes.
I recommend a trip to Bombay for anyone who wants to live an entrepreneurial life.
Cross the road, any road, while you’re there. You’ll develop skills of discernment, vision, goal-setting, perseverance, faith, and the ability to look death or dismemberment in the face without flinching or running away.
Oh–and you’ll have great stories to tell when you return.
My newsletter subscribers are the first to hear about upcoming classes and programs. From time to time, I also send them special invitations, gifts and offers that are exclusive to my list. To subscribe, please fill out the form below.
Follow me on Twitter
Friend me on Facebook
Get blog updates by email
Get blog updates by RSS
Contact me
Wonderful story! So vivid, it was almost like being there (minus the olfactory sensations, though those were well imagined)!
Many blessings on you and your house!
~Cynthia
I read this story right before bed – figured a little relaxing insight from Hiro. Vivid stuff you write about here – felt it (or some of it anyway) and just a week ago or so you wrote about Canada’s birthday and how you realized you had already “come home” (not put as eloquently as you of course). What a huge contrast between the two scenes.
You’re an awesome writer and thanks for inspiring me . . . once again!
xoxo
Char
Such contrast from where you live now! I always wondered how people navigated India, it seems so overwhelming to me. This certainly gave me a vivid sense, but at the same time, its hard to imagine one so sensitive to others surviving in such a sea.
The lack of indoor plumbing is so hard to imagine. Don’t think I’m cut out for that part in particular, although I know there is magic and beauty in India also. I’ve always had mixed feelings about going there as a result.
Christine Martell´s last blog post..Exploring with images
Hiro I loved this description; it’s so incredibly vivid! It made me think of a description by one of my favorite novelists, William Gibson, in his latest book Spook Country. When one of the characters in the book needs to navigate a particularly treacherous passage he calls on the Orishas, or saints, to protect him.
I often wonder how to have more of those moments where I’m able to “rely on senses that go beyond the merely physical.” Hopefully I’ll get to work with you someday so that we can experience them together!
Kirstin Butler´s last blog post..july 6 | free agent #fail?
I’m busting myself laughing over here. Hiro, that so deeply, perfectly explains, embraces and studies India. tee hee hee!
I just read the whole thing aloud to my love, to have a shared moment of remembering our journey and experiences there.
I have a big, beautiful journal of photos and writing and painting from while I was there. I so wish I could show it to you sometime!
Big love
xoxoxo
Leonie
Goddess Leonie | Goddess Guidebook´s last blog post..The Beauty of Away.
Cynthia and Char, thank you.
Christine, India is an artist’s dream–sometimes an Hieronymous Bosch dream, but you’d find enough material there to last you a lifetime! And indoor plumbing too–at least, most of the time. :-)
Kirstin, maybe that’s why there are so many saints in India. . . their presence is entirely necessary!
Leonie darling, I’d love to see your journal of your journey through India! That would be a feast indeed!
Love to you all,
Hiro
Hiro Boga´s last blog post..What I Learned About Life & Business From Crossing The Road In Bombay
Oh, wow Hiro. You describe it so well. I’ve lived in Bombay too, but your description actually stirred up memories of being a little girl in Cairo, Egypt. I was so distressed crossing streets, that I’d hold mom’s hand with my right, dad’s hand with my left, close my eyes, and wail as we crossed. I simply had no faith that I would live through it all — and yet I did.
As an adult crossing the streets of India, I was definitely more confident, graceful independent, flexible…practicing easy focus and being in the fullness of my senses. This is a fabulous metaphor for entrepreneurship, and I’m grateful for you pointing it out. Helps me see how far I’ve come!!
Grins,
Gretchen
Gretchen Wegner´s last blog post..Call for Art Submissions
Sounds like a exciting place to travel. It is on my places to visit.
I’m all about expanding my awareness to help improve my life. That’s what any good business person does and does it often.
I like how you described the beauty within the chaos. Because every place we are in has both. We just need to keep seeing the beauty so we find a way to enjoy the experience.
Karl Staib – Work Happy Now´s last blog post..The Target in the Bull(y)’s Eye
Hi Hiro!
I laughed as I thought about how much s*&t I’ve stepped in during my years as an entrepreneur. And how really the big picture is way more exciting and stimulating and wonderful!
This was one piece where I wasn’t sure where you were going until the end- just wrote some marketing copy for a new program so probably a little dim right now!
Love as always to you-
xox
Lisa
Lisa Claudia Briggs´s last blog post..Keeping Your Promises To Your Self
Hahahahaha!
In Bombay – we do have the black and white zebra crossings. But I’ve never seen anyone using them to cross the roads! Ever!
Loved your post.
Ankesh Kothari´s last blog post..Trending & Timing (How do you know when a product will hit its tipping point?)
Oh, what a literary delight to read. I love good, descriptively detailed prose. This is like a great poem with a wake up jolt at the end–what’s it called–ugh, I used to have those terms on the first floor. Too far to climb now. A stunning metaphor!
Thank you,
Kate
Kate Williams´s last blog post..When Business Owner and Caretaker Roles Collide
Gretchen, you grew up in Cairo, and lived in India? Let’s talk sometime–I’d love to know more about you.
Ankesh, ha! I hoped you’d get a laugh out of this. And yes, I’ve never seen anyone use the crosswalks for actually crossing the road either! :-)
Kate, thank you for stopping by, and for your lovely appreciative comment. From a writer as wonderful as you, that’s praise indeed.
Love, Hiro
Hiro Boga´s last blog post..What I Learned About Life & Business From Crossing The Road In Bombay
Oh, how perfect a metaphor, and one I’ve lived, but hadn’t made the connection to the rest of my life.
My first morning in Karachi, Pakistan my husband (the native New Yorker) dashed across a street thick with camels and horses and cars and motor rickshaws and bicycle rickshaws and PEOPLE and I stood on a high curb until a policeman came and took my hand and led me across. Yet after a month spent mostly in India, I loved Bombay and crossed streets without thinking (too much).
But the corner of Trust and Courage and Street Wisdom is hard to find, even at home.
I look forward to reading your blog.
Beautiful, vivid story. I loved reading it and yes – the metaphor is perfect, teeming with life.
Jena Strong´s last blog post..What I’ll Miss
Beautiful! what a sensual spiritual moment on-line!
Christine Kane´s last blog post..Don’t Look Back. Look Around.