Israel's immigrant children fight deportation

[spookyturtle 9,466]

Rules? Lots of rules. Indian bureaucrats are experts at making rules. What lacks is enforcement. No, there isn't much street or petty crime. Everyone knows everyone.

But people build whatever they want without follow the building code? It's more or less do as you please without fear of any enforcement? What is the population of the city?

[w¡n9Nµ7 §£@¥€r 123]

But people build whatever they want without follow the building code? It's more or less do as you please without fear of any enforcement? What is the population of the city?

In that part of the city, yes. Then there are the nice parts where you'll see lots of American and Chinese business people. Codes are enforced strictly there.

71 square miles, population over 5 million (according to Wiki).

[Peikko 1,575]

I know the long post wasn't aimed at me, I'm not stupid - I was responding to your response to my frivelous post.

Which, I was perfectly aware was completely trivial and friverlous, deliberately so might I add.

[scandal 951]

Being criminal is not a function of being poor. However, the kind of crime that is disruptive to normal civic behavior (violent crime, public drunkenness, etc.) does occur much more in communities with larger concentrations of poor people. I don't care to analyze why, I leave that to the sociologists.

I would say Bernie Madoff's crime was enormously disruptive to normal civic behavior.

I don't like the idea of starting a thread about me.

But I'll give you one little story right here.

I'm visiting my uncle and his family. They live in a slightly lower income and extremely congested part of the city. I've been to his place a few times and have some memories of what the approach to it looks like. But in a city which has so few street signs and where makeshift buildings are torn down and rebuilt all the time, finding your way around after a gap of five years (the last time I went to India) is not easy. So I'm in a taxi and as usual the taxi driver doesn't know his way around. Most taxi drivers in Kolkata today are migrants from other states. They don't even speak the language. Kolkata residents have to talk to them in Hindi (often broken, Hindi isn't the native languge) just to communicate. Thankfully, I do speak Hindi reasonably well so I'm trying to navigate this guy to my destination. At some point, I realize I'm lost. Nothing looks familiar anymore. I expected a temple on the right and then to turn right after it. But there are so many temples now. And they all look the same. Fuсk me. I ask the taxi driver to ask someone for directions. In any Indian city, there are always people just hanging out by the street. Do they have jobs? What do they eat? Where do they get money? I have no idea. It doesn't matter. Maybe they can help. Let's ask. So he asks, in Hindi. He's ignored. So I ask, this time in Bangla (the local language). They ask me where I'm from. Fuсk my accent. I repeat the question. They laugh. I tell the taxi guy to just keep driving. We'll figure it out. Eventually I do, about an hour later. I find that goddamn temple. Woot. Turn right, turn right. He says, I can't. Whaddaya mean I can't? The road ain't wide enough. But it was 5 years ago, I think. But I look and.. it isn't anymore. Squatters on both sides have taken about umm a foot of space. No more room for a car. So I get off, pay the man. As is normal in India because I sound American, no one has change. Fuсk you! They know the 110 rupee bill isn't a big deal to me and I'll happily leave him 150 Rupees if the other option means looking for change. They're all right. I hate them for takign advantage but I'd like to move on. Take my money, bitсh. Take it all. Actually, here are 3 50s. Keep the change, mofo. So now I'm on foot. Watch where you step, I hear my grandma say. She's been dead for years but she used to tell me that when I was in India as a child. Yeah, she didn't see these streets. Avoid the #######? Not happening here. I'll just step right in it. When I get back to the US, remind me to burn these shoes. And these jeans too. Ugh. So as I'm walking, I see the homeopathic pharmacy that was there five years ago. Finally, something familiar! My uncles house is a left turn at the pharmacy into a narrow alley. I turn in and hear a growl. A stray dog doesn't like me. He starts barking. Loudly. #######. Now what? Whatever, I keep walking. The dog is behind me. Barking. Not coming any closer though. I don't know what to make of it. I finally reach his house. We say hello, we catch up. They feed me. Now it's time for the ritual afternoon nap. I lie down, only to be woken up half an hour later by loud music. Very loud music. I look out the window and someone's playing music from a very large speaker in the alley. My uncle's wife comes in, says don't worry it will stop. I ask her, who are they? Apparently, they're running an illegal speaker business in the neighborhood. They build them somewhere else and bring them into this neighborhood for testing. They can't test them in the other location because it's "posh" and the neighbors have political connections. Out here, the neighbors are people like my uncle. Total nobodies. They could complain but nobody would care. Who are you again? A very common question asked by people. Who are you? They're not asking you for your name. They're asking you why you matter.

Next time you should ask your uncle to come visit you at your hotel, or wherever you're staying. Offer to pay his cab fare.

I've seen similar things in Thailand, and in Brazil. Slums and shanties filled with the desperately poor look remarkably alike wherever they're located.

Good story - thanks for sharing.

[w¡n9Nµ7 §£@¥€r 123]

Next time you should ask your uncle to come visit you at your hotel, or wherever you're staying. Offer to pay his cab fare.

That is just not done. He's blood and he's an elder. That counts for a lot in India and it would have been considered rude for me to offer him cab fare. It would have been even ruder for me to not visit him to pay my respects. Just how it is. I could break the rules, but what would be the point? It's not like I never intend to visit again. And my mother still has a lot of family left and intends to visit frequently. Breaking protocol would not be wise.