Thank you, Office Boy!!

An "Office Boy" of the company (yes, that's his job title, and he's middle aged) met me at the guest house and escorted me to pay the late visa registration fee to the State Bank of Hyderabad - Treasury Branch in Gunfoundry. It sound pretty glam, no? Imagine my surprise when we walked up to a non-descript stack of shops and headed into the bowels. Only first, I paid a random guy standing out front Rs. 20 to fill out a ratty-looking paper with my details. I would've brushed him off, but the Office Boy indicated this was part of the process. Then, we went upstairs, past a parking garage, a hair salon, and other strip-mall shops, and sat down on a ledge at the end of a hallway where several other Indians had already set up camp (with similiar looking ratty papers). We waited outside an unmarked door until 10:30am sharp.

The door opened and we went in a strange room and formed a line behind some counters enclosed by chicken-coop type wire. The Office Boy urged me to go to the front of the line and I obeyed, but wasn't sure why -- I figure it's because I'm a woman. It was awkward cutting in front of the people who'd been waiting longer than me, but they waved me ahead. I had my money (Rs. 1400), passport, and paperwork ready. But the woman behind the counter just stamped the paper with a number and passed it back to me. Umm, okay.

The Office Boy led me out and down the hall to another big room -- this one looked like a government office, with long benches for waiting and all. We went to one window where someone signed the paper and then to another one where I finally paid the fee. I didn't have exact change (I gave Rs. 1500) so they asked me to sit down. The Office Boy came back about 10 minutes later with Rs. 100 and indicated we should leave. I wondered how we'd gotten 100 back, but couldn't understand his explanation other than that it contained "40" and "60". Once outside, I called the visa registration office, but it was closed for the public holiday (the chief minister dying was a big, big deal). It's a good thing we'd changed my flight from Sunday to Monday!

The Office Boy and I headed back to the office by auto rickshaw. After he paid the driver with the Rs. 100, which he'd kept in his shirt pocket, he passed be Rs. 10. I was even more confused. Once up in the office, a former employee, who was apparently visiting because he'd yet to get his pension money back from the company, enlightened me. The Office Boy had paid the SBH Rs. 40 of his own money, and the 100 he'd had in his pocket went 40 to pay him back, 50 to the auto, and 10 to me. Ahhhhh, got it! The poor Office Boy was visibly relieved that I now finally understood what he'd been trying to tell me all along. I once again felt guilty for making everyone around me speak English. But I thanked him profusely and meant it when I said I couldn't have done it without him. I never would've found the place, paid that random guy outside, known to wait outside the unmarked door, or any of it!

I stayed in Friday evening, feeling afraid of the dark.

(Side note: Most Indians I've met speak more than one language. The problem for foreigners is that India has 18 official languages and 1600 dialects, so someone might speak three, four, or five languages, but none of them are yours. And you could speak Hindi or Tamil or one of the other main ones, and still have large chunks of India where it wouldn't do you much good.)