Unfinished

I think that, in general, Indians must have a much greater tolerance for “process” than Americans; there are so many more unfinished, half-finished, and clearly never-to-be-finished projects all over the place here than at home.

Aside from the visual appeal of seeing the guts of things as they move along towards some desired end, I think it’s also a good reminder of what we, as human beings are into, as well; our lives are unfinished works; even though we may imagine that we have somehow consummated the project of personal development or self-realization, it’s obvious that all of us have loads left to do; preventative maintenance alone can be a fulltime job.

Another thing that’s different is that here, as opposed to in the good old US of A, there seems to be a much greater tolerance for allowing people to see and interact with the work-in-progress.

Case in point: on the way downtown from Gokulum to Mysore city center, there’s a major road construction project going on: bulldozers, cranes, dozens of men digging trenches, bending rebar, and pouring concrete. If this were going on in my hometown of Seattle, there would be a huge cyclone fence around the worksite; you’d need to have credentials and a hardhat just to watch; here, though, people stroll right on by the machines; I wheel my bike underneath a concrete overpass that will apparently hold up a roadway at some point in the future; no one seems to mind.

Surely, part of the difference has to do with liability issues; in the US, you couldn’t have the public wandering through a major construction zone for fear of someone getting hurt and suing; here, by contrast, it seems like it’s just up to those who pass by to make sure they don’t get beaned on the noggin by a backhoe; if you do, it’s your fault, and probably your karma, as well.

But I also think there’s an aspect of the Indian psyche that just may be more comfortable with allowing the world to see how the sausage is made, as it were. Since we’re all on the same karmic journey, and, at essence, all the very same thing (the universal Atman that is Brahman), who cares if others see our partly-finished projects, because, after all, they’re just seeing theirs, as well.