What Do You Do? The Risk-Benefit Model For Striking A Conversation

It was still fifteen minutes to daybreak.

Usually, in the winter season, you don’t expect many people in this part of the park unless they are serious morning walkers. And I was preparing myself for a solitary walk in the misty dark morning.

But I was not alone; there was another walker ahead of me – I had company.

I, with my longer strides, chose to overtake the person who had made it to the park ahead of me. I came close and realised that though his strides are small, he is equally fast. After walking alongside for a few strides and making eye contact with him, I realised that I knew him. Here not wishing him was not an option. We met during some official event maybe a year back.

I wished him by nodding my head and with a smile and he reciprocated, I chose to walk at his pace as it suited me too. And we got talking about things in general. A lot of our interest areas were common. And as is my wont, I was quite candid about putting my tuppence in about things without bothering to know what he thought about it. He voiced his own opinions and agreed with most of mine either by voicing a laugh or by adding his to it and to the ones he didn’t agree with, he remained silent.

Amidst our discussion, he asked me – What do I do?

That’s the Indian way of asking for your professional position. I gave mine. And told him where we met last. I realised that he didn’t recollect our encounter.

I continued with my conversation.

After about ten minutes I realised some change and when I looked at him a little surprised by his reticence, I saw a mask of absolute disinterest in his face. While we were in an animated conversation a few minutes back, it had turned into a monologue. While he agreed with most of my points then, now he is dismissing it with an air of finality to end that topic.

He chose to pause without giving a reason. Almost asking me to go ahead with my walk alone. The reason for his changed behaviour did not escape my eyes.

Another incident a few weeks later in the same park.

I saw this man in his late forties, with a typical successful businessman look coming towards me from the opposite side. We got close and he wished me with a Namaskar, and I reciprocated by doing the same. I didn’t know him and was quite touched by his gesture early in the morning. While exiting the park some thirty minutes later, I saw him standing near the gate with a few community members – I knew some of them. The next day, almost at the same spot I saw him coming, and as I was gearing up to smile and wish him, he didn’t react. We breezed past each other as two unknown people.

The reason for his changed behaviour didn’t escape my eyes.

Neither of them knew me and was possibly misled by my important-looking appearance. It misleads many. The former, upon knowing my profession (What I do) realised that I don’t belong to his power hierarchy or social league and by mistake he had given me more time and ear to my conversation and chose to detach himself from it as I was not his equal; the latter, upon knowing from my acquaintances about what I do, realised that I am of no immediate value as his contact.

I introspected and realised that I am of no immediate value to most of the people in our community. I live in a community where I am not equal to many in terms of material wealth, power, and position and to those I am superior, I pose no threat to their interest or don’t offer any potential benefit – directly or indirectly. To both segments of people, I am not a potential contact they would like to nurture.

I was worthless to both.

This realisation of worthlessness can be devastating to one’s self-worth and ego, especially to those unfamiliar with how Indians operate. Your identity as a person having other talents, capabilities, knowledge, and wisdom pales when put to test in this Risk-Benefit model.

Can you affect their interest negatively because of your position or positively by providing beneficial opportunities that determine your relevance in the community and the related interest to socialise with you or befriend you?

Is this a general behaviour?

While travelling on public transportation like a bus, train or flight, if you strike up a conversation with someone; the fourth or fifth sentence would be a question – What do you do? Don’t read it literally and answer. By that they don’t want to know about what you do at your work, they want to know a lot more. The sector you work in; private or public. The rank and position you hold. The country or city you work in.

Your answer will help him know your ‘Auqat’ – your worth, your value for him, which will make him treat you like God or Dog. The position that will give you an unbridled opportunity to abuse the power with zero accountability is hilariously called ‘Service’. Indians love that trophy behind that service and worship the one who sits there. No wonder we Indians are so obsessed with a few jobs. Either you make it to those positions or at least develop contact with them so that you can enjoy some of the largesse that can come your way.

In the book, Being Indian, Pavan K Verma surgically bares open this typical trait in the Indians. He deals with this matter in the chapter – Power and how your worth is evaluated by your fellow community members.

Beneath the veneer of modernity and development we project, we are a deeply divided lot – Insular and class-conscious. We are ready to genuflect before the one who wields power to harm us or benefit us and not bat an eyelid to destroy or misbehave with someone less powerful or below us.

Some positions can be described in just three abbreviations which can make the person in front of you change his body language; take his hands above his ears bend his spine and give that smile that a small male monkey does when he meets a baboon bigger than him, and there are ranks which will make him see through you and dismiss your existence as some doormat.

Why are such achievements so aspirational?

Is it because of our background of being ruled by the erstwhile kings in a feudal set-up? Why do we want to give a substantial part of our life to catapult ourselves to a position that will make our fellow beings treat us as their rulers and we can treat them as our servants? It’s quite normal if they expect to be treated as royalty and you to behave subservient to them. Society neither resents it nor tries to change it. Why is it that despite being one of the largest democracies, we want a leader who doesn’t look like one of us but like someone sent from above? If he is one of us or from ranks below us, we will only respect him if he stands to cause harm to our interests and help us in achieving our aspirations.

Will this behaviour ever change? The answer lies in the question – will we change?