Hat for a Bat and Other Strange Tales of Tails

I jotted down some strange, but true stories both from my travels for both business and leisure:


I. Holiday Pay

My first international assignment was in the 90s, and it was in Europe. I was stationed in Brussels and was traveling to various cities in Western Europe. I was amazed at how difficult it was to manage the schedule of a 12 member  consulting team from different countries. The vacation packages in Europe are generally more liberal than the U.S. and they also have a higher number of national holidays. It was not uncommon to find team members with 5 or 6 weeks of vacation. The term holiday was used interchangeably with vacation. It was quite a task to create a tight timetable when there were all these holidays that had to be taken into account. Team members from some countries had what was called ‘holiday pay’. In addition to their regular salaries, they were given extra pay to enjoy their vacations. I WANTED A TRANSFER!

II. If I knew then what I know now

I was traveling back and forth between Frankfurt and Brussels for about 2 months. While it is not more than a hop from NY to Boston, the treatment of passengers was much more elaborate. It was an international flight after all! My elegantly served meal also included a round piece of soft stuff, that was white on the outside and yellow in the inside with what seemed like raisins stuck all over. It tasted good. I looked forwarded to that stuff on my weekly flights. Several weeks later I saw a Lufthansa advertisement on TV. The advertisement showed this stuff I mentioned. It was pig’s stomach. No thank you!

III. Happy crustaceans

We went to a fancy restaurant in Hong Kong. And our team ordered drunken prawn for shared appetizers. Much to my surprise the waiter brought over a trolley with a stove on it. He proceeded to take out a silver bowl and took some live prawns from a glass bowl of water and put the prawns in the silver bowl. He then proceeded to pour half a bottle of wine over the prawns. The prawns then promptly got intoxicated and started thrashing around in the bowl, and finally calmed down in a drunken stupor. The waiter then proceeded to cook them in front of us. Crustaceans die happy?

IV. Kneel eel!

In Hong Kong, we ventured into Kowloon one evening for dinner. The food and the restaurants there are much more earthy, but nice. We decided to venture into one of the restaurants. As we were walking in, I saw one of the kitchen staff trying to catch an eel from one of the tanks in the front. This eel was literally 2-3 inches in diameter and maybe a foot to 2 feet in length. And this thing would jump perhaps 5 feet into the air to avoid being caught. As we walked into the restaurant we saw this continuous struggle, the guy trying to catch the eel and it jumping high in the air. Later as we settled down, we saw him carry the writhing edible into the kitchen.

V. The heart of the matter

I was in Taiwan on assignment in Taipei. It was the weekend. So we decided in the evening to go the the market. Presently we were at the snake market. There was this entire row of shops (perhaps 50 of them) with snakes hung every where. There was a crowd gathered around one particular stall. I gathered with the crowd, held on tightly to my wallet and watched at the unfolding spectacle with fascination and horror.

The shop- wallah lifted a live snake, that was perhaps 3-4 feet long and held it up in the air. He then proceeded to slit it and pulled out its heart. He then squeezed the blood from the heart into a glass. He then offered it to the crowd. One of the men from the crowd stepped forward and drank it ‘bottoms-up’. I asked my colleague what the significance of this was. He said that it was considered an aphrodisiac. What-ever dude!

VI. They have brains?

In Seoul, my clients wanted to take me to lunch on the last day. This restaurant specialized in serving beef. I explained that I did not eat beef (I thought it was too subtle a point to explain that, however, I ate hamburgers – so I let that slide!). The hosts were understanding and ordered me chicken. I then saw a very small, tiny cup with gelatinous stuff. I asked my hosts what that was. And they said fish brain. I did not want to say no a second time. So I did a bottoms up on it and the fish brain entered my system, literally without touching my tongue – cup to throat to stomach!

VII. The wall – 1

In Seoul, on a spare day, I had a car with a driver. He was taking me around various museum and monuments. I asked him to the De-militarized Zone (DMZ) where there are soldiers from North and South Korea stationed across each other. I wanted to see the iron-curtain for myself. What I saw was most unexpected. On the South Korean side, the entire place looked like Dissey-land. There were shops, arcades and it was very touristy and commercial. I could put coins in a meter and watch through a binoculars the other side. The other side of the DMZ, the North was utterly different. Dry, spare, barren with soldiers criss-crossing their gates. It was a very surreal experience.

VIII. The wall – 2

Back in Europe, in Berlin, there is a revolving restaurant atop a tower. We were up there having coffee. As the restaurant revolves, you get to see the whole city. I am sure a lot has changed by now. But then at that time, the contrast between the East and the West could not have been starker. The west side of Berlin was full of wide boulevards, modern buildings and construction cranes everywhere. The east was full of really dull, ugly tenements, block after block mile after mile. The contrast between individual enterprise and mind-numbing bureaucracy of the collective could not have been better illustrated.

IX. Long lost friend

The contrast between working in Germany and Italy could not have been better setup. I had a week long assignment in Frankfurt followed by a week long assignment in Italy, Malpensa near Milan. The company was the same and the approach and objective of the visit was the same. The Germans, all showed up on time. Wanted to know my plan and agenda. Gave me everything I needed with precision. I got the job done. They were extremely cooperative. However, when the day was done, I was left to my own devices – nary a friend.

What a contrast Italy was. I showed up the first morning and I could not find a soul. I walked around the offices until I found one person and I asked him. He said, “Surya! Yes, yes, we are expecting you”. Half an hour later about 10 people assemble in a conference room. I explain the agenda, and the manager goes, “Good, now lets go have some coffee”. It was literally 3 pm before I could get the show on the road. They took me out to dinner (some combination of the 10 people) every night. The approach to work was messy, imprecise – and given my own organized style, it was stressful. But boy, did I have fun!

X. Smokin’ what?

We were on a strategy project in the U.S. and the headquarters was in the south (well south of the Mason-Dixon line). We were making the final presentation to pursue a large investment opportunity. I was a manager on the project. Myself and three of the senior partners were in this Boardroom with the CEO and his directs. We presented the recommendation and were talking about the challenges. Suddenly one of the officers said in a deep drawl, “that would be like smoking out of the end of a long rope”. The other officers understood and they proceeded with the conversation. I was and my partners were completely unsure what the man meant. Was this a good thing or a bad thing? How should we proceed? It was puzzling. I have heard many such sayings in the South. Some were interesting, some just inscrutable.

XI. A Sack of Snakes

My childhood friends from Coimbatore will remember this story. There was a person named Parthasarathy (I think that was his name). And he was always trying stunt or the other to get into the Guinness book of world records. I think he once tried to roll a pea with his nose a long way. Anyway, decided to break the world record of living the most days with snakes.

There is a big park in Coimbatore (I forget its name). They built a glass house and Parthasarathy stayed inside this glass house and there were many many snakes with his in the glass house. This exhibit drew vast crowds and the organizers started selling tickets. This continued for many days and was all over the news.

Then it turned out that Parthasarathy and the exhibit organizers got into a dispute about something or the other (perhaps, and understandably how to split the proceeds of the sale of tickets). The dispute ended badly.

There was a bridge between where we lived on Avinashi Road and the college and school that we went to. One day we were walking over the bridge and we looked down. There were three or four sacks. And they were half burned. And inside it were snakes that were burned to death.

XII. A trail of tails

My dad tells this story. The area between Hyderabad and Vijayawada was a vast undeveloped wilderness for a long time. And it had all kinds of tropical creatures including snakes.

Then a big highway was constructed connecting the two cities. In the night, snakes would be about their way and would cross the highway. Trucks traversing the highway would crush the snakes on the road.

My dad would say, that when they traveled the highway during the day, the stretch would be a vast stretch of dead snakes on the road. A surreal sight.

XIII. Nice house, thanks

Where we lived on Campus in Coimbatore in the early 70s, the campus annex we lived in was away from the main campus. And it was in a large underdeveloped area (which over a 20 year period become really well developed). In the early days outside of the campus, again there were plenty of snakes, especially Cobras. It was not unusual for a hostel/dorm student to let out a yelp for having found a snake (usually a baby snake). Outside the annex walls, were vast stretches of undeveloped land. And this would be littered with Ant Hills. I am not talking about small ant hills. I am talking about ant hills 4 feet or higher.

And we heard a very interesting story about these anthills. The poor ants would slave away forever to build up these anthills. And when they got to a certain size, snakes would chase away the ants and take them over. The air passages and the structure of the anthill was most conducive for the snakes to nest.

From the back of our house to Avinashi Road (which was the main road to the college) was a far distance. And the stretch would be full of these ant hills.

I wish I had had the presence of mind to take a picture of these!

XIV. Hoot and Shoot

While in Coimbatore, my Dad got talked into investing in a tea estate. He might as well have worn this, "I owned a Tea Estate and all I have left is this T-shirt'.

A lovely place up in the hills of Kerala in a place called Kolahalamedu. His fellow investors were his colleague Prof Sundaram and Mr. Veerabahu of the Indian Army and at that time an Industrialist.

There was partying happening that evening when we heard an owl hoot. The army friend said let’s get the bird. We stepped out of the farmhouse into a pitch dark courtyard with no lights. He had a rifle in his hands. At the next hoot, Veerabahu's rifle shot rang an echo throughout the valley.

And an owl fell dead at our feet.

XV. Rat O'5 Tales

My friend and his wife lived in an apartment in the city of San Francisco. They were plagued by a rat. This rat would evade their  various traps and get into their lockers. One day he did catch it and threw it out if the house, but he came back.

Fed up, one day Mark decided to poison the pest. He put a rat poison pill inside some cheese. Sure enough the rat ate it up. But showed up the next day!

So he proceeded to poison it again to no avail. The rat came back 4 times every time to eat up the cheese and poison. Finally after the 5th time, the rat never came back.

XVI. Is the Gecko free?

My friend was traveling in Thailand and checked into a hotel. After all his travels, he wanted to shower up before dinner.

As he was in the shower, he panicked when he saw a large green lizard in the bathroom. In a panic he dashed out of the bathroom and dialed the operator.

'There is a lizard in my bathroom,' he said breathlessly, 'and it is green!'

'Oh, that is just a gecko, it is harmless,' came the reply.

For the next few days sure enough the gecko was there and rarely moved. On the last day of his stay he was in the bathroom and the gecko was gone.

My friend called the operator and said, 'operator, my gecko, it is gone'

Now the Thais, especially in the hospitality industry are exceedingly polite. But the operator, my friend believes, hung up on him.


XVII. A hat for a bat

I was at work, absorbed in some conference calls. My personal cell phone rang and I knew that it was my wife, MK.

Usually this type of a phone call is to ask me (irritably) where I had put something away and I was in no mood to jog my memory. But I decided to answer the phone anyway.

'There is a bat in the house', she said

I heard, 'Where's the bat', but the sheer horror in her voice made me pause.

I kind of casually said, 'open the window and it will fly away'

She said, 'you @&$**!, that means I have to go into the room'

I said, 'you need to wear a hat, otherwise the bat can tangled in your hair and you will freak out and the bat will freak out even more'

She said, 'get home now'

I got home, put on a hat and opened the bedroom door slightly and peered in; and there was the bat circling the room at great speed.

Meanwhile a bat catcher showed up with a big butterfly net. For $250 and one minute's worth of work, he caught the bat and released in the nearby woods.