Lesson 2: Never take anything for granted

We needed to get passport sized photos taken so that Delta and I could get updated membership cards to our club in Bombay. So we headed over to a local photo studio to get the pictures taken.


The taking of passport sized pictures is done with a formidable level of seriousness in this city. Once Delta was seated in front of the camera, the photographer said, "look a little left. No not that much, now look a centimeter to the right. And up a bit. Now smile." And he continued with commands like that until Delta's face was positioned in his camera lens to perfection, before he would agree to click. And then he started with me. "No, look down more, we're seeing too much forehead. Smile less. No teeth. Look up into the lens. A little to the right." All of these commands had to be obeyed by subtle movements of our heads until we were positioned to the photographer's satisfaction. There was something reassuring about the amount of conscientiousness applied to our pictures. I felt like we were guaranteed the mugshots would come out good-looking. Now, if only the guy who took my green card and driving license pictures had applied this level of diligence to my photos, I wouldn't have to cringe every time I produced those documents for inspection, would I.


"Come back in fifteen minutes and we'll have these photos developed for you," the photographer told Delta and I. So we left the store and wandered the streets for a while, taking pictures of everything of interest we encountered. Finally, about half an hour later, we headed back to the photo studio, only to find a dejected photographer shaking his head in apology. "I'm sorry, but my memory card got ruined. I've lost all the pictures on the card. I'll need to take the two of you again." And so began the entire process of perfected head-positioning all over again.


"Come back in fifteen minutes and we'll have these photos developed for you," he said again, once he'd re-taken the pictures. So Delta and I hit the streets once again, with another fifteen minutes on our hands.


There was a shoe-shine man who had set up shop on the sidewalk outside the studio, with an eccentric look to him that immediately drew our attention.
"Man, I would love to take a picture of him!" I said.
"Well, why don't I get my shoes polished, and then you can take a picture," Delta suggested, so we approached the man for a polish.
"How much for a polish?" I asked the shoe-shine guy in Hindi.
"Just pay me as much as you like when I'm done," he suggested.
I hate it when people do that, because you nearly always end up paying far more than you would if a price had been pre-agreed upon. I tried to coax a price out of him, but he was adamant on his "at will" payment policy.

As he diligently rubbed various coats of various types and consistencies of polish into Delta's shoes, I asked Delta, "how much do you think we should pay him?"
"Erm, I was thinking a hundred?"
I smiled. Delta was falling into the tourist trap of paying far too much for a service because he was converting from dollars. "A hundred rupees? You know he probably gets five for this when he does it for the locals."
The shoe-shine man looked up. "This is not a five-buck job, ma'am," he said, in clear, fluent English.

Delta and I both did a double-take. It was entirely unexpected for a man living and peddling wares on the streets of Bombay to speak fluent english. But before I had time to examine the amazingness of this fact, I was overcome with a wave of mortification. Right in front of his face, I had told Delta it wasn't worth more than a fiver. How does one backpaddle out of that one?


"Erm, you're right, you're right," I stuttered.

The shoe-shine man continued to mumble under his breath for a bit, decidedly unimpressed with my attitude. And Delta and I stook in awkward silence, unable to talk to each other about the shoe-shine experience anymore, fully aware that he could understand everything we were saying. The awkward silence went on for about ten minutes, and I'm convinced he put on an extra effort of diligence and an unnecessary two coats of polish, just to prolong his moment of revelling.


Finally, when he was done (and it had seemed like this moment would never come!), Delta thanked him and told him what a fantastic job he had done, and gave him the hundred he had first talked about. And then he sat himself down on the sidewalk next to the shoe-shine man, and asked him if I could take a picture of both of them together. The shoe man was happy to oblige.


I had just raised the SLR to get my shot, when the shoe man suggested, "why don't you stand over there to the left instead, you'll capture a nice light falling on our faces. I moved over to where he suggested, and saw that the lighting was indeed much improved. I looked at him in surprise.

"I used to be a photographer," he explained.


Wonders never cease. Here was this man, living on the streets of Bombay in tattered clothes, who would have ever thought he had been fully educated, spoke english, and had been a photographer. Unbelievable. Shows you can't assume anything of anyone.


I wonder what happened to him in life to bring him to where he was. But that would be a thought for another day. For the moment, we were just filled surprise, awe and admiration.