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Technical Difficulties, Indian Style

So.

When last we looked, our intrepid heroine had somewhat successfully survived Delhi Belly, Indian auto-rickshaw rides, and the touts of Connaught Place to establish herself with her fellow MommyWizards in the small-but-holy spot of Tso Pema, in the far nothern reaches of Himachal Pradesh. Shortly after, the tribal blogs fell silent, for more than a month…

What happened?

Well, what happened was something I had been intending to write about later. As in, “I’ll do it as soon as I’ve taken care of this other problem…” And, of course, the other problems always involved a non-functioning laptop. Day after day passed as I planned out blog entries, only to get caught up in the latest computer repair nightmare. And I had even been warned about the possibility of encountering technical difficulties neither I nor my bag of geek tools was prepared to cope with. I had heard stories from other Westerners, and even from my fellow MommyWizard and partner-in-crime Joy, about the big bad Electronics Eater of the East…

Entropy, my friends. It’s not just for Physics classes any more.

I don’t know if it’s a side effect from the sheer number of gods and religions in this region, or just the subcontinent’s multi-millenial habit of always functioning just on the edge of complete collapse, but Entropy is accelerated tremendously in SouthEast Asia. Joy noticed the side effects first: laptops that functioned perfectly in the States would default to the Blue Screen of Death and stay there. Watch bands meant to last years would disintegrate within 4 or 5 months. Luggage accessories designed for the worst back-country treks imaginable would simply fall apart while sitting untouched in a hotel room.

Over the last three months I’ve found myself saying, frequently, that handling tech in India is very different from handling tech in the US. For one thing, many base assumptions are different. Assuming that things like electricity, spare parts, and fast fat Internet pipes are available is the fast road to certain madness. Instead, the rules look like this:

1. The faster you want stuff to happen, the slower you will have to work. This is the hardest rule I’ve had to deal with so far. Tso Pema is remote enough that any complicated technical difficulties require a 26-hour round-trip commute to Delhi. And overall, repair jobs and tech orders take longer, and usually involve the tech’s cousin or friend driving the needed part in to deliver it by hand from Chandigarh, 4 hours away….
2. Never assume electricity will be available or stable, and plan accordingly. This means power inverters, voltage stabilizers, and UPS’s at the ready at all times. In theory India electricy is 240v. In reality, what comes out of the wall can range from 180v-280v, with enough dangerous spikes to turn the latest handheld plaything into a really sexy paperweight.
3. There are no such things as “spare parts.” If it works, it’s in use already. The corollary to this is that it’s a good idea to find out where to get stuff before you really need to know.
4. Be prepared to work with lowest-common-denominator tools. I searched in vain for a decent repair kit, on ly to find the the kits most commonly available consisted of magnetic screwdrivers. Magnets? To work on computer equipment? Yup. Windows 98, ME, and even 95 are still hard at work daily in Internet cafes across the country, despite Microsoft’s pronouncement that they’re no longer supported. USB slots and CD burners–don’t expect them, just dance a little happy dance when you find them.

Lena frequently reminds me that India is a place that is accustomed to functioned on the verge of collapse for about 5000 years now. So far it’s actually failed to do so. Meantime, of course, any Western visitors are in for a scary ride.

Entropy, people. You Have Been Warned.

September 16th, 2006 Posted by admin | Tech, Travel, India | one comment