This is why the flight attendant should not be a genius

There's an ideal competence level apparent all around in some jobs and that's a good sign for India

- MANU JOSEPH

I get a spam call from a girl who asks which bank has issued my credit card, and I say, "Sperm Bank." She asks if it is a foreign bank, then for the spelling. Listening to her, I am delighted at the progress the nation has made. I am not being sarcastic, partly because sarcasm is the second lowest form of humor, but chiefly because her response is a good omen. Another day, I am as delighted when I hear a flight attendant struggle to make an announcement in both Hindi and English. Once, flight attendants were disturbingly articulate, some were even brilliant, and many of them had the grace and elegance of professional models. In a cinema hall, I rejoice when the person behind a counter can't tell the difference between 325 and 32.5, as though the dot is some design element. Also, baristas at coffee shops no longer have the urban swag that they used to when expensive cappuccinos first came to India. And in five-star hotels, waiters display the meek wonder of those who come from places that have no five-stars.

There is an ideal mediocrity all around in some tedious professions with no prospects. It is a sign that India has progressed so much that the smartest, or simply the luckiest, do not have to do jobs for which they may be overqualified. It is a sign that a segment of Indians who were once so inexpensive to hire that companies could afford them to do dreary work have priced themselves out of such work and moved to more complex or rewarding jobs, or at least different sorts of dreary jobs, or maybe have even opted to do nothing, which is not a bad way to be.