India 2025: Birthday Cake, Strip Clubs, and Whiskey

By Mike Huber

India:  Part III

My third day in India:  I had met Iqbal (the motorcycle rental guy) and I bought new motorcycle gear (helmet, jacket, gloves, all for $73 USD).  I am not saying this gear was high end Aria or anything, but it was something.  In the event of a crash I would hope it would be low speed and I could count on my paratrooper skills to fall properly and not get too banged up.  Things were coming together nicely and my confidence and morale was much higher than I had expected.  With an extra evening to kill, it turned out one of my offshore developers that worked with me in 2014 lived in Delhi and had invited me over for dinner.

When I was in corporate America I loved hanging out with my team whenever I wasn’t out roaming around the world.  Well, when I met this guy he had just gotten off the plane in Seattle and it was his first time in the United States.  Knowing this, I directed another one of my team members to pick him up and bring him to Pike Market where we could get a few beers and I could fully christen him to our great country.

Of course, my idea for the full American immersion was to bring him to a proper strip club that was next to Pike Market.  Without getting into details, he probably had one of the best nights of his life.  We kept in touch over the years and whenever I would walk by the strip club I would send him a photo of the sign, and that is how you maintain high morale on a project team (leadership at its finest).

I arrived at his apartment and met his lovely wife and sister-in-law.  After catching up and chatting for an hour they invited me to their parents’ home for dinner.  The conversation then turned to birthdays, and they asked when mine was.  I pulled out my phone and looked at it intensely.  They didn’t know what I was doing as I should know my birthday (which I did).  They were surprised to hear my next words: “My birthday is in 3 hours and 42 minutes.”

I don’t know a lot about the Indian culture but within two minutes I had a birthday cake in front of me, so I am guessing they always have a birthday cake in the freezer “just in case.”  Either way, it was very sweet and I felt more than welcomed into their country.

After a few pre-birthday whiskeys, it was time to return to my hotel and get a solid night’s sleep.  I needed to wash away any remaining jet lag I had as my friends were due to arrive the following day.  As I peacefully fell asleep with thoughts of riding the new Royal Enfields, my phone rang.  “Huber, I need a place to sleep!”  Well, I guess I would be meeting at least one of my new friends sooner than expected as I buzzed the hotel door to let him in. It turned out his hotel had given his room away so we would be roommates until we departed on the motorcycles in two days.

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India:  Part I

India:  Part II

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