Indian Standard Time (IST)

Every wonder why it takes the East Indian friend/girlfriend/parent forever to show up for an appointment? Welcome to the world of IST. IST is pretty much ingrained in the DNA of every Indian alive. We can't help it. Just as dyslexic person sees a ‘b’ as a ‘d’, an Indian person sees/understands “Be there at 7pm” as “It would be really nice if you can arrive around the neighborhood of 7pm – give or take 2 hours”. That’s probably why the typical workday in India starts at 10.30am as compared to the North American 8 or 8.30am start time.

So – you might ask – why do Indians take forever to make it to an appointment? Other than assuming that the OTHER party in the said appointment will also be late (imagine cross-cultural situations here where this assumption would SO backfire), Indians always believe in taking their own sweet time pre-appointment – What is the rush? Are you trying to catch the next Mumbai Local? They do not see any consequences to their late arrival hence merrily go about themselves even when the critical appointment hour has passed (because of that 2 hour window in their minds). They will have an afternoon siesta, a cup of tea, make a couple of calls, perhaps engage in some light dusting/tidying up and THEN start the process of getting ready. And in-between, if the other party calls to ask “Dude - What’s up? Where are you at?” the former Indian will say “I’m on my way and it’ll only take me 2 minutes!”

Ahhh….the famous Indian “2 minutes”. Now, Non-Indians beware as this infamous two minutes may mean 120 seconds to you but to an Indian it actually means “I will meet you and I’ll get there when I get there – I’m going as FAST as I can”. The margin of error for this fictional ‘2 minutes’ can be anywhere from 2 minutes (highly unlikely and God-willing!) to 2 hours. I have actually seen people wait at the house for up to two hours before being attended to after they were told that it’d only be 2 minutes! I was also told that it’d take 2 minutes to post something at the Indian Speed Post – HAH! And we know how that turned out! Now I’ve finally learnt the hard lesson of IST – and I feel it is my duty to have shared it with you.

The other day, my sister was discussing details with her make-up artist, she told her that she needs to be all done-up and ready for the events by the arrival time printed on the wedding cards. She wanted to be punctual for her own wedding – and to that the make-up artist and I snickered and reminded her about IST. “We’ll get there when we get there dammit – give or take 2 hours!”