Never be under the impression that NRIs are great spenders. Many of them may spend freely while on a vacation. But back in the Gulf they are parsimonious and try hard to save every baisa or hallalah. There’s nothing wrong with saving money. But the manner in which many save is sometimes extremely hilarious.
A case in point is Suresh Menon, now leading a retired life in Navi Mumbai. He used to earn a huge salary while working as a secretary in a multinational firm in Riyadh. Yet, whenever he returned to Riyadh with his family after their annual vacation in Mumbai, their luggage would be full of various types of dals (lentils) and other pulses.
“I save a lot of money by bringing dal and other things from India since all of us together have a large baggage allowance,” he told me when I made fun of him.
While working in Riyadh, a colleague, Gopi , would in public magnanimously buy me a can of Pepsi or some other soft drink. Later, when we were alone, he would ask the money for the Pepsi.
Once during a vacation in Mumbai, I invited a former colleague for lunch at the Oberoi. I asked Gopi, also on vacation then, to join us.
After lunch, I removed my wallet to pay the bill.
“No, no. I will pay,” said Gopi and took out his credit card. I was happy.
When we were alone, he gave me the bill and told me, “Give me the money I paid.” Great guy, I thought. He wants to show my friend that he was spending while the opposite was true.
There are many others with unrefined methods of cutting down expenses.
Anoop Sharma, a PR guy in Riyadh, is an example. I was told by a mutual friend that Anoop would use a teabag twice. After using the teabag once, he would hide it in corner of the fridge in the office kitchen and dip it later into a second cup of hot water.
Over to Muscat. The Indian chief of a media firm would hold parties in his apartment once in a while. Selecting about six of seven junior colleagues, he would order each of them to bring something. One would be asked to bring chappatis. Another would be told to bring a beef dish. A third guy would bring chicken fry and so on. He would supply the booze, which was often the spurious local stuff.
And since most guests were drunk by the time the party was over and did not eat much, the host was left with enough to eat for a week.
On one occasion, he asked two juniors to clean up his home. After they had sweated for three hours, he took them to a Kerala restaurant and bought them beef curry and Malabari parathas.
Two of my former senior colleagues in Muscat rarely hired a taxi to save money. Once I found them sitting on a bench in front of the Lulu hypermarket in Muscat’s Bousher area. An enquiry at the office later revealed they had been sitting there for nearly an hour after finishing shopping, patiently waiting for a junior colleague to pick them up and drop them at their apartments. But the two had become a bit anxious as the junior colleague was taking time to turn up. He had gone with his pregnant wife to consult a doctor in faraway Ruwi. The two heaved a sigh of relief when he finally arrived after dropping his wife home.
At a newspaper in Dubai, the vegetarian deputy editor would scream and scream when the price of milk or sugar would go up.
Once when I poked fun at him, he pointed to Pramod, another colleague, and said, “You know he saves more money than me.” He went on to give me an example of how Pramod saved money.
A Nagpur Brahmin, Pramod would bring vegetable sandwiches wrapped in a silver foil sheet, go to corner and hastily eat it. He then folded the silver foil, took it home and used it to wrap sandwiches the next day and the next and the next for a whole week.”
I am happily making fun of NRIs and their methods to cut down expenses to save. What about me?
Throughout the 27 years I spent in the Gulf, I would take out my salary from the ATM and rush to the nearest bank to send the excess money to my account in India. Later, I reached the office with a huge smile lighting up my face.
My colleagues knew that smile. “Have you sent your money home ?” some would ask. “Yes. It is already on a flight to Mumbai.”
This question has been asked scores of times. And my answer has been the same scores of times.