The Mumbai Dabbawalla
I'd rather play a board game with an impish five year old
Than go to Board Room Meetings and greet folks who trade in gold
A little kid wont mince her words and say what's on her mind
Unlike the men in tailored suits with whom I've wined and dined
They use their corporate jargon to launch their next campaign
With clichéd buzzword phrases their mantra they'll explain
They swirl around in swivel chairs and talk of strategies
Sophisticated gibberish - there 'lies' their expertise
While on their working lunches they try to sound profound
They throw in words like six-sigma while they muck around
They talk of multi-tasking and think outside the box
While climbing up the greasy pole their best friends they'll outfox
They leverage their assets and gobbledygook speak
Talk techno mumbo-jumbo to add to their mystique
They love to paradigm shift as well as circle back
Talk about downsizing but wont use words like sack
They spout some empty rhetoric deployed with Ninja skill
Like deluded Sancho Panzas they'll encounter their windmill
With pseudo words and acronyms and thoughtless vapid prose
They twist themselves in verbal knots with muddled metaphors
At times I feel these sycophants could learn a thing or two
From the humble dabbawalla whom it's hard to live up to
Every day in Mumbai, 5000 men in white
Transport lunches all around and always get it right
Unlike the Saville Rowe clothed men who bootlick every boss
And praise the naked emperor adorned in velvet gloss
They don't guerrilla market, drill-down or blue sky think
Don't talk of bleeding edges, synergies or data link
In 16 mill transactions, their error rate is 1
I'd say that's quite impressive - a job for sure well done
200,000 lunches are transported each day
Stifling heat or drenching rain - they reach with no delay
They pick up meals from workers homes and colour code each box
A system that has worked without pretentious boardroom talks
On local trains or cycles or crates upon their head
This team of men deliver where elitists fear to tread
This semi-literate workforce is simple to the core
Work in a relay system while they move from door to door
Devoid of verbal flatulence and cryptic dialect
These 'salt of the earth' people deserve all our respect.