Long-distance strivers

Neither Hippies nor Yuppies, I just wanted to skip some Maslow-hierarchy steps. During student-loan deferred years right after college, I volunteered in Asia and Africa – front-ending my giving – energy, time and passion (as oppose to wait to accumulate spare change and spare time in “leisure seeking years” to do charity work). It’s my self-funded version of Peace Corps “ask not what the suffering world can do for you…”

Upon re-entry, I started once again i.e. $100-suit $50-car, hitting the pavement in Sales, then Alternate Channel, Multi-Cultural Direct Sales, Revenue Assurance and Train the trainers, in Long-Distance Telephony.

With the looming Y2K scare and the imminent death of long distance, we were all pumped with adrenaline: even elevators and microwave ovens seemed way too slow. Wall Street was rumbled as robber barons prowled and scouted for the Next Big Thing: WorldCom bought MCI number 2 with hyper stocks, ATT and British Telecom joined in a Concert, Time-Warner ” you’ve got mail” from AOL; all the while MCI held on to Vint Cerf of Distributed Architecture – still is in and of max use today in Ashburn, VA (Money – still – Coming In).

Everyone tried to connect the world via whatever communication technology available: Telephony, VoIP and Dial Around. The same mission and model found in Meta’s today, albeit in the long shadow of globalization and its discontent. The more technology (the way), the more reluctant we call on our fellow human being (the will). That’s where robot-calls and bot-mail came in. Permission marketing.

People are different yet universal in their love for families, respect for the elderly and an uncompromising commitment to educating future generations. They may say change is the only constant. I ‘d say, human nature is the only constant: reciprocity for small acts of kindness, shared tips for mutual survival and hope of an eternity with more fairness and fulfillment.

At MCI, our group ( International Market Direct) was rolled under a larger banner of Direct Sales (US), whose quarterly meetings were held all over the country. By design, I was cross-trained with deep learning and across a wide spectrum : Little Tokyo, Little Saigon, Little Havana and their undercurrent universality e.g. traditional diet, spiritual ties and clan loyalty even when extended families situated oceans apart.

So ingrained that on my vacation to London, I drifted towards Chinatown of England, subconsciously and out of curiosity (even Chinatown NYC is different from Chinatown SF).

Quite an occupational hazard!

It is lucky to belong to one culture group in one’s lifetime, let alone multi ones.

Cultures mastery requires deep-diving and immersion, cross-exposure and broad strokes, context and nuances. Even today, Shadows in Paradise and Netherland are near and dear to my heart. Kindness can be found in unlikely places, in different people. It’s in us, neighbor to neighbor.

Despite its high wall of paper (I owe this to Remarque), the United States, for one reason or another, has been graced and enriched with long-distance strivers, When Corporate comes knocking, small ethnic business owners took notice. A wide range of them, embedded in their community and with bi-lingual mastery.

On a typical “sales call”, I walked them through the “indemnity clause”, explained “ Acts of god” and made sure their sales reps don’t wear MCI uniforms (since they were another layer away via a W-9 outsourcing contract). We provided the backhauling and backbone and switching capabilities; they the arms and mouths. Most were leaders in their respective community, operated out of makeshift “embassies” of rumors and gossips: Pakistanis, Eastern European, Chinese/Vietnamese and a garden-variety of Latinos under the Hispanic umbrella.

Often clustered along coastal cities, foreign folks turned sales agents were more at home in warmer weather and thrived better in face-to-face culture (port of entry), unlike European emigrant counterparts who previously had crowded in Northeast tenements.

By getting to know these beautiful strangers, I learned not just geography and demography, but discovered- underneath their tough facade – a soft longing for their homeland, roots and cuisine. Long-distance telephony serves as a bridge, reconnecting hearts across the pond ( very much as depicted by Michael Corleone who went into hiding in Sicily, leveraging his God-father’s background for a hide-away from the pursuit of rival gangs and the long arms of justice).

You may say the US is a melting pot or a salad bowl. You may say it’s a Christian country or a syncretistic society. Yes, indeed, but you got to “serve somebody” like in a Dylan line.

People called themselves “American communication agency” to mask their foreignness or P.J (initial-only) to abbreviate extremely long un-Anglicized last names; all to avoid erecting unneeded barriers to buying. Once I visited an office in the now-no-more Twin Towers and guess what: outside the door: s/t s/t American, but inside it’s a Chinese outfit seeking outsourcing contracts and scout for business development opportunities.

Broadband excess breeds splintered off channels and nodes, and gave rise to narrow-casting, just as once predicted by futurists such as Alvin Toffler we all read in college (and now, infinite Youtuber and Uber).

It’s hard for new comers to frictionlessly and fluidly fit into our socially available slots (even at the DMV, with updated software, one is lucky to obtain a driver license within a month window). Now, with available bandwidth, the melting pot slowly dissolves to make place for salad bowl – Hollywood for Bollywood.

Their journey to Paradise was paved not with gold, but with more paperwork. We, the agent recruiter, was of no exception. More filing e.g. FCC 214, like Corporate lawyers who hustle for pre-paid legal contracts. With a Telecommunication license, they could private brand their bills (without knowing on this side of the Internet, everybody can be an Alex Jones).

The so-called “other”: unspoken, invisible and dismissed as irrelevant, have conveniently been cast in shady light. In early movies, villains used to be white bounty hunters (or of mixed race gangsters e.g. Jeff Goldblum as hoodlum in Death Wish before landing big in the Big Chill).

Immigration ( trailing theaters of war which moved around the globe) evolves to include and induct more diverse countries of origin, Hollywood originally (in the name of realism) cast darker-skin tone as antagonist (just crank up the dolly to make them look small and devious), e.g. in Trading Places, John Landis pulled a prank on this stereotype by placing Eddie Murphy way low, as he pulled an “Eddie” on two beat cops as he pretended to be a both blind and crippled Vietnam veteran.

Go ahead, make my day. Just “a few dollars more”.

Lately that pendulum swings back with “Everything Everywhere all at once”… whose nominated Oscar best support actor says ” Don’t give up on your dream” (the American dream i.e. better FDA, school and traffic safety). Netflix certainly throws a wider net (as of this edit, they cross-package w/ Hulu and others).

While get-away cars get smaller, bad guys grow darker. Back in “Dog day afternoon”, robbers used to ask for a bus (to transport banking hostages to the airport). Now a days, they asked for a chopper.

People in the field (back to sales agent) behave differently: less formal. No appointment necessary. Just drop in unannounced to see an agent (one even doubled up as a pizza man, while another sold lavender perfumes on the side.) I once walked across the street of San Francisco flanked by two tall Croatians: one with no hair, the other lots of it. All three at different times, refugees of a distant conflict; yet none with “some flowers in the hair “. Wall Street whiz met Main Street smart (just follow Mike Douglas filmography from Summer Tree to Wall Street to Falling Down so as not to miss Social History heartbeats).

Between corporate (Wall St) expectations and market (multicultural marketing) demand, we strive. Pull and push. Riding two horses everywhere all at once.

Our group grew stronger, smarter and swifter. During the Chinese/Vietnamese New Year season of events, I did not sleep for a month, knowing the revenue base acquired during that one month will, per rule 78, balloon to a hefty fiscal-year (with a nagging fear that tech ride often times doesn’t last long per Wall Street greed).

We also had a “charge the bunker “ mentality, to take down the incumbent (only to see its grass grow back) like a David against the Goliath (ATT). BTW, MCI “Jack the Giant slayer” used to tape the sole of his shoes so they wouldn’t flap. Microwave Communications Inc had its start with installing “microwave equipment” to connect Chicago-St Louis-route truckers. In a published story, he was reportedly shivering in Windy-City cold without a coat – hence easily blended in as “one of them” when trying to make copies of ATT documents for court filing (I lived near Joliet for two years, and could relate to this weather).

Telephony (grandfathered by Telegraph) has itself been replaced with the Internet, which in turn, bows down to generative AI and Chat GPT, Nvidia and Intel (fintech, biotech and infotech).

Back then, Microsoft bought out everybody except for noticing the rise of TCP/IP.

I learned then and now, that Karma runs across cultures and times while people strive and sacrifice for next generations of American (law-abiding, tax-paying high achievers), in movies as in real life (Michael’s line:” just as I thought I am ready to…”mainstream”…they pull me right back in ” i.e. gunning down his little girl outside on the steps of the concert hall, Coppola’s own real life daughter.)

I also know first-generation businessmen cheated and evaded tax, all cash under-the-table. Supermarkets of exotic foods, often opened the back doors to long-distance callers at night (time difference, cash and carry). Since we were in the possession of call details: date, duration and destination, we just factored them in as promotional cost of doing business – necessary to grease our day-time deals (of securing good locations).

People cried, argued and screamed, broke up and made up over the phone as if higher octave and louder voice will solve problems at home while being abroad (imagine the same with the Pentagon and that Colonel with a bullhorn played by Robert Duvall in Apocalypse Now) or the way protective mothers yelling at kids over the ocean waves.

By running agents in the field, I crisscrossed the invisible line, with English my sling shot; knowing full well across the table sat prospects who had been conditioned to self-editorialize per harsh upbringing. It takes one to know one. Those social tests can only be overcome with time and trust.

In looking forward, I hope you do visit an ethnic restaurant, or travel to a foreign sea port (like the Fonz currently in Dublin, straight out of the AARP cover page) or locally get to know an Afghan family (with a young girl volunteering at nearby community health center in hopes of getting on its medical payroll). Watch Bill Murray’s Rock the Kasbah and put yourself in the shoes of that brave girl who secretly rehearses: ” Oh baby baby it’s wide world”.

The road from Main Street to Wall Street, from back door to front door, from obtaining an Alien number to getting a Social Security number, lay myriads of obstacle. Both corporate and small business want to strive, both recognize the 2-thousand-pound guerrilla in the room: the new reality of robot and army of W-9 sellers on eBay and Amazon.

AI works the alley, providing “ghost work” to extract human expertise on behalf of its Wall Street lords. We’re transitioning from face2face, one-on-one conversation to a many-to-many society, with AWS and the likes, exploiting and extracting every venue each minute of every day. Prime or non-prime, from OPM to Other People’s Time (sharing economy’s prosumers e.g. self-service in the name of taming inflation , yet helping behemoths build their towers of Babel – w/ Mechanical Turk).

It (technological society) prides on being efficient and infallible, in hopes of helping helpless human being interconnect; by bits and bi-nary data, while analog human- come in all colors, shapes and penchant for irrationality. Again, globalization and its discontent (when will wealth ever trickle down – except only to the rung just below the top 1 per cent per some studies). Modernity always plays to win, cultures of the West, and labor/raw resources from the Rest.

Not long ago, kids from East Europe drove Beamers after hours on their key boards, pretending to be someone else to influence election and marketing blitz in the US. An in-place, reverse assault without a need to get in line to fill out tons of forms and paperwork.

I could have enjoyed a longer telephony life (unlike my predecessors of Baby Bells). But then, the journey is the reward. Despite our differences and no matter what some may say to self-elevate at someone else’s expenses, America will always reach for the stars, seek new heights and retain decent standards, while not trying to solve crisis abroad in cookie approach in hopes that problems at home will self- dissipate.

America has nursed its wound of being “torn between two lovers” since LBJ. Now, more aids, no boots to Ukraine. Time has un-cubed and uncuffed people this side of the Atomic Bomb. Have you noticed both Zelensky and Zuckerberg are always in their T-shirts? Quite an optic contrast to Yalta conference (where three leaders posed in coat).

The long-tail nature of our Internet causes long-term divisive social media. While distance experiences near death ( given ample broadband connectivity) students of cross-cultures know the hardest gap to bridge is the last few inches between people. Judy Woodruff has been following this story across America, in the tradition of Charles Kuralt and Studs Terkel.

That’s how I felt working as an agent runner in pre-internet era: breathless and sleepless, juggling multiple balls in the air and stressed out in analog LA traffic. Multi-cultural markets don’t congregate conveniently downtown with paid parking. We could not “text” our agents to delay an appointment since no one at the time had an I-phone.

I often wonder what kind of a penniless masochist it would take to volunteer in Asia and Africa only to come home working for Corporate America (paid off student loan debt by spreading in all four). Between two irreconcilable and irritating worlds lie shadows and stones on which strange names finally are spelled out in their full original forms.

Names once abbreviated to not hinder the flow and fluidity of technology, commerce and progress. Hippies, Yuppies, Luddites or plain-old-telephone strivers from a different shore.