Give me a break! So he's an NRI. A BBCD. So he has a gazillion frequent flyer miles. He has a girlfriend in Japan and a friend who once had a mile high experience. Who cares?
Iyer keeps up a relentless barrage of naive observations that only emphasise the banality of his global sensibility. The one essay in this book that rises above Iyer's trademark post-modern schmaltz is an entertaining piece on a month spent at LAX (LA International Airport to non-global souls). It's a great idea, and yields an exceptional essay, full of insight and delight. Here Iyer steps out of the "free-floating state of temporary intimacy" that characterises most airport experiences and actually tests the gravity for a change. Sadly, it's only a brief interlude before he's off again into the "floating world" he prefers.
Iyer's apparent "homelessness" is really a privilege - one that he obscures in the romanticised multiculturalism of his essays on Toronto or the Atlanta Olympics and the self-regard of the final chapter on his Japanese domicile ("an equivalent to living in the wilderness").
A jetsetter is not an ascetic, much less a refugee. The fact is, Iyer isn't global at all. He's just from another planet. It's called the First World.
