Slideshow from Mumbai

Indian Wedding Story

Our Indian Wedding portrait with Ganesh and Palu and two cute kids that couldn't resist having their pictures taken with us.


Krissy's mehndi, drying on her hands.


Palu's fabulously applied mehndi, showing off for the cameras.


Geo having a bite to eat at lunch on the wedding day in traditional style.


The remains of the altar after all of the ceremony traditions had been completed.


Palu and Ganesh and a priest performing the wedding ceremonies.

I have to say it was a bit anti-climatic (anyone who has seen Monsoon Wedding might know why we think this) but that's only because Geo didn't get to see any white horses. We were honored and privileged to be invited to Palu and Ganesh's wedding in Mumbai over the weekend to celebrate their marriage. We were the only non-Indians there but we felt so welcomed and everyone was so hospitable. There were plenty of people who spoke great English to visit with and help interpret some of what was going on.

The first activity was the Mehndi celebration. This was on Friday night. We arrived moments before it started, so we met up with an Indian who has lived in Connecticut for the past 40 years and he helped us get our bearings. Mostly, there was music and stories about the bride and groom, but very little of it was in English. We amused ourselves by getting our hands painted with henna. Palu (the bride) had mehndi applied on both arms and feet, I just had some put on my palms. One tradition they observed was that Ganesh's name was written in her arms somewhere and he had to find it before the wedding could actually take place. I wished him luck! There was snack service during the story-telling and dancing, and then there was a full food-court style meal service for dinner. You walked around with a huge plate to different stations and took whatever looked interesting. What fun!

Sunday was devoted entirely to the wedding celebration. Prayers began at 7 am and after a few more wedding traditions, breakfast was served. (We actually slept through this part, although originally we had intended to be there for this part--more on that later.) We arrived around 11:15, and the priests were just finishing the actual wedding part. There was an altar-type structure set up in the middle of the room where the bride and groom sat, carrying out a number of traditions. Then it was over and lunch was served. This was served to us as we sat at long tables with a banana leaf for a plate. Yummy! After lunch, there was some more entertainment. There was music sung to tell the story of the bride and groom. I'm not sure if they had professionals singing, or if the performers were all somehow related. The families are huge, so this is entirely possible. The monologues were in English but the songs were all in various Indian languages. This went on for about an hour and a half. The last song we were invited to dance to, so we got up and did a little dancing. It was fun.

Then we watched the hall get transformed again into a beautiful stage. The bride and groom stood on the stage while family after family came up to be properly received by the bride and groom and then they posed for a picture. Every guest was invited to the stage. This is also where we presented the happy couple with a small envelope stuffed with rupees (the only type of gift that makes sense at a foreign wedding). We had our picture taken and then we went to eat again, this time at another elaborate food-court style buffet. Amazing. The food was so good. I was so full I didn't eat anything except breakfast on Monday.

The weekend was quite an experience in itself, given the travel to the BIG city and our first Indian wedding. But add to this the fact that Geo had to fight off a persistent stomach bug all weekend...we had a doctor come to visit the hotel because Geo was so uncomfortable. I actually thought he might have malaria, but the doctor decided it was just a stomach bug, so he took the antibiotic and was much better within 12 hours. Thank God for antibiotics. We had already been prescribed some for cases like this, but you never know exactly how bad it has to get before you should take them. Now we know.

We didn't do much else in Mumbai because of Geo's illness, but we did get to see the Gateway of India, Marine Drive, and Chowpatty Beach...pretty much the big landmarks in town. I'll try to come up with another blog entry for that experience after I post this wedding blog!

Indian Movie Night

We got our first taste of Bollywood on Saturday night, compliments of our ISB friends Pushkar and Johnson. First, they were able to borrow another student's car so they could drive us into town in style. I have to say Pushkar is a most considerate driver. He didn't honk at anyone! What a treat :) We were planning to see Guru, which is probably the most popular movie in India right now. Needless to say, tickets were hard to come by. So we ended up seeing one called Bhagam Bhat, a slap-stick comedy with some dark twists. Pushkar was kind enough to offer a synopsis from time to time, but even with the language barrier it was a fun experience overall.
The movie started at 10:30 pm, a bit late for those of us that got up at 6:30 that morning for community service! But I thought a cold coffee from McDonald's would help me make it through the three hour event. I was wrong. I shamefully admit that I dozed off near the end. But please, this is after 12:30 am and I was tired! I think Geo managed to stay awake through the whole film...amazing. The theatre was nice enough (although Geo said it had a bit of a stinky feet odor to it, only noticeable when you first walked in). There had to be at least 200 seats, all of them filled (although not on time, people showed up until 15 minutes into the film). I won't even begin to describe the premise of the movie (you can see the movie's web site though at www.bhagambhagthefilm.com) so watch the trailer on your own...it's on the website.
The evening was great from beginning to end, despite getting home at 2:15 in the morning. I was exhausted...but it was worth it to experience fine Indian cinema. Everyone thought we were nuts for going to the film, especially without subtitles or any English. One thing ironic about this film: it was filmed in England. There were a handful of sentences in English, and the one non-Indian actor who only spoke English is probably the worst actor I have ever seen in a movie. Ever.
And a few comparisons can be made quickly. One: the audience laughed out loud continuously. That rarely happens in the states. Two: there was an intermission half way through, but it was barely long enough for Geo to get some popcorn. Three: there were lots of children and babies in the theatre. Four: the movie was 3 hours long! Five: tickets were only 100 rupees and popcorn was 20. Great deals!
And the best part? We're even willing to go again :) Guru, here we come.

Community Service Opportunities

The health camp set up in the village, waiting for it to begin.


In the village with the chickens (hens).


A tent in the village. One of the many styles of housing available.


Kids checking out our parade!


In the village: all the "white hats" are the volunteers. ISB is in the far distance.


Krissy, holding a broom, with a few other volunteers (we had plenty of time for photos!).

On Saturday, the ISB community at large was given the opportunity to volunteer with a local NGO (www.premalayam.com) to provide a health camp and sanitation drive in a local "village". Several of us exchange students signed up, not really sure what we would be getting ourselves into. It looked well-organized on the school's side, and we received a proper map with all the instructions and phone numbers we would need for getting ourselves there. Three of us actually showed up at the main gate at 7 am on Saturday morning: me, Stephanie and Brannan. I thought more would join us, but it turned out it was just us. I was really hoping to get some coffee before we went, but we just went there straight away. Fine with me, since the cold weather was more than enough to keep me awake on the drive there. The village we went to was no more than 5 km away from school, so I'm glad it was just a quick ride there.
When we arrived, we signed a ledger (ledgers are common here...they are used for everything!) and received a greeting and a hat with the organization's name. A few introductions were made amongst a small group of volunteers. We waited around for something to do. We ended up being taken on a tour of the village, which turned out to be a lot like a parade with drummers and singing. Stephanie and I just followed along. Eventually we were given latex medical exam gloves and a small mask. We thought the clean up work was about to begin, but the point was to demonstrate that we were willing to work along-side the residents while they cleaned. I think the lesson for the day was "Give a man a fish, and he'll fish for a day; teach a man to fish and he'll eat forever." All good, but still we didn't have any work to do ourselves. Hmmm...the parade continued on. I felt like a celebrity being followed by the papparazzi, but honestly, I don't know who enjoyed the spectacle more: me observing the villagers or the villagers observing me!
Now the parade is over and we've ended up at the food tent. We were told breakfast and lunch would be provided. Breakfast was good: I had some flavored rice (also containing some nuts/seeds, I think) and my new favorite coconut chutney, a fiery hot, cold dressing to put on things at breakfast. Yummy. I enjoyed it, but really hoped not to get sick! You never know...but the food looked fresh (so far so good, by the way).
After breakfasting, we went back to the health camp area and because the government doctors hadn't arrived yet (3 hours late) we were all starting to get a bit restless. The villagers seemed to be losing patience, and we still hadn't actually done anything. It was now getting hotter and having only 6 hours of sleep and no caffeine, I wasn't sure I'd make it until 3:30, when we were supposed to wrap up. The three of us voted to go back to campus, having felt really good about ourselves just to make the effort and observe and get close to a real Indian community (we feel like we're in a fishbowl on campus sometimes). We said our goodbyes and gave back our hats and went back to our fishbowl.
Overall, I feel like the conditions weren't great, but they weren't the worst I've seen either. There was a small store in the village. There were toilets. There wasn't any proper sewage removal...hence the sanitation drive. I have to admit I was a bit nervous to get my hands too dirty. I'm not germaphobic, but this is real yucky stuff here. I wasn't sure I wanted to take any unnecessary health risks, so I stayed back a bit more than I could have. I probably would have been fine, but you never know. It was nice though not to be plagued by bugs of any sort. The organization of the event started off well, but because the government doctors and the medications arrived late, things sort of seemed to disintegrate. There was a small media presence there, which one of the key organizers said was the first coverage in 4 years of volunteering. Brannan even provided a small interview, who knows where that will end up.
I'm glad I went and I certainly feel privileged to have been welcomed so warmly by those putting on the event, even though they probably had no idea what to do with us either.
Enjoy a few pictures from my experience.

Shopping Excursions

I spent 5 hours yesterday shopping, eating, and exploring with Noi (an exchange student) and Holly (an exchange student's fiance). I had complete success, finding a lot of nice Indian-style linen clothes and a few things to do yoga in. I don't have any pictures from this, but I want to point out the difference in return policies here. First of all, I was able to use my credit card at both places I shopped at. Bonus. At fabindia, my new favorite store, they have a strict no-return policy. Bummer. But at the new department store, Hyderabad Central, they have a return policy. Check this out:

Exchange Policy: We will accept exchanges within 7 days from the date of purchase only if the Sales Receipt (Cash Memo) is presented along with the merchandise. Books, Body Care Products, CD ROMS, Cosmetics, Crockery, Hair Accessories, Jewellery, Pens, Pharmaceuticals, Music, Soft Toys, Stationery, Toiletries, Undergarments, and Utensils cannot be exchanged. Altered, Damaged, Used, Discounted & Promotional Merchandise also cannot be exchanged. Afer Sales Services for watches, electronics, home appliances, telephones, etc. will be provided by the authorised service centres of the manufacturers. Sarees and Shoes will not be exchanged unless returned in the original condition. In case of repairable defect in Shoes & Spectacles, it will be repaired and not exchanged. We reserve the right to determine whether the goods have been damaged or used. Exchange will be entertained only once for each item sold. inter-store exchanges are permitted only for select range of products. Exchanges are permitted only between 11 am & 4 pm on all working days.

Terms of Sale: Subject to Mumbai Jurisdiction. Goods left for ALteration/Undelivered Goods must be collected within 15 days. Your purchases are guaranteed against all manufacturing defects. Please follow the washing/usage instructions as stated on the merchandise. Please retain this receipt. Exchanges without this receipt will be done at the lowest sale price of the merchandise as per our records.

Don't you think WalMart could get away with something like this?!?
Happy Shopping wherever you are in the world :)

(PS. If you want anything from fabindia, see their website at fabindia.com and let me know. Seriously, it's my new favorite store!)

Busy Weekend

There are so many things I could tell you about to fill you in for the last 3 or 4 days. Let me see where to start:

Friday: I sat in for my first business school class. They are offering a lecture series this term about the medical/pharmaceutical industries in India. I learned a lot about the pharmacy business here and how it differs from the rest of the world. I will go to this class as often as I can, but there are actually only 8 sessions left, if I am counting right. Classes go by so quickly, it seems.

Friday night: A large group of us exchange students, plus one ISB student (Shiv) went out for dinner at a fancy place called Fusion 9. It was really nice, a great atmosphere. Actually, this place is in Lonely Planet India, so it's got a great reputation. We paid $20 for both of us. Not too bad. Geo even had a steak, which was his first red meat in over 2 weeks. Wow...I'm not sure how he's made it this long without meat, really. Shiv took us out for ice cream after the meal too. We weren't entirely sure we could handle this real Indian food (not the very sanitized stuff we get on campus), but it really hit the spot.


(My two scoop sundae...chocolate and coffee flavors. This was around 65 rupees, I think.)

Saturday morning: A few gals headed to a store called Q-Mart, which has a lot of international food and supplies. It's small and crowded, but I got a lot of things that will get me through. I got peanut butter for 180 rupees, and I even bought a set of UNO cards for only 99 rupees. Some things make little sense around here. I got a package of 20 birthday candles too for 10 rupees.

Saturday afternoon: The campus was visited by a group called AEISIC (an international student group) for a short weekend trip. Shiv sponsored them here and we volunteered to host one of 8 students. Her name is Nina and she is from Germany. She is doing an internship in Bangalore this year. I met up with her and her colleagues at lunch and then sent them off for a tour of Golconda Fort, where we went last weekend. I decided not to go through the tour again, because it was quite hot and I didn't think I needed to bake in the sun for 3 more hours.

Saturday night: I had the opportunity to go to the fort for the "sound and light show" that is also in Lonely Planet, and highly regarded as a fun activity. I went with one of the exchange students here from Italy (Antonino) and we met up with the rest of the AEISIC group for the hour long show. It's hard to describe, but they have an audio track playing with a dramatized story of the fort's history, with music and various illuminations of the ruins. Lonely Planet calls it "trippy". I haven't decided what to call it yet, but I think going was a good decision.


(Golconda Fort lit up at night after the Sound and Light Show.)

Much later Saturday night: The campus put on a celebration to usher in the Lohri Festival. I understand the festival is more from the North of India, but ISB celebrates many festivals because students come from all over India. The festival is to celebrate the harvest. There was fire, food, drumming and dancing and some impromptu singing (reminding me of the Vironia parties of my youth). The students wore such beautiful, colorful traditional clothes and even some of the exchange students got dressed up as well.


(ISB students and exchange students dancing at the Lohri festival celebration.)

Really late on Saturday night: Yes, it's still Saturday. A tradition on campus is to throw birthday celebrants into the swimming pool at midnight to usher in their birthday. Geo's was discussed and he was signed up for a toss-in at midnight. At least 15 people (ISB students and exchange students alike) were there to witness this event. They said they often throw the spouse in too, but I thought they were kidding. They weren't. I kept trying to tell them "It's not my birthday!" It didn't help. The pool was warm. Yea! The air outside afterwards was not. Boo. But I got a nice Kingfisher beer for my good humor.


(Krissy and Geo exiting the pool after a midnight birthday dunking.)

Too early Sunday morning: Nina, our exchange student, had to leave at 8:30 this morning for breakfast. I somehow woke at 8:26 and made sure she was up. She was. Amazing. She went to bed after I did! I got up later in time for a late breakfast with Geo in the dining hall, where I decided they really need to introduce Belgian waffles to the Sunday morning breakfast line. I think it would be a huge hit!

Birthday Sunday: Noi (another girl here on exchange) and I again joined the AEISIC group for a tour of the Salar Jung Museum. This is one of the nicest museums in India, I've heard (yes, I heard from Lonely Planet!). And today happened to be the last day of Museum Week. The museum was so crowded, I have never experienced anything like this. Even at the Louvre, where the entry hall is throbbing, you can still get close to the exhibits. This was really hard to get through, there were so many people. And the condition of the museum is not quite like the Louvre. It is a lovely effort though and the collection was impressive. It was hot again and the fans barely made it tolerable. I enjoyed the two hours we spent there, but we didn't even get to see half of the museum. I guess there's always more time. Oh yeah, and they don't allow cameras :(


(The entry ticket for the museum. Notice it says Non-Indian price on it, only 150 rupees. Indians pay 10. This is quite common.)

Birthday Party, Sunday evening: At 6 pm, we gathered everyone in the cafe (not the dining hall, but right next to it) for cake! I had ordered a chocolate cake from the cafe on Saturday to be ready by 6 pm. It was ready then and it was devine! I have never had such an amazing cake. The cake itself actually received applause by all. Wow! The ISB cafe staff outdid themselves. Almost all our friends here came and sang for Geo and then we all enjoyed the delicious cake. Yummy! We have some leftover too, and I can't wait for my next piece. After cake, about 13 students joined us for dinner at The Water Front, one of the snazziest new places in town. I could write a whole blog about that...anyway, we had a feast for dinner. 7 of us ate and drank for about $180 US. Even at $25 a person, you couldn't have a better experience in the US. Or in India, for that matter.


(Geo and his birthday cake.)

Late Sunday night: Geo had a study group to go to at midnight. Does anyone ever sleep around here?!? I'm going to try to stay up until 2, when he's supposed to get home. But I probably won't make it....zzzzz......

Laundry Day

The spacious laundry room


Lots of wet clothes!

We've been here 10 days now, plus we had some dirty laundry when we left LA, so I decided it was time to do some laundry. We heard quickly when we arrived here that students don't really do their own laundry, despite having free access to machines 24/7. Instead, the students hire someone to do their laundry for them, which costs about 150 rupees per month, I've been told. Now that's cheap! I thought to myself though that if I am not cooking or cleaning, and I hire the laundry out to a helper, then I have really no purpose here. So on Monday morning I set off to do laundry all by myself. I bought the detergent from the convenience store and sorted out 2 loads. I had already checked the machines and saw that they only hold 5 kg of clothes (about 11 pounds). Three pairs of jeans from me and Geo already weigh 11 pounds, so I knew this could take awhile. But I was prepared, because I have all the time in the world. However, when I got there, all the machines were in use. And they had buckets of laundry lined up already. I walked back to my room, head hung low, because now I had made the decision to hire someone to do our laundry too, if this was going to be the situation. I walked to the front desk and asked if I could have someone get my laundry. With a confused look and a head bobble, the lady replied, yes, tomorrow morning. I was happy, I guess. I almost thought to myself, good riddance. Well, Tuesday came and went. No one came to pick up my laundry. Wednesday morning and still no one is picking up my laundry. Now I have decided to do it myself again, so I went back to the laundry room and saw the same story I saw on Monday. No chance. But I made a plan to go before dinner started at 7:30 pm. Lucky me, it was empty! I had the room all to myself. I started two loads, but during dinner, I decided I'd get all of it done tonight. Only one problem. Drying racks. We'd already asked for one on Monday, but we didn't get one. (I think they also said, tomorrow then.) Geo went back today to get one and he got the same answer. Tomorrow. Hmmm. There are drying racks all over the place, but there are none for us. So we decided to borrow our neighbor's drying rack which has been sitting on our front common area since we've been here, unused. They have their laundry done for them, so they don't really need it often. Well, I ended up doing 5 loads of laundry, so I had to find more than one rack. Geo went up a level of our building and "borrowed" another one (really, he's not borrowing it, we stole it. No one is ever in their room...but we left a note!). Okay, so now I have two drying racks for 4 loads of laundry. They're both full. It's almost 11 pm. I have one load left in the washer. Now what? Fortunately, our next door neighbor came home and donated his to us. He also his laundry done and his drying rack still has the plastic on it. Woo-hoo! I've never been so excited. So it's 11 pm and I've got 5 loads of laundry drying on the front landing. It's bedtime though, so I've pulled the racks into the living room now. There isn't quite as much air flow, but it's warmer inside, so hopefully that will help.

Rupees

I realize I'm starting to talk a lot about rupees. In case you don't know, the rupee is the functional name of Indian currency. Today, 10 January 2007 at 13:46, 44.48 rupees is equal to 1 US dollar. Oppositely, one rupee is equal to 2.25 cents of one US dollar. You can look for yourself at www.xe.com/ucc to find the most current exchange rate for any currency you can think of.

Here are some facts I've learned about rupees.
1) Until very recently, to exchange any other currency to rupees, you had to have a receipt proving you went through the proper sources. Then you would use that receipt to exchange your money back to dollars (see number 2, below). There was a lot of fraudulent activities going on with money exchange. With the advent of the ATM, however, things have changed. We can simply walk up and get money now any time of day or night. The campus has an ATM, however I haven't seen any in town yet. They certainly don't jump out at you. I think you can get money still at banks and maybe at the mall. Fortunately, at the mall they are eager to take our credit card. So far, we feel confident using our card there. In smaller places, it might be a different story.
2) It is illegal to take rupees out of India (according to two sources, although both are a bit out of date...things change so quickly around here!). So, I'll have to give you a link to wikipedia so you can see the rupees, as I probably won't be bringing any home.
3) Indian counting is very different from our western style: two words are commonly used, although I doubt any of our transactions will get us using these words fluently. A lakh is 100 thousand (written 1,00,000) and a crore is 10 million (written 1,00,00,000). Hello! These groupings of two instead of three are more than I can handle. And I thought it was hard to adjust in Europe to the period replacing the comma and the comma replacing the period (ie 4.321,00 instead of 4,321.00)!!!
4) When paying with a large bill (100 and 500 bills are all that come out of the ATM), people shake their head and ask if you have anything smaller. This is especially amusing on campus, because we go from the ATM straight to the convenience store. They don't like to make change. We don't have anything but large bills. I don't know how we manage! Three times already we've had to go back later to pay the 2 or 6 rupees we owed because they didn't want to take our larger bills. If we can just figure out where to make change, we'll be happy to count out every single rupee...

The wikipedia website for the rupee is quite interesting. Just go to www.wikipedia.org and type in Indian rupee for your search. I think you'll like it!

Hyderabad City Tour

The majority of the exchange students and two local students from ISB took a city tour on Sunday. We left at approximately 10:30 am and were back to campus by 6:30 pm. It was a warm, sunny day and we had an ambitious touring schedule. We saw the Charminar, the Golcanda Fort and Hyderabad Central Shopping Center. The first two are historic, important landmarks. The mall is quite new (less than a year, I believe) and you can hardly tell you're in India when you see it! I have made a slideshow of the trip, but it's got almost 120 pictures in it, so you need to have a long break to enjoy it. But you're invited to look at it at kodakgallery.com. Again, click on the title of today's blog, Hyderabad City Tour, above to go to the kodakgallery. You don't have to sign in to see the pictures.

The pictures are nice, but of course, they don't tell the whole story. So here are a few memories to add to the big picture:

We assigned ourselves seat buddies to make sure no one get left behind. There were a lot of us and no one really seemed to know how many, but we could each be responsible for one other person and that seemed to work. No one got left behind anywhere.

Geo and I were brave and tried some street snacks after our petite lunch. I got a bag of popcorn and a bag of cheesey puffs, but instead of being cheese flavored, they were hot and sour flavored. The popcorn was easy to eat and the puffs were not as good.

Soda in a glass bottle is cheaper than soda in a plastic bottle. We paid 12 rupees for a glass bottle (that needed to be returned) and 20 for the plastic bottle. Plastic is becoming a problem as it is littered everywhere and facilities don't exist for recylcing, as far as we can tell.

When we got to the mall, we shopped at the grocery store on the lower level. It's no "hypermarket" like we had in Prague, but it had a variety of items. We bought some cereal and cookies and shelf-stable milk (Geo picked out a malted chocolate soy milk).

Before we left the mall, we had Baskin Robbins. They have 31 flavors, but they aren't the same as the ones from home. For example, there was no peanut butter cup, my personal favorite. (Honestly, I was not at all surprised...peanut butter is such a strange concept over here, but peanuts are everywhere.) And they had a lot of fruit flavors, like mango, pineapple, and papaya in various combinations. I opted for banana caramel, which is a flavor I had never had, but it was delicious. I'm not sure if you can get that at home or not. One small scoop of ice cream cost about 30 rupees, if I remember correctly. That was without the cone. A hot-off-the-press waffle cone was about 30 rupees too. Delish!

So, now you have a few more stories to go with the pictures from the tour. Enjoy :)

Shilparamam

First, take a minute to look at this link for Shilparamam (I guess you have to click on the title of this blog entry to see the link). We drove past this interesting landmark several times on our way in and out of ISB. Another exchange student, Stephanie, mentioned that she had been to a large craft fair held here last January when she was here for two weeks. She was informed that it had already ended on 31 December. She was sad, but then on my next trip to town, I noticed it was still open! There were signs all over town saying it had been extended to 8 January. So the 3 of us went to check it out. Stephanie said it was smaller than it was last year, but it still had some great bargains. We went on Thursday morning from 10:30 to 12:00 and I didn't get much, except a sun burn! Darn Indian sun. But I went back again with almost half of our exchange group (it's 18 students, and a handful of spouses/fiances/girlfriends are still coming) and I bought some fabric to have clothes made for the wedding we're going to in Bombay at the end of the month. Geo also found something fun to wear to the wedding. You'll get pictures as soon as the clothes are ready!
Anyway, this craft mart is a spectacle. We drove past it again tonight (Sunday, the last evening of it) and it was packed! Early in the morning, it was not so crowded and vendors were begging us to be their first customer of the day, promising good luck and special discounts. Like I said before, we managed to buy 3 outfits (2 for me, 1 for Geo) and a few things that would fall in the category of home decor.
One thing I found interesting was that they charged 10 rupees to get in (about 20 cents) and that got us a ticket that could be scanned at the entry turnstyles. The craft fair has technology that the very modern ISB doesn't even have. For example, each time we go to the dining hall for a meal, there are several ledgers that need to be filled out and autographed, a very time consuming process for hungry kids. Oh well...we can make a suggestion that they look towards the craft fair model.

Our studio apartment

The bathroom. Already a mess!


Our living room/office.


The bedroom and the TV.

Five Senses

If I remember right, I tried to do this in Prague when we first got there, and I don't think I ever finished. Now you will get the full sensory experience (from Krissy's point of view, of course) with pictures as I get them. I'd like to add sounds too, but I'm not sure I have the technology to figure that out yet.

First: Toucing/Feeling (I'm really not sure what to name this sense). What I feel all the time is hot. Thankfully, not sticky hot, but it is much warmer than I had anticipated. Fortunately, I checked the weather before we left LA and decided not to bring my heavy fleece. I have not yet regretted that decision. Women here wear clothes that cover their legs, so the shorts and short-ish skirts I brought are fine for campus, but I don't wear them off campus. I have a few long things, but I'll probably be getting some new stylish Indian clothes too. Anyway, it's been about 85 F (30 C) and overnight it's about 60 F (16 C). It's nice, but I don't want to overheat yet...it's only going to get hotter. At least we'll be gone before the sticky season starts.

Second: Sound. Three noises come to mind. One is the sound of airplanes. I guess we're one of the landing paths for the airport. Planes fly overhead frequently (4-10 per hour, night and day) and they drop their landing gear on top of our building. I wish I was exaggerating, but I'm not. Two, I think of horns. Beep, beep. Every vehicle on the road has a horn. The last auto-rickshaw we were in had one that had a SONY label on it, but I'm pretty sure it was a fake. I don't think SONY makes rubber horns for rickshaws here...They make distinctive noises so there is quite a symphony to listen to when you're out in the roads. Horns can mean so many things, like "beep, you're in my way", "beep, I'm here but I want to be where you are" and "beep, the vehicle in front says on its rear bumper to please sound horn". Okay, whatever. It's so noisy!

Third: Sight. The campus is a beautiful sight. It's well designed and beautifully landscaped. One thing I've noticed is there are a ton of butterflies. They're all so pretty and different. I won't mention the other types of bugs we've seen around (thankfully there are not too many of those pests). Also, Hyderabad is full of boulders. Everywhere you look, there are gigantic rock formations. Many of them are being blasted out of the way for all the new construction going on; I learned today there is a society for rock preservation. But the formations that remain are a sight to see!

Fourth: Taste. Definitely my favorite. Who knew Indian food was so good? Really, I have a very limited knowledge of Indian food...only what we've had in restauants at home. Now I know there is so much variety. It's all using the same basic ingredients (potatoes, chickpeas, tomatoes are the most common ingredients) with some type of sauce, served with rice and bread. The rice varies from meal to meal though, sometimes flavored with lemon, or saffron, or other unknown flavors and the bread is usually some sort of flat bread cooked in some sort of oil. It's delicious! We've had naan only once (it seems to be the only type not cooked in oil so far). There is usually some sort of sweet dessert, although fruit is the most common. For a few days now, we've had trays of watermelon, pomegranate, and grapes offered. Today for lunch they took the fruits and layered them with pudding and cake (a trifle, how delicious!) I actually haven't bought any food yet for the apartment. It's so cheap and convenient to eat at the dining hall, for now I see no need to worry about cooking. Although I'm sure I'm going to gain weight, everything is heavy but so delicious.

Fifth: Smell. Both Geo and I have been congested for nearly a month. So our sense of smell is definitely a bit off. Which I actually think is a good thing. The campus is very clean and doesn't smell at all. But for some reason, our sheets have a strange odor...not bad, but strange. I think I'm getting used to it. Maybe it's the smell of the detergent. No worries, it doesn't keep me from sleeping! The most powerful smell is noticed around dawn and dusk when there are fires burning off the campus. Depending on the direction of the breeze, you can smell that from time to time. And of course, there is incense. Not so much on campus, but the guy in the convenience store on campus burns it and they sell boxes of it there too. It gives me a sore throat, so we'll stick to candles if we need to cover up any unpleasant scents.

Sorry this got so long, but I hope you get a good "sense" about what we're doing here at ISB. If I notice any changes in my sensory evalution, I'll update this post.

5 Days in India

There is a very large lake in Hyderabad and we don't know much about it yet. But there are nice places to eat along the waterfront.


Geo and I took an auto-rickshaw into town. It costs 150 Rupees from the campus to town (maybe 15-20 km) and you can pack three normal sized people in. I've seen these things with 5 or 6 smallish men and 7 or 8 young children. I also saw one with 3 adults and a goat. Hmmm.


A sample of traffic at night. There are lots of motorbikes and auto-rickshaws. Some people have their own small cars, but they are not as common.


This is a picture of the area in front of the mall in Hyderabad. The traffic is usually quite heavy.

We're finally getting a bit more productive. We've had two trips into the city now. On Wednesday, we went with our ISB Buddy, Sartaj. We went into town to a big mall, then to another big mall to meet a friend of his. Then we had a nice dinner at a fancy restaurant on the shore of the large lake in town.
On Thursday, we went into town again with another exchange student, Stephanie. We had no purpose of the trip, other than exploring and seeing what we could accomplish on our own. This time the mall was closed (opening hours start at 10 am for almost everything) and we went to a large craft fair instead (Stephanie has visited here last year for 2 weeks and remembered this from her visit).
Today now is Friday and Geo took part in the orientation for all the exchange students. So far there are 10 and only one is not from the US. More are coming but I'm not sure when they're going to arrive. We did some icebreaker activities and then had lunch together. Now the students are at a marketing symposium and I'm blogging!

Welcome to the Indian School of Business

Our dorm: Student Village 2. Our room is pretty much directly behind the tree that is above the "P" sign.

The main campus building.

Geo in front of the main campus building.

Looking at the beautiful campus buildings at sunset, beneath the full moon.

India...

...has better get ready for us to get out of jet lag. We are going to hit the ground running, as soon as we can adjust to the time! We have repeated another historical fact today, last done one year ago: 6 hour napping in the middle of the day. We had a very productive morning...eating, jogging, getting set up online, shopping on campus, skyping, eating again...and then we both couldn't keep our heads up anymore, so we laid down for a short nap, lying to ourselves really, since we knew we'd sleep for ages. The doorbell rang at 10:30 pm and woke us up (it was our ISB buddy, Sartaj, wanting to greet us). We've officially slept through dinner, but that's okay, because we ate twice already today, and the food was delicious! I'm not going to drop any weight due to lack of interest in the local cuisine. At least initially...I suppose I could grow tired of it after a little while. But today was delightful...Indian food twice in one day, with no real desire to stuff myself because I know there's going to be more tomorrow!

The weather is warm but we don't need the a/c on yet in our room. The ceiling fans are a real nice addition, problem is they look they were just added. There are big holes around the ceiling where they cut the hole for the electrical box. Hmmm...the real question is how long they've been left with the big gaping holes.

If you haven't skyped us yet, please try! Our parents know this, but we've got a great new laptop (MacBook) with a built in video camera. I guess the quality is pretty impressive. Geo and I are online now, using jazzygeo as our skype name. We'd love to chat with you! Plus you can leave us voice mail if we're not around.

We'll try for a more productive day tomorrow. We need to get ourselves "official" here. That means we need IDs, a student number, class schedules and the like. Then I can use the gym and the pool, both look fantastic, but it's all without a/c, so that means I probably need to go early.

Hope to hear from you soon!