Monday, June 6th 2007
Looks like I'm going to India!
Next month sometime.
My passport needs to be renewed before I can confirm dates, but most likely in the middle of July.
Why am I going to India? That's a really good question!
Here's the short version...
My company makes a little test instrument that runs via computer. It's pretty advanced stuff but we've streamlined it to be practically simple enough to be setup and operated by a 5 year old kid. Plug it in, plug it into the computer and install the software. Read the well written manuals for the rest. Simple.
Well a customer in India ordered one of these instruments and thought that it might be so complicated that they included in the order to have a engineer FROM THE US show up over there to train them on how to setup and use the thing.
Normally we would tell them that it's not needed or we could have an agent from their own country show up and help out, but somehow nobody in our company happened to read that part in the purchase order so it was approved as is.
So now the customer has their equipment and is crying to our agent over there to fulfill the contract and have me fly over there to read the manuals to them. How exciting.
So after I get my new passport, visa, Typhiod Fever, Hep A, Polio booster, Tetanus and Malaria shots I'll be on my way to lovely, hot, smoky India!
This blog is my personal log of the trip.
Pretty close to ready
Monday, July 9th 2007
Moving right along, I got my polio booster shot, some maleria pills, my passport renewed, the visa and even the plane tickets!
I leave on the 20th and come back on the 29th.
The passport renewal was supposed to be the big delay, but they actually "expedited" it as promised (and paid extra for). It only took about 2 weeks.
The visa took another week.
Then I studied flights for about 2 weeks to make this as easy as possible. I don't have any problems flying, but I hate sitting around in airports, and this one has quite a few change-overs no matter how I sliced it. Ironically, the longer I delayed booking the actual ticket, the lower the price got. It was around $2500 with Orbitz and Expedia, then a week later it was $1900. A few days later Delta was $1700, NWA was $1675 last friday and today the exact same flight was $1565, so I booked it. It seemingly pays to wait.
I got to pick my seats and it showed that the plane was about 75% full, so I bet they lower the price after a certain percentage of the plane fills up to entice more people book. The fuller the plane, the more money they make, bottom line.
My contact in India is booking my hotel and picking me up at the air port, thats a bonus (I hope).
The picking up part is cool, it can be really tricky on your own in a foreign country for the first time, especially being an American. I can only hope my first night won't be at the "hostel infestion ala rats and mosquitoes".
The next day we are supposed to be road tripping to the first customer site. It just occurred to me that I don't know which side of the road they drive on over there. Guess I'll find out.
Moving right along, I got my polio booster shot, some maleria pills, my passport renewed, the visa and even the plane tickets!
I leave on the 20th and come back on the 29th.
The passport renewal was supposed to be the big delay, but they actually "expedited" it as promised (and paid extra for). It only took about 2 weeks.
The visa took another week.
Then I studied flights for about 2 weeks to make this as easy as possible. I don't have any problems flying, but I hate sitting around in airports, and this one has quite a few change-overs no matter how I sliced it. Ironically, the longer I delayed booking the actual ticket, the lower the price got. It was around $2500 with Orbitz and Expedia, then a week later it was $1900. A few days later Delta was $1700, NWA was $1675 last friday and today the exact same flight was $1565, so I booked it. It seemingly pays to wait.
I got to pick my seats and it showed that the plane was about 75% full, so I bet they lower the price after a certain percentage of the plane fills up to entice more people book. The fuller the plane, the more money they make, bottom line.
My contact in India is booking my hotel and picking me up at the air port, thats a bonus (I hope).
The picking up part is cool, it can be really tricky on your own in a foreign country for the first time, especially being an American. I can only hope my first night won't be at the "hostel infestion ala rats and mosquitoes".
The next day we are supposed to be road tripping to the first customer site. It just occurred to me that I don't know which side of the road they drive on over there. Guess I'll find out.
Leaving tomorrow
Thursday, July 19th 2007
Although the news this morning isn't boosting my confidence much...
"Firemen and rescuers work at the site of a collapsed building at Borivali, Mumbai, India, Thursday, July 19, 2007. At least 22 people were killed and nine others wounded when the building collapsed in Mumbai late Wednesday, officials said Thursday. At least 10 others were feared trapped in the rubble of the residential building"
So I guess I had better not jump on the bed when I get to the hotel. :|
Actually the hotel I'm staying at the first night is already arranged and it looks pretty nice.
My schedule will be pretty crazy with a day long car ride one day, staying at different places, one being a "guest house" of one of the companies I'm visiting. We return to Mumbai and stay at the BAWA again. Then fly to Mangalore and stay a night there. Fly back to Mumbai the next day and stay at the good ole' BAWA again.
At least I hope the BAWA is pretty nice... with 3 seperate stays there I should be able to write a pretty accurate review!
The flight is going to be a killer. 17 hours and 35 minutes traveling over 8333 miles!
Going to Beijing didn't even take that long, but then again that was a single flight whereas this one will have 3 stops with some 2 - 4 hour layovers.
I have a really big book that I'm going to bring. ;)
Next post will be from Mumbai (providing I can get internet...)!
-Scott
Although the news this morning isn't boosting my confidence much...
"Firemen and rescuers work at the site of a collapsed building at Borivali, Mumbai, India, Thursday, July 19, 2007. At least 22 people were killed and nine others wounded when the building collapsed in Mumbai late Wednesday, officials said Thursday. At least 10 others were feared trapped in the rubble of the residential building"
So I guess I had better not jump on the bed when I get to the hotel. :|
Actually the hotel I'm staying at the first night is already arranged and it looks pretty nice.
My schedule will be pretty crazy with a day long car ride one day, staying at different places, one being a "guest house" of one of the companies I'm visiting. We return to Mumbai and stay at the BAWA again. Then fly to Mangalore and stay a night there. Fly back to Mumbai the next day and stay at the good ole' BAWA again.
At least I hope the BAWA is pretty nice... with 3 seperate stays there I should be able to write a pretty accurate review!
The flight is going to be a killer. 17 hours and 35 minutes traveling over 8333 miles!
Going to Beijing didn't even take that long, but then again that was a single flight whereas this one will have 3 stops with some 2 - 4 hour layovers.
I have a really big book that I'm going to bring. ;)
Next post will be from Mumbai (providing I can get internet...)!
-Scott
Long day of travel
Saturday, July 21 2007
It went pretty well, here are some NWA planes lined up on the tarmac as we were taxiing out...
Bye bye Detroit...
Next stop was Hartford Connecticut, nothing special there.
Then from Hartford was a 8 hour flight to Amsterdam. It was painfully long but the flight attendants were really cool about bringing around food, wine and beer. The food was surprisingly good and they didn't charge for drinks. Last time I flew they always wanted to nickel and dime you for drinks.
Had a 4 hour layover in Amsterdam, but it was kinda fun. I met and talked with several people who were also going to India and they filled my in on several first-person details about what I might expect there. Also had a couple stiff drinks while sitting around in the airport, mainly so I could get some sleep on the third and final leg of the trip, which was a 9 hour flight.
It worked and I slept probably 7 1/2 hours on that flight! Woke up only a couple times to eat and have a glass of wine then right back out again. The food again was really good, I was quite impressed with the food and service on both of the long flights.
Landed in Mumbai right on time, the smell was overwhelming. Kinda dirty smoggy smelling. The airport was nice and air conditioned. No mosquitoes. Customs was cake. Then there was a luggage check for people bringing in fruits and stuff, but there was a senior guy there who was flagging American travelers and letting them bypass that because we usually only bring clothes and stuff, myself included. Then the third bottleneck where a guy took your customs slip to let you actually in the country, except nobody told anybody that you had to stop and fill out this particular customs slip, so everybody, including me got stopped and had to fill it out. Major bottleneck there.
Then out the doors of the airport and there were thousands of people everywhere, with hundreds of signs to identify people. I spotted mine right away because my guy had it on a long stick way up in the air. I could barely see the guy holding it due to the sheer amount of people there.
It is humid as hell, Louisiana takes a distant second to the wall of pure humidity here!
Driving is insane. They DO drive on the left with a right side steering wheel. Beeping and close calls every second on the road. Glad I wasn't driving.
My Hotel is O.K. Kinda dumpy by my standards, but it's clean and has air. Not much toilet paper though...
About a half a role and thats it...
I have a pigeon friend on my ledge thing outside the window...
And here's the traffic that will likely be honking and beeping all night long...
I haven't seen Mumbai during the day yet so this is all I have.
Tomorrow we leave at about 10am to drive to Balapur (sp), which is about a 2 1/2 hour drive. I hope to get more of a scope of this place as well as more pictures.
Not exactly sure when I'll be able to update again, I actually had to pay to get online for this one. $3.75 us for an hour... whatever, it's fun!
Oh yea, total trip time... 25.21 hours!
I ran my stopwatch from the gate in Detroit until after customs in Mumbai.
It went pretty well, here are some NWA planes lined up on the tarmac as we were taxiing out...
Bye bye Detroit...
Next stop was Hartford Connecticut, nothing special there.
Then from Hartford was a 8 hour flight to Amsterdam. It was painfully long but the flight attendants were really cool about bringing around food, wine and beer. The food was surprisingly good and they didn't charge for drinks. Last time I flew they always wanted to nickel and dime you for drinks.
Had a 4 hour layover in Amsterdam, but it was kinda fun. I met and talked with several people who were also going to India and they filled my in on several first-person details about what I might expect there. Also had a couple stiff drinks while sitting around in the airport, mainly so I could get some sleep on the third and final leg of the trip, which was a 9 hour flight.
It worked and I slept probably 7 1/2 hours on that flight! Woke up only a couple times to eat and have a glass of wine then right back out again. The food again was really good, I was quite impressed with the food and service on both of the long flights.
Landed in Mumbai right on time, the smell was overwhelming. Kinda dirty smoggy smelling. The airport was nice and air conditioned. No mosquitoes. Customs was cake. Then there was a luggage check for people bringing in fruits and stuff, but there was a senior guy there who was flagging American travelers and letting them bypass that because we usually only bring clothes and stuff, myself included. Then the third bottleneck where a guy took your customs slip to let you actually in the country, except nobody told anybody that you had to stop and fill out this particular customs slip, so everybody, including me got stopped and had to fill it out. Major bottleneck there.
Then out the doors of the airport and there were thousands of people everywhere, with hundreds of signs to identify people. I spotted mine right away because my guy had it on a long stick way up in the air. I could barely see the guy holding it due to the sheer amount of people there.
It is humid as hell, Louisiana takes a distant second to the wall of pure humidity here!
Driving is insane. They DO drive on the left with a right side steering wheel. Beeping and close calls every second on the road. Glad I wasn't driving.
My Hotel is O.K. Kinda dumpy by my standards, but it's clean and has air. Not much toilet paper though...
About a half a role and thats it...
I have a pigeon friend on my ledge thing outside the window...
And here's the traffic that will likely be honking and beeping all night long...
I haven't seen Mumbai during the day yet so this is all I have.
Tomorrow we leave at about 10am to drive to Balapur (sp), which is about a 2 1/2 hour drive. I hope to get more of a scope of this place as well as more pictures.
Not exactly sure when I'll be able to update again, I actually had to pay to get online for this one. $3.75 us for an hour... whatever, it's fun!
Oh yea, total trip time... 25.21 hours!
I ran my stopwatch from the gate in Detroit until after customs in Mumbai.
India, day 1
Sunday, July 22 2007
I didn't need much sleep, and I'm glad I didn't because there are no alarm clocks in the hotels and the wakeup call I had scheduled never came. I awoke at 8:20 am wondering how much longer before I get the call that was supposed to be a 8am!
What little sleep I got was good though. I took a very dangerous shower in a very narrow and completely concave tub. It was quite a balancing act!
My guy was running late due to a flat tire so I went ahead and had some breakfast in the hotel restaurant. My first meal in India consisted of chicken sausage, mushrooms, some sort of sweet rice mash and papaya juice. Nothing to write home about, even though I just did.
I took a few more photos from the room as a comparison from the night
before...
My guy eventually showed up and we hit the road to Dukes Retreat, which is way out of the city and up in a mountain range of retired volcanoes.
Lot of near misses on the roads...
...which seems to be the norm here.
Very few traffic lights, stop signs, road markings or cops. The cops are only around if someone actually gets killed I think?
It's basically a free-for-all and survival of the loudest horn, but somehow these people make it work. There is definitely a certain amount of intuition and commonality amongst drivers. We have a designated driver who doesn't speak any english and we ride in the back and try not to have a heart attack every time he darts in between a big truck and the concrete median.
Dukes Retreat is nice (by India standards).
Here are some photos of the area...
We had a buffet lunch with all kinds of different things, many of which I could not identify...
My beer of choice is India's own Kingfisher. Aside from water that is the only thing I've drank here. It's pretty light, like a Tsing Tao...
Here are a few more photos of the area architecture...
Pretty much every structure in India is under some sort of construction, the room directly below mine is no exception. After lunch I was feeling the effects of jet lag so I took a nap. My guy is older and he seems to sleep quite a lot so he also retired for the afternoon.
The construction under my room finally woke me up around 6pm. They had some sort of power saw that sounded like it was right under my bed.
I have a small balcony so I took a few photos of the construction goings on out back...
...but there workmanship is at a middle ages type of skill level.
It is truly a mish-mash of modernization in an uncivilized society, but they keep plugging away at it.
Tomorrow we travel to Balapur to meet with our first customer. I hear that it is a very small town and there will be no internet at all so my next post will be delayed a day.
Health wise I've been doing pretty good so far. I'm feverish off and on and I get some allergies (sneezing a lot) but I am fully prepared with medicines to help with those.
Again, I had to "buy" internet time. This place is funny too, they have wifi's mounted right outside of almost every room, there's one literally right outside my door, yet I cannot get a good enough signal. They are using Pronet, and I'm guessing they are pretty weak and/or the construction of the rooms is blocking the signals. I have to go over to the bar to post this.
I have cell phone service on roam, but I have not been able to call voice mail or anyone else, everything I try goes to a british accent message saying to check the number. I'm using Verizon, so if anyone has some tips on how to dial out from here I'm all ears.
Till next time...
Love you Dana and I miss you and the cats.
I didn't need much sleep, and I'm glad I didn't because there are no alarm clocks in the hotels and the wakeup call I had scheduled never came. I awoke at 8:20 am wondering how much longer before I get the call that was supposed to be a 8am!
What little sleep I got was good though. I took a very dangerous shower in a very narrow and completely concave tub. It was quite a balancing act!
My guy was running late due to a flat tire so I went ahead and had some breakfast in the hotel restaurant. My first meal in India consisted of chicken sausage, mushrooms, some sort of sweet rice mash and papaya juice. Nothing to write home about, even though I just did.
I took a few more photos from the room as a comparison from the night
before...
My guy eventually showed up and we hit the road to Dukes Retreat, which is way out of the city and up in a mountain range of retired volcanoes.
Lot of near misses on the roads...
...which seems to be the norm here.Very few traffic lights, stop signs, road markings or cops. The cops are only around if someone actually gets killed I think?
It's basically a free-for-all and survival of the loudest horn, but somehow these people make it work. There is definitely a certain amount of intuition and commonality amongst drivers. We have a designated driver who doesn't speak any english and we ride in the back and try not to have a heart attack every time he darts in between a big truck and the concrete median.
Dukes Retreat is nice (by India standards).
Here are some photos of the area...
We had a buffet lunch with all kinds of different things, many of which I could not identify...
My beer of choice is India's own Kingfisher. Aside from water that is the only thing I've drank here. It's pretty light, like a Tsing Tao...
Here are a few more photos of the area architecture...
Pretty much every structure in India is under some sort of construction, the room directly below mine is no exception. After lunch I was feeling the effects of jet lag so I took a nap. My guy is older and he seems to sleep quite a lot so he also retired for the afternoon.
The construction under my room finally woke me up around 6pm. They had some sort of power saw that sounded like it was right under my bed.
I have a small balcony so I took a few photos of the construction goings on out back...
The construction methods are somewhat interesting. They have the
engineering capability and the materials to make modern structures, but they severely lack in skilled labor and project management. This is obvious everywhere I've been so far. The construction guys work day and night, they even have their kids and family's helping, and apparently living nearby...
engineering capability and the materials to make modern structures, but they severely lack in skilled labor and project management. This is obvious everywhere I've been so far. The construction guys work day and night, they even have their kids and family's helping, and apparently living nearby...
...but there workmanship is at a middle ages type of skill level.
It is truly a mish-mash of modernization in an uncivilized society, but they keep plugging away at it.
Tomorrow we travel to Balapur to meet with our first customer. I hear that it is a very small town and there will be no internet at all so my next post will be delayed a day.
Health wise I've been doing pretty good so far. I'm feverish off and on and I get some allergies (sneezing a lot) but I am fully prepared with medicines to help with those.
Again, I had to "buy" internet time. This place is funny too, they have wifi's mounted right outside of almost every room, there's one literally right outside my door, yet I cannot get a good enough signal. They are using Pronet, and I'm guessing they are pretty weak and/or the construction of the rooms is blocking the signals. I have to go over to the bar to post this.
I have cell phone service on roam, but I have not been able to call voice mail or anyone else, everything I try goes to a british accent message saying to check the number. I'm using Verizon, so if anyone has some tips on how to dial out from here I'm all ears.
Till next time...
Love you Dana and I miss you and the cats.
Monday
Tuesday, July 24th 2007
Getting a connection at Dukes was considerably harder than expected. I moved over to the bar and sat right next to the wifi transmitter and it still would not connect. The bar guys called the front desk explaining the problem and they told me to go outside, so I did. Still no luck, but it kept getting a little better signal. Finally I went to the front desk to show them the problem and just as I pointed to the problem on the screen it connected and gave me a prompt to log into the net! The desk guy says "you cn sit ower der"... in the waiting area. Thanks buddy!
I've been pre-formatting the pics to 640x480 to reduce the upload time and typing out all the text beforehand, so once I do finally get a solid connection I can post everything up pretty quickly. I don't spend much time with anything else online because I only have an hour but I do read the comments and highly appreciate them. :-)
We hit the road at 6am headed for somewhere? Places and directions are already starting to blend together into one big "India Experience", one I don't plan on repeating if I can help it, so I don't really care about all the roads and tiny towns that we drive through.
I initially found it amusing that some of the trucks have "horn ok please" painted on the back because everyone honks the horn all the time. I thought it might be a joke, but as we drove further I noticed that all of the trucks have this on the back...
So it must be a sort of warning that the driver needs to be honked at or something. Still amusing.
We stopped at a roadside stand to get some sort of unique fruit, called Peru Fruit, to give to the customers. My guy said it is ok to eat and I should try some so I took a slice. First thing I do is take a bite right out of the center like a water melon only to learn that the center is all seeds about the size of lemon seeds, so I stand there spitting seeds out all over the place! Stuff was quite good though, I can't begin to describe what they taste like, totally unique...
Here's our our India-Mobile...
Driving further towards the customer location I took a few more pics of local stuff...
Most of the road signs and billboards everywhere are in perfect english.
The sacred cow. "What provides milk the same as a mother, is something that shall be cherished and allowed to live out it's life happily."
Or something like that...
I'm relishing the Beef Jerky that I brought with me, it's the only beef I'm going to see here.
Some school kids playing a game where they have to hold their breath and say some "loki loki" thing until they tag another kid, or if they run out of breath they are out of the game...
We arrived at the guest house of the company first and dropped off our luggage. It's kind of a split room bungalo, but it hadn't been lived in or cleaned in quite some time. I was less than thrilled with the many large spiders hanging out around my toilet...
Here's some Indian wasps hanging out on the back door...
We went out to the paper mill and met with the guys who requested my trip over here. They were rather lost on how to best run the instrument, but they were running it quite often anyway. I simply needed to clarify many things on how it is supposed to work...
After several hours there I was getting very tired from jet lag so we left for the guest house to rest up. I didn't get much rest however as a couple of the managers wanted us to have a meeting over some snacks and beer (Kingfisher, of course), so why not.
A couple hours later we finally went back to the rooms so I could get some much needed rest.
My bed had but one blanket, which I had moved around to check for bugs before we went to the mill, but was now surrounded and crawling with fleas! My guy had already went to bed in his room so I just left all my close on and went out and crashed on the couch. It pretty much sucked, but I got some sleep and didn't get eaten alive by fleas. I had to explain and show the whole flea problem to my guy in the morning, he was not thrilled about it and politely informed people at the company.
Here's my bed and some fleas the next morning...
The view out the back...
The paper mill from afar...
I heard my phone ring at about 6am but wasn't able to get to it in time. Of course it was Dana, and she left a voice mail, but I still cannot check my voice mail!
My time is very very limited so far. It's is very rough here, driving takes a long time, and we are always on the go. In fact I'm trying to type this in the car on the way back to Dukes so that I might get a tiny bit of time to relax this evening.
Dana, you might catch me at 7am my time, I'm usually up and getting ready about then. But that is about the only time that I'll be able to answer.
I'm now back at the Dukes, and it looks like I'll have to go to reception to post again. That sucks, but the room is nicer this time...except the power just died on me and I had to rewire the stupid key tag - power on for the room thing because a wire broke. Shoddy, very shoddy construction, wiring, internet, everything... Oh well.
I'll have two more posts tomorrow I think. Back at the BAWA and I should get some time to get caught up on all the pictures I've been taking. :)
I miss USA construction, even the road construction... hell, ESPECIALLY the road construction!!!1
-Scott
Getting a connection at Dukes was considerably harder than expected. I moved over to the bar and sat right next to the wifi transmitter and it still would not connect. The bar guys called the front desk explaining the problem and they told me to go outside, so I did. Still no luck, but it kept getting a little better signal. Finally I went to the front desk to show them the problem and just as I pointed to the problem on the screen it connected and gave me a prompt to log into the net! The desk guy says "you cn sit ower der"... in the waiting area. Thanks buddy!
I've been pre-formatting the pics to 640x480 to reduce the upload time and typing out all the text beforehand, so once I do finally get a solid connection I can post everything up pretty quickly. I don't spend much time with anything else online because I only have an hour but I do read the comments and highly appreciate them. :-)
We hit the road at 6am headed for somewhere? Places and directions are already starting to blend together into one big "India Experience", one I don't plan on repeating if I can help it, so I don't really care about all the roads and tiny towns that we drive through.
I initially found it amusing that some of the trucks have "horn ok please" painted on the back because everyone honks the horn all the time. I thought it might be a joke, but as we drove further I noticed that all of the trucks have this on the back...
So it must be a sort of warning that the driver needs to be honked at or something. Still amusing.
We stopped at a roadside stand to get some sort of unique fruit, called Peru Fruit, to give to the customers. My guy said it is ok to eat and I should try some so I took a slice. First thing I do is take a bite right out of the center like a water melon only to learn that the center is all seeds about the size of lemon seeds, so I stand there spitting seeds out all over the place! Stuff was quite good though, I can't begin to describe what they taste like, totally unique...
Here's our our India-Mobile...
Driving further towards the customer location I took a few more pics of local stuff...
Most of the road signs and billboards everywhere are in perfect english.
The sacred cow. "What provides milk the same as a mother, is something that shall be cherished and allowed to live out it's life happily."
Or something like that...
I'm relishing the Beef Jerky that I brought with me, it's the only beef I'm going to see here.
Some school kids playing a game where they have to hold their breath and say some "loki loki" thing until they tag another kid, or if they run out of breath they are out of the game...
We arrived at the guest house of the company first and dropped off our luggage. It's kind of a split room bungalo, but it hadn't been lived in or cleaned in quite some time. I was less than thrilled with the many large spiders hanging out around my toilet...
Here's some Indian wasps hanging out on the back door...
We went out to the paper mill and met with the guys who requested my trip over here. They were rather lost on how to best run the instrument, but they were running it quite often anyway. I simply needed to clarify many things on how it is supposed to work...
After several hours there I was getting very tired from jet lag so we left for the guest house to rest up. I didn't get much rest however as a couple of the managers wanted us to have a meeting over some snacks and beer (Kingfisher, of course), so why not.
A couple hours later we finally went back to the rooms so I could get some much needed rest.
My bed had but one blanket, which I had moved around to check for bugs before we went to the mill, but was now surrounded and crawling with fleas! My guy had already went to bed in his room so I just left all my close on and went out and crashed on the couch. It pretty much sucked, but I got some sleep and didn't get eaten alive by fleas. I had to explain and show the whole flea problem to my guy in the morning, he was not thrilled about it and politely informed people at the company.
Here's my bed and some fleas the next morning...
The view out the back...
The paper mill from afar...
I heard my phone ring at about 6am but wasn't able to get to it in time. Of course it was Dana, and she left a voice mail, but I still cannot check my voice mail!
My time is very very limited so far. It's is very rough here, driving takes a long time, and we are always on the go. In fact I'm trying to type this in the car on the way back to Dukes so that I might get a tiny bit of time to relax this evening.
Dana, you might catch me at 7am my time, I'm usually up and getting ready about then. But that is about the only time that I'll be able to answer.
I'm now back at the Dukes, and it looks like I'll have to go to reception to post again. That sucks, but the room is nicer this time...except the power just died on me and I had to rewire the stupid key tag - power on for the room thing because a wire broke. Shoddy, very shoddy construction, wiring, internet, everything... Oh well.
I'll have two more posts tomorrow I think. Back at the BAWA and I should get some time to get caught up on all the pictures I've been taking. :)
I miss USA construction, even the road construction... hell, ESPECIALLY the road construction!!!1
-Scott
Inside India
This is Tuesdays post, but all we did was finish up with the first customer and drive all day. No pictures aside from my much nicer room at
Dukes...
Dukes...
...aside from the power problems, and no internet even though it is
again right out side my door, it's pretty sweet. :)
Here's an overview of Dukes as we were leaving...
again right out side my door, it's pretty sweet. :)
Here's an overview of Dukes as we were leaving...
And Here's some shots from a cool scenic spot on the mountain...
My guy is quite worldly and very knowledgeable about most everything India. He speaks excellent english so we talk quite a lot while on these long car rides. He is good about filling in the gaps I have when seeing how the different people live and work here, which is quite different then anything I've ever seen. It's hard to see a majority of the road side people, and the makeshift housing that they live in and not think of some of the worst poverty situations I've seen on TV or heard about in places like Africa or Indonesia. It's different when you are actually
driving by it all day long. People living in tiny shacks, people who look like they haven't eaten in days, living areas where there doesn't seem to be a means of waste disposal or fresh water. But here conditions like that are not always considered poverty. Much of what seems like poverty to me is simply my misunderstanding of how a people such as this has evolved to meet population demands and the inevitable economic explosion here. The people living under a tarp and washing cloths in a bucket of water also go to work doing specialized jobs many times. There
are little shops and work sheds everywhere, each making something. If a product has 50 parts to it, there are 51 shops making each one of the parts and one shop to put it together.
driving by it all day long. People living in tiny shacks, people who look like they haven't eaten in days, living areas where there doesn't seem to be a means of waste disposal or fresh water. But here conditions like that are not always considered poverty. Much of what seems like poverty to me is simply my misunderstanding of how a people such as this has evolved to meet population demands and the inevitable economic explosion here. The people living under a tarp and washing cloths in a bucket of water also go to work doing specialized jobs many times. There
are little shops and work sheds everywhere, each making something. If a product has 50 parts to it, there are 51 shops making each one of the parts and one shop to put it together.
I took a few more pictures showing some of this...
Thats all for today folks.
Aside from a constant schedule and not getting much time to do this posting, this has been a pretty fun trip so far!
These posts probably look terrible, I'll clean it all up when and if I ever get some REAL internet time. I'm on a BAWA guest computer this time and it barely works.
-Scott
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