Some Observations About India

Now that I've been here for a little over a month and I'm leaving in 3 days, I thought it was time for me to write about some of the things that make India unique. These are just random observations on my part.

1. TV - Indian TV is different, luckily we have a satellite here so we are able to get English channels. I'll start with HBO: they actually run some fairly decent movies on HBO here. We've seen "Forgetting Sarah Marshall", "Rockstar" (I love that movie), "East is East", "Batman", and "Revolutionary Road" just to name a few. Every English-speaking show, from movies to sitcoms, has English subtitles even though the show itself is in English. Tom said it's because people in India can't understand American English, kind of like watching "Trainspotting" without subtitles, even though it's in English, you can't understand a word they're saying.

The people who are responsible for typing up the subtitles don't always get it right, so it's kind of amusing to read the subtitles and listen to words. As an example, I was watching "Revolutionary Road" and the line was "I loathe the sight of you" but the subtitle said "I love to aside you" which doesn't even make sense. If they just can't figure out what the words are the subtitle might look like this: ( ) or (Foreign language). They are also very censored over here so every single suggestive scene in "Forgetting Sarah Marshall" was cut out, even the scene where Aldous Snow was singing at the resort.

Language is not overly censored, like the word "shit" or "goddamn" is still audible but the subtitle will be *****. Also, the translations are the British spelling so "neighborhood" would be "neighbourhood", "ass" is "arse", "color" is "colour", etc. I have never heard the "F" word on TV here, that is totally muted out.

Commercials: the commercials here are so silly and most of them are in Hinglish (part Hindi - part English) or Tamil. Most of the commercials are for:

Deodorant (I don't know why because I don't think anyone here uses it)

Cell phones

Cars

Life Insurance (all of the life insurance commercials involve a child graduating from college and being given the gift of life insurance by his/her parents and the kid always cries when they give it to him). Tom said that only recently has life insurance become available through private companies so they advertise the hell out of it.

Some form of non-alcoholic beverage like Nimbu (kind of like lemonade), ThumsUp (a cola drink), Coca-Cola (their slogan is "little drops of joy"), etc.

Motorcycles (big surprise)

Banks

Skin Lightening Creams and Lotions - as I mentioned in a previous post, Indians are crazy for fair skin. The lighter the skin, the more attractive the person. Each time I turn on the TV I see a ton of ads for different skin lightening creams and lotions and they all promise 2 tones lighter in 7 days. They even include a little strip with different shades of brown on it so the user can keep track of how light their skin gets. The funniest one is a commercial featuring Shah Rukh Kahn (the MOST famous Bollywood actor in India) advertising "Fair and Handsome" which is a product only for men.

Shampoos and Conditioners, Bath Soap, and Mosquito Repellant

2. Public Bathrooms - This is worth writing about simply for the "gross out" aspect of it all. I don't think I've ever been in a public bathroom at home, even at a truck stop, that was as disgusting as the public bathrooms in India, even public bathrooms in "nice" restaurants and stores. Sometimes the bathrooms are unisex so there is a Western toilet and a urinal in the same little closet. NONE of them have toilet paper, unless I get really lucky and then I might get a roll with a little left on it. They all have those water hose/sprayer things attached to the wall (see pics of our apartment in a previous post and you'll see what I mean), so the bathroom floor is always soaking wet. To use the public bathroom I will hold my breath when I walk in because the smell is unbelievable, wipe down the entire toilet area with Kleenex that I carry in my purse, then try to squat over the toilet without sitting down all the while holding my pants off the ground with one hand and trying to balance without touching anything while I go. Most public bathrooms do have a bottle of Dettol (soap) to wash my hands with but they don't have paper towels or an air dryer so I just have to flap dry. It's not a pleasant experience but I have to say, one of the cleanest and least stinky public bathrooms I used was at the one and only McDonald's in Chennai.

3. Liquid Refreshment in Stores - I don't really know how to explain this but I'll give it a shot. I've seen this in several places so I think it's fairly common. Stores will have either a water cooler with a single metal cup sitting on top of it or a bunch of Coke or 7Up bottles that have been refilled with water sitting out on a counter. Shoppers will fill up the metal cup from the cooler and pour the water in their mouth without touching the cup with their lips, or they will pour water from the refilled Coke bottle into their mouth without touching the bottle to their lips. People will just line up, one after the other, total strangers, and all drink from the same cup or bottle. It is the one of the most disgusting things I have seen here and I don't think I would do that no matter how thirsty I was. Yuck!

4. Malls, Restaurants, Shops - I can lump these all together and make it easy. I have been to two malls in Chennai, Spencer Plaza and Citi Centre, and I prefer Spencer Plaza even though it is the older of the two. Malls here are smaller versions of malls that we have at home, with lots of different stores and food courts. The malls are not air-conditioned except that sometimes there is an a/c unit over the entry door so when I first walk in I think it's air conditioned, but it's really not. The malls are extremely crowded with tons of people and it's very hot and smelly because no one wears deodorant here so the stench of BO will just about knock you over. In the malls, the people who work in the different stores will stand outside the doors to their little store and hawk their wares, particularly when they see a white person (ME). They will just trail behind me for a few feet trying to get me to come into their store and I just keep on walking like I don't see them. Some restaurants advertise on their outdoor signage that they are "a/c" and most of the time it's not too bad but they don't run it like we would at home. In restaurants, the waiters hover over you constantly and when they bring food out they serve it for you rather than you dishing up your own plate. When the waiter sees that you are just about finished with what is on your plate, he will run right over and try to give you more food. Shops where we buy food are very small, smaller than a 7-11 at home. The produce sections are very small, with rotten produce mixed in with good to average produce and the produce area is covered in flies. You just kind of have to pick through the tomatoes, potatoes, cilantro, bell peppers (it's called capsicum over here), etc. and then wash up with the Germ-X when you've got what you want. We go different places for different things, not like going to Wal-Mart or Target or whatever and stocking up all at once. There is a good place to get milk and yogurt, a good place for bread, and a good place to buy everything else. So buying food can take several hours by the time it's all done and you have to plan it, like getting milk and yogurt last and then heading home before it gets gross from being out in the heat.

5. Power Outages - The power goes out every single day, at least twice. There is no warning, no particular schedule, it just goes. One minute I'm sitting here with the ceiling fan spinning away, trying not to pass out from the heat, and then the power goes out. If we are lucky, Babu the caretaker gets the back-up power on fairly quickly but the back-up power is a ceiling fan and a light in each room, nothing else. That means no power to the fridge, bathroom, microwave, washing machine, electrical outlets in the walls, etc. The power will stay off for anywhere from 5 minutes to several hours, it varies from time to time. One Saturday the power went off at 9:00 AM and didn't come back on until 5:00 PM. Needless to say, we took showers in the dark and got the hell out of here because at least the car is air conditioned. I know that the power outages are supposed to conserve power and I guess they need all the help they can get over here but still....it's frustrating but since it happens every single day I have come to expect it. The frustrating part is when I'm watching a movie and the power goes because then I miss whatever is happening on the show so there's kind of no point in getting involved watching something on TV because most likely the power will go out and I will miss part of whatever I'm watching.

6. The Police - In the U.S. being a police officer is a noble and respected profession but not in India. The police here are most known for taking bribes from everyone. The police do not carry guns unless they are a high grade within the department, like detective or chief. The cops on the street carry a stick and nothing else. The "traffic police" stand at various places in the road and they direct traffic, stand around, and pull people over by blowing whistles at them and motioning them to the side of the road. When someone is pulled over, they will then offer a bribe and that is how the situation is resolved.

7. Beggars - In the U.S. we just have panhandlers who stand at intersections with their signs asking for money. They don't approach people or anything, they just stand around hoping for a hand out. In India, they have true "beggars". These people don't usually bother or approach Indians, only white people. When the beggar sees a white person, they see dollar signs. I have had beggars follow me for a block down the street, grabbing at my arm, walking RIGHT BESIDE me, and when I get in the car and shut the door, the beggar will literally lay on the window and tap it constantly trying to get my attention. Sometimes Tom will take pity and give them a small coin but most of the time we just ignore them, with me saying "Go, Go" trying to get Tom to hurry up and get the car moving because I just can't stand to see these people begging at the window. The worst is when it is a little kid. I made the mistake of smiling at a kid at the beach at Mamallapuram and he followed me almost to the car. It's heartbreaking but we can't give money to every person who begs for it.

8. Jasmine - Chennai is a city in a state called Tamil Nadu. In Tamil Nadu one of the traditions is for women to wear Jasmine in their hair. ALL WOMEN....Before I came here I liked the smell of Jasmine, now I can't stand it. On just about every street corner there are women and men who string the Jasmine into long ropes and the women buy it (or their husbands buy it for them) and they wear these long ropes of Jasmine in their hair. So everywhere I go, I am assaulted by the potent smell of hundreds of women (and small girls) wearing Jasmine in their hair. The sweet, overpowering smell of the Jasmine, mixed with the heat, makes me want to vomit. Directly below the apartment is a garment factory of some kind and only women work there. When they sit outside for their lunch or break, the smell of the Jasmine is so strong the wind actually blows it up into the open doors of the apartment so I smell it inside the apartment as well as outside on the streets.

9. Traffic - Chennai has a population of over 8 million people, and they are all trying to get somewhere and get there fast. Traffic is a nightmare no matter what time of the day or night. When I say traffic, I mean the following: cars, motorcycles, bicycles, scooters, trucks, buses, pedestrians, bullock carts (carts pulled by an ox), auto rickshaws, bicycle rickshaws (a cart with a bicycle attached to it), goats, cows, and buffalo. The roads are marked with lane lines, but no one stays within the lane markings. So if there are actually 3 marked lanes on a road, there are approximately 5 or 6 rows of cars, motorcycles, bicycles, etc. across those 3 marked lanes. Everyone jams up together so I can literally open the window and touch the car next to us without really sticking my arm out of the window. Traffic lights are more for show than anything else because no one pays attention to the light unless there is a traffic cop standing there. Red lights are on an "as needed" basis, meaning that if we are approaching a red light, everyone kind of looks to see if there are any cars coming from the opposite direction and if there aren't any, everyone just goes on through the red light. All of the traffic signals have a "counter" on them which shows how long before the light turns red or green. So on the occasion when everyone stops at a red light, when the counter shows that the light will turn green in 8 seconds, everyone starts inching forward and blowing their horns non-stop until someone finally jumps the red light and everyone goes at once. The motorcycles and scooters ride in between 2 cars or a car and a bus or a car and a truck. I don't know how these people aren't squished but somehow they make it through. Very few people wear helmets and the funny thing is when I see a couple of guys on a motorcyle and they have helmets IN THEIR LAPS instead of on their heads. Lots of the guys on motorcycles wear handkerchiefs over their nose/mouth so it kind of looks like a bunch of robbers riding around on motorcycles.

10. Gas Stations - Gas stations in India are ALL full-service, meaning that no one in India pumps their own gas. You pull into the gas station and there is always some guy standing in the parking lot waving you into whichever pump lane he wants you to go to. Then there is a guy who does the filling up part and a different guy who takes the card for payment. When Tom first came to the U.S. in 2003, he had no clue how to put gas in a car and he was 24 years old.

11. Door Attendants - No matter where you go, there is always a guy standing outside the door to whatever place it is, whether it's a restaurant, a shop, etc. His job is to open the door for the customer when they enter and leave the store. In addition to the door attendant, there are also parking attendants all over the place who tell you where to park at whatever store you're going to. They will wave their hands around, blowing a whistle, motioning this way and that way, until you are parked where they want you to be parked. It's the craziest thing.

12. Imported Grocery Items - We found two stores that carry imported grocery items, Amma Naana and Nilgiri's. Imported grocery items are REALLY expensive and they don't have a lot of it. Some of the items that I can remember are: a normal-sized container of Philadelphia Cream Cheese for US $10, a normal-sized block of Kraft Cheddar Cheese for US $10, a small (and I mean small) package of deli sandwich meat for US $22, a can of Schweppes Ginger Ale for US $1.25, and a box of Kraft Macaroni and Cheese for US $3.75. We bought the mac & cheese, it was okay but tasted kind of funky like the powdered cheese was a little off. The ginger ale was sooo good and we didn't even touch the other stuff because it was so expensive. I guess the people who work in the U.S. Embassy here earn U.S. money so they can afford to buy the stuff they are familiar with but the average Indian income won't allow luxuries like that.

13. Chinese Food - Being in Asia, India has some of the best Chinese food I have ever had in my life. No Chinese restaurant that I've ever been to in the U.S. can compare to the Chinese food in India.

14. Religion - Everywhere in India, on every street, on every road, there will be some sort of a temple, even a small one. It might just be a little statue in a glass case or it could be a small building that is taken care of by the people in the neighborhood. I have seen so many temples it's impossible to count them all. They are everywhere. In addition to the temples there are also large signs about Jesus and being saved, etc. There are mosques dotted throughout the city as well. Directly across from the dining balcony of the apartment is a mosque and they blast the call to prayer 5 times a day from a speaker that I swear is pointed right at this building. I have come to learn the different voices of the men who do the singing and I can usually differentiate between them. Sometimes I catch myself singing along and Tom says I'm going to get us shot if anyone hears me (he's kidding). The other thing about the whole religion aspect of India is the Muslims. I'm not saying anything against anything, I'm just saying that it's well over 100 degrees here and these poor women are walking around the streets in all black burquas, with only a slit for their eyes, wearing black gloves and black stockings....I don't know how they aren't dropping like flies on the street from the heat. The other night we went to dinner at this Chinese place and there was a group of Muslims having dinner there - I think it was 2 couples with kids and then a single guy. The one couple with kids gets in their car, and the other couple with their kids and the single guy get in the other car. Get this: the couple with the single guy, the husband gets in the driver's seat, the single guy gets in the front passenger seat, and the wife with the kids gets in the back seat and PULLS A CURTAIN ACROSS BETWEEN THE FRONT AND BACK SEATS to keep her separated from the single guy. It was the strangest thing I have ever seen but I guess that's how they do it.

15. Livestock - Imagine driving down the street, or the highway, or whatever and dodging cows, buffalo, and goats. Say for instance you are cruising down 635 or the Tollway and you have to change lanes because there is a herd of cattle in the road. That is exactly what it is like here. Livestock is everywhere, and I mean everywhere. We had to stop at an ATM the other day for Tom to get cash, the little ATM building is fenced-in and there was freaking cow walking around in there!

16. Public Urination - This is really men, not women, doing this. If a dude has to go pee, he will drop trou wherever he is, whip it out, and go. Doesn't matter if it's on the side of the road, the corner of a building, whatever. Guys on motorcycles will pull over to the shoulder of the road and just go. They don't go behind a tree or a bush or anywhere else, they just go. So, that means when you are walking around the streets you have to be careful not to step in it and I guess some areas get more use as a bathroom than others because of the SMELL. Totally disgusting.

17. Slums - The first time I came to India in 2008, Tom was very careful to keep me in nice areas, nice hotels, etc. He didn't expose me to any part of the "true India", meaning the slums. Not this time....one weekend we had to do some shopping in the city (the apartment is in a suburb called Chromepet and Chennai city is about a 40 minute drive) and at some of the smaller shops it is really difficult to find a place to park. Tom wanted to go to this computer parts store and we ended up having to park about two blocks away, in this alley behind a large building, and we had to walk to the store. Part of our walk involved walking through a slum. It was the first time I had seen it live and in my face, seeing it on TV or in a movie is totally different. There were tin shacks, probably about 4 feet by 6 feet, all lined up one after the other, no electricity, no doors, no windows, just little tin shelters. All of these women and children were out in front of their little shacks, some of the women were cooking in pots over fires, some of the women were washing clothes in buckets, some of them were just sleeping on the street, none of them had shoes, most of the kids were half-naked, and I had to walk right through the middle of this. I was horrified and I couldn't look at them because I didn't want them to think I was staring at them. It was not a nice experience but Tom said I needed to see it (???); thankfully, when we left the computer store we went the long way around so I didn't have to walk through the slum again.

18. Pizza Hut, KFC, McDonald's, and Domino's - All of these restaurants are here and even though at home we consider these places to be "fast food" and maybe places that we don't really go to, in India they are considered "Nice". McDonald's is relatively expensive here and the portions are quite a bit smaller than we get at home. There are no "super-size" options here, no small, medium, large, extra-large drinks. McDonald's in India doesn't serve beef, they used to serve lamb but not anymore. The options are chicken, chicken, and chicken. KFC in India has India-spiced chicken and it's kind of funny to be walking around the food court at the mall and see a group of Indians chowing down on a bucket o' chicken (yep, it's really in a KFC bucket). Pizza Hut is a real restaurant with menus and is decorated pretty well. Domino's is huge on the delivery scene and their slogan is "Delivering Happiness". Pizza in India is India-spiced so the pizza sauce is distinctly Indian-flavored, has very little cheese, and is loaded with chicken.

I guess that is really all that comes to my mind right now. There might be more that I remember later, if so I'll post it. India is a fascinating, crazy place to be but I don't know if I could live here permanently. The last time I was here I was really a 10-day tourist, hitting Rajasthan and the Golden Triangle of Mumbai-Delhi-Agra. We stayed in hotels with generators so I never knew when the power went out and we had drivers who took us around wherever we wanted to go and knew the quick ways to get places. This time I have actually lived here for 5 weeks and it has been an experience that I will never forget and also an experience that I feel lucky to have had. I don't know many people who get to visit a foreign country like this and experience a totally different way of life. I feel fortunate to live a life in the U.S. that is really luxurious compared to life here.

More from the Newspaper

Arranged marriages are still the norm in India and there is a large section of the newspaper devoted to ads placed by parents seeking a suitable life partner for their child, even though the child is well over the age of 21. I selected a few of the best:



WANTED BRIDEGROOM for Kannada speaking girl born Jan 1984 studied BS in USA now working in a leading investment bank in London. Willing to relocate if required Bridegroom's education, position and family background are the important considerations.



NON-SRIVATSA GROOM for my Kannada/Tamil speaking with high moral values, beautiful daughter Ashilesha. Contact with height, education and horoscope.



TRICHUR NAIR girl divorced (within a week) employed in Chennai seeks well qualified/employed boy.



Fair, Slim and Beautiful Girl from a Well Cultured Family Seeks Professionally Qualified Groom.



CHRISTIAN PROTESTANT Fair girl 29 Australia employed citizen seeks professionally Qualified, clean habits willing to settle in Australia. good family background Photo/Biodata must.



Healthy young looking very active and well settled boy having diabetes seeks good looking girl. Young widows can also apply. caste no bar.



WELL RESPECTED Hindu Family in South Delhi seeks alliance for their handsome son, Vegetarian US graduate with six years experience with a US Investment Bank. Presently engaged in creating a Financial Consultancy and Investment Banking setup in India. Looking beautiful, qualified homely girl from educated cultured family.

PARENTS OF Christian, working in a leading Co. invite proposals from a slim, fair looking, God fearing and qualified bride below 23 from an affluent family of the same community. Reply with photos.

HIGHLY REPUTED Delhi based family seeks for their tall, fair, handsome, smart son 26 Phd scholar USA visiting India from 25th May to 10th June, 2010. Cultured, beautiful, fair, well educated, tall girl with good family background.

TALL MUSLIM, 25 Software Engineer London Rich/Religious family Chennai seeks educated beautiful Very fair Bride from religious rich decent family.

HANDSOME Post Graduate Sr Manager has a birth defect of infertility can have happy married life seeks unmarried bride with same issue Caste no bar

Tamil Speaking Family Invites Proposal from Pious Poor/Avg Middle Class for sons 1) 45, 2) 38 3) 36 Girls should be Pious, Simple, Homely, Humble & Soft Spoken Family must have background known in the place where they reside. Reply with Parish/Photo

I guess I should explain that in India caste is extremely important in most cases. People who are not from the same caste cannot marry. I guess for the ads that say "caste no bar" they must be getting desperate and are willing to overlook the caste situation in order to get their kid married off. It is also very important to be "fair-skinned". In India, the lighter the skin the more attractive the person. So, while in the US we are all baking in the sun trying to get tans, in India they cover up and try to avoid getting any darker than they already are.

I ran across the article below in today's paper and while it is NOT meant to be funny, the way that they write about things here can come across in a way that can be kind of strange.

Infant dies; quack held

Nagarcoil: A quack was arrested by the police following the death of a nine-month-old child on
Saturday.

According to police sources, Kumar (45) of Kani Vilai near Eraniel, was a casual worker. His daughter Sharmi was suffering from fever and ear pain. Hence, Kumar and his relatives took her to the nearest clinic, run by one Murugesan.

After examination, he gave an injection to the child. However, the child died within a minute in front of her parents and relatives.

Complaint

Based on the complaint lodged by the parents and relatives of the deceased, the police questioned the doctor and later it came to light that he was a quack.

The police arrested him and produced him before a magistrate, who remanded him to judicial custody. During the interrogation it was known that he had completed only his standard X and was practicing as a doctor by running a private clinic at Eraniel.

I also ran across a section of the paper titled "Know Your English" where people send in questions and the questions are answered by someone who I presume has been "Westernized". Here's a few:

1. "What is the meaning of scuttlebutt"?

This is a word which comes from the world of sailing. 'Butt' means 'barrel' or 'cask' and 'scuttle' refers to the hatch on the deck on a ship. A 'scuttlebutt' was actually a barrel containing the day's supply of drinking water for the ship's crew. Since this barrel (butt) of water was placed near the hatch (scuttle), the container began to be called 'scuttlebutt'. What do you think happened when the members of the crew got together to drink water? The same thing that happens today when colleagues in an office gather around the water cooler or the coffee machine. They gossiped! The sailors drank water, and they gossiped about what was happening on the ship. In informal contexts, the expression 'scuttlebutt' is used to mean 'rumor' or 'gossip'.

Have you heard the scuttlebutt about my new neighbour?

I don't pay too much attention to the scuttlebutt around here.

2. What is the meaning of "Sweat like a pig"?

This rather strange expression is mostly used in informal contexts to mean perspire profusely or excessively.

When I met Usha for the first time, I was so nervous that I sweated like a pig.

By the end of the first set, Naresh was sweating like a pig.

This is an odd expression because pigs do not have sweat glands, and therefore do not perspire like humans do. According to some scholars, the idiom refers to the 'sweating' that a pig does when it is roasted over fire. I understand when a pig is roasted, fat oozes out, and it is this fat that is referred to in the idiom.

3. What is the meaning of "All hell broke loose"?

The expression is mostly used in informal contexts in American English. 'Hell' is usually associated with chaos; therefore, when you say "all hell broke loose", what you mean is that the situation went completely out of control. There was pandemonium; people started shouting and screaming at each other, and at times resorted to violence.

"All hell broke loose when the CEO saw the article in the magazine."

4. What is the meaning of "Fly off the handle"?

This expression of American origin is normally used in relation to a person. When you say that someone flew off the handle, you mean he lost his temper. He became extremely angry about something you said or did, and started shouting.

Another informal expression which has the same meaning is, 'to go ballistic'.

Our coach flies off the handle every time someone makes a mistake.

The CEO flew off the handle when he heard the workers were going on strike.

5. What is the meaning of "Grossed out"?

When you say that something is 'gross', what you mean is that it is disgusting: it could be the smell, the looks, the taste, etc. The medicine that my mother gave me was gross. The expression 'gross out' is mostly used in American English to mean 'to fill someone with disgust'. It is considered to be slang, and therefore should be avoided in formal contexts.

"The murder scenes in the movie were very graphic. They grossed me out".

The 'o' in 'gross' is pronounced like the 'o' in 'so', 'no' and 'go'. The main stress is on the word 'out'.

Very educational, I guess they have to learn somewhere so when they get to the US they know what they are talking about.

Cyclone Laila and Our New A/C Unit

Get yourself a cup of coffee or a cold drink or whatever you need, this one might take a while. Even before I came to India, Tom was telling me about this window a/c unit in the bedroom and how even though it cools the room down, it is so loud that he couldn't have it on when he was on the phone or watching tv. Even over an international phone line, I could hear the darn thing when he had it on and we were talking. So, when I get here I have to admit, yep, it's LOUD. It sounds like a jet engine running in the bedroom. We have to put the tv volume on 78 (no exaggeration) in order to hear the tv when the a/c is on. It's too hot to sit in there with it off, so we just crank up the volume and deal with it.



Tom has told Thomas (the landlord) about this problem on several occasions and finally Thomas decided to buy a new unit. Thomas called Tom this past Saturday and told him that the new unit would be delivered and installed on Sunday morning. On Sunday morning Tom gets a call from the delivery people who tell him they are not installing it that day, they are only delivering it. Tom calls Thomas, big round of phone calls back and forth, nothing is really resolved except that the delivery guy says he'll show up sometime on Sunday. We wait around on Sunday for several hours (because we are on IST (India Slow Time) or INT (India No Time), take your pick) and finally the guy calls and says he's in the area.



He shows up with this HUGE box, and I mean HUGE. He puts it in the living room and then there is this big issue because apparently Tom needs the original receipt but Thomas has it and Tom ends up having to write a letter to the delivery guy's boss stating that he has received the unit so the guy can leave.



On Monday the guy who is supposed to install the new unit shows up, takes one look, and says that it will cost Rs 2500 (about $57 USD) to redo the frame and install the new one because the new one is bigger than the exisiting one. This results in another round of phone calls between Tom and Thomas because Thomas was told that the new one would fit "no problem". Yeah, right! Even I could tell by the size of the box that this monster came in that it wasn't going to fit.



Thomas calls Tom back Monday evening and tells him that he has another guy coming over on Tuesday morning to take a look and see what he can do. So Tuesday morning we have to get up early to be waiting for this guy, which means that I have to be fully dressed so that I am not showing too much skin - CRAZY. The guy shows up with his little bag of tools and starts measuring the a/c in the box, the a/c in the wall, and the frame around the a/c in wall. He tells Tom that the only way it's going to fit is if they remove the existing frame, knock out some brick on the outside, build a new frame, and put the new a/c in but this is going to take TIME AND MONEY, of course. The guy leaves and Tom goes to work.



Tuesday evening Thomas calls Tom and tells him that the guy from Tuesday morning will be here Wednesday morning at 8:30 and he's going to get this a/c installed. Fine with me, I just want to get it over and done with. Tom and I have a nice dinner Tuesday night, we go to bed around midnight or so, noisy a/c blaring non-stop. I wake up at 3:00 am Wednesday morning to the power going off and this massive thunderstorm. It had been really cloudy all day Tuesday and I kept hoping it would rain so it would cool things down. I wake up enough to remember that I've left the sliding doors on the dining balcony and the kitchen door open. So I stagger out of the bedroom and am met by this blustering wind blowing all through the dining and kitchen. I finally get the doors closed and go back to bed, hoping that the power will come back on soon.



Tom and I are both in and out of sleep all night because the storm is so loud and it's SO F'N HOT that we can't sleep. Tom had set the alarm for 8 am so we could get up and be ready for the "a/c technician" but I was so sure that he wouldn't show up because of the rain. WRONG!! Thomas called Tom around 9 am and Tom told him that the guy hadn't shown up yet and that we had no power in the apartment. That's when Thomas told Tom about Cyclone Laila.....I guess if we bothered to watch the news we would have known about Cyclone Laila gearing up in the Bay of Bengal and heading straight for us. Kind of brings back memories of a certain "tropical depression" in Tegucigalpa, Honduras in May 2005.



Anyway, Thomas was calling to let him know that the guy was coming, the work had to be done today because the "a/c technician" was leaving on Thursday to go to his village to get married and he would be gone for two weeks. I cannot accurately describe the rain and wind except that it certainly was equal to any severe thunderstorm that we would have in the States, I just think that the wind might have been stronger on this one than we would get in a normal thunderstorm.



So, we get up...OH, THE POWER IS STILL OUT, get ourselves dressed, brush our teeth in the dark and right before the guy rings the bell the power comes back on. So the "a/c technician" and his "helper" come in and immediately set to work removing the existing a/c. Tom and I had stripped down the bed and moved it away from the wall, leaving just the mattresses on the frame and we covered it with an old sheet. The two guys get the old unit out fairly quickly, leaving a large gaping hole in the wall (just look at the pics and you'll get the gist), then they tell Tom they have to go get wood to make the frame or have the frame made or whatever. I had mentioned to Tom, regarding the a/c technician, "at least he speaks English" to which Tom replied "his broken English is worse than my broken Tamil" which basically meant Tom couldn't understand half of what the guy was saying.



They leave, Tom and I are sitting here enjoying our coffee, and then the storm really picks up and it is just blowing rain sideways. We run into the bedroom and the wind is blowing the rain straight the hole in the wall. So between the two us we managed to get both mattresses off the bedframe and into the other bedroom, and move the tv and other miscellaneous electronic equipment into the living room. By this time the bedroom is soaking wet, with mud and dirt and rain pouring in the hole. Finally, the two guys come back and I have to give them credit, they got that thing to fit and it works!




They leave, taking the old a/c unit with them, and Babu comes up to remove the HUGE box that the new unit was delivered in. Tom and I are left with the resulting mess. We get busy, and take advantage of the opportunity to totally clean the bedroom floor while everything is out of the room, poor Tom cleaned that floor on his hands and knees with a bucket and two rags. We got the bedroom put back together, I swept the entire living and dining floors and just when we finished....the power went out.....again. It had been out from 3 am - 10 am and had come back on for a couple of hours. This time we got no back-up power. So we sat around for a bit, hoping it would come back on, but no such luck. One thing about the storm is that it dropped the temp down to about 86F inside and that is soooo much more comfortable than 96-98F inside.



Tom finally had to go to work so he ended up taking the coldest shower that he's had since he's been here. The temp outside wasn't hot enough to get the water in the tank outside warm so that shower was ice-cold! Tom went to work around 2 pm and then I subjected myself to the ice-cold shower, all the while hoping that the power would come on....just for a bit....but hell, no.



The power finally came on at 4:30 pm, so I was able to post about the fabulous day Tom and I have had. So even though I spent basically the entire day without power, the floors are all clean, everything has been dusted, and it's only 86F inside the apartment! All in all, it could have been way worse!

A Few Funny Pics

This is an example of the "Man Love" that I have described in a previous post. Right after I took the pic the guy on the right put his arm around the guy in the middle but I missed that pic because Tom was trying to turn and he made me put the camera down so he could see. I'm trying to get more pics of "Man Love" but it's hard because we drive past them so quickly.

This is an armored truck.....SERIOUSLY. It's too funny because on the driver's side, which is the side you're looking at, the window is also caged and there is a small hole where the driver can stick his hand out. There is also a small hole in the back window but you can't see it in the pic. I asked Tom if the holes were for guns to stick out but he didn't know and I guess I won't speculate.

This is an "ULTRA DELUXE AIR BUS" but you couldn't pay me to ride this thing. I think "Air Bus" means that it is air-conditioned but the driver must not have had the air on because the windows were open when we passed it. I can only imagine the smell inside. I am fortunate that Tom has a car so I am not subjected to riding a smelly bus around Chennai when I want to go somewhere!

Babu the Caretaker

The apartment is in a large compound of many buildings, kind of like at home. The units are individually owned, like condos, and the owners either live in the unit or rent it out. Obviously, Tom is renting out this unit. Just for informational purposes, the cost to buy this place would be approximately $60,000 USD. I was totally shocked by the price but I guess real estate costs no matter what country you're in.

There is a caretaker of the complex, Babu, and he is paid a small sum monthly by the Homeowner's Association (the owners of the units pay monthly HOA dues just like we do in the States) to "caretake". What I've figured out so far is that he just kind of hangs around the place, making sure there is nothing funny going on, and he also is responsible for switching on the back-up power when the electricity goes. Let me explain "back-up power" as this is NOT a generator. Back-up power means that you get a light and a ceiling fan in the bedroom and dining area when the full power goes. It is better than no power at all, but still. The last couple of days we have been having major power issues and I personally think Babu has become a bit of a slacker because there are times that the back-up power doesn't come on at all.

Anyway, the other day I was sitting at the dining table and I kept smelling something burning. This isn't unusual because these people burn trash non-stop around here, but this was a different kind of smell. Then I noticed smoke rising up over our dining balcony so I got up to investigate. When I looked over I saw Babu down there cooking. These pics were taken on two different days, one day Babu was cooking and the next day his wife was cooking. Tom had told me that Babu was the caretaker and Babu's wife does some cleaning and such for people who can pay her. Babu and his wife sleep in a little alcove under the stairs leading up to our apartment and sometimes they are joined by their adult daughter who has two kids, and their other adult daughter who doesn't have any kids.

All of their possessions are kept in this little alcove under the stairs and all of their cooking stuff is kept on the side of our building, right under our dining balcony. So, the point of this post is: no matter how bad you think you've got it and how difficult life can be for us sometimes, at least we are not living under a stair alcove and cooking our food in a make-shift fire on the side of an apartment complex building. I don't even know how these people bathe or use the bathroom, I would guess that they just go in the street like everyone else does here. So we should all be grateful for what we have, even though sometimes we feel like we want more. At least we have a decent place to sleep and cook our food.

Pondicherry, Tamil Nadu, India

Tom and I decided that we had to at least take a weekend and DO SOMETHING while I'm India. There just isn't that much to do or see in Chennai, it is not a tourist hot-spot. So, we decided that a drive to Pondicherry for the weekend was something we could easily do that wouldn't be too expensive and wouldn't involve buying plane tickets. On Saturday, May 8 we left Chennai in the morning for the 2 1/2 drive south on the ECR (East Coast Road) to Pondicherry.



Pondicherry is the former capital of French India and the heyday of Pondicherry dates from the arrival of the French governor Dupleix, who accepted the governorship in 1742 and immediately set about rebuilding a town decimated by its former British occupants. It was he who instituted the street plan of a central grid encircled by a broad oblong boulevard, bisected north to south by a canal.



Pondicherry was relinquished by the French in 1954 and became the headquarters of the Union Territory of Pondicherry. Pondicherry still retains its French history with French road names (every street is Rue whatever) and policemen in De Gaulle-style kepis, not to mention hearing French spoken in the streets. There are many Europeans staying long-term in Pondicherry and many people who have come on a spiritual quest to Sri Aurobindo Ashram.



Pondicherry is right on the Bay of Bengal with a nice and relatively clean shoreline. Much of this area was destroyed by the tsunami in 2004 but was quickly rebuilt, although there are still signs of how bad the damage really was.



The best thing for me about Pondicherry was the food. We arrived on Saturday early afternoon and after a siesta in our room at the Hotel du Parc, went out in search of dinner. Our trusty "Rough Guide to India" book once again led us to all the right places. Saturday night dinner was at Satsanga, where we feasted on Tzatziki (a dip of yogurt, cucumber, and garlic) with garlic bread, mashed potatoes (how they made the mashed potatoes so tasty without sour cream I will never know), french fries, and......STEAK. I had the filet with mushroom cream sauce and Tom had the filet with garlic butter and parsley sauce. So fabulous!!



After dinner Saturday night we went to the Goubert Salai, the beachside promenade, where we walked a little bit and then sat on the rocks and watched the tide come in. The coolness of the sea spray was so refreshing after the sweltering heat and humidity of the day.



Sunday morning we walked down the street to Ananda Bhavan Sweets for some of the best coffee I have ever had. Then we dressed for the day and went to Le Club for Sunday brunch. We had the basic breakfast: eggs, toast, juice, and coffee but for some reason it was so good!



After breakfast we checked out of the hotel and spent the rest of the morning driving around Pondicherry. It would have been really nice if we could have walked around Pondicherry but the heat and humidity is almost debilitating so walking was out of the question. We did get out of the car briefly back at the Goubert Salai so that I could get pics of the Bay of Bengal in the daylight. We watched all of the kids swimming at the beach area and tried to ignore the stares of the people as I was the ONLY white person among probably 75 or more Indians.



We decided to have lunch at La Terrasse, again recommended by our trusted guide book. We had the mixed vegetable salad, which was sliced cucumbers, tomatoes, and carrot with a wonderful garlic vinaigrette (they don't have lettuce in India), a bowl of sweet corn chicken soup (I have only had this in India and it is the BEST soup), and a wood-fired prawn pizza. Out of this world!!



After lunch we were on the road back to Chennai. I have posted lots of pictures of the Pondicherry weekend on my Facebook page.

Man Love in India

Okay, one of the things about India that is kind of strange is the way men, teenagers, and boys practice PDA. Tom and I just call it "Man Love" or "Boy Love", like we'll be out somewhere and Tom will say "Lots of Man Love going on over there". There is no concept of homosexuality in India, this just isn't accepted here and any kind of homosexuality is strictly forbidden and never discussed if it happens. BUT, all over India you will see males walking down the street holding hands, arms wrapped around each other, hanging all over each other ALWAYS.
It is not acceptable for a male/female couple to hold hands in public, really it's not acceptable for a male/female couple to touch in public. I am constantly checking myself when we are out in public to make sure that I don't grab Tom's hand or touch his back or whatever when we are out shopping.
Tom and I have had many conversations regarding homosexuality in India and he is in total denial that it happens....until today. The piece of newspaper that the ironwallah stuck in his shirt had a portion of the classifieds. Below is some of it:

Under the "Health Club/Physical Fitness" section:
MENZSPA Male to Male (Hotel, Centre) Hi-profile youngsters Total Relaxation Any Time

So, I guess it is okay to advertise children for sale?? I was totally shocked by this and so was Tom.

MALE exclusive massage complete relaxation M2M, full satisfaction head 2 toe (hotels/doorstep only)

MALE 2 Male Massage total Relaxation and Satisfaction always at Ur Service

NEVER BEFORE SEEN FANTASY MEN MASSEUR WAITING FOR GIVE YOU SPECIAL SERVICE

U Reach me, this is the most appropriate way to get feel relaxed

Okay, so some of that is pretty funny and I typed it exactly the way it was written in the classifieds. Tom was just cracking up and said that he had no idea there was any kind of Male2Male anything going on in India. I have been telling him forever that there is no way all of this Man Love is just friendly affection!

To be fair, there is a section for "Party Entertainers" and I've selected the two best ones:

"MILAN_FRIENDSHIP" Cont. for Friendship+Earn with Bold, Hot, COOPERATIVE, Models, COLLEGE GIRLS

THE Great Tamil Entmn't Network is Calling u to Rejuice ur Life, Meet Hi Society Matured Females, Make Friendship N Dating earn handsome amount (Not 4 unemployed N student)

I think I am going to start paying more attention to the pages of newspaper that fall out of Tom's shirts when he brings them back from the ironwallah. Those classifieds just cracked me up!