India!!

The plane from SFO to Frankfurt was a typical international flight, at least for me. I had a center seat, but the other center was empty and I was able to spread out a bit. There was a lovely older gentlemen sitting next to me from Bulgaria. He was very courteous and considerate as he removed my tray and delivered glasses of water. We both read most of the time. I finished my Rabbit book and he was reading Cannery Row.

When I got to Frankfurt I had less than an hour to get to my Chennai flight and it was in a different terminal. I had to go through security again and all sorts of stuff that I didn’t expect, so I was kind of stressed. But I made it and I was greeted with a mass of people all trying to get on the plane at once. The second plane was high tech, with our own monitors. I watched a Hindi movie with subtitles, Raajneeti. And the food on this flight was really good! Gobi paneer masala for lunch and samosas for dinner – yum!

I tried to look out the window landing in Chennai, but it was pretty dark and stormy. I lined up to enter baggage claim and there were lots of people who pushed in front of me. I thought to mention to them that I was pretty sure their bags don’t come any faster if they push to the front of the line, but I just let them by. I waited a long time for my bag. When I finally spotted it, I threw my arms up in joy and exclaimed something that showed everybody how happy I was to see it. I managed to make everybody around me happy too, even though they were still waiting for their bags.

I walked out of the airport looking for my driver. There were a bunch of guys with signs and I walked past them because I couldn’t see my name. But as I went further I realized that my driver wasn’t there. So I went back to the first group of guys and asked them to let me thoroughly read their signs and we realized that many of them were holding them backwards or upside down. I got everybody sorted with their signs, but my driver wasn’t there.

So finally I walked all the way out to the parking lot and sure enough my co-volunteer, Lam, yelled out my name and then he took a picture of me. The driver was there too. And they carried my bags to the car. The parking lot was right there, no driving loop or anything. And people were walking all over. I even saw a circle of people around a fire on the side of the lot.

The drive home was through a lot of little streets lined with shops, some closed and some lit up with Christmas-type lights. There were a lot of barricades, piles of stuff and trash, tons of bikes parked all over the place, groups of people walking right on the road (and this is all at around midnight), cows eating from the trash piles, and dogs running loose everywhere. All this to the tune of tons of car honking. There were lightening flashes from far away going on constantly, but no rain. I’M IN INDIA!!

The shops are quite peculiar, just everything imaginable all right next to each other and all very small, like the size of our kitchen. Men’s fashion! right next to a TV shop. If the shop was open you could look right inside and see what’s going on. The guy in the TV shop had about 10 little TVs all turned on. Is he watching them? Is this shop even open at midnight? I wanted to take a ton of pictures, but I decided they really wouldn’t turn out.

My bungalow is on quiet street just off a main drag. I’m not sure what to think of it. It’s not particularly nice, like the kitchen is kind of gross and it has a hot plate for a stove. But my room is cozy and I have a terrace and a fan and this seems quite luxurious! There’s a small billiard table here and washing machines. And the internet works!!

I spent some time familiarizing myself with the bungalow and managed to get to sleep around 3am. It’s 7am now. I was woken up to bells for church and people singing at a temple two doors down at 6am. The temple reminds me of those little Latino churches on Valencia street that have services at night. Do you know those ones? I think I’m up for the day and I’ll try my best to push through without sleeping so that I’m really tired for tonight. Even though Monday is a holiday in the States, I will go to work at 8:30 am.

This is my house (that's my balcony):


This is my room:


Shops in my neighborhood: