India or Bust - Day 1-2 (Trip 1 - 10.11-12.2008)

I woke up on Friday morning in a frenzy. I thought I had allowed myself enough time to get everything done, but as usual this was not the case. My cab showed up at 9am and my flight was to depart to San Fran @ 10:30am. I made it on time. United totally screwed me on one of my bags being overweight. At first I was told it was going to be $381. Wth? Then the counter clerk realized she was charging me for the whole trip instead of just to San Fran. It should have only been $50 but since I had checked two bags (even though only one of them was overweight) they charged me $125. Stupid really, but how can one come on a trip for a month and not over pack?

Duck fan! Goodbye from the Eugene airport.

So, I met my co-worker Allen at the airport and we flew to San Francisco. Since I wasn't able to pick up a power converter from Best Buy the night before I headed straight to Brookstone as soon as I got off the plane. I got a pretty cool 7 piece converter that will work virtually anywhere in the world, warranty included, for less than $50. Sweet! Now it was off for food. Allen and I just got some food from a small café and we wandered over to a bar to get a beer. I had a Mediterranean feast complete with falafel, hummus, and pita......YUMM!

Our flight out of San Fran was delayed for an our and a half due to wind. In Frankfurt I only had a two hour delay so I was pretty worried. I did manage to sleep for a good chunk of the flight. A dinner meal was served and I opted for the pasta. After all, who wants to eat Meatloaf on a plane? It doesn't look too appetizing, but it was. It was a mixture of stuffed shells, cannoli, and something else. I don't know. It had been ages since I received anything but pretzels or peanuts on a flight so I wasn't going to complain. One of the in flight movies I enjoyed was Get Smart with Steve Carell...HILARIOUS! At one point I realized I still had four more hours before I would reach Frankfurt and that was when I decided to pop my first Ambien. I actually opted to only take a half.

Smoking kills...



I slept for a good chunk of the 9 hour flight. Naturally, the food woke me up. I got some chicken thing that wasn’t very tasty, but nonetheless it was food. By this point the flight was getting to me. The trusty little neck pillow Josh had leant me was not enough to do it. I wanted off the plane…

 

I later woke when they were handing out breakfast. It was a turkey and cheese sandwich and a fruit cup. Sorry no pic for that one.

We landed in Frankfurt around 11am and at 11:15am we were like a bunch of cattle scurrying off the plane. I had to make it from Gate A to C, which entailed riding a tram, before my flight to Bangalore departed at 11:50am. Allen was way behind me so I decided just to book it instead of waiting. Rude I know, but I knew he was fully capable of running on his own. I made it to security 10 minutes before departure time. Shortly after, Allen showed. We were both panting and pretty nervous. I really didn't want to spend the night in Frankfurt. Once we made it through security we learned that we now had to go to C16 instead of C14, which was of course farther away. Allen and I ran through that damn airport like you wouldn’t believe. We made it just as they were closing the airplane door. Thankfully they had waited for us. Once aboard we both breathed a sigh of relief. We were a little delayed in Frankfurt due to fog and I think at some point I dozed off. I woke up to lunch being served. It was teriyaki chicken. I didn’t get a shot of that meal. After the meal I learned that alcoholic beverages were complimentary. Hehee…

I landed in Bangalore around 12:30am. There was this explosion of emotions and excitement coupled with sensory overload when I first stepped foot into the newly built airport. Went through customs, and realized it really wasn’t that bad. As soon as I turned the corner I saw a familiar face. It was Judy, one of the supervisors from work. We stepped outside and my hair turned into a giant poofball with the humidity. The driver from our hotel gathered our stuff and loaded us into the vehicle. Since it was so early there wasn’t much traffic out, but there were still lots of horns. Apparently that is how you tell someone to move over. There were areas that had three lanes of traffic and each lane had a different speed limit posted. I don’t really think the lanes mattered much. There were more like guidelines anyways. Our driver spent the majority of the time in the middle of one. A few times I thought someone was going to crash into us or someone else, but I guess it is normal. Organized chaos.

It was dark so I couldn’t really see a lot. I did notice a large amount of wild dogs roaming the streets though. A lot of cars and buses were decorated with flowers too. I saw some auto rickshaws and some hitchhikers. Tomorrow I will get to see more….

Once we got to the hotel we had the royal treatment. Top of the line friendliness. I got semi-settled into my room and joined the group for a meal at the 24 hour Café Mosaic. OMG I FN LOVE Indian food. I had the masala chole with some fried Indian puff bread. It was not too spicy, but MAN was that a little explosion of tastiness in my mouth. I cannot get over how good the meal was and I am looking forward to trying everything while I am here.

If you had just been traveling for 28 hours you’d look like shit too…

 

 

Anyhoo, it is now almost 5am. I’m really not tired so I think I need to take something to get me there. It is only day one and I am missing my girl terribly. I miss my fam and friends too. I did learn that I do have cell phone service here and can get texts and calls. I am not sure if it charges anything on the US end though. For some reason I can’t send anything back. I do have an International calling card and some teleconference numbers that I can use while I am here. The best way to reach me would be on this thing or Yahoo IM.

I am going to call it a night with the first blog of India. Namaste!

First video I took in Bangalore. It's my Home for a Month. Feeling really blessed to have this opportunity. :)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x-uiL_xiH18&list=TLgXl8Mi5zuuA0prQ_tUzTGujcNQwLKmoK