I want to share with you a picture of my driver here in India. This is Lake.
Lake is the 3rd driver i've had and I'm doing everything I can to keep him :). People drive very fast and chaotic here but Lake is sensible and a very good driver. Driving in India is an expirence itself. He also has one of the only undented and new cars in the country... ha-ha! His car is also the only one i've seen with leather interior.
Sunday was National Friendship Day in India and everyone is encouraged to celebrate with their friends. Gulshan had a friend fly down from New Delhi and stay the weekend. The two of them invited me to dinner on Sunday night which was a great experience. We ate at a restaurant named Tabala and had Salad Poppers, Basmati Rice, and KingFisher Beer. The weather was great when we went into the restraunt however, when we were ready to head home, it was flooding across many parts of India and Hyderabad had extreme rain and mild flooding in the streets. We would have to wait close to 30 minutes for a cab and since we were impatient, we waved down an Auto Rickshaw (The little yellow carts in the “Down Town” images below). It was a neat ride but I was soaked by the time we arrived at the hotel. Cars passing a Rickshaw in a flood is a bit like being in a water fight against a firehose and you know who lost!
I plan to head downtown tomorrow as I need to open an account here in India and start transitioning from guest to resident. The process of changing cultures hasn’t been easy but it hasn’t been to difficult either. There are a lot of differences but common sense almost always seems to lead to good decisions. It also helps to have a friend from the region working the same job!
I miss Lisa and the kids a lot but having video conferencing setup in advance has made a world of difference. If any of you plan to travel abroad without your family, I recommend setting up a Web Cam on your laptop and home PC using either Windows Live Messenger or Skype. Both are free for PC to PC calls and easy to use and I can't imagine how hard this would be without seeing them twice a day.
Finally, four months seemed like a short time last month when I accepted the assignment but as the days bleed away here I’m reminded of how very long 4 months really is. With out the web cams, I think it would be very easy to get home sick in such a completely new culture.
Here is how Lisa has said she gauges the time.
August 31st (ofr there about) – Kids start school
September 3rd – Labor Day vacation
October 6th – Jason Fly’s Home (1 week vacation)
-> 1/2 Way Point of the assignment
65 days to go for the 1/2 way point!
[ add comment ] | permalink |
( 2.8 / 38 )Back Next
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 |
Calendar
