Whitefield Road, Bangalore

3:30 AM - wide awake. Get up, brush teeth, pee, head back to bed to try to sleep again. 7:30 AM now, waking up to make coffee and oatmeal for breakfast - bad idea, forgot Mehnoush doesn't ever eat in the morning. Oh well, I tried to be nice, and had a double bowl myself!

Darn it - I’ve been connecting in to work quite a bit the past two days, even though I’m supposed to be on vacation here now. Mehnoush is busy at her job so I’m here alone in the day; she just told me last night that she’ll have to work both days this weekend. I may try to find a local birdwatching club or something so that I can do the things that would bore her to death since she is busy. And I can wear all my camera equipment in its geeky hang-on-the-belt holster without her commenting on it too! Oh well, I guess I look on the bright side of having a workaholic wife!

I am still fascinated with the construction zone behind the house. I have binoculars which can reach the faces where my camera cannot. The best I can do for photos is an overview shot, my telephoto cannot quite get in that far. The women laugh a lot amongst each other and their faces show the concentration as they walk through the construction zone, climbing over the steel rebar constructions left lying in the way (it would take 5 minutes to move them if only someone would do this!), up and down the paths worn in the piled up dirt and gravel. Watching them balance the wet concrete on their head while slipping down a four foot high pile and jumping over the steel is really something. Their protective equipment (besides the yellow hard-hat) also includes one huge, bright orange rubber glove to protect the skin from the lime of the concrete. Occasionally, you’ll see several feet of juice fly from their mouths, backlit in the evening sun - some must be chewing something like tobacco (paan, perhaps?). After they make the drop into the hands of the concrete supervisor, the empty pan is banged once on the ground to clean it and it flies back on top of the head for the walk back to the concrete mixer. I shot a movie on the digicam and will try to get it on the website too. Sitting down now, in the shade next to the mixing machine as the men crank it up for a new batch - they grin and laugh with each other, cough some, covering faces with parts of the sari, helmets turned upside down and standing on their support columns in the dirt.

The men seem more reserved and aren’t all buddy-buddy as they work. They seem to have the easier jobs for the most part: building the forms to hold the concrete out of wood, wiring together the rebar for the reinforcement, putting up scaffolding on some of the columns now that they are tall enough to require it, telling the women where to point their head as they dump the newest load. However, there is one group of guys who are also in the earth-moving business - but not concrete, just dirt excavated from the next set of footers. This particular group also doesn’t appear to be wearing any pants. More like a male version of the sari wrapped around their legs, although not as colorful. These men work individually, whereas the women are definitely a team, sometimes trading off or working as a relay race might.

Our maid, Soulpadia (as best I can spell it) comes in every day to sweep and mop the floors, and also do the dishes. She did laundry as well, until Mehnoush had too many things ruined - now we send the ones we don’t care about out, and do the rest ourself. It takes her a little more than an hour using a low hand broom that looks like a horse’s tail which requires bending double to use, then followed by an old-fashioned mop (no Pledge-wipe mops here yet!). She does two stories and two bathrooms, plus the kitchen and then also does the other Misys employees who live in this same complex... What’s that, you say? Oh, I haven’t told you about the housing area we live in yet? Okay then... here goes:

This is a three-story unit set back off of Whitefield Road (a major road outside of Bangalore) by maybe a half-mile. The industrial park ITP is nearby, but the apartments are located down a tiny rural road going through fields - which I suspect are not going to be there much longer at the current rate of construction! The main door enters off a courtyard surrounded by similar units - parking garage is below them all. The pool is a brilliant blue among low greenery and carefully landscaped shrubs; red tile roofs of the buildings contrast with the cream-colored stucco walls and black ironwork railings and fences - there was a crew in yesterday which either unplanted palm trees, or else they planted them and changed their minds and took them away again! I’m not sure which, but it was very confusing! As you enter our condo, to the left is the entertainment center - a few stuffed chairs and a sofa with a small TV. Straight ahead is a dining area, and then the long, narrow kitchen equipped with a propane stove, refrigerator, microwave, coffeepot, etc. The utensils are all a bit funny - more like they were stamped out of sheet aluminum and are a bit flat. The kitchen is very bright and cheery because two walls are all windows. Adjoining the dining room is the first floor bedroom with a bath and a balcony (overlooking the construction site to the south that you’ve heard way too much about). To the right in the main room, the open black marble staircase heads up to the office and master bedroom floor: two bedrooms, two baths, another balcony and a huge office space. The stairs continue up to the third floor screen room, which opens onto the courtyard and pool below - the back of which is a doorway leading to the roof balcony which seems to be shared with the apartment next door.

The main floors throughout are polished marble, with some pergo “wood” in some of the bedrooms and ceramic tile in the baths. The walls are definitely not sheetrock - hard as stone, so probably plaster over concrete block? There are no carpets or wall hangings to soften the place since it’s not really ours - so it is very, very echoey (the reverb is turned to 10 on the amp), which makes it very interesting to play the flute here - and everyone around can hear because the place is so wide open. There is no A/C - and actually, now that I look around, no heat either. We haven’t need anything at all since the weather is absolutely gorgeous: mid 70’s with no humidity in the day, maybe just a bit cooler at night. In the sun, it can get hot, but the windows are all protected by overhanging balconies so that doesn’t seem to affect the house much. And the stone floors really keep their cool. One drawback with all the open air access is that the dust and dirt do come in - it’s a good thing that Soulpadia comes every day, since the floor leaves your feet dark and dusty again by the next morning. Regardless, this is a very impressive building and seems quite deluxe to my old midwestern upbringing.

I am not sure what is in store for tonight... so will close now and finish up the entry tomorrow.

Whitefield Road, Bangalore

Tuesday itself: well, obviously I’ve done a bit of writing, eh (Most of Monday’s entry was written this morning)? I’ve taken both the digital and my film cameras and taken photos of the construction zone behind the house - constant work is going on there, and boy would OSHA not be pleased! Most people are barefoot, and lunch for one crew was brought in by a woman and her baby daughter strapped to her side. The work force is about half women - mostly doing the heavy carrying and lifting, moving sand, gravel, and wet concrete around on their heads in large, flat pans. They are wearing hard hats though, equipped with a special circular column to hold the pan. The timeless image of a heavily-laden porter comes to mind - but instead of the bundled goods, substitute a plate of concrete or sand or dirt balanced (no hands, usually) on top of the bright yellow safety hat. Many are barefoot, and the others wear flip-flops or chappals. It seems quite strange to see these workers, wearing beautifully colored silk saris and wraps, looking like they could have come from hundreds of years ago, walking out in the dirt and concrete dust of a modern construction site. I feel like I might come from a different planet - how on earth is this work done in the US? I honestly don’t know - I assumed that a back hoe would dig the foundation holes and a big truck would drive up and pour the concrete in. The women move constantly, back and forth, negotiating narrow the pathways among the huge holes for the footings and piles of gravel and sand and displaced dirt. Occasionally a welcome break in the shade of a earthen berm, while they wait for the men who are running the concrete mixing machine to catch up with them, or fine-tune the mix by adding more water or sand. There goes the dark forest-green sari, with a light pink top; here’s one in brilliant blue, with black and gold trim; another with varying shades of light pink and green trim; olive green with gold trim and black sleeves: stately, elegant, beautiful, strong, patient, cheerful... all those adjectives apply.

Others, men mostly, are wrapping the existing columns of cement and rebar with burlap and soaking them. These were evidently poured yesterday and the day before, about 6 to 7 feet at a time, and must be kept damp to ensure it cures properly in the sun. You can see where each column section joins the previous day by the differing color of concrete - whiter below, darker grey on top, and this followed by more men propped up there and nailing today’s wooden forms onto the column so that another 10 feet can be poured. Another crew is assembling the rebar - some *serious* stuff, over 1” diameter iron. I did this exact job on a worksite in Cuba, but our rebar was less than 1/2” - these guys have it propped up on a stand made of more rebar, putting 6 long pieces in place and putting rectangles of more iron around, and wiring it all together. They’ve made a lot of progress today alone as there are many more columns standing.

Mehnoush had time to come home for lunch and that was really nice! We had the leftovers from the Samarkand last night, plus a container of food from one of her colleagues - oh, man... there’s nothing like home cooked Indian food: a really rich chopped-up chicken curry, super flavorful but not spicy-hot at all. The bones in the chicken pieces were broken open with the cleaver and I think that the marrow was adding a TON of flavor. And definitely some pieces still had some of the organs like liver or gizzards as well, intensifying the flavor. You may think it isn’t sounding good, but I ate every bit of it and wiped the bowl - just intensely packed with the seasonings Whatever Indian cooks use, it makes you simply not be able to stop eating - tell us, Priti, what is the secret?! I guess it’s obvious that I am not going pure-veg on this trip, the way I did in 1997...

I spotted my first bird of the trip playing around in the courtyard today - a large pied wagtail: bigger than a robin, completely black and white with bold patterns and more streamlined as well, but acting rather similar - hopping across the lawn looking for food. Except that I could tell it was a “wagtail” of some sort: every step, the tail would bounce up and down! There’s a few of them around and the book says there are pretty common - I imagine it’s like someone from here getting excited about the robin back in the US.

Mehnoush came home around 7:30, when I was just attempting to use Nortel’s MCS soft telephone client across the 128kbps link to dial in to a conference call in RTP chaired by my colleague Vinya just across town! What a coincidence! I only had a couple comments for the review, and when I was told that my phone connection was generating a lot of noise, I took that as an opportunity to flee. I had worked a little too much today, dialling in and answering e-mail queries. This week is supposed to be a vacation!

We drove about halfway into downtown Bangalore for dinner at a pure-veg Italian restaurant - go figure! Pasta alla carbone with no meat. Pasta Bolognaise with a tofu sauce. Some combinations sounded odd, others good. A creamy veggie soup to start, some garlic bread, and a spicy tomato pizza were all good. Unfortunately, by this time, jet lag was seriously kicking in for me and I was mostly asleep! We got back around 9pm and I barely had time to position myself so that I would land on the bed when I fell over... out like a light.

Whitefield Road, Bangalore, India

(written on Tuesday)...The flight arrived on time early Monday morning, around 1 AM. Mehnoush and Babu, her driver, were waiting there to pick me up. I wound up being the last one out through the baggage claim because someone had taken one of my suitcases off the line and stacked it with a bunch of others off to the side. I looked through that stack when I first disembarked, but missed it somehow, so I waited through everyone else’s’ bags until all were gone - then I saw my lonely old bag listing against the wall - it’s missing one foot, so it always seems bent over like it’s tired of travelling.

Slept quite well that night, and woke up around 9 or 10 on Monday. Breakfast was roti and peanut butter and coffee; I also managed to connect via Contivity and VNC in to work and to home very easily on the PC. Mehnoush has a DSL line in the apartment: top speed, 128kbps! Oh well, it’s better than nothing. Babu came to pick us up at 11 since Mehnoush had taken the day off to go exploring with me.

We first drove about 5 minutes to Mehnoush’s work site in International Technology Park (ITP) and drove around the building. It looked nice, but was just a quick tour. Three main high-rises make up this park. Next we set off to find my worksite at Infosys in Electronic City. This took some driving, about 40 minutes I would say.

For those of you not familiar with driving in India or other parts of the world, I’ll describe the journey - it seems that pandemonium is pervasive throughout both major cities I’ve visited, since not much had changed since my trip to Mumbai in 1997! We only hit one person, an middle-aged guy on a small motorcycle, and since he stood up immediately we gunned the car into a conveniently open lane and sped away. I think the only reason we hit him is because Babu was distracted by the other motorcycle which had been run over by a large Tata truck and this was now completely blocking the road. That bike also seemed to be okay - we arrived at the intersection as the irate biker pulled his machine out from under the trunk, wheeled it to the front and defiantly set it up on its kickstand blocking the truck’s path until the police could arrive. Lots of shouting and rude gestures were accompanying all this, so clearly nothing was broken! Anyway, it was while we were wheedling our way into the left lanes so we could pass the truck/motorcycle altercation when the other bike tried to cut in front of us from the left and bounced off the passenger quarter panel as Babu stopped quickly, but not quite soon enough. It really was the bikers fault I’m sure since he ran right into us, but still it was interesting how no one seemed interested in sticking around.

In general, traffic seems divided into 4 major categories: auto-rickshaws (the three-wheeled, 2-stroke or 4-stroke powered taxies), motorcycles and scooters, small cars, and huge trucks handpainted in garish cyan, green and orange colors (“Horn OK Please” painted brightly on their rear bumpers). The horn is ubiquitous and is mandatory equipment on all vehicles: brakes, mirrors, lights are all optional. I love the ones that emit a continuous wail - they sound like high-powered cell phones! Air pollution is not as bad as it was in Mumbai/Borivli, although if you get stuck behind a truck (pretty much guaranteed for much of any journey, actually) you will think that the air here is comprised primarily of diesel fumes and blue smoke. Autos are also really nasty polluters with their simple engines and no environmental restrictions. However, they are a must on these streets - busses are few and far between and quite crowded and I’m sure that autos can snake their way between other vehicles and are much more efficient travel for sure.

The concept of “lane” is very flexible here - fortunately, most of the main roads do have a small concrete divider separating the primary directions! Babu only ignored this once, when he was stuck trying to make a right turn (cross-traffic here, remember) and had to straddle the lane divider for a couple hundred yards in order to escape. Our car is quite small, so I was a bit concerned we would rip something important out of the transmission or exhaust system, but all seemed well and I heard no scraping. Anyway, once in your own tributary, there may be 2, 3, 4 or more lanes going mostly the same direction, depending on if you’re sharing the road with trucks, autos or motos. The most interesting is when two trucks are side-by-side, and all the motos try to make good time and squeeze between them! Anurag suggested that I get a motorcycle as a very efficient means of transport to the office, but I think I feel much safer while hang gliding (actually, I’m *sure* I’m much safer while hang gliding!).

Anyway, remember where this journey started? We were on our way to the Infosys campus and now we have arrived. There is a huge signboard listing all the companies in Electronics City, but I think that Infosys is the dominant presence here and it was quite easy to find. My colleague Vinya had sent her extension and cell phone numbers by e-mail so as we pulled up, we gave her a quick call. Soon, four folks that I had worked with and known in the past were down the security gate to welcome us to the campus: Vinya Shetty, Anurag Prakash, Senthil Kumar, and Ranjit Abraham. I was a bit dismayed to notice that *everyone* I saw was wearing dress clothes - shirt and tie with slacks and dress shoes! Uh oh... as it turns out, Monday and Tuesdays are formal days where a tie is required. Very different from the usual Nortel atmosphere in RTP!

After being photographed for badges by security (you thought that Nortel in RTP was tight now, here even the visitors had to have photo-ID badges!), we walked through the campus on a bit of a tour: there are 10,000 employees on this site (their corporate headquarters)! There are over 45 numbered buildings, some of them business offices and others labs; most are modern, but there is one section they call the “historical district” which has a few elderly looking office buildings - very quaint amidst all the ultramodern facades. One circular, domed building is the library, where employees have access to many technical journals and any reference materials needed by a project can be requested there. At the far end of the campus is the health club and recreation area: what looked like about 40 snooker and pool tables lined up in two rows, table-tennis, a basketball court, even a volleyball court (not sand, but outdoors all the same). They have a gym somewhere in there too, I guess, and a large swimming pool - all this opens to employees at 5:30 PM and I think Anurag said the monthly change was 400 or 500 rupees (about $10) - it’s also open all day Saturday and is a very good deal compared to outside health clubs in the city.

We walked through and around at least 4 different canteens (cafeterias) serving different kinds of food: north indian, south indian, chinese, western - and Mehnoush and I were treated to lunch by my colleagues at the last one, the non-Indian one. The consensus was that I should be careful of my stomach the first few days and not eat spicy food! Oh well... we had a veg curry - kind of a chinese-ish dish, over rice. I was careful not to have the raw salad that came with it; I guess it’s best not to take any chances just yet. A foreigner has to worry about strange bugs in uncooked raw food, so fresh veggies and salads are out of the question for awhile.
We stopped in the building where the team which works most closely on my product sits, met Rajesh the manager and saw Sujesh Nair on his way out (a person I’ve worked with on and off over the past few years but had never met). It was great to catch up with some folks there and get prepped for starting next week.

From Infosys, we headed to the fancy shopping district of town: the Van Heusen store and the Bangalore Center in an attempt to find me some dress shirts which fit. Not a chance. The only one with sleeves that were long enough was a size 47 and had a 19.5” neck! We are now on a quest for a tailor to sew me some shirts that fit by next week so that I can go to work without having to hide under my desk! We did buy a couple silk ties, about $18 each, that will hopefully go well with whatever shirts I find.

After shopping, it was now about 4 pm and Mehnoush has been waiting for me to arrive in India to go to the Leela Palace hotel for High Tea. How very British! Anyway, we arrived in this very lush and almost Persian-style architecture hotel and sit in a dark, leathery room where they brought us a nice assortment of tiny sandwiches and pastries - and good tea, of course. Darjeeling or Assam. I tried them both, remembering that I like Assam better the last time: it’s a bit darker and more flavorful than the Darjeeling was. Enjoyed that, and afterward we walked around the hotel and its adjoining shops - very touristy and upscale: cashmere, jewels, silks, silver, and the like. A beautiful grounds and landscaping done there.

Mehnoush has already taken some fabrics in to a “designer” recommended by some friends and we had to pick up several of the finished items Monday as well. KRSNA is her mark, Krishna is her name (I thought that was a guy’s name, but...). Anyway, Mehnoush has had to go back many times for the skirts and shirts to be adjusted - evidently the measuring didn’t take well - first too loose, then too tight. The fabrics are all silks she bought at various stores in the commercial district on an earlier expedition. Hopefully, the clothes will come out all right in the end, but yesterday she only accepted one more of the shirts and basically just gave up having her take it in any further. Unfortunately, the designer no longer does her own sewing, and I think her tailors just aren’t very good (what do I know, though!). Crooked seams and odd looking lines where things have been stitched aren’t her fault, but she does need to exercise some quality control I guess. The price is amazing though: enough pure silk for 2 skirts, 2 shirts, and a pair of pants cost about $70; and the total for the sewing and the design will be about the same! Krishna has the name of some men’s tailors so we’ll see if any of them can make me some shirts that fit later on this week. How exciting! Hand made shirts - I’ve never really had one that fit well before, so I hope I’m easier to get right than Mehnoush is.

After the tailor, we headed to dinner at Samarkand restaurant - an Afghani cuisine specialty place. We started with tomato soups, which were served in cups, and then ordered some chicken khoobideh kabab (minced chicken and chiles - very spicy!), a dal (lentil), and a nice paneer (homemade cheese) with tomatoes and chilies. They frown on bringing you a fork, but Mehnoush insisted. A couple of naans rounded out the meal, and we brought much of it home for lunch on Tuesday! The dal was some of the best I’ve ever had - described on the menu as loaded with cream and butter so no wonder! I felt the decor was pretty cheesy - imitation Afghani, the crepe paper torches on the walls and all the wait staff dressed up - but the food was great, and the menu unique in that it also gave many facts on the region and cuisine. After dinner we headed home and I crashed around midnight.

Somewhere Over Iran at 37,000 feet

I took off Saturday around 2pm Eastern from RDU, made it to DC, and was lucky enough to be quick to the Lufthansa counter to change my seats to the bulkhead or exit row for both legs coming up. Unfortunately on the first leg I had 2 other guys, all over 6’4” who had the same idea and we were all stuck in the same row. We were flanked on the left by four women traveling with 3 babies - and they were howling like crazy. The babies, I mean, not the women. No one got much sleep - you’d think that after 6 or 7 hours of screaming a kid would have lost his voice but noooo. Read most of “A Pilot’s Wife” on this flight; a plane crash/relationship story which might not be good in-flight entertainment for most people away from their spouses for an extended period of time. Enjoyed the story myself, though. Tried to sleep some, but was not too successful, perhaps managing 2 or 3 hours total.

Despite the fact that it was 8 AM local time, I had a Wessebier and hot cheese pretzel in the “Black Forest” snack bar in the Frankfurt airport - I’m pretty sure that Mehnoush and I ate here once too. Not nearly as good as Gabi’s mom’s breakfast the time that Scott Lynch and I had a long layover and were invited to their home here. Oh well, it was after midnight to me, and everyone else was drinking beer too - gotta love Germany for that! Started Herman Hesse’s Siddartha classic in the airport after finishing the first book.

The next leg was significantly more comfortable - not to mention interesting! This time I had a real exit row so could extend my legs. The weather was absolutely crystal clear once we were clear of Europe - crossing over Turkey and Iraq and Iran was absolutely stellar! The sun was just setting as we flew over the mountains in southeast Turkey or western Iran (I am guessing here, since the flight computer wasn’t on at this time displaying position - when it did turn on, it looked like we were near Tabriz. Anyway, the peaks and valleys were totally buried in snow, and the setting sun lit them on fire with that clear pink red of high altitude sunsets. I kept thinking “oh, missed that, should have gotten the cameras” and continued to think this for almost a half-hour as so many mountains rolled by below. I *really* wish I had gotten up to get it, but I kept thinking that it would end soon and I didn't want to get up and waste the chance to see it.

As darkness was setting in, we could see a long, thin, lake (I *think* it was too small to actually be the Caspian) with a single large mountain poking up on what should be the North end, on the east side. It would be interesting to do some terrain modeling to see if I can figure out where this actually was. It was truly beautiful to see. In this area, single lights were visible here and there in the valleys, with the occasional cluster of a community shining more brightly. Just as the last of the twilight disappeared completely, the moon rose, full and yellow and in another hour or so, I believe I saw the lights of Tehran away to the north - it was a huge city, anyway.

Finished Siddartha; found it to be a very interesting book written in the 1920’s - the story of the son of a Brahmin in India living at the time of the Gautama Buddah and how his life flows while seeking enlightenment. I assume it’s pure fiction, but it’s main conclusion is that attainment of Nirvana will come from within and not based on mindlessly following rituals or just doing as clerics, mystics, or priests say. One has to assume responsibility for one’s own nirvana, an external advisor cannot do it for you. Naturally, it takes our main character all his life to discover this, after trying every path first he finally listens to a river as it points out that there is no past and no future - the water is flowing, yet is everywhere at once. A fairly quick and easy read; may take longer to digest! Starting on Straub/King “Talisman” next - switch to horror from real literature, quite a shock to the system!