I'm Here!

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I'm safely here in India!

My flight to Chicago was uneventful and I slept through about half of it. I had about three hours to wander O'Hare before boarding my flight to Delhi. I got on the plane and settled into my seat with my luggage safely stowed in the overhead bin. I had just started reading my book when a guy came and sat next to me. About five minutes later, his mother showed up and ordered me out of my seat! She told me to go sit in her seat about 10 rows up. It was still an aisle seat so I didn't argue, but I said I wasn't moving my bag since there was clearly way more luggage on the plane than was going to fit. She wasn't happy, but at least she got my seat.

My new seat was fine and I got settled in there and continued reading. The pilot announced that we'd be delayed while an oxygen bottle was replaced. About 45 minutes later, the pilot announced that the bottle was actually fine - it was the regulator that needed to be replaced so we'd have to wait another 45-60 minutes, assuming that a new regulator could be located. Just about an hour later, we were finally ready to go and we took off two hours late.

The flight was 15 hours long, but thanks to pharmaceuticals provided by much appreciated friends (who shall remain nameless for obvious reasons), I had a great flight! I was quite relaxed during our maintanence delay and then ate dinner, watched two episodes of "The Office", popped 2/3 of an Ambien, put on my neck pillow, and slept for the next nine hours. The guy next to me had to use the restroom after I'd been asleep for about seven hours and he could barely get me to wake up to let him by. After my lengthy "nap", it was only three hours to Delhi.

There was a bit of excitement about 30 minutes before we landed. There was a woman who was seven months pregnant on the plane. She was flying to India to have her baby there, but for a few minutes, it looked like the baby might just be born in the air. The flight attendants were giving her cold compresses and fanning her, but it didn't seem to be working so they paged for a physician. In a very non-politically correct moment, I wondered what the odds were that, on a flight to Delhi, there was a physician on board? After the first four doctors showed up, they paged again and said that no further medical assistance was needed. Two of the doctors talked to the woman for a few minites and then had to take their seats as we were landing. The woman seemed to be fine as I got off the plane so hopefully it was just a false alarm.

After deplaning, it took me about an hour to get through Immigration. I was almost the last one off the plane since my bag ended up way behindme and I had to let everyone else go past before I could go back and claim it. Having successfully gotten my entry stamp without even a glance, I picked up my luggage and headed out to the wilds of the Arrivals area of the Indira Ghandi Airport. It's hard to describe the chaos, but I very quickly found my taxi driver holding up a sign with my name on it - a big relief! The driver took my luggage and handed me a package with a cell phone in it. He called Ashish and Ashish called me on the cell phone to be sure I was OK.

Within five minutes of leaving the airport, I saw the following which confirmed to me that I was definitely in India:

• two men peeing in the bushes
  
• a little kid running around with no pants on
  
• wandering cows
  

Just in case I wasn't 100%!s(MISSING)ure, my driver honked his horn incessently, even when there were no other cars in site.

My hotel was only 20 minutes away and my room was ready. I dumped my stuff and hit the sack.

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