Views from the Hotel

---

Thursday was the first time I had time to get some shots of the hotel in the day light. Granted not many but we were heading in to the office quite early. Plus I was a little disoriented. Of all things my room does not have an alarm clock and I had asked for a wake up call 30 minutes late. That coupled with a couple emails that pissed me off derailed my morning so I was late.

Generally sleeping well and not affected by the jet lag. If anything I'm staying up longer, I've turned into a night owl. This blog is a couple days late but I'm writing it after midnight.

The one observation I keep making is the rift between rich and poor. It's like two societies that occupy the same space but don't interact. India has a cast system but there are obviously some people with money (middleclass types) and those without. What is hard to fathom are how people ignore the plight of other people when it is so "in your face". That and the trash is everywhere. The middle class people just seem to ignore it and not talk about it. Weird.

This is Thursday so Tray and I ditch Maria. She is heading to Bangalore to meet up with another JPMC office. Tray and I had planned to leave work early and chill but we both ended up on calls with KC folk late here and early there. After getting back quite late we had dinner at "Spices". It is probably the best restaurant yet. We both had a shrimp and scallop stir fry and sushi roll appetizer. Had some good conversation over a bottle of Reisling. Turns out Tray and I have more in common than we thought and feel we can push initiatives better at the office if we work together more.

Both of us are struggling with KC and Mumbai teams. The Mumbai people are very eager and willing, fun even. KC people are more jaded and unhappy almost. The Mumbai people from different teams have been stuck together without much leadership. They have organized grass roots training sessions for each other to help them understand the business and each other. KC teams are very silo'ed and operate with blinders on. Mumbai teams have even gel'ed with a completely different division (IMA) who were hired at roughly the same time.

Another example...Tray and I got invited to a birthday that happened to be having for Sachin. They bought a shirt and each autographed it. They had cake and actually made the time to go to the cafeteria to enjoy it with him. They also smeared it on his face for fun!

Another example...the Mumbai team has a foos ball table and you can see them taking breaks throughout the day not to run errands or smoke, they actually take breaks as teams and play each other in foos ball. I'm a little jealous of the atmosphere and the time they have to actually enjoy work.

---

Photos

View out of the executive lounge
Free breakfast, pretty good food. Some traditional things like doughnuts but some Indian foods. I try to avoid it so I don't blimp out.

Exec Lounge
This is the lounge itself. Pretty nice for us.

Roof top gardens
Above the lobby/restaurant area are roof top gardens. Not very fancy but gloriously green compared to winter in KC. Can't see it but there is a net keeping birds off.

Quick little trip outside
These are a couple shots of the grounds outside the back of the hotel. Green and cool statues.

Comments

[Kendra]

Very impressive pictures of the hotel in the daylight. Everything looks really beautiful there. I'm jealous :) Those roof top gardens are sure a very neat idea.