Advertisement
Published: August 8th 2010
The AirFrance flight from Paris to Bangalore was good. Minor bumps, etc. The plane was kind of rickety and made all sorts of creaking noises and the stewardess needs a new job. On the flight to Dublin my wine glass was kept full without me even needing to ask. On this flight, I spent 10 min trying to get the stewardess' attention and when she finally came over I raised my glass and asked for more wine. She took my glass and never returned. I had to flag down a different attendant. We went through this same procedure about 5 more times. And here I thought wine was their thing! Anyway, other than the judgmental stewardess the flight was good. It was business class so I got to lay down again!
So finally got to India around 1am, found the driver out of about 100 other drivers standing around telling me that they were who I was looking for and headed out to the apartment. Had a massive headache from the stress of flying I think so I passed out the min I got home. I had heard that Bangalore smelled like sewage. It doesn't. Some places do but it
isn't pervasive. My apartment isn't facing the river either and I think that's where the smell is originating so in that respect I got lucky. More to come on the apartment.
So much to say...to me it seems like this place is completely chaotic. The driving is unreal and super fun! I love riding in rickshaws. So far, it's my favorite thing to do! We have five drivers (unfortunately not rickshaws) and one drives like he's suicidal (and homicidal too I guess). They all drive insane but this guy even more so. I've only been here a week and can already tell when he's having a bad morning. He gets up to 100km in 2 seconds, goes 20ft and then slams on the breaks so we don't run into the back of a rickshaw, motorcycle, bike, pedestrian or gas truck. He drives into oncoming traffic to pass and will do anything to gain 5 extra ft of road real estate. I get carsick every time we get him. The GP have some sort of driving system but I haven't figured it out yet. They use the horn all the time and it seems to works in the sense that
there is no concept of lanes so I guess it helps alleviate blind spots. There are lines painted on the road but they're completely ignored. One thing on the millions of motorcycles: entire families will pile on. Only the driver is required to wear a helmet. And the women somehow ride these things side saddle, an utterly amazing feat.
Everything here is just so different. There are bright and shiny new office buildings right behind a sidewalk that looks like it had a run in with an earthquake. Right next to this beautiful building will be a village of lean-tos and shacks, each with its own satelite dish of course. And trash is EVERYWHERE! There are cows, donkeys, stray dogs, people and street vendors everywhere. I am amazed by this place.
I have two roommates and have already met some really great people from all over the US and the UK. We all went out Sat night and had a wild night. We started the night with a fight between our driver and 15 Indians over some minor parking issue at the ATM. We hadn't even gotten out of our apartment complex. The Indians (one of the 15
was a security guard and the other 14 came out of nowhere) tried to lock the gate and then ran up with a chain to lock our car's tires. One of the girls with us got out of the car and blocked him (she's 6'1'' and towered over everyone there). As the driver was arguing we ran to the gate and opened it back up and called to the driver to RUN! He jumped in and we were off James Bond style! We went to dinner at a sweet restaurant that reminded me of South Beach and then somewhere that looked like a mini Tao. We met some of our coworker's friends from India and Dubai and they took us to some underground club where we danced until 11pm! We shut that place down! I think it was underground because I've heard that dancing in Bangalore is illegal. Everything shuts down at 11pm btw. Ruling on 1st weekend in Bangalore: FUN! Only having Will here would have made it better.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.036s; Tpl: 0.011s; cc: 10; qc: 25; dbt: 0.0175s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
Loki
non-member comment
hay
Hay there nice written blogs still in Bangalore??