Drivers

I have met the nicest people among my divers here. It is not always easy to communicate but as I mentioned before, it does not really matter.

The funniest and jumpiest driver so far is Vinpi. I had the pleasure to meet him cause I was late for my train; so I had to rent a driver from Delhi to Agra. The good soul was about my age, and almost exclusively used the words "Ma´am" and "Yes Ma´am" and "Ok Ma´am?".

I took him to the Taj Mahal, as he had never seen it and we both were impressed. I asked him to take my picture in front of the Taj, and we both were not that content with the result, because either the top of the building was missing, or the focus of the picture was the marble floor and me and the building in the far background. Anyway, he made me pose in front of everything in order to practise his digital photography skills. At the end of "our" trip, he was so happy and jolly to have made a none Indian friend and almost bursted from excitement when I promised to send him the pictures. When I eventually did, he called me up and sounded like Christmas, Holi, Diwali, birthday and end of Ramadan all in one.

There is Isma, the coordinator of all the Cosy Cab drivers in Hyderabad. He does an amazing job with getting all us expats where we want to go, sends us to tailors, hairdresses, pailors, pearl shops and to doctors as well. Erare humanum est. So when I had my encounter with viral fever or food poisoning, I asked for his advise and sure enough he sent me to the best private hospital in town. He reassured me that this doctor has healed so many people before and that I dont have to worry at all. Ansari, my favorite driver, took me there and when we confirmed the appointment at the reception, he asked me if I needed to see a gynaecologist, because that is the doc I had an appointment with. The new appointment was quickly scheduled.
The next time I wanted to go for a gyaencologist checkup, so I figured Isma is the expert with that and asked him to arrange an appointment. Gopa drove me there and it turned out that the appointment was made with the clinical psyochatrist. Although I am sure a check up with this doc would not have hurt, I insisted that I would prefer to see the gynaecologist. It was a tough one. The receptionist and Gopa were discussing my treatment in high volume, having Isma on the phone. However, my repeated sentence "I dont care what the doctors name is, I would like to see a gynaecologist" finally convinced the three men.

And of course, Good Karma in the shape of a man: Gopa. He takes big pride of being among the first employees of the company. His English is rudimentory, but we bond somehow. We start "talking" in Hindi, as he is the only one patient enough to listen to me. He laughs all the time and advised me the other day "moordrr not good" when I tried to smash a mosquito in the car. I was a little embarraed to be so insensitive to Hindu believes of reincarnation, but when he slaped the next mosquito in his hands a few min later, I realized that he was more concerned about the clean windows than about a life of the insect. I love that he has the OM sign and the swastika tatooed on his underarm.

The best of Gopa next to his cheerfullness is his helpfulness. He is deeply caring and also a little clumsy. So he puts the A/C to 3 when I am sneazing and coughing, maybe he thinks fresh air does a cold good... I ask him for a kleenex, and while driving on the city highway, he searches the car, only to find out he doesnt have any. He generiously offers me the wrinkled bight orange 40x40cm handkerchief, stained with oil and what not which he found in the driver door. He explode in laughter. He first does not understand and looks at me bewildered for a second. But as it does not really matter, he starts laughing hysterically, as if he had intended to make a joke. "I make comedy!" lol

Team Dinner

Thanks to the wide wisdom of team Sholay and my rapid and fiercefull whistle blowing (sorry, could not contribute more in the hindi songs and movies and Bollywood star charade) we won the first price at our team dinner.




Thanks to the hospitality and politeness of the Pop Team and my accent-free "I am Basanti- pagh tanno pagh!!" I won the first price in female star imitation.



Bahut bahut shukria!!

It does not matter

Indias contrasts between everything is so unbelieveably overwhelming. The modern palaces are being built by the poorest of the poor who work with their bare hands from dawn to dusk and camp under plastic-bag-like shelter on the construction site. Children in rags attack cars waiting on red lights (if that happens) and try to either beg or sell Q-Tipps or Spiderman masks. Where other societies would break apart or simple become hell on earth, India deals enviously well with this. I believe they do so, because they know that at the end of the day, it is not worth worrying about anything.

One of the most beautiful things about India is the fact that nothing really matters. People come up with some rules, probably a silent cry out for getting organized. But they dont mean anything.

A everyday scene in my sheltered life; at the gym reception:

"No, Maam, you cannot use the gym, it is for members only"

"What are you talking about, I always pay as I go. You even have a price list for 'pay as you go'right here."

"Maam, what is your membership number, Maam?"

"I just told you I dont have a membership. I usually pay as I go."

"Maam, that would be 100 RS now"

"Your pricelist says 50 Rs. That was the price that I have paid up until yesterday. I just have 50 Rs with me. Could you give me a discount?"

Head wobbling on the other side of the reception desk. "ok, Maam, no problem."

"Thank you very much"

"Maam, that would be 56 Rs now incl. tax"

"Sorry, I told you I just have 50 Rs on me."

More intense head wobbling. Time stands still. Office hours are coming closer.

"You know what, I just give you the 50 Rs, and I dont need a receipt anyway. I ll just use the pool."

"Ok, ok, Maam"

The minute I want to go into the pool, the cleaner shouts at me:

"Sorry, Maam, you need to wear a swimming cap." This rule really surprises me, as I am the only reason they clean the pool. I havent seen anyone else using it for the last 1.5 month. The only purpose this pool serves is to being cleaned by 5 or 7 of the 10.000 servants.
I get in the water, put my goggles on and say politely, but without a smile: "I dont have a swimming cap."

Head wobbling from there: "Ok, no problem"

Ethical Principles of Reiki

Reiki is a Japanese technique for stress reduction and relaxation that also promotes healing. The word Reiki is made of two Japanese words - Rei which means "God's Wisdom or the Higher Power" and Ki which is "life force energy". So Reiki is actually "spiritually guided life force energy."

Chakras are used in reiki to allow focus and direct universal energy to the healer. The purpose is to absorb cosmic energy and distribute it evenly.


Just for today, I will live the attitude of gratitude

Just for today, I will not worry

Just for today, I will not be angry

Just for today, I will do my work honestly

Just for today, I will show love and respect for every living thing


If you need to see if your energy flows well, or if your chakras are blocked, try out the chakra test

Chakra Test

It takes 10 min and is free of charge.

Taj Mahal- Der Weg ist das Ziel

After my plane arrived in Delhi that late that I could not make it to my train in time, I hired a driver to take me to Agra, for 4000 Rs not the worst deal I could make. I ended up with the sweetest young man you can imagine. He reminded me of some comic character, but I cannot put my finger on it. It took us 4 hours to get there, I slept for 5 1/2 hours, we went to the Taj for 2 hours and went back to Delhi.

Seeing the Taj Mahal was for my unsentimental me, extremly bewitching. A must go for sun raise!!

Varanasi

The India that I have got to known so far is a big getting out of the way. Watch out Bus, Auto Rikshaw, Bike Rikshaw, two wheelers, cows, mad cows, cars, beggars... Arriving in Varanasi we found a new sensation to get out of the way. Watch out, Corps!
People literally drop dead when they reach the holy city. What happens next, they get burnt (it takes 3 hours to burn a prepared body) and their ashes and some hip or chest bones are thrown into the Ganga, the holiest of all ivers. Thre are some exceptions. The following do not get burnt>:
Children, pregnant women, lepers, Snake bitten deads, and animals. These dont need or are not allowed to get purified by burning. They get dumped in the river just like they are.
Strangely enough, people from Varanasi go to the Ghats of the Ganga and bath and swim in there and even brush their teeth there.
The body burning is very surreal. You see a face in the flames but it is more like there s a person in the fire, but not actually on fire. It is also surprising that this doesnt smell extremly disgusting. The cow shit and man piss is much worse.




Auto Rickshaw and Rickshaw are the most widely available public transport within Varanasi. In outer regions of the city, mini-buses are common. Small boats and small steamers are used to cross the river Ganga. Varanasi is well connected by air, rail and buses with all the important places of India. Its distance from Delhi is about 700 Kms. The airport is about 25 km from the city center.





I can recommend Hotel HAIFA, especially for the AWESOME restaurant. It located at Assi Ghat, Varanasi in a peaceful environment within the heartthrob of the city but far madding crowed. It is just 5kms from railway station and bus stand and 28 kms from airport. It'll be love at first sight the moment you enter your luxurious guest room. Where colorful island décor, sophisticated amenities, and beds as soft as a lover's touch create an ambiance that's comfortable and seductively inviting.

It is all about Karma

Life is beautiful.

After getting puked on, harrasted, almost sufficated due to allergy I had another rough weekend. I had high fever, diahorrea like never ever thought of, rash all over my body, extrem joint pains and head aches. I went to the doctor and luckly enough he had diagnosed me incorrectly with viral fever, possibly dengue. I turned out to be fine after a couple of days, so I selfdiagnosed me with bad food poisoning. Italian restaurants are still best in Italy I believe...



Anyway, things look to turn out to the better. I will leave my hotel room (I will miss the breakfast buffets I must say) and enjoy the luxury of a HOME.
Further more my plans to visit Varanasi, one of the holy cities, has come into close reach. I might as well tick the Taj Mahal on the same trip.
My good Karma is coming through, and to enhance that, I will be taking REIKI classes over the weekend.

Always take the weather with you in Chennai, Pondi and Mamallapuram

This trip that I will tell you about now has taken place from Friday to Thursday over the diwali celebrations. If you see the pictures you will see that it has been gorgeous and a great place to be with cool stuff to see. I have also bought some very cool cloths ( e.g. Diesel jeans for 30 Euros), ate great food, have spend time with awesome people and have experienced loads of love and culture. I learned about Hindu traditions, got oil massages and enjoyed many privileges. This is all highly appreciated.




Still, there has been some very shitty experiences as well. It is already funny, thinking how are the odds that this is all happening in just such little time... Well, read and enjoy:

I went to Chennai for the Diwali festival, which is the festival of lights and comes down to Christmas in our culture. I went to the Indian family of my friend which was a great experience. It was very interesting. The bad thing was that they had a dog in the apartment and I learned the hard way that I am allergic to dog hair. So I felt like I was suffocating for 2 days and could not sleep for 2 nights. I decided to leave to Pondicherry by myself in order to get some rest and relax a little bit. I was supposed to meet up with my friend the next day.

The bus was fine, I even got to nap a little bit on the journey. I had an unpleasant awaking, because a man got sick on the bus. He throw up out of the open door. Unfortunately I sat right behind the door and got some splashes of the puke. It was not too bad, but enough for big grossing out. I arrived in Pondy to find out that due to the diwali weekend rooms were booked out. I managed to get a room in "Mothers guest house", which I can highly dis-recommend. My "private bathroom" was not attached to my room. The room was basically the kitchen cupboards with the mattress. It was the actually the mattrasse and the 4 walls around it. The private bathroom was not equipped with a lockable lock. No need to mention that there was no toilet paper. The private bathroom was used by this entire group of young men who freely walked in and out. Naked guys with only tea towels round their hips were all over the place. This is highly disturbing in a culture where it is even considered rude to sit next to a lady in a public bus, leave alone men walking in the private bathroom.



What happened next was that some guys were sitting in the common area in the guesthouse and started talking to me. I told them about my life, that I was married, that I earned 300 Euros a month and answered all the other questions they asked (customized truely). They got all excited because apparently in Orissa there are no fair people. All wanted to shake my hand, which I thought was still decent. When I wanted to leave, one of the guys got super excited and grabbed me and kissed me. That was one of the most scaring experiences ever. I was just running off, forgot to kick him in the balls or to curse him and found some shelter in the showroom of the shop assistant downstairs. He probably noticed my frightentness and offered me to sit down and read a book. So I did. I sat there, in silence. I did not feel like going anywhere. The boss of the showroom arrived and both of them entertained me. It was so cute. They told me about Kashmir, their home. It was very sweet. A little later I started telling them about the encounter in my guest house. My voice started shaking and the shop assistant yelled at me: "What happened? You don't cry!! You are not a baby! You need to be strong!" OK. fine. I just realized that it was for my own good, not to let myself go. As the fight with the guesthouse owner did not bring any change either. After the sun set, they offered me tea (not earlier, as it was Ramsan or Ramadan) and invited me for dinner the next day.

So by 7 pm, I went upstairs again and there was one of the guys from Orissa waiting, all ashamed, all nervous. He apologized for the behaviour of his friend and told me that the group has kicked him out. Fine. I still locked my room and went to sleep. I was woken by the heavy rain falls during the night.

The next day was pouring cats and dogs. I was supposed to meet my friend at 12 at some restaurant. Her phone did not work. After getting wet exploring Pondicherry (which is a lovely place, well, which has lovely places...), I returned to my save shelter, the show room, and gave some business to them. I did pay a ridiculous amount of money there, but I felt I had to do some sacrifice for my good karma to return (it turned out that I did not sacrifice enough).

I went to the restaurant. The reservations were for an apartment which was not ready before 2 pm. As it was only 10 am I figured I might as well have breakfast there. This Spanish alcoholic sat down next and insisted on paying my bill. I did not let him. He started drinking beer and chatting with another Spanish guy who was on the same bus as I was. With increasing alcohol filling up his blood, he started addressing more and more words to me, Spanish, French, some English. "you mmm haff diss beautttifull lll lite..." and more of that. I put my Ipod on, and he yelled at me I should be talking to him. I politely and quietly let him know that I can take care of my bill, so he should be able to take care of his own entertainment.

By 2 pm the garcon at the restaurant told me that there were no reservations confirmed. By 3 pm my friend hasnt shown up. But it still was raining. I decided to get a massage, found out that the place was closed and went back to the restaurant to find out that I had just missed my friend. It stopped raining. I met up with my friend and her sister. The second choice hotel was fine. It had a double bed, which we shared by the 3 of us. We had another 1 1/2 hours of sight seeing and we made it to "Auroville", which is a town occupied by a sect, founded by "The Mother". What else??



We went to get a message, and afterwards to the dinner in the showroom. That was the nicest thing. You should have met Ahmed and Selim. They were the nicest persons. They served us North Indian dishes and invited some other customers as well, 2 girls from Germany. I will try to hook Ahmed up with some Import-Export people in Dublin. Let me know if you have any suggestions.



The next day I went up early, because the sister has kicked me during her sleep to many times. I felt saver to leave and explore. More rain, obviously. By the time we went to breakfast, the entire sky came down with water and the streets were flooded up to half my calf. We did some more sight seeing, Ashrams. That was quite relaxing, I have to say.

We went on a public bus to go up north again, heading for Mamalapuram. Actually, we went on quite some buses. The problem was that we did not really know if the buses were actually stopping in Mamalapuram or if they would go straight to Chennai. Considering the masses of people in need of transportation and the speed of information flow, we figured our best bet was to squeeze in the bus , secure seats and ask later for the destinations. We did that 3 times. Good exercise, I have to say. :) Finally on the way, it was raining, of course. The landscape was beautiful. It was good that it was raining, because it was nice and cool. We had seats right behind the driver, with a perfect panoramic view.

A few hours later we arrived in Mamalapuram, which is a cute little Indian village with is famous for sea food and the shore temple and the 5 raths (or something). That was pretty cool and surprisingly unadventurous. Pictures explain more than words... I ll set up a webalbum soon.



The next day we got picked up there by the family driver and got chauffeured back to Chennai where we did some shopping. We went to have lunch at Darshinis granmother who told me about Pooja, the daily ceremony to honor the gods. And also due to the multiple reincarnation of Shiva, there are so many of them. Ganesh is the one you address first, the elephant head. Krishna is my favorite. He is the cheeky blue one, that loves all the pleasures in life and goes out to steal the cream and plays tricks and all. :)

Obviously the weather had followed us and it was pouring. Darshinis father guessed that it would be good, as there wont be many 2-wheelers on the road. Pustekuchen. The whole city turned into a mess. Jams were unbelievable. The roads were just filled with water, it seemed like all the gods and their friends were crying. Our time was ticking away to get to the airport in time. We figured that the bridge was blocked, so we ve chosen a different route, via a railway crossing. Unfortunately we could not get through there either. The minutes were just falling down. And we were sitting there, the rivers on the pavement were streaming down, autorikshaws were not starting anymore because they were not equipped for underwater drives. The only thing to hope for was the Arche Noah, but even that did not show up.

We missed our flight, of course. We had to book another one for the next day early morning. Of course no refund for the missed one. We had to go back to the house. By 8.30 pm, the roads were completely blocked. So we were stuck in the car, not a single inch to move forward nor to move back. It was just such a nightmare. I know now how it feels to be on natures mercy. Anyway, by 10 we decided to go to the office of my friends father.

It was just on the other side of the street. We were talking to the night shift and they let us camp in one of the conference rooms. We laid down around midnight and woke up a couple of hours later to go to the airport. I was about to kiss the dirty soil of Hyderabad when we landed. We did get lucky though that we did not go back to the house in Chennai, because Thursday morning the chaos continued. Here is what the Indian news published.

http://www.hindu.com/2006/10/27/stories/2006102706860100.htm

I am done travelling now, at least for this weekend. I want my room service, my TV, i want to watch at least 5 episodes of prison break and order holy Spaghetti Bolognese.