Day One

Second flight was agreeably uneventful as well, and I slept much more. After making it through baggage, customs, and exchanging money at the airport, it was 2am, and I made it to the hotel in 20 minutes via a car sent by the hotel. All I really noticed about the city along the way were the aluminum roofed shacks with shop signs, and all the rickshaws lined up waiting for the morning. Rickshaws are like 3-wheeled golf carts that function as quick and cheap taxis around the city.

I settled into my room quickly, and fell asleep watching MTV India. After a few Indian music videos, it was amusing to watch American music videos for Eminem, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Jesse McCartney (a teen pop singer who is on that show Summerland), and Akon (he’s the one with that song “Lonely” where the chorus sounds like it’s been sung by Alvin and the Chipmunks). No Beyonce though. It will be interesting to see what music makes it here and what doesn’t.

This morning I met up with three of my team members in the hotel lobby. After 15 minutes of trying to track down one of the three drivers that supposed to be available to us, one of them finally showed up and we were on our way through Mumbai traffic to the client. The drive to Navi (New) Mumbai took about an hour, and along the way was much honking, illegal (I assume) maneuvers, and the sights, sounds, and smells of India through the rain. My favorite was the elephant on the other side of the road, going the wrong direction (my first elephant sighting!).

I ate lunch today in one of the client’s many cafeterias on the campus, all of which are vegetarian and very inexpensive. This cafeteria had grilled sandwiches, Indian dishes, and Chinese food. Yeah, I’m not so sure about the Indian Chinese food. I might try some later on, just to experience it. I had biriyani, a rice and vegetable dish with raita, a yogurt sauce. My Indian coworker thinks the food there is not very good; I thought it was fine. Apparently I’m not that picky. I poured myself a glass of water from the pitcher on the table, and then realized, hm, I’m not supposed to drink that. So even though my lunch was fairly spicy for my palette, I waited to drink some water until I got back to my desk. Note to self: bring bottled water to lunchroom.