Rain

We had some good rain Showers on Tuesday night and Wednesday morning- March 30/31. We think it is the first rain in 2010 here. It is certainly later than people are used to expecting. It did lower temperatures for a day and a half or so, but seems hot again- though much better than the 104F in New Delhi.

Near miss

A few weeks ago Jim was sitting in lobby of a large office building waiting for someone when four people dressed very nicely in business attire came out of an elevator and stood in the lobby talking to each other. It was obvious they were awaiting the arrival of an important customer and they were higher level people. After about 10 minutes a car drove up outside and two equally well dressed and important looking people got out and came inside where they were warmly greeted by the 4 people who were waiting. After a couple minutes they all proceeded to the elevators and disappeared. After about 15 minutes two young men brought a large sign which they placed on a stand in the lobby. The sign said something to the effect "Welcome Visitors from XYZZ Company to zzyxx Company!" It seemed that the sign arrived just a little late. It probably did not matter, but this is the sort of detail that seems to happen often here. Really good effort, but coming up a little short on the execution.

Hot

It has been rather hot here since Mid- February. We are told this is unusual- normally it starts getting hotter in March and April - May are the hot and humid months. We don't like humidity much. We are also told that a festival of about a 10 days back normally marks a point where Bangalore would have had some rain, but no rain so far. Monsoon normally starts about June 1 with sometimes very heavy rains and frequent rains. However, last year was unusual because we had few really heavy rain storms- we thought that "Monsoon" is something people made up!
People seem a little concerned about the hotter days (temps in the 90's F) and the lack of any rain. Hopefully it will be a somewhat normal year.
Ziggy has seemed a bit lethargic, but otherwise healthy. He has gained some weight. Zoe seems fine. Jim took them to the Vet today to have them checked over. We have a vet who seems good and we have heard there are some others who are good too. The vet said they seem generally quite healthy, but Ziggy's weight gain and lethargy may be related to digestive system changes related to his having been neutered. The vet said he is about the right age for that to be showing up. He did not indicate it is a serious problem, but it means we have to control his intake more than he would like or we would like. So, we will have to watch him more. It is difficult with two or more cats to control what they eat when they eat from the same dishes!
Janet is not feeling well today. She had pretty much recovered from whatever she got in Ahmedabad, but then we had some very spicy food for dinner last night and that tends to give her problems more so than Jim, though he has had his share of intestinal problems too!
Janet rested an Jim did some errands and picked up a couple paintings he had framed. We have mentioned before how inexpensive it is to have things framed here. It is cheap enough that you just do it over if you are not happy with your first choice, or if the framer gets it wrong.
The paintings are a reproduction watercolor of one done in the 1800's of the Taj Mahal and 2 "miniatures" Jim bought when we were in Delhi. The style dates from the Mughal Period, from hat we can tell, about 1500 to 1800 and there are many fine examples around of the old ones, but also lots of newer versions- often done on old paper, often on new paper. One wonders about some of the ones on old paper. They might be made to deceive, but we have found that most sellers state that it is new work on old paper, but normally, its pretty obvious anyway.
In any case, many of these are very nice- the details in the faces of the people is remarkable. many of the artists have branched out some and do animals, insects and flowers as well. Many of those are very nice!
We have received most of the items we bought while in the north and had shipped to us. There isn't that much but a couple things were a bit fragile but they arrived in good shaped. The shipping companies appear to have staff who handle parcels rather roughly (as they do in most of the world), but here is seems that they usually try to package the items well enough to survive the trip. The packing materials vary a lot. One item was a small table which came in a box that was badly beaten up, but the table was OK. Inside there was cardboard, corregated cardboard, scraps of leather, paper and cloth and some styrofoam. the last is not used so much here as in the US. Another item was wrapped in bubble wrap, and plastic with a few pieces of styrofoam and then shredded newspaper was packed all around and then it was placed in a specially made wood box.
Shipping costs by "courier" seem to be rather expensive sometimes. We don't know if we pay more because they know we will pay or if it really is that expensive. Compared to US prices, it seems reasonable most of the time.

Cricket

Cricket is like baseball. It is like baseball in that one has to spend many years learning the rules before one can understand what is happening on the playing field.
On our flight to Bangalore from Ahmedabad a week ago we boarded the plane and then a large number of men in uniforms got on the plane and took their seats. The uniforms were really only blue shirts which said "Rajasthan Royals". We concluded that they must be a cricket team by the way that half the men on the plane got out their mobile phone cameras and started taking pictures. A few days later the team played the Bangalore team and lost the match.
Tonight, on his way home, Jim had the misfortune of leaving the office late and then getting caught up in heavy traffic near the cricket stadium here in Bangalore. The stadium is not to far from where we live and the traffic was not horrendously bad like it might be near baseball stadiums in some US cities, but it did make rush hour traffic worse. We do have a nice view of the fireworks they set off after some games. We do not know if they only set them off when the home team wins, or on special occasions or after every game.
Cricket is extremely popular in India- like baseball is in the US. I don't know why.

A Trip to the north- Mar. 6 - 16

Jim's niece was here in India for a week starting March 4, 2010. She arrived in the morning and had only a short stay in Bangalore as we left 2 days later on Saturday the 6th for Mumbai. We left Ziggy and Zoe in reasonably good hands as they had at least 2 visitors each day to feed them and keep them company while we traveled.
We flew to Mumbai in the morning of the 6th and took a hotel car into the city. We stayed at the Taj hotel that was attacked on 11/26/08. The older part of the hotel that was badly damaged has not yet reopened, but the newer building was quite nice. Security there was fairly tight.
After check in and some lunch we walked to the Prince of Wales Museum and took the audio tour there. It was not bad, except that some exhibits were closed so it was hard to navigate through the tour. It was also hot and humid.
Mumbai is noted for being hot and humid pretty much year round. It is the financial capitol of India and we could see that the roads were in better shape than Bangalore and the drivers seemed to be a bit more disciplined about staying in their lane. The traffic signals also seemed to be working. We walked back to our hotel via some shops and looked but did not buy. We had dinner at the hotel too.
On Sunday the 7th we took a boat to Elephanta Island. Our primary reason for this short trip to Mumbai was to visit this island and the cave temples. The boat ride was fairly pleasant though the boat itself was not. We sat in the shade and the breeze felt good. It takes an hour to reach the island and then there is a fairly long walk up a lot of steps to see the cave temples there. This walk was not very pleasant though it was shaded some by plastic over the walkway because the entire route is lined with hawkers selling a variety of trinkets. Some not bad, others, bad.
The cave temples were a bit disappointing, but ok. There were quite a few people and a lot of monkeys around. The monkeys took drinks from several people and probably would take anything they could get their hands on! They are amusing when it is other people's stuff!
We walked back to the ferry boats which were 4 or 5 deep from the dock when we left. When a new boat comes in the people have to walk through all the other boats to get to the dock. We waited awhile as the boat filled up and then road back to the Gateway Of India- built to honor a visit by the Prince of Wales about a century ago. We had lunch and then visited some shops.
On Monday we road to the airport and caught a plane to Jodhpur. Back in November, Janet's photo won second prize in a contest and the prize was a 2 night stay at a very nice resort hotel in Jodhpur. We stayed 3 nights. We had Lunch and then went off to the fort. You can check back at our posts of just over a year ago about our trip to Rajasthan. We visited Jodhpur then and liked it, so we liked coming back. The fort was still very nice, but late in the day it seemed a little quieter, though there was a large and loud group of European tourists getting a show of some sort. We saw the many Blue houses which give the city the name "Blue City". We road back to the hotel for dinner outside. They had live entertainment in the form of a puppet show and singers and dancers. The next day we road outside the city to visit some small villages. In one they make pottery items- they had a few larger items that were rather nice, but too fragile to take, so we bought a few small items. We also visited a dhurrie maker. There are flat weave rugs that are essentially the same idea as the more famous Persian Kilims, but generally cheaper. We did not see any fabulous examples, but saw some very nice rugs.
We had lunch in a small town heritage hotel that was ok. We visited the house of a man and his daughter who are members of the "bishnoi" people. We don't know much about them, but know that they don't kill any of the wild animals around. Women wear very colorful clothes while men wear white. They have some sort of ceremony that involves a small amount of crude opium, though we are not sure what it is about. Anyway, it was a pleasant short visit. One picture shows a group of women working on a dirt road. We drove up and saw them resting, but our driver said we could not pass as the road was too rough. He asked the women to lower the height of the dirt so we could drive through. While they worked Janet and Carrie helped them a bit and they women enjoyed the company. We gave the women a small amount of money for being such fun and they seemed very happy.
Our driver also spotted some small deer and "blackbuck" which live on the bishnoi lands. We got some pictures of a few of them.
We very much enjoyed the hotel- it was quiet and comfortable, though on our last night a large group of European tourists were there and it seemed a little crowded then. In general, temperatures were ok in Jodhpur. The sun was intense, but it was still early enough in the year that it was not painfully hot.
On Thursday March 11 we flew to New Delhi. We checked into our hotel and then took a hotel car to Old Delhi. When we were there a year ago we did not quite get into Old Delhi. We went to see the outside of the Red Fort (it was late afternoon so we would not have had much time inside before it closed). We then walked to Jama Masjid- this is the largest mosque in India and was built by Shah Jahan, who also had the fort built as well as the Taj Mahal. That was all done in the 1630- 1650 period. The fort is huge. Jim did not want to go into the mosque, so Janet, and Carrie went. While Jim waited outside and took some pictures our driver came up the steps. He found us because the only good place to park was near the mosque, so he saw us! (We had his phone number so we could call him anyway.) We returned to the hotel and had some dinner before Carrie had to go off to the airport for the next leg of her journey.
On the 12th, we walked to the national museum in Delhi from our hotel. The museum was fairly well done, but with small collections of things in a wide variety of areas. In general, money is not spent on making nice museums in India. It is typical that foreigners have to pay more to get into museums and archeological sites in India. We have been told several times that, as residents of India (who pay taxes here) we can get in for the Indian rate. As mentioned in our Hampi experience, this has always failed to get us in at the India rate. So, we have generally given up trying. However, at the national museum, they told use we could pay the Indian rate- at least for Jim, who has his taxpayer ID card- similar to a SS card in the US. Inconsistency, in the application of these rules is very annoying.
After the museum, we went to another part of the city and had lunch and then visited an art gallery and a tea shop that we had visited a year earlier.
On the 13th we mostly relaxed and then went to the airport for our flight to Ahmedabad.
While in Jodhpur, Janet bought a wood ball that is covered with pieces of camel bone that are nicely painted. Unfortunately, the airlines won't allow it to be carried on (why?) and when it is in checked bags they insist on opening the bag to see it. This caused several delays.
In Ahmedabad we stayed at the same hotel as last time in Jan.- a nice place with good A/C as it was very hot! (about 98F in daytime). Our plan was to make a couple day trips outside the city to see places we missed last time. Unfortunately, Janet got some sort of intestinal bug (that is still bothering her) after our dinner of the first night in Ahmedabad.
Our trip the next morning was to the Modhera Sun Temple, then a famous stepwell at Patan called "Rani- ki- vav". It was hot, but we had an A/C'd car. Our friend, Chota, came along.
The Sun Temple was very nice and not too crowded. It has a nice stepwell too. "Stepwells" are pretty easy to understand. They are big holes in the ground with numerous steps going down. After rainy season they might be full or nearly so, then as the water dries up the people have to walk further and further down the steps to get water. The stepwell- Rani- ki- vav (Queen's Stepwell) Is very elaborate with 7 levels of structures on the way down with hundreds of beautifully carved stone sculptures on each level. It was built in the 11th century and was only excavated around 1985. It was filled in with silt for who knows how many centuries, which is why many of the sculptures are in such fine shape! It was very interesting but they had the lower parts blocked off, so we could not see it all. Fortunately Jim has a good book on the subject! We left the stepwell and went to see a Patola maker. Patolas are very special and highly prized ($$) Saris. There are only a few people making them these days, and they have back orders of a few years of production. Each one is hand made. The process is complex and takes great skill to do well. Perhaps we will describe it more in another posting. (At our hotel in Delhi had just received 5 examples and they were priced at about $5000 each.) We looked and listened to the explanation of how they were made. They had only some small samples for sale- at high prices.
Janet did not feel well, so we went back to the hotel and rested that night. On the drive back to the city we passed a group of people who appeared to be from Rajasthan. They walked along the side road with a lot of goats munching on the grasses. We saw the older man in one picture with a camel and noticed that riding on top of the camel's load were 3 or 4 young goats! Apparently they tend to wander too much, so the are given a free ride, but they are probably tied down!
On the 15th we road south of the city to Lothal. This is an ancient city. The earliest parts dating to about 2500BC ! There is not really that much to see at Lothal, but there is a decent little museum. The town was built next to the river that has since shifted miles away, so the place looks odd in the middle of large flat tracts of land used for farming. This was related to the Indus River Valley civilization of perhaps 4500BC. This area has apparently been "geologically active" for a long long time. The shifting of rivers and the amount of water in them has spelled disaster many times- apparently.
We next road over a rough road to Nal Sarovar- a huge lake that is fairly dry now- before monsoon. It is very hot. There is so little water that the boatmen found it easier just to walk in the water and push our boat along rather than use the poles they normally use. We insisted on a covered boat- our driver had to point out that it would be silly to expect pale people to be out in the direct sun. We saw some nice birds- including flamingoes.
On returning to the city we visited an art school where Chota met a friend who makes tapestries. We went to his home and saw some nice examples. We also visited a few buildings around the city with interesting architecture. One picture shows an art gallery that is underground. Unfortunately it was closed.
Our last day was spent visiting a couple museums in Ahmedabad and a few shops. We found some very nice textiles. The Museum of Indology had some nice art works on display too. This was probably the best arranged museum we have seen in India.
We left to come back to Bangalore in the late afternoon after a fun trip. It could have been a little shorter, but we would have missed a lot in Ahmedabad. Its a big country- with lots of historical sites!

Miscellany- Sitar, Wedding, eclipse, art walk and bees again

In the past week we attended two evening events. The first was a recital of Sitar, Tabla and Tamboura(?) music. This was a sort of pre- event to a wedding two nights later. The Sitar player was Ustad Shahid Parvez Khan (the order of the names may not be correct and some parts of that might be titles). He is very well known and we thoroughly enjoyed listening, even though we may not have appreciated some of the subtleties in his playing. He has his own web page and is described in many other places on the web. Much of what he played can be described as "dazzling", but there were other parts that seemed a bit dull, but in his descriptions he implied that these were all parts of Indian Classical music with special meanings of their own. In any case it was great music followed by an excellent dinner.
Two night later we attended the wedding, which was held at another very nice hotel in Bangalore. We do not know the people well, but were invited because Janet belongs to a women's group, to which the mother of the groom belongs, and all the members were invited. It turned out to be a huge wedding. We heard that 1100 people were invited and they think about 700 attended! We arrived while the ceremony was in progress. One thing we notice about Indian weddings is that they are taken very seriously in that people do attend, but they are not taken so formally by most attendees- because people often arrive late or only for part of the event or they talk during the ceremony and even talk on their cell phones during the ceremony. In this one, we arrived probably half way through the actual marriage ceremony and there were, perhaps, 250 people present. After the ceremony the couple left briefly and then returned for a reception line that ended up being quite long. Meanwhile, buffet dinner was served. At the reception, all the people would offer congratulations or some other greeting to the couple and usually, present an envelope as a gift. We understand that many gifts were delivered before the ceremony too. As mentioned, in the end, we heard about 700 people attended- most arriving after the ceremony, but for the reception and dinner. It was obvious, that the family is well known and well to do. A well known local multi- billionaire (in dollars as well as Rupees) and his wife were among the attendees.
It was quite a show with all the women dressed in their best Saris.
While riding to work one morning recently, Jim saw a car with a St. Bernard sticking its head out the window. These are cold weather dogs, so it must be rough for them here most of the year- the cooler months, which seem to have passed now, would probably be ok, but the hot months, which are starting now, will be rough.
Feb. 12 was a Holiday here. We asked Joseph what is the significance of the date. He said : "It means the cool weather ends and the hot weather starts in Bangalore". Apparently, it has significance to Hindus, but he is Christian, but in Bangalore that meaning has come to be the practical interpretation.
Back in January there was an eclipse that reached its peak at around 1:30PM. It was a normal work day in most respects for Jim, but at lunch time it was surprisingly cool outside. The light was still quite bright even though people said it was supposed to be about 85% of the sun eclipsed by the moon. We learned that most shops would close early this day or not open at all as it was considered unlucky to open or even dangerous to be outside one's home, so we did notice that traffic was very light that day. It was, practically, another holiday as far as getting any tasks done outside the office, though bigger stores and malls were open. There is a lot of superstition about these things. Most of the people Jim works with joked about it all, but a few people stayed home.
At the end of January each year there is an "art walk" scheduled by the Chitrakala Parishanth- or "CKP". We don't know the translation of the words, but the place is intended to encourage artists and artisans to pursue their interests. They have many events at their building in the city and we have gone there many times for lectures and art shows and craft shows. Last year we attended the "art walk" and wrote something about it. We went again this year. It is a huge event with hundreds- perhaps more than a thousand artists showing their work on the long street outside CKP as well as on the grounds. Just like last year, the street was "nominally closed" to vehicular traffic, but numerous cars and bicycles and motorbikes still moved up and down the street at all- to0- great- a- speed in some cases. It really is a hazard, though we did not see anyone get injured. There is a large hotel on the road, so they have to allow some vehicles to move, but we saw few of them going in and out of the hotel! The art works varied a lot in quality- just as in the past. There were some huge paintings of good quality and several artists with high skills. We each bought a couple small items we liked that were quite inexpensive. We got the name of one artist who does charcoals and may see if he can do portraits of Ziggy and Zoe.
Speaking of the Z's, there have not been able to log on lately because we changed the passwords on the computers. They seem to be reasonably healthy. Ziggy seems to be gaining weight and is becoming as heavy as he looks. His fur is very thick and this makes him look big, though in the past he has not actually weighed that much. Zoe is still fairly light and pretty active. She runs around the apartment more than Ziggy does, so she is getting more exercise. Ziggy has always been more docile.
"The Bees" came back again a week ago - on Valentines day- the 14th. We came back home after late lunch around 4:30 or 5PM and found a huge swarm of bees converging on our balcony outside our kitchen. They did this 3 times last year in Jan. so we thought we had passed the swarming season this year, but, obviously, did not. One of the building maintenance people came the next day and sprayed them. He got stung once and Janet later got stung by a bee that was not yet dead. They seem not to be too aggressive toward the sprayer- thankfully. We hate to seem them killed, but there seem to be no bee- keepers here who would move them to another place. We hope we do not get another group. We are guessing that they come because there is a mango tree just outside the building and they probably like the nectar- and pollinate the tree too!

busy week

It was a busy week. Jim was getting over a cold or whatever it was after we returned from our fascinating visit to Gujurat, but it seemed like a busy week at work though the evening telecons were not so bad. He had them 3 nights out of 5 but not many back to back. There was one relatively important one on Friday night, but his trip home from work took 90 minutes instead of the usual 40 or so. So he missed the telecon. It will have to take place another day. The traffic delays are often bad, but not that bad. The drive to work on one particularly light day was just over 20 minutes. Typically, it take 35 -40 minutes and about 40 to get home in the evening- unless he leaves the office later and gets caught up in some rush hour mess, then it can be bad.
On Saturday we had a rather full agenda of things to do and each one took longer than expected- from leaving the apartment in the morning through meeting up with the carpenter when we returned home in the evening, each ran late. The carpenter left about 10:30PM. The good thing to point out is that at home we would never even have a carpenter present that late without paying a fortune, the bad thing is that his work is not of high quality so we have to keep having things done over. (You may look back at earlier postings and find one about "The Carpenter"- the one who seemed very competent and who's wife was seriously injured before he could do our tasks has not been heard from since then. We do not know what happened- he may have had to take his wife to a town or village where they have more relatives who can help care for her and the kids so he can work. Families are extremely important in that respect as they all recognize the need to help. This is less strong in many western countries where the social needs are more heavily taken up by the government.) Of course, labor costs are very low here, so that is not a huge issue. The carpenter has made two stands for sculptures for us and two shelves for storage of shoes and odds and ends. He is around 3/4 done -and none are exactly right, but they will probably be OK.
We had some photos from our recent trips printed on nice paper on Saturday. This was generally a pleasant experience, though, long. The printing paper and ink are the expensive parts. The labor is cheap, so they will sit with you and help edit pictures for printing for a long time. Next we have to see about framing some. This too, is inexpensive here. We don't quite understand why it is so cheap- both materials and labor.
Janet had a bit of an argument with people in a shop on Saturday. It is a little strange when we go into shops- big or small- and the staff follow us around. In a few places they know not to follow, in some they follow at a distance and are there to answer questions. However, in most places they follow very close by- sometimes it can be 2 or 3 or even 4 store staff members following one or both of us. What often makes matters worse is that these staff people feel obligated to try to tell us about each thing we look at- especially if we touch it. 90% of the time we know what the thing is, so it is annoying to have someone tell us "that is a blue scarf" or "That is a red scarf" when it is quite obvious most of the time. In any case, Janet said she lost her cool after asking them to move away (4 staff people) several times. She told the store manager this was annoying to be followed and be told silly things. Some Indian friends said they are followed too and the staff often tell them dumb things too and they don't understand it either. We think they are partly curious about us, and we think they really want to be helpful, but most of what they tell us is useless or obvious information. About 90% of the time when we do ask for more information about something the same people have no idea what the answer is. Eventually, they may find a manager to answer, but generally they are poorly trained and probably not paid much either. We had to go back to the same shop today because they also over charged on something Janet bought, but they were quite good and refunded her money in cash. She paid with a credit card. It is nice that they paid in cash, but we suspect that the banking system does not allow them to easily credit her card, so it is easier to just give cash.
On the subject of cash... we are constantly amazed at how many shop owners have no change to give customers when we buy something. It is not a rare occurance to want to buy something and find that the shop has NO change. This may happen 50% of the time with small shops- especially early in the day. They may be able to get change from someone else, or, we know this happens a lot, so we carry as much small change as we can, but it is still surprising. Of course, everyone manages to move forward, despite this, but it does waste time... but labor, and time are cheap here for the vast majority.
Feb. 12 is another holiday here. It will be nice to have another day off from work for Jim. We ought to be looking for a short trip to take- to see more while we are still here, but we may just want to relax too.