Corn flakes and boiled eggs?

I just got home from my first day of work after the chicken/heat stroke episode. When I got to the hotel, all 3 guys at reception stood up abruptly and asked what I wanted for dinner. So I pulled out a menu, looked it over... Of course there is only curry this, masala that... not gonna happen. I closed the menu and said, "I will have cornflakes and boiled eggs for dinner... and I'll wash it down with some mineral water". The guys at the desk thought it was the greatest joke ever. I wasn't joking. When I walked away and went into my room, the waiter followed me, laughing and said, "Dinner sir... boiled egg and cornflake?". "Yes, boiled egg and cornflake", I said. He looked a bit concerned and walked away. I am now anxiously awaiting this delectable meal. Haven't they heard of breakfast for dinner? If they haven't, they have now :)

Bobby J

Don't eat the chicken in india. Just don't do it.

Here's a rundown of the worst 2 days of my 24 years of life...

• Sunday night - Went to the office for about 6 hours (I know, this may already be cause for the worst day ever)... When I got back to the hotel I decided I would order some butter chicken since this would be my last night in the hotel (I didn't mention that my apartment is now move-in ready so I can move in any time). Anyways, I decided I would do it up big by ordering some non-veg!
• 5 minutes after eating the butter chicken: Death. Death by cause of chicken. Let's just say there was no longer any chicken to be found in my stomach... I still feel bad about what the housekeepers had to do to clean... anyways... I got very sick. So sick that I couldn't keep down food or water... Constant sickness for several hours... When I realized that I wouldn't even be able to sleep through the night I asked the hotel staff to take me to the hospital... and oh did they take me to a hospital...
• Hospital numero uno: I don't think you can call it a hospital... maybe you could call it a basement, or a dorm room. It was small, dirty, weird... I was feeling uncomfortable from the get go. I had to speak to a translator to tell the doctor what was happening since he didn't speak any english. He felt around my stomach, turned me over, and gave me 2 shots in the couch cushion (by couch cushion, I mean butt). He then gave me some medicine and sent me on my merry way... This whole process took about 10 minutes... 10 minutes? Seems a bit fast right? Righhhht...
• Back to the hotel: So I'm back at the hotel, it's probably 3 in the morning... Almost immediately when I get back I start vomiting again... not good. This continues throughout the night, but somehow I manage to get a couple hours of sleep. 
• Monday morning: Same deal: Eat, drink, everything comes right back up... At this point I'm so dehydrated that I can barely function. Time to go to a real hospital now... maybe one that has those beeping monitors and has more than 1 room.
• Monday afternoon: I arrive at the best hospital in Gurgaon. By arrive I mean, stumble through the emergency room door and let the nurses drag me to a bed. Before they start asking questions I'm relieved to see, right above me, a beeping monitor... and nurses, they have nurses too! I explained to the doctor what happened, all about the first hospital and so on. They get me on a steady flow of fluids and antibiotics. After about 3 hours they decide to admit me since I'm still feeling like garbage...
• Tuesday morning: I wake up and realize that I'm feeling much better. I have saliva in my mouth and I feel like I can move around pretty well... I realize, however, that I haven't been given any food or water since I arrived at the hospital (although I've had fluids pumped through me continuously). I ask for fruit juice, but no fruit juice comes... I ask again for fruit juice... still no delicious fruit juice. Eventually something does come... it's what katrina would call, "red drink", haha. Basically it was like cool aid except it had medicine in it and didn't taste like cool aid at all. It tasted more like salt water with a hint of cherry. Yuck.
• Tuesday afternoon: I'm feeling much better. The give me some semi-solid foods as well as some pasta and garlic bread (maybe the best food I've had since I've been here!) and I'm able to keep everything down. I'm ready to go home and I think the nurses are tired of me asking if I can go home... About 8 hours later... that's 8 hours of drinking 'red drink' and staring at the cealing... they let me go home.
• I'm in the hotel right now and it's been about 12 hours since I've been discharged and I feel really good. I'm actually hungry for food which is really good. It will still take a couple of days to fully recover from the hit my stomach took as well as the hit my body took from extreme dehydration. So I'll be watching lord of the rings and eating ice-cream for 2 days :)

I know this was a long post, but it was horrible. It wasn't even that I was sick. It was that I was sick and I couldn't talk to my wife, and since I didn't have a cell phone, nobody knew where I was... It was just a bad situation... for me and for everyone that was trying to find out which hospital I was at.

Anyways... I left out the gross details that nobody needs to know. But this was one of the worst experiences of my life. Word of advice for everyone: Don't eat the chicken in India. Just don't do it.

Bob

Am I getting deported?

So, I found out about 12 days after I get to india that my passport as to be 'registered' with the government 14 days after arrival. Whoops. It's fine....

• I get all of the paperwork and go to the registration office on day 14.... when I get to the front of the line (after 2 hours of waiting mind you) the guy says, "Sorry, we can't do anymore today". Can't do anymore today?! Then he tells me when I come back I have to pay a penalty for not registering in time. I almost freaked out on him... But I left and went back to the office and finished my work day.
• Attempt number 2: I go back the next day... do the normal 2 hour wait... when I give the FRO officer my papers, he looks at the address of the current hotel i stay at... he looks at it for a long time... he then says, really, really loud...'illegal, no register!'. what?! what's happening??? i'm naturally a nervous person anyways... when he says this my heart starts pounding, my hands start sweating, and i look to him for some sort of indication that this is a joke... he doesnt give me that indication... i then start thinking, holy crap, im getting deported... anyways....he says that the hotel that im at right now (and where i'm currently writing this blog post) is not authorized by the government, and hence illegal. not sure why, but apparently some stuff has gone down here... He then goes on to ask me why I need a lease for an apartment when im a foreign national... I don't know dude, I'm staying here for 6 months so it might be more cost effective to stay in an apartment. He doesn't agree. He tells me I need more proof that the owner of the flat is ok with me staying there...
• Thankfully I'm with a guy from the office that talks through everything and we get the passport registered... But I have to go back with proof that I changed hotels and more proof for the apartment...
• Oh, and this guy from the office... he randomly tells me the world is going to end in about 8 years... weirdly he seems ok with it. he asked me i believed this and i said no, i believe in jesus and jesus hasn't told me himself when he's coming for me (i didn't say all of this, but i did disagree with him)... we were no longer friends for the rest of the day. 

So this experience wasn't fun... but I'll be fine. One thing that's not ok... Apparently the government shut my phone off b/c I was late registering. When I try to make calls this woman, speaking in hindi says, 'you haven't submitted your papers for government approval. no calls can be made'. not cool india. not cool.

Bob

Cricket match!

So I realized that I didn't say anything about the cricket match in my last post... Here are my experiences!

• The cricket match is in old delhi, so I go to meet the guys there. Apparently they forgot about meeting me and went straight into the game. Mike apparently said, "Hey, wheres Bob? Oh no! Bob". He called me and everything was fine and I met up with them and we got in there ok.
• When we get in there I don't think I was prepared for the atmosphere... It wasn't anything out of the ordinary at a sporting event... but maybe it was b/c it was dirtier than a normal sporting arena, and i couldn't understand the chants and the yelling. 
• So we start watching the match and at this point I realize that everyone, including us, is standing up. It's the first match of the season, so everyone's excited. Also, Sachin Tandelkur... the greatest of the greatest cricket players is playing... So rowdy crowd. The crowd behind us apparently doesn't like that people are blocking the views of others... In the US we might say, "Crap, I can't see anything... Oh well, I'll just hop around and hope to catch some of the game". In india they throw things... anything. At one point a half full mcdonalds cup comes flying past my head and hits someone. Woman and children were getting pegged with trash. Craziness. Surprisingly (sarcasm), everyone sits down and watches the match
• The actual match was boring. Mumbai killed Delhi.
• After the match I think theres only one more interesting thing that I can tell about the trip. So... we had to take an auto rickshaw to the metro station to get home... Thousands of people are outside, all trying to get one... We're having a hard time getting one. It doesn't help that the police are telling the auto rickshaw drivers to keep moving... we finally flag one down... mike and jean-luc get in... while im trying to squeeze in, the police are yelling at the driver to get moving... so the driver speeds off... i only have one hand on the thing and i'm outside of it, hanging onto the side railing... mike and jean-luc are yelling at the drive, 'stop stop!!!'... i don't think he knows very much english... anyways... i eventually pull myself inside and i'm ok. 

Moral of the story is... don't stand up at cricket games and don't forget that not everyone speaks english. Below is a pic of the cricket game and a pic of akshardham from my last post!

Bob.

Akshardham

So... it's been a long time since my last post... I've been super busy at work, but I figured out the solution to this problem... I'll just blog at work!
Lately I have been getting into work around 10 am and working until 10pm... so long days and nights. They're starting to get longer since I'm starting to miss home and I'm desperately awaiting the arrival of Katrina. I know, gross, bob loves katrina, bla bla bla... whats new, right?
Anyways... so I've been having a great time in india since my last post. I'm starting to get a lot more comfortable in the office and I'm starting to make my 'work friends'. So I realize that I usually do a bullet point outline of my days in india, so I'm just going to stick with that. So, a few new things that I have learned/experienced in india...

• Akshardham: I went to Akshardham last weekend. I think it's the newest temple in Delhi. The place was massive, the architecture was beautiful... it was truly an experience i'll never forget. 

Ram and Nattu (2 guys from the office) were nice enough to take me there and show me around. First we went to the central temple... It had statues of a lot of the hindu gods and they shared the story of each of them... very interesting. Then they took me to the center of this temple and we looked at the 'main god' of the temple. By this I was very confused... b/c in hinduism there are 3 main gods... verma, shiva, and one other i think? But now there is a main, main god?
Confusion...
Anyways... I found out that each temple has it's own god that's worshiped. I can't remember the name of this one, but I learned plenty about him through videos, animatronics (seriously), and tours throughout the temple. It was truly a hindu god theme park. A little creepy, but a little fun.
After the creepy animatronic shows and such, we went outside (by this time it was dark) for the water/light show in front of the giant main god statue. There were probably about 2000 people there. Very very fun.

So that was Akshardham. This blog isn't letting me add photos, but I think they're available on facebook!

Bob

4/3: First time on the metro

Today was my first time really venturing away from the hotel area. The main purpose was to get a phone, but it was nice to get out... yesterday I was stir crazy! I walked about 1.5 kilometers (everything is in km here, so I'm starting to get used to it) to the closest metro stop. A couple of things I learned while getting on the metro...

1. Indian's have no concept of personal space. I was standing in line to get my token on the metro and the guy behind me was practically giving me a hug. Luckily he spoke english and he helped me figure out how the whole system works. They also have no concept of single file lines. In the US we would stand in lines for things like metro tickets and food at mcdonalds... Not so in India. It's like a line cutting frenzy. People push and shove to get their way to the front. I've been pretty passive about it so it's taking me quite a while to get things when I stand in line.

2. Once I got off the stop and looked around I was in shock. There were about 4 malls right off the stop. All of them were 4 stories high and had everything you can imagine... food, upscale clothing stores, tons of cell phone places, and of course... the apple store. No ipad 2's though. I chose to eat at McDonalds on my shopping break. I swear I'm gonna be a super fatty by the time I'm done with this trip....

3. I ended up getting a phone at the nokia store. Yes, the nokia store. They are still very popular in india. I think they were popular in the states in 1999... I was sure, prior to this trip, that nokia ceased to exist... apparently not.

4. I traveled back to the hotel on the metro and the second time went much more smooth. On the way back there were some beggars outside the hotel. 3 little girls. I'm having a hard time with this...  it's a lot more difficult than I thought I would be. They'll run toward you (especially americans) and grab at you and ask for money. This one little girl held my arm for 2 blocks saying something in hindi and holding out her hand. I'm getting to the point where I hide from them and run if they start running for me...

Time to rest after a long day in the heat... Btw, having tv shows on dvd is great for this trip. Modern family is saving me!

4/1/2011 post - Camels?

So yesterday and this morning I learned a few things...

1. I thought I saw some camel statues outside of my hotel yesterday. On the way back from work I realized they were actually camels...


2. Eating at a traditional indian restaurant is not the same as eating at an indian restaurant in the U.S. Some of my co-workers took me out to lunch yesterday at this restaurant. I truly felt like I was learning to read again. There are too many things to share about my lunch experience so I'll just say 2 things that stood out... 1. Don't try to grab nan bread that is shared with your left hand... huge no no... 2. at the end of the meal they give you a bowl full of warm water with a lemon in it. initially i thought, 'yes! this must be a traditional indian tea!' psych. it's water to wash your hands. i guess the lemon takes the indian food smell off of your hands... The whole experience was amazing and the food was great. I got chicken tiki masala... i know, 'way to step outside the box bob!'. it was delicious though! i'm not ashamed.

3. I went walking to look for a grocery store called 'Spencers'. Couldn't find it :( But some nice dudes did point me to a store close to the hotel that I can go to. On my long journey I did realized something... the pigs are no longer as cute as i thought. My last post unveiled this discovery of the pigs. On a 45 minute walk today I probably saw 50-75 pigs just walking around the streets... 

 

The last day has been quite an experience. I'm still trying to get my sleep under control and I think I have today. I slept until 6:30am this morning so that's good news. I should have a full day of work today where I'm told they're throwing me a welcome pizza party. Should be fun. Well, I'm off to the grocery store!

B