Wednesday September 29th (additional)

So last night Gopi took Julie and I to go get some fruit. The area he took us to was much more populated and looked to be Bangalore's 3rd Street Promenade (with mostly brands we have in America). We went to a fruit stand to get the fruit and you have to tell the person working there what you want and how much you want (in kilos), not a self service stand. We got some bananas, kiwis (which are from New Zealand not India), passion fruit, lemons the size of a peach seed, and a couple other things. However, the fruit stand was not the memorable event of the evening, the kids pedaling for money were. As soon as we parked, there was a little boy, skinny and looked to be no more than 5 year old, tapping on Gopi's window. Gopi told us just to ignore them and to not make eye contact. When I got out of the car, the little boy came around and poked me on the arm. It was so sad not to even look at him. Amelia, you would have the hardest time in this area because you can't give any of them money. Remember in "Slumdog Millionaire" when the boy's eyes were burned out with acid to make him look more helpless? Well there was a boy sitting on the ground by the fruit stand who had his left arm missing and I can only imagine what happened to him. There were a couple little girls walking around (and one came up and tapped me on the arm) that were carrying babies (just like in "Slumdog"). It was so sad and I hope to never go back there, even though it appears that that area is the place to get fresh fruit and groceries.

Part of the trip home from they gym...

Wednesday September 29th

Gopi, JBA's second in command, has been a lifesaver in Bangalore. He picked me up from the airport and immediately called the airline to find out where my bags were, he's been Julie and my driver so far this week, he's given us detailed itineraries are where to go on our weekends, he's helped us find restaurants that aren't too spicy and are on the healthier side and this morning, he brought us to spinning! The instructor was a South African native who had a very thick accent so it was hard to understand her some times so I'm curious if the Indians in the class could understand what she was saying. Also, it appears that India has a love for boy bands. The spinning instructor played all boy bands and some other pop songs from 1999 (Shania Twain and Pink). At the office, everyone has songs for their ringtones and I guess it's OK for them to keep them on ring all day long. My favorite is the man who has Britney Spears "Hit Me Baby One More Time".
For lunch, Julie and I went to UB City which is a high rise across the street from our apartment that looks very out of place in Bangalore. It's a couple years old and has a mall with high end stores like Louis Vuitton and Burberry and a really nice restaurant selection. We decided to splurge and we went to a Japanese place that looked like it would fit in with the LA restaurant scene. The food was ok. After lunch my luggage arrived!! Amazing! Also causing some excitement at work was that there is going to be a verdict tomorrow on a case about land involving muslims and hindus. I guess it's become a very political issue and the people can get very passionate about their opinions, thus we have to go into work early and leave work early to be back before 3 PM when the verdict is announced. Worst case scenario, people burn stores. So, stores are closed tomorrow afternoon. School has been canceled for tomorrow and Friday in preparation. I guess they don't get snow days so this is the next best thing?

Monday September 27th

I've finally landed in India!! Bangalore to be exact. It's the Silicon Valley of India so I'm expecting big things. My bags were less fortunate and have yet to arrive. I took a rest day today since I'm 12.5 hours ahead of LA and got to check out what Indian cable has to offer. There are a couple English channels and they play shows that aired about 4 years ago (Gilmore Girls, Fear Factor, The Simpsons). The apartment is a two bed/two bath "fully" furnished apartment with a kitchen, dining area and couches. It's actually really nice except for the mini-ants that roam the floors/counters. We asked people at work about them and they said there is nothing you can do about them, everyone has them and there's no easy/good way to get rid of them. The only time I went out of the apartment today was to go to lunch with Julie to Sunny's, a not-so-Indian restaurant across the street. It had a large menu (on a Cheesecake Factory scale) and the chicken sandwich I ordered was pretty good-not spicy but had a lot of mayo. We attempted to be adventurous for dinner and ordered from Kabob Korner, however this proved to be less of a success than Sunny's. It arrived very quickly but my chicken kabob was a burrito look-alike that just didn't smell right. So, since the two things Julie and I ordered came to around $2, we decided to play it safe and order from Sunny's again.