- Wow, Indian food in India is awesome - 1.5 weeks - This phase was fun. There was lots of food, most of it was very good and I ate a lot of it. I impressed the folks here with my willingness to try anything.
- So wait, you guys eat Indian every day? - 3 days - My stomach started letting me know that a bit of variety would be very much appreciated. I gave it more Indian food. I was still feeling ok, but I was more than a bit concerned as to what the future held.
- Kill me, kill me now - 2.5 weeks - I don't want to talk about it, you don't want to hear about it. Let's move on.
- Everything in moderation - the rest of the time - I still love the food. I just can't eat a lot of it. There are a few things that I'll probably never be able to eat again, but since I've never seen those things in the States I think I'll be able to manage around them.
We went to Bangkok the weekend before last. In a turn of events that I didn't see coming at all Bangkok made me incredibly homesick. It turns out that Bangkok is a MUCH more western city than Kolkata. The roads and drivers are much more western (ie the roads have lanes and the drivers use them). The city skyline could have been either Seattle or San Francisco (Kolkata doesn't have a skyline). Even the hotel felt a lot more similar to the Sheraton in Seattle than the Sheraton in Kolkata. Near as I can figure my lack of homesickness up to that point was due not to my iron resolve, but to the fact that Kolkata is sooooo different from what I am used to that it is impossible to imagine myself at home, which means I don't get homesick.
Other than the homesickness thing, Bangkok was very cool. We saw a bunch of temples that were like nothing I have ever seen before. Our itinerary on our first day in Bangkok was crazy. As we were only there for two days we tried to pack in as much as possible. On Saturday we did the following:
- Arrived in Bangkok at 6:15 am local time.
- Spent an hour and a half getting through immigration.
- Toured the Temple of the Emerald Buddha. They don't allow you to wear shorts on the tour so we had to get loaner pants at the registration desk.
- Had lunch at a market noodle stall. Very good.
- Took a boat tour of the river. I pretended I was on my way to invade Burma.
- Toured Wat Pho. That's a big Buddha.
- Walked around a city park. Very pretty and peaceful.
- Staggered our way back to the hotel. Cabbies in Bangkok do not speak English. At all. The hotel even gives you a little card to show the cabby so he know where to take you. Our card didn't seem to work. We had to take three different cabs to go approximately 8 km. The second cabby kicked us out almost immediately because he didn't know where to go.
- Watched a few Muay Thai matches at Lumpinee Stadium. We saw a guy get his face smashed by the other dudes knee. Three times. I've never seen anything like it.
- Walked around the Night Bazaar. Mind bogglingly big. We guessed that there had to be at least 1000 stalls. Capitalism at its best.
- Had dinner at a Thai place. Very good, but it tasted a lot like the Thai place near my apartment in San Francisco.
- Walked around Khaosan road. I've never been to Mardi Gras, but Khaosan road seemed a lot like a cross between that and Vegas. Needless to say, you could get into a lot of trouble on that road.
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The week after Bangkok was a bit of a slog. I was tired most of the week. Luckily the pace at the office had slowed down quite a bit at that point so we were able to leave at a semi-reasonable time every day.
This past weekend was spend in Kolkata. I played cricket with some work colleagues on Sunday. I don't think the India is going to offer me citizenship in order to get me to play for the national team, but I didn't embarrass myself either. They even let me bowl (pitch) a couple of times. My first time bowling I asked for a warm up throw as I haven't pitched a baseball in years. My first toss had impressive velocity, but my accuracy was a bit off. It flew right through the space that was soon to be occupied by the batters head and clanged, very loudly, off a metal pipe behind the crease (we were playing indoors). Half of my colleagues immediately began explaining to me that I didn't need to throw quite so hard while the other half practically had to carry the batter into the crease. I managed to get through without hitting anybody and I even bowled one guy out. Not too bad for my first time.
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This coming weekend is going to be in Kolkata again. I was thinking about going to Agra to see the Taj Mahal, but the flights are too expensive. Next weekend we are going to Dubai for three days and then the following weekend (my last) we are going to either Darjeeling or Hyderabad depending on if we can get train tickets to Darjeeling.
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I've booked my plane tickets for New Zealand. We're flying out on 4/9 and we get back on 4/25. I wonder how the Indian food is in Auckland?
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I know I need to put pictures up on Flickr. I'll try to get some up this weekend from the hotel.
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