Fear and Safety

For those of you out there who have wondered, Ryan and I live in Hyderabad, which is about 8 hours away from Mumbai, where the attacks were.  For all our friends in the Northeast, it's about the same distance from Bridgeport, CT to Buffalo, NY.  I'll admit to looking that up after we heard about the attacks.  I wanted to know what kind of distance separated me from all this horror.  I was not comforted; I wanted it to be a lot farther. I guess the thing that gets to me is that these gunmen were seeking out Americans and Britons.  And believe me, from living here, I know how much we stick out!  All these events have got me thinking about racism and persecution. As a white person, growing up in suburban Connecticut, I don't think I've ever been on the receiving end of it.  On the one hand, it's probably good for us, to know how it feels to be afraid because of the color of your skin.  But on the other hand, no one should ever have to feel this way.

I have been trying to tell myself that we are safer here in Hyderabad than the people were in Mumbai.  I say, "Mumbai was the business capital of India, and therefore more of a target.  It is a peninsula and easily accessible via water."  And while those things may be true, it doesn't really assure anything.  And I've been imagining what those people were going through, when they were asked at gun point, where they were from.

I call myself a Christian, and yet I still have so much fear in my life.  I've always been like that, and kidded about it often on this blog, but this fear is so much more real than ever before.  I guess it comes down to a matter of trust.  I'm supposed to believe in God, and in His will for my life.  But it is so hard for me to surrender my own control and trust in His.  Every time I read the Psalms, I'm always amazed at David's trust in God.  He was being pursued, his very life was being hunted.  And yet at the end of so many of his psalms, he says "but I will trust in your unfailing love".  It's like he was saying, "Despite all the men chasing after me, wanting me dead, I will still trust in God, because His love for me does not fail."  I wish I could trust like that.  It's definitely something I need to work on, not just so that I can have some sort of peace in the rest of our time here in India, but for the rest of my life, however long that may be.

All this to say that my thoughts and prayers are with those affected by the tragedy in Mumbai, as well as with this nation, that it may someday be at peace.

On the bright side, continued

I said I would try to keep this post up, so that is what I'm doing. Today was such a gorgeous day, Ryan and I finally decided to clean up our balcony and just leave the doors open.

photo-2191

Tonight, there are hundreds of fireworks going off in every direction (including some that seem to be coming from our own apartment complex) in celebration of the Diwali festival.  It's fun just to be sitting in our living room and be able to watch them!  OK, there's a part of me that wants to duck my head in the sand to make all the loud noises STOP!  But I'm trying to ignore that side of me, and just enjoy.

How to Steal a Car in India

1. Call your driver's company and ask for a car for the day.  (This will help you if you need to claim innocence later.)2. When the company says the car will be there in 5-10 minutes, go down to the garage and wait.  The car will not be there for a good 30 minutes, so you have time to scope out the car to steal. 3. Once you have your mark, wave to the driver and just get in. 4. Go out to lunch, run your usual errands, then return to the scene of the "crime". 5. If you run into trouble (for example: you see your neighbor shaking her fist at your car and yelling at the driver) simply point out that you had ordered a car for the day and had mistaken it for this one.  She will not be angry at you. 6. Simply smile, apologize, and go about your merry way.

True story.

Good news!

We have hired a tutor to teach us Hindi!  He will come to our apartment twice a week for an entire year, and says by the end, we will speak and understand well.  All for $100.  Total.

Culture Shock, episode 2

I knew in moving so far away from home, friends, and family, that there would be a lot of things and people that I would miss.  I miss beautiful lawns and trees; I miss my family; I miss jumping into a car and driving myself around.  But there is one thing I never thought I would miss as much as I do now.  One place that I rarely went to and groaned inwardly every time my dad would want to take me there:  Home Depot.  Yes, Home Depot, the one stop shop for everything "home".  Oh, how I dream of Home Depot!  And today, I learned that Ryan dreams of it, too. We were discussing our list of items that we feel we still need in order to get settled: power adapter power converter(s) shower head(s) some plants grass seed or sod some lamps light bulbs a drill & other small tools

And Ryan blurts out, "If only there was a Home Depot around here; we could get everything we still need in one place!"

"The funny thing is," he continued, "we probably only went to Home Depot once or twice in all the time we we have been married."

"But that's the beauty of Home Depot," I responded gleefully.  "You only have to go once or twice and you can get everything you need!"

Today we were out in the hopes of crossing one or two items off the list.  We've learned if we can cross off one thing we set out to do in a day, it's a productive day.  This, however, was not a productive day.  Many of the stores were closed (it is a holiday, after all) so we came home with our hands empty (and in a stolen car, but that's a story for another day!).

So now, as I sit here without plants or lights (OK, we have some lights), I am yearning for the days of driving with my dad, and him always seeming to veer somehow towards Home Depot.

On the bright side...

If my recent posts have given the impression that our move has been a negative experience, please let me assure you that it is not true!  Yes, I am still homesick and adjusting to life here, but more than anything, in my posts, I want to just point out the differences (and sometimes similarities) between life here and the life that I'm used to.  However, I think I will take this opportunity to start pointing out the things I like about living here so far.

1. the food! This has to be Numero Uno on the list because the food here is amazing. And not just the Indian food. Because we are living in a city, there is a lot of variety.

2. deliveries! Going along with number one, we have found that many restaurants here deliver. This is exciting for me because, since Ryan works nights, I'm on my own for dinner. Being able to order from some of our favorite restaurants is something I can look forward to in the evenings.

3. people do seem to want to be helpful... It's funny because even if they don't know the answer, they won't say so!

4. our apartment. It really is a lovely place, and I can't wait until we get the rest of our furniture to decorate it!

5. the spa prices! Back home, I never went to spas because of the ridiculously high prices! But here, an hour massage is $30-$40, and that's at a really, really nice place. I figure I could do that on a monthly basis!

6. the church we've been attending. It is amazing to me that we can be on the other side of the world, and still find a church that believes what we believe, sings the songs that we are familiar with, and has a service format almost exactly like our church back home! Plus, seeing people from so many different countries together and worshiping God is an amazing experience in and of itself.

I think it would be a good idea for me to continue updating this list, so I'll let you know when I add to it as the months go on.

Indian Stretchable Time

"Time-keeping is not an Indian strength.  Your punctuality will be expected, but don't assume the the Indians will be on time.  Delays are normal and to be expected, so be prepared to be kept waiting for appointments.  It is a standing joke that IST (Indian Standard Time) really stands for Indian Stretchable Time.  Westerners in India have difficulty in understanding this fluidity in relation to time; patience is key." -Culture Smart! India

Culture Shock, episode 1

So far I must admit to being rather proud of myself for how I'm adjusting.  That said, it should be noted that while Ryan is out in the "real world" for 9-10 hours everyday, I just sit in our apartment and watch TV (our shipments haven't arrived yet, so it's all I have had to do--don't judge me).  Even so, there have been a couple things that have struck me as so different, it's even hard for me to wrap my mind around them.

The first is what I like to call "Indian time".  Actually, from what I've heard, most countries aside from the US have their own time, where "tomorrow" means "next week" or "30 minutes" means "2 hours".  But I have never experienced this before.  I come from a culture of "If you don't have your pizza in 30 minutes, we'll give it to you free" etc. etc. so I've always expected that when someone says "30 minutes", they mean "30 minutes".  If it's after that (within maybe a 5 minute grace period), it is considered rude and apologies are usually offered.  That is not the case here.  Since we have arrived, we have been promised many "tomorrows" that turn out to be several days or even a week later.  We have been promised "I'll be there in 30 minutes" and we now know not to go down for at least an hour.  It's not rude here, it's just how it is.  However, Ryan is picking up on it.  He called his driver when we were an hour from our apartment and said, "I'll be there in 15 minutes."  Let's just hope it's not something he brings back to America with him.

Secondly, as white people, we get stared at, a lot.  In fact, we were told before we came that people would even want to take our pictures, and would sometimes even try to do it sneakily without you knowing.  Well, it's one thing to be warned, and another to experience it for yourself!  Ryan and I visited Golconda Fort one Saturday, which is a big site-seeing attraction here in Hyderabad.  There are hundreds of huge stairs, so at one point we just needed to sit down and take a break.  At one point, I noticed that someone was sitting beside us and when I looked up, he was getting his picture taken.  So I moved to get out of the way, as people politely do in America, to get out of other people's pictures.  As I moved, however, the huge group of people near the person taking the picture started laughing!  The guy who was sitting next to us says to us, "No, come sit back down, I wanted you in the picture!"  We were shocked!  Here is this young guy, speaking perfect English, dressed very western, and yet he still wanted a picture of the two white people next to him!  So I said (probably too politely), "I don't want to be in your picture" while everyone was still laughing!  I was very embarrassed and Ryan and I just walked away. 

Finally, most people here have domestic help and we were told that it would be a good idea for us to as well, as the apartments can get very dusty.  So we thought we'd just get someone to come in and do the floors, the kitchen, and the bathrooms a couple times a week.  However, if we want someone to do the toilets, we'd have to get someone separate who's in a lower caste.  This fact was such a whole different concept for me!  I thought to myself, "Forget it!  I'll clean my own toilets, I don't care!"  It must be so strange to come to America after living in India and realize that people in the middle class clean their own toilets!  And even their houses!! 

I am hopeful that once I adjust to these three changes, I'll be a more patient person, not be so self-conscious, and know how to clean a mean toilet!

We have internet!

After 41 days, two internet service provider applications, four electricians, countless calls to complain, one angry husband, we finally have internet!  Get ready for posts galore!

Arrival to India

Perhaps some of you are wondering why this post is entitled "Arrival to India" when in fact we have been here over a month.  Well, there are a number of factors:

1. We still do not have any internet in our apartment (I'm currently crouched in a corner, stealing someone else's)! As you will learn from my posts to come, things take a lot of time here...

2. It took a week to move into our apartment. Another week to get a bed (we slept on couches). And another week to get our air shipment (computer, sheets, towels-we've been drying off in t-shirts).

3. And frankly, I've just been allowing myself to be a lazy butt and just never felt like writing this post! But there are some good stories, some of which I will share with you now (these are just excerpts from my journal, so please excuse the informality of the writing).

August 28, 2008 Hugo did very well on the flights.  We could NOT get him to pee anywhere, let alone on the weewee pads.  Sometimes I feel like God really does have a sense of humor, because while on the plane to Frankfurt, I prayed that Hugo would go when we got to the airport.  Well, while walking through the busiest terminal, where all the food and shopping is, all of a sudden we notice a trail of poop coming from Hugo!  So we had to stop in the middle of the terminal and I had to go back and pick it all up!  Luckily, I had brought little baggies with me just in case.  What forethought, if I do say so myself.

August 29, 2008 Arrive in Hyderabad, no one waiting to pick us up... again!  Wait around, make calls, nothing.  Meanwhile, these four men started picking on Hugo and taking pictures of me! Very awkward...  Ryan finally picked up yet another one of those men with cars that are not associated with a taxi company.  I was so mad I could have screamed (this is exactly what had happened on our last visit).  And on top of that, we didn't know where to go!  At first we thought we'd go to one of the nice hotels and sneak in Hugo, but the way he was whining so much at that point, it wouldn't have worked.  So we got the guy to take us to Ryan's office.

When we got there, about 8 security guards needed convincing that Ryan actually does work there and then we had to get them to call the ex-pat resources person.  Finally they got a hold of her (in the middle of the night) and she gave us the address of where we were going and sent a cab.  The cab was a tiny little car and can't fit all our suitcases, so he had to put one on the roof (mine, of course) ...and he didn't even secure it up there!  So we thought we were finally headed for the guest house.  Well, the cab driver couldn't find it!  We probably drove around for an hour looking for it.  (Our cab driver even had to stop to pee on the side of the road!  Or at least I think that's what he was doing... he stopped the car, took out the keys and ran around the corner for about 30 seconds and then came back.)  After many phone calls and many wrong turns, we arrived at the complex.

Up we went with all our suitcases and walked into a reasonably nice apartment.  "OK," I thought, "This isn't too bad.  I could stay here for a while when Ryan's at work."  Well, then I started noticing all the locks on each door.  Then I realized they were taking all our bags into one small room in the corner.  That's when it hit me we just got one room in the place.  The rest was community area.  I sobbed myself to sleep.

August 30, 2008 We don't think they get any Americans at this guest house.  First of all, they do not speak English-at all.  They also seem to think it's very weird that we keep the door closed while we're here.  Ryan says we seem to be an anomaly in every way: taking the stairs instead of the elevator, not keeping our door open when we're just hanging around, bringing a tiny dog around with us everywhere.  We are probably quite the site!

Well anyway, today we didn't have any food or water!  And we didn't know how to get any... I think we were slightly dehydrated.  We had no phone, either.  Luckily we have email, so Ryan was able to get in touch with our relocation expert and after much communication, we finally got a car to pick us up.  Apparently this woman tried to call the guest house twice, but the man said to her that he could not disturb us because the door was closed.  This was after having knocked on our door twice, once to ask if we wanted housekeeping and once to see what we were doing for dinner!  He doesn't really speak English though so the conversations went something more like this:

Little man: Housekeeping? Ryan: No we're fine for today, thanks anyway. Little man: No housekeeping? Ryan: No.

Little man: Dinner? Ryan: No thanks, we actually have a car coming to take us out to get some food in a bit.  Thanks anyway. Little man: No dinner? Ryan: No.

The car brought us to Q-Mart, which is a store of mostly imported foods from America and Europe.  It's funny the different clientele you see there: very western looking.  Even the Indians that were shopping there were speaking English and dressed in jeans and t-shirts.  This is opposed to what seems like 99% of the women walking around the city who are in saris or those Indian suits.  We got some food and water (thank goodness!) and came back to the apartment to a dinner of peanut butter and nutella sandwiches. September 1, 2008 I was dreading today, but it turned out much better than I thought!  After not sleeping well, Ryan and I met with the woman who manages our apartment to sign the lease.  She confirmed that it will be ready for us on Sunday (yay!)  [note: it wasn't] but also mentioned she had another "guest house" that didn't have any other guests, so we could basically just have the whole apartment.  And the best part was that it was in the same complex as our apartment.  Well, we jumped at the chance!

So here I sit, in an apartment almost exactly like ours will be.  The internet is limited here because we haven't set it up yet, but other than that, it's 100x better!  And the grounds are so lovely, it's so nice to take Hugo out there.  There's actually grass!

People are enamored with Hugo.  No one yet has been familiar with Yorkshire Terriers.  We were pleased that the manager of our apartment complex seemed to love him.  She thought he was adorable and so well-behaved (yeah right...).  And tonight at work, Ryan said that the only question that his employees had for him was "Is it true you have a dog?  What kind is it?"  It seems to be quite the oddity.

September 2, 2008 So much for being productive today.  I was about to write and say what a good day it was because Ryan and I went out to lunch together and had such a nice time.  It was called Serengeti and it was basically a Rainforest Cafe with Indian food.  But then when I got home, I killed an R [note: my way of saying "roach" without having to say it] which put me in a state of terror.  I cleared off the bed and made myself a safe space and just sat there pretty much all day!  9 hours!!  Just not a good day overall.

So that's basically our arrival.  After another week or so, we finally moved into our apartment and from then on, it was basically shopping for furniture and appliances, waiting for furniture and appliances, and passing the time watching King of Queens.

New Category

For those of you interested in only reading about my time in India, or about my other travels, please note the new category that I have added for those posts only: Imported Chocolate.  I thought about just calling it "India" but figured that would not encompass any traveling to other countries that we do and does not fit in with my chocolate theme.  I thought about "foreign", to refer to chocolate from other countries, and that led me to "imported". Look for new posts under that tag in the next couple weeks.  Unfortunately, our internet is quite spotty right now, but I am keeping track of everything for posting at a later date.