Happy Hour

A really slow internet connection is the best India can do. This is pretty much the explanation I got from the modem tech. help line. "It will take a long time for pages with a lot of pictures or video to load." I repeat this to George who says, "oh, so like the entire internet." So our fancy wireless internet cards really have not put us ahead. How am I supposed to catch up on LC and "The Hills" when I can't download shows from MTV?

Since we were going to our fancy happy hour at the ultra-exclusive "Sutra Lounge" I decided to wear some jewelry. I've been keeping it locked in my suitcase since the last round of Krishn's strange men were in the flat. Last night, I went to open my suitcase and the lock was still locked but the zipper was broken. It definitely wasn't broken the last time I used it. Luckily, everything was still there and nothing looked like it had been touched. So then I started thinking. Our maid-boy didn't come yesterday even though I had asked him too. But when he was here the other day, I left after he had been here about a half hour. I came back about 45 minutes later and he was still here and looked a little surprised to see me. He was just sort of standing around talking on his phone. Now, I'm not accusing anyone of anything right now but these are the facts as I know them. I'm either going to go back to not leaving him alone or just keep the back bedroom locked and clean the bathroom myself. I did scrub our bedroom floor - it took me 2 days but I must say, it looks amazing.

So we went to a place called Sutra Lounge last night (in the hotel where we had dinner overlooking the city). It was organized by the OWC for members and their spouses. When we walked in, we had to "register." Luckily, they did not ask for passport sized photos. But they were looking for a business card. This is something I've been noticing alot lately. Everyone carries business cards - even women who are not currently associated with any business. The other day I was at the Home Stop store and on the way out a man stopped to ask me a few questions. From what I gathered, they are looking to get a better idea of who shops there and what they buy for marketing purposes. After he finished with his questions he said, "can I have your visiting card?"
"My visiting card?" I wasn't sure if he was saying "visiting."
"Yes, you know, you're card." He made a invisible box with his index fingers.
"You mean, my passport?"
"Yes, visiting card."
"I don't have my passport with me. Do you mean my FRO form?" (The FRO form is the paper that says we are registered foreigners.) All I had with me was my OWC card so I pull that out and he looks at me like I'm an idiot.
"No, no for your contact information," he says like he is talking to an idiot.
"Oh, I don't have a business card."
"Ok. Thank you."
But now that I'm meeting more people, I'm realizing that everyone carries business cards.

But back to the happy hour. There were probably 100 or so people and when we walked in, I recognized a group of people from the IBM coffee last week. Before we could make our way over there, snap! There was a camera in our face and we were standing with the general manager of the hotel. No idea who took the picture or where it will surface. But we found the IBM group and I introduced George and we got another lead on a possible mattress that is more than 2 inches thick. We met a woman who moved to Bangalore from Stamford, CT. She had cropped blond hair with dark roots that looked like it wouldn't move if she stepped out into a monsoon. Her head looked like it had been shellacked. She kept talking about how "gorgeous" her house in Stamford is (they are currently renting it) and how it's "up by the parkway on 2 acres. You know how hard it is to find two acres in Fairfield County." And she had just done large renovations on the whole house and had the most gorgeous granite counter-tops put in. George then mentions something about wanting a scooter and she launches into these horrific stories of a man who got hit by a bus and other fatal accidents that the Indians just gloss over. George thought she was on some sort of drugs.

We left the IBM crowd to talk to Vivian and my other Singaporean friend Karla. Vivian (who also lives in our building) was telling us a story about how she needed to get more gas for her range. She had to call about 20 different people and it took about 3 weeks. I said, "well, that's another reason why I don't cook here." (as if adding the "here" would lead her to believe that I cook at home). So we shared our hungrybangalore.com find and said they should try ordering out more. Snap! Another photo of the four of us.

I also saw another woman who was at the Mastery International School with me the other day. She said, "did Ava (the interviewer) ask you any questions about your experience?"
"Nope. Come to think of it, I had to ask her if she wanted to see a resume."
She said, "it was the strangest interview I've been on. She was just looking for someone white."
And I can't say I disagree. So I think I made the right decision saying no. Then a women who seemed like she couldn't decide if she wanted to be from Singapore or Australia came over to talk to us. She kept switching where she was from and she looked more like she was from Singapore but she sounded more like she was from Australia. Snap! Another picture of us.

Throughout the night, there were many people with cameras taking pictures. Some were for the OWC newsletter but one man said he was from the Deccan Herald. So if we can find them online, I'll give you the link. We did feel like quite the rock stars though.

I also went to my weekly OWC coffee yesterday morning with Vivian. I saw Vanessa there and she said, "did you get my texts?" Apparently she sent me TWO text messages I never got. One was about how she didn't have any more information on the Friday morning walks she told me about and one was about having lunch. So I told her I wasn't being rude, I just never got the messages. Then she started talking about how she just got tickets to the India/Australia cricket match being played in Bangalore. I said that George was talking about it but heard tickets were hard to come by. She said, "no, you can get them but they are expensive." But I think we're going to try to get tickets. Going to India and not seeing a cricket match is like going to the US and not seeing a baseball game. It's the national pastime. Then I met Heather. Heather is from San Francisco and couldn't shake my hand because she has a cold and didn't want to spread germs. She laughed alot even when nothing funny was said and every time she laughed she leaned back. She reminded me of the girl in the movie Grease who was hyper-active and got Sandy involved in cheerleading - only I think Heather was probably involved in cheerleading and drama club. Heather is organizing this year's Christmas bizarre and she could really use all the help she can get. It's going to be a "spectacular" event. After her plug for help, she also launched into a story about an American woman living in New Delhi who was driving she and her child somewhere and accidentally hit a Muslim child who darted into the street. "Well, as soon as she got out of the car and they saw that she was white, it turned into mass chaos." And with all of her drama skills, she became very serious. "Do you know what the crowd did?" She paused for just a minute, the suspense building..."They went into her car and killed her child." Weren't we just talking about how there will be a Santa and Christmas village for the kids to play in?

Tomorrow we're going to see about venturing outside the city to a place called Nandi Hills. It's supposed to be scenic and is a good place for hiking - although we'll see what that means in India.