What day is it?
We started in Toronto on Saturday afternoon. With a last-minute dash to the finish I managed to shoehorn everything into my suitcase, which weighed EXACTLY 50.0 lbs on the nose (free baggage weight limit). Check it out!
The flight from Toronto to Frankfurt went by really fast because I sat next to this really fun guy, Mikey, a sound engineer who was on his way to Croatia to shoot a documentary for National Geographic. You may recognize him from the Food Network show, Restaurant Makeover. Mikey has been doing the sound for every episode since Season 2 and he had a special cameo in the Jeremiah Bullfrog episode that aired last week. We chatted for around 4 hours, so before we knew it, we were in Frankfurt.
Let me tell you that Frankfurt is a smoker's paradise. They had these little islands with embedded ashtrays where happy smokers could lean and puff. Along the same lines, apparently Frankfurt is the birthplace of Davidoff cigarettes, which must be special because Tim and Todd both convinced Marcelo to buy some at duty free for them.
We had a few hours to kill, so we had a light German breakfast of cold cuts and pastries (we were tempted to order the classic breakfast of sausages, pretzel, and 1/2 L of beer, but it was 6:30 AM).
Then we boarded the Air India flight that would take us to Mumbai. This plane had 84 rows of economy class plus both business class and first class (upstairs). The seat division was 3-4-3. Marcelo and I were in the two middle seats of the row of 4 (ugh). At one point I baled and snuck into the flight attendants' area and passed out on an empty row of their seats. They were so sweet to not kick me out until I woke up on my own. The Indian vegetarian meal wasn't bad at all.
Towards the end of the flight, there was a passenger medical emergency and a woman had to be evacuated from the plane before anyone else could go. The angriest baby in the world really didn't want to be in the stuffy plane any longer (nor did we) and bellowed for the last hour while we were waiting.
After that things got a little rough for poor, spoiled me who has never been to a third world country. I knew, in theory, that there is extreme poverty and suffering in some parts of India, but that didn't prepare me for having to ignore the woman and baby who followed us to the taxi (it was 2AM) and begged us again and again for money. More beggars gathered around the taxi before we pulled out. I definitely wasn't ready to drive by a man who has just gotten into a scooter accident and was writhing on the ground in pain with blood pouring out of his mouth while a crowd gathered but didn't seem to be helping him. Our taxi driver didn't stop and we continued on to the hotel where we checked in and I cried for an hour.
The next morning, after 2 hours sleep, I felt better. We had a late breakfast and Marcelo, who has been to many third world countries, told me that I'll adapt quickly. We'll see.
One interesting thing we realized was that Marcelo's room was much better than mine (bright, airy, with hardwood floors, city view, new flat screen TV, living room area, and marble tub) and was outfitted to be a men's room (shaving mirror, men's toiletries). My room faced the inside atrium, was 2/3 the size, had a horrible moldy-smelling carpet, less towels, an ancient telephone, no living room, and was outfitted with women's toiletries. We paid the exact same price for our rooms. Then Marcelo told me that when we were checking in, the reason why I was sent to see 'guest services' instead of the front desk was because "women check in at guest services". We nicknamed my room the woman's grotto.
We wandered to the rooftop pool area and looked out at the view. The Orchid Hotel is a 5-star hotel, but it is built immediately next to the poorest-looking shacks I've ever seen. Rich and poor pressed directly up against each other. This is also something I knew in theory, but had never seen. I felt like an overfed fat cat. I felt like Marie Antoinette.
In the late afternoon we went to the domestic airport for the last leg of our trip (Mumbai to Pune). The flight was a sweet 35 minutes in length, which by this time was a piece of cake. A lovely young driver hired by Symphony Services picked us up and took us to the hotel. It was the most amazing ride. We saw a herd of huge, black cows with massive curled horns moving in the traffic along with the cars. There were baby pigs and goats just grazing free in the middle of clusters of homes. The most adorable schoolchildren with matching uniforms were coming home and there were people, people, people everywhere on bikes, mopeds, rickshaws, trucks, buses (stuffed to the rafters). We were amazed, and then the driver told us that it's not very crowded now because it isn't rush hour.
I think Pune is, in general, a wealthier part of the country than Mumbai and the atmosphere feels more relaxed. I don't regret staying the night in Mumbai and having a meltdown though because it really woke me up to reality.
Our hotel is lovely with excellent Internet access so I can blog and Skype to my heart's content. Marcelo and I attended the Oriental Food Festival in the hotel restaurant and ate very good Thai and Chinese-inspired food. Marcelo has been very patient throughout this trip while I have taken pictures of everything we eat. For my foodie friends, I'll publish all my pictures to a photo album so you can see all of them.
Well, I am absolutely exhausted. I have to be up in 5 hours to start work and meet our friends at Symphony Services. Hope you are all doing well.
We started in Toronto on Saturday afternoon. With a last-minute dash to the finish I managed to shoehorn everything into my suitcase, which weighed EXACTLY 50.0 lbs on the nose (free baggage weight limit). Check it out!
The flight from Toronto to Frankfurt went by really fast because I sat next to this really fun guy, Mikey, a sound engineer who was on his way to Croatia to shoot a documentary for National Geographic. You may recognize him from the Food Network show, Restaurant Makeover. Mikey has been doing the sound for every episode since Season 2 and he had a special cameo in the Jeremiah Bullfrog episode that aired last week. We chatted for around 4 hours, so before we knew it, we were in Frankfurt.
Let me tell you that Frankfurt is a smoker's paradise. They had these little islands with embedded ashtrays where happy smokers could lean and puff. Along the same lines, apparently Frankfurt is the birthplace of Davidoff cigarettes, which must be special because Tim and Todd both convinced Marcelo to buy some at duty free for them.
We had a few hours to kill, so we had a light German breakfast of cold cuts and pastries (we were tempted to order the classic breakfast of sausages, pretzel, and 1/2 L of beer, but it was 6:30 AM).
Then we boarded the Air India flight that would take us to Mumbai. This plane had 84 rows of economy class plus both business class and first class (upstairs). The seat division was 3-4-3. Marcelo and I were in the two middle seats of the row of 4 (ugh). At one point I baled and snuck into the flight attendants' area and passed out on an empty row of their seats. They were so sweet to not kick me out until I woke up on my own. The Indian vegetarian meal wasn't bad at all.
Towards the end of the flight, there was a passenger medical emergency and a woman had to be evacuated from the plane before anyone else could go. The angriest baby in the world really didn't want to be in the stuffy plane any longer (nor did we) and bellowed for the last hour while we were waiting.
After that things got a little rough for poor, spoiled me who has never been to a third world country. I knew, in theory, that there is extreme poverty and suffering in some parts of India, but that didn't prepare me for having to ignore the woman and baby who followed us to the taxi (it was 2AM) and begged us again and again for money. More beggars gathered around the taxi before we pulled out. I definitely wasn't ready to drive by a man who has just gotten into a scooter accident and was writhing on the ground in pain with blood pouring out of his mouth while a crowd gathered but didn't seem to be helping him. Our taxi driver didn't stop and we continued on to the hotel where we checked in and I cried for an hour.
The next morning, after 2 hours sleep, I felt better. We had a late breakfast and Marcelo, who has been to many third world countries, told me that I'll adapt quickly. We'll see.
One interesting thing we realized was that Marcelo's room was much better than mine (bright, airy, with hardwood floors, city view, new flat screen TV, living room area, and marble tub) and was outfitted to be a men's room (shaving mirror, men's toiletries). My room faced the inside atrium, was 2/3 the size, had a horrible moldy-smelling carpet, less towels, an ancient telephone, no living room, and was outfitted with women's toiletries. We paid the exact same price for our rooms. Then Marcelo told me that when we were checking in, the reason why I was sent to see 'guest services' instead of the front desk was because "women check in at guest services". We nicknamed my room the woman's grotto.
We wandered to the rooftop pool area and looked out at the view. The Orchid Hotel is a 5-star hotel, but it is built immediately next to the poorest-looking shacks I've ever seen. Rich and poor pressed directly up against each other. This is also something I knew in theory, but had never seen. I felt like an overfed fat cat. I felt like Marie Antoinette.
In the late afternoon we went to the domestic airport for the last leg of our trip (Mumbai to Pune). The flight was a sweet 35 minutes in length, which by this time was a piece of cake. A lovely young driver hired by Symphony Services picked us up and took us to the hotel. It was the most amazing ride. We saw a herd of huge, black cows with massive curled horns moving in the traffic along with the cars. There were baby pigs and goats just grazing free in the middle of clusters of homes. The most adorable schoolchildren with matching uniforms were coming home and there were people, people, people everywhere on bikes, mopeds, rickshaws, trucks, buses (stuffed to the rafters). We were amazed, and then the driver told us that it's not very crowded now because it isn't rush hour.
I think Pune is, in general, a wealthier part of the country than Mumbai and the atmosphere feels more relaxed. I don't regret staying the night in Mumbai and having a meltdown though because it really woke me up to reality.
Our hotel is lovely with excellent Internet access so I can blog and Skype to my heart's content. Marcelo and I attended the Oriental Food Festival in the hotel restaurant and ate very good Thai and Chinese-inspired food. Marcelo has been very patient throughout this trip while I have taken pictures of everything we eat. For my foodie friends, I'll publish all my pictures to a photo album so you can see all of them.
Well, I am absolutely exhausted. I have to be up in 5 hours to start work and meet our friends at Symphony Services. Hope you are all doing well.
posted by Kaori @ 11:17 PM
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