(This one is for Mom & Dad.)
People often ask if I feel safe travelling alone outside the States, and I often respond that I’d have to try REALLY hard to get into trouble because I have so many handlers watching after me. Last night was a good reminder of just how ‘guarded’ I am here…
I have struck up a friendly morning routine waving at the guard who attends the reception desk of the company on the ground floor. When I arrive, I always make a production of waving good morning to him as I get on the elevator up to my office. He doesn’t work for my company – Aspect occupies three floors of an eight story office building… but it never hurts to be nice, even to people you don’t know.
So… Tuesday night I was leaving the office (late at night, as usual). I had called the hotel to send a car to pick me up and waved to Mr. Ground Floor as I left the building. My routine is to step outside, sit on this little short wall facing the street and wait for the car. The car arrived in 7-8 minutes, as usual, and as I reached for my laptop bag something behind me caught my eye… It was Mr. Ground Floor, standing in the door watching me leave. I felt like a little girl getting on the school bus – her Daddy watching from the window to make sure she boarded safely. When he saw that my car had arrived (and that I had noticed him standing in the door), he waved good night and turned around to go back to his office. I wonder how many nights he has done that… I love this place.
Tuesday 20-April (11am): I dropped my pants and he nearly fainted.
I am exhausted. I don’t feel well. My lead guy in India told me to take a long lunch and go rejuvenate myself on Commercial Street. (He’s practically a newlywed and therefore still appreciates that the way to soothe an ill woman is to send her shopping.) It was a good idea; I had an errand to run to get some alterations done to a dress I had made on Sunday… so I grabbed my friend (the Shopping Diva) who needed to pick up some glass bangles for her upcoming wedding, and off we went.
To set this up, I have to explain that one of the things I had to get used to when I first started visiting this wonderful country is that in some settings there is no sense of personal space. It’s crowded – plus, the nature of people here is very collaborative, so there are lots of huddles for discussions. I repeat: no personal space. And when you go ‘out’ into the world (outside my safe little office), that condition is magnified. Shopping lanes are congested beyond description; people hover over each other’s shoulders to get a look at the goods in a space about two meters wide; you get the picture. On another note, but related to the story I’m about to share, is that although the country is highly religious… the sheer nature of the heat dictates that sleeveless tops, light/sheer fabrics, and open necklines are a fashion necessity for all but the orthodox-level conservative Muslims who dress in their dark wraps from head to toe regardless of the climate. Given all this, I didn’t consider India an overly-conservative environment on the modesty scale.
So… I had a dress made on Sunday but was unable to try it on before I left the tailor. Sure enough, when I got back to the hotel, the thing hung on me like a big sack and I wanted it to be a bit more fitted. The reason I didn’t try the dress on earlier is that the tailor shop didn’t have a fitting room. The shop is literally two rooms open to each other (no doors) – with sewing machines on one side and the handwork being done on the other (oh, and with a counter spanning the middle for cutting the fabrics, transacting business, eating lunch, etc. – no wasted space, here). So I had planned for this… I dressed for the day in a tank shirt and jacket with a pair of loose elastic-waist pants – knowing that I could remove the jacket, slip the dress over my head, slide the pants down, and basically make a change of clothes without ever really exposing myself. Or so I thought.
So we arrived at the tailor. I explained my requirement (tuck the dress a little tighter) and stepped into the less occupied of the two rooms. The tailor followed me, which was fine – remember ‘no personal space’, so I had anticipated this… and I had a plan. I slipped off the jacket… dress over the head… started tugging at my pants… and then the excitement started! He turned pale and started speaking excitedly in Hindi (or Kanada?) to my friend. There was a loud exchange of words… I really didn’t notice too much – I was just trying to get my pants off over my shoes in a room not more than 7x7 now holding three people (two people too many, IMHO). Apparently he was telling my friend to tell me to ‘get my pants back on’… And she was trying to explain the concept of a dress and that I wouldn’t be wearing pants under a dress. This is a summer dress with the hemline hitting just below the knee… but in India, it could easily be mistaken for the long kirtis they wear. Theirs has a really deep side slit up to the hip and they wear it with what we would call leggings (pants made of lightweight material, worn very tight and scrunched up along the leg). But what I was wearing thoroughly covered me (by my standards) – all the way down to both knees. But clearly this was enough to raise a complete panic with the tailor.
So anyway, this poor man thinks I have just shed my last ounce of modesty. My friend is trying to explain ‘it’s a DRESS’ – and tells him to just take the measurements. He is pale and oh-so-very off kilter. Poor thing, his wife was probably on the way with his lunch – and to him, I couldn’t “get dressed” quickly enough!
Of course, I was petrified when I learned what had transpired. I’m painfully modest about my body, so to think that I embarrassed this guy confused me a little. But the more I thought about it, the funnier I thought it was. My friend told me that he was in quite a state of panic… But, we got the job done. And I’ve learned another lesson in India: never ever drop your trousers. J
To set this up, I have to explain that one of the things I had to get used to when I first started visiting this wonderful country is that in some settings there is no sense of personal space. It’s crowded – plus, the nature of people here is very collaborative, so there are lots of huddles for discussions. I repeat: no personal space. And when you go ‘out’ into the world (outside my safe little office), that condition is magnified. Shopping lanes are congested beyond description; people hover over each other’s shoulders to get a look at the goods in a space about two meters wide; you get the picture. On another note, but related to the story I’m about to share, is that although the country is highly religious… the sheer nature of the heat dictates that sleeveless tops, light/sheer fabrics, and open necklines are a fashion necessity for all but the orthodox-level conservative Muslims who dress in their dark wraps from head to toe regardless of the climate. Given all this, I didn’t consider India an overly-conservative environment on the modesty scale.
So… I had a dress made on Sunday but was unable to try it on before I left the tailor. Sure enough, when I got back to the hotel, the thing hung on me like a big sack and I wanted it to be a bit more fitted. The reason I didn’t try the dress on earlier is that the tailor shop didn’t have a fitting room. The shop is literally two rooms open to each other (no doors) – with sewing machines on one side and the handwork being done on the other (oh, and with a counter spanning the middle for cutting the fabrics, transacting business, eating lunch, etc. – no wasted space, here). So I had planned for this… I dressed for the day in a tank shirt and jacket with a pair of loose elastic-waist pants – knowing that I could remove the jacket, slip the dress over my head, slide the pants down, and basically make a change of clothes without ever really exposing myself. Or so I thought.
So we arrived at the tailor. I explained my requirement (tuck the dress a little tighter) and stepped into the less occupied of the two rooms. The tailor followed me, which was fine – remember ‘no personal space’, so I had anticipated this… and I had a plan. I slipped off the jacket… dress over the head… started tugging at my pants… and then the excitement started! He turned pale and started speaking excitedly in Hindi (or Kanada?) to my friend. There was a loud exchange of words… I really didn’t notice too much – I was just trying to get my pants off over my shoes in a room not more than 7x7 now holding three people (two people too many, IMHO). Apparently he was telling my friend to tell me to ‘get my pants back on’… And she was trying to explain the concept of a dress and that I wouldn’t be wearing pants under a dress. This is a summer dress with the hemline hitting just below the knee… but in India, it could easily be mistaken for the long kirtis they wear. Theirs has a really deep side slit up to the hip and they wear it with what we would call leggings (pants made of lightweight material, worn very tight and scrunched up along the leg). But what I was wearing thoroughly covered me (by my standards) – all the way down to both knees. But clearly this was enough to raise a complete panic with the tailor.
So anyway, this poor man thinks I have just shed my last ounce of modesty. My friend is trying to explain ‘it’s a DRESS’ – and tells him to just take the measurements. He is pale and oh-so-very off kilter. Poor thing, his wife was probably on the way with his lunch – and to him, I couldn’t “get dressed” quickly enough!
Of course, I was petrified when I learned what had transpired. I’m painfully modest about my body, so to think that I embarrassed this guy confused me a little. But the more I thought about it, the funnier I thought it was. My friend told me that he was in quite a state of panic… But, we got the job done. And I’ve learned another lesson in India: never ever drop your trousers. J
Sunday 18-April (5pm): I do it myself!
It’s no surprise to any of you that my first complete sentence was “I do it myself”… However, in Bangalore that has been difficult to put into practice. I have an extensive set of well-intended ‘handlers’ here and every move is supported by a team insistent on my complete happiness while in Bangalore. (I know that sounds lofty, but these guys take incredible care of me!) On every previous trip to Bangalore I have been escorted all over the city by my work network (i.e., friends and family). However, this weekend I insisted on going it alone. My Shopping Diva buddy is getting married and was off in marriage class all day (hmmmn… now there’s a thought: marriage class… somewhere along the way I missed that training!)… and with her out of pocket, I took the opportunity to exercise my independence and DO IT MYSELF! Needless to say, it was completely liberating.
I took a rickshaw from the hotel to Commercial Street -- my very first solo rickshaw ride… and then I tore all over Commercial Street. Now those of you familiar with my travels (and my blogs) know that Commercial Street is one of my favorite shopping zones in the world. It’s not just one ‘street’ – but a labyrinth of streets and alleys (locally known as ‘sidelanes’ – where the real deals are). I have shopped with good guidance so much that I know where I want to go… and all afternoon I enjoyed visiting my favorite spots and spontaneously stopping in to explore new ones.
It’s interesting when you’re a foreigner and out ‘solo’… You do meet more people. And I find that in Bangalore – even in the lower-end type shopping areas – everyone either knows enough English to get by or really really wants to work with you to know enough English to communicate. All afternoon I went in store after store and fell more in love with Bangalore and the beautiful people here. When I went to visit my favorite ‘one-gram’ gold shoppe – the shopkeeper I normally work with was not in, and his mother, Maneesha, was tending the shop for the afternoon. I spent an hour there with her… in the basement of a shopping complex, drinking tea and talking about the volcano eruptions in Iceland impacting world travel. I’ve known it a long time, but it’s such a small world… I mentioned my friend Michelle, and it turned out that Maneesha was holding a couple of bangles for Michelle for her wedding… so I picked up the bangles to take to Michelle that night at dinner that we had planned. I know this sounds overly simple, but to think that a girl from Tennessee could be in Bangalore and wind up basically running an errand for a pal – picking up something at a shop for her… well, I just thought that was pretty cool.
I also bought some shoes (no brainer, there) and some silver jewelry (duh, I know) and had a skirt and a dress stitched. 
I am still amazed that I can go pick out fabric (from literally thousands of fabrics to select from) and walk into a shop and draw out what I want – and then return in an hour or two to pick it up. I was feeling so confident, I even used two different tailors I found along the way and then returned to both to pick up completed (and totally lovely) new clothes. If I get a chance, I’m going back for another couple of summer dresses.
Of course, I got completely ripped off (according to my ‘handlers’ who I met for dinner that night).
My rickshaw ride into Commercial Street was 50 Rs (about a dollar)… and the ride back was 80 Rs ($1.60). I stopped and paid 30 Rs. for some jasmine that only should have cost me 5 Rs – but I figure sixty cents USD is a small price to pay for that really really awesome fragrance in my hotel room. It’s all relative – and in the big scheme of things, I may overpay fifty cents for some flowers… but the experience of an afternoon exploring on my own and meeting new people… well, you just can’t put a pricetag on that.
I took a rickshaw from the hotel to Commercial Street -- my very first solo rickshaw ride… and then I tore all over Commercial Street. Now those of you familiar with my travels (and my blogs) know that Commercial Street is one of my favorite shopping zones in the world. It’s not just one ‘street’ – but a labyrinth of streets and alleys (locally known as ‘sidelanes’ – where the real deals are). I have shopped with good guidance so much that I know where I want to go… and all afternoon I enjoyed visiting my favorite spots and spontaneously stopping in to explore new ones.
It’s interesting when you’re a foreigner and out ‘solo’… You do meet more people. And I find that in Bangalore – even in the lower-end type shopping areas – everyone either knows enough English to get by or really really wants to work with you to know enough English to communicate. All afternoon I went in store after store and fell more in love with Bangalore and the beautiful people here. When I went to visit my favorite ‘one-gram’ gold shoppe – the shopkeeper I normally work with was not in, and his mother, Maneesha, was tending the shop for the afternoon. I spent an hour there with her… in the basement of a shopping complex, drinking tea and talking about the volcano eruptions in Iceland impacting world travel. I’ve known it a long time, but it’s such a small world… I mentioned my friend Michelle, and it turned out that Maneesha was holding a couple of bangles for Michelle for her wedding… so I picked up the bangles to take to Michelle that night at dinner that we had planned. I know this sounds overly simple, but to think that a girl from Tennessee could be in Bangalore and wind up basically running an errand for a pal – picking up something at a shop for her… well, I just thought that was pretty cool.
I also bought some shoes (no brainer, there) and some silver jewelry (duh, I know) and had a skirt and a dress stitched. 
I am still amazed that I can go pick out fabric (from literally thousands of fabrics to select from) and walk into a shop and draw out what I want – and then return in an hour or two to pick it up. I was feeling so confident, I even used two different tailors I found along the way and then returned to both to pick up completed (and totally lovely) new clothes. If I get a chance, I’m going back for another couple of summer dresses.Of course, I got completely ripped off (according to my ‘handlers’ who I met for dinner that night).
My rickshaw ride into Commercial Street was 50 Rs (about a dollar)… and the ride back was 80 Rs ($1.60). I stopped and paid 30 Rs. for some jasmine that only should have cost me 5 Rs – but I figure sixty cents USD is a small price to pay for that really really awesome fragrance in my hotel room. It’s all relative – and in the big scheme of things, I may overpay fifty cents for some flowers… but the experience of an afternoon exploring on my own and meeting new people… well, you just can’t put a pricetag on that.
Sunday 18-April (10am): The 'princess treatment' continues.
I know, I know… it’s all about me. But, heck – that’s all there is right now. Me and the road… and my peeps who take succccccccch good care of me. I got up this morning, put on my yoga gear, and went down by the pool for some breakfast (before Bikram, not good…). Anyway ----- my café team was all excited to see me. All excited. ‘My table’ had been reserved looking out over the pool. ‘My breakfast’ was quickly ordered without me asking for it (some uppatum, a masala dosa, and a strong South Indian coffee with Splenda). I don’t know how they do it… how they remember all these things… Of course it was difficult to eat breakfast – with all the visitors dropping by to catch up with me… everyone wanting to know where I had travelled from, what the food was like in China, etc. It’s good to be home.
Sunday 18-April (4am): Hi, honey... I'm HOME!
Plane landed around 2am. A few luggage challenges (don’t ask – all that matters is that I got home with ALL of it!), and I was to the hotel by 4am. I believe I have achieved some sort of ‘platinum level frequent flyer status’ here… I didn’t even have to check in at the lobby. They (yes – a group) greeted me at my car, whisked my luggage away, and escorted me straight to my room. Yes, “my room”… They arranged for me to have the same room as my last stay because they knew I liked it (with the balcony overlooking my pool… yes, ‘my’ pool). I can’t believe I didn’t even have to properly check in! There were chocolates by my bed… orchid blooms on my towels in the bath… Being here, it’s like being on a cruise!
Saturday 17-April (7pm): Starbucks Celebrity in the house!
So I’m a gold card Starbucks coffee club member. When you stop and get an iced coffee four or five times a week before yoga, it’s just easy to rack up points and get the benefits of their program (like free syrups, free refills, etc.). When you hit ‘gold’ status (which, by the way, isn’t that difficult to do)… Starbucks sends you a gold card (like a credit card) personalized with your name and year you hit gold status, etc. The deal is that you load that card with $$$ (like a gift card) and pay with that and get more points and more free coffee, etc.
So – now that I’ve set up the story… Without even thinking, I whipped out my personalized gold card and handed it to the cashier at the Starbucks in the Hong Kong airport. I never knew this simple action would draw a crowd. Every single worker at the Starbucks (and there were close to 10 guys) took their turn holding the card and talking about it excitedly in some language I didn’t know before giving me an appreciative nod of reverent respect. They had never seen one before; I think maybe they thought I was like the #2 guy @ Starbucks corporate or something! :-) Anyway, it was fun. And my story of short-lived celebrity just doesn’t do the moment justice.
Oh, and P.S. … I was sooooooooooo happy to get a Starbucks. Had been nearly a week… It’s the little things that remind us of home.
So – now that I’ve set up the story… Without even thinking, I whipped out my personalized gold card and handed it to the cashier at the Starbucks in the Hong Kong airport. I never knew this simple action would draw a crowd. Every single worker at the Starbucks (and there were close to 10 guys) took their turn holding the card and talking about it excitedly in some language I didn’t know before giving me an appreciative nod of reverent respect. They had never seen one before; I think maybe they thought I was like the #2 guy @ Starbucks corporate or something! :-) Anyway, it was fun. And my story of short-lived celebrity just doesn’t do the moment justice.
Oh, and P.S. … I was sooooooooooo happy to get a Starbucks. Had been nearly a week… It’s the little things that remind us of home.
Saturday 17-April (6pm): Shoppers Paradise? No - trapped under one roof for 6 hours!
I love shopping. More and more and more, I love shopping... but really truly only if you can actually afford to buy anything. The prices at the Hong Kong airport border on obscene. So – nice 'looking' during my 6hr layover… but I didn’t buy one thing. Not one. And proud of it! Cartier. Marc Jacobs. Tiffany & Co. Burberry. Tumi. Those are all nice for the people who can spend $600 on a thin cotton scarf… but I don’t know who those people are! And knowing I’ll be on my beloved Commercial Street in Bangalore all afternoon tomorrow, why in the world would I buy anything here? I abandoned the shopping mission and opted instead for a Chinese massage. Little did I know, it would render me barely able to walk the next day.
Friday 16-April (7pm): Korean Barbecue... in China.
Well, you know Dalian is closer in distance to North Korea than it is to Beijing… so it would be no surprise that we went to dinner on Friday night at a place that is known for Korean barbecue. The team had a lot of fun – what a bunch of showoffs!
This is the Chinese Year of the Tiger, so they got me the gift below. Cute, huh? The picture is terrible, but the little tiger couple is just too cute. They’re made of clay and formed into these figures – I can’t describe it well, but nothing here is painted on. They use different colors of clay and shape them together to make the designs in the hat and the costume… Pretty impressive when you think about it.
Friday 16-April (11am): My friend, Phoebe.
When I first started to put the Dalian site together, there was no team in China. Just me… me and Phoebe. Phoebe was the project manager assigned by the Dalian Software Park team to help us negotiate the task of site selection, business licenses, and the recruiting process. She was my partner in establishing this office.I have not seen Phoebe since July 2008. When I was last in Dalian in October of that year, she was not here. And then she got sick. She was out of work for over a year. She has a serious illness, but is now stable after a year in and out of hospitals and treatments. The prognosis is good that she will survive with this illness and that it will remain treatable.
So I got the call on Thursday that she was available to meet me for lunch today. I couldn’t help myself – I cried. She looks great and we had the best time catching up over lunch. She is, for me, my first friend in China. She’s the one who helped me understand that Communism isn’t all we’ve branded it to be and how to understand how the Chinese mindset works. When I think about how to foster acceptance between people from different cultures, I always first think of Phoebe… because she has done more for me and my understanding of how to function and operate in different cultures more than anyone else I have ever known. Without trying, she showed me how we’re all really the same when you peel back the socio-cultural layers.
We had a great time at lunch – Phoebe is on the right and Cathy (another colleague from the software park) is on the left.
Wednesday 14-April (7pm): Hot Pot!
One of my colleagues, Tracy, had been to Nashville a year or so ago and we spent a lot of time together then. She took me shopping on Wednesday night. I wasn’t good company – the jet lag had hit hard… but she was a trooper. We went to one of my favorite Chinese types of meals: Hot Pot.
Wednesday 14-April (10am): Hello, Dalian!
I arrived last night. Rod Stewart is playing in the lobby. Yes, in China. And it’s the ‘show tunes’ album he put out a few years back (so no ‘Maggie’ or ‘Gasoline Alley’). I will find over the course of my four-day stay that Rod Stewart is playing in the lobby every single minute.
I’m staying at a different hotel – a Howard Johnson property. And check this… in my closet. I’m not sure I like this now. I’ve never stayed in a hotel with oxygen masks designed for high-rise fire escapes… Yikes!
The team in Dalian is just precious… absolutely delightful. Of course I feel guilty – the kind of guilt a mother feels when she leaves her child too long with the babysitter… I have missed them and there is much excitement as we catch up and I admire how far each of them has come in learning about the company. It is a good day, if it just weren’t so darn COLD. Dalian is freezing… I checked the weather before I left, so I knew it was going to be in the 40s… but brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr this is colder than I thought. My team saved me – check out the space heater they put in my office! Ke
pt me all toasty the entire time.
I’m staying at a different hotel – a Howard Johnson property. And check this… in my closet. I’m not sure I like this now. I’ve never stayed in a hotel with oxygen masks designed for high-rise fire escapes… Yikes!The team in Dalian is just precious… absolutely delightful. Of course I feel guilty – the kind of guilt a mother feels when she leaves her child too long with the babysitter… I have missed them and there is much excitement as we catch up and I admire how far each of them has come in learning about the company. It is a good day, if it just weren’t so darn COLD. Dalian is freezing… I checked the weather before I left, so I knew it was going to be in the 40s… but brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr this is colder than I thought. My team saved me – check out the space heater they put in my office! Ke
pt me all toasty the entire time.
Tuesday 13-April (6pm): George Clooney only makes it look easy!
For those of you who saw “Up and Away” – the George Clooney movie that earned him an Oscar nomination earlier this year – you know it’s a story of an HR corporate type trying to hit his ten million mile mark (that’s for air miles for those of you who don’t play this game). Anyway – a good portion of the storyline is about him training up a new colleague – a smart kid just out of school who doesn’t know the first thing about being a road warrior. All through the movie Clooney makes business travel look simple. It’s not.
Chicago (Monday mid-day). My flight leaves nearly two hours late while we sit on the tarmac waiting for a part to arrive. I know I only have a three hour connection in Shanghai, and so I pray for a strong tailwind. Tuesday late-afternoon local time, we arrive in Shanghai. There was no tailwind, I have only an hour to get my 100 pounds of luggage, get through customs proving I haven’t smuggled in raw meat, and transfer my luggage to another terminal darn near on the other side of the city. The Shanghai airport in Pudong is huge – and you could fit the county where I grew up in the space between Terminal 1 and Terminal 2. But I am an eternal optimist, and so I hit the ground at a dead run. Customs’ Immigration clearance drags like cold molasses. And then there’s the signage. It has been over a year since I’ve been through this airport, so I don’t have my ‘system’ down. And the signage is terrible – somewhere between non-existent and terrible. With all the life I have in me (after a 15 hr flight extended by another 2hrs trapped waiting for a part to arrive), I start my run. It’s more like a zig-zag, because I have no idea where the heck I’m going and every uniformed individual I ask for directions gives me a different answer. (Where’s GEORGE when I need him?!) So I finally make it… breathless, in a bad way, to Terminal 2. And, of course, wouldn’t you know… my flight has been cancelled. But there’s another flight. Another airline. And yep – you know it… back in Terminal 1 (where I started from) that departs in like 45 minutes. So I race back, negotiate a flight change in this delicate dance of Mandarin (them) and hand signals and positive/reassuring voice tones (me), and just barely barely make it on the flight to Dalian.
Chicago (Monday mid-day). My flight leaves nearly two hours late while we sit on the tarmac waiting for a part to arrive. I know I only have a three hour connection in Shanghai, and so I pray for a strong tailwind. Tuesday late-afternoon local time, we arrive in Shanghai. There was no tailwind, I have only an hour to get my 100 pounds of luggage, get through customs proving I haven’t smuggled in raw meat, and transfer my luggage to another terminal darn near on the other side of the city. The Shanghai airport in Pudong is huge – and you could fit the county where I grew up in the space between Terminal 1 and Terminal 2. But I am an eternal optimist, and so I hit the ground at a dead run. Customs’ Immigration clearance drags like cold molasses. And then there’s the signage. It has been over a year since I’ve been through this airport, so I don’t have my ‘system’ down. And the signage is terrible – somewhere between non-existent and terrible. With all the life I have in me (after a 15 hr flight extended by another 2hrs trapped waiting for a part to arrive), I start my run. It’s more like a zig-zag, because I have no idea where the heck I’m going and every uniformed individual I ask for directions gives me a different answer. (Where’s GEORGE when I need him?!) So I finally make it… breathless, in a bad way, to Terminal 2. And, of course, wouldn’t you know… my flight has been cancelled. But there’s another flight. Another airline. And yep – you know it… back in Terminal 1 (where I started from) that departs in like 45 minutes. So I race back, negotiate a flight change in this delicate dance of Mandarin (them) and hand signals and positive/reassuring voice tones (me), and just barely barely make it on the flight to Dalian.
Monday 12-April (4am): Wow, it's early!
Leaving for Dalian now… then on to Bangalore. Can’t wait to see the teams; I have been away from my friends far too long. The other night in yoga (here @ home), I heard a buzzer/horn sound off in one of the basketball courts at the sports complex where I practice yoga… In my hot yoga stupor, I thought I was hearing the sounds of the Muslim call to prayers that I hear at night from my Bangalore office windows. It was then that I really truly knew that I was homesick for my friends across the pond.
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