Day 1 in Mumbai

I've been on sensory overload so far just taking in how this city moves and operates, and I'm a bit jet lagged, so I might not write in complete sentences. I do have to say that I did much better than I expected in nearly 20 hours on an airplane. (I didn't cry during takeoff!)


Highlights of the plane ride:

• getting to see downtown Frankfurt, Germany from the plane window as we landed there...although that made me sad not to actually visit Germany at all in my first landing in Europe
• flying over exciting places like Hungary, Bulgaria, Turkey, Iran, and Pakistan...although again, I didn't get to visit them, or even see them out the window since I wasn't very near to one and it was cloudy anyway...but it's still pretty awesome to fly over a place like Tehran, I think
• the last in-flight movie was a Bollywood flick called "Krazzy 4," which to my surprise I actually thoroughly enjoyed. the basic storyline is that four men who are in a mental hospital end up having to save their caring and supportive psychiatrist when she is kidnapped by a criminal who needs her to deem him insane in order to clear him of criminal charges. lots of hijinks, lots of singing, in Anglicized Hindi (I kid you not, "Why should I care?" was uttered in fully intact English in the middle of an otherwise unintelligible-to-me dialogue.) my favorite part was the theme song, which the beauty of YouTube brings you: http://youtube.com/watch?v=XbtFVTFe2AI

We landed around midnight, a little bit later than scheduled but not complaint worthy. The driver was waiting for us when we stepped outside the airport, and fortunately his sign with my name on it stood out among the melee of people waiting for people. We got to the hotel and checked in around 2 a.m. -- we got to spend our first night on Marine drive across the street from the Arabian Sea, which was awesome even in its choppy brownness. The hotel room was beautiful, so it was a shame we had so little time to enjoy it. After a minor snafu wherein the driver that I was told would arrive to pick us up at 11 did not (we only spent one night in the hotel before transitioning to our apartment hotel with kitchenette and wireless internet), we ended up having a driver from the apartment hotel come pick us up. But when we got to the apartment hotel, the power was out due to some kind of maintenance in the area, and our room wasn't quite ready yet. But around 6 we did finally have the power kick in, so we're happy to have some air conditioning going.

More interesting things in bullet form since I'm tired of paragraph-based reportage:

• the title of this new blog is on account of the herds of autorickshaws buzzing around (among other things like black-and-yellow taxi cabs, bicicyclists, motorcyclists, loads of pedestrians, buses, cars, and the occasional ox-drawn cart)
• it's incredible how unregulated the streets are -- there aren't really any traffic signs or signals in our neighborhood, so it's a game of "make a break for it when you get a chance" -- and don't be shy, because no one's slowing down for you, and everyone's honking at everyone else.

• there are a lot of stucco buildings, mostly peeling, and a lot of rough patches and craggy, puddly areas on the roads. most shops (at least in our area) are small open-air deals.


• at first, Mark thought there wasn't a shower in the bathroom, because there's no tub or curtain. but there is a shower sans tub and curtain, you just stand in the middle of the room and let her fly, and then the drain is on the side of the room...i'm looking forward to tomorrow morning's shower being my first freeform hose-down.



• one of the more random things i've seen so far are Kettle Chips at the grocery store we stopped in. sure, big name brands like Cheerios and Tropicana I can understand, but a fringe player in the market like Kettle Chips? random. didn't get a snap of those, though.
  
• so far i've been surprised by how people in the neighborhood where we're staying, Bandra West, are pretty indifferent to us. i guess since it's not as much of a tourist trap as some of the places closer to downtown, there may be fewer people out to try to get a few rupees from us.
  
• i was not surprised by the humidity, but i was also not totally prepared for it. it hasn't rained yet since we've been here, but windows of air conditioned cars and buildings get wet enough that the water drips down them.
  
• i also didn't realize beforehand that bringing Mark along would mean that everyone would address him first as the male representative. which doesn't work well since Mark is one of the shyest people on earth and not a good nominee for "lead man." but we're getting by fine for the most part...hopefully i'm not totally weirding people out by speaking up at times. :)

I think that's it for now...If I've forgotten anything, I'll just write more tomorrow!