Every day I'm confronted by things that are just not the same as back home and thought I'd share some of my observations with you:
1. Getting woken up early in the morning by the fruit vendor pushing his cart along the street and shouting out what he has for sale that day. I have no idea what he has for sell because it's all in Hindi, which I don't speak (of course!).
2. Spraying my sheets with mosquito repellent each night before I go to bed so the "mosies" don't get me during the night - back, back you dreaded Dengue fever and malaria!!
3. Wearing black footies so my feet don't turn black by walking around barefoot, a lesson I didn't learn until after the first couple of days during my first trip.
4. Having a houseboy who makes my bed and does the dishes for me every day!! He's also supposed to clean the floors, but that consists of getting on his hands and knees and using a nasty dirty rag every day to move the dust around. Hence the need for the black footies noted in item 3.
5. The ability to have ANYTHING delivered from ANY of the restaurants or stores, including fast food for about $1.
6. What the Indian's call a McDonald's burger is what we call a McChicken sandwich. After all, cows are sacred in India - you don't eat them here!
7. Delhi Belly - maybe I have it (again, 3rd times a charm!), maybe I don't. Who knows? I will, in about a week. This time I brought antibiotics with me.
8. Doctor's make house calls! The last time I got Delhi Belly really bad the doctor came to the apartment, did the exam while I was on my own bed, and gave me the medicine. Total cost USD: $25
9. Milk in asceptic packaging - think a quart size juice box. It doesn't need to be refrigerated until you open it and has about a six month shelf life.
10. Almost everything you get in a restaurant is flavored by India. For example, I ordered Chinese (lemon chicken and veggie spring rolls to be exact) yesterday for lunch. I got the Chindian version. It's not McDonald's, it's McIndian; KFC has an Indian flavor to it, as do Subway sandwiches, Domino's, Papa John's and Pizza Hut pizzas. So far the only thing I've ordered that doesn't have an Indian flavor to it is Robbins ice cream.
11. Road lanes have no meaning here, and sometimes neither does "directionality!"
12. Not a day goes by that I don't see a man taking a leak against a wall somewhere. "What's that smell?"
13. How beautiful the majority of the women are here! They truly are gorgeous. I especially like it when they are dressed in the more formal "saris." Stunning, really. I'd be totally intimidated if I didn't have such a healthy sense of self-worth not dependent upon my looks!!
