Back in the good ole' USA!!

I made it home safe and sound. I had a great trip and was a little bit sad to leave but once I got on the plane, I couldn't wait to get home and see my family and friends and the cornfields of Iowa.

My trip to India was great. There were so many amazing things to see and all of the people I met were fantastic. The people are probably what I will miss most. Everyone at work was super nice and very welcoming. The people at the hotel were great and very helpful. There were also lots of people that we met at the airport, in the hotel and on the street that made the trip wonderful. I will also miss the food, even though I couldn't wait to get home and have a cheeseburger.

It was a very tasty cheeseburger

I'm so glad I had the opportunity to go to India and I would definitely go again. Although if I go back, I probably still won't get used to the traffic. I must say it was very nice to drive my own car on the right side of the road and not have to worry about passing cows.

A little bit sad

Today was our last day at the office here. I was a little bit sad. I had a great time getting to know the team and working with them. The one thing that we noticed was that everyone always seemed happy to be at work. They all had such great attitudes and really made us feel welcome. They even accepted my random laughing. Don't get me wrong, I like my team back home but I wouldn't mind taking the team here back with me.

Camera or cell?

The security to get into the office building here is very different than getting into the building in West Des Moines. When you walk in, the females go to one side and the men to another. All bags are searched and you weren't allowed to bring a camera in. We wanted to get a few pictures of the office and the team so we went through all the hoops to get permission to bring the camera in...or so we thought. The first day we brought the camera, they stopped us at security and said that we didn't have permission so they put it in a locker in the security office. Later that day, we were told that we had the permission and we could get the camera. When we went to pick it up, they told us that we needed permission from the security director and he had left for the day. Oh well, we'll just try again the next day. So we went through security and told them that we had the camera and they let us in with it. In the afternoon, we took pictures of the team and then went to different floors to get some pictures. On one floor, a security guard saw us getting off the elevator with the camera and started following us, talking on his radio. He came up and asked what our name's were and once we told them he said it was ok. We got the rest of our pictures taken without any problem. That is until we were leaving. The car was late but it was pretty nice outside so we were just sitting by the door waiting. After a little bit, another security guard came out that we realized later was the security director. He asked if we were the ones with the camera in the building. At this point I was pretty frustrated with the whole situation and almost said that we were the only white girls in the building so yes we were the ones with the camera. But I held back. We just told him that we were and he said that he hadn't given approval for it. I told him that we were told we could and eventually he went back inside. On the drive home, he passed us on his motorcycle and I really thought about taking a picture of him but decided it was just too much work to get my camera out of my bag.

However after the "camera day", security would ask if we had a camera or cell and check our laptop numbers. We had been coming in every day for over a week and they had never asked us before. After a while it became a joke especially the day that the security lady pulled a feminine product out of Shelly's bag and held it up, asking what it was. Oh, I should mention that most of the security people didn't speak English. I was putting my bags back together and heading to the elevator as Shelly was stuttering and trying to figure out how to explain/describe to that was. Eventually she got my attention and I just told the woman that it wasn't a camera or cell. This apparently was an acceptable answer because she put it back in the bag and sent us on our way. I don't know why it seems like I always get into situations like this but at least it makes for a great story.

Toast...Dost

Saturday night might have been the most fun I've had in India. During the afternoon, Shelly and I met Atulya and Shubham at Janpath. This is an outdoor market with every kind of Indian craft you can think of. Everything is relatively cheap but when you go, the plan of attack is to bargain, bargain, bargain. Apparently even there, people can tell I'm not from here. Weird I know. When you ask the price of something, the shop owner will increase the price by 2 or 3 times the value hoping that you will just accept it and buy the item. We knew better...too bad neither Shelly or I were good at bargaining. And we would go into the shops alone while the guys stood outside. Eventually Shubham got into the bargaining. Shelly was looking at a table runner and the lady wanted 600 rupee for it. Shubham was having none of it and starting talking to the woman in Hindi. Every now and then we heard a price thrown out but other than that, I had no idea what was being said. I just kind of stood off to the side with Atulya giggling about what was happening. Eventually they got a price they could agree on and Shelly got a new table runner.

Later at another shop, Shubham was eaves dropping on another woman purchasing a bag. She bought it for 225 rupee. Then Shelly and I started looking at the bags and the lady selling them wanted 500 rupee for each. Shubham told her 225 and we handed her the money and walked away, with our bags of course. Shortly after that, Atulya had had enough shopping and suggested we got to McDonalds. We ate a little something and then called for the car.

I may have gone overboard with the scarves. But it was so cheap.

The car wasn't going to be there for a while so we walked around a bit longer. When we were walking around, Shubham was attempting to teach me some Hindi words. He said that the word for friends was dost. I said it and he said "Not toast...dost" to which we both started laughing. The funny thing was that I did say dost but he heard toast. Shelly was walking behind us and she heard "Not toast...toast." I think we walked the rest of the way to car laughing. And the laughter just continued.

One of the managers, Ricky, met up with us and we went to the other main suburb of Delhi, Gurgaon. There is a mall there that has a German brewery named Rockman's Beer Island. It was no discotheque (Yup, thats what they call clubs here) but we had a blast.


We all hung out having a beer and getting appetizers which are called snacks here. After a while, Ricky's wife called him home but Atulya, Shubham, Shelly and I hung out for a while longer. We were all laughing so hard. They were teaching us more Hindi words and telling us stories from India. We were telling stories about the States. But the thing that kept coming up was "not toast...dost." We've been laughing about it since then.

Garlic Toast and my Dost Shubham

This one reminds me of American Gothic...with toast and dost

Awesome Allison Adventure

Today Shelly and I decided to do a half day tour of Delhi. The concierge at the hotel had given us a map and circled a bunch of places that we should go see. We picked a few places, told the driver and we were off.

The first place we went was Raj Ghat which is Ghandi's Memorial. There are also several other memorials in the area. The first thing we noticed about this place was how quiet it was and how green everything was. It was nice just to walk around and not have people coming up to us. It was such a beautiful place.

The next place we went was the President of India's house. Our driver told us that there were 365 rooms in the house. Once we got back to the hotel, I googled to see how many rooms the White House had...only 132.

After that we headed down to India Gate. This is a war memorial for the 90,000 Indian soldiers that lost their lives in World War 1. All the names are inscribed on the gate.

When we were walking up to the gate, a group of guys came up to us and asked to take our picture. At first we said no because we assumed they wanted to take our picture in front of the gate and then charge us. Then he said that his friend wanted to take a picture with us. So we took one. Then when we got back to our car, they were sitting next to it. So I took a picture with him.

The next place we went was the Lotus Temple. It is a meditation temple where you must be quiet inside. A guy at work said that he didn't think we would like that because we couldn't giggle in there.

The temperature wasn't too bad but it was very, very humid. Just in case you were wondering how the white girl fro was coming along, this is my hair when I got back to the hotel.

Bollywood

One thing that I wanted to do while I was here was go see a Bollywood movie. Shelly and I watched a couple of previews and found one that we thought we could follow even though it was in Hindi. We decided on Kambakkht Ishq which is about a stuntman, Viraj, who falls in love with a super model, Simrita. Even in India, they have good, quality chick flicks.

We leave the hotel and cross the scary street to the mall although it wasn't so scary today. We get up to the theater and I attempt to pronounce the movie before we get in line. It sort of sounded right but I figured the guy at the window would know what I was talking about. I go up and say Kambakkht Ishq...at least how I thought it was pronounced. The guy looks at me and says Terminator Salvation and I say no and repeat myself. He kind of looks at us for a minute and says "Thats an Indian movie in Hindi with no subtitles." I tell him that was ok and he just started laughing at us. But he gave us our tickets and where we were sitting because apparently you have assigned seats here. We go in the theater and go through security. Shelly had to turn her cigarettes in so we go to the area they pointed us to. The first guy we spoke to didn't speak English so another girl came over. She got Shellys cigarettes and apparently we looked a little lost cause she showed us to the theater and our assigned seats.

One of the greatest things about Indian movies and television is that every now and then they speak English mixed in with Hindi. So at least there were a few lines that we knew what they were saying. Plus there were a couple of American actors in the movie - Brandon Routh, Denise Richards and Slyvester Stallone. Yup, Rocky. He first presented Viraj with the Stuntman of the Year award and then he saved Simrita when she was getting chased by thugs in LA. The fight scene was one of my favorites...right after all the singing and dancing. I think I'll have the song from the movie in my head for a week. I'm probably going to learn the dance too.

Shoes

Don't worry, Seth. I left the Taj with my shoes. Probably because I got to wear these sweet shoe covers.

Our guide handed the shoe covers to Shelly and I when we got to the Taj and we decided that we would just keep them in our purse and just take our shoes off like everyone else. But when we tried to do that, our guide told us that we had to wear the shoe covers. Not sure why but we did what we were told. I kept mine because you never know when shoe covers might come in handy.

Taj Mahal

This morning at 5 am, we loaded up a couple of cars for the 4 hour journey to Agra to see the Taj Mahal. There were several people from the team at MetLife that came with us. After driving through several small towns and seeing lots of cows and monkeys, we finally reached Agra. We came around a curve and saw the Taj (as the locals call it) in the distance. We still had to get through crazy traffic to get there and also pick up our guide. We parked the cars about 1 1/2 km away from the entrance because they don't allow vehicles that create pollution any closer. We then loaded into a couple of horse carts instead of walking that distance. Even at 10 am, it was ridiculously hot. But the heat was well worth it. Its not every day you get to see one of the New 7 Wonders of the World.

All 4 sides of the Taj Mahal are exactly the same.

There is text from the Quran written around each entry way.

Precious stones are inlaid within the marble to create the flower and vine design.

Most of our group at the front gate. Atulya, Me, Shelly, Shubham, Shiv, Manoj & Ashish.

Shruti was taking the picture.

Standing in front of the Taj Mahal looking at the front gate.

They're Everywhere

When Shelly and I were talking about what things we wanted to do, see and eat while we were in India, we decided that we weren't going to eat any place that we could eat at in Iowa. That was a good goal to have but apparently we didn't inform everyone of it. The first day at work we were planning on having lunch in the cafeteria. But they didn't know if we would be able to handle it stomach wise. So we ordered pizza from Dominos. The next day we went out to lunch with some MetLifers and we went to TGI Fridays. Then on Saturday on the way to Agra, we stopped here...

Yes Lisa, they do have McDonald's in India. (I almost referred to it as FatDonald's but I held back) The McDonald's here are a little bit different than back home...namely the fact that they have chicken, fish and veggie burgers. No beef. I decided that I didn't want to try the veggie burger right before I spent the day in the hot sun so I went with fries. Even those tasted a bit different. The best part of about this McDonald's though was that they had a Ronald McDonald sitting out front. And I didn't have to sit with him by myself...

WGF

The other morning, even though it was raining a bit, we decided to go for a walk before breakfast. We asked the front desk for an umbrella. Because apparently we don't stand out enough, they gave each of us giant, red umbrellas. But I didn't really feel like getting wet so I used it.

The umbrella was great for keeping the rain out. The one thing it did not keep out was the humidity. This is what my hair looked like when I got back to my room.

White girl fro is starting to come out.