Kalyani’s own version of “Mobile Commerce”. You don’t need no stinking mobile phone to order goods or services. Here, goods come to you. In a three wheel pedal-pushed van 🙂 You have to just buy it if you want 🙂

Best part of every day while in India. It is 5:30 in the morning – dad and I are sitting outside. Completely drowned in what seems like a million birds tweeting. Beautiful mellifluous sounds – especially the cuckoos. The rude noises of the world waking up – the train’s horn in the distance, the launch’s hoot from the Ganges and the clanking of cars in great need of maintenance are yet to set in.
The pre-dawn light is barely glimmering thru what promises to be a foggy morning and the light wind from the river is gently wafting by.
Dad and I have been sitting here for over an hour sipping multiple cups of tea. Hardly any words are being spoken – yet volumes are being communicated.
If only these moments could be bottled up and replayed at will in life.

If yesterday was the day of the elephant, today is the day of the monkeys. It is like Kalyani (where my dad and mom lives now) runs on the Chinese calendar – only in fast forward 🙂

5M run early in the morning with my brother. Guess who is muttering at home about the downsides of running? 🙂

Myself, my brother and brother in law went for a walk and stepped into a Monginis to have snacks. Both of them ordered the same plate. It is called Chicken Internet!!!
Apparently it is very popular.
I have no idea what the hell “Chicken Internet” means.
Or how it got its name. Maybe the snack and the Internet are both teeming with viruses? It certainly explains why my sister was so flummoxed when I had asked her to look for something starting with “W W W” while looking for her daughter’s test results on the Internet 🙂

On my way to surprise dad and mom in Kalyani. In previous trip, I have seen various animals on the road – dogs, cats, cows, buffaloes, pigs … But an elephant is a first this time!!

India – such a country of diversity. Here we are on the highway to Pune – there are slow trucks, local vehicles, broken vans and a Porsche !!!!

That is one heck of a way to get to India. First, back in Atlanta, as I was trying to finish off the last few calls before they close the doors of the plane – hailstorms hit the airport. Hail hitting your plane when you are sitting inside sounds far worse than when you gift your 10 year old nephew his first set of drums (presumably to exact some kind of revenge on your brother) 🙂
Of course, we had to wait for a couple of hours for the State Farm guy to show up – or whoever it is that shows up to check hail damage for planes. Yes, there is such a thing. I have half a mind to write to Delta that they could have easily saved all of us 15 minutes by switching to GEICO! 🙂
Finally we took off with no chance to make my connection flight in Amsterdam. I took a zen like attitude – whatever happens will happen. Worst case scenario, I will stay in Amsterdam for a day and go the next day. There are worse things that can happen. For example, Delta could have been with Allstate 🙂
Fortunately, the flight picked up speed and we made up some time. Just enough that I realized I had a shot at making the connection. Which I did. By a few minutes! And that is when it dawned on me that my luggage may not have been that lucky 🙁 Nothing shatters zen-ness like the the prospect of being in a hotel with no extra set of clothes and a few customers to meet that day!!!
So, here I am in my long flight from Europe to India wondering what is in store. Delta tried to make it up by giving me three gulabjamuns in my meal. Why the odd number three, I will never understand. At this point, I had the proverbial angel and devil duking it out on my either shoulder. “Too much sugar”.. “So what? it is India”.. they went on and on 🙂
Finally, I gave in and bit into my first gulabjamun. It was so hard thatI barely left a bite mark!! And that is when I realized that Delta’s gulabjamuns beat paper and scissors 🙂
And that brings me to where I am now. Slowly descending into the Indian sub continent. Not knowing what I am going to wear tomorrow morning for my run. And a couple of teeth that are sore 🙂 Zen, shmen, my left foot 🙂