Bienvenidos a Bangalore... Just Kidding. They didn't actually say that.

My arrival to India took a total of 23 and a half hours, including air time, layovers, immigration, waiting for my baggage (45 minutes), and customs (.36 seconds).  All in all, the journey was a good one.  I had an aisle seat for both flights, and during each flight I sat next to interesting women.  The first was on her way home to Algeria after spending the last year teaching Arabic at a college in Portland Oregon on a Fulbright Scholarship.  The second flight I sat next to a woman from Bangalore who had just spend the week in Paris for work.  She was nice and assured me that I would have an excellent trip.

My first day here was spent learning about the NGO I'm staying at, meeting the Selvaraj family, and forming the research project for my college Sudhir and I will be working on while I'm here.  I ended the day with dinner at the Selvaraj house with students and interns at Visthar from Iowa, New York, Finland, and Nigeria.  

Now I am sitting at the end of day two, which included a lot of walking and meeting people.  We walked around a middle-class, normal college hang out shopping area in Bangalore, attended a high school personality competition Siddarth (Sudhir's brother) was judging, sat and ate lunch/dinner (actually, I had a mango milk shake that was fantastico), went to a theater group meeting (more on this another time), and ended the day with dinner at a Chinese restaurant (which is different from one back home because it has Indian influences with the food... essentially it's less greasy) with a few of Sudhir's close high school friends. 

Organizers of the personality contest performing Soulja Boi while the judges decided on a winner for the competition. 

With Love, Air France

Imagine receiving an e-mail from AirFrance that read:

Les autorités du pays de votre destination, ou de votre correspondance vous imposent de fournir avant votre départ certaines informations réglementaires. Afin de faciliter votre enregistrement, merci de nous communiquer parmi les informations obligatoires suivantes celles qui ne figurent pas actuellement dans votre dossier, pour vous même et pour les passagers vous accompagnant:

- vos données passeport 
- votre pays de résidence
- votre adresse de destination (pour les non résidents)

OK, it wasn't so bad. The first half of the e-mail  was in French, which was undesirable, because I do not speak or read French.  The second half was in English.

The airline instructed me to follow a link and provide them with my passport information, along with where I'll be staying in India.  This is a formality so I will not have to take time and give them the information during my layover in Paris on Tuesday/Wednesday.  The language they used made it obvious that it would be a bother to them if I did not provide the information online, so I attempted to oblige their request.

Upon entering my surname and reference number for my flight, I was directed to a page informing me that AirFrance's online flight-information-gathering tool is broken.

Boo internet and boo AirFrance.  I hope this doesn't cause any hangups en route. Oh well, it's all part of the adventure.

One Week to Go

It's almost time to leave!  One week from today I'll be traveling to India.  By myself.

Almost everything is in order.  Passport? Check. Visa? Check. Sunscreen? I'll buy some before I leave.

My hosts are the Selvaraj family, who live just outside Bangalore.  Their youngest son, Sudhir, is a classmate of mine at Concordia.  Sudhir's dad, David, runs a nonprofit organization near their home called Visthar, where I will be staying during my trip.

I was speaking with Sudhir on Skype a few days ago when he asked me if I was nervous to arrive in India.  The truth is most of my anxiety about this trip comes from the plane ride -- I usually fly with white nuckles and sedatives in hand.  Once I arrive, the trip can only go up hill.

The trip to Bangalore will consist of two flights: a Delta flight from Minneapolis to Paris, and an Air France flight from Paris to Bangalore.  Both will be a little over 9 hours.  Joy.  Hopefully the trip will be smooth -- both in the air and at the airports.  I should arrive in Bangalore at 11:45pm (their time... Minnesota time will be 1:15pm) after traveling for almost 24 hours.

For now, I'll be plotting the most convinient arrangement in which to pack my suitcase.  I may need to e-mail Sudhir a few thousand times between now and when I leave to determine what I do/not need.