Monsoon

Did I mention that monsoon season is starting tomorrow? Well, not tomorrow- I read in the newspaper that it would be two days late. The average rainfall will be 825 mm with a max along the coastline of 1326 mm. Wow, that's more than 55 inches! I cannot imagine that much rain. Should I bring some back to drought-stricken Georgia with me?

Airport

Things are slow here. I left the guest house at 9:40, arrived at the airport at 10:55, checked in at 11:55, got through emigration at 12:40, and passed security at 12:55. We are to start boarding at 1:25, just a little more than 10 minutes from now. In fact, they are starting the announcements right now. (I'm in the last group to board.) Whoops! "10 minutes" goes by fast; they are starting to board!

Drive Dead Slow

I just saw a sign along the side of the road saying "accident prone zone drive dead slow". I'll have to see if I can dig up a picture.

Driving

I wish you could experience the roads in Bangalore. The newer roads have lines, but drivers ignore them, drifting from lane to lane without a thought. There are traffic signals in the more densely populated areas, but if people are forced to sit for too long, they decide it is their turn to go anyway. It can be a little frightening how close they get to one another...

Good Night and Good Luck

Well, the driver got here 45 minutes before I asked him to, and I've already made him wait a half hour while I phoned home to say g'bye to my family. I will be incommunicado for about 27 hours while I go to the airport, wait for my flight, yada yada yada. Most international flights leave Bangalore between 10 PM and 3 AM; I'm in the "late middle" of that, at 1:55 AM. But been reading the paper this week, and the new airport has had its share of hiccups. Yesterday they lost all computers at checkin and had to manually check everyone, ~10 minutes per person. Lines backed up something fierce. I'm willing to leave waaay early to avoid missing this flight. I am eager to get home.

So, this is the last entry until I'm stateside. Probably. They have wireless at the airport... :)

FYI

I've added some posts with pictures in their chronological position, so you may want to scroll through things again looking for pictures you've not seen before.

Just 3-4 hours before I leave for the airport...

The Compound

It's my last day in India, at least for a while. Since I didn't have anyone to go with on an adventure, I've stayed at the house all day and studied GWT. I took a break in the afternoon and walked around Prestige Ozone, the "premier community" in which our Whitefield guest house is located. It's a charming community, obviously catering to transplants from other countries. I saw many different types of families, and I recognized English and German. There are probably other nationalities located here as well.

The amenities here are very nice. It's immaculately kept up, there is a large pool, a sauna, multiple play areas, multiple ponds like the one shown, an amphitheatre, and a big field where the kids were playing.

I walked around for a while to get some sunlight on me before the rains came (they come every afternoon during "pre-monsoon" season). I stopped and sat on a bench for a while to get some sunlight before I resumed my studies. It is so very different here in the community when you compare it to what is less than a tenth of a mile away...

And they don't want it coming in easily...