I woke up everyone else around 9 because we had plans to go see a few temples today. We still didn't make it out of the apartment until closer to 10:30. We caught a bus to the area with temples and walked through a busy market to get there. The temples were cool to look at but crowded. We left our shoes outside and walked through. A few little kids kept following us asking for money. And we were stopped several times with requests to take pictures with us. I really do wonder if this is how celebrities feel. It's a little strange, but I just smile and give a noncommittal shrug. These requests have become a part of going to public places in India. ..I still make faces.
There were a lot of fertility statues in smaller sub-temples alongside the big centerpiece. Carlos said a prayer there because he wants to have children. We saw the Ghats where people bathe and perform rituals in the holy (and filthy) Ganges river. We caught a tiny full boat to a temple on the other side of the river but it was closed when we got there and we were starving so we caught a boat back and walked to a different bus to go to center city 2, where we saw James Bond.
The temples were great and the boat ride was fun too but it didn't matter so much what we were doing. It was wonderful to hang out with Carlos and Andreas and shoot the breeze for a few hours. We had tons to share with each other about our worlds and much less important topics. They're the kind of people that I would be friends with back home.
At CC2, we went to KFC. They eat Indian food for most meals at work and try to eat other things when they can. Connor and I ordered 3 meals each and then we went to McDonald's for mcflurries. We wanted to buy some more alcohol for Carlos' birthday party tonight and we went to ask in the super market if they sold any. It was like we had asked him where we can buy weed. Super offended "oh nonononononono not here not I.. Etc" and then wouldn't tell us where it's sold. We decided to go to a supermarket in a mall down the road they they knew.
We bought what we needed and I got a couple bottles of Indian wine. I'd never learned anything about wine from India or seen it carried in any stores and wanted to try it. We bought a bottle for Carlos for his birthday too.
It was a sort-of-surprise party for Carlos' 29th birthday and there were decorations all over the flat. We helped blow up some more balloons and then rested for an hour or so before people started showing up. They had cooked dinner for everyone and we sang Feliz Cumpleaños with everyone. There were maybe 20 people there, all working for TCS. Most were from Latin America but some were African or Scandinavian.
When we were sitting down, Oliver showed up. It was crazy watching him walk in and say hello to everyone. Where we were sitting, he came to us last and then stopped in shock and we both started laughing. We had spent about 3 hours in the train station the day before. We helped him figure out how to work the system and commiserated. It turns out the friend he was helping to change a ticket for was Bame, one of the girls in the apartment. We had heard her side of the ticket story and didn't connect the dots until we saw him in the apartment.
The party was nice and we went to sleep around 3 or 4. Oh, and the Indian wine was awful.
-AB
Ring the bell for children
It's become normal to travel like this
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