First Day in Bangalore

The first day was good, jet lag kept me home for half the day but still some experiences worth noting. I wanted to take pictures but I didn't have my camera ready but I plan to start posting pictures soon.

I got down at the airport and there was a driver standing outside for me who drove me to my service apartment.

Surprisingly the traffic outside the airport was real bad even at 5 am but while we passed that area, it was all clear road directly to my service apartment

In India there is a trend of offering service apartments rather than hotels. The service apartment is basically a fully furnished flat (2-3 BHK seems to be more common), depending on your requirement and company's budget you may have to share the this apartment. There is a servant there who would keep the house clean and there even is a complimentary breakfast of your choice. One thing to remember in these service apartments is they would charge heavily for anything extra, like local telephone calls, laundary etc. etc. so you are better asking the charges before taking any additional services.

Few of my experiences:

Good: Coming to India is always a great feeling, there is something in the air that makes you feel so elated, after all its my home. Many things may have changed but people still have that welcoming shine in their eyes, the frank attitude and smile on their faces.

The Indian economy is booming, if you haven't been to India in a while you will be amazed at the kind of shops that are here now and even the stuff that is in there (I will not comment on quality and price yet as I haven't really looked at those yet)

I went to big bazaar for some shopping, people throng these stores as if the stuff is available for free. It was a six storey building but all the floors were jam packed.

Eating out is still not very costly, I tried a veg crosissant at the big bazaar cafe for only 15/- there were other snacks like pav bhaji, masala dosa etc for less than 20 bucks.

Talked to my family in Indore for 3-4 times during the day, the cellular phone service is really cheap in India.

Bad:

A huge bill for small stuff: I bought 4-5 stuff at big bazaar and on the checkout I found the bill to be 400 Rs. I was amazed at that price. Looking carefully I realized that 3 items in my bill were 80-90 Rs each and that bumped my bill, these things were 2 juices from tropicana and a small tube of hair gel. Thus not everything is cheap in India, always look at price tag before you buy.

People in India honk a lot which was not a surprise for me, but what I saw was tendency of people honking for no reason at each and every turn.

Worst: This was the worst experience for me and I hope it had not happened the first day of my arrival. I was standing in a queue at Big Bazaar and there was this gentleman in front of me with his kids and had like 2-3 items in his hand. As the line was moving he sent one of his kid to somewhere who came back with 3-4 more packets of some candy. In the meanwhile another man walks ahead of me and starts talking to this guy and suddenly they decide they would like to do their grocery together. And if this was not enough a lady (probably second person's wife) walks and give him some more packets to check and goes back because she forgot something.

So here I am standing in this long queue and the person in front of me who only had 2-3 items now has more than 20 items. He might have gathered more if he had more time.

I haven't had to deal with real bad traffic or pollution yet so wil not comment on that.