Mumbai

After attempting to dance at a News Years party at Riverdale Resort, I was quickly escorted to the airport, and sent to North India. Now, I wanted to see North India, but I had no idea that bad dancing would put me on the fast track to New Dehli. I barely had time to say goodbye to the nice people I worked with at IdentityMine India for 7 months. I wondered if I was going to get kicked out of the country for bad dancing, but instead, I was sent to live with the North India people, who were perhaps more tolerant of foreigners who did not know the native steps to local music.

I had heard that North India was much different culturally than South India. So, going to North India was an opportunity to investigate the differences.

Before I could get to New Delhi, I had a connection at Mumbai. When I arrived at Mumbai, I waited to get through the security check, but nobody was allowed through because the gate number was not known. So, I waited, and waited, and waited. I was talking to another passenger, Raaj, who was also booked for New Dehli but with another airline, and he was waiting too. Finally, they declared fog in New Dehli and all planes in or out were canceled. At that point, there was the typical “information chaos” where people circle the wagons around the check-in counter to get desperate scraps of information that might help them figure out what to do. The check-in girls were surrounded by “information vultures”, and I felt sorry for them. I’ve never been involved with a canceled flight, but I just sat down and waited for the vultures to fly away after getting their fill of information. After 2 hours of pecking at raw minute by minute information, the crowd finally dispersed. I walked up to the exhausted check-in girl and got some quick coherent information scraps within 2 minutes. The only difference between my approach and the crowd approach is that for 2 hours, I was sitting watching them in amusement, while the crowd stood and pecked at each other to see if someone knew something they did not. I believe “Information vultures” swarming check-in girls after a canceled flight is standard behavior across all cultures, and not limited to north Indian culture as there were a number foreigners from France, Asia, England, and Russia who were also part of the flock.

Each person finds themselves in a unique situation depending on their circumstance. For me, my airline was Go Air, and they had no seats available for at least 2 days. They could not schedule a new plane into the system either. There were only 2 options. Wait at the airport until morning, and try to get on an open seat on the next flight or find another ticket for the next day. So, I got on the internet via my lap top by way of a King Fisher airline wireless access point that was not encrypted; I could have also paid to get access, but King Fisher’s was open. I went to expedia.com, and checked for other available flights to New Delhi on Jan 2 – the next day. I found a reasonable fair on Jet Air at 7:00pm. So, I got a refund from Go Air, and then went to terminal B and bought a Jet Air ticket to New Delhi. There was a guy standing near the ticket counter, and he asked if I needed a hotel room. I said yes, and he told me I would get free transport to and from the airport if I went to the Hotel Jewel Palace. It sounded like a good deal, and I accepted his offer. When the taxi came, it was a small minivan, and there was a couple in the back seat who were also going to the same hotel because their flight to New Delhi was also cancelled.

Here is a pic of the room at the Hotel Jewel Palace. It looks like a 2 star type hotel. It is neither a Jewel or a Palace, but it was clean. The “Foreigner Rates” were reasonable, and there was a small restaurant. So now I will get a good night’s sleep, and see if my flight is canceled again, and I have to do this all over again.

What has impressed me so far, is the English skills of all the people I’ve met so far. They are great. Hindi is the main language, and it sounds very different from Malayalam. I found one person who knew the Malayalam numbers 1 through 10, and that was about it. So, now I hear Hindi and English as the mainstay of day to day discussions, which gives me the feeling I’m in a very different place – before it was Malayalam\English. The environment still looks similar though – buildings, traffic, and population density. I have not seen a man in a mundo – they are all wearing shirt and pants. The women are very mixed, but most have colorful pants and bright to dull colored long flowing shirts that hang below the knee with a slit on both sides.

Here are some pics outside the room.

So, my first experience in North India was a canceled flight due to fog. I didn't know fog could make life so interesting.