MB & J

May 25th, 2006

Last Days in Alabama
Our last few days in the US were pretty hectic. We came off an incredible weekend of celebrating the marriage of our two close friends, Rachel and Jason, with the 3rd Birthday Party celebration of our niece, Gracie, on Sunday. Monday was for finalizing several important things. I drove into Birmingham around 8AM and began the final packing of items still left in the house. The PODS team used the PodZilla to get our pod around 9:30. I took some pictures (posted below soon) because I think it's cool how they lift it off the ground to put into the truck. I was on and off of the phone all day with United Healthcare, MedCare, and CVS in order to get out Malaria Pills and final drugs paid for the entire year by the insurance company. This was an ordeal. I literally got a different answer about how to handle the drug payment from each representative that I spoke to. Fortunately for us, Sheri at CVS was able to get the approval, and also handled pulling all the drugs for us to take. Without Sheri, I'm not sure we would have all the medications needed. Also during the day on Monday, I had lunch at Brio with my old boss, Phil; I got my 401k rolled over to an IRA; I finished packing for the trip; and I mowed the grass one last time for Wyn and Mark. After mowing the grass, I enjoyed an ice cold beer in my back yard to reflect on all the great gatherings and good times we had at 212 Elder St.

Traveling Around the World
We left for Atlanta-Hartsfield Airport at 10:30 CST. Mike and Primrose took us to the airport to see us off. The ride to the airport was bittersweet. All the sights that are so familiar from making that drive too many times to count would soon be traded for views unknown. For really the first time since we made the decision to move, I began to get nervous. What if I don't like it, what if I don't get a job, what if I don't make any friends? While these had crossed my mind, the feeling was much more intense. Regardless, it passed soon enough and the excitement of this adventure set in. We made it to the airport with plenty of time to get thru check in and security. The first of our two flights, from Atlanta to Frankfurt, Germany lasted 8 hours 20 minutes. We flew on a Lufthansa (pronounced Looft-Hanza) Airtran A340 airplane. We got to sit on the first row behind business class, which are great seats because of the enormous leg room. We stayed awake on this flight and watched Fun with Dick and Jane and Seabiscuit II (actually called Dreamer). It was midnight CST and 7 AM in Germany, we ate breakfast in an airport cafe watching the sun come up. Interestingly enough, one of MB's co-workers, Teresa, was on her way back to the states from Bangalore and we got to see her for about an hour at the airport. The flight from Frankfurt to Bangalore took off at 11:45 AM, MB and I were exhausted. I was asleep before the plane even took off. Same airline and kind of plane, but different seats, a few rows back and not nearly as much leg room as before. No matter though, sleep ensued. We woke up for the in flight meal and I watched part of Cheaper by the Dozen II (yes, I watched most of it). The other movie was a Bollywood movie called Bluffmaster. I saw all of this movie, while it's nothing like a film made by US producers, it was interesting and entertaining. I was extremely tired of travel when we landed in Bangalore at Midnight. Customs was no problem, but the bags took forever to come out. Another one of MB's co-workers, Jim Fancher and Sashi, a shuttle service driver met us at the airport with a car to take us to our apartment. You couldn't see much of the city at night, but what we did see were mostly slums, like what you've seen on TV of a 3rd world country. We got to the apartment at about 1:30 AM, which would be 3:00 in the afternoon Central time. The apartment buildings are very nice, gated with guards and guards in each building. Our apartment is huge, a big living/dining area, a large kitchen and 3 rooms with bathrooms, 2 of which are bedrooms. We also have a washer and dryer. This is our home for the next 12 months.

First Day in Bangalore
There is not a main hot water heater for the apartment. In each bathroom there is a switch called 'Geyser'. This switch turns on the water heater for each shower. You turn this switch on before you go to bed so that you can have hot water to take a shower in the morning. The showers are like handicapped hotel room showers...no real tub, just a tile floor with a drain shower head and curtain. As you know, you can't drink the water here so you even brush your teeth and rinse with bottled water. There is a 5 gallon water dispenser already in the room available for us to use. Getting ready this morning was different, but really no big deal, just some subtle differences. We ate breakfast in the Hub, which is a room on the first floor of our building for Accenture employees. They make breakfast and dinner for anyone who wants it and charge it to our room, which we pay every 15 days. The local people as well as the Accenture employees we have met are all very nice and really eager to help. Everyone has some good advise to give, its great to have all these people who have experienced what we are experiencing. I feel a bit overloaded with information right now, we just need to put into practice this information in order for it to be ours. At breakfast we met Vigee (sp?), who is Indian, but has been living in the US for about 10 years and is working for Accenture; Melvin, who works in the building and is one of the people who take care of the Hub; and Gayathri, she works in the building and is one of the people who take care of the Hub. After breakfast we unpacked and worked on getting our wireless network setup, which we may have blown our wireless router already, so we had to just connect directly to the DSL model to get on the internet. We'll see if it works later, otherwise we may need to buy one somewhere. Then around lunch time we took the shuttle service to the Forum. The shuttle service are 3 or 4 guys who work for Avis and drive the Accenture employees (and spouses) to where they need to go. They drive small older model SUVs. Our driver today was Ravi, he was very nice and helpful. The Forum is a mall, which I was surprised to see that they had just about everything that a mall in the US would have. It was different in that it was packed with people and of course everyone was Indian...except us. We ate lunch at the food court, MB had a turkeyham (yes this is one word and one meat) sandwich from Subway. I had a chicken quesadilla from a Mexican food place. Mine was very good, and spicy, but I don't think MB liked the turkeyham sandwich. Then we went to the Landmark, a store with a variety of sundries, where we bought towels and bath mats. Next we went to the Big Bazaar. The closest thing to this in the US is probably Wal-Mart or a Dollar Store. They had everything there, we picked up some clothes hangars and some washing detergent. There was a section in the Bazaar for different beans and rice, which produced the kind of smell that you think of when you think of India. It was quite pungent. The Bazaar itself was slammed too, there were people everywhere, who were for the most part, pushy. I didn't like the Big Bazaar and won't go back unless necessary. Then on the way back, riding with Ravi, we saw our first cow in the road. Well to be fair, it was a bull and he was on the side of the road, not right in the middle. But still, you don't see that in any US cities. So I was exhausted after all that and took a short nap this afternoon. We ate dinner late, so that we could eat with Fancher. We met the "Adapter Pimp", as he is lovingly referred to by many of the Accenture employees because he knows were to get power strips and power converters and adapters. He was very knowledgeable about the area, showing us around the complex a bit, and then of course hooked us up with a power strip and power converter. That about wraps up the day. Tomorrow we are going to Goa, we are going with several Accenture folks, so this will be a good "getting to know you experience" for me and MB.