Jake Giddes, Slap Me Silly

Over the past 25 years I have had the opportunity to visit a number of cities on every continent. The morning we arrived in Hyderabad, it was, in the classical noir genre term, “a dark and stormy night”. During the drive to the hotel, very little of the landscape was discernible, but I immediately recognized some of the characteristics I had seen in other cities. There was the haphazard architecture of existing neighborhood shops. There was evidence of demolition and rubble at each bend in the road. And then there were vehicles of all shapes and sizes in various states of repair that loomed in the shadowy edges of the headlight beams of our car as we wound our way over the irregular surfaces of the streets toward the hotel.
It wasn’t until Wednesday when Deb went to the office that the landscape fully presented itself. It was a moving sea of people, vehicles, and animals. But unlike the staged shots you get in National Geographic by very skilled photographers, you get the contextual view of that dichotomy of urban vitality spurred on by the economic growth in direct proximity to the abject poverty which is attracted to it and lives on any piece of space not occupied by something else. I could sense some apprehension in Deb as we rode to the office. But the sounds and motion of the traffic that surrounds you keeps some of the focus off the squatters’ tent cities in the open spaces that come right up to the edge of the road. The occupants literally have to watch for traffic as the crawl out of their makeshift abodes. But what always fascinate me are the entrepreneurs who serve these communities. We don’t often see this in the US because our poor are (1) not poor by world standards, and (2) they are bifurcated into urban and rural pockets that we generally don’t visit – ever. Did you ever think about why the Southland Corporation is a quiet success story? Well, that’s another story, but vendors purposefully come to serve these communities. Most of their stores are as rustic as the homes of their customers. They poach electricity if they can so that a string of discarded lights becomes a beacon for the customers who may be coming home with a few rupees he or she earned that day.

I am not disheartened by this. The people, animals, and various means of transportation are part of the fabric that holds the world's largest democracy together. What I think is amazing is the amount of energy people put into their politics. The local papers devote pages to the upcoming elections. One politician, the son of a local political legend, is starting his campaign and the coverage is just about as much as the local cricket team -- and THAT is saying a lot.

Day Two -- Part Two

This was D-Day which is to say Deb got to the office. Did I mention that we're surrounded by new construction as far as the eye can see? Well, if you look closely, there are cows in a small paddock just about a hundred meters from our hotel window. These are probably the lucky ones. The drive through Madhapur to the office in the daylight is, literally, enlightening. If you go on YouTube and type in Hyderabad traffic, there are some good examples of what it looks like, but really experiencing it on the ground is exhilerating, to say the least.
And the fellow who navigated the craziness is standing with Deb outside Novartis' building in HiTec City. You probably can't see it, but he is "wired" with a radio that all the hotel staff wear. He is a cool and skilled driver. You must have to develop a sense of when to stop and go since there are almost no traffic lights. We actually saw one last evening as we were going to dinner. It was an experiment by the city to relieve gridlock that happens at rush hour(s). In the next few posts I will give you a sense of the sights and happenings along the drive to Deb's office.

Day Two

Don’t expect to see “Day 172” or such as I am not a diarist. Deb is going to the office today. I will accompany her to see where she’s working and get a lay of the land in Hi Tec City, so to speak. I have a checklist of things to get done for today, but I am committed not to get stressed out if they don’t get done as I get accustom to IST. Fortunately our residency with the India FRO (not to be confused with any Tolkien character but the Foreign Registration Office which is part of the regional police office) is arranged through Deb’s office. I’m also on a quest for cell phones to use locally. All the literature says that foreign visitors need special permission to get cells and you are required to give them a passport photo and the letter from the FRO.
We’re off to exercise today in the hotel gym/spa. We’re committed to getting a regular routine as soon as possible to get past the fuzziness of the past three days. I’ve added some additional photos of the hotel and the little things that make you aware that you’re not at a Quality or Comfort Inn in Ohio.
One of the most not striking things you notice is the amount of building going on. From any window in the hotel you see high rises going up. The entire landscape is literally being reshaped. But within that booming, there is still the natural greenery and flowers that you would expect from a sub-equatorial climate. And also something I’ve come to expect is the floral decoration like the floating petals arranged on a platter in an out-of-the-way corridor.

This is the happenin’ place with the Hyderabad convention center. Interestingly, the dining room does change the menu around to offer more pan-Asian items as the convention has a large Japanese contingent. Well, if this isn’t another ‘duh’ moment. Geological issues – Japan – it’s as obvious as a Godzilla movie. We’re talkin’ the guy in the rubber suit Godzilla with Raymond Burr as the over-weight American scientist who is horrified by the awakening of Godzilla.


Today has been our first experience with intermittent power disruptions which started early this morning and continued on until about 9am. Then the internet slowed to a crawl. We can’t be on at the same time because THAT blows the hotel server’s little mind. But this will not deter us! If it’s starting to sound like whining, I’ll end for now. Whaaaaaaaaaaa!

Day One

When we finally got up, here's a scene from our hotel window. It could be anywhere in Southeast Asia, but it's our home away from home. There's a large Asian Geo science event happening at the conference center connected to the hotel, so there are hundreds of earth science geeks from all around the area. So the hotel is booked solid.

Here are some shots of the lobby and other areas of the hotel. More to come tomorrow.

The Journey Begins

We got to the airport easily as just about everyone was where they wanted to be or had to be on the 4th. We had the good fortune to spend time in the SAS/Lufthansa lounge. Deb felt very comfortable there as every female who was not wait staff in the lounge had blond hair and blue eyes. The people even approached her and spoke to her in Swedish or German.

Lufthansa still has some amenities that weren’t eliminated during the last run up of fuel prices. While airline cuisine has not changed, the airline has spent more on the menus which all sound like you are going to have a meal equal to any five star restaurants. Well, they try, I’ll give them that.
I’m going to go to bed now. We’ll start up again while we wait for our plane in Frankfurt. Good night!

If it's Monday morning, it must be Frankfurt! OK, another Lufthansa lounge, another day of living the IKEA life. If anyone thinks Danish modern has gone out of fashion, well, think again. Blond wood, blond chairs, maybe a pop of color on the walls, but overall, ya know you're in Europe. A quick shower and we're off again. As we walked to the gate, it was another "duh" moment because the gate was on the ground floor. This could only mean one thing: tarmac or bus ride. Well it WAS a bus ride, standing as strap hangers as there were no seats and with about half the city of Hyderabad on board with us sweating in what the Germans must consider good air conditioning. Now, we were going on an Airbus A320. Not the biggest in their fleet now, but pretty damn big. As we got off the bus, there were the stairs. A good, long flight of stairs up to the plane. There were two types of stairs: one with and one without a cover. Deb's quick thinking: head for the one with a cover. It probably means something better than the one without one and 150 people standing in the hot sun waiting to get in.

Deb is comfortably set in her seat. You will note from the next shot of Deb that we made it to Hyderabad at midnight. It was pouring rain. Well, duh, it IS monsoon. While I didn't get it in the photo, Deb was being supported by two porters as we waited for our driver to get there.

Now the driver brought a small car to pick us up. There was luggage weighing down the car so the tires were rubbing on the wheel wells. Going over speed bumps was a major effort and when he put on the air conditioning, the car couldn't go any faster than 20 miles per hour. We got to the hotel around 1:30 am. The car was screened before we could enter the hotel area. All our luggage had to go through screening and we had to go through metal detectors before entering the lobby. By now, we're exhausted. We had all we could do just to find jammies and, of course, check e-mail.

Monsoon June

Four days left. The little lists are all over the apartment with piles of clothes, boxes, luggage, and cleaning paraphernalia. Should I take my Staples “That was easy” button? Easiest question to answer: “Which winter clothing to pack”? It must be karma, but the weather has been hot in New Jersey. How hot is it? Well, let’s just say that Snookie’s makeup melted on the set of “Jersey Shore” and the local Chamber of Commerce demands the episode only be shown on Halloween. In fact, the weather today in Hyderabad is no worse than in Newark. OK, bad comparison. My bad.
Hyderabad is a relatively young city and not just the Hi Tech City. The city proper is only about 500 years old, though the area shows evidence of Iron Age habitation about 500 BC. The Charminar (Four Towers) is in the heart of the old city. OK, duh, it's a mosque, reflecting the long heritage of the Muslim Principality that existed throughout the second half of the millenium including throughout the British Raj.

Hyderabad is a diverse city. In the center of the large reservoir, Hussain Sagar, isa large statue of the Buddha in it. There are Hindu temples throughout the area as well as several Christian denominations.


We will be arriving in monsoon season, so we're planning to be rained on more than a planned vacation in Michigan.

Gotta keep packin'. Talk to you soon.

Destination: India

Some of my enduring memories of my childhood were the rustic surroundings of our family home on Byram Lake. We had two trees in the front yard: an Elm and a Catalpa. The Catalpa was my daydreaming tree, it's the one behind me in the picture. It had a branch that jutted out like the bowsprit of a sailing ship. From the time I was 4 and could climb up on that branch, prop my back against the trunk, I imagined I was at sea in the heroic quest for faraway lands. So now, thanks to Deb, we have the opportunity to set out on another yet another journey.

Our India travel preparations are in full swing. The cautionary activities go far beyond simply stocking a large supply of Imodium and Pepto-Bismol but include the usual treatments like Hep A and B, Typhoid, tetanus, and rabies. We will be coming into monsoon season, so Lariam will be one of the regimens with plenty of DEET and pyrethrin in our kits. You will appreciate that all of the cautionary literature for travel scares most people away from ever setting foot outside the US. I wonder what those first East India Company employees did when Elizabeth I gave them a charter in 1600. You can imagine someone like Bob Cratchit's great-great-great-grandfather being told he was being shipped off half way around the world. My first thought would have been, "What on earth did I do wrong? Was it something I said to the boss' wife at the last Christmas party?" There were no Fodors, Frommer's, or cultural training. Then again, did they really care?

Last week we finalized our visas. Since 2009, there have been significant changes in the Inda visa rules and the protocol for submitting the documents. Interestingly, the Indian government has outsourced their visa process to a private Indian firm. Go figure. Last week also included a one-day cultural immersion. It gave some very good insight and perspective on what we should anticipate. We DID get a Frommer's guide and an etiquette guide. We also spent a recent Sunday afternoon in the Edison, New Jersey shopping district that Indian expats frequent.

Now it's time to start packing. Stay Tuned