Thursday, November 29, 2012

Hop into the Future


When you only visit a place occasionally, it can feel like time travel.  I last stepped out of India in 1996 (N about in 1990).  When we walked back in, we were transported 16+ years into the future, and in many ways, India isn't the same place.

Here is the subway in Delhi.


Although I did see one of the first McDonalds in 1996, they are everywhere now.


One McSpicy Paneer, please!  (no beef or pork served here)


Angry birds are everywhere now!



Check out the fancy cars in front of a faux Euro-Coffee shop.


The weird thing about India (and China) is that you can always step around the corner and see the olden days still.  Although India hasn't moved as fast as China, it is still amazing to see how far things have come along.


The heart of Indian Governemnt

We headed up to the seat of India's government....  Parlament, The President's house, all leading down a long road to the India Gate.... 

 OK, I'll admit it, we had the driver bring us down the long road to the India Gate.
 Security was understandably tight.



Wednesday, November 28, 2012

Jantar Mantar

Delhi is full of a bunch of ancient stuff that you can climb on.

Visions of India

My first impressions of India are....  It is much wealthier, but just as chaotic as it used to be.

Tuesday, November 27, 2012

India!

That is where we are. It has been so long since N (or I) have been here that we are basically foreigners at this point. Truth is, N's family has almost all left, so she is all the more a foreigner. Actually half or my extended family still lives in India, so I have more roots here than she does, but try to explain that to the guy on the street who just sees me as a white guy with a local girl. OK, her Hindi is fluent, and mine is pretty bad, so that doesn't help either. I do get the white guy treatment , though, in that whenever I say something simple in Hindi, people start clapping, and everyone keeps asking me if the food is too spicy (I can outdo any of you with the spices, Indian people!)

The kids have heard so much about this mythical place across the world where things are totally chaotic but the food is really good their whole life, but this is their first visit. I kept asking them what they think of India but they were just so happy to finally be back in a country where YouTube works that they locked themselves in their rooms with iPads and told their secretary not to forward any calls. I guess kids have their own expectations about what is supposed to be exciting.

I have heard enough about how much India has changed that I was pretty curious myself to see the place.



China!

We just left China after a year there.... Due to a pretty hectic schedule and tight Internet controls, I never blogged about anything there, but I have many pictures and will retroactively describe what we saw there.

For now I will do things backwards and describe our current India trip, afterwards I will do China.