Today I ventured into the 'old' Vadodara. It is old India, raw India, unspoilt India. No tourists in this city, just the odd expatriate like ourselves. Caught a Rickshaw about 15 minutes out of the city and hit the colourful bazaars. Every corner I turned, I saw something exciting and new. The bright colours of the fabrics, the infectious smells of burning insense, the animals wandering about with not a care in the world, the human excrement ground into the walkways.....it's here and it's now as it was hundreds of years before. The auto rickshaws are an added touch to that of yesteryear but the noise of the bazaar is electric and exciting. As I wandered up tiny laneways barely wide enough to let two pass, I was treated to some fabulous sights, smells and sounds to excite my senses. This is Incredible India!
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We were invited to Bruce's bosses home to meet his family yesterday. It was a good chance to delve deep with the questions. One thing that does concern me is how I'm going to overcome my compassion toward the 'help' (maids/ drivers etc). I've not been unkind to anyone before and I'm told we cannot be too kind or the help will leave. They will go elsewhere to find work. They like to be busy and not allowed to slacken off. I guess that's just the way. The class system is very prominent all across India as it has been hundreds of years ago.....Things just don't change. There are rules for the 'help', not governed by the wealthy of today but put in place hundreds of years ago and they are the rules. Things like 'the maid or nanny must not sit on any furniture'....therefore if the family is watching tv with the nanny or the maid, they must sit on the floor. If the nanny accompanies a family to a restaurant they must sit at another table with their chair in a certain position. If the maid is a live in maid, she must sleep on the kitchen floor if there is not provision for a maids room. (We did see a few houses with maids rooms attached) Things like that..... So I guess if you are lenient towards the maid and let's say you think what they are doing is un-necessary like cleaning the oven because they did it yesterday, perhaps they are insulted. If they are standing around, you should direct them to do something apparently because that is what they want to feel 'special' in the class system. Indians just love Westerners for some reason and we are treated like royalty... Especially in the less tourist visited cities like this one we are living in. What an exciting day.....looked at another 10 properties today but have narrowed it down to 3 now. Our number one choice is amazing so hope we can be successful at securing that one. If not, the other 2 are lovely also. Had lunch with some locals at a cafe serving THE best food!! Sorted my pre paid SIM card for my iphone. Went for a walk close to our hotel...the locals just love saying hello to us. They are very inquisitive. Hopefully catching up with some other people Bruce will be working with for dinner tonight. Today we fly to Vadodara, India. We are flying Thai Airways to Bangkok then onto Mumbai then connecting to Vadodara. We are doing a 2 week orientation trip this time...preparing for our relocation in early January.
Keep up to date with our journey here!! Tell us what you think by leaving a comment. :) Well we have arrived......sooo tired though. Actually going to bed now at 4pm....just can't stay awake any longer. Left Brisbane bound for Bangkok, boarded another plane an hour later and flew to Mumbai arriving at 00:10am (India time)all in all around 26 hours since we left home. Cleared immigration & customs then transferred by bus to the Mumbai domestic terminal where we waited until 5:30am for our flight to a Vadodara or Baroda (whichever you wish to call it). The domestic terminal didn't start operations until 4am so due to the lack of seats, sat on the refreshingly cold granite slab garden borders and watched people arrive and the police wandering around with their machine guns over their shoulders until such time as things started moving and we could go through yet another security check point to our boarding gate. Descending into Vadodara was such a surreal feeling....it was just dawning with an orange glow on the horizon from the unrisen sun. We descended upon the city which is to be our home for the next few years viewing it for the first time ever with our own eyes. After checking into our hotel, we showered and had a nanny nap for an hour before our orientation tour began at 11am. Our relocation case worker met us in the lobby at 11am and after some formal introductory info, we loaded into our chauffeur driven car and did a drive around the city to show us the main sites. We visited supermarkets and she showed me how to enter the store. After being scanned and frisked by security, they put your handbag inside another zip-able bag and cable tie it so you cannot shop lift... This is then removed when you reach the register so you may pay. She then took us out to lunch at a local Indian food haunt.....great food. We then began looking at available houses to rent. Absolutely amazing huge properties with security. Felt a bit overwhelmed so decided to call it a day and after a good nights sleep, we'll be back into the property search tomorrow. We will have a car & a driver supplied. He will take Bruce to work & back home each day (the factory is about half an hour out of Vadodara). In between Bruce's working hours, the driver will be there for my convenience. And question you may well ask? - will we drive? After our visit to India in 2011 and after yesterday's drive around the answer is unequivocally 'No'.....if you're not avoiding those above much loved moo cows, or an auto rickshaw which has come out of thin air right in front of your bonnet, it's the motorist who decides to just drive on the wrong side of the road just because he feels like it and is coming straight toward your car at 60km an hour. It's chaos but it seems to not be a problem to those who drive but for me i think I'd be a basket case if I attempted it. A few pics from Day 1. |