Farewell India

Not only was this a great trip, but I made lots of great friends. I think that the group we had on this trip was very special, in that there were not really any cliques or subgroups. Everyone did their best to be adventurous and open minded. Sadly, it’s time to say goodbye to India, but at least I have the 1 million pictures that I took, priceless memories, and a whole bunch of new friends to party with back at Bing.

Round 2 at the Guptas’

The last few days in India have been awesome, you can really see how much effort the professors have put into making this trip special for us. We went on a bike tour of Old Delhi at 6 am. This was so much fun, since we got to see so many parts of the city that normally a tourist would not go to. We drove our bikes down back alleyways, and through bustling spice markets. Even though our tour guide told us that we were not allowed to, I still took pictures while riding my bike. I can’t wait to show these to family and friends. It’s not every day that you get to ride a bicycle along side a camel pulling a giant wagon full of spices. Another cool thing that we did in the last couple days was our visit to the Lotus Temple. The building was beautiful and it resembled the Sydney Opera House in Australia. We all went inside without our shoes, and observed the temple in complete silence. Later that night (our last night in Delhi) we all partied it up at the Gupta Residence. This was the second party we had at our professor’s home in India, an experience that most students don’t get to have once let alone twice. Only a select few survived until the end of the night. The Guptas outdid themselves once again. The party was on the second floor of the house, there was a huge porch outside that was covered in carpet and protected by a giant tent. Everyone was dancing with each other and eating traditional food from all over India. The DJ was a big hit; I think he played Sheila 7 times that night. The Gupta dance floor was equipped with music blasting, strobe lights, lasers, colored lights, and a super heavy-duty fog machine. This the perfect end to our awesome tour through India.

Sheila Ki Jawani

Our seventh day in India was probably my favorite day so far. Not only did get an awesome breakfast at our hotel, get to see a beautiful fort and palace, and ride an elephant, but we got to visit an Indian orphanage. I did not really know what to expect from the orphanage visit, but it turned out to be a beautiful place for children. The orphanage was in a rural neighborhood, almost in the middle of a field, and it cared for about 50 children. We went on a small tour of the grounds, which you could see that they made the most with what they had; it was really cool to see how creative they were in designing the orphanage.  Afterwards we were able to dance with t  he children, which was the best part. I was amazed by how talented the children were at dancing, and how much they seemed to connect with it. One girl in particular was extremely talented, and she taught Tara how to do the dance to the Sheila song, which everyone has had stuck in their head since the Gupta’s party. At one point the girls dragged my up to the front of the room and made me show of my dance moves. I usually look silly when I dance, and this time was no different, they were all laughing hysterically at me it, but it was all in good fun so I thought it was really funny too.  It was great to see all of the children smiling and laughing with us. I feel like going back one day to volunteer with them.

“A Tiger is Present in the Park. Tourists are Required to Move in the Main Road Only.”

At day 6 the trip is already halfway over, wow this is really flying by too quickly. This morning we had a visit to the Bird Sanctuary in Agra, and soon after we left for Jaipur. Jaipur is know in India as the pink city, since all of the buildings are made of stone that is pinkish red. When we got off the b us, Issac and I used an Indian bathroom, which was just a urinal (wall) on the sidewalk. In Jaipur we saw an astronomical observatory that included the worlds largest sundial, which is accurate by two seconds, and other amazing astrological measurement tools. This place was so impressive; the detail, and precision of the massive tools shows how talented and intelligent people were hundreds of years ago. Later that night we saw an Indian wedding procession that was going down the middle of a busy road. The groom was decked out in fancy traditional Indian clothes, his horse was ornamented with jewels and silk garments, and he even had the same groom hat on that I bought in Old Delhi. We stopped by the wedding to take pictures, and the groom’s father invited us to the party, but unfortunately we didn’t accept the invitation. The hotel we stayed in that night was really nice. It was like a walled village, and it had activities at night that included elephant rides and shopping. The rooms were HUGE, so before dinner we all got together and played some games to get to know each other better. Afterwards, dinner was eaten on the floor in the restaurant, which is the traditional Indian way.

“There’s Only One Chicken Maharaj Mac”

Today (day5) has included some really great activities. We drove to Agra and saw some snake charmers on the side of the road, lots more Eicher trucks, monkeys that do back flips, Chicken Maharaj Macs, camels, cute street children, lots of people peeing on the sidewalk, amongst other priceless sites. The Chicken Maharaj Mac is the McDonalds BigMac of India. Personally, I would much rather have a BigMac, but I thought the Maharaj was pretty good. McDonalds in India is very different. First off, it takes forever, but the workers are very friendly and took take pictures with them. Also, on the way to the Taj Mahal, we saw our first monkeys! They were all on leashes, some with their faces painted, and doing back flips. One of the monkey even tried climbing into the window. A lot of the kids got out of the bus to take pictures with the crazy monkeys, instead I just chilled in the window taking pictures. The Taj was really beautiful, we took a camel from the parking lot to the main gate, and while were at the main gate we were surrounded by lot of street vendors. One of the vendors was a kid about 11 years old who doesn’t go to school, but he could speak Russian, French, German, Spanish, English, Hindi, Punjabi, and Italian. He also had tattoos; this kid was a boss. At the Taj we took so many pictures. At one point I had Christian on my shoulders, standing on a wall, pretty cool. After the Taj we saw another historical fort in a more rural area. At this fort some Indian guy really wanted to jump 20 feet into a nasty puke green body of still slimy water, so I gave him 100 rupees, which is about $2, and he did it in just his underwear without any hesitation.

Party at the Guptas’

I have realized that I enjoy the bus rides a lot. I love sticking my head of the wide open while I check out the streets of India, and take pictures of all sorts of unusual sights. Some people might get bored after a while but, it’s not everyday in New York that you see a herd of bulls crossing a busy street, or a guy getting a full shave on the side of the road. The company that we visited today was HCL. We met the CEO of the company, and asked him all sorts of good questions. We learned a little bit about the business culture at HCL, that follows a slogan of “employees first, customers second.” That night we went to a party at the Gupta House! The party was great, all of the family members were in attendance, we had a huge tent set up in the middle of the street, a massive bonfire to dance around, delicious food, and a sweet dance floor/ DJ. Some of the guys and girls dressed up in traditional Indian clothes, and the girls even got Henna tattoos on their hands. The party was a great, and generous welcome by the Gupta family and friends. Some of our E-Buddies were even in attendance. I was amazed by how friendly and outgoing the people at the party were. It was also good to see everyone, including 5 year olds and 50 year olds, breakin’ it down on the dance floor.

The fourth day of our trip was awesome. We first went to a beautiful temple, and then walked around the main shopping street in Old Delhi. This was our first experience with the hagglers. This place in Old Delhi was one of the most crowded places I’ve ever been. No matter where you stood, you were always in someone’s way. Cars were all excessively using their horns while moving at a snail’s pace through the sea of people. We did some decent gift shopping here, I love haggling. I think my favorite purchase of the day was my beautiful grooms hat. When I bought it, I had no idea it was only to be worn by someone who is about to get married. I looked like a fresh prince, plus I received countless laughs from people just by walking down the street. After this we went to the light show at Red Fort. I think that most people where so tired by this time that they were sleeping during the show. Most people woke up laughing when the narrator in the show mentioned said something along the lines of  “the King always loved the common slut.” We had a very adventurous dinner with Professor Gupta before the light show, which was down some loud overcrowded loud alley at a tiny hole in the wall place with just a few tables. Food was great, and our waiter was only 9 years old! Rodrigo was extremely tired on the way home, so tired that he slept with his eyes and mouth open on the bus ride home.

The First Two Days

The first two days in India have been great. On our first day walked around the grounds at the India gate, and we were greeted by marching bands from all over the country. It was pretty cool to see so many different marching bands (they were practicing for an upcoming parade), they all had very unique uniforms and they seemed happy to see us. The soldiers were taking pictures of us, and with us. After this we headed to a Sikh temple, where we learned about the religion and participated by taking off our shoes, covering our hair, and eating the small offering. An interesting fact that I learned from the temple is that regardless of race/religion no person will ever be turned down for food at a Sikh temple. Later on our first day professor Gupta showed us around the neighborhood near our hotel where I ate some street food. That night we received a warm traditional welcome from the staff at our hotel. We all received a “red dot” between our eyes, and a necklace of fresh flowers. Overall, my first day felt relaxed while at the same time being a great taste of India.

Our second day in India consisted of many more activities. Our activities included a visit to a beautiful garden/temple in the morning, visits to Pricewaterhouse Coopers and Dunnhumby, and in the evening we went to the Kingdom of Dreams where we ate and saw the musical called “Zangoora.” My favorite part of this day was probably the business visits. First off, it was very interesting to see the set up and appearance of the businesses. The large corporate firms in Delhi work out of state of the art office buildings, which could be located just across the street from a slum. This coexistence of wealthy and less fortunate people was striking in this area. Also I noticed that on our way there, the traffic was unlike anything I had ever seen. People were driving there cars/tractors/horses all over the road, often making their own lane. I also saw my last name, Eicher, on the side of a tractor that was slowly hauling a bed of about 20 laborers down the highway. Anyway, I found the businesses to be very welcoming and extremely interesting. It was really cool to see the differences between PwC and Dunnhumby, and to learn about how their businesses related to the emerging markets in India.