Wook's Place

India: The Hotel Royal Orchid

My hotel in India, my home for the next 3 weeks, will be the Hotel Royal Orchid. So far, it's been nice. The room has a hardwood floor, a wide-screen TV, free internet, and your average selection of coffee/bar/restaurants. The shower head is at mostly-above-head-height.

If the Royal Orchid is any indication, the service industry takes itself very seriously here. The hotel has people assigned to every possible job, and they insist that you let them do their job. The bell staff doesn't also park cars, and the doorman out front opening your car door and greeting you is neither a bell hop or valet. There is another guy there, who is none of the above, just to track which taxis are waiting for which guests. There is another one (on the "travel desk") there to call a car for you if you need one. They were all there when I arrived at 2AM Sunday morning. Only the concierge was missing at that time of morning.

Dinner last night was at the hotel restaraunt, Ginseng. An oriental fusion kind of place. The food was top notch, and cost about $30 a peice for the 6 of us. There are 4 servers hovering over the 6 of us. When I tried to refill my water glass myself, one of them jumped to my side and asked me very seriously but politely to please let him do that. I did, I wasn't sure I wanted to see what would happen if I didn't.

The hotel provides bottled water in the rooms, I guess. When I drank all mine and stopped by the front desk to ask where I might get more, they said they'd send some more right up. Rather than go out looking for bottled water, I went back up to my room, and a dude showed up a couple minutes later with 4 more bottles, and asked very seriously if he could please put them on the nightstand himself. Again, fearing what would happen if I didn't let him, I let him in. I also tipped him 10 rupees for this, which now that I think about it, is probably what they are looking for. I hope that 10 rupees was the going rate.

The room is equipped with a door buzzer, they don't knock it seems. Course, I thought it was the fire alarm or something when I first heard it. I only opened the door for the water-bottle guy because I wanted to see if the alarms were flashing in the hallway, because it wasn't in my room.

On the wall near the door is a plastic holder receptacle thingy for the room's key card. When you come into the room, you open the door with the card, then place the card in the holder. Until the card is in there, and seated well, the power in the room is off, except for the A/C. The room goes from fully dark to all lights on when you enter. This makes sense, from a power-saving standpoint, but I lost 3 large downloads on my laptop to this, until I figured out my laptop was shutting down when the room power went out to save battery power.

My itinerary said I had a "meal plan" with the hotel. Breakfast is complimentary. There's a manager's reception every night up in the executive lounge on the top floor with food and drinks. Pretty much like an Embassy Suites hotel here in the states, except the food was good and the drinks were strong. If I don't want to go up there, I can take advantage of "Happy Hour" in the pub downstairs, for free beer and assorted food.

Another Culture's Bathroom

Here's one you might have to think about if, like me, you come from a culture that hasn't really embraced the idea of using a bidet.

This is a common sight in toilets in India not meant for Westerners:

Yes, that is a sprayer. No, it is not for hosing down the toilet seat before you sit down. Or, at least it isn't completely for that purpose. And yes, there is also toilet tissue in there as well.

Admittedly, we're not talking about pit toilets (a hole in the ground only), which are worse if you aren't practiced on using them. But still, this took me off guard. Indians are fastidious, by culture. And they view wiping your ass with paper, of any so-called "softness", as creepy and silly as I found this. It is all about cultural orientation and what you're used to. My friend Dominic has a bidet in his newly renovated house, and he's told me "But Steve, a bidet gets you squeaky clean". It does have the advantage that other than patting things dry, you don't actually have to touch that end of yourself before it gets cleaned.

Palaces and Temples

The first weekend I was here, I arranged a trip to go to Mysore, a city not to far away from Bangalore. Mysore has two famous palaces, and a bunch of famous temples. I got up early Saturday morning, and a driver took me to Mysore and showed me the sights.

The gallery is on SmugMug, with commentary.

I didn't get as many photos as I wanted of this whole trip, due to almost anything worth photographing still being operational. Photography was mostly not allowed. I suspect a conspiracy. Even had I been able to photograph these places though, I would not have gotten good photos. The temples are dungeons inside except for where the idols of the gods are, and the palaces are not well lit either. Tipu's palace was unlit, except for some crappy displays of 300-year-old guns and assorted military paraphernalia, most of it British.

The one thing I didn't do was the botanic gardens. I'm sure they're cool and all. Because I was by myself, I kinda zoomed thru all the other things to see, and was done with them by 3:30pm. The botanic gardens have some fountains that they light up, and those turn on at 7pm. I wasn't up for waiting around for 3 hours trying to amuse myself somehow, so I went back to the hotel.

Impressions of Bangalore India

It has been an interesting trip.

Bangalore smells bad. It smells like sewage and rotting vegetation pretty much all the time. It isn't overpowering, except by this river that runs by the hotel. But it does kind of burn your sinuses for the first week or maybe two. After that, you stop noticing it.

I found the people to be friendly, helpful, and fun. The people at the customer took care of me, giving me advise on what to see and where to get souvenirs without getting ripped off. Enough people spoke English that I could get around and not feel totally alienated. The food was good, if not spectacular, and very cheap. It was not what I expected. I didn't find much of the food I'm used to seeing in Indian restaurants in NYC in India anywhere.

Despite being as careful as I knew how to be, I've had the shits for a week and a half so far. It hit me bad enough last Monday (the 9th) that I called the hotel who had me talk to their doctor and got prescriptions for stuff that helped some. I must have eaten or drank something, somewhere, that I shouldn't have. Just wish I knew what it was.

I enjoyed my trip, but I don't think I'll want to go back. It is just to far away, both in travel time, and time zones. By the time I got over my jet lag, more than a week had passed and I was already starting in on being homesick. Over the last week and a half I've just been trying to hold on until it is time to go. I am jonesing for a cheeseburger and real pizza.

The smell was everywhere, outside. The hotel also smelled bad, but it turns out this was to cover up the smell of the river outside. They burned scented oils over candles in the elevator lobbies on each floor. I didn't like this smell any more than I liked the smell outside waiting for car service. At least the room didn't smell that way, or like the river of sewage outside.

I've gone vegetarian on India food. Anything that has meat in it has chicken or lamb, and has all the bones in it. All meat is all from joints, it seems like. It is nearly impossible for me to eat anything meat without spending more time trying to either get it off the bones, or to spit out the bones when I've given up and just stuck the damn thing in my mouth. I didn't really like lamb before I came here, and it hasn't gotten any better here. Club sandwiches here are made with a fried egg and ham. Ham here is substandard, and they have never heard of turkey. It has proven impossible to get bacon cooked until it is crisp.

Lest you think I hated the food, I didn't. The actual Indian food was good, once I found the things I liked. Room service had a few winners, and Geoffrey's, the "English Pub" (ha ha) had a couple of others. Ginseng, in the hotel, had good food when I needed to get away from Indian to "Oriental". They Leela Palace hotel up Airport Road a ways is, I'm told, the most expensive hotel in the city, at like $6000 a night. (That's dollars, not rupees.) I tried the main restaurant there one night, and just asked the hostess to arrange for me a meal of their best without being stupidly expensive. They did, and it was incredible. I have no idea what any of it was.

I got really sick, with diarrhea, at the beginning of week two, and called the hotel to see what they could do. They connected me with a doctor, who prescribed some stuff, and when I called the hotel to find out where I could get this stuff, they sent someone out for it for me. I took the two pills for 5 days, and at the end felt better, though far from cured. I'm just hoping I can keep it under control for the flights home tomorrow night.

I went shopping Saturday. Got some Indian stuff for friends, and some stuff for me. I have no idea how I'm getting all this crap home.

Home From India

I'm home.

My suitcase was so over-packed and overweight that Lufthansa charged me nearly $220 bux (INR 8800) to get it on the plane. I was afraid the first time someone touched it my suitcase would explode and kill like 4 people. It didn't. And it made it home. Customs didn't ask to see in it either, which would have been hard.

I had to be in coach for the BLR to FRA segment, and it sucked for all nine-and-a-half hours. But somehow I pissed off the guy next to me enough early on that he went to sit with his girlfriend by a window, so I at least got an open seat next to me. In business class in Frankfurt, the idiot next to me spilled his champagne on me before the doors where even closed.

India: The Aftermath

I've been home a week now, and I'm still not sleeping during normal hours, and I've still got a bad case of digestive problems. I left the 3 days of Cipro at home accidentally, so I took it Sat/Sun/Mon/Tues, and I'm still not right. Friday, I went to the walk-in clinic to ask them what the hell I could do to stop feeling like crap, and maybe get back on a sleeping-at-night kind of cycle.

I had a moderate fever, and they did blood and other tests. The doctor prescribed Cipro again just in case, but for 7 days this time. He said 3 days isn't actually long enough to be useful.

When I went back today to get the blood test results and drop off the other samples he wanted, the doctor said the bloodwork did not indicate anything other than a bacterial infection, which the Cipro should clear up. No parasites or topical diseases. Oh joy. He also said it might take a couple of weeks to feel better, due to the inflammation of the bacterial infection. More oh joy.