another quick ten minutes

hopefully i'll be able to write all i want to write about.

the meals are great...but some of my western counterparts are having a hard time. i guess the look of curry just turns their tummy, too bad...cos its good stuff! what i find gross is the western food that they try to make...some sort of pasta dish or some weird looking casseroles. they don't look appetising to me at all, but my classmates are appreciating it. they've really gone above and beyond over here, the hospitality is fabulous. interesting thing is that during breakfast and break times, they often have tea or coffee. except what it ends up tasting more like is flavoured milk! ha! what a treat.

indian people are pretty small comparably to north american people. i bought a shirt the other day. i was a XXL. 8\ yea. and i'm usually a L in Canada. it was only after then that i realised that the average height of most of the males here is about 5'6" and they are all pretty lean folk.

i got cheated the other day. don't worry it was for a fraction of a cent. apparently the indian economy no longer accepts their 0.25 denominations. the highest they accept is the $0.50 denomination. while getting change back for a rupee, i was given a $0.50 coin and two $0.25. and then when i tried to use the quarters elsewhere, i was told that they no longer use them. ha! well, its harmless mistake. one US dollar is equal to about 45 rupees. so i think i was cheated by exactly half a cent.

i'll try to write a bit more about dalits later on. having fun, thanks for checking in!

hyderabad

hey everyone

well after about 30 hours straight of travelling and transit time, i finally got into the campus this morning at 530am! i napped for an hour and then got ready for the day. suprisingly, i haven't dozed off once yet. i didn't sleep that much on the planes either. maybe 90 mins on each flight. there was one from vancouver to amsterdam, and then another from amsterdam to hyderabad. some of my other friends made like 4 or 5 connections. i didn't envy them.

i got into amsterdam pretty uneventfully, good flight, good food. wow, dutch women are really tall - or maybe thats just ALL the flight attendants i saw in that characteristic KLM blue uniform. the amsterdam airport basically has a mini mall inside of it, so that helped kill time a bit

i got into hyderabad at 130am india time, and then waited for my two classmates to arrive at 250am. well, the flight was delayed and it didn't arrive until 330am, and then it took them another 90 mins to get out. wow. i was so ready to leave the airport when they arrived.

also, another neat thing? its like an event when an indian family member comes home. seriously, a person's ENTIRE family is at the airport waiting for them, babies and 4 year olds in tow. everyone is there. you even have to pay 30 rupees to get into the airport. its like going to see a show. 30 rupees is about the cost of a good meal out here. so yea, when i left the baggage area, i was surrounded by like hundreds (ok not that many) of indian people just swarming the exits. and then when i finally left the airport 3.5 hours later, there was another swarm of people outside the airport - presumably people who didn't want to pay the entrance fee. according to my friend, its way worse at the Delhi airport

as you can see, i have internet access. they even have highspeed now. but its not dependable, clicks in and out. and there's only one internet computer for the whole school. good times. i guess its all about finding the right time to get on.

i have a feeling i'm going to crash tonight. despite the smell of mosquito coils burning in the room (that give me a headache) and 10 other snoring classmates. we were supposed to be put in rooms that hold two people, but there's this conference going on this week, and all the rooms are taken up. next week, we'll go back to normal.

there are people here from all over the world. people on ship ministries, azerbaijan, tibet, kajikistan and other countries ending in stan. i've only had two meals, but i hope to learn more about their lives in the next 3 weeks. almost all of these people are involved in some sort of relief work or helping out underprivileged people. its good company to have.

i'm having a blast with the food. this morning we had this, i dunno, some kind of fine grain porridge that was like the consistency of soft cake, and this coconut curry to die for. it was great. its SPICY here, but good thing i have training from my singaporean roots, so i'm enjoying it. its seems like its most vegetarian, but i'm ok with vegetarian when the food is THIS flavourful. i could never be a strict vegan, cos i wouldn't know how to cook food as interesting tasting as they make it.

well, i'll try to update again when i can.