First time in India?

It's been a long time since I last blogged! My parents came to visit for 2 weeks so we were very busy travelling, in and around B'lore.

The 1st long weekend we flew to Cochin, in Kerala and explored the backwaters in a houseboat. It was calm, green and the slow pace of the houseboat was a perfect antedote to city life and B'lore traffic. Then we did a week of my 2 main activites here: shopping and eating and otherwise exploring of B'lore. The 2nd long weekend we visited a Jain statue, the tongue-twisting 'Shravanabelagola'. This was voted India's top wonder by Indians. You have to climb over 600 steps to get to it! Following this we travelled to Mysore and visited the palace, the outdoor flower and fruit market, the Hindu temple. And finished off with a safari stay in the jungle (elephants and monkeys included).

So we packed a lot in! My Dad was struck by the disparity, the sheer diversity in wealth. The gap between rich and poor is enormous here. Leela palace hotel vs MTR. My Mum was shocked by the many ecologically unsound practices here. For example, there are no plugs in the sinks in our home and elsewhere even though there's a water shortage. People just don't do plugs. (I've since learnt that a friend bought plugs for her home and her maid refused to use them).

Having my parents here was both stimulating and exhausting for all of us! It's impossible to go from 0 to 60 culturally in 2 weeks. I'm still learning and adapting to Indian culture after 14 months of living here, it's a never-ending process, as there are so many differences. In wanting to help my parents avoid the common 'hasards' of visiting India: scams, faux-pas, ill health etc...ie in wanting to give them a cultural "cheat sheet", I came to realise there's a fine balance between explaining or forewarning and being over-protective!

Food formed a large part of my parents' discovery of India. They've had a lot of Indian food in our home town in Manchester. But here there are new and different varieties of dishes, breads and accompaniments that they'd never had before. Idlis, dosas, appams, rotis, thalis eaten on banana leaves, all washed down with a cup of masala chai, or fresh lime soda, or mosambi juice. We'll try a lassi together next time.

They left just before the mass expat exodus of Bangalore which is currently happening. I've the impression very few expats are staying here. Many are travelling, either back to their "native place" or to another destination like Australia or Malaysia. Christmas isn't big in B'lore. Only 4% of Indians are Christians. So most Christmas stuff is commercial. It's nice not to have it shoved down our throats here. Shops are just starting to put up their decorations, which is refreshing.

Now that my parents are gone I've been catching up. I've signed off the January version of the charity magazine and done the second of many versions of the pagination for the February version. I went to my 1st Christmas party last night, held before friends left, and frantically looked for presents at the last minute. Today after some ringing-round, I also managed to unearth a 2008 refill for my Filofax diary - very unexpected. (I felt a bit like J R Hartley in the UK Yellow pages advert "Oh, you do have it!")

I also discovered the new Spar supermarket here. A true revolution in shopping: large clean aisles, smiling personnel, lots of check-outs with lots of space, two floors. They actually call it a hypermarket and in comparison to Indian supermarkets it is. 3 ply toilet paper (1st time I've seen this), salted Elle & Vire or Lurpak butter, Nesquik chocolate powder....a very large choice of products, something I took for granted before. The Cardigans "Erase and Rewind" was playing as the store music. I almost could have been back in Europe...