Life in India, Days 1-18

Just want to bring everyone up to speed on our first couple of weeks living in India. After about a week in a hotel, we have finally moved to a small 2 bedroom service apartment. We'll be here until we can get moved into a house...which I hope is soon, because I think Steve is starting to feel a little spoiled here.

The apartment brings us breakfast every morning...we get to pick off a list of about 3 things what we want the next morning to eat. We normally either get an omelet, an egg sandwich, scrambled eggs, or a breakfast burrito. It's actually pretty good...however, they sometimes have some weird side dishes that go with the main breakfast. For example, this morning we had an omelet and our side dish was about one tablespoon of mashed potatoes!

Also, every afternoon around 4:30 or so, the apartment brings us two cookies and a bottle of water each. Anyway, I think Steve may be in for a wake up call when he has to go back to eating cold cereal for breakfast, and I don't serve him cookies in the afternoon. (OK, maybe I'm also getting use to this life of luxury!)

On to the house...we still do not officially have a house yet. We have selected one and met with the landlord of the property. After some negotiations, everyone has agreed on everything, but now we are just waiting for the landlord to actually sign the lease and for the legal department in Steve's office to sign it. Once that is done, then the landlord will get his deposit...here in India, a typical deposit is 10 months rent! (Dad, don't be getting any ideas...I don't think any of your renters will give you a 10 month security deposit!) Then, we just have to wait for the landlord to get the house ready for us. He has to provide new appliances plus get us a generator (electricity goes out multiple times per day here, so a generator is an absolute must have). Anyway, we are hoping to move in to the house around August 1 or so. For those of you who are dying to hear about the house...you will just have to wait. For fear of jinxing this whole thing and having to start back at scratch with the house hunting, I'm not telling anyone about the house...except that it is next to a sod farm and a coconut farm. As soon as the lease has been signed, I'll tell everyone all about it.

Let's see, what else can I tell you about life in India...the monsoon season has started early here. With the exception of today...I think it has rained every day since we arrived here. For those of you who don't know...Beijing is very dry. In the 9 months we lived there, it only rained maybe 5 times total. Therefore, I'm actually enjoying all of the rain we have had here. The other night Steve and I were laying in bed watching TV when I heard water gushing. I thought that a pipe had burst or something like that...nope, it was just pouring rain outside! I had completely forgotten what that sounded like. Anyway, the rain here hasn't been as bad as some other parts of India. I think in northern India there has been quite a bit of flooding. Besides the rain, the other thing I am loving about Chennai...NO POLLUTION!!!!!!! Of course, the locals here think the pollution is bad. Ha! Go to Beijing if you want to see some pollution.

OK, well I guess this post is long enough. I will be doing another post soon about our experience of ordering pizza. Trust me, you don't want to miss this posting.

Let me know what questions you guys have for me. Take care!