Arrival on July 22, 2008

I've just arrived in Delhi (on Sunday) and I've become somewhat used to the heat. It is like a sauna here all the time. The humidity is the worst, but allegedly it gets better as we approach december. The heat makes it really nice to sleep here, but very difficult to get up in the mornings. I think it is also mostly the reason that everything is crawling with life. There are a ton of insects everywhere, including huge ants that climb trees, lots and lots of birds (which I guess aren't insects), and of course flies by the truckload. There are a lot of stray (perhaps?) dogs on campus that just chill at the road sides and seem very friendly. I refrained from trying to befriend any of them, although I'm sure they would be very nice. I also saw 4 monkeys. One was probably wild, and the other three were owned by somebody who had them on a leash.

Everything here is incredibly cheap, and almost all prices outside of campus are negotiable. I haven't figured out the best method for haggling yet, but I'm working on it. The method of transportation here is by "rickshaw" or at least what the other foreign students call rickshaws. We aren't pulled by someone walking, the rickshaws are either attached to a bike or are a sort of cross between a motorcycle and a tricycle. As far as I can tell foreigners pay about twice what an Indian would, but it still amounts to maybe 60 or 80 rupees for a motor rickshaw (1.5 to 2 dollars).

So far almost no B-Tech* students have arrived. (*That's BS.) Mostly we are surrounded by Masters and PhD students. (We being me and the other foreign students.) They are all very friendly. Almost everyone takes the time to talk to you. It's as if there was no pressure on them to do anything. I remember the feeling of being under pressure for most of the time at home to get somewhere or do something, but here everyone is very relaxed. They are extremely helpful interrrupt their conversations or whatever they are doing and help you with whatever information you need. They will chat with you afterward too so it's extremely pleasant generally. People often ask you whether you need help if you are looking particularly clueless. That is pretty cool too. The difficult thing is learning names, since everyone's name is a bizarre mixture of weird sounds that are hard to follow because I can't differentiate the sounds people make that well. Many people (probably three quarters of them) speak english well enough to help you out, but the language used is very clearly Hindi. Hindi seems like it will be a fun language to learn, in particular because most of the signs are already translated into english. So it is easy to compare the English way saying something and the Hindi. In the US I managed to pick up some basic grammar and got a good grasp of how the script is pronounced, so the signs are very useful.

So far I've been hanging out with the people who are also on exchange. We have done a lot of touristy things. It is fun buying things here because it is cheap, and haggling is kind of cool. I will want to buy some clothes and the like. Ironically there are three types of people on exchange here: French speakers, German speakers, and me. Everyone speaks English fairly well, but I've been travelling mostly with the French so far, so they speak French among themselves and feel less guilty about it since I can sort of speak it too. We teach each other French words and English words back and forth and when I communicate with them it's usually 70% English 30% French. My roomape is from Switzerland, and we speak English although he is a French speaker as well. They're all pretty cool so far, and the other students are too. There are two CS students from the TU Munich who know of my uncle Helmut, so that's pretty interesting too. I seem to be the only American & native English speaker.

The food here is excellent. It is all Indian and generally a curry or something. I figured out that it's all vegetarian, but you don't really miss the meat. I'm trying to eat using one hand like the Indians. It works fairly well, although I've poured food all over my shirt a couple of times now. There is bread (Chapatis or Nan) with every meal, which is really nice, but very difficult to tear into pieces one handed. Some dude who was a Grad student or exchange student from England informed me that Aloo means potato, Paneer is something like a cheese (prolly a curd), and Masala is like a spicy vegetable thing.

Anyway, tomorrow is my orientation, when I ought to get a real internet connection for a change and hopefully get the paperwork that allows me to register for my visa. We will see. Rules don't seem to apply here like they do at home. It doesn't seem unlikely that it won't work out like that.

This seems like a long email, maybe I will look into writing a blog instead. Although if it is particularly complicated I prolly won't bother. If you have any thoughts etc. feel free to drop me an email. I'd recommend not replying to everyone, just to me.


I hope life is good wherever you are.