One of the souvenirs I wanted to bring home was a kurta. That is a traditional male outfit that is a long sleeved shirt that goes down to you knees. We looked at many places and they just don’t make them in my size (big supprize). Do on Tuesday Dhananjay from the office took me to the main part of Pune to their clothing district. This is the oldest part of the city and the roads are narrow and very crowded. Plus with Diwali just around the corner there were extra street vendors selling just about everything. Here is a photo of the fun.
On Thursday they were planning on having “Traditional Day” at the office here. This is when everyone wears their traditional dress to the office for one day. So I wanted my kurta by then so I could wear it on Traditional Day. Luckily we were able to find a tailor who could make it in a single day. We picked out some cloth (pure silk actually) and he took my measurements. The tailors tape just made it around my chest and he acted like he had never seen a 20″ neck before! Anyway it cost me just $27 and I got my kurta on Thursday morning just in time for the activities at the office. The cloth shop was dimmly light and I thought I had chosen a brownish color but when it came it looked more like pure gold. Here I am with Dhananjay from my team (on the right).
The team here has a montly party to celebrate the birthdays and to give out awards and such. It was my birthday in October and so I was included. The tradition here is that frosting from the birthday cake gets smeared on the face of those with birthdays. So you can see I got a healthy dose of frosting smeared on me! It was a fun time.
Also becase Diwali is next week, they also had an activity for that. The women of the office created some beautiful displays that were then judged and a winner was awarded. This is a tradition that has much symbolysm and they decorate their displays with flowers, food, spices, powdered paint, and small lamps of burning oil. Here are a few photos of the displays just to give you a sample.
Here is another photo of the party. I loved to see all the traditional clothes everyone was wearing and it was a great party!
I made a trip into town today. We ate at Pizza Hut in the mall. Pepperoni pizza (pork of course) has never tasted so good! Here are a few photos from the trip.
Indians love their motorcycles (and scooters). It is the most economical way to get around. Most are 125cc engines and the bikes are pretty small (compared to US street bikes) so they can easily maneuver them in the busy streets and so they get good gas mileage.
I love seeing the cattle roaming the streets. It is so cool!
They are setting up lights everyware for Diwali – The Festival of Lights.
Everyone is out and about on a Sunday night. It is exciting for me to be with so many people!
They had a parade that included some type of shrine complete with a guru on a float. First a water truck came by sprinkling water on the road with people sweeping before and after the water to clean the street. Then they sprinkled the road with flower petals and said prayers to get ready for the shrine float. These guys came just before the shrine and are some type of famous warriors from the past.
This is the truck covered with flowers. All are fresh and put on strings.
This is the guru on the float with many loyal followers. There were ladys passing out blessed food. It was like puffed rice with a bit of sugar. Very tasty. It was fun to see the whole production.
This is my first in a series of blog posts on my trip to Pune, India. On Tuesday October 7th I decided that I needed to take a trip to visit my development team in India and as soon as possible. We discovered it was not more expensive to book a trip 3 days from now than 3 weeks away. So we booked the flight and 3 days later I was on a plane.
The entire trip (with a 4 hour layover in New York and travel time by car to Pune) was just over 30 hours. The trip went well and I even found my ride to Pune. That was the part I was most worried about. But my team in India had a nice apartment ready for me just accross the street from the office and that has been VERY convienient! The team here has taken very good care of me and has made it very easy. They have several “office boys” who basically wait on me hand and foot and get me anything I need (including making me breakfast and putting the jam on my toast!).
It was great meeting my team in person. It has been very productive so far. The team here even had a welcome get-together and gave me a nice arrangement of flowers.
I have had a great time so far. I am liking the food (mostly) and everyone is very friendly. Here are a few photos of my travels. They are kind of weak photos but I will get some better ones posted soon.
