So I'm finally in Bangalore! I'm in a netcafe right now, and it has to be the crappiest one I have been in yet. The machine I am sitting on is a Pentium, with 32 MB ram! Still, I can come online at least After a long flight here (24 hours total) I finally landed in Bangalore, and took a cab to find the company guesthouse, where I will be staying for the next couple of weeks. And hunting the guesthouse was a terrible experience, the Bangalore addressing scheme confuses the residents too My initial impression was pretty bad .. at 5 am the only people on the road were people who spoke only Kannada, no Hindi or English. I was starting to despair really .. and I was tired, cranky and thinking Oh my god, what have I done! But the guesthouse, when I finally found it, was pretty nice. After that initial impression though, things have improved. The guesthouse is in the suburbs, somewhat .. but here in the main city things are really nice! And regular English speaking people .. else the language thing was freaking me out a bit. I'll try to come online regularly and post here .. right now I'm off on an apartment hunt! See you chaps online sometime
when I saw this thread I thought it would be on food in Bangladore...oh well.... Hope your having a fabulous time!
Day 1 of apartment hunting: summary, a disaster! The agent seems to love showing me crappy apartments in crappy localities, all at the higher end of my budget Oh well, at least I am not getting too swindled by rickshaw drivers now Traffic is pretty horrible, and I'm sort of wondering about my initial decision to buy a car I'm having a lot of fun with the food though, its pretty different from what I am used to and its quite exciting, if you are the kind who likes to experiment. Of course, I'm gonna do a stupid thing now, and eat in a small hole in the wall type of place next to this netcafe .. I just passed it and the smell was delicious! Hopefully will have some more luck hunting for a place tomorrow. I just discovered that I do have a few friends here, so must find their contact numbers!
Good luck with the place hunting, Sampanna! It may be obvious from the post, but is Kannada the language being spoken in? I've got a friend -actually a family member- who has been adopted from Mangalore (sp?) near Bangalore to Germany, and she doesn't know much about the place really, so I was curious.
Yep, Kannada is the language here. Mangalore is supposed to be a really nice place .. I have a friend who is originally from that place. I'm planning to drive there once I get a car, it isn't too far .. maybe half a days drive. And in case you are wondering, I don't speak Kannada. I speak Hindi, Marathi, English but no Kannada. Except 'gotilla' which means 'don't know
Been there Don't worry, the first week they will show you all the crappy houses that no one else wants to buy, usually because they work on commision (they call it 'getting a clear idea of what your looking for') and recieve more money for them. You should move on to the cheaper, nicer ones afterwards. Good luck! Oh and at least 'I don't know' is useful...it answers almost everything!
First day in office! I'm pretty much at a loose end at the moment .. still waiting for my computer, my access card and stuff like that. Other than that, have been exploring Bangalore a bit .. its a pretty nice place. The traffic is horrible though, and my rickshaw driver for the past two days (I coincidentally got the same chap two days running) seems to have a personal vendetta with everyone on the road. I'm pretty much sending up a short thanks when I reach somewhere safely I haven't gone pub crawling yet .. mostly because I didn't want to do that alone! But a friend of mine just arrived in the city, so this weekend we plan to do just that Hopefully I will not wind up in the gutter as Rinso is so apt to do but I'll let you know if I do! I haven't taken any photos yet, which is really remiss of me, but I'll do that and put them up somewhere soon. Now to see what I have missed on the board this past week!
Any hints and tips you can pass on to a Brit heading out to Bangalore for a few days? Things not to miss, things to avoid etc. If you have a favourite restaurant, let me know. His Lordship is heading out there in a week or so and he likes to try the local fare. Oh and if you have the time (or the inclination), can you let me know where any "Western" chain restaurants might be? His colleague is a bloody peasant and refuses to try anything new; no matter where he goes! Thanks in advance and hope you have a grand time on your pub crawl.
I hope his Ludship has transportation arranged for him, because one thing you do not want to do is travel in a Bangalorean rickshaw. Apart from being a hair-raising experience, you will definitely get duped. I have sort of resigned myself to that, and am just planning to buy a car as soon as I can. About things not to miss, well, I really do not know yet. I haven't done any touristy things yet, have just been wandering around to get my bearings. Eating out shouldn't pose much of a problem, you'll find McDonalds, KFC, Pizza Hut, Dominos, Subway here. I don't really remember exact locations .. though I do know that the Forum mall in Koramangala has a McDs and a Subway .. It might be worth trying the local food though .. its pretty delicious. Some of it is new to me too, and I'm enjoying it!
Excuse me, ive only been on this board for 1.5 days, i don't know if i'm entitled to ask seniors questions, but where is Bangalore? I hope your transportation worries clear up soon though.
seniors cute...bangladore is in india sampanna: glad to hear things are going well...im surprised thud! cost so much considering books in india are generally cheap (not because they are fake) A bookstore clerk person said when I was in Mumbai, it's because there is very little taxation on books and the majority of the books are printed in the country... edited to add stuff edit cause I like adding more stuff I think Rickshaws are fun! probably not as a sole mode of transportation however...we use drivers
Well, I think the Indian prints cost less .. Thud! doesn't have an Indian edition yet. In fact, I don't think any Pratchett books do .. so the cost is usually a straight conversion from pounds to rupees .. and with the exchange rate being what it is, it burns a hole in the pocket!
I saw the childrens books there when i was over...they were chep so im sure they print them somewhere...but I can imagine just taking the serling would leave you with a rather light purse/wallet
Many thanks for that insight, Sampanna; I've passed it on to m'Lud. Apparently, the Motley Crew are staying near the Golf Course. If you've frequented a good restaurant in that area, perhaps you could let me know. Thanks. How's the house/apartment hunting going?
I passed the golf course when I was coming back from the airport, but I have no idea other than the fact that Microsoft and Intel have offices opening next to that. I remember feeling jealous ... my office itself is nice, but is not in a nice locality. The house hunting is done, I opted for an apartment in a seedy locality, whose only claim to fame is that it is a two minute walk from office. So why do I want to live close to office? Because Bangalore traffic is scary
