United States vs. India

Nothing seems to be familiar to me in India... I decided to write about some of the things I am noticing here.

WATER?. As we drove over what looked like a river, our director announced, "There are no rivers in Bangalore!" One breathe later I realized that it was sewage. It's everywhere! and open for the eye to see, the nose to smell... and sometimes even for shoes to touch. Also, it is very rare to have a hot shower, due to the power shortages the water can't always be heated.

DIVERSITY. 99.9% Indians .1% Other. Bangalore is not diverse at all, apparently no one has immigrated here.

HOUSING ARRANGEMENTS. I was living in an apartment called National Games Village, which is about a 30 minute walk to campus. It looks like a very run down apartment building, but in India its pretty high end! Each apartment held 5 people. 3 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, kitchen, and living room area. It took 3 weeks, but we finally got the TV to turn on last night! My roommate was fantastic, but I just didn't really hang out with a lot of people there, so this morning I moved into Jonas Hall, which is an on campus all girls dorm. I have more friends here, so it will be better for me I hope.

WEATHER. It's currently monsoon season, so it does rain frequently. Not so much in Bangalore, but in other cities I have been to it rains at least once a day. If it does rain in Bangalore it passes pretty quickly. I don't go anywhere without my umbrella anymore.

COMMUNICATION. Everyone here speaks at least 3 languages. Hindi, English, and their Mother Tongue. There are tons of languages in India, approximately 1 per every 100km. So, according to where someone is from, that is their mother tongue they speak (in Bangalore it is called Kannada). Hindi is the national language so everyone can speak that. English is usually learned in school and so everyone can speak that as well, but the younger crowd seems to speak English a lot better.

SHOPPING. Every store here has a guard standing in the doorway. You can't go anywhere without having your bags checked (I don't even know what they are checking for). Once you get inside the store someone will usually breathe down your neck and follow you around trying to "help." I am just so used to having more personal space that it gets very frustrating sometimes. Also, people do not form lines to wait their turn when buying something. You have to aggressively fight people to the cashier to pay.

BLACKOUTS. There must be about 20 blackouts per day (no exaggeration). They usually only last about 30 seconds. They used to startle me, but now they don't phase me. Even in class, the teacher just continues talking through any power outages.

Sorry about the crazy fonts on this post. I can't figure out how to fix it.