Separation Anxiety

We were so lucky to find a place to keep Mira and Chaya while we are visiting home for the holidays, our friends JP and Yasmine have graciously offered to board them along with their approximately 20 other kitties while we are gone. So yesterday morning we packed up the girls along with all of their stuff (who would have ever guessed that cats have "stuff") and headed to their temporary home away from home. Chaya HATES to travel, she meows and makes other noises that I am not even able to define all through the ride, whether we take an autorickshaw or a car, it just doesn't matter, she hates it all. So she was yowling the whole way there which makes a stressful situation for both them and me even worse. We got them to their temporary lodgings where they found that they would be sharing their room with a comparatively HUGE Persian cat for just the day. They did not regard this with much enthusiasm, in fact, they assumed the fetal position (or a close approximation of it) and tried to disappear in their baskets. Our poor babies. They stayed in their baskets for at least a few hours while I chatted with JP and Yasmine, and Chaya only ventured out after I came back to check on them. This bravery was short-live though; as soon as Chaya saw that the big Persian was following her around she jumped into Mira's basket where they again huddled together. I felt (and still feel) terrible, I hope that they have relaxed a bit by now and that they have a good time with JP and Yasmine. I know that they are in excellent hands (certainly better hands than mine and Eric's) but I still worry and miss them terribly. Last night when I got home from work I was so sad that they weren't there to run to the window to greet me with their meowing. It was nice to pack without them climbing into the suitcases and dragging our socks all over the house as they are normally famous for, but it was too quiet, too boring. I thought that maybe I would sleep more soundly without the noises that they make at night with their climbing, jumping, and general trouble-making, but my sleep was actually more disturbed by the lack of noise.


I miss my girls, but I am also excited to come home. I am sure that the girls will settle in and be fine, but I have to admit that part of me will look forward to coming back to Bangalore to collect them and bring them home where they and we belong, at least for now...

Ferocious Felines

One of the main arrangements that we have had to make in preparation for our visit home for the holidays is to plan for the care of Mira and Chaya. Bringing them with us is not an option so we have had to think of other ways that their needs can be met while we are out of town. This has been a bigger chore than we could have imagined. Back home in the States it would have been no problem to give the key to a neighbor and ask that they stop by every day to replenish their food and water and clean out their litter boxes. Any person there would be perfectly comfortable carrying out these simple tasks and unless they had severe allergies would be happy to do it. Not so here. The main issue is that most people are afraid of cats. That's right, afraid of little furry creatures that weigh no more than 10 pounds (Mira and Chaya weigh in at a whopping 4 lbs.). I absolutely can not understand this. I have already described at length the number of stray dogs in the streets which somehow do not frighten nearly as many people despite their obvious larger size and greater aggression. And I cannot contribute this irrational fear to lack of exposure as there is no shortage of stray cats in India. Finally, India is famed the world over as the home to one of the greatest felines ever, the regal Bengal tiger. I would think that as close relatives to this splendid animal, cats would be respected, not feared. Now that I think of it though, the only time I have seen or heard anything in reference to a tiger is watching a few sleazy 80s style heros fighting them in F movies (I could never offend B movie stars like Eric Roberts and Billy Baldwin by placing these Indian movies in their class).



We thought that the best situation for our kittens would be to have someone come to our apartment to give them food and water and clean their litter once a day, 10 minutes tops. None of our coworkers live close enough to us to manage this, and the one who does is both a bit scared of cats having never had exposure to them and is also going for a visit home during the time that we will be gone. We do not know any of our neighbors, they are all middle-aged or older Indians and they regard us with caution. We then thought that perhaps our landlords who live just below us might be willing but then realized that they (along with most other middle-class Indians) don't even do their own cleaning or dishes so why in the world would they consider cleaning our kittens' toilet when they won't even clean their own. We then thought that maybe the person who actually does clean their toilet might be interested in making some extra cash so we asked our landlords if they would run the idea by their maid.



A bit now about Indian maids (the following are observations based only on my time and experience so far in India). It would probably not come as a shock to you to find out that maids are very poorly paid, I would say that they earn anywhere from $0.50 to $1 an hour. These women are unskilled workers and are infamous for being lazy, thieves, unreliable and stupid (at least according to 95% of their employers). They are often married with a couple to several children. It is also not uncommon that they are the sole or major breadwinner due to a husband's injury, alcoholism, or good old-fashioned laziness. Money is usually so tight in a maid's home that she will take extra food from the homes that she is working in to feed her family and often the employers will pay for certain things for the maid's family such as school books and clothes for her children. We thought that based on the real need for extra money in most maid's homes, our landlord's maid would jump at the chance to make some extra cash. She comes every day to clean their apartment so we assumed that it would be no trouble for her to pop up to our apartment and spend 10 minutes at the most giving the kittens fresh water, pouring out some dry cat food, and scooping out their litter with the pooper-scooper. We were offering to pay 1000 Rs for this service which comes to $6.58 an hour (if it actually took her the full 10 minutes). A no-brainer, right? I know that if I were cash strapped and trying to take care of my kids I would do almost anything to try to make ends meet. I was shocked when our landlords told us that she didn't want to do it because she is scared of cats! Maybe money isn't as tight for her family as I thought, or maybe she would just rather take a hand-out than actually work for her money. I can guarantee that if my family was in need, I would do ANYTHING to put food on the table, even if it involved something that I found distasteful like maybe spending 10 minutes in a room with a bunch of cockroaches (my least favorite animal). Oops, I forgot, I do that already in my own home for free! Anyway, I am on one hand relieved that she was truthful about her feelings and said no because I doubt that she would have done a very good job with the kittens if she doesn't even like them. On the other hand though I am surprised and frustrated that someone who definitely needs extra cash isn't willing to work for it. How can anyone help the less fortunate if they are not really willing to help themselves? Regardless, we need to find some other way to have our ferocious and terrifying Mira and Chaya cared for in our absence, unless we just pack them in our luggage, I wonder if we'd make it through security. I have included some pictures showing the girls at their most ferocious. Aluminum balls, silk flowers, and bills BEWARE!



Chaya loves to play "fetch" with little aluminum balls, and she stares at it intently until I finally toss it for her to retrieve.


She is ready for the next toss!




Mira is a very smart kitten, she tears up all of the bills that come in the mail!



When there aren't any bills to destroy, a flower will do.

More Birthdays and Anniversaries, plus some Animal Advocacy!

It is so hard to believe that December is already here. The weather here is the same as always, sunny and warm, making it no easier to accept that Christmas is nearly upon us and that 2007 is drawing to a close. With the start of December comes several important occasions, our anniversary is on the first (celebrating 12 years since our first date and 4 years of marriage) as is Eric's Gran's birthday (Happy Birthday Gran!). The second marks the birthday of my dear sister Dawn (Happy Birthday to you too, Dawn). I unfortunately had to work on my anniversary, but I did leave early so that Eric and I could go out and have lunch together. We spent the rest of the day relaxing and putting off the housework...



On the following day we went to meet a lady that I had met through a blog on-line. I had found a blog early last week that discusses cats in Bangalore and I posted a comment in the hopes of finding some like-minded individuals. Cats are DEFINITELY not popular pets in India so it is difficult to find products for cats and also advice and care for cats is hard to come by so I had hoped that I could make some contacts to maybe help us out if and when we needed. A lovely lady named Yasmine e-mailed right away and invited us to her home to meet her, her husband JP and her 20 cats and one dog. So we made our way there Sunday not quite knowing what to expect. We were greeted by two of the sweetest and most intelligent people that we have ever met. Oh yeah, and we also got to meet their 20 cats (only 19 though as 1 has gone missing) as well as the 2 cats that they are boarding for friends while they are out of town, and a mother cat and her 5 newborn kittens which Yasmine rescued from the school that she works at and the one poor cat-abused dog. It was a wonderful visit, Yasmine and JP are very caring people who want to try to improve the conditions for animals in India and have been working very hard at it since they were teenagers in Bangalore.



I have already described the conditions of the shelter from which we adopted Mira and Chaya, Yasmine has reported this shelter many times to the government and has actually managed to get herself banned from the facility because they apparently find it easier to ban her than to improve the conditions for the animals. The life of most animals in India (at least in Bangalore) is difficult at best. There is huge population of stray dogs and cats which leads to a great deal of starvation of the animals. Every day I will find at least one dog that has been injured by a car, broken and missing legs are very common and these dogs almost never get treatment. Animal dumping is a huge problem, people will adopt a puppy and find that it is too much trouble or has outgrown the apartment and they will just throw it out. Often if a pet becomes ill or old or disabled, it is also dumped. New litters of puppies and kittens will be thrown out because the owner never bothered to have their pet sterilized but doesn't want the babies. Additionally many people see their pets at stats symbols are want only pure-breed and are not interested in adopting a stray at the shelter. There was an effort to sterilize the street dogs, but in the last few months that practice has been minimized in favor of simply picking up the dogs and killing them. This was in response to a couple of incidents that happened in Bangalore last winter where two children were killed by packs of stray dogs. It is of course, terrible that 2 children were killed but based on the conditions in which these animals live and the abuse that they suffer at the hands of humans every day I would think that these tragedies are inevitable events that are brought on the population by the same population. When you hit and kick a dog, can you blame it when it bites you? Of course not.



Before coming to India I would never have claimed to be an animal lover or an animal advocate. I believe in the humane treatment of animals, but I am not a vegetarian and I do believe that there is a need for animal testing. But my heart goes out to the cats, dogs, horses, and even cows of Bangalore that are living in such an incredibly hostile environment all alone. I feel that we have a responsibility to all animals to look after their welfare, were are after all the only species that can so profoundly affect the lives of all other species. I have been horrified by the conditions that these animals are experiencing and I found that I was complaining about it often. But complaining doesn't help so I have decided to volunteer at another neighborhood animal shelter and start making cash and food donations to pay for food (proper food is quite expensive here as it is all imported as far as I know). I don't have much time to offer, but something is better than nothing. Eric and I also want to assume responsibility for the stray dogs that live on our street, we would like to make sure that they are well-fed, sterilized and vaccinated. If only 1 person on every street would do just these simple things, the problem would be nearly solved! With the help of Yasmine and JP, we hope that we can make a small difference in the lives of some of the animals of Bangalore. Wish us luck!




“The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated.” Mahatma Gandhi

Thanksgiving, a Second Time Around

Happy Thanksgiving! I hope that you all had a happy holiday. It is sort of amazing to me how quickly we can learn to adapt and adjust to pretty much anything that life throws at us. After one year of living in India we have indeed learned to manage in this place, despite its vast differences from home. However, though we might have adjusted we certainly have not forgotten the traditions of home and we certainly miss them. So this Thanksgiving we were not content to celebrate with rotis, rice and subzis, but instead longed for the typical Thanksgiving Day feast with turkey, stuffing, cranberry sauce, and all the rest. I was very lucky to have met an American last year who had been in India for a bit longer than us, and she mentioned a restaurant in Bangalore that hosts a Thanksgiving dinner. It is named The Only Place, and aptly so as I think that it is the only place that serves Thanksgiving dinner. I had filed this bit of valuable information away in my brain and a week before the big day I called to make a reservation, I was not leaving this up to chance, we HAD to get a table. Luckily the restaurant took my reservation and all I had to do was wait for my feast.



We went for dinner at 6 PM on Thanksgiving and were happy to see a buffet waiting for us to attack it! We had turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes and gravy, sweet potatoes, potato salad, pasta salad, steamed vegetables, cranberry sauce, garlic bread, and pumpkin pie for dessert. I wish that I could say that the food was wonderful, but the quality and taste was only okay. However, it was still wonderful to have turkey on Thanksgiving, and I was thankful for that. In celebrating Thanksgiving properly this year it made it easier to remember why it is we celebrate it at all, and I was able to take the time to give thanks for all of the wonderful people and things in my life. Eric and I are both so lucky to have friends and family who have supported us through everything, even when we said we were moving to India. We have asked so many favors of so many people and everyone has been wiling to oblige us so graciously. Upon arrival to India we made a new set of friends who have also been so kind and helpful and continue to aid us in navigating our way from day to day. So this Thanksgiving we thank all of you, all of our friends and family for all that you hove done for us thus far.




P.S. Happy Birthday Amanda! I remember November 22 so many years ago when Grandma woke us up and told us that we had another little Kim. I am pretty sure that my response was, "So what?" Now I see what the big deal was. I love you and miss you!

Home for the Holidays!

After missing out on not one, but two huge Ziegenhorn holiday dinners last year, we have learned our lesson. We are coming home for Christmas and New Year's and we are so excited! We are only disappointed that we have to miss Thanksgiving again, but we think that we might at least be able to get a proper Thanksgiving meal, more on that later if and when it happens. We arrive in Chicago on December 19 early in the morning (pray for good weather for us so we make it in one piece and on time) and leave in the evening on January 8 (so we can also celebrate my oldest sister's birthday with her on the 4th). It is hard to explain how much it will mean to us to spend the holiday season at home with our friends and family, it is something that I didn't think that I would miss so much until I was half a world away. We can't wait to see you all!

Got a light? On second thought…

I guess that I should not have been surprised when we moved to Bangalore to find not only plenty of smokers, but plenty of smokers lighting up American branded cigarettes like Marlboro, Camel and Winston. I guess the one thing that can be said for Big Tobacco is that they know how to market their product and find new consumer pools. As the number of American smokers has declined slowly but steadily over the last few decades Big Tobacco has shifted their focus to expanding overseas markets. And there is probably no better market for cigarettes than the Third World. When one considers the example of India, there is a huge population that can be exploited, and many in that population are absolutely ignorant as to the health risks of smoking. And just as in the United States, in India the majority of smokers are among those who can least afford it, both economically and physically. Unfortunately, the purchase of tobacco often depletes the family’s already meager finances, contributing to the major problem of malnutrition in the Third World. And buying cigarettes is SO easy in India. Don’t have enough cash to buy a whole pack? No problem, you can just buy single cigarettes from any shopkeeper.


But some Third World countries are fighting back. Thailand has been fighting with Big Tobacco since the early 1990s to stem the flow of imported cigarettes. Until 1990, Thai law prohibited the import of cigarettes claiming that chemicals and other additives contained in US cigarettes might make them more harmful than Thai cigarettes. The US brought a case against Thailand under GATT (General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade) to the World Trade Organization (WTO) arguing that this infringed on free trade. The US won their suit and Big Tobacco was free import as many cigarettes as they could shove down Thailand’s throat. Since Thailand has been forced to accept imported cigarettes, the government has employed a different tactic in preventing smoking. In 2005 the Thai government began to require that each package of cigarettes include a health warning that covers at least 50% of both sides of the package. And this is no weak Surgeon’s General Warning saying that smoking is harmful to the health, it includes not only a verbal warning, but a pictorial one as well. And as the saying goes, a picture is worth a thousand words. As Eric and I were looking around the duty free shops at the Bangkok airport before returning to Bangalore, these cigarette cartons caught our eye. It would have been impossible for them not to, the images are very graphic and I would think quite effective in preventing the purchase of the carton. We snapped a few pics to show you, and after reading up a bit about the different warning policies around the world, I learned that though America started the trend of labeling cigarette packages with health warnings, today our country has one of the smallest, least prominent warnings placed on its cigarette packages. Sadly, another example demonstrating that in our culture, corporate interests take precedence, even over public health.

Gone crackers

Festival season is upon us. We missed out on Navaratri (Nine Nights) and Dussehra (Tenth Day) while we were in Thailand. These festivals are quite complicated to explain as they celebrate different things in different states, but the one common thread is the victory of good over evil. In Southern India, Eastern India and Western India, the festival of Navaratri which culminates with Vijayadashami commemorates the legend in which the Goddess Durga vanquishes the demon Mahishasura, an event that is said to have taken place in the vicinity of the present day city of Mysore in Karnataka which is only about an hour and a half away from Bangalore. This festival is known as Durga Puja and is huge in Bengal, the eastern state which has as its capital Calcutta. In Northern India, the same 10-day festival commemorates the victory of Ram, a prince, over Ravana, the ruler of Lanka, who according to the Ramayana (an ancient epic that forms the basis for many Hindu beliefs) had abducted his wife Sita Devi, and held her captive.



In Northern India, this festival is highly celebrated. The Ramlila, an abridged dramatization of the Ramayana, is enacted with much public fervor all over northern India during the festival. The burning effigies of Ravana, signifying the victory of good over evil, brings the festivities to a colorful and loud close as the effigies are lined with firecrackers. In Bengal in Eastern India, Durga Puga is a huge festival (the biggest of the year in this part of the country) celebrated by the building of pandals (huge stationary float-like objects) to honor the goddess. Everything is lit with lights, and from what I gather, the place goes crazy. In the south, people set up altars for the goddess Durga where they offer up small objects from which the goddess is to derive enough power to defeat the demon. In addition, on the 9th day, the South and North Indians also offer up their tools to Saraswati and do not work on that day to allow the goddess use of the tools of their trade. On the tenth day (Dussehra) prayers are made to their tools (be it books for students, cars for taxi drivers, etc.) and according to my friend Neha, everyone straps banana leaves (or banana branches) on everything (on cars, motorcycles, autos, buses), at least in Karnataka.



Now, on to Diwali (Deepavali), the festival of lights that celebrates the victory of light over dark which was celebrated this weekend. Diwali is the homecoming of King Ram and his rescued wife Sita after ultimately defeating Ravana following a war and a long exile. The prince’s path home was supposedly lit by oil lamps that his subjects left out to light their way. One of the major traditions of this holiday includes Lakshmi Puja. Lakshmi Puja, marks the most important day of Diwali celebrations, when Lakshmi, the goddess of wealth and Ganesha, the God of auspicious beginnings are worshipped across Hindu homes, followed by lighting of lamps all across the streets and homes, to welcome prosperity and well-being in. Many people actually leave their doors wide open to allow the free entry of these things (and a good number of mosquitoes, I imagine). As far as I can tell, the major tradition of Diwali is bursting fireworks. Imagine the 4th of July simultaneously on crack and steroids, for 4 days straight! The firecrackers started on Thursday morning around 7 AM and when we got home from work in the evening it was also pretty loud and a little nerve-wracking to be honest (our kittens were in a constant state of terror). This continued all weekend, and even on Monday morning we heard crackers bursting. It was loud enough that we closed all of our windows to try to block some of the sound, but even then there were times that we had to shout to hear one another even when we were standing right next to each other. On Friday night I went to a Diwali party hosted by the NCBS, and I got to watch the Lakshmi Puja and then we played some games and ate (the universal method of celebration). We also went to the roof and watched fireworks bursting all around us. From up there it was actually quite nice, so many beautiful explosions and we were a bit removed from the noise which made it all the more enjoyable. There is obviously no regulations on fireworks here, so every kind imaginable were being lit by people of all ages, from small children to the elderly. And I honestly think that ALL the people here lit at least one cracker, it was pretty crazy. Anyway, we made it through our first Diwali, and I think we suffered no more than minor hearing damage. Hopefully the next festival will be a bit more quiet…

Birthday and Anniversary Celebration

The beginning of this month marked two very important dates, our one-year anniversary celebrating our arrival in India (November 2) and my birthday (November 3). And how did we recognize these landmark dates you might wonder, with a feast, with a party, certainly something spectacular? Unfortunately both dates slipped by without much notice because we had our minds on other things. On our one-year anniversary of living in India, we took Mira and Chaya to the veterinary to be spayed. It was quite a different experience than I imagine one would have in the US, so I thought I would write a bit about it.



First of all, I had to make the appointment almost 2 months in advance as the hospital that we went to told us that they only perform 2 surgeries a day (this is a government animal hospital with an affiliated veterinary college where they train students). The night before the surgery I went to the vet pharmacy armed with a list of items for the surgery given to me by the vet. The owner is responsible for bringing all consumables to the surgery so I bought the anesthetics, bandages, sutures, needles, syringes, surgical gloves, antiseptics, etc. The following morning we took the girls in and the vet asked me to sign a form giving permission for the surgery stating that I had been informed of the risks and understood the procedure. I had done enough research on my own such that I did understand, but not a single person at the clinic had told me a thing about the procedure. I told them I would not sign until someone took the time to discuss these things with me, no way was I signing an informed consent form until I was informed. Wow, this was a new concept to them, that they actually explain their actions and answer questions. I have found that professionals here expect to be trusted and believed unconditionally and are not generally receptive to questions. I am, I’m afraid, the worst nightmare of these people as I have an aversion to trusting without question and following direction without explanation as to why it is I am doing what I am doing. Anyway, after being properly informed, we handed our girls over, one at a time, to be shaved and undergo their surgery. Chaya went first and we got her back immediately after the surgery just as she was coming out of her anesthesia. It was actually pretty scary because she looked like she had just snorted a couple of lines of coke. Her eyes were bugged out and she was thrashing around in her basket which was terrifying since she had just come from surgery and I was afraid that she would tear her stitches. We had to wait until Mira was returned to us before we could go, and when we got her, she was as different from Chaya as could be. While Chaya responded as though she were high, Mira seemed as if she were dead. She would position her head in such a way that she looked like she had been hit by a car. This was equally terrifying. They were both wrapped in a bandage that covered the whole of their torso, leaving only their four legs, head, and tail exposed.



We got them home and Chaya sprung right from her basket and immediately fell down. Neither of them had any sense of balance and would just continually fall over while walking. They then both starting vomiting, either from the anesthesia or vertigo, I don’t know. After staggering around for a couple of stressful hours, both finally settled down to sleep. The next few days involved much sleeping and Eric and I playing nursemaid, bringing the kittens their food and water (they started to eat a full day after the surgery), taking them to the litter, and administering their medicine (we had to give an oral antibiotic 2 times a day and it took us a while to figure out the best way to do this without anyone getting hurt, namely, poor Eric). We were also instructed to bring the kittens back to the vet every 2 days, which we have been doing faithfully since last Friday so that their progress can be monitored. Their stitches were taken out yesterday but they are still in their full-body bandage, at least until tomorrow when we take them to the vet again and hopefully they will let us take it off of them. They are getting back to their old selves, they are now able to jump again (initially they were not able to even jump onto the sofa or bed to take a nap) and are playing a bit here and there. I have posted some pics of our sick little girls, and hopefully they make a full recovery soon!

Terrific Thailand

Hello everyone! Greetings from Bangalore, you will be happy to know that we got our visas issued in Bangkok and made it back to India safe and sound last week. We arrived in beautiful Thailand on the morning of October 18 and after dropping our bags at our hotel went straight out to find the Indian Embassy. We were in quite a hurry as applications for visas are only accepted from 9 AM-12 PM and we wanted to get our applications submitted before we flew off to Phuket the following afternoon. We arrived at around 10:45 and waited in line until we were able to speak with someone who told us that the gentleman who gives the interviews was out of the office, but would be back in 5 minutes and we would be called when he was ready for us. I found this pretty funny since this guy basically works only around 4 hours a day and he can’t even manage to be his office during that time. And, not surprisingly, 5 minutes turned into around an hour and a half before this guy came back (hey, you can take the government official out of India, but you can’t take the India out of the government official). Luckily though, even though it was after 12, we still got our interview. Eric and I went back and met this fellow and gave him the letter from the NCBS explaining why we were there and why we needed a visa. He glanced at it and immediately said, “No, we can’t issue a visa based on this.” I immediately just started shaking with nerves and asked that he please just READ the letter. After he read the letter he asked why we hadn’t applied in India and I told him that I had but hadn’t received the renewal yet and that Eric was told that he couldn’t even apply until my visa arrived meaning that at minimum his visa would expire and leave him (and maybe me) essentially stranded in India. He then agreed to forward our request to the Indian Consulate in Chicago since they were the original issuing entity and leave it up to them. Whew, at that point we were pretty sure that it would be okay, but until the visa is in your hands, it is difficult to relax. It takes 5 business days to process visas, so we set off to try to relax anyway.





The next afternoon we took a short, one-hour flight to Phuket, the Pearl of the Andaman. We arrived at our hotel in the evening and were blown away by the resort, it was grand on a scale that I have never experienced before. We made our way to our villa, which was also spectacular and mostly spent the week relaxing by the pool gazing out on the beautiful Andaman Sea. We met a wonderful Irish couple who we hit it off with really well, and by the end of the week they had invited us to come visit them in Ireland and we asked them to visit us either in Bangalore or Chicago. We hope to take them up on the offer! We hired a driver for one day and he took us all over the island showing us the sights: beautiful beaches, amazing temples, a gigantic Buddha, stopping along the way to pick up snacks from the local street vendors. We also stopped and took an elephant trek, where we rode an elephant up the mountain and back down again. It was an amazing experience, but I was pretty terrified most of the time. The path was quite narrow and very steep and muddy and I was so afraid that our elephant, Lemon, would get a huge foot stuck in the mud and tumble over with us strapped on top of her!
I also made friends with Charlie, one of the gibbons (a small ape), while we were at the camp and took some time to groom him, he was so friendly! The food was amazing the entirety of the trip, we both just loved the Thai dishes and ate plenty! Unfortunately, all good things must come to an end and the week was over before we knew it, and we made our way back to Bangkok on Friday.




We spent the weekend in Bangkok visiting the sights; the Grand Palace, the Golden Buddha (I've included a pic), the Marble Temple, and the Reclining Buddha at Wat Po (another pic). We also learned that Bangkok is a FANTASIC place for shopping. I bought silk pillow covers that would easily cost $20-50 for $3, silk prints, figurines, all sort of stuff for our home once we return to the States. Bangkok is also a wonderful place to have high quality tailored clothes made for cheap, so Eric had 4 shirts and 3 slacks custom made for a real bargain (and who says men can’t shop). I also bought 2 beautiful pashminas for $3, I think the one I bought in the U.S. a couple of years back was around $50. If you ever get a jones for shopping, I think that Bangkok is probably the best place in the world to go; you get the best of the West and the East, Western quality in a modern and clean city with Eastern prices. A couple of notes on the country: first, the prostitution is insane. You couldn’t walk for very long before seeing some middle aged or older Westerner with a beautiful Thai girl on his arm. You, of course, aren’t certain that she has been hired by him, but I am pretty sure that most of the time that he has paid for her company. It wasn’t terribly in your face, but I did sometimes get a bit disgusted when seeing these mismatched couples walking together. Another thing that is even more obvious than the sex trade is the outright worship and reverence of the King. His picture is up everywhere, and people wear yellow polo shirts with the king’s emblem emblazoned on them almost as if it were a uniform. Some days around 50% of the Thais that you met on the street would be wearing this shirt, and it was a bit surreal. One thing is certain in Thailand, don’t mess with the king.



On Monday we made our way back to the embassy to see if we would be getting our visas and we dropped our passports off with no problem (they keep your passport for a couple of hours to actually put the visa into it) and picked them up later in the day with our beautiful new visas!!! We are legal in India for another year! I was so happy and kept opening my passport to look at the new visa to make sure that it was really there. It was such a battle to get it, that finally having it was such a sweet reward. We spent the next day at a tech mall to take advantage of Thailand’s cheap prices one last time before finally coming back to Bangalore, and maybe for the first time, I was happy to be coming back. Not that I didn’t like Thailand; I loved it, but our kittens and friends were waiting for us to come home, and maybe Bangalore is becoming just that, home (even if just for a while).




In the interest of full disclosure, one week after we left for Thailand I received notice that my visa renewal filed with the FRO in Bangalore had been approved (notice was given 5 days before my visa was set to expire) so it was too little too late.

Visa, Revisited

I wanted to update you all on our visa nightmare. As you might remember from an earlier post that I wrote in August, Eric and I are in the midst of trying to deal with our visas for the coming year. I applied for my extension in August with the promise that it would be ready in a month and a half, at which point we could then apply for Eric’s extension which would take an additional month and a half, leaving us a month and a half before we were scheduled to leave India for our visit to the US for the holidays in December. The only wrinkle in this is that of course, you can’t take an Indian civil servant at his word. Knowing this, we made a contingency plan. We booked a flight to Bangkok, Thailand and a hotel room near the Indian Embassy so that we could simply apply for new visas for both of us in case my visa didn’t come on time. Good thing we did, it has been over two and a half months, and surprise, surprise, no visa.



One of the most irritating aspects of this debacle has been actually trying to convince the head NCBS administrator that this is indeed a debacle. He has, since August, stubbornly refused to believe that the visa will not arrive in time despite all evidence suggesting that it will probably never come at all. As soon as we booked our flights and hotels in Thailand, he suggested that perhaps it wouldn’t be necessary that we go, that my visa should arrive before that time. I replied that no one would be happier than me if my visa did arrive before we left as I had gone through a considerable amount of trouble to apply for it, and also since I had already paid for it. I continued that regardless of this, Eric’s visa also needs to be renewed and that certainly wouldn’t happen before our December cut-off. The administrator assured me that we needn’t leave to renew Eric’s visa, as long as my visa was renewed, his renewal is automatic. First of all, in India, nothing is automatic. Second of all, that is complete rubbish, actually it is insane to suggest that you could just hold up your spouse’s visa and claim that you are somehow covered by it. Even as late as last week when I was gathering the paperwork for our visa renewal in Bangkok, this same fellow suggested once again that maybe we wouldn’t need to go, that my visa could arrive any day now. I can only assume that this guy is a mindless ignoramus. First of all, my visa IS NOT here, we have absolutely no assurances that it will be here, secondly, what about Eric’s, and thirdly, even if there was some sort of divine intervention and we opened our passports to find that we had new visas for both of us, we have already booked our flights (one to Bangkok and another to Phuket), and we have booked our hotels in both locations as well and there is no refunds when you cancel. This guy is either ignorant or unimpressed with all of these things, and it makes me crazy. He also was responsible for writing a letter to the Indian embassy in Bangkok on my behalf for our visa extension basically stating that I have a job at the NCBS, blah, blah. In it, he outright lied about why it was necessary that we go to Bangkok for our visas. He refuses to acknowledge that there is a problem with the Indian government’s ability to take care of business. I rewrote the letter, there is no way that we are going to shoulder any part of the blame for this thing, and we have followed the rules to the letter. When December rolls around and my visa still hasn’t arrived from Delhi, I am looking forward to going into this guy’s office and informing him that I was absolutely correct to be concerned about the arrival of my visa, and that he should never again regard someone’s affairs with so little care.



Though this guy has been a royal pain, I have been encouraged by the support of a few key individuals. My lab-mates have always offered a sympathetic ear when I needed to vent and comforted me when I returned from my disastrous visits to the Foreign Registry Office. My boss has completely thrown her support behind me and has acknowledged the necessity of our trip to Bangkok and has helped me whenever I have asked. Most surprisingly, the head of the institute approached me a few weeks ago and mentioned that he had heard of my troubles (I tend to make a lot of noise) and that he would have the institute pay for airfare since we had no choice but to attend to this issue out of country. I have not seen a rupee yet, but I was heartened to learn that the people that mattered knew the situation and wanted to help in any way that they could.



Anyway, I have again assembled all of the paperwork required for our visa application, tonight I will pack our bathing suits and sunscreen, and we depart for Bangkok tomorrow morning at 3:30. We are crossing our fingers that everything will go well for us at the embassy, if not, we will have no choice but to get on a flight coming back to the US because our visas will be expired. Wish us luck! Thailand, here we come!

Gandhi Jayanti

Today India celebrates the birth of one of the most famous and influential individuals of modern times, Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, or more famously known as Mahatma Gandhi. He was born on October 2, 1869 and spent most of his 78 years working towards Indian independence and subsequent reconciliation following Partition. He pioneered civil disobedience and rejected violence and has served as a model for civil rights movements around the world. He is truly the most amazing individual that I have ever learned of and he should serve as a model to the whole world that much can be accomplished by wit and diplomacy without having to resort to violence. This June, the United Nations General Assembly unanimously adopted a resolution declaring October 2 to be the "International Day of Non-Violence". If only a resolution could achieve peace, Gandhi would be proud.

Star Struck (Literally)

I sometimes wonder what has happened to our culture and why we care at all about the famous. With all that is happening throughout the world, how is it possible that a terrible performance by a chubby and talentless Britney Spears at the MTV Video Awards not only makes the news, but leads it? Who cares about coked out Lindsey Lohan, perpetually intoxicated Paris Hilton, and Anna Nicole baby-daddy? Give me a break, these stories aren't news, but somehow they manage to creep into the press and seem to have taken over the cable news networks.



So, what is our fascination with celebrities, particularly fallen icons who somehow always manage to find themselves back in the limelight, though the source of that light is often from a policeman's Maglite. My theory is that we are drawn to the fallen (or falling) star because their stories reassure us that celebrity isn't all it's cracked up to be. Who could be envious of a celebrity like David Hasselhoff after seeing him struggle to eat a burger, okay, forget about the burger, after seeing him struggle to sit up and form complete sentences while his teenage daughter taped his bender? I would say that we seek out these stories because they serve to humanize the celebrity, but I feel that instead, we love to see the suffering and unendless stupidity of those of our species that have everything and manage through their ridiculous carelessness, to lose it all.



I am, however, relieved to say that no matter how celebrity-obsessed our culture is, it could be worse. Take for instance the case of India. Reality television was stolen by the United States from Europe, and even though most of us would probably like to give it back since it has evolved (more like devolved) to include shows like I Love New York (a spin off of the critically acclaimed Flavor of Love), Who Wants to Marry a Multi-Millionaire?, and Temptation Island, India decided to try their hand at it. And so Indian Idol was born. The show is virtually identical to its American step-sister except for its potential to lead to mayhem and bloodshed. Prashant Tamang, an ethnic Nepali youth from the eastern state of West Bengal, beat Amit Paul from a different sate, Meghalaya, after a closely contested final round last Sunday which in turn inflamed regional rivalries. Tamang, as an ethnic Nepali, does not look like the average Indian, and in fact looks like an East Asian. Apparently this difference in ethnicity lead to some initial animosity which was quelled when the contestants appealed for peace. However, a radio talk show host threw out a couple of ethnic slurs when referring to Tamang, sparking violence in East Bengal where THOUSANDS of protestors took to the streets. The protest turned violent (as often happens in India) and around 60 people have been injured and countless cars burned and stores looted. A curfew has been imposed and the army has been called in to maintain order.



Who would have guessed that reality TV could be so devastating? After learning of this story I was pretty grateful that there was no violence between Texas and Pennsylvania when Kelly Clarkson beat the pants off of Justin Guarini. I really think that we dodged a bullet; we all know how much Texans love to fight. Just imagine the result of infighting between Ruben Studdard's Alabama and Clay Aiken's North Carolina. Oh, the horror! Actually, imagining a fight between Ruben and Clay is pretty entertaining and would probably make for some pretty good reality TV itself. Certainly no one would stoop so low as to air washed out celebrities fighting. What, FOX, the last bastion of taste and class, has aired Celebrity Boxing, are you kidding? There goes the moral high ground.

Oh, to Have a Cat's Life...

I thought I would post some pictures of Mira and Chaya's long and difficult days as kittens. Poor things, how do they manage?



You think you're safe under that pillow, think again!



What, am I doing something wrong?



My god, this thing put up a GREAT fight!



That's right, this is MY sofa and you can sit on it when I am finished with my nap!



Kitten yin and yang.



Bringing new meaning to "lean on me".

Full Metal Racket

I have finally decided to delve into the medical and dental tourism trade that is booming here in India (though I am not technically a tourist). After several years of looking into orthodontics in the United States and being discouraged to learn of the high costs and almost non-existent coverage from our insurance company, I resigned myself to the idea of life with a crooked smile. I was interested in getting standard braces to straighten my twisted chicklets and found that it would cost me around $6000, with our insurance covering just $1000. If you could put a price tag on my vanity, you would find that $5000 is much more than I am willing to spend. But now that we are in India, procedures that were once out of the realm of possibilities are now not only possible, but also quite affordable, so I went out searching for an orthodontist. I had a couple of consultations and finally settled on an orthodontist who trained and practiced in England until a couple of months ago (I just now realized that maybe the training in England is not so impressive judging from English grills). Anyway, she is very nice and seems to really know her stuff, and she is based in the excellent hospital that Eric went to for his finger infection. Total cost of braces, X-rays, impressions, fixed retainer after the treatment, all appointments and any other hardware: $470. No joke (and by the way, I know that $470 is a lot of money for most Indians, blah, blah, blah. I don't want to get into that discussion again; I am speaking as a Westerner).



So Saturday afternoon I went and had the brackets glued on; having your mouth wide open and lips pulled back in a quite attractive snarl for 45 minutes after having your teeth acid-washed is truly under-rated. After ripping up the inside of my cheeks the entire weekend, I went yesterday for the main event; the arch wires. Ahhhh, I am really feeling it now. I don't even notice that my cheeks are like hamburger since I have the disturbing feeling that my teeth are going to fall right out of my head. I feel like Tommy Lee at the MTV Video Music Awards (that is, if Kid Rock didn't hit like a girl). Right now I am taking Tylenol to relieve the pain but Eric keeps pressuring me to get my hands on some Vicodin, I guess he wants me to end up like Rush Limbaugh. Hey, maybe he is right, who wouldn't want to end up like Limbaugh, a hateful hypocritical bigot with an approximate listening audience of 13.5 million weekly. I guess that his listeners must be able to forgive or forget the three divorces and drug addiction problems. Family values just aren't what they used to be, I guess; but I digress. Another popular suggestion for pain relief due to braces that I found on the web is smoking marijuana. Apparently one feels much better after smoking a blunt; the only trouble that I see with this suggestion is what do you do about the subsequent munchies??? Maybe these guys are right, I could end up like Bill Clinton (and, in fairness, probably almost every person in America). Right now I think that I will stick to my Tylenol. Anyway, I thought that I would include a pic of my new metallic look and also a poem that my friend Neha sent me about dentist woes, it is pretty accurate. Enjoy!





Ogden Nash

This Is Going To Hurt Just A Little Bit




One thing I like less than most things is sitting in a dentist chair with my mouth wide open.



And that I will never have to do it again is a hope that I am against hope hopen.



Because some tortures are physical and some are mental,

But the one that is both is dental.

It is hard to be self-possessed

With your jaw digging into your chest.



So hard to retain your calm

When your fingernails are making serious alterations in your life line or love line or some other important line in your palm;



So hard to give your usual effect of cheery benignity

When you know your position is one of the two or three in life most lacking in dignity.



And your mouth is like a section of road that is being worked on.

And it is all cluttered up with stone crushers and concrete mixers and drills and steam rollers and there isn’t a nerve in your head that you aren’t being irked on.



Oh, some people are unfortunate enough to be strung up by thumbs.

And others have things done to their gums,

And your teeth are supposed to be being polished,

But you have reason to believe they are being demolished.



And the circumstance that adds most to your terror

Is that it’s all done with a mirror,

Because the dentist may be a bear, or as the Romans used to say, only they were referring to a feminine bear when they said it, an ursa,

But all the same how can you be sure when he takes his crowbar in one hand and mirror in the other he won’t get mixed up,
the way you do when you try to tie a bow tie with the aid of a mirror, and forget that left is right and vice versa?



And then at last he says That will be all; but it isn’t because he then coats your mouth from cellar to roof

With something that I suspect is generally used to put a shine on a horse’s hoof.



And you totter to your feet and think. Well it’s all over now and after all it was only this once.

And he says come back in three monce.



And this, O Fate, is I think the most vicious circle that thou ever sentest,

That Man has to go continually to the dentist to keep his teeth in good condition

when the chief reason he wants his teeth in good condition

is so that he won’t have to go to the dentist.

Our Star

Well, our kitten is famous. Not only is she famous, but she has made into the latest issue of one of the most prestigious science journals in the world, Nature (which, by the way, my work has not made it even close to making it into this journal and my kitten makes it in after only about 2 and a half months of life, some people have all the luck). Mira, the several billion-year old star (not to be confused with our kitten) has recently been found to have a 13 light-year long tail, and is the first star ever discovered to have any such appendage. You can read more about it at http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/6947607.stm or if you are a physicist, you can read the article at http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v448/n7155/full/nature06003.html (I could barely make it past the abstract). I think that I see a resemblance, though our Mira is much cuter. The list of similarites between the star and the kitten is growing:

1. Our Mira can probably give the star a run for its money when it comes to gas emissions.

2. Both have tails (okay one is 13 light years, but since when does size matter?).

3. Both move very quickly, the star at 80 miles per second, and our furball can't be far behind.

4. Both leave in their wake plenty of destruction and waste.

5. Both continue to astound scientists, one captivates an entire field of physicists, the other mesmerizes just one, me.

Pb or Not Pb? That is the question.

I grew up during the 80s in the age of Atari and Nintendo so I only risked rotting my brain. So thankfully (or regrettably) I missed out on the earlier era that had chemistry sets that allowed you to make gun power or military grade C4. Also I missed out on the toy guns and weapons that could take down low flying aircraft. It is actually amazing that the US did not suffer negative population growth after the 60s and 70s because most children should have been killed off due to mishaps with "Easy Bake Ovens" and "Lawn Darts". Maybe DARPA secretly had a deal with manufactures such as Mattel and Whammo for training children to fight the Soviets or maybe it was a huge Fascist social Darwin experiment.



The latest Mattel recall of nine million Lead (chemical symbol Pb for all you non-chemists) based toys has started me thinking about the various deathtraps passed off as children's toys during my parents era. I really don't see what the big deal is. So what if Lead causes nephropathy and dementia. Nietzsche once said, "That which does not kill us makes us stronger." Of course he suffered from dementia and later died of pneumonia but hey you can't win 'em all. Lead really can't be any worse than what was found in "Shrinky Dinks" or "Super Elastic Bubble Plastic" right? Also weren't Tonka Trucks just big blocks of Lead with wheels? People are over-reacting to this latest Pb based toy scare. Hell, its not like our government and corporations are exposing us to something really dangerous like Mercury or something. Those of us with kids should just calm down, grab a nice plate of salmon or tuna and watch the little ones play with their "Silly Pants Elmo" and "Ernie Lightup Musical Pal". Why is it that the Ernie toys are chocked full of Lead but the Bert toys are Pb-free? Aren't they supposedly a couple ... of guys living together?



Let's save our outrage for when Mattel dips into their archives and re-releases the "Mattel Agent Zero M Sonic Blaster 5530". Because then we all will know that DARPA is at it again trying to training our youth to fight the new Commies - Al Qaeda.



Oh, if you haven't heard or seen the "Mattel Agent Zero M Sonic Blaster 5530" then you will be happy to know that the toy can emit a blast of compressed air that produces a 157dB sound wave capable of rupturing and causing permanent damage to the ear drums of adults and the kid using it. I attached a picture of a kid holding one. He is probably about to take down a flock of geese or maybe a twin engine Cessna.



And no that is not a joke or doctored picture. You can still buy this TMD (Toy of Mass Destruction), "Mint In Box", on Ebay for the Buy It Now Price of $2495.

Independence Day

The Indian civilization has been on this earth for over 3,500 years but today it celebrates only its 60th birthday. August 15 is the day that India gained her independence from Britain, and became a sovereign nation. The story of the journey to Indian independence is a dramatic one and, like any good story, filled with interesting characters as well as a great deal of tragedy. I have been reading a very good book called “Freedom at Midnight” which documents the enormous undertaking that was Indian Independence. Unlike our independence, India’s was not won at gunpoint, but was rather earned in greatest part by the non-violent efforts of Gandhi which wore down British rule the way that water will eventually wear down even the hardest of stone. Of course the Freedom Fighters and politicians like Nehru and others were also critical in Indian independence, but by all accounts that I have read, independence would not have come to India without the great Gandhi Ji.



I think that I will tell a bit of the story of Indian independence because it is such an interesting story, and one that if it hadn’t actually happened, would be the stuff of fiction. The story is very long and complex, and I certainly can’t do it justice here, but I wanted to share just a taste, especially about the partition of India, which certainly is on the mind of all Indians as they celebrate their Independence, because it came at such a high cost.



In 1947, the British had finally submitted to India’s cry for Independence, and appointed a new Viceroy and Governor-General of India, Lord Louis Mountbatten, to oversee Indian independence and work with the Indian politicians to sort out the details of the hand-over of power. The Muslim League, a political party in India, led by the very shrewd Jinnah, saw the impending departure of the British as the perfect opportunity to demand that a separate Muslim state be carved from India. Jinnah argued to Mountbatten that the Hindu majority in India would persecute its Muslim minority after the British withdrew, and in effect issued an ultimatum that the British could partition India into two states, one Hindu and the other Muslim, or else India would erupt in a violent civil war and Britain would leave behind an India in flames. Jinnah claimed that India would be “divided or destroyed.” The atmosphere in parts of India was very volatile and the British felt a great deal of pressure to withdraw quickly in the hopes that their departure would quell some of the violence that was whipping through parts of the country (riots during the Muslim League’s Direct Action Day of August 1946 in Calcutta resulted in over 5000 deaths in just a single day). The British had little choice but to submit to The Muslim League’s demand for an independent Muslim state so it was decided that each of the 565 princely states that made up India at the time would choose which country to join, either India or Pakistan. Those states whose princes failed to choose either country or chose a country at odds with their majority religion, such as Kashmir, became the subject of much dispute. Kashmir was eventually annexed by India, but India and Pakistan continue to do battle over this idyllic piece of earth as a result of the poor decision of one prince. The result of partition was the division of the Punjab, the Northwest section of India, into two halves, the western-most part became West Pakistan and the eastern section became the western border of India. Additionally, in the east of India, Bengal was to also be divided into two, with the eastern-most section becoming East Pakistan and the western section becoming India’s eastern border. So Pakistan, as Palestine is today, was a country with discontinuous borders, the two halves separated by the massive India. This is, of course, an untenable situation and East Pakistan eventually declared its independence from Pakistan and after the 1971 Bangladesh Liberation War, became what is today known as Bangladesh.



At midnight between August 14 (Pakistan’s Independence Day) and August 15 (India’s Independence Day) both countries were freed from British rule. There was little time for jubilation as those individuals who found themselves within a country that they did not wish to live began a mass migration where 14.5 million people crossed the borders to what they hoped was the relative safety of religious majority. Based on a 1951 Census of displaced persons, 7,226,000 Muslims went to Pakistan from India while 7,249,000 Hindus and Sikhs moved to India from Pakistan immediately after partition. The newly formed governments were completely unequipped to deal with migrations of such staggering magnitude, and massive violence and slaughter occurred on both sides of the border. Estimates of the number of deaths range around roughly 500,000, with low estimates at 200,000 and high estimates at 1,000,000.



Okay, now time for the color commentary. First of all, the idea that one country could almost completely withdraw from another after about 350 years of occupation within the span of a few months is flabbergasting. Additionally, not only did the British have to hand over power and withdraw in only 2 months, they also had to oversee the separation of said country into two parts (three really when you consider that Pakistan was geographically split in two). That means that every single thing that India possessed had to be divided, as fairly as possible, between the two countries: her army, her treasury, her government, even the inkwells in her government offices has to be divvied up. And all in two months’ time. It must have been mad. There is much debate to this day concerning Partition, those in India generally feel very strongly that the British made a terrible decision in submitting to Jinnah’s demands. Additionally, it is thought that they are largely responsible for the debacle following Partition due to their haste in leaving and thus left the business of public order up to the two fledgling governments which were ill prepared to deal with the migration and violence. Others would argue that India and Pakistan wanted the British out as soon as possible without considering the implications that it might have on the ability to enforce law and order and that the British felt that their presence in India was fanning the flames of Hindu/Muslim violence (sound familiar anyone?). My personal feeling is that the British were between the proverbial rock and hard place. I feel that the similarities between the British presence in India and the U.S. presence in Iraq are a little sickening. As in, why is it that we cannot learn from history? The British would not have found themselves in such a terrible position if they had never involved themselves in Indian affairs to begin with. They became so entrenched in the country that they could not effectively extricate themselves when it became apparent that their presence was no longer welcome (not that it ever really was). And now the story is playing out again in Iraq, and if we believe that America will be remembered lovingly by Iraqis when Iraq’s Independence Day rolls around, I just think of how the Indians remember England on their day of Independence and I am not so convinced.



Happy Independence Day India.

Visa, it’s everywhere you want to be, except in India.

For those of you that aren’t extremely familiar with international travel, one typically is required to obtain a visa from the country to which you are planning to travel, think of it as a permission slip from the host country. As Americans, we are very lucky that our government has made agreements with many other foreign countries which allow us to forgo this process. We rarely even consider the possibility that we might need a visa to enter a country since we don’t often need one. However, when entering a country for purposes other than tourism, most (if not all) countries require that the individual obtain a work visa. In the case of our move to India, I was required to get a work visa, and Eric got what is known as an X visa, in his case a co-terminus visa as he is joining his employed spouse in India. Some of you might remember how much I complained about what a pain in the butt getting these visas were, we were turned away the first time because they claimed at the Indian Consulate that we were applying prematurely and to come back closer to the date of our departure. We went back and again waited in a long line, but were approved and told to return the next day to pick up the visas, which we did. In retrospect, I am not sure why I thought at the time that this was such a pain. Knowing what I know now, I should have kissed the guy who approved us and handed us our visas the very next day. That was last October, and our visas are valid only for a year, so they are up for renewal.



Another lovely aspect of the visa process is registration. When we arrived in Bangalore, within seven days of landing, I had to go through a process known as registration. This involves driving to the Police Commissioner’s office near downtown Bangalore (read: hellish traffic) with a ton of paperwork proving who I am, why I am here, etc. The particular pleasure of this process is that you are operating in an information blackout. The application form is not available on-line, nor is the list of paperwork that needs to accompany your application. To obtain both of these you have to actually brave the traffic and pick them up (by the way, they change the application form and list of paperwork at random, and very frequently such that you can not just get the information from friends and/or colleagues that have gone through the process before you). Only after getting these forms and collecting your stack of papers can you go to the office to get registered. I would also like to mention at this point that I have no idea what registration is actually FOR. Are they worried that foreigners are more criminally inclined than their Indian brethren and should thus have a record at the police station before we get into any trouble? Is it for our own safety (doubtful). I am not sure. Anyway, back to registration. So you travel down to the Police Commissioner’s office again, only to find that they want additional information that is not included on the list of required supporting documents. For instance, when I went through this heartwarming process the first time (accompanied by 2 Indians from my institute to “smooth” the process, i.e., assure that bribes were not solicited by the officials) I had assembled all of the paperwork on the list, including letters from my institute stating my purpose for being in India and stating that I was financed by my institute. These documents were signed by an administrator at the NCBS. When I tried to submit my documents for registration, the official gleefully turned me away because I had not brought proof of this official’s Indian-ness. No joke. I guess that I was supposed to know that I needed not only copies of my passport, but of the passport of anyone who signed any document that I needed as proof of my legitimacy. So we had to come back to get copies of this fellow’s passport (actually his Internal Revenue Card, I think this is sort of like a Social Security card) and then brave traffic a third time. They accepted my documents and told me to pick up my registration the next day. Cool, mission accomplished, it only took four trips to get it done (this also works out to 2 days off work as each trip takes a half day minimum mostly due to traffic and waiting in line).



So when it came to getting our visas renewed, I have no idea why I thought that doing it in India would be a good idea. A friend of mine from France had advised that we just leave the country and have it renewed while there (don’t ask me why it is easier to renew a visa for one country in a different country) but I wanted to be a good worker and didn’t want to take time off. So, when Eric was able to get a day off, we set out with 2 NCBS representatives to begin the renewal process, 90 days prior to expiration, as instructed. I had assembled all of the forms that I could imagine but we did not have the application form or the list of required documents (remember, these can only be found at the Police Commissioner’s office). We picked up the application form and the list, and found that there were a bunch of things that we didn’t have and also didn’t know what they were. Anyway, they did start to process the forms, and I received a slip of paper that I was told to take to the local police station where I live (god knows why). We also had to go to a bank to pay the fee for renewal and get a receipt indicating such. When we got to the bank I realized that they had only processed my forms, not Eric’s as well. I was pretty worked up about this as Eric’s visa expires the same day as mine so his really needed to be renewed as well. So after paying my fee, we went back to the Police Commissioner’s office to inquire about Eric. Well, they said that my visa needed to be dealt with first and only then could we worry about Eric. This makes absolutely no sense, one would actually think that it would be much more efficient to process them together since Eric’s visa is dependant on mine. Whatever, I do not think that there is even a word for efficiency here. So we went off to the police station to drop off my form, where Eric and I parted company and he made his way home. He had already wasted half of his day unnecessarily, why waste any more? So I went into the police station and waited while some schmuck sat around until he was ready to talk to us (any public official that has even an iota of power loves to abuse it and throw it in your face given the opportunity). He looked at the form and asked for passport photos (these are a must have here, even to get a SIM card for a cell phone you have to hand over a couple of photos, so it is just best to carry some with you at all times) and a copy of our rental agreement. Of course I didn’t have a copy of our apartment rental agreement with me, why would I? It wasn’t on the list of paperwork that I needed and I certainly had no idea that I would end up in my local police station that day so why would I bring it? So I told them that I would drop it off since I walk by the station every night on my way home from the gym. Uhhh, nope, dropping by after 5 PM wouldn’t work as it was too late (I actually walk by the station around 8 PM, so that was definitely out of the question) and dropping it around 7:30 AM when we drive by in the morning was too early. It does not inspire great confidence when you find that your local police station is not a 24-hour enterprise. God help you if you are attacked outside of normal business hours (which, by the way are around 10-5 with a two hour lunch break from 12-2, this is for I think all government offices). Anyway, this guy then grabs a police officer and says that he is coming with me to my house. WHAT!!! So we head off to my apartment, apparently so that the police officer can verify that I live where I say I live and so that the people from whom we rent can attest that we live there and aren’t axe murderers (like they would even know, maybe we are silent killers). We pull up and I get out of the van with the police officer and Eric comes to the door and asks, “Why are the police here!?” I didn’t even know so I told him to not bother even asking. So he spoke to our landlady for a bit (during which time I took the opportunity to go up to our apartment and say hi to the kittens and use the restroom). When I came to my door, the policeman was standing there and asked if he could look in. What the hell for????? Anyway, he peeked in and said, “Nice.” If we get robbed in the near future, I will have a pretty good idea who is behind it… Back to NCBS to get the remaining paperwork on the list.



Two days later we were back at it again, heading down to the Police Commissioner’s office to submit my documents and to inquire about when we can start the process for Eric. Earlier in the day I had spoken to my French friend and told him that the visa renewal process was underway and told him of my adventure a few days before. He went on to tell me that he had actually tried to renew from India in October, and had yet to receive the renewal (even after 10 months!) and had decided to just go out of country to get it done. He also told me of the only other foreign post-doc that he knew of that had also tried this and received the extension only after many months (more than the 90 days that they claim) and in the meantime could only exit the country with permission, but could not re-enter, effectively preventing his exit from India). So I was very worried, but I went anyway. I met with the visa official and he went through my documents, and, with pleasure said that he couldn’t accept them as I had not included proof of the Indian identity of the administrator that had signed off on my paperwork. With equal, or perhaps greater pleasure, I whipped out of another stack of papers that I had brought (just in case), the proof that he wanted. I wasn’t going to get screwed again, I had learned my lesson from the registration process. He still got me though, he wanted copies, and I had only an original so I had to run across the street and make copies, but at least I didn’t have to go back to the NCBS this time. So after he accepted my papers I asked when I could expect to receive my renewal. “Oh, about a month and a half” he said. I was not convinced and asked how would I know if it had come. He said that I just needed to stop by the Police Commissioner’s office to check. Oh, how convenient! I asked if there were some phone number that I could call to see if it had arrived so that I didn’t waste a trip if it wasn’t there. “Oh, just come and see’” he said. He then said that maybe I should ask this other fellow in the next building when I took to him a form that needed to be submitted. So I went and asked him, and he told me that the other guy would know since it is he who receives the visas. I told him that the other guy sent me to him, so if the other guy was the one who was to receive my visa and he doesn’t even know it, that I am pretty confident that I am screwed. He laughed and I informed him that I was not making a joke, I did not believe that I would ever receive my renewed visa if it were left up to these idiots.



So I also inquired about Eric’s visa renewal and was told that he first had to register (he hadn’t because his visa, unlike mine, didn’t require it and as he saw how frustrating it was for me to do it, he smartly opted out). Fine, he has to register first. I went and asked at the information desk if I could please get the application form and list of supporting documents so that we could get him registered. The fellow asked who was registering and I told him my husband was. He asked to see his passport (which I didn’t carry) and I asked why, all I wanted was 2 pieces of paper. What purpose could it possibly serve to check passports just to hand out 2 pieces of paper? Do they think that they are handing over state secrets, maybe the codes for their nukes? The guy told me something ridiculous about the paper being imported and expensive (by the way the paper is of less quality than my toilet paper) and I screamed at him if the paper is so expensive, I can just pay him for it!!! I lost it at that point. That is exactly what I mean by an information blackout. They make it nearly impossible to know what to do and make everything as difficult as possible. It is particularly frustrating because we are here trying to do some good, and we are treated like criminals or potential terrorists.



I was very angry and upset and my Indian escort (who I have now become convinced are actually handlers that are meant to pull angry Westerners off of Indian officials when they are pushed to their breaking point) tried to comfort me by telling me that getting visas are difficult anywhere and I informed him that I got my Indian visa in one day in the US (so shut it). I burst into tears and called Eric and told him as much as I could. I made it back to work where I related the day’s events to my lab mates, and then to my boss and NCBS administrators. My frustration was mainly that I did not (and still do not) believe that my visa will come in a month and a half, I do not believe that it will come even before it expires (end of Oct.). If I have to wait for mine to come before applying for Eric’s, then his will definitely not come before it expires, and most likely would not even come before we come home for Christmas (Dec. 19, we already have the plane ticket). This means that we would not be able to re-enter India. And Eric’s renewal is, of course, contingent on Eric registering. After the experience that I had, I told my boss and the administrators that we were absolutely NOT going to register Eric. I have had enough of this crap to last me a lifetime, and I am NEVER going to willingly subject either Eric or myself to it EVER AGAIN. I told them that we were going to leave the country to get his visa renewed, if mine actually comes before we go to take care of his, wonderful, but if not I will reapply for renewal out of country. I also told them that we are leaving India in December for the U.S., and if we are not able to re-enter India because the government cannot get it together, then so be it. We, by that time, will have done all that we can do, we can only do so much.



So, to make a long story short, by trying to save time by renewing our visas in India I actually wasted a whole day and will have to leave anyway to get anything accomplished. The upside is that Eric and I are going to Thailand to renew our visas (it is supposedly the best place for renewing Indian visas). We plan to spend a day in Bangkok to turn in our visa renewals before flying to Phuket to lounge on the beach for a week. After this experience, we deserve it and I also hope to have a few drinks and put it all behind me (hopefully the tsunamis will stay away while we are there, wouldn’t that just be a perfect ending to this story, Suzi and Eric get swept away trying to renew their visas because they couldn’t get it done in India). We will then head back to Bangkok for a couple more days to see the sights and pick up our renewed visas (hopefully, or we will be on an plane back to the US)! There are a couple of upsides to this debacle; I have always wanted to go to Thailand and we are very excited to have the perfect excuse to go. We are hoping to take advantage of the sex trade there, it supposed to be the best in the world (just kidding, I don’t want this blog to be flagged for elicit content). Finally, the other positive thing that has come from this experience is that I have learned my lesson, you cannot get anything done in India, and I vow that I will never try to again.

Caste Away

I am sure that most of you have heard of the caste system that has persisted in India and defined her societal interactions for thousands of years. The caste system is a hereditary system of classification into the social strata wherein an individual inherits from his/her parents at birth their position in society. As a birthright, the caste into which you are born is your caste for life and upward mobility from the lower castes such as the scheduled castes (which generally consist of former "untouchables" ) and those that fall within the Other Backward Classes (this is the "technical" term for a grouping of over 3000 lower castes) is impossible.




Though the caste system has been illegal in India for over 50 years, its influence is still starkly evident every day. There exists in this country a palpable sense of position that time has not yet erased, and a knowledge of being better, or lesser, than your neighbor. The idea that "All Men are Created Equal" is absolute nonsense here, which gives rise to some very uncomfortable and difficult situations for a Westerner like me. And as hard as I try to understand, I simply can't and I am often frustrated and infuriated by the side effects of this backward and ignorant system.




Eric has already described the violent and demeaning scene between the police officer and the auto driver, a consequence I believe of the caste system. The effects are usually not so dramatic, but the result is always the demeaning of the "lesser" person. For instance, my trainer, after knowing me and working with me for many months, still insisted on calling me only "Madam". So during my workout he would encourage me by saying "Good work Madam", "Fantastic Madam", etc. I found this to be quite uncomfortable as I felt that he was elevating me to a position higher than the position at which he placed himself. I strongly feel, and hope that all other Westerners (and ideally, all humans) agree, that no person is better than another. There is a time and a place for addressing others with respect, but the gym is not one of those places. So I asked that he please call me Suzi. His reaction to this request was that of complete confusion. He asked, "Do you really like your name, is that why you want me to call you by it?" I told him that no, I was no more fond of my name than the average person is, but that my friends call me Suzi and I hoped that he would please consider me a friend.




This issue of position is also disturbingly evident in my workplace. The professors here are no less than tyrants that seem to delight in berating, belittling, and demeaning those that they view as "lesser". This includes, well, everyone. Post-docs, graduate students, master's students, junior trainees, janitorial staff, kitchen staff, support staff, administrators, service representatives, salespeople; it seems that almost no one is immune to their wrath. I have personally witnessed this and it is a sight that literally makes my stomach turn. There are certainly bad bosses all over the world, but I have never seen or heard of such mistreatment of employees to the degree that I have witnessed here. (And remember that I am in one of the premier research institutes in the entire country, a place for higher learning!) The students and staff seem to tiptoe around for fear of arousing the attention and subsequent anger of any given professor. As you might imagine, this does not particularly lead to an atmosphere of collaboration and honest discourse if one is constantly living in fear of your boss, so ultimately the science suffers (and I am sure all other forms of industry suffer as well due to this environment). I have seen my boss berate and humiliate many of the students in our lab, lashing them verbally for little or no reason at all. Particular care is taken that this be done in the middle of the lab, to assure the maximal humiliation by the presence of a captive audience. It is disgusting and despicable and I honestly don't know if I can continue to stand by and watch this type of behavior for another two years. The professors are nothing but bullies, so insecure in their own intelligence (often for damn good reason) that they exert their position of power by instilling fear and loathing in their students, constantly kicking them down to keep them in their place. This results in a population of meek, submissive worker bees, afraid to think or question for fear of being the target of the boss's unpredictable rage. I sometimes consider it a miracle that any Indian educated in India can think for themselves, as it seems to me that this urge is immediately quashed by a tyrannical educator.








The complete and utter lack of respect for students by their bosses was made evident to me yesterday, when I heard the story of a senior graduate student here. Students at the NCBS have a tenure, and if they have not yet finished all of their work for completion of their PhD, they have to ask for an extension from their boss to continue to provide a pitifully small stipend as well as to set aside a room in one of the hostels (NCBS has two dreary dorms where students stay, not for free, without television, in some cases without internet, and the student has to provide even a bed for the room). This particular student has had a successful graduate student career by any measure, she is hard-working, she is intelligent and she has submitted a paper to a very reputable journal, which is currently under review. Her tenure is up at the end of July, and she has asked her boss for a three month extension during which she would be writing her thesis, the final requirement for completing her PhD. Her boss, who has been her mentor for the past seven years, said no, why would he continue to pay her while she is writing? What this means is that she has no income and she will be thrown out of her room unless there is some intervention on her behalf. In addition, because her PhD isn't yet completed she is not free to pursue a post-doc or other industry jobs that require a PhD. That is what seven years of intense work gets you, thrown out on your ass without any concern for your well-being. That is how the "lesser" people are viewed by the professors, expendable commodities that you throw in the garbage after you have finished with them.



I have so far been fortunate enough to not be targeted by any of the professors here. I am not sure if my Western heritage provides me with some unseen force field against the caste system, or if it is just a matter of time before someone tries to make me aware of my "place". I hope that if that day comes, I am prepared to stand tall and make known that not I, nor anyone, is lesser than anyone else and anyone who thinks different is an ignorant fool.