I arrived in India a day and a half ago. I’d barely slept for the past 36 hours when I crawled off the plane in Hyderabad. Rajiv Gandhi International Airport is new and modern and I was through customs and immigration pretty quickly. Gopal was waiting right outside and we were quickly heading through Hyderabad to our apartment.

After spending the first couple of days in Hyderabad, Gopal and I left for the west coast. The trip is 700km long and over the roads we had to travel, he expected it to be about a 12 hour drive. Rather than drive by day, we decided to drive overnight. Gopal says it is a bit safer, because the roads are less crowded with motorbikes, bullock carts and autos at night.

Yesterday was Holi, the Hindu festival of colours. Our first warning was the night before when a lot of food places were closed due to Holi. Our next taste was as soon as we left our place in the morning, there were two boys in the neighbouring place covered in coloured dyes, bottles in hand ready to help others get similarly coloured up.

We are staying at a place right on Chivla Beach in Malvan. Our place is literally on sand, although is raised a couple of metres above the high tide mark. Here is the view of the place from the top of the beach:

I’ve only been here a few days and I swear I’ve gained a few kilograms already. The food here is awesome. The places we are going don’t look anything flash – just a little room or two with some plastic tables and chairs (the kind you buy from The Warehouse). Most of the ones we’ve been to are family establishments, with the family sometimes even living out the back of the restaurant. The women generally do all the cooking, with the menfolk serving, or just supervising.

Looking down a street at the market:

After we left Malvan, our next stop was Goa. We stayed in Agonda Beach in south Goa, away from all the party/rave crowds that infest the northern beaches. This is the view from our hut at the northern end of Agonda Beach.

After leaving Goa, we headed south for Kerala, driving most of the night. We’d looked up a beach or two in advance which seemed to have accommodation right on the beach, but when we arrived there at 5am, it turned out not to be the case. The roads were dreadful and what little accommodation there was wasn’t anywhere near the beach. We headed south and eventually came to Kozhikode, which looked like it had a nice long beach and plenty of accommodation along the promisingly named Beach Road.

The road up to the hill country resort of Coonoor is a steep, winding road full of hairpin bends that twists through a forest full of wild animals. There are even signs warning that elephants have right of way (although surely nobody would be so silly as to try and argue right of way with an elephant?)

Coonoor is a hill country resort at 1800m elevation in the Nilgiris (Blue Hills). The first thing you notice is the temperature. Where it was near 40 degrees down on the flat, in Coonoor, the daytime temperature is a pleasant 22-25 degrees, and during the night it drops into the teens.

I’ve been back in New Zealand for three weeks now. These are just some general impressions of India.

The first thing we did when we got to Hyderabad was to start looking for an apartment and a motorcycle. The first day, we went to look at two bikes, one of which happened to be in an area that we were quite keen on. As we were driving around looking for ‘to let’ signs, we saw an apartment building (Greenwood Residency) built by the same people as the building where Gopal’s sister currently lives. He researched and chose that building and was quite impressed by this company and their standard of work. We drove up and asked if they had any flats to rent.

The apartment we ended up taking was actually the very first one we saw in Hyderabad. It is in a complex called Greenwood Residency in the northeast of Secunderabad, between Yapral and Kowkoor:

After a bed, the next thing we looked for was a fridge. Fridges in India have a few differences from the fridges commonly available in New Zealand.

After a bed, the next thing we looked for was a fridge. Fridges in India have a few differences from the fridges commonly available in New Zealand.

We’ve been in this apartment for a bit over a month now and we still haven’t really got the furniture situation sorted. Here is our progress report:

Last night, we had a power cut. They are not uncommon here, but mostly happen during the afternoons or early evenings. Last night’s was a bit different though.

Last night, we had a power cut. They are not uncommon here, but mostly happen during the afternoons or early evenings. Last night’s was a bit different though.

One of the problems we noticed after we’d moved into this apartment, was that the tiles in the wet areas hadn’t been laid properly. Both bathrooms are completely tiled (floors and to 2 metres up the wall) and have two drains in them.

One of the first things we did as soon as we moved into this apartment in January was go to the bank to try and open a joint bank account or get me added to Gopal’s existing bank account. Try is very much the operative word, as nothing is easy in India.

And walk. And ride. And stand around. And shop. And talk. In fact, everywhere I go and everything I do, there are people watching me.

Our maid often brings me flowers to wear in my hair. They are jasmine flowers and they smell lovely all day.

The other day, we were out buying some supplies for finishing off our furniture. It had rained just before we reached that area of the city but by the time we got there, the sun had come out again and it was hot and humid. While Gopal was sorting out what we needed, I was just standing around outside idly looking around. Without the cooling airflow of the motorbike, I was starting to feel hot and sweaty.

Fires are a very common thing here in Hyderabad. People sweep leaves & debris into a pile and just set fire to it. You see little flaming or smouldering piles at the side of the road all the time. This picture was taken from our balcony and is at the tent village next to our apartment building. The guy who lit it stuck around for a little while before wandering off. You can see from the scorch marks on the wall that a fire here is pretty common.

As I’m sure most of you are aware, India is hot. Well, most of India is. In the northern parts, it stretches up into the Himalayas where the altitude makes it a lot cooler. There are also “hill stations” which are high in the mountains and have much lower temperatures. When the English occupied India, the hill stations were where people would go to retreat from the heat in summer. When I was here last year, in the space of an hour we drove from Mettupalayam at 40 degrees to Coonoor at 2000m up where it was a lovely 23 degrees.

We live in a pretty quiet part of Hyderabad. We’re in such a rural area that frogs in the nearby rice paddies are the biggest source of noise at night. One night a buffalo mooed the whole night, but that was just a one-off. This complex is still only partly populated so it’s pretty quiet most of the time. There is still a bit of construction noise, but nothing too bad. The biggest sources of noise here are fighter jets and gunfire.

A couple of days ago, I had a few new experiences in India. It started when Gopal had to go to the bank. The rear seat of the motorcycle is not usable as it is currently being modified to be comfortable for more than 20 minutes at a time, so he went alone. Plus, we have our niece staying with us at the moment, and there is no way all three of us can go. He left around 2:30 and the bank shuts at 4. It’s about half an hour away.

Back in New Zealand, I have had very different coffee routines at different times.

One of my favourite drinks is a mango lassi. You can get it at most Indian restaurants in New Zealand and many restaurants here, but most of the time it is made from either tinned mango puree (if you are lucky) or some mango flavoured stuff (if you aren’t) and a lot of sugar. Since it is mango season here right now, I’ve been able to have the real thing fresh and homemade almost every day.

The monsoon wind arrived bringing with it the rain. In Hyderabad, it normally starts around the first week of June. I was in New Zealand at the time, so there was a huge contrast. When I left it was 44-45 degrees most days, and when I returned it was a mere 30 degrees or so. And it gets down to the low-mid 20s during the night. We don't even need the AC on anymore, and a lot of the time we don't even need the fans now.

We used to cook at home almost all the time, but lately we've been eating out a little more. (When I say we, I really mean Gopal did most of the cooking and I would sometimes help by chopping vegetables :-). We've been going out and getting dinner at one of the street food vendors nearby. We tried a number of them and have definitely settled on our favourite, a young guy who is set up outside a Rajasthani sweet shop in nearby Yapral village. Over time, we've tended to converge on a standard menu. It's even gotten to the point where Nilesh starts to make our order when he sees us coming.

"We should probably get some petrol," I said as we passed the petrol station, eyeing the fuel gauge reading just over one quarter full. I meant diesel, of course, but old habits die hard. I tend to get antsy when the gauge reads below one quarter, and we often fill up when it gets just below half. "I want to fill up just before we leave," Gopal replied, "so we can better track our mileage".

My last post ended with our disabled car parked outside our apartment complex, unable to start and with us having no idea what was wrong with it. This one ends on a much better note, since although there is still one issue to fix, we yesterday did a 700km round trip without any significant issues.

A couple of weeks ago, we went to the wedding of the daughter of one of Gopal's friends. After a honeymoon trip to Ooty, they were ready to head back to their home in Guntur, some 300km from Hyderabad. Although both of them work for the railways, they were unable to get a railway ticket. Getting tickets can be hard (as we found when we wanted to go to Sikkim in April/May) but especially so at the moment as there are a lot of strikes in Andhra Pradesh at the moment.

A week or so ago, we got back from our first road trip in India. It was only a week long, but we managed to cover some 2500km and see quite a bit of south India:

So it turns out it was back in February that I last posted an update about the furniture situation. At that point, we had a bed, a single plastic chair, washing machine, fridge, microwave and a single element induction cooktop. Things have improved since then, although, as with everything else in India, it wasn't easy :-)

One of the interesting things about the Hindi language is that the alphabet works very differently to the English alphabet. In fact, I think that technically it is not an alphabet at all - it is a syllabary. That means that Hindi symbols directly represent spoken syllables, and therefore is almost completely phonetic.