Land of eternal summer...

One of the most bizarre things about Mumbai I've found is that the seasons never change here (besides the one large exception of the monsoon). The temperature is always constant--it's the peak of winter and the weather outside is 90 degrees. As you can see below, the average temperature in the city not matter what time of the year--summer, winter, spring, monsoon-- is always between 75 to 85 degrees and humid.

I miss winter and I really miss fall, my favorite season of all.

Surviving the Indian Healthcare system

This past week was an epic fail/FML with regard to my health (hence the paucity of posts). I was down with 3 uncorrelated ailments:

1) Full blown flu (in 95 degree weather)
2) Food poisoning (from vegetarian food)
3) Allergic reaction (to a skin product I've used for years)

Given all this, I decided--even though I despise doctors--to go see a physician. Little did I know of the adventure I was in for. I hadn't set foot in an Indian hospital in 15 years and apparently very little has changed. My two biggest observations during my brief interaction with the Indian healthcare system:

1) It's surprisingly expensive (why my blue chip employer doesn't provide me proper health insurance is a story for another day). Granted I went to the "best" hospital in Mumbai--Breach Candy Hospital (pictured below). I suppose, they have to charge those prices since they are nestled between the American Embassy and the exclusive Breach Candy Club (see post on urban country clubs) with views of the Arabian sea.

2.) It's not-so-surprisingly unpredictable (see post on Indian time)

You never know where to find a doctor--docs are affiliated to different hospitals and have separate clinics.

You never know when to find a doctor--docs keep random hours (the hours are literally random and have nothing to do with someone's typical work day) and then don't keep to their posted hours. I had to wait for a doctor for 1 hour after I somehow made an appointment figuring out his schedule (fine, you caught me, my assistant made the appointment).

In any case, after 2 rounds of antibiotics, several anti-inflammatories, anti-pyretics, and anti-histamines and some antacids to help with all these meds in me, I'm finally rid of my illnesses!

The Rushing Hour

Whereas most major urban agglomerations have a morning and evening rush hours, the town of Mumbai has what I like to call to a Rushing Hour. Traffic starts increasing around 9am and just keeps increasing from there, see exhibit A below (click image for high res pic).

Some basic annotations*:

7am-9am: People that take public transportation leave for work (majority of people in Mumbai)

9am - 11:30am: People that get to work in cars leave; richer you are, the later in that window you leave

11:30am - 5pm: People going to lunch "meetings" and returning; people go to lunch as late as 2 or 3pm in Mumbai

5pm - 8pm: Most people with normal jobs/own businesses leaving work

8pm - 11 pm: People heading to dinner or a movie

11pm - 2am: People finally going home (from dinner/movie for most people, from work for me)

Double super secret prize contest is back-, what do all the y-axis labels have common?

* Again caveat, super gross generalizations that don't really apply to many people esp those who are especially wealthy or poor (beyond 1.25 SD away). So why do I write them? What do you care?

The Expat Mailing List

A quintessential part of being an expat is being on the mailing list--presumably to meet like-minded people and celebrate expattie things (side note, creating a holiday called St. Expattie's day has definitely crossed my mind). The list usually ends up being a ton of messages with people looking for things or apartments or selling things/renting apartments. However, a few chains from time to time are gems (esp for their frequent lack of irony):

1) The "anything your maid can do I, mine can do better" chains
2) The "Bollywood movie looking for white extras" chains
3) Personal favorite, the "I forgot my giant dildo at the Imperial" chains (excerpt reproduced below, click on pic for higher resolution image)

Waking up to flute music

Woke up this morning (who am I kidding, this afternoon) to some soulful flute music. Not sure where it was coming from, is one of the security guards at the South African Embassy next door a budding musician? A reminder that despite New York being the city that never sleeps, Mumbai is the city that is always awake and full of life.

Top three things I've been woken-up by in New York:

1) Garbage trucks' annoying loud back-up beeping
2) Traffic, backed up all the way from the Lincoln tunnel (I used to live on the east side)
3) The Puerto Rican day parade--seriously, that thing is super loud

Some play play in India

This Sunday was an eventful one; after the Derby, I went to see a play for the first time in India. 'Broken Images,' a one-women production starring renowned Bollywood actress and social activist Shabana Azmi was short (~1 hr), but sweet (well-worth the entry price of ~$30).

Outside of the play itself, the most interesting part of the experience was the celebrity sighting. Not sure if this was b/c it was in a smaller, more expensive venue (for Bombay) or that it was one of the last nights of the play, but the theatre was full of B-list celebrities from smaller movie stars and TV stars to businessmen and socialites.

My favorite socialite that I run into from time to time is the extremely gay but extremely married Yash Birla (scion of the famous Birla family of India). I don't actually know him but he it's fun/funny to watch him dress up for the paparazzi. See below; if there were any doubts, that is his wife.

Indian Derby -- The White Seersucker pants are back!

The Indian Derby (pronounced 'Daah-bee") has been touted as the Kentucky Derby + Preakness + Belmont of India. Needless to say, I was excited (despite many other disappointments being similarly hyped) when I found out that the family of a close friend of mine in Bombay owns horses that are running at the Derby. The afternoon no Belmont sh*t-show but it was a lot fun regardless. Some highlights/lessons:

1) No cell phones were allowed in the event ($200 USD fine for cell phone use). This made me paranoid the entire day of losing my group of friends at an event with 25,000 people.

2) At a social peacocking event, people will go to absurd lengths to display their wealth. I couldn't even count the number of men in full suits (many were not even linen or seersucker) in 100+ degree weather. (Picture below is of someone actually looking good at the event instead of drenched in sweat)

3) Betting on the "most coked out" looking horse works reasonably well for short races. But definitely does not work for long races. I learned this the hard way.

Pigeon in the bathroom

Wake up in the morning, feelin' like P. Diddy. Hey what up, pigeon? Wait, what?

This is exactly the moment, I had at 9am this morning. For those of you that have never seen me at 9am on a Sunday morning, I feel like it would have been a treat to see me try to "shoo" this pigeon out of my bathroom in my state.

I don't know if this was an authentic Mumbai moment but I feel like this would have never happened in New York. If you were expecting a bigger story out of this, I'll share if you call me. It's too graphic to put on a public website.

Fitness...Mumbai Style

Instead of the usual sophomoric attempts at wit to describe my level of frustration with this topic in India, I thought I'd share a picture of women "running" in the Mumbai "marathon". As the old adage goes, a picture is worth more words than a 3 page double spaced essay...

Yes, those women are wearing jeans, sunglasses and carrying phones and shopping bags during a marathon.


Also, psych, gotcha! I'm still going to write a 3 page essay on this topic. Below are a few observations which I think are among the causes for poor fitness among the middle/upper classes in India.*

1) For women, skinny (aka "smart") is healthy--forget that there are things like cardiovascular health and muscle tone. Women would much rather starve than hit a gym or be active

2) For men, skinny is unhealthy--again, forget that you might have good cardiovascular health and are toned. Not that I necessarily possess either of these characteristics, but I keep getting told to eat more. For those of you that have seen me eat, you know this is pretty difficult

3) Gyms are considered only places where body builders go. Case in point, Gold's Gym is the most popular "high-end" gym in India

...I can keep typing more reasons but I think that might me too much of a workout for hand and we know the last thing we want is for me to be any skinnier.



* I have to qualify that these are gross generalizations because I do have many friends in the city that do not subscribe to these views and I know many in the west that share some similar misguided views.**

** Will I ever get tired of footnotes or now footnoting footnotes? Never. Believe it.

Repat/Expat journey resumes after mid-season hiatus...

As many of you know, I've been held hostage in New York for the past month or so...by the Indian government. In an ironic twist, after getting my US citizenship, my Indian visa application was rejected.* Indian bureaucracy stayed true to form with below follow-ups regarding my visa application:

(1) "Purpose for which visa is sought?" The two response options are "construction" and "commissioning."
(2) Name and address of project site
(3) Total manpower required

I suppose, my job can be a bit difficult to understand, but I never thought it could be interpreted as a construction worker.


Anyway, the good news is that I now finally have a visa to return to India and will be back in Bombay by Wed night! After a month's exile, my repat journey can restart; albeit, I guess it's technically just a boring expat journey now.

Teasers for upcoming episodes on Journey of a Repat: "Fitness...Mumbai style" and "Healthy Eating in Land of Sugar and Ghee."


* Not officially rejected--just returned repeatedly for more "information" when the application was more than complete