Exploring the city... (Heidi)

I've spent most of the last couple days enjoying chai tea, air conditioning, and fabulous food -- Sara really has me spoiled!

But today we went into the heart of Hyderabad, downtown where it tends to be the more "real" Hyderabad experience. Walking down the streets was entirely frightening and I've yet to gain the courage to walk on the outside next to the traffic. She tells me it's safe and nobody gets hit, so maybe in the next couple days I'll get to where I can brave it! And I'm completely blown away by her ability to navigate and drive a car in this city. It's pretty hard to blend in too when there's two blond girls walking down the street here, but aside from the expected stares everyone was incredibly nice. I had Sara take me into a hospital (just to see what one was like) and it was really impressive -- at this point I had no clue what to expect, and I was pleasantly surprised. I LOVE all the sinks available for washing hands before and after meals at all the restaurants... makes sense since you eat with your hands here, but still amazing to see! (The Google cafeteria that we ate at this afternoon had a whole hand washing station that you went to before eating, crazy!) This isn't a tourist town so it's been amazing to know that everything here is for locals, from the Mercedes dealership to the sugarcane juice stand... it's all catering to the local community.

Which leads me to my next topic, contradiction. I must say I had no idea what I was getting into when I was going to India, and it's been really difficult to try to articulate how I feel about it. The people I've met are lovely, the food is spicy-goodness, and the amazing color of the sari's on the street just blow your mind. I was told that the sheer number of people would be overwhelming but that really hasn't been the case in Hyd (we might be going through Delhi to see the mountains this weekend so that will likely be true there). But, it's more the entire state that is overwhelming. There is such incredible wealth and incredible poverty on the same street, unlike in the US where everything is very divided. Here there is an Armani store next to a family living in a blue-tarp tent, and the most expensive apartments in the city overlook an empty lot with children playing and urinating in construction sand. I don't know which India to describe, nor which is "real." We've had some really great conversations about this in the last couple days, and it seems that the only explanation is that "This is India. Whatever you say is true about India, the opposite is also true." Because of this it's been difficult to decide what "India" I want to share on here. So I've decided that I'll only describe and post photos in pairs of two, describing both Indias that I see because it's a dichotomous place -- I haven't taken very many because I've been completely overwhelmed, but I will take some and post the next few days.

The next couple days I'll be exploring on my own so there will likely be some eventful happenings, and I'll keep you posted!

Heidi