Weekend in Bangalore

so, despite the first 3+ hour (each direction) trip to bangalore, i decided to give it a second shot. one of the guys here, Vishal, has family living in bangalore. we stayed in the guest-cabins at his uncle's house, and it was pretty awesome. we left friday evening and bade the trek to bangalore in time for dinner (9:00, which is approaching the end of dinner time by indian standards). we spent saturday in the city, doing a little shopping (you have no idea how hard it is to find a) bow-ties, b) suit-vests, and c) american board games in india). being able to have alcohol (incredibly strict enforcement of the dry campus rule) was nice, but by far the best part of the trip was being able to eat an actual meal that left me feeling full afterwords.

in true american fashion, we ate dinner at the Hard Rock Cafe.

i had a bacon cheeseburger ('bacon', 'cheese', and 'burger' are not food in india) and a pomegranate margarita. both good. i also bought a t-shirt, since i most definitely did not bring enough informal clothes to india.

basically, it was a lot of relaxing and getting away from indian beaurocracy. there are a few pictures up (http://picasaweb.google.com/shadedaemon/IndiaAugust2008) and i am trying to get some pictures from my photo-maniac friends who came with us.


also, i found out that i am now a part of the Manufacturing Business unit, which means i will be working on post-training projects in either Chennai or Bangalore, and i will be "based in" Seattle when i return to the U.S.
fine print: being "based in" an area doesn't actually mean anything, so far as we can tell, because i have yet to find a trainee from last year who actually has spent more than a week or two living in the area out of which he is "based".