Patience

The first week in Bangalore has gone by. If I had to sum it up in one word it would be patience. I think that will be my task while here, learning to have more patience. On Monday we met with the coordinator who is arranging much of our stay here, Murali. He said we could go to the FRO (Foreign Registration Office I think) on Tue afternoon, when I had commitments at work. So we rescheduled for Friday afternoon--ok, but it delays our residency permit by a few days. Murali then had a phrase which I think typifies India-- Hurry, but slowly...

Tuesday in the morning we took Anna to the school in the morning, about a 45 minute trip across town from our temporary flat. We found out that the school which was started not too long ago had undergone major changes-- the original founder had fled the country with all of the money taken in at the beginning of the year. As it turned out, the owners of the building where the school was located decided to take pity on the school and took it over. It got a new name, new administrator, new head of curriculum, but most of the students and teachers stayed on. So we decided that Anna would still go to the Trio World School. In the afternoon I went to work and met with HR, and found my assigned desk. Everything moved slowly-- getting a cell phone would happen by Friday, then Friday I learned it would be Wednesday due to the holiday on Tuesday. My desk is in the corner-- a manager's cube, with a phone, but due to internal issues with the merger, my laptop has no connection to the intranet from my desk. I have to go to another floor to get connectivity. I am supposed to get a new laptop, but IT needed something from HR. That may come on Monday. Patience, Bryan Patience. It will have connectivity to the intranet, but not to my mail or any of my ex-Nokia tools as this is an ex-Siemens site and the internal merge is not complete yet....

Wed & Thur. were pretty average, meetings with everyone local and in China and Finland. At least there is more overlap between the time zones.

Friday we had a new driver. The original one was wonderful!! Very friendly, very good driver. Anna even mentioned that she liked him because he uses turn signals. BUT, he lives to the south of the city, and we will be in the north. This is too far for him to commute 6(7) days a week. Our driver is on call 8am-8pm, 6 days a week, and we can ask for overtime on Sundays or evenings if we need. Oh well, he would have been wonderful, but we could not ask for him to add 2 hours more each day to his commute.
So we got a new driver. The day the car showed up with the new driver, there was a scratch on the side of the car. It was brand new when we arrived in India, and had been getting it's registration the previous 2 days, plus tinted windows and a radio. On the second day(Saturday) there was a big dent in the front of the car. Later on the way home he got in a second accident, luckily in the same spot, but now the front headlight is damaged. He doesn't like to have the side mirrors out--they stick out too far. In my opinion, if he used them he would see more, and if he had to keep room for them, he would be a safer driver. He brakes very suddenly, and honks incessantly, even by Bangalore standards. Let's hope we can get someone else as this is he first driver I felt uncomfortable sitting in the car with.

Back to Friday. The day went fairly uneventfully till around 2pm. I had met my Murali on Thursday and he asked if I was adventurous enough to ride on the back of a scooter, then Rohith would pick me up and we could meet Cindy at the FRO. As it turns out he didn't really mean it, at 3 pm I get a call from him on Cindy's phone that he is going to send the car for me (with Cindy and Anna). I am waiting on the street-corner so they can find me and I can get in the car easily. There is such a racket that I cannot even hear my phone ring and have to put the ear-piece in to just hear the rings. I get 3 calls while waiting (more than I got all morning). Luckily I do manage to take the call from Cindy--the driver cannot easily get to my office for some reason, so I have to hoof it down the street to meet them.

Eventually we get to the FRO at about 3:45. First thing we do is wait for Rohith. He shows up, and we have to wait while he stands in line to talk to what looks like someone who checks that all the paperwork is there. 5-10 mins later, he comes back, now we need to follow him to another office. We exit the building and go around the corner. We have to be there so the person who is validating our paperwork can verify we are actually present in India. They have our passports, photos, and a sheaf of papers already. The building looks like it was built at least 50 years ago, and hasn't been painted since. The walls are grimy where people have touched them while standing or going around the corner. There are plackards on the wall with instructions of all of the paperwork necessary for each kind of applicant, sorry I should have gotten a photo, but they were fun to read, but confusing. Ok so back to waiting again. The person we are to see is not in the office. 10 mins later he shows up. Rohith is standing in line. He is second. The first person has a stack of about 10 dossiers to be signed. The Asst. Commissioner of Police as we figure out, is signing some stamps on each one, he doesn't even seem to be reading what they are.

So our paperwork is next. Rohit hands him the 3 stacks, the Assistant Commissioner signs each of our documents (in addition to the 6 or 7 signatures already there). I don't think he even looked to see if we were there. Now we go back to the first office. We sit down while Rohith stands in line at the counter-- he turns in our paperwork and joins us sitting in the lobby.

While sitting there waiting Rohith explains that we will have to do this all over in a year as our visas are only good till Dec. If we want, we can submit our passports for extensions while there, but it is a 3 month process. If we want to do it faster and keep our passports, we can go to the US and re-apply for visas (a one day process).

10 mins later he is called up, and Cindy and I have to join him so we can sign yet another paper and we are given receipts and our passports back--except for Anna's. I guess we get residency papers and since she is a minor, she gets a stamp in her passport--this is India.
While we are standing there waiting to sign our papers, there is a gentleman waiting next to us to get his Residency Permits. He is told to sign on the receipt form that he got it. There is no designated space, but there is a box for comments. He asks the man behind the counter whether he should sign in the box, or where to sign? The gentleman behind the counter says "This is India, sign anywhere". Yup, this is India. Anyways we have to go back on Monday to pick up our permits. Then we'll be all legal, at least for a year.

Saturday, aside from getting in traffic accidents, we went to the house again to check which curtains, colors and sizes we need to get. We don't want to be in a fish bowl the first few days we are there. Now we need to figure out what furniture we want, and how/if we can rent instead of buying it. We went to a local mall close to the house, for lunch, and to look at curtains. We also found a good bread shop (well Cindy actually found it the day before) but we all went there, Cindy had a coffee and Anna a real croissant. Then home (accident) and we had planned to go out locally for dinner, but decided to order in instead. Cindy got a lovely Indian Curry. I tried a European style pasta dish. It was pretty good, but definitely had an Indian spin on it. More spicy, and different spices than you would expect for an "Italian" dish. Anna ordered Chow Mein. When she opened it up, her fist comment was "it looks like swamp water". She didn't eat much of it, she complained it was too bland and too salty--Ok, ok a bit of a contradiction, but you get the picture. I called the driver to tell him we were not using the car and he could go home. He told me he was waiting in the parking lot. I had to try to explain 3 times in different ways that he could go home and come back on Sunday. Yet another reason to get a different driver.

Cindy and I are going to brave the driver again today (Sunday) to go to an Expat Brunch. More about that later.