June 21st to 21rd; I relocate from Mumbai to Hyderabad, with a stopover in the lap of luxury

Saturday morning I was all in a tizzy. K---, the head of the Magic Hands programme was scheduled to give a half-hour “debrief” of the events of the prior day at 8.45 a.m. sharp, and had decided to delegate the actual writing of the thing to me. I spent around three hours Friday night writing the thing (once again, God bless my bullshitting skills, courtesy of MUN!) but had to email it to myself via a hacked IPO connection since the S--- household has no printer. I asked M--- whether we could get to the hotel around 10-15 min earlier so I could rush to the business centre and print out the speech (you can see where this is going, can’t you?). It got later and later, and I was freaking out. The one constructive thing I’d been tasked to do so far and I was going to mess it up by being late! We arrived at the hotel at 8.50, but of course no one was remotely ready, or even there, and my nervousness had been umsonst (for nothing), as the Germans say. I got everything printed and ready, and when we started at 9.15 sharp, K--- (whom I had handed the papers to moments before) announced that instead of the debrief, she was going to let one of the speakers from yesterday take questions instead. Sigh.

The rest of the day went smoothly. An Australian-Indian guy who works for Al Gore’s Climate Project (whom I saw on Television last weekend, actually) held the “An Inconvenient Truth” talk, and in the afternoon Prof. David Gibbons (Canadian, yay!) from Cashpor held his talk on Microfinance. I’m going to post a big thing on Microfinance itself later, so no details, but it was nice. After the closing speeches and such, I jumped into the car with M--- and her husband, and headed to the Taj hotel, across town. They were going to a Business India function hosted by Generic Big Bank, and I was going to meet MY DAD :D

But first, a bit on the Taj, Mumbai’s famous five-star hotel. Jonathan (Damsgaard, duh) was actually the first one to tell me the apocryphal story. It is told that Tata, the richest businessman in India, was refused entry to Mumbai’s fanciest hotel, with the words “No Dogs or Indians allowed”. So, being rich beyond belief, he decided to build a nicer hotel right next to it. Heh.

Anyway, my Dad had had business in Delhi and Hyderabad and decided to stop over in Mumbai, picking me up along the way. He was scheduled to arrive at the hotel by 9, but I felt grimy and craved a shower, so I brazenly went up t the front desk and asked permission to use the room, despite offering no credit card or passport etc. Amazingly, they accepted my McGill ID as legit and let me in! Heaven. I should mention that the S--- family has two (adorable and crazy) cats, which I am unfortunately allergic to. So sleeping was always a bit of an issue there, and I was thoroughly relishing the prospect of breathing through the night. I showered, changed, went for drinks at the “Sea Lounge” – a flapper-style lounge with breathtaking views (where I charged two glasses of wine to my Dad’s room, heh!) and, once he arrived, went for dinner with my Dad. It was really lovely to speak Danish for a change, and not to have to watch what I was saying for fear of giving offence.

The next day we slept late (what what!) and used the hotel pool before having lunch with the S---’s at a delightful colonial-era club. You see, my Dad and M--- met when he was studying at DTU in Copen and she was interning at some Danish company for a few months. (Først Vibeke og nu M---? Min Far har virkelig gamle kaerester hele verdenen over, ikke? :P) After lunch we were driven to the airport and Dad and I caught our flight to Hyderabad. Once there, we were picked up and shuttled to the hotel.

Monday morning my Dad went off on business (he’s running a joint venture with a German competitor of ours, Reitz) while I was picked up by S---, my Dad’s associate’s daughter. She’s in her late twenties, and just came back from the US (where she’s lived for 9 years) a few months ago. She showed me around the city including a museum with a collection that seemed to rival the Louvre in the sheer number of objects. My favourite thing was a statue called the veiled Rebecca, a female figure in marble with a thin veil over her face, but where you can still see the features and expression clearly. Very cool (click the link! click the link!). The afternoon was spent with my Dad, and in the evening we met my Dad’s German business associate Herr Pollman for drinks before all of us going out to dinner with the Indian associate (P---) and his family (S--- et al).

By the way, in case any of you ever go to India, two observations:
1) South Indian food is considerably spicier than North Indian food
2) Unlike our spicy foods, the hotness of a dish is not immediately discernible upon tasting; rather, it takes about 45 seconds for your taste buds to relay the spiciness to your brain (and pain centres) and the sensation to build (and build and build and build). Therefore, do not try a bit of a dish, think “Hey, I can totally handle this!” and shovel a whole load down your gullet. Just… Don’t.

That's all for now, tune in next time when I finally start real work, see the poorest of the poor, and cause a stir as a single gal about Varanasi!
Please keep your comments coming, they're a heartwarming piece of home over here. Miss you all and can't wait to see you again!
Hugs, Knus,
Gitte

P.S. The poll for presents is still up, and so far the guys have obviously come out strongly for the dagger, with jewellery and a scarf the top choices for the gals. Got an idea for the next poll? You could WIN.. well nothing but I'll credit you, and maybe buy you a pretty postcard or something.