East Meets East (Liz is in India
Aaron is in China)

Aaron -

I’ve been waiting to start this for a long time. That’s no accusation, by the way. As I’m sure you know, I have no idea how to start a blog and no interest in learning. So, to begin – thanks for setting this up, writing the first entries, and making it look cool. Pictures! Videos! It really does look snazzy.

The requisite introduction:

After collecting enough horror stories in Kyrgyzstan to scare away any potential new friends at parties for a lifetime, I wasted some time at home in Michigan. I moved to India in April and have been here ever since. Basically, after the Peace Corps exhausted my patience with altruism, I sold out and outsourced myself as an editor with a huge Indian knowledge factory. Last week I got even more toolish/corporate, when I moved from miscellaneous editing into investment research. I live in Gurgaon, a suburb of New Delhi. More on this delightful city later, for sure.

Life here has been pretty good so far, but there have also been a few unpleasant moments, and it’s at those times that I have felt the absence of a public forum on which to air my grievances most acutely. Funny that your first substantial entry was about a bad trip, because a lot of my travel experiences in India have actually sort of sucked. Not univerally, but there have been quite a few of those moments when I’ve thought, “Well, this is awful, but at least it will make a good email/journal entry.” Those moments just got a lot better, because now, technically, the entire internet-connected world can read about how miserable I was and roll its eyes.

Take the time I forced to spend over twelve hours in a horizontal position, wedged into a bunk on a smelly overnight bus on a winding road with only a little bag of cashews and a package of ketchup-flavored potato chips… and no bathroom stops for an eight-hour stretch.

Or the jungle walk on a work trip, led by a guide who clearly had no idea what he was doing, wishing with more desperation than I’ve ever felt before that a certain team member – who considered herself something of a naturalist and liked to point out mushrooms like she knew what they were – would eat one and die, or at least be incapacitated enough that she wouldn’t be able to lead us in any more ice breakers. (Wow, that was long sentence. I’m off duty. It stays.)

Or the five hours of valuable weekend time I once spent in a temple in Delhi, trapped in a seemingly endless amusement park of indoctrination.

…But GUESS WHAT! I did write about this one – potentially offensive entry coming soon this very blog!

A more pleasant travel memory:

Escaping the heat in Goa with my college friend Meg, who visited me from Almaty!

- Liz