Today is Independence Day here in India. That means nobody goes to work, at least in the normal offices. (Restaurants and things tend to be open, I think.) So what does a group of weary foreign travellers do on a day off in India? Well, we go in to the office, of course. We have legitimate reason, of course. Most of us don’t have internet access in our apartments, so we have to feed our respective addictions to the ‘net. Either way, let me explain some things that are going on…

Yesterday we had our first day of training. This included an Introduction to the TWU program, a lecture about the history of ThoughtWorks and another about the TW India office, and finally we had a discussion about the cultural differences among the people in the program. At this point we’ve got people from the entire world. The TW offices represented are the US (SF and Chicago), UK, China, India, and Australia, but the people here are from a various assortment of other countries. It’s great to get to interact with all these people from so many different places, and our discussion helped to understand each others’ thoughts and ways of life.

But anyway…I’m sure the work part is less important to many of you. I think a lot of people would rather I discuss India and what’s going on here. So I’ll do that.

The first thing that I must say is that I have been shocked because I am yet to see a single Mosquito. Strange, no? I thought so. However, the monsoon season will soon be upon us, changing the current bugless state.

The other day I went shopping on M.G. Road and Brigade Road in Bangalore. There’s tons of shopping to be done there. I bought some beautiful (I think) curtains for the place in Chicago. I’m kind of excited about those. I also picked up some CDs to listen to since I don’t have any music on my work computer.

Here’s an interesting tidbit…the most exciting part of one’s day in Bangalore is when we cross the road to get a meal. I think I might have already said something about how crazy the driving is here. The honking is ridiculous, and constant. We can hear it from the office at all times. Anyway, the interesting part is when we try to cross the street. Basically, all you have to do is wait for a small gap in the traffic, then run with all your might to the middle of the road…then do it again to get all the way to the other side. Quite exciting…and a great replacement for a morning caffeine kick.

I’m trying to think of other things…but I can’t at the moment. The food here is fantastic, if you enjoy Indian…and cheap as well. A dish at a rather nice restaurant across the street costs 130-200 rupees…$1 = 46 rupees. Yum.

I’ll check in again when I think of more. Keep on keepin’ on.