More than a year has passed

August 18, 2008
It has been a year and 3 months since we moved to India. I no longer yearn for home (America). Slowly, we have searched for “comfort” foods, “comfort” trips, libraries, restaurants, and slowly we have found them all. I no longer yearn for a trip to Java City, instead we just take the 15 mins drive to Breadz, the bakery where we buy our fresh breads without preservatives, and indulge ourselves with the “Mind Blower Chocolate swirl coffee”. We have bought the Times food guide, and have been visiting all the recommended restaurants in town.

I am often touched by the special treatment I get being a “lady driver”. Often I have gotten lost in Bangalore roads, there has never been a dearth of help. Even the policeman once let me make an illegal U-turn to the nearest main road because he did not want me to get lost some more. India’s ability to “tilt the mirror’, as Shantaram said in his book. Just a couple days ago, in my effort to find parking, I ended up in a narrow blind alley, from where I could not steer my car back to the main road. Two men came out to help me, one of them even drove my car out of that alley. Total strangers they were.

The library that we discovered on Infantry road, carries such a wide range of books. At a time when it seems like that fantasy books are taking over every bookstore, the different genre of books we can find at the library for our son has been very much appreciated.

Last Friday, we went to a Pizza Hut, this was just our second trip there, but the lady remembered our daughter and came after her saying “Last time you did not talk to me, today at least you tell me your name”. At Breadz, they ask my husband “How is the family?” They remember that I like to limit the plastic shopping bags that I use.

I am realizing that such personal touches calm people down, reduce stress, there is something about human nature that makes it appealing.

Not to mention all the trips that we take. India is such a beautiful country. Living in India, we are able to visit the little gems, places that can be reached only by road. We have the luxury of time now.

We are finally getting familiar with the lanes and bylanes, the little alleys, the specialty shops, that new Italian restaurant that just opened. The discovery of all these has been a challenge and adventurous.

Our childrens’ lives are full of their friends. School friends, who come over for sleepovers. Neighborhood friends, who stay up all night and exchange ghost stories. Our daughter, who looks at the clock every evening to see when it is 5:30, so that she can don her helmet and take off on her bike to meet up with her friends.

Life has been good to us so far in Bangalore.