Bishop

First Impressions

January 24th, 2009

>мебели стара загораonline casinocatvnew International Airport is about an hour north east from the city.  And they weren’t kidding about the fact that the painted lanes in the road are optional.  Huge overloaded lorries are transporting all kinds of goods at 2:30 in the morning and we are weaving and darting between them, with what seems nothing but pure idiocy.  The driver is flashing his brights as he comes up behind them and honks his horn as he passes.  We pass marked speed limit signs, but it doesn’t really matter.  The lights on the dash of the car don’t work and there is no way to even see how fast we are traveling.   The roads are relatively good – they look new.  Except for one thing and that is the presence of giant speed bumps placed every few kilometers across the road.  The onlt thing warning you of an impending date with a 2 foor high bump is a very dim blinking red light on the right side.  Essentially, had I been driving I would have had to figure out how to expense a new transmission.

We pass over a bridge and the driver exclaims that we are now int he city limits and then all of a sudden the smell hits me.  I have no idea how to descibe it.  Rotting socks?  Decaying flesh?  I have no idea but it takes my excitement away as we enter Bangalore.  It’s very dark and we are zooming through intersections that have yellow blinking lights  on all four directions.  “This can’t be good,” I am thinking.  My driver does a good job of flashing his brights as we come into an intersection, announcing our presence, but he doesn’t slow, and I am just bracing for impact.   A car traveling in our direction is only 25 meters in front of us but as we both cross the intersection it is common to have a car from the cross direction pass betweenn us – all at over 60km per hour.  It is surreal and a crazy introduction to the driving habits of Bangaloreans.

The Leela Palace is impressive.  I arrive and there are several levels of security present.  They stop the car before it reaches the centrally places entrance and ask you to walk through a metal detector and place your bags through a x-ray scanner.  I don’t think they have any idea what they are looking for.  The guy who wands you over with the metal detector wand does so half-heartedly and when it beeps, he doesn’t stop.  I check in only to find out that my reservation is for Friday, but not until 2:00pm so I have them book me a night now, but the room I requested won’t be ready until he current occupant checks not.  No worries, I just want a bed.

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