It’s the end of my first day in Bangalore and before I fall asleep (for what will hopefully be an amazingly restful night of slumber), let me catch you up. As you learned in my last post, my flight from Paris to Bangalore was delayed, to the tune of THREE HOURS. Ugh. Definitely not ideal, but as I said, I didn’t have an uncomfortable wait on the plane and at least we did finally make it to Bangalore in the end. So why the delay? While the pilot did tell us they were missing two crew members, it turned out they were actually missing two maintenance folks who were needed to fix an issue on the plane’s tail fin. And I would rather be three hours late than not arrive at all, so I’m thankful for that. I was feeling a little less thankful about not getting to my hotel until nearly 4a and not getting to bed until almost 5a but again, those are some of the joys of travel! On the plus side, my driver was waiting for me – he’s very nice! And the hotel staff were nothing but gracious when I arrived (unsurprisingly, there were no other guests arriving at 4a, so they walked me to my room, told me about all the amenities, etc.) and I have a really nice room, so I’ll stay focused on the positives. Even the weather was nice – about 70 degrees, not raining (I was afraid that would happen a lot, since July is the early part of the rainy season), and not even that humid. After getting to my room, I had to get a bit settled (it’s just part of my process when I get to a new place) and take a shower, but then it was straight to bed…at 5a. That’s about the time I wake up for work when I’m at home! I probably got about five hours of sleep, so not amazing, but it was better than nothing!

As for my actual day today, after waking up a little before 11, it was nice! My driver came to get me around 1p and I got to experience what traffic is like here. In short, there’s a lot of it! Cars, motorbikes, people, and street dogs are everywhere, so I’m very glad I didn’t have to do any driving myself. If you’ve ever been brave enough to drive here, kudos to you! At the office, it was awesome to get to see work with all the people on my India team in person! Once I met everyone, I had a pretty normal (albeit shortened) work day – I had a late lunch in the cafeteria (my first Indian food in India!) that I enjoyed, though I couldn’t tell you the specifics of what I ate, but it was all tasty. It’s so nice to be able to work in person with the folks I talk to on a daily basis when I’m home, so I’m really looking forward to getting to do it more over the next week and a half. Especially since I’ll be more awake by the time Monday rolls around. 🙂 It feels a little weird to have traveled this far for a work trip, but I can already tell it’s going to be worth it and, of course, I’ll make the most of my time here. That starts tomorrow as I take in some sights around Bangalore, so keep your eyes peeled for more new blog posts in the coming days.

The photo selection is a bit sparse today, but there will be more to come as I see more, so hang tight!

The AirFrance seat I got to spend ~12 hours in, between the delay and the flight. The Paris->Bangalore flight is on an older aircraft, but the seat was still comfy.

The hallway just inside my hotel room door.

Well-decorated and comfortable!

Looking to the front of the room from the back wall.

The bathroom is nice and big! You can’t see it in the photo, but there’s also a large tub to the left of the vanity.

The view from my window includes part of Cubbon Park. Also included is a little slice of Bangalore traffic!

The Sandman is knocking down my door now, so cross your fingers that I’m sleeping soundly by the time you read this.

Zzzzzzzzzz…………