First Drive in India

It wasn't a long drive nor was it a terribly stressful one; however, I can now lay claim to having driven an automobile in India. Today, I drove home from Galleria Market. The only time my trusty Kailash ever really brings up the idea of me driving is when it's a holiday or a festival. While I'm slightly insulted, it's probably the smart move on his part since the traffic is typically light.

Dussehra, which is today's festival, is no exception. Even with the added degree of difficulty of the stoplights not working, traffic was nearly nonexistent and the drive uneventful. I honked a couple times, passed a couple auto riskshaws, turned a couple times without hitting anything, and successfully navigated my first Indian roundabout.

The most stressful part of the drive was when my pocket started to vibrate and I realized the wife was calling. I threw the phone to Kailash so he could answer (because, you know, safety first). To help alleviate the confusion caused by an Indian voice answering my phone, he said to her, "sir can't talk right now, he's busy driving home." What was she calling about? She wanted to make sure I picked up some Diet Coke at the store. If that isn't a little slice of normal middle American life, I don't know what is.

Exact Change

A couple weeks ago when I went through the toll booth on NH8, which is the primary road between Delhi and Gurgaon, I noticed a sign that read, "Please pay exact amount. Cars Rs. 21." I'm probably not the first person to think it's odd that you would set your toll price at an uneven number like that and have the gall to expect people to have exact change.

It would seem more appropriate to set the toll one rupee less and make it a nice even twenty rupee fee. If revenue is an issue, why not raise even more and make it Rs. 25? Alas, the toll commission (or maybe it's the National Highways Authority of India) decided on Rs. 21 and decided to invest in a sign expecting exact change. With this decision, you'd hope they also made a decision to stock their toll booths with one or two rupee coins. I grew up in western Illinois where there were two strange $0.95 tolls to get to the Chicago area on Interstate 88. I'm pretty sure those toll booths were well stocked with nickels.

Actually better organized than many toll booths in Chicago

On the way back from Delhi on Saturday afternoon, we were stuck in a rather long line at the toll. I was thinking to myself, "it's probably that 21 rupee deal that's forcing everyone to wait for change." Selfishly, we wanted to get through as quickly as possible as we had a staycation weekend planned at The Leela, which is located just on the Gurgaon side of the toll booth. And yes, I realize The Leela is fifteen minutes from my apartment, but we had a free room; you'd take advantage of this too. After waiting patiently in line for a few minutes, we approached the toll booth; finally, we were set to pay the toll and get on with our day. The bus in front of us went through the toll, advanced far enough for my trusty driver Kailash to pay the toll, and stopped. And it didn't advance.

We were trapped. Our weekend getaway blocked literally and figuratively by this large bus. A couple minutes later, the bus driver jumped out of the bus and walked back to the toll attendant. I immediately thought there was some sort of issue where the attendant had given incorrect change on the Rs. 64 toll (buses cost more than cars; exactly Rs. 41 more; again, pricing at its finest). A fairly heated discussion began. Sensing this wasn't going to get better without a little friendly intervention from an over-privileged Westerner, I rolled down the window and very politely asked what was going on. Hearing English, the toll attendant shrugged his shoulders and gave me one of those, "I don't really care that this is inconveniencing you; just deal with it" looks.

Kailash, always the protective one rolled his window down and asked a couple questions in what sounded like a fairly confrontational tone (though to be honest when you hear Hindi spoken it sounds confrontational more often than most languages, it certainly doesn't flow from the tongue like French). From what he was able to ascertain, it wasn't an issue of correct change, it was an issue of the bus driver's refusal to pay a little something on top (i.e., a bribe) to the toll attendant, which apparently is a fairly common occurrence for larger vehicles where, presumably, its not the driver's money being paid. But here's the thing, the bribe was a flat Rs. 10, thus making the total cost to pass for the bus to be Obviously, in the U.S. assessing an additional toll at a tollbooth would be pretty much the easiest way to get one's self fired and/or put in jail. Here, I've come to accept that these things happen, and there's not much I'm going to be able to do in the next eight months to change it.

What I can't understand is: why not make the bribe an additional rupee? It's win/win, Mr. Toll Booth Guy gets a 10% bump and traffic rolls through a little less less encumbered. Of course, this doesn't solve the issue of a bus driver refusing to pay the bribe, so it wouldn't have even mattered. Thankfully, with Kailash remaining somewhat involved and two increasingly agitated expats who may or may not have raised their voice a time or two, the bus pulled forward enough to let us pass. This entire episode likely took between seven to ten minutes, so it's not like we were stranded passengers on a tarmac for hours; however, do you have any idea how long seven minutes feels like when you you're waiting to pass through a toll you've already paid?

The Newly Discovered Option

I have an iPod. It was purchased in 2004. It doesn't have video. It has a gray screen. It stores 20GB, which seemed like an unlimited supply of music when it was purchased. It still works and for that I am grateful. It is, however, old. When you put it next to a new iPod it looks like an Apple IIc sitting next to a Mac PowerBook. All that said, I didn't realize exactly how old it was until the other day.

Even my playlists are old, though just wait when the college kids hear about this band.

The car provided to us here is the Honda City, which is basically a mini Honda Civic. They're relatively new and clean yet fairly basic modes of transport with few frills. Regardless, they get the job done. I recently learned that if you flipped the face of the radio down, it opened a secret compartment with a USB cable. We never really listen to Indian radio so this cable was the opening to a whole new world of listening to music while in the car. To be honest, when you're always in the car with another person, lack of music doesn't really seem like that big of a thing; however, any new discovery (even something as mundane as a USB cable) seems like a bigger deal here than it really is.

My trusty driver Kailash piloting the Honda City

I plugged my iPod into the car and expected instant gratification. The display on the radio said, "Loading...", which as you might expect I took as a good sign. A few seconds later the display switched. It read "Old iPod" and was followed by silence. My dream was dashed. Temporarily.

Not to be defeated, a few days later I remembered (I can be a little slow at times) that the wife had a slightly newer iPod. I went through the routine again. After the display read, "Loading", something magical happened. The iPod started to play. It would only play the playlist that was previously playing but alas there was music. I was fairly certain I could at least change the song by hitting the "forward" button the radio, but when you're being chauffered around, it can be a little awkward to reach into the front seat. Plus, I can't say "next song" in Hindi and didn't feel like I really needed to bother the driver to change the song. Regardless, I was happy to just have music in the car, even though I really hadn't missed it.

On Sunday we headed into Delhi and I figured I'd bring the iPod along for the ride. Ashok, our Sunday driver and the driver I consider to be Lindsay's, stepped out of the vehicle to call for directions to Sharma Farms (more on that in the next couple days) and I took the opportunity to plug the iPod into the USB. When Ashok hopped back in the car, he seemed surprised that there was music playing. He immediately flipped down the radio cover, pulled out a small object, and said, "Here, sir." Surprised, he handed me a remote control. To be honest, I wasn't sure if I was surprised that there was a remote or that my trusty driver Kailash (with whom we had made the working iPod revelation) had neglected to tell me about the remote the day before.

The remote (with Ashok safely navigating a roundabout in the background) 

I'm just relieved that my "stuck on one playlist/song" issue that I discovered the day before had magically disappeared. Such are the issues you encounter when you're stuck riding in the back of a car seat for two years.

Driving in Bali

The best advice we received before coming to Bali was from our former neighbors from Holland; that is, rent a car and drive it yourself (thanks, Loes and Pierre). Sounded simple enough, but little did we know we’d be one of very few sets of travelers doing just that. Much like in India, few Westerners drive themselves. Thankfully, with my year in India I’ve become an expert rider in developing world Asian traffic and finally found a place to put those months and months of watching to use. Bali traffic more closely resembles India than any other place I’ve been. There’s not quite the diversity of implements on the road, but still a great number of slow moving scooters, slower moving trucks, and stray dogs to avoid while swerving in an out of oncoming traffic on roads that are typically a lane and a half wide. In hindsight, it’s probably easy to understand why people don’t drive the island, but I must admit I felt a certain amount of pride when asked where our driver was by cheerfully responding that I had my own car.

That car was a late model Daihatsu Feroza, a two-door mini-SUV type contraption. I had forgotten that Daihatsu was even a company much less think I’d ever have the pleasure of getting behind the wheel of one of their fine vehicles. While exceedingly basic, it got the job done. And at $25 a day with insurance included, it seemed a small price to pay for complete freedom of movement. It included a guy that met us at the airport upon arrival and agreed to pick up the vehicle at the boat landing in Sanur where we caught our fast boat over to Nusa Lembongan.

Yep, I'm that excited to get behind the wheel of the Feroza

Perhaps what scares many visitors to Bali from driving are the various warnings one can come across while researching the topic prior to traveling. Based on Lonely Planet and other online research I performed, it convinced me into getting an international driver’s license for fear of getting pulled over at any intersection by a Balinese cop looking for a handout from an unsuspecting foreigner. As it turns out, the rental car place could have cared less if I had that license and I was pulled over a grand total of zero times. I was only told I didn’t know what I was doing one time when I started down a one way in Ubud in the wrong direction. I learned then that the concept of “one way” only applies to vehicles with four wheels as any number of motorcycles and scooters seemed exempt from the restriction.

Having come from India, it doesn’t phase me to see entire families on a motorcycle. If it’s the most cost effective way to transport one’s family, who am I to argue? What seemed odd to me in Bali wasn’t the number of people on scooters and motorcycles, it was the age of the children driving them alone. Maybe I’m getting old and teenagers look younger than they used to; or maybe kids wearing school uniforms are simply allowed to drive themselves around.

While most of what we saw could probably be done by taking day trips while staying at one of the more traditional tourist centers of Bali (Kuta, Seminyak, or Jimbaran in the south or Ubud a little further to the north, home of the “Eat, Pray, Lover’s” – more on them in a later post), driving it ourselves helped us get away from the tourists and enjoy the island at our own pace. If you ever make it here; heed this simple advice: get a car and a map, bring some patience, don’t be afraid to ask directions, and you’ll have an unbelievable experience.

My International Driver's License

While researching our upcoming holiday trip to Bali, source after source mentioned how an international driver's license was required to drive on the island. I honestly neither knew this license existed nor how to go about getting one. If caught without a license, the punishment varies but the prevailing scenario seems to be that one pays the cop off at the going rate, somewhere between $10 - $20, depending on how much cash the cop thinks you're carrying. Since we're planning to spend a majority of the trip driving around the island, I decided to lock in my expense and get the license. Perhaps I'm more risk averse than I like to think.

What does it take to get a license? You pretty much go to this website, fill out the application, send in an electronic copy of your signature, passport photo, and current valid government-issued driver's license, select your method of delivery, and two to ten business days later you have a license.

Pretty sure if there's ever a "wanted" sign for me, this is the picture they'll use

The most impressive part of this entire process was that I actually received the license. With time being of the essence, I was forced to select DHL international express shipping, which goes for the low, low price of $59. Or, said another way, three to six Indoensian bribes. Not needing the undo attention in the event of pullover or two (which apparently are fairly common for visitors), I easily justified the added expense. Having placed the order on Monday morning, I was shocked when my driver pulled it out as he dropped me off tonight. And yes, I realize that sounds ridiculous, but thankfully both our drivers are friendly with the building guards and have some sort of system worked out to get us our packages. Whatever it takes; I'm not one to complain.

With my new international license in hand, which even though until two weeks ago I had no idea even existed is valid in any United Nations country, I'm allowed to drive just about anywhere. I can't wait to whip it out to my trusty driver Kailash, tell him to hit the passenger seat, and take him on a little ride through the streets of Gurgaon.

The Freezing Point

At work yesterday, someone told me the upcoming weather in Delhi included low temperatures that dipped below freezing. Skeptical, I decided to check the ten day forecast. Thankfully, he was wrong (at least according to the 10-day forecast). The lowest listed temperature was 55 degrees Fahrenheit, well above the magical mark.

The balmy temperatures not withstanding (it's still typically around 80 here during the days), his comment sparked a little curiousity. Has it ever snowed in Delhi or Gurgaon? What would happen if it did? Based on short research, the closest thing I could find was a morning frost in 2006, which was the first in 70 years.

As a result of this event, weight issues on the power lines caused power cuts across the city and schools were shut down for three days. Slightly more dramatic than the first unexpected frost in Illinois, where the largest victim might be the uncovered flowers in my Mom's garden. Without central heat, it makes a little more sense why such drastic measures are necessary. Based on my short winter in the apartment last year (after living in a hotel with central heat for much of January), I had to admit that 50 degrees in Delhi feels a lot different than 50 degrees in Chicago. While this winter I still probably won't break out the "woolens" quite as regularly as the locals, there will be far fewer sarcastic comments about the thick sweaters and stocking caps in 50 degree weather.

As far as snow goes in Delhi, I'm still not sure it's ever happened. If it does, the two things I'd want to witness would be (1) the locals initial reaction, many of which have probably never seen the white stuff and (2) the traffic.

To stereotype, drivers in the northern U.S. (take me, for instance) and especially those living in mountainous regions consider themselves expert drivers in the snow; whereas, they consider drivers in the warmer southern states to be far inferior when driving in snow and ice based on their exposure to the elements (I'm sure southerners question northerners decision to live in a climate where it's even an issue). Regardless, I can't imagine people that have never seen snow would fare much better than those stereotyped southerners.

Of course, I'm sure the Indian reaction would be much the same: why develop an unneeded skill?

Pushkar Camel Festival

The dream is over. The dream that is, of purchasing a camel, taking a picture of said camel, and quickly selling that same camel. Luckily, that was the only disappointment of a weekend in Pushkar, which ironically, also included pushing a car.

The Pushkar Camel Festival was one of the top "things" we wanted to experience in India. Officially, it's an eight day dual-purpose festival set in Rajasthan, about a six hour train journey from Gurgaon. It's part state fair and part functional camel trade show. The earlier you arrive, the more it resembles a camel trade show. Gradually through the week, the camels start to leave and supposedly it becomes more about the cultural festival. We were there for opening weekend. When you have a wife that has an inexplicable love of camels, that's a good thing.

The somewhat contentious relationship between Lindsay and the camel

Traveling with us for the weekend were our friends Jodi and Ben. They had experienced the festival last year but went to the second weekend (i.e., nearly all festival, nearly no camels). Making the trip all the easier, Jodi had planned everything (train tickets and the tent) and Ben really wanted to negotiate to take an Ambassador from the station, so there really wasn't much for either Lindsay or I to do besides show up. Quickly finding a car, we started the thirty minute journey in a 1989 Ambassador, which could have been produced in 1969 for all we knew.

Pushkar? Push car.

We arrived at camp (around Pushkar a number of full-service camps pop up each year at festival time) relatively unscathed. Other than the driver having never heard of our camp, apparently getting into some sort of argument on the phone when asking for directions (which is more common than you'd think), and the car completely stalling out (requiring Ben and I to give it a push start), it was an enjoyable ride. After a quick lunch, we hopped on a camel cart for the slow forty minute ride back to the festival. As a means of actual transportation, a camel cart leaves a little to be desired. However, it's seemed the proper way to approach and initially explore the mela grounds ("mela" basically means gathering or fair; it's also commonly used for craft or handicraft shows organized for charitable purposes to sell stuff to expats).

The camp

The grounds seemed to be unofficially divided by type of animal. Upon entering, we passed through the cattle, then on to the horses, before finally coming to the main event: the camels. By some estimates, 20,000 to 25,000 camels. I can neither confirm nor deny those estimates, but I have no room to argue. We stayed fairly close to the village and main mela grounds; however, there were ridges in the distance littered with camels as far as one could see.

In addition to the actual camels, it really was a working trade show. Stalls were set up with any number of camel accessories, including harnesses, colorful beads, saddles, and anything else with which a self-respecting camel herder might want to decorate his or her (actually "his", I didn't see any female herders) camel.

Decorative camel beads

After walking through the festival, riding through the festival, and spending a little time in the village (which, to be honest, resembled any other village in Rajasthan with the same nameless handicraft stalls), we found our camel cart. The camel cart ride seemed extraordinarily long on the way back, especially given the fact that it got dark. It's scary enough to be on an Indian road at night; even scarier when your legs are dangling off the back end of an unlit camel cart, only illuminated by the approaching headlights from behind.

After a nice evening at camp, we were ready for day two. Ben called his driver to pick us up for the slightly more modern though less quaint ten minute car ride back to the grounds. Ben somehow managed to convince the driver to let him get behind the wheel. As a result, Ben realized his dream of driving an Ambassador. I also realized my dream of being driven by a German in an Ambassador on an Indian country road.

Ben realizes a dream

After getting our bearings on the first day, it seemed more comfortable in the mela grounds on the second day. We walked into the festival, gradually making our way back to the camels. Still wanting a camel ride but having been hounded non-stop by people to ride their camels or take a camel cart ride through the festival, Lindsay did the fun thing. She found a herder that didn't approach us but still had a camel with a saddle. I mean, sure, she interrupted the camel's lunch, but the genuine look of surprise (and delight, since it required no work on his part) on the herder's face was well worth it. When he learned that she only wanted a ten minute ride (rather than a tour of the entire grounds), it was all the better. After agreeing on the always enjoyable variable price of "as you wish", she was on her way. Easy, quick money.

If you want to see a person smile, I highly recommend finding Lindsay a camel to ride.

On one end of the grounds stood a blue stadium that played host to the official opening of the festival on Sunday. With open admission and a fairly lax policy to walk around on the field of the stadium, we had a close-up view to the camel races that mark the festival's start. Pushkar is a holy city where non-vegetarian food and alcohol is forbidden; however, they seemed to relax any restrictions on gambling for the festival's opening. I didn't get the chance to participate, but before each race on the field, you could have just as easily been in a pit on the New York Stock Exchange with the buy tickets being hand written as the books were being made for the next race.

Starting line for the camel race

Other than the gambling and camel races, the highlight of the stadium was a section with local Rajasthani women in colorful and traditional dress. Like tourists that get surrounded and constantly hounded by hawkers, these women were the object of every photographer's shutter. Thankfully, this seemed to be one of their roles at the festival, though I can only assume they were there for some sort of performance (we didn't stick around that long).

Something seems out of place here...

Pushkar was exactly as hoped, though we're glad we decided to go the first weekend. A camel festival without camels would just be another festival. As we experienced it, it was touristy enough that we didn't seem THAT out of place but local enough that you could literally walk off the beaten path. An unbeaten path surrounded by camels.

And in case you were wondering, you can get a camel for a cool Rs. 20,000 (about $450).

The Commute

For residents of the national capital region (NCR) that work outside the home, it's safe to assume I have one of the shorter and luckier commutes. My apartment complex is adjacent to my office complex. The net result? Even though I live at the far end of the apartment complex: a seven minute walk from desk to door; that is, if I have to wait for the elevator at the office.

Yesterday, on the other hand, my luck ran out. My company has three offices in the NCR; the one described above, the one where the Wife works which is about a fifteen minute drive and still in Gurgaon (southwest of Delhi), and the one located in Noida, which is the "other" suburb of Delhi on the east side of the capital. Yesterday, I finally went to Noida.

Making matters worse, the hours I needed to be in the office (basically 10 - 6) necessitated hitting the worst of the Delhi rush hour on both ends. Having spent six months commuting from the Taj Palace Hotel in Delhi to Gurgaon during my first assignment in 2004, I'm quite familiar with the flow of Indian traffic jams; the close quarters created when a road designed for two lanes of traffic is stuffed full of vehicles inches apart with motorcycles and scooters filling in the gaps. That, I'm used to and while, frustrating, completely met my expectations. What I couldn't figure out was the traffic in Noida. Here is a city so new that its name is an acronym (New Okhla Industrial Development Authority), yet the traffic pattern lead to 45 minutes in traffic inching forward to get off the highway and into town. The roads seemed wide enough to handle the volume, yet at random intervals along the road, the all too common police barriers were set up, basically chicaning the eager commuters and delaying their progress to the glass and steel towers of Noida. No construction, no evident reason, just people getting delayed for the sake of getting delayed. Based on the amount of open space waiting for development, the problem is going to get a lot worse before it gets any better.

A fairly typical scene in Delhi traffic

Days like yesterday make me realize how lucky I am to spend ten minutes a day commuting rather than the four hours I spent patiently riding through the streets of Delhi and sitting in the traffic mess that is Noida. And yes, I recognize a seven minute walk in both directions would technically be 14 minutes of commuting, but you don't expect me to actually walk both directions, do you?

Trials and Tribulations of Turkish Travel

So it really wasn't a trials and tribulations type of trip, but I couldn't think of a better post title. Here's a quick list of observations on some of the various aspects of our recent trip to Turkey. What you're about to read is complete opinion, so take it for it's worth.

The Language
A quick lesson I learned upon arrival in Turkey was that for all intents and purposes, the India in which I live has no language barrier. Sure, I may force myself to speak slower or use fewer or less complex words when communicating to certain people, the net result is that communication in India is simply not an issue. I lulled myself into thinking that was the case everywhere.

Then I showed up in Turkey. I was absolutely stunned at the lack of English language fluency in the country. I ignorantly didn't think those types of places still existed. Among the English-deficient included those that make their living in tourist-heavy industries; airport employees, hotel employees, taxi drivers. After some initial frustration, it was actually refreshing in a strange way to find a place that, in this day and age, that basically said, "screw it, we speak our language." Turks weren't rude about not knowing their language and they were genuinely helpful when asking for directions or trying to communicate; however, some were nearly as stubborn about speaking my language as I was about even attempting to learn their's. Even when both parties were equally stubborn (ok, maybe one side was stubborn and the other was ignorant), once a key word was understood I'd gleen enough information to get myself where I needed to be.

Maybe that's the case through the rest of Europe or other parts of the world. Maybe I live in a privileged bubble in India. Maybe English isn't becoming the global language after all, which is certainly frustrating as a unilingual traveler, but I'm not exactly in a position to complain.

The Flag
The Turkish flag is bright red with a white cresent moon and a white star, and in Turkey, it's everywhere. On the front end of the trip I thought that maybe it was just because we were in a port where ships and smaller boats proudly displayed the flag; the nautical world is, after all, a little more flag happy than other worlds. However, I quickly realized that it wasn't a "we have flags on our boats because flags are cute and seemingly more approrpiate on boats" kind of place. Proudly flying in any prominent place was the basic yet imposing and impressive Turkish flag. Let's just say that with the flag and the language, it's fairly obvious that the 70 million Turks are proud of their country and culture.

The Heat
As any guidebook or website will tell you, Turkey is hot in August. For some reason, having lived through one of the hotter springs and early summers in fifty years in India, I thought I would be immune to effects of the heat. What I failed to realize is that even if I'm exposed to temperatures in India that regularly approach 120 degrees Fahrenheit, I'm exposed to those temperatures for minutes at a time, not entire days. Bottom line, the guidebooks and websites weren't lying; Turkey is hot in August.

The Coffee
While walking around Bodrum one evening, a restaurant owner was conveniently walking into the patio just as we were walking past. As is usually the case in Turkey, he tried to lure us in to the restaurant, which was (I think) the only Chinese restaurant in Bodrum. Having no intention of eating Chinese food but still interested in the free coffee, we decided to sit down, where as promised, we were brought free Turkish coffee and the restaurant owner, "Charlie," sat and talked to us. It was a little sketchy (if not disturbing) that he guessed the hotel we were staying at saying only, "another American couple was there the night before and mentioned there was one other American couple at the hotel" (note, we had no idea who this other American couple was). Maybe it was a coincidence, maybe we're naive. He was an interesting guy who had been an interpreter in Iraq and avidly followed the NBA even though the west coast start times weren't terribly convenient for his time zone. At any rate, the Turkish coffee was actually very good, stronger than any I've ever tried before (I'm a staunch black coffee drinker but had to ask for sugar), and left a good half inch of sludge in the bottom of the small cup. As we were leaving, we tried to leave a small tip for the waiter (something like $3 for the two free coffees) and they nearly forced it back in our pocket. Charlie ultimately seemed to just want to show us some good hospitality. Of course, if we had wanted Chinese food at a harborside restaurant in Turkey, he may have just had a sale.

The People
As evidenced by Charlie, the people of Turkey were extremely gracious hosts and very friendly. Even with the language struggles, they were more patient with us than they needed to be and I never felt uncomfortable or like I was in the wrong place. They were easy to talk to and Lindsay found, that if she offered to take a picture of a group of people, they often wanted to include her in the picture. We were visiting a cave church near Goreme one day and Lindsay climbed a ladder to get into the chamber. After she got up, there was a group waiting to come out that I left come passed. In the two or three minutes that it took me to get into the chamber, she had made good friends with these two older women that were there with their family. I have no idea how she did it, but it was good to see that Ambassador Luth was back in action (I had no idea Lindsay was this funny but apparently she can tell a good joke in Turkish).

The Touts
Those same guidebooks that warn summer travelers of the heat also warn unsuspecting tourists that they will be mercilessly badgered by people trying to sell them things on the street. This is one area where our experience in India had us ready, if not too ready. In India, it's best to simply not make eye contact or keep walking as people approach to try and sell you something in a market. In short in Turkey, "no" really means "no."

The Driving
I drove for the first time in nearly seven months and also realized shortly after leaving the rental car counter that it was the first time I had driven in a foreign speaking country. Admittedly, it took a couple days to get comfortable behind the wheel again; however, I struggled the most with the signage. Signs indicating the street name were either nonexistent or precariously posted walls that weren't too obvious. Arrows at various angles seemed to inconsistently indicate exactly where one was supposed to turn. Ultimately, I made it where I was going, it was just more frustrating that I would have hoped. When asking for directions, our pronunciation of cities and streets pretty much sucked so that took longer than you would typically expect or we'd get one key information from a person and drive until we felt it time to ask a new person. Often times directions would come in the form of, "just keep driving and then turn left." Not exactly the precision of Google Maps.

The roads were actually in very good condition, and, unlike a certain other place, drivers basically stayed in their lanes. Other drivers had a habit of coming up right behind you and swerving out and swerving right back in front of you; however, I quickly determined that if I drove a little faster this didn't happen nearly so often.

The Verdict
As a whole, there is a lot to see in Turkey. Probably not groundbreaking news there. It's a little difficult to get around by yourself but ultimately not impossible (as proven by the fact that I'm writing this from my living room in India). In fact, for us, it actually helped define the trip and was part of our experience. Since the wife and I tend to have about a 90 minute attention span when just looking at things, we were much better off driving ourselves around without a guide trying to explain everything to the "nth" degree. Of course, we would have been somewhat insulated from some of the items above, but then again, would fun would that be?

Tollway Exemptions

Every time I drive between Delih and Gurgaon I get a kick out of this sign (apologies I couldn't get the entire sign, but this is the best result after five or six attempts from a moving vehicle). It just seems an odd thing to post so publicly to make sure everyone is aware that the VVIP's don't pay the INR 15 toll (or in American currency, $0.33).

The sign raises a few questions (which I'm sure have reasonable, less interesting answers): What constitutes an "independent consultant" (number 13)? Why the discrimination against "central and state ministers" and "speaker of central and state legislature" (numbers 6 and 7)? Would they ever be going through a toll and not do so in a vehicle?

It's Not So Foreign Here

I had the opportunity to watch the Holland/Japan game with our Dutch neighbors yesterday. They claimed to be novice soccer fans so I felt I might fit in; however, once the game started they seemed to know all the players by names and the sordid private details of their strikers' lives (apparently the strikers appear more in the tabloids than those playing defense). It was a good game, though Japan's style of play effectively killed the viewing enjoyment in the first half. Other than that, I must admit it was a little odd to see my cook playing with their baby in the background throughout the game (we found our cook because she's their nanny so it really shouldn't have seemed strange).

After the game, we had a long, casual dinner with varied topics. The thing that got me to think the most (other than the fact I learned Samoa recently changed from driving on the right side of the road to the left side of the road to better coordinate with Australia and New Zealand) was that I now believe it's relatively easier to be an American expat than an expat from another country.

The reason for this is not deep at all; in fact, it's fairly basic. All around me, whether driving on the streets or shopping in stores, there are signs of America: McDonald's, Tommy Hilfiger, Budwesier, Pizza Hut, even TGI Friday's. While it can easily be argued that those images have varying degrees of importance in American society, they are still familiar symbols that one can easily identify with. The same holds true in the grocery store, where many of the imported products are imported from the U.S. If I want Skippy peanut butter, I can get it in three or four varieties (sadly, Jif isn't available). You pay a price, but it's here.

For the Dutch? EVERYTHING is foreign here (except Heineken). At least when I'm paying INR 250 for a small jar of peanut butter, I know what I'm getting and paying a premium for a small piece of home. For them? It's just an expensive jar of foreign peanut butter.

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Other random things I learned yesterday:

• The announcers of the Holland/Japan game mentioned a connection between Holland and South Africa with this paraphrased quote, "The Dutch have some history in this country; 300 years ago Holland conquered South Africa."
• The country of Holland fields a world-class soccer team from a population base that is equivalent to the states of Illinois and Iowa.
• Children's clothing is outrageously expensive in India; unwittingly confirmed by Lindsay after her day of shopping and a birthday purchase for our niece.
• When Lindsay doesn't want me to know how much money she spends shopping, she switches between currencies when listing how much she spent on various items to throw me off her trail. It doesn't work.
• Samoa's decision to switch which side they drive on the road was the first such switch since the 1970's. Sweden was the last such country. Not the country I would have guessed.
• The Prime Minister of Samoa likes to wear flip-flops.