Lazy Tuesday

Since I finished working Monday night, I didn't have to do any work on Tuesday. Unfortunately, since I had finished too late in the evening, I had to delay my flight back to the States until Wednesday.

I didn't really have anything to do and from what I could tell, I have seen everything there is to see in Pune. I wanted to keep it a pretty low key day so I slept in, lounged by the hotel pool, took a nap, had a quick lunch and headed out to the airport.

This gave me some a chance to reflect on my time in India.

On the city of Pune:
I didn't really like Pune. It wasn't very nice and there weren't a lot of places to go/sights to see. I realize this may get me in trouble with many of the folks in the Sebald family, but Pune was very much like Baltimore to me. Baltimore has a few cool spots (Inner Harbor/Camden Yards, Fells Point), but if you're somewhere else, there is nothing t0 do. New York, Chicago, Atlanta... these are cities I am excited to visit. Its hard to get excited about visiting Baltimore. Pune is the same.

On Indian Food:
I tried to be open minded about the food. It was just hard because I am not a fan of spicy food. Even when I asked for non-spicy, I often got something that was at or over my limit. I tried everything that was offered to me though. A few of the things I had were Jhinga Maharaja (prawns in a brownish tomato gravy), Chooza Masala (which was fun to say... I chooza some of this... chicken with chili peppers and tomato sauce) and Gosht Hara Masala (mutton in a curry sauce with mint, cilantro, chili peppers and other spices). Indians feel that no meal is complete until you have some rice so everything is served with rice. Also, you often get an achar on your plate. This is a pickle but instead being pickled with vinegar, which they do in the US, these are pickled in oil. They look pretty much the same but the taste was odd and they are strangely squishy. The one bright spot were the mangos. May and June are the height of mango season and so they were everywhere. My favorite mango dish was mango ice cream with fresh mangos on top. Simply delicious.

On the Autorickshaw:

This is the main form of transportation in and around Pune. These are basically mopeds with a backseat. Autorickshaw drivers are crazy, weaving in and out of traffic. They are really cheap though. We went about 5 miles for 40 Rupees (which is like about $1.20).