I know Kevin and I have not been great at continually posting blogs about our life here in India. We tend to blog about our big trips or big events in our life. The truth is, most of the time our days are all the same: going to work and going home. And, although we see things new everyday, we don't have the time or the organizational skills like some people to actually put it up on a blog. Well, here is my attempt to tell you all a little more about life in India.
Bollywood Stars
Living in Mumbai and especially in Bandra, one would expect to see a few Bollywood stars. Everyone knows where they live and where they go. We hear lots of stories about people seeing them, at Golds Gym or at the restaurant around the corner. There are two things you normally need to be in a situation were you see a Bollywood star. 1. Know who they are and be able to recognize them. 2. Go to places they might be at. (See note above about Kevin and my daily routine.)
Well, I happen to luck out big time, because I saw our first Bollywood star the other day. After finishing my Masters Degree, I felt like I needed to treat myself so that it felt a little more like I was actually done, so I made an appointment to get a pedicure before going on vacation. Luckily, the place I go to is one that some Bollywood stars often go to as well. Of course I still don't really know Bollywood stars (I can only name/recognize about 4 of them) but again, lucky me, someone else did the work for me. As I was sitting there, letting the polish dry oblivious to the woman sitting next to me, all the sudden a group of ladies walked up to the woman and began to gush. They said, "Oh we just had to come say hi and tell you how much we love you. We've seen all your films and are big fans" etc, etc etc. The woman was very kind and polite considering her mani-pedi was getting interrupted.
Now the sad ending to this story is that I still have NO IDEA who she was. I tried to describe her to a friend who knows much more about Bollywood stars and we couldn't figure it out. Oh, well, at least I can say I've seen a Bollywood star in person.
Indian Bureaucracy
Anyone who knows a little about India or has been here has probably heards something about the bureaucracy. Well, I recently experiences a typical situation that I wanted to share with you all. Kevin and I decided to bring Suri home with us at Christmas. (There are many good reasons our decision including weather, other flying concerns for Suri and health issues even though we already miss her a ton and have only been home for 2 weeks. It's going to be a long 5 months!!)
In order to take her out of the country, we needed to get a vet to fill out a healthy to fly certificate, and then we need to take that and 10 pictures of her to get approved by the government. Of course we have to use an agent to get this all done. So I took her to the vet, got the necessary paperwork including photos and then on the Wednesday before we were leaving the agent took all of this paperwork, me and the dog to the government agency for their stamp of approval.
There is another couple who were bringing home their dog at this time and a HUGE thank you to them for letting us ride their coattails on all of this as they did all the legwork and we decided a week before we left that we wanted to take Suri home too. So David a got in a van with our and drove an hour and half to Navi Mumbai. When we got to the government office, the agent said to wait while he went in.
So we waited, and waited...and waited. Four hours later, the agent and government representative came out, looked in the van and nodded. About ten minutes later we left for hour hour long ride home. This whole time, we just sat in the car, or walked our dogs around the concrete parking lot. I'm not sure why we had to go, why our dogs had to be there, but that is what we had to do.
And now she is home, happily enjoying the weather.
क्या कहाना K&E
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