Djurdjevic - Personal Photos - Around the World Trip

23 Jan 2011

Updated July 15, 2007

'Round the World, Again

New York, France, Spain, Germany, UK, India, Thailand, Japan...

BANGALORE, July 14, 2007 - As I did on our approach to Mumbai, I kept taking shots of our landing in Bangalore...

Due to its higher elevation (about 3,000 feet, like Tucson, for example), the Bangalore climate is more moderate than that in Mumbai. The temperatures are lower and the air is drier, as is the ground. That should be evident from the above pictures. The brown patches are more typical of the highlands in Arizona than the jungles of lowlands in India.

The ground doesn't get green until just around the airport, where there is a small stream that feeds the fields around it.

The Bangalore airport is a low unappealing building that's reminiscent of what some smaller U.S. airports used to look like in the 1950s. It is in sharp contrast to the city's global image as the Silicon Valley of India.

Prior to my arrival, my hosts had informed me that I would be met by a "chauffeur driven Hertz limo" which would take me to my hotel. Hah! You should have seen this "limo" and the "chauffeur." It was a dusty old beat up SMALL black car with a driver in a black T-shirt and jeans who was trying to hustle me for sightseeing trips. The only thing remotely resembling a limo or a chauffer was the black color of the car and the driver's clothes.

When I got to this Park Bangalore hotel, disappointments continued. My room was tiny; furniture spartan; the hotel was utilitarian, aesthetically unattractive... Worse, it was in the middle of the bustling city, noisy as hell, with a view of dilapidated buildings and construction site in front of my room. Take a look above. I took the picture from my balcony. This is what "a room with a view" means at a high quality hotel in Bangalore, as I had been told beforehand by my hosts. It was a small consolation that my room was clean and the hotel staff kept smiling.

With all the money giant American corporations are spending here, you'd think there'd be at least some top quality hotels by now. And maybe there are... but I would not know it based on my initial experiences.

After traveling for 7,000 or 8,000-miles, my body was aching for some exercise, but my brain wanted to go to sleep. So I decided to swim and then sleep. I knew that physical activity would help me get over the physical exhaustion by tomorrow. That's another 'recipe' for long distance travel: Try to exercise as much as possible on arrival, as unappealing as that may seem when you're dead tired.

As it turned out, after I did about 600 yards in the hotel pool, I stayed awake till after 11PM local time, doing my Munich and London travelogues. And when I finally went to bed, I had to go asleep to the loud "doom-doom" sounds of the hotel disco (or a place nearby). It reminded me of some vacation places I had stayed at in the Mediterranean in my youth. Except that I am not here on holidays, so sleep is more important than dancing...