Where was I?

India was fantabulous. The food, the colours, the fabrics, the manic traffic, the lack of road rage, the polite people.  Not fabulous:  jet lag, coffee, spending two hours in a traffic jam getting back to the hotel after a long, long day and  the beds in the hotel (single, thin mattress).

I flew into Mumbai on the Sunday night.  I had a driver waiting for me and gave some of my clients a lift to their hotel.  We had a fabulous dinner that night at a restaurant specialising in food of the North West which is ranked in the top 50 in India.  The tandoori lamb (forgive me, that's a bastardisation of what it was really called) was tender and fragrant and fell off the bone.  The breads were light and fluffy and more-ish.  There was a huge platter of grilled vegetables and paneer cheese.    Fantastic clean and sharp flavours.

Traffic was astounding and every street has small businesses filling up the sidewalk.  And lots of people but not so many more than any other big asian city. 

We then travelled on to Bangalore, call centre capital of India.  The hotel was three times the price of the Mumbai one and pretty shabby but this is a town where business is booming but infrastructure still has to catch up.

But did I shop?  i did and my colleague turned out to be an extremely agreeable shopping companion.  He hung around the shop with all the wall hangings and bedspreads.   And we both loved the sari shop, not least because it all looked so like an old fashioned haberdashery shop with piles of silks in glass fronted wooden cabinets and rows of clerks waiting to be of service.  I bought two saris just for the delicious pleasure of handling the silk.  Six yards of silk for around $30 australian.

I so want to go back with my huge shopping list.  Orange and pink never seemed so attractive.

I'll post some photos later when I find the cable to connect my camera to the computer.

Comments

[ab]

Good to have you back and looking forward to seeing you in your sari.

ab

[David]

Sounds wonderful. I'm quite envious.

[Lisa B-K]

Good to see you!

I'm quite fond of orange and pink these days myself... anyhow, it sounds like a fantastic trip.

[rara avis]

welcome back. trip sounds amazinng and you have me craving some indian nosh now!