After five years....

Hi there:

I'm back to to my travel blog. It's not like I haven't been anywhere since I last blogged. I've been to the UK a ton of times, plus three trips to Amsterdam, and single visits to Trondheim, Norway, Vancouver and Ottawa, Berlin and of course all over the continental US. But this trip is to Singapore....and that seemed to warrant dusting off the blog. Why am I going to Singapore? Well it's the International Common Criteria Conference,  I've been to every ICCC since 2007....but this one feels very different. Why? Well for one thing the ICCC is a really specialized conference for government security, and that means attendance is usually around 300 or so. But this time, the ICCC is a subset of a much larger security event, "Singapore Cyber Week." I have no idea how much bigger this will be but it definitely will have some effect.
I'm writing this at Logan and waiting to board my Virgin Atlantic flight. I'll be in the back of the bus for this journey so don't expect any wow moments! One funny moment though was that my Flexbar that I put in my carry-on (to help with my golfer's elbow injury) got me selected for a deeper bag check. Apparently it looks like sharp object.

As always your comments are appreciated!!

Goodbye India and Final Thoughts

Friday  was interminably long.  I continued to feel strong allergy symptoms...congestion, drip ... something triggered my symptoms....the flight was just way too long.  People were sneezing and coughing around me I felt so conscious of my health.  My back was bothering me what can I say India was telling me to leave...so I did.  By the time I finally crashed last night at around 9pm my body just shut down.  It was like running out of gas....putt put putt...OUT.

Some general thoughts about India:

• As I wrote throughout my time there, the squalor the poverty cannot be over estimated.  And I heard that Mumbai is much worse!
• On the other hand Oracle had a banner conference, our political and tactical goals were absolutely met with a roaring success
• My panel went really well, and I enjoyed it!
• The Indian food I did have was fantastic.  I'm convinced I got Dehli belly from the Chinese restaurant we went to last Friday.
• Service is overwhelming in India.  I've never been bowed to more in my life.   
• You will get sick in India.  If its not the food its the germs.  Just be prepared.
• The Taj Mahal is one of the most amazing places I've ever seen.  Unforgettable.

All my pics (plus some taken by others are online).  I'll be adding to this album and organizing it over the next few days. Thanks for reading!

Thursday September 11, New Dehli

Thursday I woke up with a definite something going on in my throat.   I also had lost some of my voice.    This was my 10^th day in India and at this point I was anxious to get out of the country…but not without seeing a bit more of the city.   Sessions and meetings went by pretty fast and the final plenaries were mostly boring.   It absolutely poured all morning (monsoon?) which has some impact on the story later.  After lunch Stephanie, Petra, Franck and I decided to go to the Old City and do some exploring.  We hopped in a cab and asked him to take us to the Red Fort.  Now the Red Fort is impressive in its own right, but we wanted to go to the largest Mosque in India, the Jama Masjid.   The taxi ride was mostly uneventful, other than the horrifying image of a man on a motorcycle with a woman on the back sitting sideways and holding onto him with one arm and an infant in the other!  Oh the other problem was that the rain had created many flash floods.

Flooded streets

The mosque was literally across the street from the Red Fort but to get there we had to navigate an incredibly busy street, and then (due to the earlier monsoon), a muddy, puddle filled mélange of some of the worst smells I had ever experienced.  Franck seemed to know where he was going so we followed him.  Unfortunately so did the rickshaw bikes…they never gave up!  The walk to the mosque was really like walking through an open air sewer.  I've never felt so awful for a people as I did walking that short mile.

The road to the Mosque

Stephanie navigates her way to the mosque

Franck leads us to the mosque

Eventually we got to Gate 2 and started walking up the stairs to the mosque.

Gate 2 of the Mosque

 It was very hot and humid and up to that point I was happy I was in shorts.  Then as I got close a man approached me and signaled that I had to cover my legs.  This resulted in what my friends thought was an absolutely hilarious out fit for me, of a wrapped blue piece of cloth (skirt?) that i had to wear the rest of our time there.   I think that my friends must have taken 15 pics of me in this outfit.  Even the locals thought I looked ridiculous.  

Me and my skirt

Franck, Petra, Me and Stephanie

It is an amazing mosque.  People were praying and they were also drinking out of the pool in the middle of the square.  Of course we had to take our shoes off as well. We headed to the back of the courtyard to try and climb one of the spires of the minarets.   When we got there we agreed to take a guided tour.  The steps were very narrow and I almost wiped out on my skirt a couple of times, but the view was so worth it.    Again all I kept seeing was the squalor...the abject poverty of the city.   This stood in stark contrast to our little problems...the term of the week was #firstworldproblem ....like can't get good data service on our cell phone, or the restaurant only takes cash...the problems we have as Westerners pale in comparison to people who shit in the open, beg for food every day and probably have a very short life expectancy with little hope.   Before we climbed the spire we had to leave our shoes (we had been carrying them) and we paid someone to watch them.  Our guide took our photo and we paid him as well.  After snapping a few photos

View of the top of the Mosque

Climbing the spires of the minarets

At the top of the minaret

at the top we made our way down and started the walk to the taxi which was waiting in the parking lot of the Red Fort.  Again we were assaulted by beggars and rickshaw bike drivers who wanted to take us wherever we wanted.  They were particularly fascinated by Petra (blonde hair) and by Franck who is 6'4".  I can't overestimate how stressful it is to walk in this part of the city.  You feel like anytime something awful will happen, but at the same time you can't give any money to a beggar or you will be overwhelmed with kids asking for handouts (often a part of a scam).  Finally we got to the car and Franck asked the driver to take us to what we thought was an open air market called Dehli Haat. It turned to be another high pressure store for gifts and textiles.  I did end up buying some gifts (probably spent too much).  By the time I got back to my room, my allergies had really kicked in (belly was fine), and Duncan had texted me that we were going to dinner at 7:30pm.  I should have declined and went to bed early but I went ahead anyway.  We went back to the same hotel of Bhukkara this time to the West View The Grill Room there.   Again the contrasts were striking to me.  A couple of hours ago we saw people living in their own shit. Then we were at a fabulous hotel getting our Rack of Lamb grilled to our liking.  There is no middle ground in India.
By the time I got home it was 11:30pm and I still hadn't packed for the trip home.  I was feeling some ear pain (I was clearly congested) and I was hoping I didn't have an ear infection. The germs we had walked through that day, you couldn't wash your hands enough.

Wednesday September 10, New Dehli

Wednesday was a crazy day.  I woke up at 5:30am and headed to the gym.  This was a big accomplishment since I had been so sick the last few days!  Then I headed up to the club for breakfast (this was a pretty cool option as eating at the restaurant downstairs meant that anyone could sit down at my table...) to meet Duncan and I thought the Government Relations guys for breakfast.  But they didn't show...so instead I enjoyed the last moment of solitude until I went to bed.   Then I had 2 back to back meetings with NSA (one with a larger group of other vendors, then just Oracle).  By 9:30am I had to meet my moderator and prepare for my 10am panel.  We met in the VIP room and it was oppressively hot.  The reason is the “VIP Room” was actually a partitioned area placed next to large plate glass windows.  The result?  It was a sauna in the room.   I suggested that it was oppressively hot and could we go somewhere else?   So we went downstairs to one of the track rooms.   Surprisingly the prep went well; and I took just a few notes about what I would say to certain questions.  After only about 25 minutes we headed up to the Main plenary room.   I sat down next to the moderator.   The time flew by and I got a couple of good responses that I got complimented later on from the audience.  Here’s a shot of me on the panel that came out ok: 

My Panel

The rest of the day was  I was in intense meeting after meeting.   By mid-afternoon, I started to feel some allergy symptoms coming on…so I went back to my room to take a short break.  That seemed to help as I had 3 more hours of meetings that lasted right up to the cultural presentation at 7pm. 

I changed (we were getting one certificate) and headed down for what turned out to be a pretty good dance recital, spanning the variety of dances in India.   There was one audience participation dance that seemed to have some parallelism to the Hava Nigila Jewish dance. 

Indian Dancing

There was also a dance for the monsoon (which apparently worked).  Some of the dignitaries took part and that was pretty funny.    There was no “Gala” to the dinner, just another Indian buffet, but at least they had a Pasta bar so I had that….still being careful about my stomach.   I had a few laughs with some friends,  and at some point there was talk about going to the club in the hotel “Kitty Sue.”  But by 10:30pm I was so exhausted that I went up and crashed.

Feeling better

Monday morning almost normal. . Thanks everybody for the well wishes!

Sunday September 7, New Dehli

I don't want this blog to be a health blog, but its a part of the story.  I did not sleep well...up every 2 hours or so.   I got up thinking I was going to go on the All Day Dehli tour that I had signed up for but I knew fairly early on that it was a bad idea.  The Dehli Belly had taken a predictable turn and I was now confined to be near a toilet.   I did venture down and have  a peanut butter and marmalade on toast sandwich.  But I stayed in my room all morning.
Actually by lunch I started to feel a bit better and (probably pushing it) came down and had lunch (Chicken Noodle soup and a couple of slices of vegetarian pizza).  I decided to give it a go and go on the afternoon tour of the Akshardham temple which also included "shopping."   This was an over the top temple only recently built...no photos and no electronics could be brought in, but it was pretty spectacular.   It is the world's largest comprehensive Hindu temple (Guiness Book of World Records).  The Golden statue of one of the Hindu Gods alone was beyond belief...you'll have to trust me on this as I took no pics.  
People said I wasn't looking so good, and they were right...my stomach started to feel bad..but I held it together as we went to a rug store (where we got a demonstration in how to make rugs).  Then they put the sell on us (the rug they showed us was only $22,000).   I headed back to my room and here I've been the rest of the night.  No dinner with my team and a partner.  No drinks with the boss or a friend.  Just in my room.   I just ordered a vegetarian sandwich...because my stomach is completely empty and we'll see how it sits.  Tomorrow the work week really kicks in and I need to be 100%!  But don't feel bad for me.   A guy from NSA who sat next to me on the bus had the exact same issue except much worse yesterday.   Better to get this over with now and be fine later on in the week.

Saturday September 6, Agra, the Taj Mahal, and the Agra Fort.

We had to be downstairs by 6:45am for the bus to Agra, so my alarm went off at 6am.  Unfortunately I was already up.    I found "porridge" which was a very watery version of Oatmeal, and had that for breakfast (my body was missing its fiber with no raw vegetables being eaten).   That would be the last food I would eat for 15 hours (well I did have 3/4 of a banana).
The bus was extremely cold...A/C tends to either not work at all or be super cold here.     The ride to Agra was supposed to take about 3.5 hours but it took about 4.  We had one stop at a "rest area"which was packed and full of colorful trucks and all kinds of people.
As we arrived in Agra the poverty was stunning.  

Agra

Raw sewage in the river and people living in Mud huts.   And there were so many children begging.

The bus dropped us and we got in large electric golf carts which took us up to the entrance to the Taj.  Security was pretty tight and they have some unusual rules; no books or newspapers...why?   Because the Taj is not a library.   Of course they allow cell phones and tablets so you could read all day, but I wasn't going to correct them on that.  They were however going to confiscate my New Yorker...but I promised not to read it there....so they let it go.

Reflection of Taj

The Taj Mahal is stunning in that the whole thing is essentially a is a white marble mausoleum It was built by Mughal emperor Shah Jahan in memory of his third wife, Mumtaz Mahal. The Taj Mahal is widely recognized as "the jewel of Muslim art in India and one of the universally admired masterpieces of the world's heritage."    It took like 22 years to build and each side is exactly the same.  Our tour guide was really terrific...he knew so much history and took some photos.  For example he borrowed my camera and took this reflecting shot off of my sunglasses.   Everything is all designed around the tomb in the center of the main building, but no photography was allowed in there.  There's a mosque there which is the building on the left of the Taj and the right building was supposed to be a guest house, but that never happened.  After the Taj was built, the Shah wanted to build a black one on the other side of the river behind the Taj for himself.  But his son thought he was crazy so he put him under lock and key and the Shah died eight years later.   His last eight years weren't too bad though...he had 200 concubines accompanying him!
The marble was imported from all over India by elephant!  The reflecting pool and gardens were also amazing.  This guy really loved his queen! What's really interesting is how many people come there on pilgrimages.    Since there's a mosque there, they can go and pray while there.  But when you think about it just being a tribute to one queen, its stunning in its over the top architecture.  The inlaid precious and semi-precious stones alone could do a lot to solve the poverty issues in this country.  So many amazing places like the Vatican could do a lot to make people's lives better...but I digress.

View from the Taj looking back

The Taj Mahal with all 4 spires visible

Men carving inlaid stones into marble

After we had finished at the Taj we went to a marble "store" where we got a demonstration in the ancient art of inlaid stones
and marble.   This was followed by the hard sell of seeing if us rich foreigners would buy something, and then after we mostly decided not to buy super expensive stuff, they take you into a 2nd room where they have cheaper items more suitable as souvenirs.
I should mention at this point that while all this was going on, I was not feeling well.   I felt nauseous and I had chills.  I clearly had a case of Dehli Belly.  My colleague Chris gave me some Anti-nausea pills which helped but really dried me out, he also gave me some Tums.   By the time we got to lunch (at a really swank hotel by the way) I was in no mood to eat anything.   So all I had to eat was 3/4 of a banana and a regular coke...probably the 1st time I had regular coke in 20 years.  Somehow I held it together as after lunch we headed to the Agra Fort.  A very impressive architecture as well, but not nearly as pretty as the Taj Mahal.  It was here that the Shah spent those last eight years of his life with his 200 concubines.  The tour guide told us a story that the Shah used to throw a ring in a pool and tell the concubines that whoever found it could be the queen for the night.  A part of the Agra Fort is actually occupied by the Indian Army, but the rest is a museum.  Of course by the time we got here all I wanted to do was get back to the hotel.  The heat was unbearable (with the humidity) and when you add the 40% deet I had applied plus my Dehli Belly I was barely holding it together.  Finally the tour ended and we climbed onto the bus.    I slept part of the way back and when I finally got to my room and its air conditioning, I collapsed into my bed.

Pilgrims lined up at the Agra Fort

Men maintaining the Gardens at Agra Fort

Monkeys everywhere at Agra Fort

Erin and two locals

Entrance to the Agra Fort