At 7am on January 1st, 2016, I started my journey to India. I flew over with Anna, one of our advisors and an alumnus of Olin, and Forrest, a Babson student on our team from Washington DC. When we arrived, we went straight to the hotel in Bangalore. I crashed pretty instantly. Subhash, an Olin student on the team, also joined us at the hotel. After spending the night there and having breakfast with Thiagu (one of the chief executives of Agastya), we piled into a car to commute to Agastya International Foundation, our partner. We drove all through Bangalore, so I got to see a lot of the city from the streets. There were a lot of markets and people bustling about the street. We were even told that the city was pretty empty because people were home for the new year. Surprising as there still seemed to be a lot of people around and lots of stands open on the street. But the newest experience was the insanity of driving. The roads are filled of a range of vehicles, from motorized rickshaws to buses to trucks to cars to motorbikes and scooters. While lanes exist, drivers go wherever they can fit, which can be a lot of interesting places with the conglomeration of vehicles. Also, if a vehicle is going to slow, or even the road is not well paved on your side, the driver doesn’t think twice about going to the other side of the road. I can not tell you how many buses I stared coming at me. Oh, I must I mention, you drive on the left side of the road here. Also, people walked through the street carelessly, either diagonally crossing, or begging to the people in the vehicles stopped for a light or a toll. Finally, horns are used as communication tools, simply to notify someone walking that we are coming or to tell another vehicle to scootch over. Or maybe to warn the pack of any type of animal that they should clear the road. Whatever it is, the horn is used a lot.
On the drive over, we went through a few towns and cities. While we were passing through a town, there was this huge festival going on. We were stopped on the street by a drum line and people in costumes celebrating. There were fireworks and floats. It was quite a sight and a very fortunate coincidence. However also pretty scary as we were stuck there because the festival had pushed into the road. Crowd’s aren’t exactly the safest of places. After we finally made it through the crowd, we continued on the road and saw quite a few more floats and celebrations.
After winding around some dirt roads we made it to Agastya. The campus here brings almost 500 different students from all over the country for field trips for their science lessons almost every day. They have a huge arrangement of programs that they have created and sponsor, and we are working on just one aspect of one of them. We were welcomed with tea and brought to our rooms. Food here is made in a kitchen for the staff and guests. They make one or two dishes each day and that’s what everyone enjoys. It’s a great way to try lots of different things, since there isn’t a choice. It is all home cooked and respective of the cuisine of southern India. After lunch, Anna gave us a walking tour of the campus. We also did some construction of the boxes and organized our materials. We all crashed before dinner, woke up for dinner, made plans for the next day and went back to sleep.
This morning, one of the staff members knocked loudly on my door and whistled. I was confused and jolted, as I was still in bed and in my pajamas. I finally learned that he was there to offer me lemon tea. It was delicious and maybe one of the best ways to wake up. What a good, but pretty scary morning.
On the drive over, we went through a few towns and cities. While we were passing through a town, there was this huge festival going on. We were stopped on the street by a drum line and people in costumes celebrating. There were fireworks and floats. It was quite a sight and a very fortunate coincidence. However also pretty scary as we were stuck there because the festival had pushed into the road. Crowd’s aren’t exactly the safest of places. After we finally made it through the crowd, we continued on the road and saw quite a few more floats and celebrations.
After winding around some dirt roads we made it to Agastya. The campus here brings almost 500 different students from all over the country for field trips for their science lessons almost every day. They have a huge arrangement of programs that they have created and sponsor, and we are working on just one aspect of one of them. We were welcomed with tea and brought to our rooms. Food here is made in a kitchen for the staff and guests. They make one or two dishes each day and that’s what everyone enjoys. It’s a great way to try lots of different things, since there isn’t a choice. It is all home cooked and respective of the cuisine of southern India. After lunch, Anna gave us a walking tour of the campus. We also did some construction of the boxes and organized our materials. We all crashed before dinner, woke up for dinner, made plans for the next day and went back to sleep.
This morning, one of the staff members knocked loudly on my door and whistled. I was confused and jolted, as I was still in bed and in my pajamas. I finally learned that he was there to offer me lemon tea. It was delicious and maybe one of the best ways to wake up. What a good, but pretty scary morning.