Empire based fun

The greatest headline that never was: "Chinamen fear savage beating by Longwang" BBC World told me that a typhoon called Longwang was moving through the pacific, I'm not proud to say that I hoped it eventually made the newspapers.

Overheard in the office the other day: "If you're going to wear poo in your hair, make sure it's fresh". Poo ofcourse mean flowers but you all knew that, I giggled like a little schoolgirl though. Its Onam at the moment, a harvest festival from Kerala. I'ld tell you more about it but I wrote that ages ago and will post it when I find it.

Down the road from me is a "Gujarat handicraft cum-sale" yet more giggling.

Too tired now, next time: A guide to whitey and whitey spotting. Bring your eye-spy book of whitey, you'll need it!

Hello again

I'ld tell you hello in Tamil but it's not used outside Tamil Nadu. There is no official language of India, everytime Hindi is suggested the tamils block it. I know yes and no, which helps for negotiating all the autorickshaws.
A little about my situation. Work is developing the website out here. Small company, very nice people and work wouldve had a very nice beginning if it wernt for the NYTimes. Thomas Friedman, NYTimes columnist and author wrote a piece about American kids being left behind in education, mentions us and our server fell over for a while. After about 2 weeks we've replied to almost all enquiries and people have got evaluation accounts if we think they'ld like to sign up. Incidently, this is my first Sunday off and I cant think of much to do that isnt ramble here.
India is great but I don't know how to describe it. There are many, many shops but theyre not very big. It seems like everyone has some kind of stall be it fruit or tea or the girls making strings of flowers. Just down one street you'll find maybe 5 or 10 of the same sort of shop, I have no idea how they keep in buisness. There are so many autorickshaws buzzing around the city (or atleast the parts Ive explored). Autos are small 2 seaters that'll take you around the city, you negotiate the price before or after but its significantly easier beforehand. There are so many of them that they'll pull up to block you crossing the road, if you catch their eye they'll try and stop for you to get in. Cars honk their horns merely to show that they're driving, there are less lights and travel tends to be quite slow because of the number of cars on the road.
Food varies from mediocre to amazing. TN is predominantly Hindu so restraunts are 50/50 veg based, which makes for some good eating. A good meal with juice too comes to maybe 80rps which is a quid. The nice thing about Chennai is you can go into a hotel with the money in your pocket have a good meal and a beer. Local beer is water and is sold in wine shops or Hotels and comes with a good warning: Alcohol ruins Country, Family, Life. Seems alcohol is one of the most serious things here and can lead to being disowned. Its just TN though and doesnt spread into Kerala, just to the west of here.
I'll leave with that and add more soon. Daljit dhaliwal.