Happy Hampi

I was standing in a 3000 year old temple, completely naked and still dripping from the river water. It was at this moment, as I looked out over the boulders and destroyed columns, that I realized Hampi had been calling me all along. A true adventure that began with a bus ticket, a backpack, and a couple bottles of rum.

Friday marked the end of our first official week in India. It was a week packed with new information, new people, new food, and really what amounts to a new way of life in a country that, on the surface, is strikingly different from my own, but, with greater and greater frequency, gives me glimpses of a life full of the same passions, fears, desires and joys as my own. Hampi. We decided to go to Hampi about a week ago. It was easy. At the time, there was no need to book anything, and we figured we'd just take a bus up, see some ruins and head back. Basically a short overnight trip just to say we did it. Two overnight buses in a row seemed like it might be tiring, but whatever. I promised myself I wouldn't waste any time. Friday was a long day. I didn't leave the office until 7:30 because I was waiting for our bus tickets to arrive. They finally did, so I ran home, packed, and then headed over to a party my colleagues were having. There were only three of us going to Hampi that night, but we made an appearance at the party nonetheless. It was a good time. I drank. Took some sweet videos. And acted like an idiot. Typical party Sam. Around 9:30, we packed up the remaining rum we had at the party and headed to the office to catch a cab for the bus station. At the bus station is where the crazy-meter began to make its gradual shift upwards. Little did we know that the crazy-meter would continue to inch upwards over the course of the next 48 hours.

The bus station was totally packed with people. I mean, there are just millions of people everywhere all the time anyway, but man, everybody and their brother was heading out to take a bus Friday night. Turns out, this weekend was a festival weekend and so many folks were heading out of town. This, of course, meant that every single bus would be packed. Needless to say, the three of us ended up in the last three seats, in the last row of a "semi-sleeper". Admittedly, I found this naming convention a little suspicious. Couldn't I just normal sleep? How exactly does one semi-sleep? Suspicious indeed. Our saving grace, alcohol. We knew that no matter how bad this 8-hour bus ride turned out to be, we had booze. And if we drank enough of it, we knew we'd eventually make it to drunk-sleep. And we were fine with that. I think the three of us took some classes in drunk sleep in college, so this would be a piece of cake.

No.

It was not a piece of cake.

It was a piece of whatever is the opposite of cake.

The trip started out great. We went through the Hi. How are ya's? with the other poor souls next to us, set off cruisin down the main drag in Bangalore (and by that I mean immediately into insane traffic) and started mixin some drinks. Yeah! Party! Frat! Sweet! The plan was working. For a while. Problem one. Urine. There was no bathroom on the bus and we were about 2 hours in. As I sit there in a hazy rum fog, Nolan pissed in an empty bottle. Oh and I forgot to mention what they meant by semi-sleeper. See, semi-sleeper means regular bus with no air conditioning and a back window that doesn't work. Problem two. Tom. Tom's a really nice dude from the UK. Drunk Tom is a whacked out lunatic that may get you killed. Now, Tom may be reading this, so I'll try to be as descriptive as possible. At some point, drunk Tom's personal crazy meter started to crescendo and as the normal human beings on the bus lie in slumber, Tom turned his headphones all the way up. Then he started to play the drums on his legs. Then he asked me about 50 times, in pristine British fashion, "Have you ever heard of Oasis?!" I mean, this was already hilarious and out of control on so many levels, but the kicker was that Tom's voice was louder than the really loud bus engine. I totally understood. The bus engine was loud and the music in those head phones at 3am was just blaring. How else were we supposed to have a discussion about the best thing to come out of the UK since the Beatles? We tried to politely ask Tom to keep it down a bit, but that seemed to make him rage a little, and some raging white dude in a bus full of Indians at 3am in the absolute middle of "tigers eat people here" nowhere was definitely not a path I was about to head down. Problem three. The road. About 6 hours in (I still hadn't really slept), the road went from decent to totally ridiculously horrible. Now I'm not some pompous westerner who's too good for other countries roads. These roads were insane. Imagine driving over speed bumps and into potholes, constantly, for 4.5 hours, at 40 mph. Every single second there was another brain-rattling crash that I swear just destroyed the vertebrae in my back. Even better was when there was a really bad one, which was every other one, Tom would yell in the most cliche'd British accent you can muster, "Ahhh for fuck's sake!". This old lady was totally giving him the death eye and he had no idea. I started looking through my dictionary for ways to say "Take him. He's not with me" in Hindi. Luckily, there was no mutiny. Hi Tom.

We eventually did bounce, rock and roll into Hampi. Only, however, after we missed our stop and literally had to call the guide, try to explain what happened, and then finally just really freak out the bus driver by asking him to talk to someone he never met. "Hi, I'm a 6'5" white dude and I'm lost in India. I know you can't understand anything I'm saying, but would you mind talking to this guy?" Extends hand holding cellphone. It worked though. Basawa, our guide, was awesome. He pretty much saved us on a regular basis over the course of the trip. If you ever go to Hampi, which you should, just ask for him by name. He knows everyone. The bus parked and we got out. Then, we wanted to get back in because immediately there were eleventy billion people shouting at us. You want post cards? You need guide? You want a taxi? You want a rick? You want a room? I kind of just said uhhhh alot. I did buy some nice post cards though. You know how we got the commotion to stop? I said, "Uhhh....uhhhh...uhhh." And then I said, "We're looking for Basawa." Silence. Basawa's a man with a plan. People don't screw with his tourists. And like a shining knight on a white mare, there he was. He got out of the air conditioned Nissan Ultima, shook our hands, and we'd never be the same.

After a little rest in a room that Basawa booked for us, we headed out. Tom was still drunk and looked like death. I just smiled a lot. That's my thing. We went to some ruins and got some really good panoramic photos of one of the sites from pretty high up. Oh by the way, I'm done posting photos inside my blog. I think it looks tacky and editing the HTML so that every one shows up right is a total pain in the ass. If you want photos and videos, click on the slide show photos and you'll be taken to a web app where I've been posting all of them. Anyway, we descended down the back side of this slope toward a market and the main temple for that area. The market was bustling and we got to see some really cool stuff. Animals. I really like animals. This place had awesome animals. The first one we saw was a cobra. It was just like the movies. There was some old guy playing one of those recorder things and the cobra popped its head out of a basket and started dancing around. It was crazy. We were walking along the street and everyone kept trying to sell us bananas. I wasn't really sure why, but we bought some. Everyone seriously insisted that we buy their bananas. So here we are walking down the street with these bananas. I happened to glance back and in the distance I saw this cow walking through all the people. Funny. Cows just walk around here. LIttle did I know that this cow had a plan. I glanced back again and noticed that the cow was picking up speed, knocking over little children, and heading towards, well, us. I didn't think too much of it until I turned around a third time and saw thing full trot right towards Nolan. It Wanted the Bananas! Give 'em your bananas Nolan! Run! Oh my god!! We're all gonna die! It was so funny. The cow chased Nolan right into the temple. At the entrance to the temple there were more aggressive animals. Monkeys. These things weren't screwing around either. They'd jump down, smack their palms together as if to say, "Bananas. Now.", and then do their little monkey chirp thing. We handed the monkeys some bananas. Oh but that wasn't all. The cows had our bananas, the monkeys had our bananas, and as we walked through the gate, on the right, a giant elephant was asking for bananas. And not only that, it wanted money too! You walk up, hold out the banana and if it wants to eat it, it does. If not, it puts it down in a pile at its feet for later. Apparently the elephant does blessings as well, but only for cash. And the more cash you give, the longer it blesses you. I gotta try this. I handed its trunk 10 rupies, not really knowing what to expect. It took the cash, put it in a bucket, and then plopped its trunk on my head. It just kept it there for about 8 seconds. I was hooked. I think I gave that elephant a hundred rupies. At one point, after I jumped down from taking pictures with my new fuzzy-trunked friend, Nolan told all the children that I was a giant and that I could bless them too. I was bent over putting my shoes on and when I looked up, there were about 15 pairs of eyes starring at me. I started laughing and they all thought I was hilarious. Then they started touching me. Which was awkward. But still cool.

Basava continued to bring us around to all these wonderful places. He was so knowledgable. He studied archeology and ethnography in college and made his living taking people like us on these adventures. He was good too. He knew exactly what we were looking for and it wasn't the typical tourist traps. Before we knew it, we were straight up Indiana Jonesing it down this river in a buffalo skin boat called a coracle. We paddled down the river and listened to Basawa tell us about Hindu gods and the temples that had been carved into the cliffs. Feeling adventurous, we went for a swim in the river and climbed soaking wet up into one of Sheva's temples. It was here that I stood, flailing in the wind, peering out over the great divide. Conan. Conquerer. Terminator. We climbed down, paddled on, and eventually docked. There was an old lady on the shore making chai, so we stopped for a drink. Delicious.

Lunch was at a famous place called the Mango Tree. There was great food, great drinks, great setting with an outlook over the cliffs, nestled in banana trees, and people had come from all over the world. I managed to strike up a conversation with some Russians, who seemed surprised that I knew where they were from. There were other travelers around, reading books, smoking cigarettes, drinking tea. It was a very relaxed environment and made for a nice resting point before our evening excursions.

Later that night as the sun go down, we climbed another majestic temple. We talked about how crazy it would have been to see this place in its heyday. There were bathhouses, giant platforms for music and dancing, markets, dining halls, even a small temple for beheading people. It was awesome. At one point, we descended into this pitch black underground lair where people were chanting. It was kind of scary. We didn't want them to know we were there, so we tiptoed through and out the other side. I had to use my whip to swing over a precipice in the ground, only barely managing to grab my hat before falling into a snake pit, all the while being chased by a giant boulder that had been sprung upon us by Nazis. I almost didn't make it our alive.

We watched the sun go down atop the tallest temple. You could see everything. It was beautiful.

That night, thanks to Basawa, we had a real sleeper bus for the trip back home. I had my own bed. Nolan and Tom had to share one. Bwhahahahahhaha. We each took some of my sleeping pills and the next thing I remember was a loud "Bangalore! Last stop! Everybody get out!" Took a rickshaw home and slept. A grand adventure indeed.

Ramblin.

We are three days into our first official week. I'm happy to say that I've just hosted my first Open Space, which I hope was a success. Open Spaces are an opportunity for ThoughtWorkers to host discussions on whatever topic they choose. There is no structure for the discussion. It could range from a full on presentation given by the discussion leader, to a completely open format where people just share ideas. I decided to have my discussion on language acquisition. In my class, there are folks from Brazil, China, India, Germany, the US, the UK and New Zealand. Many people, of course, speak their native languages plus English, while others are multi-lingual. My goal was to have a discussion detailing the various techniques and resources I've learned to use for my own purposes in foreign language acquisition, to gather the techniques and resources others have used in their experience, and finally, to relate all of these to the acquisition of programing languages, something many here, of course, are very passionate about. We discussed these things, shared ideas, and I actually learned quite a bit about how programming languages are grouped by various characteristics. In many ways they resemble the language families we see coming from various parts of the world in that there are certain underlying characteristics they all have in common, and yet remain unique languages because of a few central differences. Overall, it was a very interesting discussion.

On a different note, I'm happy to say that I've officially booked all of my plane and logging arrangements for travel over the next 5 weekends! This Friday, myself and a colleague will be taking an overnight bus to Hampi to explore the ancient ruins. The next weekend we hope to be camping with elephants at the edge of a large forrest in southern India. The following Friday, we'll be flying to Goa which is a set of beach towns on the western shore. I believe the next weekend, which spans three days because of a holiday here in India, will be the famed Taj Mahal and Delhi trips. And on the final weekend, we're heading to Jaipur for the Diwali Festival of Lights. We'll explore the city, visit India's largest tiger sanctuary, and end our travel time in India with a camel trek across the desert. I'm ecstatic about the opportunity to see and experience these places. This has all really been a once in a lifetime opportunity.

I've found that it's kind of tough to write entertaining blogs about work stuff. And that's not because the work stuff isn't entertaining. It's actually a blast and I've enjoyed every minute so far. It's just hard to find stuff to poke fun at. We've been learning new things at an alarming rate, not only about tech tools, etc., but about ourselves. For example, on day one we were all given a book called Strengths Finder 2.0. We were told to go online, put in a code (a unique code found in each book), and fill out an hour-long survey that would determine what our top five strengths were. The premise of the whole thing was that westerners are often so pre-occupied by pinpointing and overcoming our weaknesses, that we forget to use or even think about our strengths. After your strengths are determined, each is given a chapter in the book in which it is discussed, i.e. how to utilize it, the type of things that would most satisfy it, etc. In short, my strengths were spot-on. Like creepy spot-on. The descriptions detailed directions my life has already taken, things that I'm already passionate about, career paths I'm already on, etc. It was a pretty profound experience to have many aspects of my life described to me (to a T in most cases) on the pages of a book that I had never seen or heard of before. I won't tell you my strengths, but I would encourage people to check the book out. I now have a number of concrete ways to use my own strengths at work and in my personal life, which is a relief in many ways.

A couple more highlights from the week so far. We met the CEO of ThoughtWorks, a British guy named Trevor. I had never met a CEO before. Frankly, it was not what I expected. Trevor seemed, well first of all, like a really intelligent guy. But he was humble. Seemed very down to earth and excited to meet all of us. We drank beer and ate Chinese food.

Finally. The funniest photo ever taken. Be back soon.

Me attacking Shaobo. Shaobo running away. Run, Shaobo, Run.

I bought fake Ray Ban sunglasses from a 12 yr old today.

So, today was awe-inspiring in many ways. In short, we visited our first Hindu temple, did a couple team building, low-ropes course type games, took a bus around Bangalore, had brunch in the park, ran through the markets bartering for a number of items in our Amazing Race relay, and topped it all off with beer and a buffet for lunch. That all said, I'm totally exhausted. I still can't manage to sleep past 4am. Which means right about now, 7pm, I really just want to pass out. I can't though. I'll never get fully adjusted if I keep giving in. My camera died, of course, about three minutes after we entered the Shiva temple. Luckily, (Andrea will appreciate this) I had my trusty 'ol Iphone with me to continue snapping photos throughout the day. I've been really pleased with the picture quality. I'm just going to post them below so you can see some of these things for yourself. Once I recharge my camera battery, I'll upload the ones from the previous few days.

One a side note, tomorrow's the big day - the official start of ThoughtWorks University, the consulting apprenticeship program I'm here for. I've gotta finish writing a couple programs and take an SQL exam. If I can keep my eyes open, I'll finish those tonight and just prepare myself for rocking and rolling over the next six weeks. Tomorrow night: write emails, facebook messages, get gym membership, and book trips to Dehli, The Taj Mahal, and Goa.

Store full of silks and linens.

More silks.

Every street. Everywhere. All the time.

Families enjoying a day at the market.

How would you approach crossing this street?

Markets were very busy today.

India has gigantic ant hills.

Young boy selling chai.

Holy men with incense.

Saw this in a cave behind the giant statue. See below.

Locals offering homage to Lord Shiva the Destroyer.

Lord Shiva the Destroyer represented here by 50ft tall statue.

Closeup.

We're not gonna step out in front of that truck are we?

I went to bed last night, well, earlier than I think I ever have before. Jetlag is a funny thing. All of a sudden, you are incredibly tired at weird and often inopportune times. It makes sense. My entire sleep pattern has basically been flipped on its head. In my case, the inability to keep my eyes open at 6:45 in the evening really didn't present any problems. I left the office at around 6, played a little guitar, read about two pages from Our Magnificent Bastard Tongue: The Untold History of English (actually very interesting, but will put you to sleep, especially given the circumstances) and then promptly passed the hell out, to put it bastardly. The flip side to this coin, however, must have struck me in the forehead right around 3:45 am. There was no going back. What to do? What to do? Check Facebook. Check. Check Linked In. Check. Read the news. Check. Do pushups. Check. Get through half a decade of Rosary before going back to recheck Facebook. Recheck check. Check. I laid there in the dark listening to Moscow radio broadcasts for the remainder of the night. Definitely not the most enjoyable experience, and unless I plug in my coffee i v soon, tonight might be more of the same.

We had to be at the office at 8:00 am for a traditional standup Bangalorean breakfast. I was mistaken, however. I thought the breakfast was going to be at the office. It was not. We needed to walk a half-mile or so down 100-mile road to a small outdoor cafe. This presented the first of what I hope will be many grand opportunities in India. Today. For the first time. I crossed the road. I know it's crazy, but true nonetheless. I will never look at crossing the road the same. Everywhere you look, both directions, is a mass of semis, scooters, cars, rickshaws, and motorcycles, all coming at you at speeds fast enough...well fast enough to kill a small herd of elephants. Kind of like fighting off a bear in a campsite, our tactic for accomplishing this unfathomable task is to herd together ourselves in as large a group as possible, waving our arms and yelling "Stop!" in a feeble attempt to stop traffic. I'll admit, this transformation into the black, white, chinese, brazilian, indian, 20-something glob monster is quite a sight and actually works. For about 3 seconds. The cars do hesitate for a moment, but then instead of stopping, they zoom behind you, in front of you and around you, all the while never taking the foot off the gas. Being a pedestrian here is simply a game of Frogger. Only in this Frogger (unlike the Atari version) you actually DIE!

We ended up having a very nice meal. Our trainers, to whom we were introduced yesterday and got to know today, met us for the mini-adventure. They, being the veterans they are at this sort of thing, led us down some of the back streets of Bangalore to the cafe. It was my first glimpse at real life for people here. Again, very vibrant, bustling, moving, raw. People were selling things, picking things up, dropping things off, drinking coffee, smoking cigarettes, looking at the 6"5' white dude, etc. Despite drawing a bit of attention, people were very kind and seemed very comfortable affording us certain permissions that maybe they wouldn't one another, like walking in the middle of the street taking pictures, nearly getting hit by motorcyclists who still hadn't taken slowed down from the road we crossed half a mile back. I had some great coffee and the spiciest breakfast I've ever had. I don't know why I expected eggs. Rice and some of that good ole' melt-your-face-off curry at 8:00am is the way to go. If you want your stomach to feel like the 7th gate to hell for the remainder of the day. I may be "eggs"aggerating a bit, but this stuff was definitely no sausage McMuffin.

We came back to the office for our first administrative sessions. Things were very informative. We played some icebreaker games, got to know one another a bit and were given an intro understanding of what we should expect, what our goals are, who are coaches are, who we need to contact for various things, etc. Informative. I had some lunch, spoke one-on-one with my trainer about my personal goals for the program, unlocked my Iphone (something everyone should do - http://jailbreakmatrix.com) so that I'm no longer held captive by ATT and can use any sim card I wish, and then sat down to read a bit of this new book we've all been given,
"Strengths Finder". For anyone interested, my personal goals for the program are to gain an intermediate understanding of the skills necessary to be an effective BA and then to gain experience using these skills in a real-time setting. I also to hope to learn more about creating test automation frameworks from scratch, writing functional tests to populate regression suites, and overall betterment of my QA capabilities. I've spoken about these goals with my trainers and so far they have all been very supportive. I know this experience will be what I make it. That said, I don't plan on leaving any stone unturned. It would be a waste not to utilize such amazing resources.

Tonight, I may play some cricket for the first time. And tomorrow, off to a winery. Pictures to come soon...

I've never pulled 20,000 of anything out of an ATM. Until today.

Seriously. What world am I in? I've been asking myself this question for about a year now. At the present moment this is a question that holds a certain weight that previously it had not. I've just come back from my first meal in Bangalore, India. Prior to arriving, the extent of my knowledge concerning all things Bangalore was that Bangalore, home to two ThoughtWorks offices, is a bustling IT hub near the southern tip of India. Over the course of my twenty-two hours in flights and layovers from Chicago (mostly flights) (literally, 20 hours in economy class), I had plenty of time to think about what lay ahead, what kind of experiences I would have, what I would learn, etc. Now, I didn't really use this time to think about lay ahead, but had I chosen to think about what lay ahead, this would have been the perfect time to do so. Instead, I caught up on some Russian dvd's left over from my time in the land of the Bolsheviks, read some Nietzsche (I've been really getting into this whole philosophy thing lately), ate some pretty terrible Lufthansa food, drank a lot of exceptionally tasty Lufthansa red wine, and popped a few sleeping pills (despite telling my mom I wouldn't). The last of these activities was clutch. I was asleep for about nine hours from Frankfurt to Bangalore. As exciting as Karate Kid 3 was for the second time in twenty hours, I couldn't fight the urge to rest my eyes. For half a day. Sitting. With people all around me. Talking. Myself and two colleagues finally crashed into the runway a bit after midnight Bangalore time. At this moment, after a couple screams, many sighs, and a few claps, it finally sank in that I had arrived and was going to spend the next 7 weeks further away from the US than I have ever been geographically, immersed in a culture far different from any I have ever experienced. That said, I'm not one to worry about these things. Just another stop on this bogus journey that has become my life. Only on this stop, you can't drink the water, you'd be advised to douse yourself in hand sanitizer on a regular basis, and the mosquitos like handing out a little present called malaria. It's free.

After convincing the customs officers that I wasn't a terrorist and that I wasn't smuggling anything other than a guitar and 4 pounds of Columbian cocaine in my guitar case, I walked out the main terminal exit to about 200 men holding signs, looking at me and yelling. Awkward. It was a little bit like being on the red carpet. I strutted my stuff down the runway. Stop. Turn. Stop. Turn. Sashay. Looks like all those America's Next Top Model reruns (the one's I'm constantly forced to watch at home) finally paid off! Not really. I'm sure I looked like the biggest deer in headlights. Among all the men in the crowd, I finally spotted a man jumping up and down in the back, waving a sign that said ThoughWorks on it. We were getting somewhere. He walked us over to the parking lot and left us there while he fetched the car. The smell here is different, but not necessarily bad. The air is filled with exhaust from all the cars, but often you smell a mix of spice, perfume, and sewage. I'm not being facetious, though. The smell actually brought back very fond memories of Kazan', a bustling, growing city, always pulsating with noise and activity. There is something literally and figuratively very raw about the smells in these cities. It makes them feel much more organic and alive.

The nice man (whose name, unfortunately, I cannot remember, nor could I say correctly) drove us for about an hour to the Diamond District. This is where I'll be staying throughout my tenure in Bangalore. He dropped us off and another gentleman helped me to my room. For all intents and purposes, I have a great apartment. I was struck by how large it is. There are three of us living there, each with our own room. The apartment buildings are known as "blocks", which I find hilarious. I'm currently serving 20 to life on H-Block 62 with a member of the Chinese Triad crime syndicate known as "Bob" and an Indian guy I haven't met yet. I was the last to arrive, so I dropped my stuff in the one remaining room, and after turning on the air-conditioner, the fan, the mosquito lamp and the mosquito repellant air-freshener thing, I finally managed to find a bed. I needed it.

I woke up this morning a little hesitant I must admit. I had really received no direction at all and had no way of contacting anyone. I kind of just started going about my normal day. Got out of bed. Took a shower. Unpacked some things. Made some toast. Boiled water for tea. I was sitting on the couch in silence and decided to flip on the TV. A couple preliminary notions about TV in India. I didn't expect there to be so much English. I was watching all the same commercials I see in the States, just with Indian folks talking about how this Ponds product is so great for moisturizing, or why Yahoo is such a great search engine. Bollywood definitely seems to have made it's mark. The music, dancing, traditional dress, etc. is everywhere. I managed to find an English-speaking news broadcast. The journalist was reporting from the streets of Bangalore about potential riots this afternoon. I kind of did a double take when I heard this. Wait, wah? So apparently there's this 500 year old land dispute between some Muslims and some Hindis and today a court will rule (I'm assuming after 500 years of back and forth) on what should be built there, a temple or a mosque. Depending on how the ruling goes (I'm not really sure which way I'm supposed to want it to go), some folks could be pretty upset. I didn't think much about it, until they said that all businesses, universities and schools had been closed. Our team has been told to stay off the streets the remainder of the evening. Apparently it's the real deal. Although, at lunch today one of my trainers was telling me that this kind of thing really wasn't a big deal for the younger generations. I suppose that remains to be seen.

I made my way over to the ThoughtWorks office around eleven, picked up some adapters, met some folks. The office was humming. Like most ThoughtWorks offices and especially delivery sites, you walk through the doors into a bee hive. Many people buzzing around a central hub, each with their own role, working diligently, but always with the well being of the hive in mind. There are no walls. Only tables, chairs, laptops, phones and dozens of city clocks, all in one large, central room. If you don't think osmotic learning is a real thing, work in a place like this for a year. I settled into my honeycomb, plugged in, sat down, and was immediately invited to leave for lunch. Long day. We walked out to the street and one of my trainers asked me (with a grin), "You ever ride a rickshaw before?" "Do the ones near Wrigley Field count?" "No." And no, they don't. We paid a man 43 rupees to drive us to a restaurant not far from the office. He probably deserved much more. There are no traffic laws in India. It's basically every motorcyclist, rickshaw driver, scooter guy, semi-truck driver, man, woman, child and pedestrian for himself. I've decided to characterize what you experience riding here (not driving. I don't plan on driving here. I would die. And that's coming from someone who's been driving in Chicago for 4 years) as poorly-organized chaos. Not quite complete chaos, but close. The honking. So much honking. People use their horns all the time and it's not like in the US when you use your horn all the time because you are angry. The Indians are actually using their horns for a purpose closer to what they were actually designed for: to let others on the road know where you are. When 50 million people are crossing lanes and passing you at any given moment, a few taps on the horn every three or four seconds can't necessarily be a bad thing. Riding along I saw alot. There were definitely cows just walking along the busy roads. People were everywhere. Thousands of people were everywhere. There are just a ton of people everywhere in this place. We stopped off at a local restaurant. This next part might seem totally cliche, so the only reason I'm writing it is because it actually happened and I think I may have been the only one who noticed. We got out of the rickshaw, paid the man and walked up the crumbling sidewalk to the restaurant entrance. Just outside the entrance, I saw a dead cat. It was lying there, dead. I didn't really think much about it until I walked out of the restaurant and the dead cat was no longer there. Now I'm not saying the cat was used as part of our meal. I'm just saying that the cat was used as part of our meal. And it was nice and spicy. Meow.

Back to the Future...

Well, what can I say? It's been a long while since I last posted anything. Now, however, is a better time than any to start back up again. Having just listened to a fascinating talk on Agile methodologies, I've been given a few minutes to unwind, eat some lunch and get ready for our next discussion. For those of you familiar with Chicago, I'm looking out the south window of the AON building from the 26th floor. Grant park is covered in snow. There's a gray plume of smoke billowing from the oval telescope on top of the Adler planetarium and Sue is growling at me from the Field museum. Michigan Ave, as usual, is bustling. Everything's gray. Chicago winter. Things in my life, however, are far from gray. If I had to assign a color to the events of the past 4-5 months, I think I'd say bright-red neon bordered with navy blue. I'll rewind a bit so you can get a sense of where I'm coming from.

I left the amazing people of Kazan, saddened, but knowing that I'd soon return. We spent three incredible days in St. Petersburg, exploring the city with our new and improved Russian. We performed a musical of sorts for the State Dept. people. I played guitar. There was a lavish party on the beach outside the Peter and Paul fortress, followed by a sombre boat-ride, three hours of sleep, final goodbye's and the day-and-a-half trip home. In short, the experience was more than I ever expected. They were so, so good to us. That all being said, it was good to be home. I missed my fiance', family and friends.

Admittedly, I was nervous about being back in Chicago. I basically had no money, no job, and I came back to a United States where the economy was plummeting, job prospects were dim and friends were being laid off. As you might expect, the idea that I'd immediately find and begin my typical 9-5 (something I've always been adamantly opposed to) was not looking good. I spent weeks on job search sites, trying to network with people and get that ever so important "in", but nothing seemed to be working out. I was growing more and more frustrated with the whole process and by the end of it all, was willing to do just about anything for a few dollars. I was applying at bars, furniture moving companies, dog-walking, garage-cleaning...anything. What's worse is that I really started to question the choices I had made in terms of schooling. Now that I was in a tough job market, would my skills really set me apart, or just take me off the list completely. What does one actually do with the ability to speak a couple exotic languages and with the knowledge that a master of arts in comparative linguistics actually brings. After a few more weeks, when I was really approaching the freak-out point fast, I received a call back. Actually no, it was an email.

Earlier that day (early September), I responded to a Craigslist ad requesting warehouse workers for a small Russian ebay company in Northbrook (a northern suburb of Chicago). The gentleman, Andrej, requested that I call him. Actually, I believe his exact words were, "Call me. Andrej." I called him and immediately started in with Russian. He asked me my name and chuckled a bit when I said Sam. He says, "No, what's your real name? Semyon?" I explained to him that I did not have a Russian name because, in fact, I was not Russian. I was an American who had simply studied Russian enough to converse in it. There was a long silence, a long awkward silence. I don't think he thought I was telling him the truth. He immediately began asking me all of these questions and complimenting me on my Russian, which is, in my experience, the typical reaction from a native speaker. He told me to come in a few days later for an interview. I believe he actually mentioned something along the lines, "I've got to see this to believe it." I went in for the interview and everything was fine. I don't know if management was more surprised that I was a Russian speaking American who was willing to work 8 hours a day in a Russian-only environment, or that I was willing to do all of those things for the incredible rate of 8 dollars per hour. Either way, the pay aside, I knew that I could be sitting at home worrying about working for the time-being, or I could be working, improving my Russian, and continuing my search for something a bit more lucrative. I started the next week.

It was great. I had a lot of fun really getting to know those that I worked with. Essentially, I checked cellphones for a number of common problems in the hope that they might be refurbished, repackaged and resold. The work itself was mind-numbingly boring, but that was nothing a steady stream of house-beats live from Moscow, the occasional vodka shot, a new onslaught of tea, and lively conversations about guns, sex, money, drugs, music, religion, banyas, and the "old country" couldn't help to livin up. We had a really good time. Eventually, I was moved to the actual phone room and then placed into the "shipping" role. I felt like I was actually learning something, with the added benefit of learning the inns and outs of shipping in Russian. Looking back, I left with a new set of Russian friends and technical vocabulary. I'm happy that those I've encountered in Chicago's Russian community have been so welcoming and hospitable to me. But this really was no surprise. Russians, stereotypes aside, are some of the warmest, most hospitable people in the world once the initial introductions are made and a sense of trust is established. So, how does one go from working in the suburbs in a warehouse with a bunch of Russians for 8 dollars an hour to the 26th floor of the AON building? Well, it's kind of a long story.

Way back when, even before I started working for the Russians, I received a tip that a company called Thoughtworks, headquartered here in Chicago, had an opening in their legal department, more specifically in immigration. I was interested in positions like this. I had experience in processing visas, had done work with the State Dept. and had already worked with international delegations coming in and out of Chicago. My cousin in law was able to pass my resume along to a contact who was actually interning in the department at the time. They called me. Said they were interested. I did two phone interviews and eventually was called in for in-person interviews. The process, even then, was intensive. Aside from 4-5 in-person interviews, I had to do a number of assessments. These were personality tests, logic tests, and even a quick IQ test. Like I said, intensive. The company itself is a global IT consultancy. Basically, teams of consultants are sent out to clients all over the world and are given the task of solving problems and developing tools to solve problems. That's a very simple explanation, but in essence, it's what goes on. That all being said, I did not get the job. Not cool. It actually really sucked. I was thinking that Thoughtworks would be a great company to work for. Everyone I met was very, very intelligent, passionate about their work, opinionated, dedicated, ready to learn and wanted to see the world. I thought, "Man, it's not a typical 9-5. And I don't want a typical 9-5." Nonetheless, didn't get it. I did, however, receive an email after my interviews from someone stating that although I did not receive the initial position I was applying for in immigration, people liked me and an attempt was being made to find something for me. I thought, "Well, that's better than nothin'"...

Days, weeks, and even months passed and I had still not heard anything. I wrote a couple polite emails stating that I was still interested in a position with ThoughtWorks, but received no replies. I continued my work at the warehouse, while Andrea and I began to discuss other options. I began to search for jobs out of state and abroad. We did a lot of research on teaching opportunities in China, Japan, Russia, etc. All hope was not lost, but the whole situation was starting to wear on us. Thank God we had parents and grandparents there to help. Much longer and we would have literally been screwed. Andrea and I have always wanted to go abroad together, at least for a year or two before we begin our family. I realized that if I was going to make this happen, I was going to have to take a much more proactive role. I had all but stopped considering ThoughtWorks as a viable option and had basically moved on. That is, until early December when I received an email from recruiting. In short, they actually were still interested in me and wanted me to go through the interview process again. Only this time, it was for a consulting / business analyst role. I was very excited. It took a lot to keep me from jumping up out of my chair. I told Andrea on the way home. She freaked out too.

I was a long way from an offer though. ThoughtWorks, despite the country's economic woes and thanks to good leadership, stepped-up performance globally, and good ol' hard work, had just had one of its best years ever. Recruiting was looking at me as part of a new initiative seeking out "aptitude hires". An aptitude hire is a person who doesn't necessarily have the typical IT or software development background or experience, but does have the skill to work into one of these roles. As a business analyst, I would be responsible for working with clients, determining their needs and then interpreting and translating these needs into language that is usable from a development standpoint. It's my job to build relationships with clients, but also with the tech team so that everyone has their needs met in a timely matter. In the end, I made it through another round of interviews and assessments. There were some crazy logic tests, but all along I felt like I was performing well. I met with a number of Thoughtworkers and was really impressed with everyone. I began to learn more and more about the consulting role. While there would be a lot of travel involved, I'd have my chance to see the world, work on challenging projects with a global community of developers and code-monkeys, and finally start to earn a little money. I always felt like I had a lot of really good skills, but had yet to find an industry outside of academia where I could put them all to use. I soon realized that with my background in linguistics, international experience and desire for something a-typical, the field of software development / consulting could actually be a really good fit, especially with a well-respected company like ThoughtWorks. Not to mention, the perks of working for Thoughtworks are crazy!

All in all, I was extended an offer. I am the first aptitude hire. I've heard that that title might be changed, because everyone hired has high level aptitude, but I figure I'll bask in the glory for a bit. Really, I'm just a junior-consultant who has a lot to learn in a short amount of time. It looks like I'll be doing a lot of shadowing these first few weeks. For the time being, I am a pro-active sponge. At least this is what I'm calling myself. I'm looking forward to challenging new career that will develop my skills and give me some new one's to play with. So far, so good. I found out yesterday that I'll be sent to India for 6 weeks in June. I can't say that I'm all that surprised. I've also been hearing how easy it is to get year-long projects in Australia, China, Brazil, etc. Looks like Andrea and I might get our chance after all. Oh, and don't think I've given up on my Russian. I've already met some Russian-speakers here. One American and two native speakers. Now, I've just got to convince them to let me open the Moscow office.

Swan Song....

Honestly, I've been dreading this post. Our time in Kazan' has come to an end. It's been 14 days since I last posted, which, I know, is a long time. However, these past two weeks have been filled with such a sense of urgency that I can barely think right now. I've tried to spend my time here as wisely as possible. I've learned so much. My Russian has progressed immensely. I've seen and called home a unique part of the world in which eastern and western cultures coexist harmoniously and, in turn, create a cultural dynamic that is like nothing I've ever encountered. I've lived a way of life that at first was absolutely foreign. And yet, over the course of the past 70 days, this life has crept into my bones and dare I say into my soul, snatching them piece by piece and transforming me, in the end, into a cultural-hybrid, a griffin.

I look back at my time spent here and my heart is heavy. The people. The people I've come to know in this place have taken a piece of me as well. Words cannot express the gratitude I feel to all those who made my time here what it was. My professors, my colleagues, KGU administration, those affiliated with the US State Department and Bureau of Education, etc. I know that without them, this adventure wouldn't have been what it was. My hozyaika. My hozyaika is awesome. Having lived together these past months in a small apartment on Avaizovskova street, we've become family. I'm thankful that I have a place to call home in this city. Irina has worked very hard to make this my home and for that I am indebted. She and Sasha have been so hospitable. My dear friends from Kazan', Masha, Natasha, Natasha(2), Rustam and Aigul...thank you. Because of you all, Kazan' will always be a shining star in my not-so-distant past and I will always have a yearning to return. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. The help, the hospitality, the friendship, the planning, the answers to questions, the finding me when I'm lost, the correcting grammar mistakes with a smile, the care, the understanding, the fun, the Cuba Libre, the teploxod, the walks along Bauman, the Alla Nash, the banya, the late nights at the dacha, the listening to me play guitar, the listening to me in general, the beach, the Tinkoff, the ice-skating, the vecherinkas, the Russian songs, the Russian movies, the excursions, the Tatar culture, the Meat House, the dancing, the sun-burns, the long talks about religion, the long talks about politics, the long talks about the extraordinary histories of our cities and our countries, the long talks about the past, the long talks about the future, the all too short talks about our job prospects, the linguistics arguments, the Esperanto, the patience, the patience, the patience, the camping trip, the long bus rides, feminism, the getting rained on, the Volga, that long walk into the forest and that long walk out, together. You see, the most valuable gift I've been given, one that is far too big to fit in a suitcase, and yet easily transported across oceans, continents and even time, has been the gift of your friendship. Without it, I'm sure I'd have an easier time leaving, and yet, under all of my sadness, I can appreciate the difficulty endured in walking away. Without a doubt, this has been one of the most fulfilling experiences of my life. I take my leave with the friendship of the best people in the world.

I spent my last night in Kazan' exactly the way I should have...sitting at the dacha, under the stars, singing songs and playing my guitar with my friends. It really just doesn't get any better. Thanks.

PS: I'm not signing off just yet. We still have three days in Petersburg with all the State Department people. I'll be posting on that adventure, as well as on anything I've overlooked here.