Next thought: "Gosh, their Hindi sure sounds like it's spoken with a Spanish or Italian accent." No, as my taxi driver explained, it wasn't Hindi, but something related to Portuguese that I still haven't figured out with the use of Wikipedia. They do say India is diverse.
The picture of the rice paddy just failed to miss the many billboards that were sticking up out of the paddies.
The conference I was going to, which was a meeting on maternal mortality, was to take place in a seminary, which I was also planning on staying at. On the way from the airport, the driver stopped at three, count 'em, three seminaries before we found the one I actually needed. There was an amusing contrast between the beautiful, gardened, clean nature of the penultimate attempt, and the one I was actually going to.
Maria, my coworker/supervisor/new best friend, greeted me with a pout and the information that there was a frog in the bathroom.Nothing can convey what the rain was like. The seminary sounded like it was just naturally located under a gushing waterfall. Some of us very intelligently failed to bring either umbrella or raincoat, so I accepted that life would be limited to the dank, froggy seminary for the next few days. Also, as I was soon informed, you couldn't even get out of this place if you wanted to--it was isolated on a hill and taxi drivers did not wander there.
I'm okay with roughing it in life, but I guess I had anticipated that "accommodations provided by the organization" might have included, you know, a bed. I ended up usurping my boss's as I passed out in a water-logged stupor, vaguely paranoid about being devoured by mosquitoes due to no blankets (I was told she'd found another spot--every woman for herself nonetheless). The next night I followed the lead of a few other interns and checked into a hotel nearby.
This gets us to Saturday morning, but I'm afraid the suspense will have to continue for now. Stay tuned for Fear of Getting Hacked to Death by Tour Guide.
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