Not a normal post...

Well, it has been a while since I posted a blog. I really haven't had much to talk about. Actually, I started a new job in January! I am now a Management Information Systems Analyst and am liking it so far. That means I automate processes and help other teams find inefficiencies then fix the inefficiencies. I have only been there for a month and a half and haven't been able to help many groups. However, the first project the team gave me has a lot of exposure. I better get it right since we know we are going to be audited when all is said and done.

Anyway, I was putting together reference document to easily find VBA code I have used over the years. I found some Excel code I use but never actually finished making it more user friendly. I spent a little bit of time on the code to fix some of the kinks and make the tool run. The tool is an Excel workbook that allows you to enter the hours you worked for any given day. If you have to keep track of the time spend on a specific project then this tool will be useless. However, if you just need to keep track of when you get in and when you leave work then this tool works. I don't have to keep track of projects I work on and actually don't have to keep track of hours. Salary is great, right? I just like to keep track of my hours worked even though it doesn't mean anything for my pay.

It is nothing spectacular but, who knows, you may find it useful. Click on the link below and enable macros if you want to use it.

Get the workbook

Maybe an update on the new job after a few months and a few projects are in my pocket.

The Dirty Thirty

Well, I have joined a new club! I joined the Dirty Thirty club. I remember thinking 30 was so old while I was growing up. Now I am grown up, well sort off, and 30 isn't looking so old anymore. I am lucky that the Mayans were wrong and the world did not end on my 30th birthday, however, if they had been correct I couldn't have spent the end of the world with better company.

My wife and I had discussed that I didn't want a real big event for my 30th. I didn't want to go to a public place and create a big scene. Making my friends and family come out to a big restaurant or to Boondock's for bumper cars is not something that I would have enjoyed (and probably a few or more of my friends and family wouldn't have enjoyed it that much). I also did not want people to bring presents if we were going to do something when the day came. Getting presents isn't the reason I would want a birthday party. The reason would be to get all my friends together in one place where we could talk instead of me saying, "Give me, give me, give me." The time with friends and family is present enough for me (sounds cheesy, but it is true).

Well, after we had that discussion at the beginning of November, Sheila started planning the big event. I had a feeling she was putting something together but I didn't know to what extent or how many people. We always do dinner with both Sheila's family and my family for birthdays. We discovered that when we tried to make dinner plans for my birthday that my family had a lot of conflicts. My dad probably wouldn't be back from work in time, my older sister was on call that night, my two little sisters were out of town. This would have been dinner with Sheila, Mom, and me. Not a bad dinner, but not the whole family. The day we that would work was December 23. Sounds good, Jorgensen dinner planned.

December rolled around and Sheila was involved in some questionable actions, getting angry when her phone beeped with a text and I brought the phone to her possibly seeing what the message said, sitting strange on the couch so I couldn't see her computer screen, and staying up later than me (this hardly ever happens) to name a few. I even tried to make plans on December 14th at one point and was shot down really quick even though we did not have an event on the calendar. As a side node, I think smart phones that are able to link my calendar to Sheila's calendar is great so we are always on the same page when making plans.

I will be honest, I like to save a few dollars and like to make a menu at the beginning of the week so we aren't scrambling to find something to make when we both get hungry for dinner or go out to dinner. However, I also like to treat my wife and don't often tell her no when she wants something. The night of December 14 Sheila came home and said she wanted to go out to dinner. This was strange especially since we had a great menu item for the night, chicken pot pie. This made me think even more that Sheila had planned something for my birthday. Ultimately, I said we could go where she wanted to eat and ended up going to Red Rock.

Sheila didn't wait for a host/hostess to seat us and started walking in like she knew where she was going. This sealed the deal, I now knew she had planned something. She did make plans. It was very small, only a few friends. She made a plan and followed my wishes to have some friends where we could talk and be heard. Restaurants are hard since you can't hear everyone and don't get the opportunity to talk with all the people. Well, turns out the surprise has only three other adults and two kids. Kind of small but at least I could hear all the conversations even with only 40% of the hearing in my right ear. Good plan Sheila! I thought this was the birthday surprise and didn't think she had anything else planned.

The beginning of the next week, Sheila came home and asked if we could go to dinner at the country club with her parents and sister on my actual birthday since my family dinner was going to be the 23rd. We hadn't planned anything, and we had already had dinner with a few friends, so I said that would be great, Sobieski dinner planned.

The whole week before my birthday Sheila came home and seemed really stressed. I couldn't understand why, Winter Break was coming up and she wouldn't have to work for two weeks and she always talks about how the week before a break is almost useless. I did what I could to help her, who knows how successful I was.

Well, along came December 21.We usually go to her parents house around 5:30 to visit before we go to dinner. Sheila had mention that the club was doing a dinner with Santa so it would be really busy and we wouldn't be going to until about 6:30. That was alright with me. I thought that we would then want to get there around 6:00 so we could visit before dinner with the new dinner time. Sheila started getting ready around 5:40. I thought, "That is ok, it usually only takes her about 15 minutes to get ready. We will leave about 5:55 and be to here parents house to still visit, no problems."

I watched an episode of "The Big Bang Theory" while I waited. The episode finished. I came upstairs and Sheila wasn't ready yet. She came out and asked me what pair of glasses, which sweater, which shoes to wear. I gave my opinion, she put them on, and asked again which ones. We had a five minute conversation on her new glasses and if she should wear them. I finally told her she bought them for a reason, to wear them and she should wear them. We spent probably another five minutes on the shoes she should wear. Why all the sudden did she need so much help getting ready? Usually she would ask me once and go with what she had initially thought. By the time she was ready to go we wouldn't have any time to sit and visit with her parents before we headed to the club.

She finished getting ready to leave around 6:15. I was right, all the visit time before dinner was now gone. Luckily traffic wasn't bad so we didn't have any more holdups. Sheila was texting her parents while we on our way. This is not uncommon so did not cause me to think something was happening that I didn't know about. I still believed we were going to dinner at the club with her family.

We pulled up to the street before her circle and I noticed a large number of cars along the street. Someone was having a Christmas party! I hoped the party was going great for them. Then there was one car in the driveway, her dad's. The car we usually pile into to drive to the club. We opened the door and as, usual, Mike said, "hello." We walked into the kitchen and, "SURPRISE." Sheila had planned two surprise 30th birthday parties. The first was a decoy to make me stop thinking about it and the second had many family and friends that, I felt very privileged, would be able to find some time during the holiday season to come spend with me.

I spent the night talking to great friends and family and had a wonderful night. I could not have been with better company if the world really had ended like the Mayans thought. Even without the end of the world I couldn't have spent it with better company. I had family members, all of which had told me they were busy on my birthday, and friends there to celebrate. There was food and much laughing. I was able to spend time with everyone that came and I could hear them! No long tables with me at one end and someone on the other that I wouldn't be about to carry on a conversation.

Some great friends were able to spend the night with me and some other great friends were not able to make it. December is a busy time and I understand if you weren't able to make it. I am also very grateful to all those that were able to come and spend the night with me turning into an old man.

Thank you (in no particular order):
Sheila Jorgensen
Allen and Shauna Jorgensen
Mike and Micki Sobieski
Scott and Trisha Rafferty
Stacy Sobieski
Joyce Dahlquist
Robyn Dahlquist
Erika Dahlquist
Josh and Chelsy Judd
Aaron and Stephanie Partridge (although at separate times)
Katie Partridge
Jake and Betsy Wilberg
Jerry and Tiffany Turner
Clifton Uckerman
Peter and Beth Jorgensen
Alex and Rachel Rowe
Woody Bartlett
Bruce Bakker
Jon Seiler
Tyson Kamp
Megan Lauer
Matt Rowell
Jackie Higley
Wayne

And to those who weren't able to come, I hope to see you soon! Happy Holidays!

(I am sure there are more pictures but I don't have anymore maybe I will get tagged in Facebook?)

Email - bringing the world together

Email is a great tool for everyone to use. The size of the world has shrunk, well not literally but figuratively speaking. Correspondence which use to take days, even weeks, to reach a person on the other side of the world can now reach person in mere seconds. It is also much easier to send letters letting the family know what you have been up to, even Uncle Joe who you only met once at an obscure cousins wedding who only invited you to the wedding because they saw your name on Facebook and wanted another gift. You only have to type the letter and hit send, no printing using the ink on my printer which hasn't worked in months and no postage needed. All that we need now is a working email address before hitting send. Okay, it really takes a little more work, like knowing what you are going to write about, but nothing you weren't doing before.

Now we must ask ourselves, is everything email allows us to do always that great? We have all heard arguments that people will become so reliant on email and social media that we will forget how to actually dial a phone and talk to someone. With smartphones it is much easier to forget how to dial since we don't actually see the numbers we must dial to talk to a person. Email and social media are at our fingertips without even turning on a computer, unless you consider your phone a computer which has more power than the Apple IIGS we bought when I was a kid.

In addition to never talking to people, I see another issue that has to do with the workplace. It is easy to respond to an email, maybe it will take five minutes for an easy question which you know the answer right off hand. The issue comes when you see the email and decide NOT to answer. This email may become lost in the cyper-world of email because you didn't respond right away, or perhaps the email was deliberately not responded to in an effort to leave a "paper" trail.

I like to give people the benefit of the doubt and think that maybe they just missed the email or called because it is quicker. Yes, calling is quicker and take perhaps one minute instead of 10 emails back and forth, but there are cases when having the paper trail is appropriate. When do you decide that a person is avoiding the paper trail? That is a good question, but I think it can be answered when the person NEVER sends an email and always calls.

Say, hypothetically speaking, a manager never answers an email and will only call the employee with answers to emails. A new questions arises in which there was an HR issue and a manager needs to respond and provide proof that an agreement was made. It would make sense to have the "paper" trail to prove the agreement, should any questions arise. HR calls and says what the agreement is, but that your manager will be in charge of keeping track and making sure the agreement is executed. Well, the hypothetical person then emails the manager, on three different occasions, and never receives a response, not even a phone call this time. There comes another issue with email, phone call avoidance because a hypothetical email was sent and the manager now knows what the employee is calling about. No response to email and no answering the phone.

So, now there is no proof of the agreement, aside from the initial call from HR, and no "paper" trail. The employee sending the hypothetical email has proof that the emails were sent, but how will this hold up when stating that an agreement was reached? That will become the test. A new question, is this really an issue with email or is this an issue with the manager?

Last night in India

Well, I am back to my apartment and finished packing besides my computer. I will soon be on my way to the airport to board my plane to come back to the good, and I understand cold, Salt Lake City, Utah. It will be a long trip back, but it will be good to be back to family, friends, and familiar things. I am calling it the three F's, not to be mistaken by the three f's issued as a list of demands by the Tenant Right League in Ireland from the 1850's. The three f's from the league are fair rent, free sale, and fixity of tenure. My three f's have nothing to due with land or renting, so they are very different.

The traffic back to the apartment from work today was the worst I have ever seen. It may be that I have never left that early, 7:45 PM. I think this is the first time in three weeks that I haven't worked at least eleven hours! The roads were flooded as well as crowded. You may have guessed that today it rained in Bangalore. Apparently lakes appear in the roads and the amount of walking space on the side walks is reduced by half. Much of the sidewalk is only dirt and quickly turns to mud. As I was walking from the apartment to dinner my shoes got covered in mud which I then brought in to my nice tiled apartment. Luckily, a TriStar employee was standing ready with a broom and mop to clean up the mess I made.

This week my managers manager, Ally, came into Bangalore for the week. Yes, she was only here for a week. She probably was not able to get on a normal sleeping schedule so will be alright coming back to Salt Lake the same time as me. I, on the other hand, have been here long enough to get on a regular sleeping schedule and will probably suffer from jet lag when I get back.I am going to try taking some Melatonin on the plane at the time that would be Salt Lake night. Melatonin helped to get on a regular sleeping schedule in India, so I am hoping it will help me sleep on the plane. Salt Lake night will be while I am on the nice double decker plane from Dubai to JFK. It should be an experience to be on that large of a plane. It is amazing that something so large can actually fly! My direct manager is afraid of the small planes that go from Salt Lake to New York, so it is probably a good idea that he did not come out to India with me.

When Ally got here she took the products team (the team I came to work with) and me out to Leela. This is not Turanga Leela, which some of you Futurama lovers may be thinking of, but a "palace" with three restaurants in it. It was interesting the prices on the menu. Ally decided she wanted to order a coke for dinner. The price on the menu was 300 rupee, or about six dollars. Well, they brought her out a can of coke which had a ribbon across the top which read 20 rupee, or about 50 cents. Needless to say the hotel food, I felt, was very overpriced for what we got. I had been taken to other restaurants in town that were as good, if not better, than Leela Palace.

Not much happened this week. We had an issue on Wednesday and I worked until 12:30 before finally saying I had to go home since I had been there since 9:30 that morning. Sneha doesn't come in until 1 pm, which is the standard for all the operation groups in Bangalore. They work much too late for my liking. I would much prefer to come in early and leave early to have afternoons with my wife. I know I say leave early and we all know that I do not leave early, but earlier than the hours if I were to work the same as Bangalore. If I did work the same hours I would never see my wife, she would be asleep by the time I got home at 11 and I would probably learn to sleep in from working so late.

The project is almost done. We have one segment of testing left which we will complete by a week from today. We had some limitations that would not allow us to test until February was over.

I just got a call saying my cab was here to take me to the airport. I will be there early, but I will be home in about 36 hours!

Approaching time to come home

Well, I only have five more working days and then I get to come home. It will be nice to come home and be able to eat a home cooked meal again. I am very tired of eating out for every meal and I am especially sick of Italian food. Yes you read that correctly, it reads that I am sick of Italian food. Every restaurant that is close by is an Italian restaurant. I must be in little Italy of Bangalore. I had a team member suggest Sunny's for dinner on day, Italian. The next day someone suggested Madili, Italian. I went out with some friends Sunday, last week, they wanted to go to Italia, obviously from the name Italian. Italia serves a combination of Italian food and Spanish food. We stuck with Italian food that night. The Italian food comes with a little Indian twist. Everything has added some spice to the food, except Sonny's which claims to be real American Italian. I was informed the owner and chef, Sonny, is from the United States so knows how to do Italian food American style. While eating at Sonny's there was a nice bartender who just wanted to talk to me the whole time. It was nice to have company, but his English was not that great and I don't think he comprehended about 3/4 of what I was saying. I think I answered the question of where I was from about eight times. He wouldn't take the United States as an answer, he had to know which state. He only knew New York and California which he thought were right next to each other. I explained to him a few times where Utah was and that New York was on the opposite side of the nation from California. While I was speaking with him there was another American there eating dinner. He said, "Your accent sounds familiar to me. Where are you from?" I told him and asked where he was from, turns out he is from Phoenix and works for Honeywell. Well, once the other American started talking to me the bartender thought he would be done speaking with me. This was Saturday before I went to a club with some co-workers and took an hour and a half to eat .

That night we went to a club which is only about three doors away, but I can never find again. Luckily Bhumika and Ankur picked me up from the hotel so I was able to find it the first time since I don't know any landmarks to find it. I think it was on the sixth floor of a building, but I don't recall which one. The club is very close to an American club, just different dancing. Not so much bumping and grinding with each other. That may be due to the fact that even kisses are edited out on TV. I met a few people that worked at Goldman that night, but they had a few drinks prior to me arriving and I don't know how well they remember me.

Getting into the club was interesting. Bhumika told me that a friend was going to get us in for free. We got up to the club level and the friend was waiting for us. they introduced me and he said let's go. Bhumika was in in front of me with Ankur and the new friend behind me. Bhumika made it in just fine, but the bouncer stopped me and said I could not go in. When the friend spoke up and told him that I was with him, the bouncer gave me a nice long look and finally let me in. It is an experience to be judged because I am different from everyone else. I don't know how much of this happens in the US, but I have felt it and it does not feel good. I am glad that I try to always treat everyone as the same.

The club was a club. Nothing spectacular from clubs in the US. I actually don't go to clubs much, in fact never, so it was different to go to a club. We thought laws in Utah were bad, well, in Bangalore even the clubs have to close at 11. I think I mentioned that drinks cannot be served after 11PM, and that is even true on weekends. Drinks stopped at 11PM and they started kicking people out at 11:15PM. I walked home so Ankur and Bhumika could just go home. It took about five minutes to walk back.

Sunday was a lazy day, I didn't do much. Bhumika had arranged to go to Lalbagh, which means Red Garden in Hindi. It is a botanical garden that is close to where Bhumika went to college. I was excited to get out and see a piece of Bangalore outside of the office. Well, we got to the garden and couldn't find parking. I am surprised anyone can park their cars here. There are no parking lots in the city. Valet parking is offered everywhere, but I am not sure where they take all the cars too. After the sidewalks are all filled, which makes it rather hard to walk anywhere, I don't know where they could put them. We found an empty spot on the sidewalk about two blocks away from the garden and walked over.

It cost ten rupee per person to get into the garden. This equates to about 25 cents. Not very expensive, but I am glad I didn't pay more to get in. At first Bhumika kept saying it was the off season and there wouldn't be many flowers. Bhumika I think is an optimist. We didn't see any flowers. The closet thing to a plant we saw was a building full of cactus plants. We didn't even really to get to see these as the fence around this building was locked and no one was allowed to see the plants. We walked around for a bit and went up to this statue on top of a big rock. The statue was blocked off by a fence so people could not get to close. There was a sign that read, "Protected Ancient Monument." It then goes on that any destruction would be prosecuted and to keep it clean. Either the sign is not effective or people don't car about monuments as there was trash all around the monument and many pieces missing. I am going with people just don't care, no rules are followed here. That is probably because no one actually enforces the rules.

We walked around a bit and saw people playing frisbee on the lawn. Well, we saw another sign that said, "Absolutely no playing games on lawn." There was a park ranger walking around and looked right at the people playing. He put his whistle in his mouth and I thought he was going to enforce the no playing rule. I was wrong. He blew his whistle a couple times while he was still walking. Once he blew his whistle he must of thought he did his job and didn't need to do anymore. He walked away without anymore enforcement.

After Lalbagh we went to Italia for dinner, this is Bhumika's favorite restaurant. She always starts off with chips and cheese. I think my hotel and Italia shopped at the same place for cheese, the cheesewhiz factory. Well, we then got some Indian style Italian food. We then went to get some ice cream, which no one knew where the ice cream place was. We went to a store they thought was the right place, but we were soon told we were in the wrong store. We walked out and Bhumika remembered where it was, we were one block away. The ice cream was just ice cream, they didn't have any crazy kinds of ice cream, but did have some interesting kinds. I tried the fig vanilla. It was vanilla ice cream with a fig newton blended in. It was interesting.

The week of work was just another week of work. I never get to see any of Bangalore since nothing opens before I leave and it is almost closing time when I get home. During the week I just ate more Italian food and didn't get as far in my testing as my manager would have liked. He gave me grief for not being as far as he wanted. The problem with that is that he has never done projects and doesn't understand the whole process. All week I have been working, but not 100% on what he wants because there are other just as important activities to make sure the project goes live with no problems. I spend about half my time working with technology on the other activities (part of the reason I am here) and half on "Pike's" activities. Well, Pike complained so now this week I have to spend all my time and get technology to spend all of there time on "Pike's" activities. That is not as beneficial to the project since most of the problems found come from non-Pike activities. Anyway, enough complaining.

Friday night I came home and booked a trip for Saturday to Mysore. It is a long day of site seeing. The cab picked me up at 7AM and I was to return around 11PM. To get to Mysore it is a three and a half hour drive! Good thing I don't mind talking to strangers, it was just me and my driver. We didn't go straight to Mysore. We made a few stops along the way. The first one was to the Tipu Sultan's summer palace. The gardens at the summer palace were much better than those at Lalbagh. Throughout the day there was a common theme: no pictures are allowed in most of the buildings. The palace was one of those. I wish I could have taken pictures, it was a very nice sight. every square inch of the palace was pained. Not just a single color, but many patterns and pictures. The palace was built by Tipu after he won a war in the 1800's. The pictures on the walls all depict a battle or someone that was close to Tipu.

After walking through the palace I decided to walk around the gardens for a while. All the trees are numbered just in case someone decides to come in and steal on. They will be able to find the tree and know exactly where it belongs in the line. I saw five gentlemen taking picture. Four standing for the picture and one taking the picture. I asked it they wanted me to take it so all five could be in the picture. There immediate answer was yes. After I took their picture they were very interested where I was from and why I was in India. I talked to them for about 15 minutes. I saw them a few minutes later trying to take another picture. I offered again to help and they said yes. When I started handing the camera back one said they needed a picture of me with them. We took a few pictures and talked for a few more minutes. Once people saw I was willing to be in a picture with them, almost everyone that walked by asked if they could take a picture with me. I probably spend a good 45 minutes taking pictures with people just walking around. One man even took a picture with me and asked if I could wait while he went to find his wife. As soon as she learned it was an American she came running over to get the picture. The same questions were asked: 1) Where are you from? 2) Can I take a picture with you? I felt like a celebrity. There was another white couple there, but they only took about three pictures and then were tired of it and left.

The next stop was Tipu's place of death. The only thing worthy of mentioning here is that the road to get there was a city road, but was not paved and was a dirt road. It was like going four wheeling in a city.

We next went to a Hindu temple. The temple is was very nice and well crafted. One thing I forgot to do on this trip, where my sandals. I forgot that you are supposed to take your shoes off to go in any holy building in India. Well, I had my shoes on so the laces got tied and untied a few times during the day. We drove up to the temple and my driver said he was going to stay in the car while I visited the temple. I took a picture of the temple and there was a very nice man that offered to take my picture in front of the temple. I said sure. He then followed me telling me history of the temple. He took a few more picture with me in them. Well, soon after my driver came up and said something to the other man in Hindi. He turned to me and said this man was a cheat. The guy yelled something at my driver and my driver turned around swinging at the man. The other man argued with my driver for a few minutes then came to me and said I owed him money for taking pictures. My driver said not to pay him and he was a cheat. We walked through the rest of the temple and as soon as we left the temple the other man was waiting for us to argue some more. We walked back to the car with my driver and the other man yelling the whole time. We got back to the car and they were still yelling. This was getting a lot of attention and others were now gathering around. Luckily all the new joiners took my drivers side and pulled the other man away. We got in the car and drove off. I learned a lesson: if someone is being nice, better still be wary of their intentions. My driver told me everyone was a cheat and don't trust them. I don't have any more pictures with me in them because I didn't want to start anymore fights.

Next stop was to Kings Refuge, a bird refuge. The cost for my driver to get in, 30 rupee, about 75 cents. The cost for me to get in 300 rupee, about 7.50. I learned that this is normal for getting in to anyplace. It cost a foreigner about 10 times as much to get in somewhere. Well, I paid an additional 300 rupee to take a boat ride. On the boat ride they guaranteed me to see alligators and different kinds of birds. The boat guide was this skinny man that rowed us around for about an hour. I mean to say there were 12 total people that constitute us. We first saw about 2000 bats hanging from some trees. Our guide starting rowing up and then we saw two alligators swimming about 15 feet away from us. Floating around we saw about six different kinds of birds including pelicans, ravens, and others I can't remember. The guide was nice to tell us everything we saw and joked around with everyone in the boat.

We then stopped at a Catholic cathedral, St. Josephines Cathedral. I am sure there are probably about a million Joesphines in the Catholic church, so good luck finding that one. I didn't have to take my shoes off there. I walked around and went into the catacomb. It is kind of freaky to think about what is in the catacomb. that is the highlight of the cathedral.

I told my driver I wanted to take a tour of Mysore Palace so we skipped the next place which was another garden. We got to Mysore Palace and my driver told me not to buy anything from the vendors and that they would cheat me. As I was walking up to the palace someone came up to me and offered me a bracelet for about 800 rupee or 20 dollars. Definitely not a good price. I got up to the window to pay my entrance fee and it cost me 200 rupee. I noticed that for a local it would only cost 10 rupee here. They sure take advantage of the foreigners. I went inside and learned the the Maharaja still stays in the palace and holds many events there. All my co-workers said this palace was nothing compared to the Taj Mahal. I felt this Palace was very nice, so I can only imagine what the Taj Mahal is like. If Mysore Palace were Disney Land then the Taj Mahal would have to be Disney World Paris.

I walked around and found the elephants in the yard. They were moving the elephants to near the palace. One of the workers asked it we (a group of us at gathered around) wanted to sit on an elephant. Of course the answer was yes. Unfortunately the guy driving the elephants didn't stop and kept going. No sitting on an elephant for me.

After walking around I went to sit near the entrance to people watch for a few minutes. A European family sat next to me with a baby probably about 1 yr old. The baby was now a celebrity! Everyone that noticed a white couple with a baby stopped to see the baby. It was like they wanted to make sure the baby looked the same across cultures. Very interesting the level of attention that white people receive while out in public here.

After the palace we went to another Hindu temple. It is considered on of the most eight sacred places in India. Again, the craft work was amazing. Walking to and from the temple we cows, lambs, and monkeys. There were cows and lambs walking around and three monkeys just hanging out in front of the temple. One man was trying to get money from people who were just looking at the monkeys. I didn't give any money to him because the monkeys soon showed they didn't know who he was. Turns out a lot of people are cheats.

We then made our way back to Mysore Palace for the weekend light show. Saturday for 30 minutes and Sunday for an hour the castle is lit up with more than 96,000 lights. When we got back to the palace there was a Bollywood movie being shot. There were so many people taking all the good picture locations. I didn't know what movie or the actors so wasn't very interested in the movie actors, more so in the lights. The lights were beautiful. I did take a picture of the Bollywood actors in case they ever become big in the US. Not that when/if they become famous I will know who they are and remember I took their picture.

All the sites were very beautiful and nice to see. I have learned at least one thing, I would rather share these experiences with family and friends, especially my beautiful wife Sheila. It helps the experience so much more if you have someone to share it with. A good experience but I would change it by having loved ones with me.

The drive back took three and a half hours. Only two and a half to get back to Bangalore and an hour to go the last 10 km (about 6 miles). the traffic here is terrible!

Sunday was a day of relaxation again. The time to come home is getting close and I am excited. It will be nice to come home.

One week down in India

Well it has been a few days since I sent an email to everyone. After work I usually just want to eat dinner and go to bed. The hours this office works is very different from Salt Lake. Back home I have the option to come in anytime before 8 and leave as long as I finish the work. If I were to show up at 6:30AM (my usual Salt Lake time) I would not see anyone in the office for four hours! It makes sense to have overlap between Bangalore, New York and Salt Lake, but staying late makes it so you cannot do nothing in the evenings. I have been going to work at 10AM and have been working until about 9 or 9:30. This means that I do not get much time to explore in the mornings. By the time I wake up, shower, talk to Sheila, and eat breakfast the GS driver has arrived to take me to work. By the time I get back from the office between 9:30 and 10 I just want to eat dinner and go to bed.

Part of the issue about eating dinner so late is that everything in Bangalore closes at eleven. No exceptions. I guess there is a regulation that you cannot serve alcohol after 11PM. This means that there is no reason to stay open since no one will want anything if they cannot have a drink with it. there was one night I didn't get home until 10:30. By then I didn't have time to go anywhere to sit down. I called Domino's to order a pizza, which almost all the pizzas have corn on them. Hope you like corn if you eat pizza in India. Well, I was just told about Domino's that morning from another GS employee that is staying at the same hotel. This week he has ordered pizza every night! Anyway, at first I couldn't tell the drivers how to get to the apartment. I gave them the address, which apparently means nothing in Bangalore. You have to give landmarks if you want to get anywhere. I don't know any landmarks so had to go down to the front desk to get help in ordering the pizza.

About 40 minutes later my door bell rang and my pizza was finally here! Well, I didn't know at the time, but I caused some issues for the other guy's, Matt, ordering of his pizza. Domino's thought that there couldn't possibly be two Americans staying at Tri Star hotel and refused to take his order. It took him about 15 minutes of convincing that there was two of us at Tri Star that could order pizza. even after they let him order they delivered my pizza to his room. He had to tell them I was in apartment 34 not 26 and that we had both ordered pizza. He let me know this the next morning as we share a car to work every morning.

The reason I got home so late is that I was told about a restaurant called BBQ Nation and that I needed to try it out while here. It is an Indian BBQ place. I walked down there, about 1 KM from the hotel, and went up to the host. I asked if they would be able to sit me for dinner. I was informed that unfortunately they do not have any open tables and were only able to seat reservations. Everyone at work had told me that it was popular, but didn't inform me you would need a reservation. The next day when I told my story they all said, "oh yeah, you need a reservation for that place." So the plan is to one night go there after work.

One night I went to a restaurant called 100 ft restaurant (my hotel is on 100 ft road). They had Italian type foods. All the food had an Indian flare to it, except the menu item called American Lasagna. I had chicken with avocado salsa, without the avocado salsa. Avocado's are out of season so I had to have pineapple salsa instead. After I finished the chicken, which was very good, I remember reading that I should be careful while eating salsa here. Luckily, I didn't get sick, but need to be more careful when ordering.

The week ended on a High Note, literally but kind of not true. We left work a little earlier than normal, 8:15. Dileep is moving teams so everyone was going out to celebrate/mourn his leaving PWM. Dileep has been working on a project with me for the last year and a half. All the tech knowledge for the project is leaving with him. I was mourning him leaving especially since I just want that other project off my plate! I seem to get all the projects that go on forever! The project I am here for though will not go any longer than March 19th. We were told by some very senior people at the firm that we have to go live at that time. Maybe that is why they sent me out here?

Anyway, that night we went to the authentic southern indian food restaurant called High Note. The restaurant was at the top of a building with not very visible signs. A few nights ago when I was walking to BBQ Nation I walked right past it, but didn't recognize it as anything but maybe a business building. The food was very good! We all had drinks and food and left at 11:30. All the lights were off and the workers were all ready to go home. I walked home with Muthu to Tri Star which was only about .5 km away.

You always here about jet lag. Well, I am here to attest that the theory is true. Even if you think you can sleep on planes you will most likely get the lag. Granted on the plane I didn't get a full nights sleep, I thought I would be ok. Boy was I wrong. The first day I hit a wall about 4:30PM. I think I was falling asleep at my desk, but everyone was complementing me that I wasn't looking as tired as most people who come from the US. I thought that night I would sleep with no problems. Well, I didn't and Tuesday I woke up at 5AM and was not able to go back to sleep. I was tired all day and had a rough time all day. Since then, I started taking the Melatonin Trisha suggested. I think that is my Ambien. I have slept very well every night since.

Some probably saw that I posted on Facebook that I was watching "Total Wipeout." That is equivalent to America's "Wipeout." I thought that it would be really funny and good to watch! It is amazing how much the commentators actually add to the show. Watching people wipeout is still funny, but some of the replays I had no idea why they were replaying since I couldn't understand the Hindi they were speaking. Every once in a while there would be some English words thrown in the mix. If a show is an American show it comes automatically equipped with sub-titles. The sub-titles are in English. I guess the stations figure that the American accents are ver hard to understand and require reading.

The language is interesting here. There are three languages, English, Hindi, and the local dialect. At work it is funny because my co-workers will start talking in Hindi and someone will remind them that I cannot understand Hindi and that need to speak in English so I can understand. Dinner last night was the worst, get a little alcohol into them and I think they forget how to speak English altogether. I think only the very poor do not speak Hindi, it seems that everyone can understand the drivers and speak back to them and I know everyone is not from the same state.

Today has been a relax day. I walked down 100 Foot Road (don't let the name confuse you, it is not only 100 feet). I walked into some local shops and around the hotel area. Tomorrow the plan is to visit Mysore Palace. It should be fun. It is nice to have a weekend and actually see stuff around the city.

The project is going well. We have completed about 20% of what I came here to accomplish and will get very close to completing this week. There are some processes that we won't be able to complete this week and will make the project carry over to next week. We are making some really good progress and I have only found seven issues so far. Seven sounds like a lot, but when you know that I usually find 25 - 30 at this point we are in a much better position. I hope the project continues going this well and I don't find anything critical.

Only two weeks left!

Arriving in Bangalore

I made it to Bangalore! I loaded the plane at JFK at 10:40AM on Saturday. The seats in Business class were amazing. It was almost like your own personal room. The person next to you has to walk by your seat, but there is a rather large partition that makes it so you don't have to see the other person if you don't want. Before we took off I met another person from GS. She was headed to Bangalore as well. Her stay is only going to be for four days after which she flies to Singapore.

On this plane they really made you comfortable. The stewardess asked it I wanted to have my mattress taken out before or after take off. I stayed up and selected a movie to watched. each person is able to select their own movie to watch. At least in Business class, I did not check to see if each economy class got their own scree. I select Prince of Persia: Sands of Time. Emarites provided sound canceling head phones in order to watch the movie.

in addition to the head phones they made it a little easier to sleep on the plane. The matress make the seat very comfortable to lay on. When I say lay, I really mean lay! The seat almost turned 100% flat. This made it much easier to fall asleep. The also provided eye covers to block out all the light. I still had issues and was only able to sleep for four of the eleven hours to Dubai. I decided to watch another movie once I woke up. I selected Robin Hood and Sheila you wouldn't like this movie, too much talking not enough action.

Once we landed in Dubai, 11 hours by second but 20 hours by the clock, we had to get off the bus using stairs and load a bus to move to the terminal. It was about a 15 minute drive before we finally reached the terminal. When I got off the plane I met another person from Goldman Sachs, he was moving to Bangalore to become the head of some teams. When you enter the terminal everyone must go through a set of security again. The guy moving to Bangalore somehow managed to unknowingly brought a Swiss Army knife through security at JFK. The Dubai agents had a good time with them catching the knife and New york missing the knife. Well, he was pulled aside and question by a few different security members for about 30 minutes. Finally someone else started making a larger scene and allowed him to go.

We then walked to the business lounge. This lounge was much bigger than the one at JFK, really just more seats. It was also much more busy. In the lounge I met another Goldman employee who was coming to Bangalore to train a new team. We sat there chatting until it was time to load the next plane. This trip was not as long, only a little more than 4 hours. I felt very lucky that my luggage made it from SLC to Bangalore. If it had been lost I was smart enough to pack one set of clothes in my carry on so I could have lasted one day.

After picking up my luggage I walked outside to find my car ride to the apartments. Well, I quickly learned that if I never got in another car in Bangalore it would be to soon. Lucky for me I get to get in another car tomorrow morning. I think that the traffic lines in the road mean nothing. No one follows them and they honk more times in 2 minutes than I have my whole life. It took us an hour and a half to get to the apartment. During that time we just chatted about Bangalore and the US.

When I got to my apartment I went in and started unpacking my stuff. I soon found I was very hungry and decided to go down stairs to the in house restaurant. I got a chicken and cheese grilled sandwich. The cheese tasted like it was cheesewhiz from the can. I was starving though and it tasted pretty good. I came back and decided I could afford the 200 Rupee to get the internet for 24 hours so I could write an email or two. After the email I am going to go to bed. I am extremely tired and hope that I will not suffer to bad from the time lag thingy ( I can't think of what it is called). Hopefully the continuous honking outside my window does not cause to much issue sleeping.

Hope you all enjoyed your weekend!


And P.S. since it is Sunday night at 10PM the Super Bowl has already happened here and the both teams played a good game. Nothing too exciting happened. Hope you all enjoy it! I won't spoil who won because that would just be rude to give it away.