The Past Week...

A week has past since my last blog and it's been jam-packed!
Last Wednesday we got to visit Prasad Labs, which is where a lot of Hindi movies and regional movies are shot onto the film to be played in the cinema. This talk was actually pretty interesting as our guide was so enthusiastic - he'd flown from Chennai just to show us around.
We also got to see a local movie and we all noticed that the actors were totally different to our actors as they were a bit podgy, unlike the size 0's of Hollywood flims!

The following day we visited Srishti school of arts and got to do a bit of art purselves and it was a bit strange to be at an arts institution as it proved that some people in India do actually go on to study art, as 99% of people that you talk to want to study engineering or medicine as there's loads of money and jobs in that sector, and people tend to look down on any other subject.

On the afternoon we visited Chennapatna village which is where a lot of wooden toys and ornaments are made and we were able to go into the factory and see the workers using their tools to create the pieces. The village was a really small one and was, I guess, the kind of thing that we had been expecting to see as it was full of little houses that were just a step above the slums. Once again we managed to attract the attention of all the school children and they subsequently followed us around for the rest of our visit!

Our trip to Infosys the following day was amazing. We all agreed that whether you liked or disliked the business it was a bizzare experience. The business had developed from a single room with 6 workers and is now a huge business with it's own site of restaurants, gyms and water features. The whole experience was a bit odd as it was like living in some kind of infosys land that employees never really need to leave! The story of infosys is inspirational though as it's now India's largest IT company and developed from such a small scale.

On the afternoon of the Friday we had an interview with the local press and our article actually appeared yesterday, half a page so pretty big! It looks like we're becoming more famous by the week!

On Saturday night we all put our best clothes on for our last night together in Bangalore before we left for our host families. We dined at the Hard Rock café (not really immersing ourselves culturally I know, but that's what the next 2 weeks are for!) and then went out on the razzle for a bit (before closing, which is at 11:30!!!).

On Sunday we were all doing a bit of last minute frantic packing. Everybody was getting picked up this morning and we were all a bit sad to see each other leave, but really excited for our stay with our host families. I got picked up around 11:30 by Abhishek, his dad and their driver. I was pretty surprised that nobody here wears seatbelts, especially since the roads seem so manic to me! I also found out about the gruelling univeristy entrance exams. Honestly, I thought we had it bad but here to get into the top unis you have to sit a 6 hour entrance exam, mad!

We arrived at the apartment and it's such a nice complex. We've got a pool sop we went swimming in the afternoon and there's basketball too so I surprised myself by having a go, although i did miss a lot! The evening we went with James and his host Akshay to see Harry Potter. The cinema seats were so comfy and you even get an interval half way through which was so weird!

On Monday we went to school along the road and we didn't really know what we were supposed to be doing so I took some classes with Abhishek, although we weren't actually doing that much as everybody was getting their marks back from the tests and kicking themselves for not doing as well as they felt they should. In the afternoon we got a proper programme although some parts of it, such as taking classes, seem a bit formidable!
On tuesday we watched the inter-house dance competition and we were all really impressed by the dances, we couldn't believe that they had been prepared in just 5 days! we also got called up to speak in the assembly by surprise and I had to give a short speech which was a bit daunting.

Today was good, we got to go to a commerce festival at Bishop Cotton Girl's school where some of the other fellows are based and did a treasure hunt and watched some of the competitions like an ad competition and pictionary. All of us enjoyed it and it was nice to meet up again with the others and share our experiences.
Well tonight I'm going to go and see the ice cream parlour that's owned by the family business so I'd better be off for now!