Gremlins in India

We’re staying in one of the older American branded hotels here in Chennai – the Chola Sheraton. It’s haunted by Gremlins. Of this I have no doubt.

In World War Two, airmen blamed the mythical Gremlins for random, unexplainable mechanical failures. They’ve all migrated to India, and here the entire Gremlin population seems intent on keeping us from sleeping.

Gremlins are particularly good with electrical devices, as most have Electrical Engineering degrees, and fantastically insulated pliers, which allow them to cut live wires at will.

I’ve estimated there are no less than six Gremlins living in this hotel, judging by the droppings and coordinated attacks. They’ve devised the following torture schedule for their amusement:

4:00 AM – The “Indian Two Step” boogie: Gremlin #1 turns on the television to a Hindi channel with exotically dressed people dancing about at top volume, while Gremlin #2 moves the remote to a location farthest from the bed. Gremlin #3 and #4 have arranged the low heavy furniture in an ever changing, complex pattern which allows me to get to a full walking speed before tripping over one table, while turning another into teak toothpicks by crashing down upon it. When I regained consciousness the other night at about 4:15, I was lying on the floor with no less than six 4” splinters embedded in my soft parts.

5:15 AM – The “Night of a Thousand Lights” torment: some nights, the Gremlins will turn on everything electrical in my room simultaneously. I will inevitably spring up Frankenstein style, and pinball about the room in a coma searching the walls for light switches that are not there. As soon as I have reached the farthest point from the bed and his night vision is completely wiped out, they’ll turn off ALL the lights, stranding me in a sea of darkness. When the lights went out last night, I couldn’t tell if my eyes were open or closed - I had to feel them with my fingers before crawling back to bed.

8:15 AM – The “Wake-up call HA HA”: This is a particularly embarrassing torture, which involves a phone and the whole lobby staff. Somehow, the Gremlins have figured out a way to completely control the phone next to my bed. When the woman in the lobby did my wakeup call this morning, the bedside phone was rigged to go directly to speaker mode, NO RINGING. So imagine….I’m WIPED OUT asleep, suffering a concussion, my room is completely blacked out with the curtains closed, and suddenly there’s a woman on a loudspeaker 6” from my skull.

This morning’s call went something like this I think:

Me: SNORE. SNORE. SNORE.

Woman: Mr. Freedman! This is your wakeup call!

Me: What ? What ? TURN IT OFF! Where are you? ME! VOICE LADY! HEY!
(I’m STILL ASLEEP)

Woman: Mr. Freedman, this is Kumari from the front desk, are you hearing me?

Me: Hearing? YES! Why this? What have you done with my lamb, LAMP, dammit? The Chops! The Chops!

Woman: MR FREEDMAN THIS IS YOUR WAKE-UP CALL

Eventually, I woke up, and realized what was happening. While I’m shouting sentence fragments at a busted phone, she’s downstairs thinking she’s dialed the looney hatch. I could imagine the conversation in the lobby as soon as she hung up the phone: “You know the chubby American in room 609? He must be in India for an exorcism or something!"

Malarone - Trying NOT to get Malaria

While in India, we're given Malarone - it’s a medication which prevents malaria – SUPPOSEDLY.

The pills look like beige M&Ms with squared edges. The instructions state that you MUST take it every day, and at approximately the same time every day, like birth control, for it to be effective. Problem is, you have to start taking the pills 2 days before you leave, and for 7 days after you return. With the time differences - traveling for a day through 10 time zones getting here, you’d have to be Einstein to get the time right. It’s like Survivor: India, except the prize is staying healthy. My solution? Before leaving the US, I set the alarm on my Blackberry to ring every day at the same time, which like a MORON, I always get wrong, and the alarm ends up going off at 5 AM here in India, the WORST possible time.

Every night before I go to bed, I put a single Malarone and my blackberry next to the bed, along with a bottle of water. In the morning when I wake, the pill is gone. I hope I’m taking them in my sleep. I have a strange feeling that they are all under the bed, or that someone is sneaking into my room at night, and flushing them down the toilet, or painting them blue, and selling them as Viagra. I have absolutely no memory whatsoever of taking a single pill since I arrived.

Hot, hot, HOT

New Delhi weather this morning: clear, windy, and hot. Hot for India, which is hot for anyone. Hot. 112 degrees and very windy. What does that feel like? Imagine standing in front of a hair dryer built for King Kong, minus the noise, and add a heat-lamp.

I walked outside the hotel for 9 seconds, and saw a camel with a deflated hump, crying. I turned on my heels and went back inside to towel off. The camel’s going to be OK – he’s in my room, drinking out of the sink in the bathroom. Pity the housekeeping staff.

I’m not built for this heat. I have nothing appropriate I can wear because in a Speedo, I’d frighten the children. And most adults.

Indian Food - Just Like France, Without the Paradox

Everything tastes better in India.

Pancakes taste better.

Ingredients like whole milk yogurt and European butter combined with fresh spices and a complete abandon for all comprehensible rules of healthy cooking make for cuisine which could kill an Olympic athlete in 7-10 days. They create unimaginable combinations here –made fresh moments before you order. If you order dumplings in a Chinese restaurant, they are made from scratch - everything takes 20 minutes to reach the table.

The 24 hour “diner” in the hotel lobby serves a lamb hamburger. Yep. A hamburger made out of lamb. The lamb is ground to order, most probably fried in clarified butter, and is served with a fried egg on top. The McLamburger happy meal - comes with a plastic defibrillator toy and a $100 gift certificate to a cardiologist of your choice.

Human Keyword Game

As Americans, we’re lucky in that a fair portion of the world now speaks English, which, 30 years ago, was not the case. The Internet, globalization, US entertainment and our viral culture has propagated the globe nicely with English speaking people. The only issue is, that even within the narrow scope of English, there are different names used for the same things in different places. Diet Coke is called "Cola Lite" in most countries and elevators are commonly called "lifts" in a lot of places.

When we travel, we play the "Human Keyword Game" - like trying to find the right search phrase when using Google, we're collecting the right English words for each culture. For example: in Germany, try to get a sugar substitute brought to your table using any of the following words, and all you’ll get is a dirty look:

Sweetener

Equal

Sweet & Low

Not Sugar, the other thing….(as you pantomime shacking a sugar packet)

Now, try asking for “saccharine” and you’ve got a shot. That’s human keyword searching. Knowing English is not enough – knowing the right English word is the fun, and it’s worth documenting.

Think this trivial? Riddle me this:

You’re in India, and explosive case of traveler’s diarrhea has come on as suddenly as a heart attack (what are the odds). You SHUFFLE into a hotel lobby, and approach the man cleaning the floor.

You need directions to the only place where relief can be found.

Every muscle that can be clenched is clenched. You have 5, maybe 10 more seconds. Max. Use the right words, and all is well. Choose the wrong word, and Mr. floor cleaner’s job just got a whole lot worse. Do you ask for:

The Bathroom

The Rest Room

The Men’s Room

The WC

BAM! Full diaper. The correct answer is TOILET. Thank you for playing. You need to know the right keyword to get the desired result in each place. More to come.