robert.admin – Page 154 – Robert Raymond’s Blogtorium

March 6, 2016

CultureSmart!India (Review)

ust barely in time for our India trip, the CultureSmart! series book on India. Where I am going. Right now. Sitting in JFK writing this review. Finished the book on the first leg. The book isn’t a “go see this, check this out” guild book. No, it’s actually a small guide to the people and customs of India. It gives a brief history, a layout of the place, its geography and weather, before explaining what makes Indians tick. Very interesting insights on these diverse people. It explains their traditional culture and how it’s manifested given their urban, emigration and technology […]

March 1, 2016

India – Day Nine – Liquid Death in all forms

oday was our trip to the Ganges. “But wait,” you say. “I’ve already read this.” No, this time it was to see the sun coming up over the Ganges, a time of prayer. But in starting the day off I got two pieces of bad news. First, my sister had explosive Ebola-level liquid death (likely from that Air India sandwich she ate on the short flight out – two other people were down for similar reasons). And then a good friend, Ed Rieg, had passed away. So I had a lot on my mind when we pushed through traffic (human, […]

February 29, 2016

India – Day Eight – Love and Death

kay, so, Khajuraho Temple – looks like those temples out of the Jungle Book (yeah, already made that comparison). But that’s where the G-rating ends. Whoever the natives were, they were very open-minded. Their temples showed all manner of court life (unclothed court life) and all manner of sexual configurations (69, three-somes, voyeurism, bestiality). So yeah, I got a lot of pictures. Really, there is something (as an occasional writer of erotica) that these stone-masons of 1000AD captured, the saucy cant of a woman’s hip, her come-hither expression, all that. And did they ever catch it. Honestly, much of it […]

February 28, 2016

India – Day Seven – Steel Rails to Jhansi

errible start for the day (the usual 3am bing awake deal). Turns out JB had some sort of mango tea drink for dinner. Either that or something else dumped her guts. I’m lying in bed, trying to will myself to sleep, and I’m hearing say that her bowels are dumping, that she’s got a throbbing headache, that she’s sick as a dog, and my mind whirls on the logistics of three hours on a train and five more in a bus. Told her to pull the ripcord and take the anti-diuretics, aspirins, everything. Bomb bay doors open. Salvo. Within ten […]

February 27, 2016

India – Day Six – Grieving with marble

o the first thing today – the Taj Mahal. And what can I say – as soon as you walk in, forget all those movies and photos you’ve seen of this place. The reality, especially on a cool clear morning, is just of walking through the sandstone entry gate, looking through the darkened portal at the gleaming white dome, and spouting an expletive. This was my India moment, where I stood and shot photos and just shook my head and said “Wow…” Strolled around it for a bit. Sat with JB on a bench and watched the parrots and chipmunks […]

February 27, 2016

OpsLog – FEC – 2/27/2016

he Hindus have a little idea, how everyone who dies is resurrected. I can only hope this is true. If it is, in my next life, perhaps I’ll run that Cocoa switcher a little better than I did today. Just stupid blunders. I needed tanks, gons and a couple of boxcars for a train I was building. Tanks and gons were all scattered in the north yard – had to go cherrypicking. The boxes were in a neat little grouping one track away from where I’d construct the outbound turn. And it seemed like a good idea (at the time) […]

February 26, 2016

India – Day Five – Mad Max: Agra Road

oke up today and JB gave me a Valentine’s Day card. In return, I gave her a dumb look. Totally forgot, given the strange background we find ourselves in. But it was a sweet gesture. Pretty much a transport sort of day. In the morning, a quick run over to the Palace of Winds (where the ladies of the court could spy on the street from their perfumed sitting rooms in the sixteenth century). Then we hit the road for the Step Well of Chand Baori. What’s a step well? Well (snicker), imagine that you have to go down thirty […]

February 25, 2016

India – Day Four – Red Forts and Hot, Hot deals

p early and off to the Amber Fort, a sprawling hilltop fortification that wends around the nearby valleys like some sort of circular Great Wall. The structure was absolutely breathtaking, hanging on its crags in the morning haze. Rode up to the top on the back of an elephant, giyap, which swayed so much my hips hurt. Still, it was something to find yourself atop a huge moving creature on a cliff road, looking out over your feet and way way down to the Maotha Lake (with its gardened island). Now, you gotta understand that hawkers are a rupee a […]

February 25, 2016

OpsLog – LM&O – 2/24/2016

o joke – when you go wheels up out of Delhi at 3am and touch down in Orlando at 8pm the same day, you’ve either got a really fast plane or you’re making up the time-in-flight adding in the time difference from flying halfway round the world, ten and a half hours in this case. That equates to twenty-seven hours in planes and airports, all during the longest day in your life. And yes, you’ll have jetlag like you won’t believe following this. Somehow I made it in to work Monday for our most important audit we face every two […]

February 23, 2016

India – Day Two – Delhi, new and old

he day actually started at the airport – we got in at half-past eleven in the evening. The Indian tourist visa deal was a pain; it took an hour to clear it what with the dodgy fingerprint machines. The van ride in to the hotel was hectic; dark and smoggy and honky. When we got to the hotel, ready to crash into bed, first we accidently rode the elevator down to the basement then found out the room card wouldn’t allow us access to the elevator buttons. Finally someone coming up gave us a lift back to the lobby. After […]