Hi everyone!
So it's been 3 weeks I'm in Kolkata now, 2 actually if you don't count a week of training in Bangalore. During the first 2 weeks in Kolkata I basically spent 100% of my time looking for a Hive (the house / apartment we will live and work in), which has proven not to be an easy task (see explanation why below). Last week however I was in Bangalore to meet and get trained by the founders of Pollinate, together with my buddy Tao, the other city co-founder (picture below at the cricket game), it was really exciting! They're an awesome group of people and I'm really proud to be working with them, helping them achieve our goals.
Now I don't really have a theme for this post, so I thought I'd just share some random thoughts and pictures. Enjoy!
So it's been 3 weeks I'm in Kolkata now, 2 actually if you don't count a week of training in Bangalore. During the first 2 weeks in Kolkata I basically spent 100% of my time looking for a Hive (the house / apartment we will live and work in), which has proven not to be an easy task (see explanation why below). Last week however I was in Bangalore to meet and get trained by the founders of Pollinate, together with my buddy Tao, the other city co-founder (picture below at the cricket game), it was really exciting! They're an awesome group of people and I'm really proud to be working with them, helping them achieve our goals.
Now I don't really have a theme for this post, so I thought I'd just share some random thoughts and pictures. Enjoy!
1. Real Estate Agents
They are oh so special people. I have come to believe that when real estate agents are borne anywhere in the world, 3 fairies give them 3 gifts, but they all come with a ow hard is it to understand: "min 4 bathrooms"?). catch . The first fairy gives them the gift to multiply themselves (as you can see from the picture. Bear in mind that one of them was taking said picture), but it comes with the obligation to say "Hello" about 100 times on the phone before saying anything else. The second fairy gives them the gift to take 1 month rent as commission for their hard work, but it comes with the obligation to arrive late and without the keys at every single visit. And by the third fairy they have been given the love of taking photos with westerners, but it comes with the obligation of consistently showing their clients things that do not match their criteria (Seriously, h |
2. Hindlish
Hanging out with Real Estate Agents I started perfecting my Hindlish (a mix between Hindi and English). Here's a selection of the best figures of speech I've come across:
- First and foremost, the accent. As you can see on the picture above, adding an "e" at the end of a word helps a lot for people to understand you. "Right" becomes "Righte" and "Left" becomes "Lefte", which sometimes translates into the spelling of the word.
- "Maximum" is used in Hindlish as "a lot". For example, "this house has maximum bedrooms", or "India has maximum people" (oh yes it does). On the other hand, "less" is used as "little" (don't ask me why it's not minimum).
- "Each and everything" is used quite a lot, especially by Real Estate agents, to describe a house that has a lot of amenities for instance.
- "Only" is used after pretty much every amount (even in contracts!), e.g. "the rent of this house is 1 lakh only" (oh yeah, that's just to make it more confusing, 1 lakh = 100.000 and 1 crore = 10 million), or at the end of random sentences. For example: "Here take a left only", "Are you on Facebook only?", or "We are going there only". I still have to figure that one out.
- Throw in a couple of head wobbles, a handful of "matlab"s ("I mean" in Hindi), at least one "Accha" (good/awesome/oh.../really?/well!) and one "Thik hai" (OK) per sentence, and you got yourself a Hindlish speaker!
3. Cricket
When people say that cricket is a religion in India, the reality is hard to grasp until you witness it yourself. People talk about cricket all the time (especially during the world cup and the IPL, which basically happened to run these last 2 months I was here), play cricket everywhere (literally everywhere), they live for cricket. This particular picture was taken on Sunday at the Eden Gardens in Kolkata, during the IPL final, where the Mumbai Indians literally crushed the Chennai SuperKings!
4. Mother Teresa and the Ambassador cabs
Ok I'll give it to you, these 2 things have absolutely nothing to do with each other, but I liked the picture. Mother Teresa has done many great things for the poor people of Kolkata, and the world, so much that already a couple of people have randomly come up to me to tell me how she changed their life. Many foreigners still come here to volunteer at "the MotherHouse", her former HQ. As for the ambassador cabs, they are all over Kolkata, and they're probably just as old as Mother Teresa's charity is, if not older. In fact, I have recently learned that they have stopped producing them 10 years ago, sadly enough. Therefore each and everything inside is broken except for the horn of course, and even though the words "no refusal" are written on each and everyone of them, they won't take you if the distance is too short, or use their meter after 9 pm. They are also, of course, a great place to nap.