First days in Hyderabad

Waouh! Already one week I have been here in Hyderabad.

I am staying for the moment at the ICRISAT campus where IWMI offices are located. It is a beautiful, very very quiet and peaceful place. ICRISAT is a large research centre on agriculture, the campus is 3500 ha large and around 2000 people work here.

And the best swimming-pool of Andhra Pradesh is here !

It has been quite a busy week, settling at the office, getting a computer, a printer, doing a lot of paper work... I have a nice desk luminous and with a lot of space to spread my papers! We are around 15 people at the office, the atmosphere is very friendly. There is a chat/tea break in the afternoon and we go together for lunch. Almost all my colleagues are Indian - except Paul, an Australian hydrogeologist who arrived 3 weeks ago, and Samad, the director, who is from Sri Lanka. Otherwise, I have met on ICRISAT campus a German postdoc Simone, who is also starting a postdoc and two French students in agronomy, Amandine and Paul, doing an internship .

Evenings and week-ends have also been busy!! I have been to the city centre and in a few places around the campus:

- buying some Indian outfit - it is good to look Indian here as there are not many westerners,

- going to the theatre,

There was a theatre festival with plays from everywhere in the world. The one I saw "Ouch" was about three Indian girls making a cast for a TV-show. It was fun - but not always easy to understand the jokes (I need to get used to the Indian accent)

- going to a jazz concert at the very porsh and exclusive Secunderabad club (a kind of Rotary club). It was the rendez-vous of expats and very upper class Indian society...

- visiting the marvellous marble Birla temple from which there is a fantastic view of the city (it is on the top of a hill, the view looks a bit like when you are up in Montmartre),

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birla_Mandir_(Hyderabad,_Andhra_Pradesh)

- visiting an Indian family for dinner, I was invited by an Indian woman I met in the train.

It was funny, all the children of the building came over to speak English with me. I was actually surprised how well they can speak already - they start learning English at school at 6 here!

- seeing the gigantic statue of Buddha on the lake,

(see a photo of the statue and an introduction to Hyderabad on:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyderabad,_Andhra_Pradesh)

- visiting flats in the city centre, (I will talk more about this later on!)

- enjoying Indian food...

गरम गरम मसाला डोसा ! (masala dosa) it is a kind of pancake... miam miam.
I heard the food in Andhra Pradesh is the most spicy of India... so far I am doing ok, but I think I have not eaten yet the real spicy stuff!

To go to anywhere in town from the campus it is minimum 1h transportation, either taking the bus, train or rickshaw (also called auto) .

The rickshaw is a fantastic vehicle, it is like a vespa with a roof and two wheels at the back... It is very flexible , you can make a U-turn in 30 s and avoid the holes, motorbikes and dogs very quickly with a sharp turn of the steering-wheel. Hyderabad is said to have the worst traffic in India... It might be true!

I hope it gave you a little taste of my new life in India and of Hyderabad... Anyone wants to come for a visit??