Sometimes I write my thoughts down.

I’ve decided I don’t much like Mumbai. As we circled Bangalore on our approach to land, it looked so much nicer – proper houses with gardens; cricket pavilions; tree-lined avenues (strictly speaking, of course, that’s a tautology!) and a generally cleaner, more civilised character. This impression wasn’t much dented from ground level, either. My boss, Caroline, met us in Mumbai before our departure, and explained that most of that city is reclaimed land, and every monsoon season the whole place gets flooded out, which partly explained why it all looked so shabby. Also, Mumbai is the equivalent of Dick Whittington’s London, being a hub for trade & commerce, film (it’s the home of Bollywood) and talk centres, as well as being a major port. Each new group of hopeful migrants start off sleeping on the streets, then as they find work they can maybe afford a tent, and eventually a shack in a slum – as permanent structures, these are highly sought-after, and expensive due to Mumbai’s restricted land space.
Anyway, I’m returning to Mumbai later in the trip, so enough of that for now. After landing in Bangalore, Ragu, a colleague of Caroline’s, met us with a ‘proper’ cab (a modern-ish Toyota people-carrier thing) to take us on the 5-hour road trip to Vellore. We left the city down those tautologous tree-lined avenues, and although there were still roadside shacks in abundance, they looked… if not thriving, then at least not overly forlorn. The countryside started off completely flat, with numerous small villages which, whilst shabby and distinctly third-world, seemed contented. I had found something more like ‘real’ India, which I was glad about. (The driving was just as bad, though!)
After an hour or so, small round hills began to appear, together with stacks of enormous boulders. The whole landscape looked like God (or an Indian supreme being, I guess) had been playing marbles. It looked like it could be glacial moraine, but Caroline and Ragu both doubted this. It looked remarkable, at any rate. Even better than that, though, was when we stopped for tea at a roadside café and saw MONKEYS!! IN A TREE!! This made my day, as you can tell :D
Soon afterwards it began to get dark, so most of the remainder of the journey I couldn’t see much, especially since there were no street lights in the villages. Our hotel is nice, though, and having my boss around is comforting as she knows the place inside out and can answer all our silly questions. Tomorrow I’ll be starting work, which will also be comforting as I’ll know what I’m about...