The head-wobble

Move your chin to the right, and the top of your head to the left. Now reverse and repeat quickly.
In India this interchangably means:
Yes,
Maybe,
Sorry,
Thanks,
I don't know what you are talking about.
Also used as a conversation ender. Its kinda infectious though. I caught myself doing it at McDonalds the other day. Rather embarrassing. A smile also goes a long way here and can get you out of most situations.

Funny Traffic #2

Oh the laughter. I wonder what they get taught? There are NO road rules here. At one narrow railway bridge near work, one direction of traffic regularly muscles the other direction out and fills the entire road space. I also see cars with stickers that say "How do you rate my driving? Call xxx to report bad driving" ??

Funny traffic #1

There appears to be only ONE road rule enforced by the police here - that motorcycle drivers must wear helmets. Of course that doesn't mean this applies to passengers or that there is any restriction on the number of family members you can take for a ride. Four seems achievable when you squish smaller ones in between larger ones.

Speaking of which...

If one is on the treadmill in the gym and the power suddenly goes out, things could get quite messy. (think about it).
..so the treadmills are all hooked up to huge UPS devices. I assume this gives you the chance to jump off in the dark before the motor stops. I don't want to test it.

Marat Hali street view

This is the view from the grocery store we went to on the way home. I think we were somewhere near Marat Hali which is the closest village to where we live on the ring road near where the airport road intersects. Notice the building under construction - there are buildings going up everywhere here and they are ALL concrete. Nothing is built of wood here coz termites will destroy a building in a year.
Underneath the sign advertising personal satellite TV you will find squatters and poor roadside stall men.
Notice also the great wiring on the the power pole. Electrical safety is not one of their strong points. There is a metal lamp post in our apartment grounds that issues strong arcing sounds from it, you see guys joining 220kv lines in the street mud and melting electrical conduit together with fires. No-wonder the power goes out regularly.

View from the apartment

The nice building across the way is actually Cisco I just realised. Doesn't mean we are any nearer to civilisation. The hidden road that runs across the picture in front of Cisco is the outer ring road. This location doesn't even appear on the comprehensive "Bangalore Road Map" I purchased, or any map for that matter.

Difficulties

The apartments are in the middle of nowhere .
There are no stores of any kind within reach without using our driver on the way to-from work. I just found a good store "big-bazaar" down the road from work that thankfully I can get what I want at lunch time but struggle to find good food.
It is extremely hard to find: safe vegetables, there is no milk (only UHT), no frozen foods or fresh meat, no eggs.
I have to live off: cereal, bread (not very fresh), yoghurt, meals-ready-to-eat, pasta and sauce, two minute noodles and juice. Thankfully it is all cheap, a shop-load normally costs me about $5-6
The road out of our complex is intraversable by foot within 48 hours of rain and its been raining lately. Public transport is difficult to take from the city and cabs dont like coming out this far. Auto-rikshas will refuse to come here as well.
BTW the big-bazaar has a sub-store called "Loot Mart". Strange invitation if you ask me.