Taj Mahal this weekend!

Going to the Taj Mahal this Saturday and Sunday! Looking forward to taking lots of pictures and seeing how giant and beautiful it is. The popular places are the Taj Mahal of course, Fort Agra, and I'm going to eat dinner and sightsee at the Oberoi Amarvilas. Room rates there start at $600 a night, up to the thousands! Dinner was recommended by the NY Times and entrees are a more reasonable $10-30. Hopefully there will be some good shopping vendors there too. Work pays for all my hotels here even if I'm travelling on the weekend. And I think they pay for most of my flights too since I can't "go home" every weekend. It's called flex trips and I just pay the taxes. If they can't reimburse me, that's ok, b/c then I'm just paying for personal weekend flights.

The Accenture Pune is in a gated IT community, but still some dirt roads and ok infrastructure. The building itself is pretty decent. The 16 person team is very nice and they take me to the cafeteria for lunch, which is really the only place to go b/c the surrounding area is empty. Lunch is 30 rupees, which is like 70 cents! Mostly vegetarian and they have fruit which I am so tempted to eat everywhere. Only peelable fruit for me though. But they have lots of curry, spiced food, rice, naan and roti type bread. They are all right out of college except for the supervisor who I am on the same level with. Surpringly a quarter women on the team, but the rest of the building is heavily male. They took me on a stroll outside after lunch around the building. They are from different places in the country but leave in apartments near work now since they were placed at this office.

I eat whatever Indian cooked food that looks good and write down what it is if it's labelled at the hotel. The included breakfast is awesome in a beautiful restaurant called Spice Kitchen, both Indian and American food. And freshed squeezed juices, like orange, pineapple, watermelon, a delight. I've eaten medu wada, aloo paratha, poori, rice congee, aloo bhaji, pongal, sambhar, and idli. It's buffet style so I just get a little of everything. Not eating Indian 3 times a day anymore b/c it gets old, so eating continental food too a little bit. It would be different if it were Vietnam, I could eat that all the time. But a lot of India reminds me of Vietnam, in terms of 3rd world but still good cultural aspects.

Looking forward to weekends when I can actually get out and do fun touristy things. Scheduling my next weekend trip to Goa beach town, and I think my last weekend will be Mumbai. I want to visit some temples. I brought a head scarf at the advice of a friend, and hope to see colorful scarves to bring home too. Don't know how I'm gonna fit much in my full suitcase though. Wanna ride an elephant like another friend suggested, but don't think I'll have time to visit a reserve. The Holi Festival is this weekend. According to Wikitravel, it's the Spring Festival of India with lots of colors. It welcomes spring and wins the blessings of Gods for good harvests and fertility of the land. It's the second most important festival in India after Diwali. Said to be full of fun, frolic, and exhuberance. They throw colored powder each other and one guy told me they even fill balloons with the powder to hit people with.

In the mornings I eat breakfast outside near the waterfall walls and sometimes sit by the pool until the hotel car takes me to the office. Most of the people are older here but there was one cute young guy with glasses and we were the only ones sitting outside. The only sucky thing is the hotel's 45 minutes away with all this traffic and I'm getting the worst motion sickness from the stop-and-go. I asked to be driven in a van tomorrow b/c that's the only car I haven't gotten nautious in, and I'll ask to sit in the front. Still trying to get fully onto Indian time, I'd say I'm half way there. Gotta force myself to sleep on a regular pattern.

Arrived in Pune

landed in pune after the 30 minute domestic flight from mumbai this morning. the are 2 separate security lines for men and women, which is awesome because the women's line is so short. from the car ride, pune seems cleaner than mumbai. still lots of traffic with cars inches away from each other. even though it's short distances, it takes a long time to get anywhere b/c of congestion. my office is 7 miles away but they said it'll take 45 minutes to get there.

they let me rest today since i'm jet lagged, and go into work tomorrow morning. free wi-fi in my room is great so i can function normally. this pune marriott is even better than the mumbai one and cheaper since it's in a smaller city. the service is very good, they even took my picture so the staff knows me since i'm here for a month. one person already recognized me and said my name. it might be a little too polite though b/c everyone feels the need to talk to me and do things for me. the hotel's gated and they do security for everyone who comes in.

i get free breakfast and executive lounge access with continental/indian happy hour food. there's enough food that i could just eat free dinner there, but i won't every day so i can eat real indian food too. eating at the hotel's 3 restaurants and pretty cheap indian room service might be easier though b/c i'll have to take cars to go to specific restaurants in the city. maybe it will be easier if i do it right after work. the mini-bananas are delish, which is good because i can only eat the fruit that is peelable and that's difficult to remember when i see raw vegetables and fruit that i want to eat but can't. they even had a "vietnamese spring roll." i've been collecting water bottles for drinking, brushing my teeth, and washing my face. i have like 6 in my room.

i met a person at the lounge b/c we were the only 2 people eating there at 8pm. his name is alister from scotland but lives in san fran with his wife, who has 2 vietnamese adopted brothers. he owns an outsourcing company and one of his clients is yelp. he's here for 2 months and prob in his 40s. any younger single ones? i explored the hotel. the outdoor pool is also very nice and has great padded lounge chairs, so i will lay out there some times. i prob won't be in pune on weekends, so i'll go in the morning or after work. i'm planning to go back to the hotel pretty early after work so i'm not in the city by myself when it's late. the hotel's driving me to work, so i can prob arrange for them to pick me up everyday too. there's a nightclub which i heard funny indian dance music coming out of for a convention party. there's supposed to be a rooftop restaurant opening up, i hope while i'm here. the hotel's actually very new, opened in november 2010. this was prob more info than you wanted to know, but the blogs are a good memory saver for me too. good night.

India Adventures!

re-using this old blogspot. wow, my cali blogs didn't last that long. now using it for my trip to india, so this blog is now called "travel adventures."

i arrived in mumbai at 8:30pm indian time and checked into the marriott renaissance until my 30 minute domestic flight to pune tomorrow morning. this hotel is swank. how come all the cool ones are in 3rd world countries like the hanoi we we stayed at??

i hope the pune marriott i'm staying at for the month is as nice. flight was 15 hours long but it's good it departed at night b/c i fell asleep and was delighted to wake up 8 hours later. saw black swan, due date, and tangled on the plane.

their autorickshaws here are what scooters are in vietnam, all over the streets and no traffic lights or laws it seems. saw lots of big stray dogs too on the road when i was in the taxi. free wifi in the business lounge and then going to walk around and take pics of the hotel.

Thanksgiving visit

Chau came to LA last week which was more fun than doing stuff alone. We did San Diego, Warner Bros. studio Tour, Robertson Blvd, Marc Jacobs and Penguin, The Grove, Venice Pier, Century City, Getty Center, Disneyland (last time it was California Adventure Park), Pacific Design Center, lots of brunches, Asian grocery shopping in Little Saigon, and Jonas Brothers at Jimmy Kimmel. We are very efficient. I also went to the American Music Awards and took the Metro which has very shady stops and an honor system for tickets which is wierd.

Tonight I'm going to see Keane on Jimmy Kimmel. Loving the free concerts. I tried to get Snow Patrol and Taylor Swift on Carson Daly but no luck. I have an all-day work meeting in Anaheim this Friday. Thinking about going to the All-American Rejects concert next week in San Diego since I missed their LA show. KROQ has a cool Xmas concert with the Killers, Paramore, Snow Patrol, the Cure, Death Cab, etc. but I'll already be in DC. This is random, but I'm obsessed with Twilight and Robert Pattinson now.

Coming home in 1.5 weeks! I hope Dumpling runs over to me when I'm home. But he'll probably either not care or not remember me. Oh well, we'll still frolic in Bethesda and I'll give him a haircut (and snuggle). I've discovered there's a bus from my area that goes to the airport so I don't have to drive and park, so it's good I live like 10 minutes from LAX.

Paramore and cast of Twilight (minus the dreamy Robert Pattinson, but his character is actually cuter than he is) at Hollywood and Highland Center mall


NKOTB at American Music Awards at Nokia Theatre LA Live downtown


Friends' Central Perk at Warner Bros. studio tour in Burbank

Really cool garden at the Getty Center in Brentwood

Pacific Design Center (NT will appreciate this, Top Design contestants get the expensive furniture here, it's a huge bulding)

Jonas Brothers at Jimmy Kimmel, omg (TY would've appreciated it more than me and Chau, although I do like their song Tonight now. And Burnin' Up and SOS)

One Republic @ Hollywood Palladium

Went to the One Republic concert at Hollywood Palladium Saturday night. They sang a cover of Gnarls Barkley's Crazy which I really liked, and I don't even like that song. And of course I liked Apologize, Stop & Stare, and Say (All I Need). They were good and I'm an expert at finding free parking in LA now. I just go a couple blocks off of the main street instead of the ripoff parking that's $20 valet on the Sunset Strip. I did that in WeHo and Venice too.

I'm taking full advantage of all these concerts and events in LA while I'm here. The Paramore concert at Hollywood & Highland Center is indeed free tomorrow, so I'm going. You just need to buy a wristband if you want a better seat and autograph, which is sold out anyways and I prob wouldn't buy it. And I got a $15 for Phantom Planet at the Troubador in Dec. This will be the first time I'm going to Phantom without Nutmeg, we've prob seen them like 3 times. Going to concerts by myself is fine b/c there's no seats so I don't look weird. Plus there's a gazillion AZNs in LA so I blend in.

I bought a lot of fruit like tangerines and pumelo grapefruit at Costco which is really good b/c know I'm eating a lot of that instead of the Ben & Jerry's mint chocolate cookie which I knew I shouldn't have bought in the first place. And the Twix I got just in case trick or treaters came, which they didn't, rofl. I also got those prepared foods like the steak wrapped with mushrooms, chicken parmigiana, and salmon with butter. So I just freeze most of it and refrigerate what I can eat that week.

Lanny will like this Costco story/say I'm lying. Last time I ditched and ran when I used Chau's old Costco card at the Costco right by my apartment b/c only the cardholder can use it and I said I'd get my sister who was "parking the car." So I tried again on a weekend when it's crowded and there's more distractions. And this time I picked a guy instead of a girl b/c they pay less attention. He said I looked nice in my dress and let me get away with using my debit card even though it wasn't my Costco ID. But now I think I'll go to the other Costco where they don't care who's ID it is.

West Hollywood and Daniel Vosovic

This blog is a little late but awhile ago I went to West Hollywood because I saw this online sale for Revolve clothing and noticed their one store is on Melrose Ave. Marc Jacobs is down the block too so I went to their accessories store. The store definitely does not have as much as they do online, it's like those minimal boutiques. So I got cute wedges online that were also in Lucky mag b/c they have free shipping and returns http://www.luckymag.com/shopping/blogs/shop/2008/11/well-heeled.html. The Marc Jacobs store is on the right with the building covered in green leaves. Herve Leger is to the left.

I also got J. Crew pumps in store and if you show them your student ID, you get 15% off, just like Madewell in patent blanched almond http://www.jcrew.com/AST/Browse/WomenBrowse/Women_Shop_By_Category/shoes/heels/PRDOVR~96716/96716.jsp. So now I'm not allowed to shop anymore for awhile. Except there is an Ella Moss sample sale this weekend, hmm. That's how I decide which neighborhoods to visit, where sales are, although I usually just window shop.

I went to see Daniel Vosovic at FIDM for his book signing and lecture. I wanted to get a photo with him but you had to buy his book so I nixed that. I listened to his lecture though, it was about his life story, what he's been doing since, and design career advice b/c most of the audience were very trendy FIDM kids. He didn't talk much about Project Runway unless someone asked him a question about it. Sweet P was there to listen to Daniel b/c she lives in LA and she answered some questions at the end. The photo is small, but Daniels in the front with a grey sweater and black tie and Sweet P is sitting next to him in the purple shirt.

All-American Rejects and the Donnas had a concert that was only $15 last week! But I didn't read about it until this week so that sucked. Paramore's playing at Hot Topic for some kind of Twiilight promotion, but you had to buy a special edition t-shirt and it sold out I think. It was $30 anyways, but maybe I'll just go to see if the paid part was just to get an autograph. It's true, whenever I hear that Twiilight song, it sounds like Flyleaf, which is not good. That movie is really hyped up, I might go see it or try the first book if the movie gets good reviews. And I want to see Bolt next week, $5 first weekend showings at the theatre down the block!

Weekend exploring

On my birthday I treated myself to some shopping since I haven't done any since I got here. I went to Barney's Co-op section in Beverly Hills and Alice+Olivia, but didn't see anything. I went to an outdoor shopping mall in Century City that had Cusp and Madewell. A lot of the malls here are outdoors, which make sense b/c it hardly rains. It rained a little yesterday and people were slow and freaking out on the road. Madewell had a good sale and I got a white chino blazer for only $30 and a white vest for $40. I really liked the vest but one of the gold buttons already fell off! So I'll have to sew that back on. And I got Macaroni Grill's seafood linguini to go b/c I had a huge craving for it. I'm cooking steamed fish with lemon and cilantro and sauteeing broccolini with spring onions tonight. And using the rice cooker that TY and Lanny got me!

I had to network at my work reception, but it actually did some good b/c I talked to a girl on the Warner Brothers project and she said soon there will be a lot of roles open. That would be really cool if I got on that project, that's one of the reasons I wanted to live here, to good media & entertainment projects.

Went to a Thousand Oaks, CA sample sale on Saturday, which is 45 minutes up north passing through Malibu. I saw a lot of surfers sitting on their boards waiting for waves in Malibu. Then I drove through this huge canyon which was a little scary b/c it was curvy and had cliffs. It was pretty though. Thousand Oaks pretty much has nothing and the sale sucked, but it was good to see another part of SoCal. They had knock-off Marc Jacobs bags, and for a second I was excited.

I window-shopped in Venice on Abbot Kinney Blvd on Sunday. It has cute boutiques that are hippyish, eco-friendly, but expensive. But I guess all boutiques are pricey. A lot of people biking in Venice, which is next to where I live. I'm gonna take a photo of every neighborhood I explore. Below is Venice: