Back in Hyderabad

We got up at 5am, and got everything packed and downstairs.  To the best of my knowledge, we didn't forget anything.  Mr. Natan (the driver who took us to Pondicherry, not the owner) was waiting for us, and off we went to the airport.  Vindya was really excited.  She loves to fly, for whatever reason.  We had absolutely no trouble getting into the airport.  Checking in was  a little hairy, largely because a film crew was checking in ahead of us.  They had many people, and many more carts full of random luggage - crates, large tubes, boxes and barrels.  I nearly had heart failure when the clerk told me that they had closed check-in for my flight, but he had me talk to a different clerk further down the line, and she got me on without problems.  I didn't ask, since I'm fairly sure I don't want to know.

The flight was uneventful, and we were met at the airport by one of Mr. Ganesh's drivers.  He doesn't speak a lot of English, but that was fine.  Our first stop was the Minerva Grand.  They had indeed put aside my notebook of important papers, and I was thrilled to be able to recover it.  This means that I didn't need to try to reschedule for a notary appointment, and I had the hard copy of the travel notes.

This last was something of a mixed blessing, as I looked to see about the medical clinic.  In the hard copy, it was obvious that there was a heading "Punjab" above the second clinic number.  In other words, only the first clinic, unreachable, was in Delhi.  The one I had been talking to was somewhere else.  I was vaguely thinking that Punjab starts right outside the city limits of New Delhi, so it still might be close, but I put it on my list of things to look into.  My first idea was to call Mr. Singh, the driver, and see what he thought.  However, every attempt to reach him (with or without 0 as the first digit) got the automated "the number you are calling does not exist" message.  Since the number had worked in Delhi, I decided to let it go and work on other issues.

I asked the driver to take us to an !dea shop, and he found one within a couple of blocks.  I just wrote off the 200 rupee internet package (about $5) and asked for 500 rupees top-up to my phone account.  This was one of those little roadside stands that sells all kinds of things, and he had to pull out the !dea manual and consult it, with the assistance of one of the other customers.  (Several customers were paying household utility bills via cell phone.  They brought their cell phone and a small booklet from the utility company, and the clerk dialled with his cell phone, and their cell phone and then the bill was paid.  Just another way that cheap mobile phone service has changed life in India.)  Eventually, the clerk and the customer decided that I couldn't buy 500 rupees of phone service, I had to buy the 555 rupee package.  Fine.  I gave them 555 rupees, and, seconds later, it was credited to my phone and I was on my way.

I called the adoption section promptly at 10, which seems to be when they open.  Mrs. N answered the phone, and was somewhat surprised to hear from me.  She discussed me with other people in the office, and then told me to come in at 12:30pm.  I said OK, and then had a couple of hours to fill.  I decided that we should pay a farewell visit to Beyond Coffee.

We got there after the usual run around and no idea where to find it that every driver goes through.  (Incidently, remember when I said, a long time ago, that Indian addresses are insane and refer to "opposite thus and such," or "behind that place" and there are no street signs?  It turns out that this is only in Hyderabad.  Other Indian cities have street signs and house numbers, and the inability of Hyderabadis to produce an address is a national joke.)  The manager walked up and introduced himself, and said that he had heard about us from the ex-pats that I had originally contacted.  We had a nice chat about adoption and how much we like his restaurant.

We also met a very nice lady.  She is originally from Hyderabad, but went to college in Toronto, where she met her husband, who is originally from Russia.  They have some kind of internet based business, and split their time between homes in their favorite places: Hyderabad, Florence Italy, and Miami.  They have a young son (who played with Vindya) who speaks Telugu with her, Russian with his dad, and English in his various schools.  She was very pleasant, and taking photos.  I asked if she had a website, and she said no.  I didn't get a name, either, but it was a nice interaction to end our time here.

At 12:30, we showed up at the Adoption office.  To my complete lack of surprise, this produced quite a lot of flurried chatter, and the information that we should wait.  So, I pulled out a book and sat down to wait.  Vindya very happily went to talk to all the ladies who work there.  This went pretty well, except that they started talking to her about going to America.  At that point, she totally shut down and came to sit next to me.  We were out on the veranda, and she emphatically did not want me to touch her.  After a while, she started crying - not loud sobbing, but just tears running down her cheeks.  She didn't want me to wipe them away, either.  She sat there crying for a while, then started rocking back and forth and repeating the names of all her friends over and over in a low monotone.  After a while, she decided to follow the office guy (who was carrying a tray of goodies) back into the office.  I count that as a major improvement!

After another long while, Mrs. A came past me, going in.  She stopped to comment that I always had a book and was a voracious reader.  I wasn't sure how to reply.  On the one hand, I've been hearing variants of this since I was 4.  On the other, I wanted to yell at her, "Yes, because you are always running several hours behind what you tell me to expect!"  I settled for just smiling at her, and going back to my book.

At 4:30 (one complete issue of The Economist and about 2/3 of "Holmes of the Raj," a mediocre pastiche), she and Mrs. N reappeared, carrying large stacks of paper and in a big hurry.  "Come, come!  We will go to the passport office!"  I went to find Vindya, and hurried to the front gate.  Mrs. N was waiting.  She pointed at a white car and told me to follow.  I said OK, and turned left down the lane to where our driver was waiting.  Vindya took advantage of this to keep going, because the sisuvihar is further down that lane.  I ran after her and caught her, at which point she sat down on the dirt and refused to go with me.  I picked her up and carried her back to the car.  She didn't want to go, but didn't fight me, just cried.  We all got into the car, and I told the driver to follow the white car.  "What white car?"  They had driven away while we were getting into our car!!!

I called the adoption section on my mobile.  The lady who answered didn't understand the question, but she said that she would have Mrs. N call me on her mobile.  We waited about five minutes - no call.  The driver asked where we were going, and I told him to the passport office.  He said that he knew where that was, so we took off.  After a while, he pulled up at the US Consulate!  I was sure this wasn't right, so I called the adoption office again.  They were still confused, but I insisted that Mrs. N needed to call me.  She called in about 45 seconds, asking where I was.  I just gave the phone to the driver.  He talked to her in Telugu for a while, and then handed the phone back to me.  He drove off, and we eventually came to a completely different place, where Mrs. N was standing outside waiting for us.

I was really angry that they just drove off without even waiting for us to get into the car, but I never had the opportunity to tell them this.  Mrs. N turned and started walking as soon as she saw us, and Vindya and I had to run to catch up.  She had papers that got us through a large gate, and then we went into a tunnel that led down underground.  At the end of this was a staircase, and we went up quite a few flights of stairs.  Typically, we ended up in a waiting room, which was full of people sitting around waiting.  Vindya insisted on sitting on my lap, and I pulled out the next issue of The Economist.

As I was turning the page sometime later, I noticed that the people on the other side of the room were staring at us. It was the Indian-American couple from Atlanta. We had a nice chat, and they said that they were also going to pick up their passport. They had left their daughter with grandma, but they showed Vindya pictures of her on their cell phone, and she promptly identified her as Anita. This made everyone happy.

At this point, Mrs. A asked them to go into another room. They came back a few minutes later, and she asked me to come. We went down a small hallway into a large office with several desks. At one of them, she introduced us to a gentleman who she described as the lawyer. "He does all the legal work to get the passport in 10 days." He recognized Vindya and called her by name, and I told him that I was very pleased to meet him, and appreciated all the work he did for us. He laughed and said it was his pleasure. He was really pleasant. As I was leaving, I noticed a large sign on the wall that read, "Work is Worship." It struck me as not quite the usual attitude in India.

Speaking of signs on the wall, the large waiting room had posters in English, Hindi and Telugu headed "Looking for an OCI bridegroom?" in big letters. I read the English one. It strongly cautioned against marrying someone unknown. Prospective brides were advised to meet his family in India, contact his school alumni association, and otherwise verify the identity of anyone offering marriage over the internet. Apparently, this is a big enough problem that the only wall commentary at the passport office needs to warn against this kind of scam. (OCI - Overseas Citizen of India)

Finally, we were called into the back office. This was an office, about the size of a cubicle. We all crowded in, completely surrounding the desk and the clerk working there. He had a stack of paperwork on his desk, and would call out the name on the top. Everyone shifted around so that person could get to his side, there was a brief discussion, papers were signed, and then we all moved again so that person could leave with their passport, and then moved again to make a path from the desk to one of the corners. The clerk threw the completed file onto a pile in the corner, and called the next name. Ours was the fourth or fifth one called, right after little Anita. I signed for Vindya, and we were free to go, in possession of that lovely little booklet!

We all went together down the steps and out through the tunnel. At that point, Mrs. N told us to meet back at the adoption office, but Anita's dad objected. They had a quick conversation, and he told me that they wanted us back at the office so they could make photocopies of the passports for their records. He said there was a photocopy shop across the street, so he offered to run the passports over there and get them copied, and then we could head out without having to go back to the office. This sounded good to me, so I gave him Vindya's passport and he ran off through multiple lanes of traffic.

While talking to Anita's mom, I had found that she had no idea what the next step was. Her agency had not given any guidance, so I went to the car and got the travel notes. I let her write down the phone number and website information for the medical appointment, and also the number to call for the visa interview appointment. I also told her that number didn't work for me, but the main embassy number (which I gave her) did, and they transferred me to the correct department. She said that phone numbers in India sometimes changed or stopped working for no real reason. It had something to do with the phone company.

At that point, her husband came back with the passport, and we were ready to go! Finally!! We said our goodbyes and hopped in the car. It was 5:30, and we needed to be at the airport by 7 to make our flight to New Delhi, which meant we were just about on time. I had previously called Rufus and he wasn't going to be able to meet us, and also Gaya and Shakur. They had offered to have an early supper for us at their apartment after the passport, but I had previously called to tell them that it was getting late. As we drove off, I called them again to say I didn't think we had time to stop. Gaya agreed, but asked me to give the phone to the driver. When he gave it back, she said that we were driving right past them and she had asked the driver to stop on the main road near their house. We got to the designated spot and got out of the car. Vindya and I walked up and down a bit. There was really heavy rush hour traffic and we were standing on a little strip among parked motor scooters and rushing people. Gaya and Shakur came running up about 2 minutes later. They gave us quick hugs, and Gaya gave Vindya a small present that turned out to be hot fresh dhosa (kind of like Indian crepes) and a paste to eat with them. They bundled us into the car and waved goodbye. Vindya started to cry to see them go, but Shakur started talking about airplanes and her face lit up. We waved until they were out of sight, and that was the last we really saw of Hyderabad.

Next stop: Delhi!