I Counted My Blessings in Bangalore and Something Didn’t Add Up

I demand a recount.

American Germaphobe in India (part 3)

For those just joining us, this is an ongoing true story of a work trip to India by a spoiled, frightened, American germaphobe, who to maintain some semblance of sanity must find humor in the fear.

In my last entry, I described my harrowing journey to the hotel and that, even before I could drop my travel-weary self into the ominously less-than-pristine bed, I was already developing a foreboding sense that not even a good night’s sleep was going to adequately prepare me for the welcoming embrace of Bangalore and its Royal Orchid Hotel.

Like a flamboyance of flamingos, I was gonna have to stay on my toes.

“Don’t turn on the lights unless you’re prepared to see the monsters.” — Anonymous Royal Orchid Guest

AN EVIL AIR

Did I mention the smell? Now, I know I briefly mentioned the smell outside the hotel in my previous entry, but now, oh wandering seeker of olfactory sensations, let me bring you into the hotel room itself. Unlike the smells outside the hotel which I’ll discuss in more detail later, this scent doesn’t surprise you like a late-night dark-alley mugging, rather it sneaks up on you like a lion stalking a gazelle.

I think it comes from the so-called air conditioner.

Bangalore this time of year is hot. I, myself, this time of year, am also perpetually hot. Put me in Bangalore and we’re talking a potential Chernobyl situation. So of course one of the first things I did upon entering the room (after taking care of the even-higher priorities I explained in my last blog entry) was to identify the thermostatic situation and ascertain the quickest way to prevent myself from melting down. So I’ve got that sucker cranked into Siberia mode and even after running for hours on end it still won’t really cool the room. It is trying, to be sure, as indicated by the whining machinery I can hear behind the wall and through the vent. Aside from its age and the questionable engineering which went into the device, I think its failure to cool may be all of the dust, mold, mildew, varmint hair and only God knows what else that is stuck in the vent and ducts. I took a picture of it but it’s dark and scary inside the grill and as such the camera refused capture any of the pertinent detail. You’ll just have to trust me on this: the dark area behind the grill is not just a camera-defeating absence of light, but a foreboding tunnel of teeming hoards of various dark, gooey, evil presences of life that not even the Eye of Sauron has the stomach to inspect.

You don’t look into the grill. It looks into you.

Having uncovered this existential threat to my mental and physical well-being, my anxiety-enriched paranoia demands a more thorough inspection. So, taking advantage of the dawning new day’s ambient light now barely leaking through the age-yellowed windows of my hotel room, I take a more detailed tour of the rest of my room.

AN EVILER LAIR

A quick scan of the bathroom reveals details previously hidden by last night’s darkness and fatigue. For instance, there are the invading colonies of mold and mildew fortifying their positions on the shower ceiling. As proof that mutually assured destruction is an effective deterrent, these colonies are perpetually left alone by the hotel staff.

That’s not dust up there.

Moving onto the main bedroom area, I note that the furniture is dated, stained, dented and scratched but otherwise quite functional. The pictures on the wall above the bed are crooked…

I can’t look at this and not think of an alligator with a lazy eye.

…an offense to a borderline OCD’er such as myself but I am loathe to touch them lest I find something else to worry about. My body already has that fear-borne sensation that bugs are constantly landing on it and doing nefarious things to my epidermis and defiling the purity of my bloodstream, but every time I try and catch one in the act, there is nothing there. I’m sure that’s just my mind playing tricks on me.

Stupid mind.

My inspection of the bed for critters and other nasties reveals several suspicious bed-covering stains that make me wary, but it is obvious these had been washed and the stains looked years (decades?) old. I wish I had had the foresight to bring a hazmat suit with me, but travel fatigue combined with desperate hopefulness is inspiring within me a fatalistic surrender to the optimistic possibility that it is “safe enough.”

A man can dream, can’t he?

COUNTING MY BLESSINGS

Let’s be fair, though. It is shelter and it does seem to be keeping the big bugs out. And while the room isn’t as cold as I’d like, it isn’t as hot as it is outside, and that’s good too. “Count your blessings” is wisdom that has been handed down generation by generation, and who am I to question it? (Ok, one legitimate question I’ve still yet to find an answer to is whether the originator of this pithy saying actually knew how to count?)

There’s one more “blessing” in this hotel room that I’ll complain about in this blog entry: the buzzer.

I’m tired, jetlagged, and had been sleeping peacefully this morning until interrupted by a buzz.

A Big Buzz.

It’s quick (maybe a quarter second?) but it’s very loud, and I have no idea what it means. When it strikes — there’s really no better word to describe it — I sit bolt upright in bed with no other thought than that I could be in trouble.

Hell, I’m in India. I AM in trouble.

Summoning the advanced survival training I absorbed while watching the original 1984 Red Dawn movie, I remember that a single gunshot is almost impossible to trace to its source, but when followed by another, it is easier to establish a directional vector toward its position. Oddly elated that I finally have cause to apply this knowledge, I summon my inner Patrick Swayze, and just like him (but somehow not quite as cool), I sit still, I wait, and I listen.

The Red Dawn Survival Guide — still on VHS for under $18! (source: amazon.com)

A slow minute passes, like an old man crossing the street against the light at a busy intersection. Also passing by me, drifting through the tinted ray of sunlight leaking thru the crack in the window curtains, are what I desperately hope are only innocent particles of dust. I’m loathe to breathe, not trusting my optimistic assessment of the dust, but also because I want my senses finely-tuned to detect any nuance of…

BIZZZZT!

The second shot: it came from a previously ignored “something” on the wall. Maybe it’s a door buzzer? I get up and look out the peephole but see no one. I am not about to open the door and show folks my tighty-not-so-whiteys-after-that-buzz so I figure I’ll invoke my back-up survival-tactic: ignore it.

Later on I will hear it again and, having meticulously crafted a plan for just this contingency, I RUN to the peephole and discover that yes, it is a doorbell (doorbuzzer?) of sorts.

At first I want to accuse India of having nefariously turned the honest doorbell into a torture device. Seriously, they could use this in interrogations to extract secrets from stubborn terrorists after the less-effective procedures of electrocution, waterboarding, and bamboo splinters shoved under the fingernails have all failed to produce results.

This thing is so loud that each time it happens my heart goes into palpitations and I have to climb down from the ceiling where I am clinging like a scared kitten.

And so begins day 1 in Bangalore. (source: youtube.com)

But then I realize that perhaps this is actually India doing me a favor. I probably should be scared at what unexpected surprises come beckoning at my door.

Very scared.

And this door buzzer is the perfect spark to ignite my anxiety and fuel my fight or flight response into a state of readiness the likes of which Brave, Brave Sir Robin would have been proud.

So far this is only half of the day 1 story. It continues in part 4 where I will trade the relative safety of my hotel room for the promise of a meal.