It's raining

There has been near constant rainfall in Chennai for the past 2 weeks. Though the rain is much needed, both for replenishing the dwindling water table and for its cooling effect, it is getting a bit annoying now.

I waited this morning for the rain to stop so I could scooter myself to work. After a 10 minute lull in the downpour, I reasoned I could safely journey for 10 minutes to work. Obviously, if I am writing about this event, I was wrong.

About a minute after I left, the rain was coming again. About half way through my trip, it was falling hard. I arrived at work drenched -- literally dripping wet (though my face and hair were spared thanks to the helmet).

Normally, this would not have been too big of a deal. I could have waited for my clothes to dry or put on scrubs. But my oozing water today was a problem. See, I had a press conference to attend as a part of this Indo-American collaborative health work I am doing. So I dressed semi nicely. And we were scheduled to leave for the conference about an hour after I arrived to work.

Going back home was not really an option either because the second journey was just as likely to leave me wet as the first. So, I did what all wet Indians do -- stood in front of a fan.

Ten minutes later, I realized wet Indians typically stay wet for a while. Certainly longer than the roughly 40 minutes I had remaining to dry myself.

I went asking around if anybody had spare clothes, but no luck there. Finally, somebody suggested I run up to housekeeping and have my clothes ironed. Now that seemed like a reasonable idea...

I ran (and slipped several times) up to the fourth floor where housekeeping has their office. I was given an iron and a table by an incredibly nice lady, who then asked if I knew how to iron. Of course, I said, who doesn't? Little did she know that I have probably ironed a total of 10 times in my life -- never successfully.

Even better, the iron and the table were in a room located off of one of the main passageways of the fourth floor with large, uncovered windows. Everybody from housekeeping staff, physicians, nurses, dieticians, and patients roamed those halls with what seemed to be reckless abandon. This was a problem (I thought) because I had no clothes other than those that were wet and on my body. But the lady assured me that "we are all brothers and sisters here." Translation: stop wasting time and dry your clothes. She even offered me coffee, which I accepted, to smooth the transition.

So I stripped down to my boxers and started ironing. First my shirt. I had no idea what I was doing, but I saw the water turn to steam and leave my shirt and slowly even some of the wrinkles disappeared! The pants weren't nearly as wet. The best part was that nobody seemed bothered by this! All of the patients, physicians, nurses, housekeepers, etc., were completely indifferent to the fact that I was standing nearly naked in a room and ironing my clothes. While I was expecting some sort of spectacular ridicule, all I got was people going about their regular jobs.

In summary, I love India.

By the way, pictures from Hyderabad, Ahmedabad, and Bombay to follow soon.