This day started off very low key. We met with our professor Alok Gupta in one of the ISB classrooms and we did a case study on eChoupal. Then we drove to eChoupal-about 45 min away in the city and they taught us about their service of creating these kiosks for farmers in rural areas. These kioks educate the farmers about when to plant, harvest, and care of the crop as well as allows them to use the internet to check the market prices domestically as well as internationally. I found this site visit very interesting as I am from a rural background myself and their ways of educating and helping the farmers is astounding.

After lunch, Reema Gupta spoke to us about the Societal Impact of IT in Emerging Economies. This was also very interesting and we all realize how huge the India economy is expanding as well as a future possible superpower or player.

At night we went out to a few different clubs and restaurants for Austeja's 22nd birthday which actually occured on Monday but she actually got quite sick for a few days and we didn't want to risk her getting more sick. Now we have another classmate that is sick but for the most part I think he is just run down and might have had a small intestinal infection but nothing to worry about!!!

Thursday-

HOLIDAY! Today is a national holiday which everyone went on the roof-tops and flew kites! It was quite a sight! So because of this we went on a tour of the city. This day was probably the day that wore us all out the most as we walked up 320 stairs in the Golconda Fort. We also visited a place called the Birla Temple,as well as the Charminar Monument (the monument that Hyderabad is known for).

It really hit us yesterday on how "famous" we are over here for having light colored skin and a few of us that have blonde hair. I think I had .at least 50 people take pictures of me...whether it was asking me to be in a picture with them, take one by myself, or them taking out their phones and trying to discretely take it over their shoulder. It was almost tiring for all of us to deal with it but also funny how different they view visitors compared to us in the US where diversity isn't a problem or occasional occurance. The funniest photo I had taken of me was of this older man and his son who was about 7. First they took a pic of me and them while the man was holding his son.Then he asked me if I would hold his son-which was quite awkward because this was not a small young boy-he was probably 7 and could definitely stand himself.ha! very weird!!

We were all very exhausted after these long tours and came back, ordered pizza because we were too lazy to walk anywhere and fell asleep early..

Friday--

Last full day of India, ISB, Hyderabad and fun! (then its back to the 2nd semester boo!)

Today we had two very cool site visits. First we went to Microsoft and talked about a few of the new products they are launching as well as how they do business in India and IT perspective. The building was right next to ISB so it was a very short trip!

Then we went to a gorgeous "campus" of Infosys where we learned about their consulting service to IT companies and the other stuff they do for their clients. We also got a tour of the campus where like google it has a persons every need right there within their walls. Very cool site visits and very informative.

We just got done making a "bollywood dance video" of the 4 girls and two of the guys on the trip for the video challenge that we are sending in for International Programs at Carlson. It was SO much fun, we dressed up and did typical dances moves to a Bollywood song. I will have to post it on here once it's finished if I can!!!

Now I am going to get ready and go to our final dinner right here where we are staying near the executive housing which has been a fabulous place to stay as well. We will probably go out tonight for one last time as well afterwards.

Finally-this will be my last posting in India!!!! Tomorrow morning we are planning on going to the markets that we only stopped at briefly on Thursday to get final items such as scarves, jewlery, purses, household items and maybe spices. Our plane departs at 5:50 our time so we leave for the airport at 2;30 here and we land in Minneapolis at about 10 am (your time) on Sunday. I can't believe it is almost over! SAD! Well I am looking forward (not) to the 30 hours of travleing that we calculated we will be spending driving, waiting, layover(ing) and flying to get back home. I

It has been an amazing trip and one I will never forget! I will most likely add pictures and maybe the video once we get back to feel free to check in again!

Be home soon!

Today was our first full day in Hyderabad at the Indian School of Business which is strictly an MBA college with "the best of the best".

We began the day with introductions to a few of the faculty, a campus tour and a welcome lunch. The campus is beautiful and when you are in the gate, it really does not feel like you are in India at all. The school is only about 10 years old so everything is up to date and basically brand new. They only accept about the top 1 percent of GMAT scores as well as a very well rounded person in general.

In the afternoon we had two academic sessions and a panel discussion about business in India in general as well as the impacts that ISB has upon the economy. They were very interesting but a bit long since we were all antsy to get out in the warm weather.

We finished the day right before dinner and we decided to not eat the free cafeteria lunch and to venture out into the city. We ended up taking two taxi's, managed having them get lost, take much longer than expected, but successfully ended up at the Hypercity Mall. It was a typical mall and just like everything in America so we did not stay long as we were also very hungry. We went to a very American-ized place called Xtreme Bar and Grill where we all happily ordered and ate american food as well as enjoying the rest of the night there making new friends.

Tuesday-

Today-finally I am caught up to the actual day! It's very nice having free internet!

Today we had an AWESOME day and a completely contrasting view of India. We started by going to Google in the morning. Carlson definitely pulled many strings to have a full tour and a short info session. Google is an amazing company! They have just colors everywhere, a very laid back place to work, a work out room, yoga room, free food places on every floor, a full cafeteria, a music room, and a daycare center. It was absolutely a great place to work. So that was very fun.

We came back to ISB to have dinner at the cafeteria and prepare to departure for the afternoon. The next even was quite eye opening. We traveled an hour and a half to see a rural village. It was amazing to see how happy the people there are and how different they act compared to the city kids. What we saw there was a branch of HMRI (look it up ha!) where they bring their nurses to these rural villages once a month where people can put in their information into the hospital database as well as get a monthly check up, get pills, and gain better health. It was very very very eye opening and definitely something that you would think of when you hear the about the country "India".

Tonight we got back and were also craving american food. So we ordered 5 dominos pizza and were currently watching Hancock on Indian HBO.

What a life-what a day-what a trip!

Saturday we traveled about 5 hours, stopping once at a small tourist shop to see the famous Taj Mahal.

I can't even explain how amazing the site was. It was also very interesting as I don't think most people know that the King built this temple for his queen after she died. And across the river which is the back of the Taj Mahal he attempted to build another temple made of black marble that would connect to the Taj with a bridge made of silver. You can see the land that they started to build it on but there was no more progress. The building wasn't completed because his son had him arrested?-something weird like that!

It was also very funny the amusement that the Indians visiting had with us Americans. I was asked to take a photo many times, however the best time was when I was in the bathroom and some lady took our her phone to take my picture (by myself ha!) as well as one with her youngest daughter, middle daughter, eldest daughter, herself, and them all together. Needless to say the group "yelled" at me for taking so long....but I was taking pictures ha!

We spent quite a lot of time there so that occupied our whole day. We also briefly saw the Agra Fort (agra is the village) which was quite impressive as well.

The rest of the night was a long 5 hour trip back to our hotel, but it was definitely worth it!

Sunday-

Today was a very low key day. We left Delhi and took a two our plane ride south to Hyderabad and the Indian School of Business. It was a pretty uneventful day. We got a quick briefing of the wonderful school here and spent the rest of the hot 80 degree day at the pool finally getting some sun.

Thursday was a very busy day. It started with an hour and a half bus ride to a more industralized part of the city where Bharti Airtel is located. This was a very interesting site visit as we were able to meet with the CIO of the largest telecom provider in the world. What an honor!! It was very interesting and the only thing I will really elaborate on this site visit is that the people of India really only use a cell phone. The first reason is that they can't afford it and the cell phone usage rates that Bharti has provided is the lowest in the world! Also, although it may seem that India is very huge in computers, they typically don't own their own computers or use the computer for anything besides email and social networking.

After Bharti we came back to our Ramada hotel and had an adventure. We went to a local "underground" market where they don't completely sell knock offs-but they will bargain for a good price on basically cheap stuff. It was pretty fun to go to and experience! The girls (4 of us) stopped at a sari shop (the wrapped dresses that most women wear) and we all bought one to wear and had a really good talk with the family that owned the place. He gave us very good insights for places to eat and see before we left Delhi.

That night, our hotel had free drinks and a fireworks show for winning a prestigious award among hotels as well as celebrating the chance for India to hold the Common Wellness Games (like the olympics). It was awesome as we went up to the 14th floor, one of my classmates room and watched the fireworks show from there! They literally "blew up" thirty feet from our face. Very impressive. However, the fireworks were practically hitting the side of the hotel and being set off by the swimming pool-something that would NEVER happen in the US.

Friday-

Exciting morning- not! We took our final on Friday, which wasn't bad....but wasn't easy. It was quite fun knowing the night before that all 12 of us studied together and all thought the test was difficult. However, we all survived...now just a paper to finish after we get back.

The afternoon we took the bus to Gurgoan (a village) to meet with Genpact which is a BPO company. The MBA group also met us there and we had a great time learning about the BPO industry and how Genpact has evolved. Afterwards both the MBA group and the Undergrads went to United Health Group. They gave us a tour of their office and also talked about the HR practices that they are performing which is changing the way the India people work and expect work. (moving laterally across the company rather than just vertically)

It was a very late night and long ride back home so we were all quite exhausted and went to bed.

Wednesday January 6-

On Wednesday we had a very, very interesting day and also quite unexpected events! We started our day out by eating our usual complimentary breakfast in the hotel's restuarant. They actually have 3 restaurants, this hotel is pretty high class. It is considered a 4 star hotel, so for all of my family, friends and classmates following this blog- Carlson treats you well!! It is a very great hotel, the first night we got back all of our clothes that were laying around were folded as well as our bathroom items were neatly arranged. In the breakfast area-it is pretty fun as we have sort-of "claimed" the 9th floor restaurant as "ours" and they seem to know what eggs I am going to order before I even get there!

Another great thing about India is the tea! I was never a tea drinker in the US but now I think I have about 3-4 cups a day (yes I know it probably isn't the best for me!) The problem is though that they serve it at every meal as well as at every site visit and we all just can't pass it up! Along with drinks, most of their soda is in glass bottled water. And it is not clean bottles at all. They reuse the bottles and doesn't look like they clean it very much, cans are a much better way to go! As for the food, I am not a fan although I thought I might be. My favorite so far has been American-Indian food and nan-which is a common Indian bread that is delicious! However, American food is not uncommon whatsoever and seems to be served at most of the restaurants we go to.

This brings me to my next point of language barrier. There does not seem to be one at all here! Honestly I have only learned a few words but have never come to the situation where I would need to use it! Everyone here (even though they said the American speaking rate is only about 10 percent) seems to speak English. So maybe we just have not come across the right area yet that only speaks Hindi or more and more Indians are being educated this way (as most schools are taught in English).

Back to Wednesday's schedule...We started the morning by traveling to QAI which I believe stands for Quality Assurance Incorporated.the speaker there was very interesting and we had a session where we were able to mainly do a question-answer session and not a lecture which we have seen at the past site visits.

We then walked to a local eating place where half of the group got Subway and the other half ate at Ruby Tuesdays. We all seemed to enjoy the food. You have to take into consideration that they do not serve meat (besides chicken and sometimes lamb) at these places so most of us are eating vegetarian meals and Indian based meals because there is no other choice. It is agaist the Hindu religion to kill a cow/pig so instead these animals are roaming the street sides in the middle of the city-unbeliveable site to see!

After eating, we took the bus to the Indian eGovernment Services office-this is where the unexpected event happens! At the eGovernment we learned about these Kiosks full of computers they are putting up mainly in rural areas to allow citizens access to getting government documents, getting trained in computers to be more illiterate as well as just to surf the internet. It is a very interesting concept that they have established and seems to be working wonderfully! Government officials are very dedicated to their country and expanding their services to the locals. If you are interested in more details..let me know!!

After they gave their speach, we found out that more officials that walked into the room were basically a BIG DEAL. A few of them were VERY high up. I believe they are called ministers and we met the 2nd in command only to the prime minister. UNREAL! However we did not get a picture taken :(

Afterwards we came back, talked to some locals to find good places to eat and maybe go out. We ended up just hanging out in a few of the hotel rooms and bonded. I think the atmosphere of the group and the relationships made have been wonderful. It is a very nice small group where everyone seems to get along and enjoy the company. I am learning more and more about each person everyday and I know for a fact I will make 11 new good friends by the time we leave and we will all hang out when we get back!!

This is all I can blog for now as we are currently in Hyderabad-which I will write more about later I have quite a few days to catch up on! We are going to get dinner so hopefully it is not something too spicy!

The first day was the coldest day in India in the past 5 years! Lucky us! However, compared to below zero back in MInnesota, it was about 50 degress here but very, very windy, so we were all quite satisfied with the weather compared to the locals.

On this day, we got an entire day to tour the city of Delhi. We saw the War Memorial as well as different Mosques and towers built by different emperors. I forgot my itinerary therefore I can't tell you all the names exactly-and we have to pay for internet at our hotel so I'm leaving this day quite vague. -Sorry! Monday-tour day- was amazing and we all got to see the completely differnet culture that India has compared to the US.

As for our hotel, it is amazing! Very, very nice place and well kept. There is security everywhere and you have to go through a medal detector before you can enter the building so it is very reassuring. However, this is true for most businesses and even malls throughout India, to my suprise. Even the underground market we had to go through security.

India is a very populated place (2.1 billion people and 14 million in Delhi alone) and there are people everywhere! Cars pack the roads and there is no order in the streets what-so-ever. The dotted white lines mean nothing to them and they tend to honk, swerve, merge, and turn without any care in the world. We have all come across many close calls with being hit by cars already! There are also people just sitting around on the grass, on the sidewalks, starting fires randomly places, just roaming around-you just can't seem to get away from people.

Another very interesting fact I noticed was that were there is one Indian worker needed-there are at least 4 along for the ride. For example, if you pass a gas station, there will be two workers at every pump, however they are all standing around chatting and we hardly ever see them working! Also, while making our eggs in the morning, one cook was frying the egg, and 3 others were looking over his shoulder observing. It is quite amusing! Also, most workers seem to be men and we have talked to our professor about it and it just seems to be the trend here however women are getting educated.

Tuesday we had two site visits. At the first site visit we had a meeting with the head of NASSCOM which deals with BPO's (look it up too long to explain ha!) of India and is a major player in their economy. Also here we met up with another Carlson group of MBA's that are here for two weeks and it was very intriguing to listen to their view points and get different perspectives. The second company visit was not quite the same as listening to a presentation and asking questions. Here we got a guided tour of the Metro which has been built in the last 6 years and completely changed the way of life in Delhi. We went through the metro museum and also took a short ride on it. Very interesting to see and also interested me as the Cities have just started a similar transit system and it will be great to see how it will evolve!

After the two site visits we were able to have the rest of hte night off! We went to a local shopping area in Delhi and went to the underground market-where we were advised not to buy anything as there are many knock-off items. However the bargaining was definitely an experience and very fun to deal with. Afterwards we hung out in the hotel lobby as a group.

A few other notes I have learned and saw is that they are very impressed by Americans (especially blondes). As there are so many people on the streets and as we have to wait for the long traffic lights, we find many Indians smiling and waving at us. However, they all seem to be very friendly people and are very interested in where we come from and why.

I don't think I will have time to get to today, Wednesday's schedule so you will have to check back in a few days as I will try to keep this as up to date as possible!

Bye!

PS-sorry if there are spelling mistakes I wrote this very quickly!!