Our dwelling place in Bangalore was an apartment that Chase and Lacey rented for their two and half month stay. It belongs to a family of four who live on the second floor and the father's aunt lives on the top floor. Multiple family homes are the norm there. Many people buy or build their home with the intention of having income property. This makes for very interesting hardware found on odd doors - both inside and out.
Now I am not talking about just outside doors, I am talking about all doors. In our apartment we had huge ancient looking hardware. Each door has a deadbolt in the middle on the top and on the bottom on the outside of the door and each one has a deadbolt in the middle on the top and on the bottom on the inside of the door.
The rental that where we lived was on the first floor. First floor windows are barred from the inside - the bars are permanently installed and there is no way out or in through them. The glass in the windows is frosted. To get fresh air or let in your daily dose of mosquitoes, you would push the window open through the bars and hook them to close them (or go outside and push them shut as I had to do sometimes). With the two extra outside doors padlocked from the inside and no key available and the bars on the windows, there was no alternative escape route besides the front door. If someone chose, they could throw the deadbolt on the outside of the front door and ...well, you get the picture. As far as fire hazards, the walls are all concrete and metal so there isn't much to burn.
We enjoyed a sunken living room, dining area, good size kitchen, two bedrooms and two bathrooms (one of them a squatty and one western). The floors are all marble tile. This is very condusive to Indian living. They aren't spectacular but practical. We had two girls who would come in three times a week and sweep and mop the floors and clean the bathrooms. With a great flurry, they quickly moved through the house in their saris with their asian style brooms and a mop and bucket, finishing their work in under 30 minutes. For this they received 1000 rupees each month (approx $20). It was remarkable how much dirt and dust were on the floor in just two days time!
The kitchen became my domain. Everyone needs purpose - to be loved, wanted and needed - and I am no different. I saw quickly that my presence in the kitchen would be welcome. We were fairly well equipt for a rental place and made do with what we had in a pinch. The stove and oven were gas and ran off of a tank. I enjoyed cooking with gas - it has been a while. We had a microwave, large fridge/freezer, water cooler, and the portable clothesdryer was in the kitchen. The outlets were used for multiple appliances and so we had to plan well for maximum use. We had a toaster, hot pot and bottle steralizer that we had to juggle, along with the microwave and sometimes the clothes dryer.
The biggest obstacle in cooking and cleaning is the water. There is no running hot water in the kitchen and the water that comes from the faucet is not injestable. Although most westerners living there have adapted and don't mind washing their dishes in cold water and then waiting for them to completely dry before using them, I just couldn't do it. I developed a process. I would boil water while I washed the dishes by filling the largest bowl or cup that I had with water and dish soap. I washed everything with that water, as much as possible, refilling as needed. (Water conservation is more important there and so you don't leave the water running). I would then rinse them in cold water to remove the soap. I would set everything in the sink side by side that would hold water and pour the boiling water in. When everything had been rinsed with boiling water, I would put them on the counter to dry. With cooking, you had to constantly be thinking about the unsafe water. We would wash vegetables and fruits in bottled water with a grapeseed extract to kill the nasties on the peels. We would wash vegetables that would be cooked in sink water to get dirt off and we would used bottled water to actually cook with. Alll drinking water came from the cooler. Yes, it is a process just to get clean, safe food.
The clothes washer was in the squatty bathroom. It took forever to fill so we began filling it with a bucket - much more time efficient. The dryer was in the kitchen. Most often we would wait until the evening to use it because it took up the kitchen space and had to share an outlet with our other countertop appliances. It also heated up the kitchen and so we waited to push it across the room and stretch the hose across the sink and vent it out the window until later. We also utilized a drying rack quite a bit. We had great ceiling fans and the clothes dried fairly quickly.
When Ajay was snuggled all safe in his bed, we would relax and play a game or watch a movie from the selection some friends had loaned us.
About 10:00 am, exhausted from the day, we would say good-nights and I love yous and turn out the lights. Anyone have a guess how to do that?
Squatty talk, how to shower and how to brush your teeth - next post!
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