You are currently browsing the monthly archive for February, 2008.
this must have been the day from hell. I can start by saying that I have been sick in my stomach for 3-4 days and not able to keep my food so Im not the strongest person in town.
Today I woke up with a smile on my face since it was the first night I slept alone in 2 weeks. I made myself really pretty, took on a fancy dress and decided to go by train to my meeting. On the trains there are certain female departements wich are comfy and airy. But Patrik are not allowed in them so we went past them and took the man departements with me thinking “I dont want to be a part of making differences between women and men anyway”. Everything went fine until we were getting of at bandra. The cabin was totally full, people were hanging outside the doors almost falling of, hands were grabbing me everywere inside and outside my dress… it was so himuliating and I couldent do anything about it, I couldnt even move. I just stood there crying begging Patrik to not leave me on the train. Then we lost Nina at one station because people pushed her off but me and patrik couldnt get of until two later. Patrik were of course superstressed about nina since she had only been o the country for two days and didnt find her way, so shaken after the train ride we did operation finding nina in three hours. At least we found her, we went on the meeting which went fabolous but still right now I just want to go home from this shit country. I am so tired of all the man staring everywhere, how a hand every now and then are placed on my ass, and how they dont leave me alone even when asked. Its nor happening one time every day but 50.
Well thats all for today. Hope tomorrow is a bit better than this crappy day!
Its my birthday today =) and its have been fabulous from the beginning untill the end. Me and Patrik have been working our asses of in this city the last two weeks so yesterday I had a crasch and burn day. I started the day by crying and ended the day by crying. In between those two events I complained over everything I could possible complain about and argued a bit with Patrik (I am really glad he is calm as a cow and take me down on earth when I explodes like a vulcano). But this morning Nina and Patrik woke me up with breakfast on the bed, phoone call from my parents, lakerol, kamasutra books and a videoband made with love from malmoe. Of course I spend this morning crying again being moved by lovely lovely Elin =) But the bottomline in all of this is that birthdays are fucking good days to have. Like some people see on new years eve I look at my birtday. Birthdays are perfect for making a fresh start, new visions and goals… so all the stress and frustration that I had when I was 22 will just have to stay there. And the year of 23 will be my next exciting adventure with everything that that will bring.
My legs are aching and the head is still hearing the beat after the funkiest friday ever. We went with our journalist friend jonas to Mumbais “swankiest” club right now, Blue frog. Its hidden in a dark, robber friendly backyard but inside its glitter, glamour and bollywood stars. Me and Patrik were the only one with flip flops and since we were there on “research” we managed to slide past the que =) Its definately a place worth visiting again and again and again….
Today Patriks girlfriend Nina came. We met here with flowers and champagne on the airport =). Unfortunatelly there are no other rooms at the hostel so I am going to share room with the two love birds untill tomorrow. I must admit its a little bit “third wheel feeling situation” so Im glad they are the sweetest persons ever.
We also went to the crawford market with my indian “mum” and guru Sunita. It was a cool experience to see how much the things I have bought on causaway road truly costs.
The only thing I still cant handle that well are the street childrens. Last night we walked past a child that were about 2 years old, she was babysitting her little sister that only were a couple of months since their mum and dad were working. It breaks my heart and I dont think I ever will get used to just pass by. But I have some great contacts here in Mumbai which works with making sustainable changes for children so as soon as the pre outpost thingie ends I will start working with that.
Love
All things just seems to work out nowadays =) Yesterday we had dinner with one of the smartest and warmest women I hve ever met, Suvita. She has contacts all over mumbai and are a real fixer. She begun asking “what do u want” then she made a few phonecalls and fixed it =) We also talked about our thoughts for the future and I told her about my dream about a creativity centre for childrens in third world countries. Suvita put her hand on my shoulder and said, ok lets go talk to my neighbour. It showed out that her neighbour worked with small childrens in shantitown as a teacher so on saturday and on wednesday I will come with her and spend some time in the school. A small step for humanity but a huge step for miss ekbom =)
Today we went to a meeting with wwf and they are really positive making projects with us. And our friend Anand has put me in contact with all kinds of companys from design to insurance so it will be alot of runnings between meetings the next couple of days. Its really fun to experimente on the professional side as a business women and see what work here in a totally different context.
So the wedding plans will have to wait because right now Im busy working on my dream coming through =)
India is a strange country… today we went looking for apartements in Cobala with our friend Sunny. He is an overstressed bankman/realestater/partyfixer… I dont think he sleeps that much at all. Anyways he came like 2 hours late to our appointment so I was pretty pissed off and took some of it out on poor Patrik. I hope that it isnt in their culture to come late here in india. The appartments were qute dirty but really cheap so maybe we will stay there. I also talked to some NGOs here in mumbai and tomorrow I will go on a meeting with WWF and Green Earth Foundation for Global Environment. Its really easy to get appointments and I hope they will be interested in doing some kind of cooperation with us while we are here in Mumbai. We also meet a swedish journalist today who seems to be interested in writing some kind of article about us.
Everyday here in Mumbai has brought one or another surprise from what I aspected in the morning so it feels really cool to just walk out on the streets and embrace what Mumbai has to offer.
And the date yesterday was fantastic. Me and my new friend Andy went to a roof top bar were we could see all off mumbai. The place was decorated as a beach and it was awesome to run the toes in the sand, look at the palmtrees and smoke apple flavoured waterpipe. Sometimes its nice to get away from mumbais vibrant atmosphere and just chill =)
Hello compadres,
Idag har vi genomfort operation colaba. Vi har intagit vartenda hotell med storm i detta omrade och checkat av vilka som ar aktuella for oss. Patrik ar magsjuk och har skoskav sa han har varit lite skruttig idag men haltade tappert med. Sa fort vi kom in pa hotellet dackade han och ligger nu och sover som en liten gris, stackarn. Jag tror det ar efter fruktsalladen vi at igar medans vi kollade pa bollywood movien no1, om shanti om. Hyr den och fall in love with bollywood =). Ikvall ska vi aka ivag och kolla pa en massa lagenheter runt om i Colaba med en real estate snubbe. Om vi lyckas hitta bra stallen vagar vi kanske ta ledigt under helgen och aka pa brollop. Kommer vara loads med business people dar sa ur ett kontakt knytande perspektiv ar det briljant. Men jag far se, maste kanna mig lite lugnare pa bostadsmarknaden forst. Det ar konstigt, har vill de inte boka upp hotell rum i forvag. Till och med nar vi lockar med deposit ar de svarflortade.
Jag och Patrik ska pa date ikvall med en snubbe som heter Andy. Jag vet annu inte hur en indisk date ser ut med jag berattar imorgon.
Curry kram
Today have been a fucking heavy day. Something that would have taken me 5 min in sweden takes 6 hours here. Kind of frustrating. We went to a place to get some contacts with real estates, since we were from sweden and very exotic we got called into the boss room. He made some phonecalls to his friend and fixed a “really nice hotel not far away from city, good price”. He gave us a t-shirt each with his companys name and me and patrik went looking for the hotel. One hour later, 2 shantitown areas and 6 shoebites later on patriks foot we got to the hotel. It was neighbour with the railway station and far far away. We wont stay there.
The bright thing for today was that we got invited to a big wedding in Bollywood. Its not a movie but some politician that will have foreigners on his wedding ceremony. The wedding will be during two days with everything paid for. Very tempted to go but have shitloads to do in this town before the team arrives.
I see how it all works out tomorrow =)
Me and patrik are starting to find some routines in crazy mumbai. Have realised its not as caotics as it seemed to be the first day. The thing i miss from sweden is quietness. Today we were going to have a meeting on how and with what we were going to work next week. We left the town and went down to the harbour. Unfortunatelly there are no quiet area in Mumbai but instead for finding a serene quiet place we found a cool and exciting mini shantitown (township). Small kids played soccer and “kula” everywhere. Peder, you can easily make a soccer tournament here if you want to.
Its kind of provokating for me down here being a women. As long as I have Patrik by my side the men are pretty ok, but alone it is really hard. Many people down here are so interested in talking with foreigners about everything so I could easily get caught in a conversation for 20 min. Hopefully I will find a good technique soon for travelling fast through town because right now it takes me one hour to get 2 blocks away from the hotel.
But otherwise the town is super funky!
Love love love
Ps. our best street friend so far thinks our names are syra and batterie. His name is camera
After months of dreaming, visualizing and researching I have finally landed in the city of cows and heat, fashion and kakstad. After a flight with a scary twist on the end me and Patrik went straight into town to look for a hostel. The first person we meet was a drunkie who we couldnt get rid of for two hours. Homeless people were lying everywhere, the males were just a pain in the ass and it was loads of small childrens begging. My heart was aking when I went to sleep.
This morning I looked out through the window, breathed mumbai and realised that the city wasnt to bad at all. There are absolutely gorgeous women walking around in colorful saries, cars and cows are trying to samsas on the road and it smells of exotic food from evry corner. The first thing that happened when we stepped out from the hostel was that a agent from bollywood asked us if we wanted to be in a movie . It showed out to be a photo shoot for hsbc (the worlds largest bank according to the slogan) and it was so fun. I will put up some photots when I figure out how to do that. Elin, it wont be a problem to get you into a bollywood movie =)
The food here is delicious and the people we met are really genuine friendly so I absolutely love this town. I think we will find the coolest projects ever because here there are everything from extreme poverty, business suits and religion…
Thats a bit from my 20 first hours in Mumbai.
Finally me and Patrick are on our way to Mumbai =) The tickets have been booked and we will arrive in India on thursday. Crazy!!!
Over there we will be Kaospilots Öresunds very own pre-outpost people and arrange everything from meeting project clients to finding the best restaurant in mumbai, find an kaospilot office to find bollywood movies who needs actors… the list can go on forever. Huge responsibility but im really looking forward to the trip. Going with Patrick feels amazing and I think we will do a god damn good job over there.
I will write more when I come to India!
Love siri
