Apartment living in Bangalore

Apartment living - another new things in our life. We have not lived in an apartment fro a very long time. We were a bit worried about feeling claustrophobic and feared a huge invasion of privacy. Being used to space and privacy in the US, downsizing to the patio/yard-less living was not in our 'looking forward to' list.

Having family in the city and living in our apartment a HUGE difference. Coming into a already setup house helped us a lot. We have not yet missed the space or yard. The apartment is very spacious (they say its quite big for bangalore standards) so I guess, if you want to stay sane and comfy - spend the dollars on space. The critical point in picking an aparment is the layout. We only have 4 homes on each floor and lots of privacy to the baconies. The windows do not face the next door neightbor's noisy TV or crazy kids running in the hallways. Find an apartment slightly higher up (like 5th floor or above) to avoid any foot traffic noise or cricket balls crashing through the windows.

One of the fun things about living in bigger communities like ours is the people watching fun. I love to spend time on the balconies and watch the kid play downstairs, watch the worried New honda car owners looking with hawk eyes at the kids playing cricket near their cars, watching the old couples taking slow walks while the younger ones zip past them in their skates, boards and self-concocted versions of heely shoes.

I also totally enjoy watching some people getting completely lost in the maze of buildings, blocks, floors and door numbers. You can spot these people at the lift lobbies.. the dazed look, the confusion, totally intimidated by the 3 yr old taking the lift by himself... yeah no restrictions .. i hv seen a few 3 to 5 yr olds ride the lifts(elevators) all by themselves.

The best part about elevator usage here in Bangalore ... a LOT of the people.. even the seemginly educated or high-class(will explain later) people take the wrong elevator - meaning - take the one going up while they want to go down... it took me a day to figure out why they were doing this. Acutally, my dad and sister had me in splits when they explained. I initially thought
people just got into the elevator no matter which way they went.. because they were tired of waiting for it. But, thats not the case. People here think they need to select the up or down based on where the elevator is at.. and not where they need to go. SO if the elevator is in the ground floor.. an they are at the 10th floor. they would press the "UP" button.. calling the lift to come up and pick them up :-) Somehow, they don;t get the idea that the machine(elevator in this case) is a service provider and the people are customer. If only this simple sense of who the customer is and who the service provider is - life in India will be SO much different (not sure if it will be better - food for another post some other day)

This elevator theory is acutally is an important and interesting one. This attitide of assuming that things/machines are superior, and people's assumption that they cannot control a machine or others that seem more important - is quite sad. The feelign of self-worth is so low among a huge population... and its true on the flipside as well.. the feeling of superiority and lack of humility is qutie notable.

I am sort of losing focus here... was supposed to stick with Apartment living in Bangalore... there is so much to learn about people, attitudes, financial ladders, and so much more ... and living in a huge building jungle is the best way to understand the people of India.