First Time Out...

Wow, it's not even 8 am and I've already had a partial cup of coffee, left the house for about an hour and am ready to blog about it with you! Those who know me better would probably be a little frightened by this, as i don't often do anything too early in the morning and with good reason, as you'll soon see. but this early wake up has been in the plans for a while. One that was both anticipated and a little dreaded.

You see, I got myself a scooty. Well, in all honesty, God got me the scooty. Some very special friends gave God, who gave me the finances needed to purchase it. This in itself was a journey.

Not long after I moved here, my friend Dan brought home different flyers and catalogs for scooties. I knew it would be beneficial in getting me around, saving me so much time, allowing me to see people I might not have time to see, but seriously, driving in India had me a little terrified. The rules of the road are there are no rules. Which isn't exactly true, but to the untrained eye, that's exactly how it appeared. So, when I was in a rickshaw, I would observe these "laws" of the road. Funny thing is, they are always changing. And pedestrians had no set rules either. And the cops don't really enforce any of these except at a few random street crossings. Now that I think about it, I ought to see if there's some sort of driving manual, not that it's strictly adhered to and not that many people have ever read it. Crazy when you think about the fact that that seldom happens in the US.

In September I was feeling a little pressure to get 'er done, so after prayer, I invited a few others to pray with me through this and God answered with the go ahead. Though, I didn't really sense the timing was completely right. I went to one of the showrooms and the color I wanted was right there! That must have been a sign. But I wouldn't have the money in hand for two more weeks! I put down a small deposit and when I went back for it, it had been sold. In fact, there were none in that color to be found. I figured I'd wait. So I waited, and waited, and waited. I was now ready, but that color had not returned to my city and possibly would never return.

I came to the realization that if it had been an actual scooty, and not the cash that had been given to me, I would be tickled with it regardless of the color. I needed to get over myself and just pray that there was a scooty available, period. I called (or my friend Iffat actually did, so that there would be no language misunderstandings) and they had an orange one in the showroom with red and black coming the following week. Orange was my second choice and I was excited by that. So off I went with my male friend (it's always helpful to have male around in this country, besides, I wasn't ready to drive it on those busy streets), made the payment, took care of the paperwork - all in less than 1/2 hour. They have a different person for each step of the phase - as in, one person came up and took care of one thing, someone else came and entered it in the computer, someone else had me sign something different, someone else came and gave me this book, someone else gave me another paper - it was almost humorous. When it was all said and done, we couldn't leave with it because there wasn't sufficient proof of address for the insurance people. But all I needed to do was wait for a call that evening saying it was all okay.

I waited and then I called. My friend brought it home the next day. With one thing or the other wrong, I didn't really get much of a chance to get on it and start practicing. I sat on it in our courtyard. I even started it up. But there is construction going on next to us and those guys stare at me enough as it is - I had no desire to stumble through my first experience of driving a scooty in front of them.

My neighbor also has a scooty which she is afraid to drive (partly because she witnessed her friend having an accident on it), so I mentioned that we should practice together. She bit. But she wanted to go out early in the morning before there was much traffic. Thus, todays early wake up.

First things first, I made my cup of coffee, which I decided to take into the bathroom with me. I'm sure this might disgust a few people, but I really do have a clean bathroom and I needed to be getting ready and time was limited. But in a quick move to dump something in the trash, I lifted the lid without even thinking about the coffee cup in close proximity and knocked it over, onto the marble floor. Marble + falling ceramic mug = broken mug and loss of coffee. Luckily the coffee was nearly finished, but it was a new mug. This is why I usually sit and enjoy my coffee without much movement and give it some time for the caffeine to work it's way through my system. But there was no time to cry about the spilt coffee, I had places to go, people to meet, things to do.

We drove out of our neighborhood - which I mentally was not really ready for, or so I thought and went to this police academy grounds. After driving past joggers (men), walkers (women), marchers (cadets of both male and female persuasion) we got to this street that goes in a big square. We drove it bother directions a number of times and returned a different route, on a busier section. It was exilerating. And I think really good for Iffatt too, when we got home she said she is going to drive to her coaching time this afternoon. Maybe I'll drive to go get eggs in the neighborhood. Ha!

But now, I'm feeling tired. I guess I'll have another cup of coffee, which I never do. Can't go back to sleep. And besides I'm trying to Skype a friend in Vegas - if we could only stay connected.