Gas Food Lodging
It sounds like an Ugly American sort of thing to do, but hanging out in fancy hotels is my new favorite pastime. Posh hotels always blast the air conditioning, which is a treat when you spend most of your day in the sun or in a thatched-roof covered classroom, and the food is a nice break from the usual Indian delicacies, and sometimes there is shopping, and we all know how I enjoy the shopping. It's sort of a nice break from the yogayogayoga focus of my days.
The Sheraton is our oasis, a quick ride from the Mandiram and full of business travelers. They are the not-so-oasis (oastic? is that a word?) part of the Sheraton. I heard an American woman last week explaining to the waiter that "In the West, green peppers aren't usually in lasagna."
Over the weekend, Anna and Rebecca and I checked out the Taj Coromandel, which was all plush and quietly luxurious inside. We had a snack in their cafe and I savored an Andres-quality mocha pastry and we discussed how, if we were a reality show, we would only be talking about eating and shopping. Okay, and yoga.
We ate an amazing dinner at Chennai's equivalent of the W, The Park. My share of the most expensive meal I've had here? $14. The lobby was full of young Indian hipsters dressed in Western clothes, chatting on cell phones, and we, suddenly a wee bit jealous of modern surroundings with really good food, asked if someone could show us a room. Just in case we won the lottery and decided to pay ten times what we pay at the Hotel California, I mean President.
Holy Jesus was what we were all thinking when our new friend Sharon showed us the room. A room, I'd like to add, totally free of mosquitos and other many-legged friends (which reminds me: there was something on my floor last night that looked just like Cootie--yay!). I think we all cried a little bit inside when we left the front drive--with many Mercedes, not just one--and returned back to collect our keys from The Man Who Can Only Do One Thing At A Time.
The Sheraton is our oasis, a quick ride from the Mandiram and full of business travelers. They are the not-so-oasis (oastic? is that a word?) part of the Sheraton. I heard an American woman last week explaining to the waiter that "In the West, green peppers aren't usually in lasagna."
Over the weekend, Anna and Rebecca and I checked out the Taj Coromandel, which was all plush and quietly luxurious inside. We had a snack in their cafe and I savored an Andres-quality mocha pastry and we discussed how, if we were a reality show, we would only be talking about eating and shopping. Okay, and yoga.
We ate an amazing dinner at Chennai's equivalent of the W, The Park. My share of the most expensive meal I've had here? $14. The lobby was full of young Indian hipsters dressed in Western clothes, chatting on cell phones, and we, suddenly a wee bit jealous of modern surroundings with really good food, asked if someone could show us a room. Just in case we won the lottery and decided to pay ten times what we pay at the Hotel California, I mean President.
Holy Jesus was what we were all thinking when our new friend Sharon showed us the room. A room, I'd like to add, totally free of mosquitos and other many-legged friends (which reminds me: there was something on my floor last night that looked just like Cootie--yay!). I think we all cried a little bit inside when we left the front drive--with many Mercedes, not just one--and returned back to collect our keys from The Man Who Can Only Do One Thing At A Time.
posted by Rebecca at 2:20 AM
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