Back to Vapi

We just got back from a short two-day trip to Chandigarh. More about that in the next few posts. But in the meantime, Vapi has not been standing still!

I'll start with electrical items. Unpredictable electricity is one of the frustrations of life in India. For example, while I was trying on clothes in Fabindia in Chandigarh on Sunday, the power went off no less than 5 times in 20 minutes. The flashlight feature on my phone came in handy!

I suspect that this damaged power pole along Gunjan Road in Vapi was the cause of one of our recent outages. Repair work has started with the typical vegetation "traffic cones".

I'm not sure if this is a failure of the concrete in the pole, or was the result of a vehicle encounter. Nonetheless, the rebar did a nice job of holding the pole together.

I took this picture three weeks earlier -- directly across the street from the power pole photo above. It's not unusual to see electrical line splices protected with this type of "insulation".

From electrical safety to fire safety.

This is the standard fire suppression equipment at Indian petrol stations. I'm not sure how well four buckets of sand would do against a major gasoline fire. This was also the sole type of fire protection in the museums we visited in Chandigarh -- just a rack of sand buckets in the galleries.

And finally, the world of American fast food in India. For better or worse, American fast food is rapidly expanding in India. Vapi alone has Pizza Hut, Dominoes Pizza, Subway, and (two!) McDonald's. Of course, the menu adapts to Indian sensibilities. For example, the only animal protein available is chicken and eggs. (Milk products are considered "veg" in India. "Pure veg" even.)

This photo is not from Vapi -- I think Lon took it in Baroda --  but all McDonald's have two kitchens, so that their veg food is not contaminated with oil and equipment used to cook non-veg food.

Dominoes delivers -- with motorcycles.