And....the Journey Began...

Krishna in charge

I was told by fellow expat friends in India that "once you set the date" to leave... the time will slow to a virtual crawl. And I found that for the most part, this was very true. I was like a kid sitting in afternoon math class at around 2:00 P.M. and staring at the clock, anxiously awaiting that 3:00 bell to ring!

After my hip-replacement surgery 13-weeks ago (on 7 February) - the entire household "team" pitched-in to help us vacate the upstairs part of our Banjara Hills home and get everything down the stairs and into the living room for organizing and eventual shipping. We had had the Indian relocation specialists in to survey what we had. We were taking no furniture (the house we leased came fully furnished) ... a few nice woollen rugs we had picked up on our first trip up to Jaipur in Rajasthan...all our treasures we had picked up along the way during our various travels...and a wide variety of artwork, religious items and all of our clothes, (of course!)

The best part about organizing things wa the help I received from Krishna and Jyothi's to kids,,,Akhila and Akshay. Because I was still on the "walker" post-hip-replacement surgery...my only job was to point at piles of things and bark out orders: "Akshay....put this with Madame's clothes... Akhila, this goes to charity..."

The kids were so helpful and so efficient...we made really short work of the whole process. We had set a date for the actually packing and shipping.... 22 April at around 9:00 A.M. was to be the date and the hour.

In the meantime, we had agreed, for expedience sake, to allow our landlords to begin the necessary repairs and cosmetic things that needed to be done in order for Amy's replacement to move into our house and taker over both her position and our house! In hindsight....maybe not the best idea. It was a constant flow of Indian guys we didn't know. Often heard in our house the last month: "Who was that??" "I have no clue!" But around the chaos, we were able to keep our sanity and look forward to the goal!

Over the Easter weekend, we used a coupon for a "Couple's Spa Weekend" at the Park Hyatt Hotel in Hyderabad which included a couple's massage and the Easter Brunch. We have eaten at the Park Hyatt too many times to count, and their Chef's Market Menu is where we bought all of our chicken, salmon and most of our veggies for the final two years of our time in India...but this would be the first time we actually stayed there overnight. It never seemed worth it because the hotel is walking-distance from our house in Banjara Hills.... but we checked-in and had a lovely time. Facebook photo album link below.

Here are some photos from the packing portion of our journey from Hyderabad to Salt Lake City:

Links for Albums:

Our Last Weekend in Hyderabad

Why Cricket is a Religion in India

Park Hyatt Easter Brunch 2014  

My Farewell Lunch at Bombay Duck  So many wonderful memories in one great album!

Hemant Chauhan - Govind Bolo Hari Gopal Bolo

Preparing myself mentally, physically and spiritually to head to Salt lake City in 28-days...I drive out of Hyderabad some time on 25 April... my hip-replacement recovery has gone so much smoother than anybody thought was possible... I might just do a Bollywood dance on my way down the jetway in Bangalore on 27 April !! Hari bol!

The Coming Culture Shock (HYD to SLC)

And there we were...living in Hyderabad, the capital city of the State of Andhra Pradesh in the southern-central region of India. We were pretty sure that my wife (Amy Suzanne) was going to take a position up in New Delhi. We had begun our fourth (and final) year in Hyderabad ... and had even taken a trip up to Delhi to do a "look-see" visit to check out local neighborhoods and high-rise apartment complexes. I think we were as mentally prepared as possible to make the move and spend the next two years (2014 and 2015) in the north of India.

Then I got a short, cryptic e-mail from my wife that seemed to change everything...on September 10th of this year, I saw this message in my in-box:

"What do you think about moving to Salt Lake City

instead of Delhi in June 2014 ?"

I actually think the best answer I could muster at that moment was: "Huh? Salt Lake City??"

When I received the email (which was marked "TOP SECRET!!") ... I was over in the coastal city of Chennai visiting friends and attending a wedding. For that story and all about our four-year stay in India... see our blog from March of 2010 until the present day at "At Home in Hyderabad" on Blogspot.

The next few weeks were spent in silence as there was nobody we could talk to about it. We talked a lot about it between ourselves - and became really happy and excited about the process. And the possibility of not just going home to the U.S. - but the chance to begin yet another NEW CHAPTER in our lives that have been so blessed by the opportunities we have had over the last 4-years!

Week by week, day by day it seems... we got sucked into the wormhole toward Utah. The word came from the "higher ups" that we could not only begin to tell people what was planned... but also to start making plans for the move. Things in India seem to move at their own pace...so it's never too early to begin planning such things. Here is a photo taken at a Deloitte expat party the night we were told that everything was "all systems go"!

Right now the plan is... to do our yearly Christmas/New Years trip (this year to China!) - come back to India - where I am planning to have my much-needed and put-off-for-far-too-long hip replacement surgery here in Hyderabad, get Amy Suzanne through this year's Spring Tax Busy Season... and get outta Dodge. Our Indian visas and the lease on our house here expire on the 1st of May... so it should be shortly after that when we arrive in the Beehive State to begin "Chapter 5" of our lives.

We can't wait!

Stay tuned for more!!

Scott, Amy Suzanne and Beloved (the Lhasa Apso)