Bangalore, part II

or: I need a week here

So after switching hotels, the next two days passed pretty smoothly. On Sunday, M. got to pick up her salwaars which, I have to admit, had turned out beautifully, we spent a good amount of time by (and a considerably shorter time in) the pool and all in all were spoilt around the clock by the staff of 'our' hotel.

Now to make you understand the next part, I will have to go back a bit, almost one year, to be precise. I had been to India for the first time almost exactly at this time last year. Bangalore, Mysore, Hyderabad, Pondicherry, Bangalore again .. you get the picture. Having spent a few days in India, I worded the following doubt to D. on whatsapp: 'What if I don't want to go back at the end of this trip?'. 'Just wait, maybe you will without any problem', she tried to calm me. Ok, I thought and continued to live my first Indian adventure. 

So far so good but a few days before my scheduled departure, I started to panic. I noticed that I really didn't want to leave, at least not without the option of coming back to stay. Feverishly, I looked around for job opportunities (Call centre employee? Not really. Shop assistant? I hardly think so. Maid? Hell no!), when an idea suddenly struck me: the Goethe-Institut or as they call it in India: Max-Mueller-Bhavan. I looked up the website and ta-da! they were indeed looking for me (ok, they worded it differently, something about guest lecturers with experience for four to eight months, but you have to agree that this basically describes me)! Immediately I called them. The nice lady at the other end told me to e-mail the head of department, spelling out her address, which I did right away. Just for your orientation: It was Thursday morning by then and my flight back was going to leave on Sunday morning at 3 am. 
I added my phone number to the e-mail and headed out. In the middle of souvenir shopping, a call reached me and a female voice introduced herself as I.T. She started grilling me about my intentions, work experience, methods, time remaining in India and a lot more. At some point during the interview, she apologised for asking so many questions. 'You can ask all you want if you're going to employ me', I replied with a smile. She laughed and then noticed that there probably wasn't enough time to set up a test lesson. Reluctantly, I had to agree but we decided that I would send in my résumé, CV and references from current and previous employers as soon as I had returned to Germany.

So upon returning, I bugged my employers to write me references, found one from a previous school, received one new one and the promise to give an excellent oral review of my performances to anyone who would ask for it. Once I had gathered all that, I e-mailed it to I.T. and her colleagues and waited. And waited. And then waited some more. My colleague C. had, as I found out, done an internship at the same institute a few years prior and had stayed in touch with I.T. all this time. He offered to approach her on my behalf - turns out that she wasn't in charge of guest lecturers anymore but told us who was the one now. 
I e-mailed the new person in charge. Nothing. A couple months later, I followed it up with another letter, again, to no avail. By then - around November 2013 - I thought that maybe MMB and I were not meant to be and started looking elsewhere, applied here and there but nothing really came of it. And then, out of the blue, N.K., the new person responsible sent me an e-mail, asking if I was still interested in the post. Yes, I replied directly, very much so. Besides, I would be in India in April, how about meeting in person then. Perfect, came her answer, thanking me for my quick response, and could I please let her know my exact dates of availability maybe by mid/end March so we could set up an appointment. Most definitely I would do that and so another e-mail found its way to her from Mumbai, informing that the week from 2nd to 7th April would be the one. Excellent, she replied, and how about meeting on the 2nd itself, at 3 pm? Hell yes! 

Jump back to the present, 2nd April. I dressed carefully in a business casual attire (white long-sleeved blouse, black jeans, black sensible heels and a pink-black-white scarf), hopped on (ok, into) an auto (oh did I tell you about our new auto game? It's called: 'Put on the meter?' and in case of a negative reply, we move on to the next one) and made the driver drop me right to the place. N.K. turned out to be very nice and this meeting nothing I needed to worry about as it was pretty informal. She showed me the library, the classrooms (super modern, motivating with state of the art equipment), the cafe with German style marble cake and introduced me to a few of my potential new colleagues. Then came the time to talk business: On the following day, I was supposed to visit one of her classes (and did I prefer 5 pm or 7.15 - 5, please) and in the same group, I would conduct my test class the day after, complete with meticulously elaborate lesson plan to be handed in before. 

The visited class was a breeze, I took loads of notes, asked a number of questions afterwards and noticed that N.K.'s style of teaching doesn't differ all that much from mine, phew.

On Thursday, the day of the actual class, I was a nervous wreck. I could barely eat anything for breakfast (Breakfast! In India!), just had some tea and stole a bowl full of fruit for later. M. considerately absented herself until shortly before the time I was going to leave so that I could work on my lesson plan in peace, call a few people to have them assure me that everything was going to be fine and we'd celebrate afterwards, and hoping against hope to chat with you for a moment to calm my frayed nerves. Anyway, I left, copied the aforementioned plan neatly during the auto drive (!) and arrived a little while later, pretending that all was normal. Sitting in the teachers' room, printing out something I needed for a game, I glanced at N.K.'s computer screen where I could see my contract-to-be. If the director of the institute (who was going to be present but would have to leave earlier, not to return before Monday) was convinced of my suitability immediately, I would get my contract, signed by her, the very next day, otherwise N.K. would have to convince her upon her return.

Two representatives of the institute (I.T. being one of them) sat down at the back of the classroom, next to N.K. They were holding copies of my plan, following the class strictly but not without interest. And - wonder oh wonder - I even made them laugh here and there! The students were every teacher's dream: extremely motivated, curious, hard-working and game for anything I suggested, the games including ;-). When the other two had left and N.K. signalled me to end the class, the students left with 'Danke! Auf Wiedersehen! Bis morgen!' (Thanks! Good bye! See you tomorrow!), having fully accepted me. And yes, my performance had been taken very positively by everyone, the only point of criticism was that I had been a bit fast at times. Anyway, my contract (for four months at first but with the option of extension, yay!) was signed and would be ready to collect on the next afternoon. 

Very relieved, my breathing back to normal, I walked out after the post-class conversation, squealing inside. Looking at my phone, I saw a number of missed calls and a few 'How did it go??'-texts. 'I'm coming back now and will tell you everything', I replied to one. 'Will tell you when you come over' to another, and 'I got the contract!! Boy, I was so nervous, I almost called you at 4 am your time' ('You could have', D. replied. Muah.).

End of story: My contract begins in August, with the new term. Apartment in walking distance and friends living in the same area. Woohoo!! Bangalore! India! Yes!!!