by Bob Van Leer 

  (NEW DELHI, INDIA, May 7, 1995) - Our first day in India happened to be Sunday, so we spent the day looking at monuments.

  We arrived in Delhi at 11:00 p.m. the night before after a 14 hour flight from New York, with a stopover at Heathrow Airport in London.

  My start of the trip was actually Thursday, May 4, when I left Gold Beach for Medford. My flight to New York left at 6:40 a.m., May 5, too early to drive over in the morning.

by Bob Van Leer

  (NEW DELHI, INDIA, May 8, 1995) - We spent the day in meetings with Indian government and industry representatives and three messages are emerging: India's largest trading partner is the United States, India has a middle class of 200 million people, and India is open for foreign investments.

  The four of us, delegates from the National Newspaper Association, myself, Jim Kelly from Hood River, OR; Ken Rhoades, Blair, Nebraska; and Sam Kennedy, Columbia, Tennessee; started the day with walks around our hotel to get a feel of the city.

by Bob Van Leer

  (NEW DELHI, INDIA, May 9, 1995) - The highlight of the day was an evening visit to the Chandaini Street market in old Delhi.

  The street was an unbelievable jammed crowd of markets, people, and motor vehicles. And, of course, cows taking their ease on the sidewalks. There were several times more people in that mile of market street than there are in all of Curry County.

 by Bob Van Leer

  (NEW DELHI, INDIA, May 10, 1995) - The morning began with a visit to the National Museum in New Delhi. New Delhi and Delhi are adjacent to each other, not really separate cities.

  This is an old, old civilization. Artifacts in the museum go back 5000 years. We saw an exhibit of bronze implements, quite well done, dating to 2500 B.C. At that time, Europeans were still breaking bones with rocks.

  The museum building is one of the best-maintained public buildings we have seen in Delhi.

  The museum has a number of collections including: jewelry, arms and armor, paintings and decorative arts. But what impressed us most were the diverse displays of culture. The style is peculiarly Indian and often consists of a frieze of human forms with a half-dozen or more per foot.

  There was one life-size stone statue of a man with a large belly. Our guide, the director of the museum, said there was a tradition that rubbing his belly brought good fortune. The museum tries to discourage the rubbing but the belly looked as if the campaign wasn't making much of an impression.

by Bob Van Leer

  (NEW DELHI, INDIA, May 11, 1995) - Today we visited the famed Taj Mahal. Many monuments do not live up to expectations, but the Taj Mahal meets and exceeds anything we imagined. The tomb is breath-takingly beautiful.

  The monument was built as a mausoleum by the mughal emperor, Shah Jahan in memory of his wife, Arjumand Banu Begum, who died in childbirth at the age of 39. She had 14 children in the 18 years they were married.

   The Taj Mahal is built at Agra, the old capital of India, 133 miles south of Delhi. It was built between 1631 and 1653 by a work force of 20,000.

by Bob Van Leer

  (BANGALORE, INDIA, May 12, 1995) - Our stay at Delhi was over and we left the hotel at 6:00 a.m. for the two hour, 15 minute flight to Bangalore in southern India, the "Silicon Valley" of India.

  Much of the world's computer programming is done here or nearby. I was told 60-70% of this is for the U.S. Some of the big U.S. companies such as Intel and IBM have facilities here.

 By Bob Van Leer

  (BANGALORE, INDIA, May 13, 1995) - Much of today was spent in a meeting with the Citizens Forum - Bangalore. This is a group of high-level retirees who meet monthly for discussions.

  Our party is down to three, Ken Rhoades from Nebraska had to go home from New Delhi to make a previous commitment.

  The meeting started with breakfast, extended into the afternoon, and was completed with lunch. About 25 were in attendance. The food served was traditional Indian vegetarian dishes, most of them quite good.

by Bob Van Leer

  (BOMBAY, INDIA, May 14, 1995) - We arrived in Bombay this morning after a short (873 kilometers, 1 hour, 20 minute) flight from Bangalore. Bombay is India's largest city with a population of about 13 million.

  The city is built on seven islands connected by causeways. Because of the limited opportunity to expand, real estate prices are among the highest in the world. Our guide said land prices start at $1200 per square foot.

 by Bob Van Leer

  (BOMBAY, INDIA, May 15, 1995) - This morning, our last full day in India, started with a drive to the Bombay office of the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII).

  There are quite a number of beggars in Bombay and they tap on the cab window every time we stop for a light. We did not find as many in Delhi. We were hassled a little there, but not much more than you get in San Francisco. And in Bangalore there were hardly any beggars. They look pitiful, but we were told to ignore them completely.