Finding a New Home Away From Home

My colleagues and I are currently staying at the girls hostel that is associated with the research institution where we are working. It is basically a dormitory but I have come to nickname it the nunnery (others have referred to it as a prison). When we arrived we were given a 10pm curfew (for our own safety, of course), but when we missed the deadline by 4 minutes on Saturday night, it was scaled back to 9pm.

My favorite part of the day is when we go to have a meal in the canteen. It reminds me of one of the final scenes of the Sound of Music when the head nun is leading them through the dark corridors and locking and unlocking gates behind them. It's sort of like that. The warden (this is actually what they call her) leads us through the first floor of the hostel and unlocks the gate into the canteen. It must stay locked because the canteen is co-ed and there is a fear that boys will sneak in.

When discussing the restrictive rules to our supervisor, he told us without any irony "too much freedom, leads to trouble."So as you can guess, my colleagues and I have been looking for alternate housing. While finding accommodations in a foreign city is always hard, in Bhubaneswar it is particularly daunting. First of all, since this is not a big tourist or expat destination city, there are very few furnished apartments on the market. Those that do exist, prefer to have tenants who can sign on for at least a year. Further complicating matters is that we are four women. And landlords are not willing to rent to unmarried women (apparently, we might start a brothel or something with all of our unbridled freedom).

We tried looking for guesthouses and hotels that might be suitable and were directed to Utkal Guest House. We didn't know ahead of time that it was also a marriage bureau. For those unfamiliar, a marriage bureau is a place where parents trying to arrange marriages for their children go to get help finding a match. It's like a corporate matchmaker, just bring your child's horoscope.

When we walked into the guest house/marriage bureau there was a calendar of the gods on one wall of the room and a poster of what looked like an x-rated Indian film on the other. The actual guest rooms were OK, a little musty and shabby. But then we looked up to see that there was a red light bulb over the beds. Hilarious. Needless to say we're still at the nunnery, exploring other options.