Redhead in Bangalore

Mysore summers

2009-04-25T19:05:00.001-07:00

OK, so I know, it's been way to long since I updated. Almost two months? Really? I apologize. It has been busy here and I don't often have access to the Internet.

It's beautiful here! The evenings are my favorite time. The thunderclouds roll in and put on quite the show. Bolts of lightning flash from one cloud to the next and it continues to put me in a state of awe. It's wonderful! My favorite part is the rain that follows. The wind and the rain cool off the 105F temperatures from the day making the nights pleasant. Actually, I've been waking up cold as I keep the fan on while I'm sleeping. I actually don't mind that too much. It's much better than waking up sweating, which is what was happening a month ago.

At the beginning of the month I went to visit Bangalore and was able to see the kids at Vathsalya, which was delightful!

Last weekend I went out with some of my students to Planet X. We went bowling and go karting.. and, through playing air hockey, learned the competitive side of one of them is far different from his normal disposition!

About a month ago, before school let out for the summer, some of the kids that attend here were practicing the art style that is seen at the doorstep of most, if not all, Hindu homes. I snapped a couple pictures.

And, as promised awhile ago, here is a photo of me, with my friend Shashi, in authentic Indian garb, eating authentic Indian grub! And a photo with my friend Phoebe and her brother.

Karla and I had the wonderful pleasure, or so we thought, of attending a free concert of a few members from the Vienna Symphony Orchestra. We were delighted to go, but when we left we both felt ashamed of the Indian culture's lack of respect toward such well-known people. Going to see the symphony in America is a special occasion, one dresses nicely and remains quiet while the performance is going on. Here, people came in jeans and constantly came in and out of the room, noisily slamming the door behind them. At times it was difficult to hear the performance over the voices of the people around us. How appalling! Another example, this is the stage and setup before the concert began. Please, answer me this if you can: How many men does it take to hang up a sign?

Welcome Summer!

2009-03-03T02:34:00.000-08:00

Summer already? Yes, that's right. While I hear that there was snow last week in Seattle, I am diving in to the summer heat. With temperatures of 35/21 listed for today and no precipitation noted for any of the major cities in India according to today's paper, it is safe to assume that India, at least the southern part of India, is entering in to the brutally hot summer. For those of you unfamiliar with the Celsius scale, it's currently in the high 80s during the day, and the mid 70s at night. "How wonderful!" you may exclaim. Well, I suppose it is. Right now, it is bearable. I hear it will get significantly warmer and my brain and body do not really want to speculate as to what that might mean. All I know for sure is the fans in my room will only be off when current is unavailable.

In other news, my salwars are back from the tailor! I would upload pictures, but the upload speed is ridiculously slow, so when I have more time, I will try to upload more photos. I feel so much more "Indian" now! Actually.. I feel more professional. Although my American garb is nice, I do not feel comfortable in it here, especially around men that are not used to seeing so much exposed female skin. (Hello, it's called a tshirt...) However, I am certainly not going to complain about my new dress because I rather enjoy wearing bright clothing and will enjoy every moment that I am able to do so while I am here. I have a feeling I will be unable to be as free when I head back to the states.

Also, after three weeks of avoiding the scooter, I spent about 20 minutes driving it by myself. That was about all my nerves could handle. Seriously, I'm only going around on the neighborhood streets. I may have practiced longer, but the street that I was going to go on was in use by a herd of cattle. I doubt that weaving in and out of cows would have improved my confidence, especially with a red vehicle. I must say, it is significantly easier to drive one of those without another passenger on the back. An extra 150 pounds really makes a difference.

I should get back to preparing for my classes. I feel lazy because whenever I have an unexpected cancellation all I want to do is go into my room and sleep, or get caught up on things totally unrelated to classes, but I know I should be using my time more productively.

Sanjay

2009-02-11T23:49:00.000-08:00

Two posts in consecutive days?! What??!!!! Well, yes, I decided that since I have a few minutes and my attempt at recollection late at night is nothing of note, I would add on to my previous post.

One of my new friends here is Sanjay. There is a picture of him in a play car a couple posts down looking adorable, as usual. My classroom is on the third floor and borders an open terrace. The terrace is his play area for most of the day, so he frequently comes to the door or peaks in the window, calling out to get my attention. He is the most adorable thing ever. He's three, or almost there, and always calls me "Acca" which means 'older sister'. I have no idea what his other words mean, though I can usually understand his intention. He always wants me to pick him up for follow him to the kitchen, or play some game with him. He has definitely become a bright light during my days here. Everyone here says he behaves badly, but I figure, he's three. He's supposed to run around and play and act like a three-year-old boy. My interactions with him are always pleasant.. though I can't say that I truly enjoy him pretending that I am a mountain or a jungle gym. Ah well.. he's good company :)

a month in review

2009-02-11T09:15:00.000-08:00

My apologies for not keeping anyone up to date. The last month has been incredible, busy, and rewarding. I am teaching a ridiculous amount, though this week I have had random breaks in my days due to students canceling for some reason or another. I am grateful for the breaks because last week's 11 hour days were a bit much. I am enjoying teaching and even though I have had long days, the relationships that I have built with my students have totally been worth it. I have felt as though many of my teaching times are an opportunity to spend time with my friends. We get to know about each other, but they are also learning English rather well. They are improving and I am glad that I have been able to help them.

On Sunday I went shopping! By the end of next week I will have four new outfits! I'm pretty excited about that. I bought the material, I just have to drop it off with a tailor. Hopefully I'll be able to do that tomorrow. I am also delighted by the incredibly low price of earrings! I may need a whole suitcase just to hold the collection I have been acquiring here when I return to the US in a few months.

Here are some pictures from Brindavin Gardens.

Read the sign carefully.
"Don't miss if visit once you will again and again"

By the way, the aquarium was rather lame. There was a fish from Malaysia that they had paid 40,000 rupees for (approximately $800) and it was floating lamely near the top of the water in a tank that was far too small for the fish's size. That was rather sad. We were all in agreement that they shouldn't have paid so much for it.

Here I am with a couple of the girls that work here. The girl on the left is an amazing cook! I have thoroughly enjoyed everything that she has made. She does quite a bit of the cooking for the crisis center and also for Tim and Karla. Mostly, she makes the breakfast. This morning it was chapattis with a potato mixture which is one of my favorite dishes. Yum...

Here I am sitting all my myself. I am, of course, the center of attention. Isn't that my favorite place to be? Well, I'm certainly getting used to it. It's pretty easy to ignore, especially since I'm honing my skill of being oblivious.

This I thought was beautiful. The way the sun shone off the fountains at the gardens was amazing. Pictures will never do it justice.

my new adventure begins in Mysore...

2009-01-17T06:32:00.000-08:00

I arrived in Mysore on Wednesday and since then my schedule for the coming weeks has filled up faster than I anticipated. I'm hoping I have time to breathe.. but I'm not going to schedule that in. I will have a 1.5 hour break around lunchtime, but other than that I will be teaching students from 7:30am-8:30pm. Yes, I know. I am crazy. That is my Monday-Thursday schedule.. Fridays I will be done at 4 and Saturday I will be teaching 2 hours, but only for one month. All I can say is I will be trusting God to carry me through all this, because there is no way that I'll have the strength to do it on my own. I don't have time right now to think about all the work that I will have to do in addition to the teaching, because I know I will feel overwhelmed. God will provide me with the time. I will be saying no to all future inquiries unless the prospective students are at the same level as another student I already have. Most of the time I am tutoring one on one, but I will be teaching three TOEFL courses (an international English exam). I'm actually starting that course here.

I am living in a small apartment on the Hope Center campus.. I would give measurements, but I don't know them. All I know is that it's the perfect size for me. The bed is like sleeping on hardwood, but at least it doesn't feel like concrete. That is the only thing wrong about it.. well.. that and the small roaches that I discover in the mornings. I don't know where they come from, but Tim and Karla's son (he's 3 or 4) doesn't mind picking them up for me and disposing of them - glad I have someone to do that for me! I have a couch and a couple chairs in the front room, along with a small table and a coffee maker. There's a fridge and a microwave and a small assortment of Indian tea.. which actually gives me the shakes if I drink it on an empty stomach. I do think the tea will become my friend for the next month, I'll just have to eat a banana with it or something.

I will be learning to ride a scooter!!! Mercy, one of the girls that works here, is going to teach me! I'm kind of excited. I wasn't really excited about it at first, but today I went with her and Somiya, another girl that works here, and the associate pastor of the church that meets here - I can't remember his name - to Bandavin Gardens and the KRS Dam which are 40 minutes away by scooter. The ride was so much fun! I mean.. we only went up to 40mph (that in itself was rare), but it was so enjoyable. What a freeing feeling to have the wind blowing back my hair as we "sped" through the villages and countryside.. at sunset. I mean, really, what could be better than that?

Another thing that is great about this place is that there is always some kind of activity. Tim and Karla have four children, so their house is always busy. The school meets on the bottom two floors, and during the school-day there is a lot of activity there. I can hear them playing and singing throughout the day. I start teaching on Monday, and my life will be very full from there on. However, two of my morning courses will not start until the 26th, so I'll be easing in to the craziness of my scheduled life rather than diving in..though I feel like I'm diving in. One student who will by in my TOEFL course handed me his 265 page thesis to mark this weekend. I told him I would have it done by Monday...and even though that is ambitious, it will have to be done by Monday because I won't have time to work on it after than.

I'll add some pictures later. For some reasons my computer isn't reading the picture card :( Ah well. I'll make sure that works next time :)

Mysore for the day

2008-12-11T05:37:00.000-08:00

Today Cindy and I went to Mysore to take a look at a ministry that her church is considering partnering with. Mysore is about three hours from here, so though we only went for the day, it was well worth the time spent in the car. I have to confess, the prospect of riding for 6-8 hours in the car (time dependent on crazy Bangalore traffic) did not thrill me, and I was originally thinking that it may not be all that interesting..we'd sit in someone's office, they may give us a tour of the facility, but mostly it would be talk about what they're doing, how we can help, that sort of thing. I think it was the sitting and talking about something that I wouldn't be involved in that didn't immediately grab my attention. However, when we arrived, we were greeted by two incredibly welcoming people. The couple we met run the ministries at the Hope Center which consist of two schools, one is in another part of town, both of which are comprised of over 300 students from the slum areas! In addition to the schools, there is a Crisis Center where women who are in crisis, usually pregnant or with children, can come to stay temporarily and be cared for. They aren't officially open, but there is a woman who is staying there with her small baby and her two year old son. This is him in the toy car.

This is where I think it gets even more interesting.. The woman was approached not too long ago about teaching English to a group of Iranian PhD students. She has no formal English training, she studied to be an elementary school teacher, but she is American. Apparently Iranians want to learn American English rather than British English. Also, she is the only American English teacher in Mysore (Did she say the only non-Indian English teacher? I can't remember.). She and her husband, have been praying for someone to come teach the students starting in January so that she will have a bit more time to put into the other ministries, to have more time to dream up ideas for the ministries with her husband, and so that they can accept more students into the ESL classes. Mostly, the need is for a tutor, as private instruction is what these students most strongly desire. She offhandedly, while giving Cindy and I a tour of the facility, asked if I had any English training. ...Totally not expecting the truth that I responded with, I told her I did, in fact, have ESL training. I graduated with my TESL certificate.. I had to do a practicum at the end of my classroom education... she was thrilled! I told them I would pray about it. I do have commitments here that I am enjoying, but this offer greatly intrigues me.

Here are some other pictures of the facility for you:

-All lined up for morning assembly! There are 330 students that attend this school.

-The headlines of the paper are read every morning after the state and country anthems are sung. The school medium is Kannada.

-This is one of the classes at the Hope Center. Here there are about 20-30 students per class and they go through grade 10 standard. That's the normal range of education before pre-college courses.

-This is one of the classes at their other facility. This school has 450 students! They only go through grade 6 standard here, and the class sizes are at minimum 50 students! The kindergarten was around 60. I can't imagine having a class that size for such young kids!

-Here is a mural of Jesus with the children at the smaller building, which, interestingly enough had the larger student population.

-I couldn't resist this picture! I thought the ponytails were adorable....

-This is the room for the women in the Crisis Center

-The playground for the kids

Jupiter and Venus

2008-12-07T16:35:00.000-08:00

Last week I was able to witness a beautiful sight just after sunset: Venus, Jupiter and the moon lined up in such a way that they looked like a smiley face! It was beautiful! And, I was so glad that it wasn't cloudy so I could actually see it! I took a couple pictures, not thinking that they would turn out, but I think they came out okay, so I'll post them.

Thanksgiving Dinner

2008-11-28T11:08:00.000-08:00

I don't really have any stories from dinner, but I took a few pictures (shocking, I know! It's been awhile) and I wanted to share them with you.

-This beautiful little girl decided to make me her new friend and demanded that I be the one to feed her a bite of pie after dinner.. according to her parents, she allows no one but them to do this. ...Potential for babysitting?

-I taught these guys how to play Sorry. Perhaps Carly (the blond girl) already knew, but the others didn't. That was fun.

-These pictures are of mingling and dinner.. we had quite a few people over.

the week in review

2008-11-27T20:39:00.000-08:00

It has been an interesting week in India. On Monday Cindy and I took the kids from the orphanage to the park again. This time, we took all of them, not just the ones that live there, but also those who are in foster care. We had ten children with us. I find it rather impressive we were able to keep track of all of them. And! There were no serious injuries.. just one scrape, I believe. That was also a relief. I enjoyed watching the kids play and pushing some of them on the swing. They really wanted me to play on the teeter-totter again, so I obliged for a little while, until the screams of one of the girls became too much for me to handle with being less than a foot from her. But it was quite enjoyable. Tuesday and Wednesday passed without incident, although during each 30-40 minute walk from Light House to the orphanage my list of things that I miss from home seems to increase. The most prominent of late is fresh air. I am eagerly awaiting the day that I can fully breathe in, while outside, and not smell burning garbage, urine, animal feces, or any other foul scent that I refuse to adjust to. Others include the absence of demanding beggars that refuse to take no for an answer. Those children can be incredibly persistent. Although they are cute, they will not get what little money I have. I would much rather give them food, but that's not what most of them want. Also, the honking of horns. I'm trying not to let it drive me crazy. It's so rude.. and the noise pollution that results really makes me glad that this neighborhood prohibits the use of horns and we are far enough off the main road that we can't hear it. I did read in the paper yesterday that December 1 is no-honking day. I'm pretty excited about that. I'll make it a point to pay attention on Monday to the noise levels while I'm on the road.

So... in addition to all of this trivial news, Mumbai was hit yesterday with Islamic terrorist activity. I don't know how anyone would have missed that news. I have heard it's all CNN and other major news broadcasters are covering. Cindy and I watched one of the online CNN broadcasts yesterday morning which had Hindi subtitles and as with many major news networks, the other news captions at the bottom of the screen were running. I was surprised to be reading, while hearing about the fire at the Taj Mahal Hotel and the gunmen who had taken Westerners hostage, about how a famous cricket player was upset about some game with Australia. I thought to myself, isn't that interesting. We have a *huge* news story going on where many people are being killed, and hundreds have been injured, and the small news ticker is making mention of a sports figure who's upset about a game. My brain was having a hard time making sense of that and when I mentioned it to Cindy later she said that would be pretty embarrassing. However, it may be a big deal to some people, even in light of the events of yesterday. How unfortunate and sad that is. In addition to that news, a former PM died yesterday, though I'm not sure if that was in connection with the hotel hostage situation, but as a result, schools and government offices have been closed for the day so that the people have time to mourn. I have no place to go today, which I kind of like despite the reason for the day off.

It is currently Thanksgiving in the land that I love, and tonight (though it's now Friday here) we are having about 50 people over for turkey dinner.. and whatever Indian dish the caterer is preparing as an alternative for those who are vegetarians or not fond of turkey. I'm really looking forward to the company! It is a lot of people, but I've met most of them. The majority of the people coming are the families of the ladies that Cindy has Bible study with. So, I have met the moms. I have also met the families of those that go to the church we attend, which actually is quite a few. There are around 5 high schoolers that I've met from this group that are coming and I'm really looking forward to spending time with them. Two have recently taken the SATs and are applying to schools in the US, Canada and Europe.. Oh the days of planning for college. Those were great :) ..and perhaps soon to be in my future again with how I have been enjoying helping out in Miss Aruna's math classes.

shopping and colds

2008-11-14T21:06:00.000-08:00

I realized I haven't updated in a long while and thought that it would be high time I did. The last couple weeks have been interesting. I tripped walking from Light House to Vathsalya last week and ended up with a bloody knee and a nice sized lump on my leg. Thank God for shots! I was worried I might get something from that, but it's healing nicely and it's merely sore this week. I have come down with a bit of a cold.. and plan to spend a good portion of today sleeping. The weather is changing. It's getting cooler and perhaps that is the reason. Although, I would be more inclined to think it's due to the 20 runny-nosed kids I spend 3 days a week with and my lack of sleep over the past couple weeks. Besides, could I really get a cold when the temperature is going down from 90 to 79? I doubt it. I could not have adjusted that quickly. It's certainly cooler at night, sometimes getting down to the low 60s, but I consider myself blessed because if I were in the US right now it would be in the 30s. I'm grateful for the warmth.

I went shopping on Commercial Street downtown last week! That was exciting. I think I'm getting the hang of talking vendors down. I only did it once. I probably should have for my other purchases, but it didn't end up being a big deal. I bought some beautiful Indian suit material and eventually I'll take it to a tailor to make me the outfit, but I haven't done so yet. That's on my list for next week. (The image is not mine, it's from another blog.. I forgot my camera :( )

Light House is going really well. I love spending time with those kids! I never thought I would ever say something like that, but they truly are a joy. We don't really have verbal conversations since their vocabulary is limited but smiling does wonders. After lunch we have the kids watch tv while we wait for parents to come and this week I've had at least 4 kids try to claim my lap for that half hour. It's amazing how much little kids love touch. It almost seems like they don't really get that kind of attention at home, but I'm sure most of them do.

Tutoring Lakshmi has been going well. I made her flash cards and timed math sheets, and she enjoys both. We started reading Matilda and she seems to enjoy that as well. Last Saturday the orphanage put on an adoptive parents meet, where the kids performed a song and dance to "I can be your friend" from VeggieTales. That was really cute. The rest of the meeting was about adoption, so after the kids' performance we slipped out. On Wednesday I got to the orphanage early and one of the boys was asking me to help him with his Italian (He's going to Italy soon to be with his adoptive parents.) He had language sheets and was asking me how to pronounce the words. The extent of my knowledge of Italian is what I've heard in "Life is Beautiful", and I had a little bit of an idea of pronunciation from French and Spanish. I thought it was funny that he thought I knew the language when I told him a few times that I didn't. But it was fun to hear him practicing.

Obamamania!

2008-11-06T01:41:00.000-08:00

If I didn't already know who won the election a couple days ago, this morning's paper would leave me with no doubts. The Times of India wrote of nothing else on the front page and, in fact, dedicated eight pages of its 24 page paper to the news and information of Obama. There are a couple of smaller articles about him on other pages as well, and though I shouldn't have been surprised at how much coverage there was of him, I was. The Financial Express which we also get along with the Times, a small paper of only 10 pages, filled four pages with the news and what could be expected in the financial world.

We have a list of what India expects from the president-elect.

Obama is the "Dark Knight in [the] White House".

Bangalore is ecstatic.

"It's the beginning of the end of racism...will they change the name of the President's house to Black House?"

What role will young people have in the future elections in India?

Will India be hurt by Obama's win, considering his stance on outsourcing and how heavily it is used in IT companies?

Will the next US president be Hispanic?

Also, I have to laugh at the US map of the swing states. I didn't realize that Mississippi had been renamed. Apparently, it is now called Missouri. A lot has changed since I've been gone, and I'm sure there's more to come.

Vathsalya

2008-10-28T08:51:00.000-07:00

Monday was a beautiful day! It rained for the majority of the weekend, and when the sun peeked through the clouds Monday morning and revealed the glorious day it would be, Cindy and I were pretty excited about it. We decided to take the kids from the orphanage to the park. The office was closed Monday, so only the five children that live at the orphanage were there. The others are in foster care and because of the holiday and office closure they stayed home. We walked to the park which took about ten minutes with all the children wanting to walk holding our hands in a long line.. this did not please the cars and two-wheelers that wanted to get around us, but we managed. Now, the "park" consisted of a tall double slide. There were stairs and a slide on each side that formed a triangle with a small platform at the top. Also there were two see-saws. This was the park. I played on the see-saw with the kids for a bit.. they thoroughly enjoyed my panicked expressions every time they had me up in the air and suddenly let me drop. On more than one occasion I had a vision of myself falling backwards or getting knocked off and seriously injuring myself as the seats were inadequate and I felt far from safe, but I'm still alive in one piece. After I had enough of that, I decided to go on the slide. The kids were having fun on that so joining in seemed like it could be a good idea. The slide was steep. Really steep. It was only about ten-twelve feet long, but it looked like one could pick up a lot of sleep if he/she wasn't careful. Also, at the bottom of the slide, unlike the gradual stop that the slides come to, the stop was abrupt. The harsh angle of the slide met a piece of metal parallel to the ground with no curve. It was a solid angle. When I sat down at the top, I needed a few seconds to prepare myself and figure out how I was going to arrive at the bottom uninjured. Unfortunately, I had not been watching the kids closely enough to see how they did it when they got to the bottom. Well, in the middle of my contemplation, one of the kids decided he wanted to go with me, so he sat down behind me and gave us a bit of a shove, because obviously I was taking too long! We went sailing down the slide, my hands gripped to the edges to try to slow us down, and came to an abrupt stop at the bottom. Ouch. I can still feel where I hit. I'm not doing that anymore. I later learned that I should have stopped myself with my feet.. that information would have been incredibly helpful before I started down the slide... It was a fun day and it was very enjoyable to watch the kids laughing and playing. They are such joys.

-Anappa and Lakshmi, Lakshmi is the girl I have been tutoring

-Anappa and Naveen.. and in the lower corner is Ashwath

-Anappa and me

rikshaws and new friends

2008-10-24T04:14:00.000-07:00

This has been a laid back week. Last weekend I was feeling ill so I didn't do anything exciting. However, once I started feeling better I was able to have a full week. Although I have no pictures today, I do have a couple of fun stories.

I finally contacted the person who runs the slum school that Cindy and I visited about a month ago and I told her I could come in on Mondays and Wednesdays. Our driver ended up being sick with a cold, so the man who took me to the school didn't know where we were going. Now, I have a fairly good sense of direction, but there are no road labels unless it is a very main road. So, we found the area that we were supposed to turn off the road at, but we had about 5 alleys to choose from. I called up the number again and the lady told me she would come and meet me. She (Hannah) pulled up with her scooter about five minutes later and we arrived at the school shortly after that. The kids were finishing up their playtime and as they filed into the main room and sat down, Hannah told me all their names. I hope I will be able to remember them all. She also told me not to be disappointed or alarmed if they do not willingly come up to me, most are afraid of foreigners. Honestly, I was totally okay with that. I would have been a bit freaked out myself if 20 or 30 3-7 year olds suddenly flocked to me. They sang some songs, which were completely new to me. Maybe I knew them once when I was little, but not even one was vaguely familiar. I like learning new things. After the song and a review of the date and alphabet, the kids were split into two groups. I went with Hannah's group. Before the session started, it was potty time! I did not realize that this meant that all of the little kids were going to pull of their pants and then wait in line to use the toilet. I will be prepared next time for the onslaught of bare bottoms. That was definitely not what I was expecting. Anywho.. we sang some more songs, and as I sat with the kids, about four girls made their way over to me and were vying over the space surrounding me. None sat in my lap, but they were as close as they could be to me without being on top of me. And they are afraid of foreigners? I helped them learn how to write the first four letters of the alphabet and then it was lunch time! When the kids had their fill of the food, we put them in front of a movie until their parents showed up. Once the kids had left, I met with the two teachers and another volunteer who had also just begun to help out at the school that day. We talked about ourselves and about the school. Overall, it was a really good experience and I'm glad I said 'yes' to helping out.

I was to tutor Lakshmi that afternoon at the orphanage which wasn't too far from the school, so my plan was to take an auto rikshaw after walking up to the main road. Well, Hannah offered to give me a lift on her scooter up to the road which was so fun! After being on one, I can totally see how a family of four can fit on the seat of one of those, provided it's one of the larger ones.. and the children are small. She dropped me off at the road and I decided that since it wasn't raining, I would walk to the Coffee Day at the next major intersection. I needed a bite of food and coffee sounded really good. After ten minutes I was sitting down at a small table and pulling out my book after placing my order. Now, being used to Starbucks' timely service, I tend to forget that in India it can take almost 15 minutes to get a drink, possibly longer, and I had about 30 minutes before I had to be at the orphanage, so I hoped they would be a bit quicker this time. Nope. If anything it took looooooonger. A quickly finished my coffee and walked briskly to the nearest auto driver. I told him where I needed to go knowing full well how much it would cost for the 5-10 minute ride and exactly how to get there in case he needed directions, but he needed to ask his friend about 80 feet road. That's what I assume he was asking about. He told me 40 rupees and I told him I wanted him to use the meter. Why would I pay 40 rupees for a ride that should cost 10-15? I knew it's basically pennies.. but still. I didn't have exact change on me and I didn't feel like paying extra. He told me again 40 rupees, I said fine, I'll walk. I walked away half expecting him to change his mind, I mean, who turns down business? But he didn't, so I walked. It was a good walk. I didn't even have anyone ask me for money the whole trip to the orphanage, it was fantastic! I think in the future I just won't bother with the auto drivers on those days. I've walked once and unless it's pouring down rain, I wouldn't mind the exercise.

Thursday night Cindy and I went to the YWAM service which was rather short but there were a lot of people there. We saw some friends and while we were waiting for our driver to pick us up we started talking to a group of girls. I met Marina and Linda. Marina is from Manipur and wants me to come visit her home when she goes back in March. They asked for my phone number and told me about all the people they knew in the US.. apparently there is an old man from Ohio living with them. They said that they really want to be friends with me and they're definitely looking forward to hanging out with me again. And...while I was talking to them, Linda's brother interrupted so he could meet me. His second question was 'how old are you?' Followed by 'can I have your phone number?' Shortly after that he said that he wanted to hang out with me and he wanted me to meet his family... He just talked to my mother, who I quickly informed him was not my mother which embarrassed him and I told him that I would have to think about hanging out with him. I don't think I should give him the wrong idea and start hanging out with his family. I would much rather hang out with his sister and cousin and tell myself that I was imagining whatever it was that I read into that conversation. Anyway, I am looking forward to spending time with my new friends.

This weekend the parents are out of town so Katrina and I are on our own. We're heading into the city tomorrow to go shopping! I'm really excited.. I haven't been shopping yet and I've been wanting to go.. even if I don't buy anything.

xkcd

2008-10-19T19:55:00.000-07:00

So.. I was shown this the other day, and I realized that it rather perfectly describes me. It's from xkcd.com.

Kabini

2008-10-14T01:10:00.000-07:00

Katrina had a four day weekend so we decided to take advantage of that vacation over in Kabini. The Kabini dam has backed up the river to form a huge lake which is surrounded by jungle. We went on a boat safari around the lake and saw elephants, a crocodile, wild boar, spotted deer, sambar (big deer - a tiger's favorite food!), and many, many birds. The following morning we went on a jeep safari through the jungle. The vehicle was a truck with six seats attached theater style to the cab. There were three rows of two seats; the cab had been extended to allow room for the back two seats. The seats themselves were fairly comfortable, but without seat belts. The roads really aren't that great, so whenever we went over large potholes we found ourselves launched at least a foot from our seats. There were a couple times that I almost found myself in Katrina's lap.. and she was sitting diagonal from me! It's a good thing I was hanging on! The most exciting part of the jeep safari happened as we were driving down the road to the lake. It was morning, so of course that would be the best area to spot animals. We were driving along, straining to see the birds in the trees, when in front of us a group of 12 people ran across the street.. what?! The number one rule when you're in the middle of the jungle: Stay Inside You Vehicle! We drove a bit further to ask why they had abandoned their jeep and they pointed to a stuck vehicle next to the lake. Apparently the driver had done off the dirt road closer to the lake to get a better view of an elephant. Well, he drove a little to far and managed to get stuck in the mud. He tried to back out and nothing happened. The elephant noticed the disturbance and decided to meander on over to see what was happening. The guide told everyone to run for a place to hide across the street, and that's what was happening when we drove up. They all piled into the back of our truck and we watched the elephant walk slowly by, minding his own business. He sufficiently cleared the truck and the drivers and guides went to push the truck out of the mud successfully. We drove a little further on after everyone had returned to their proper vehicle, and stopped on the road where we could get a proper look at the large creature. He was sixty feet away. He passed a couple trees, turned, and started towards us. He stopped at a tree about thirty feet away and started scratching himself: his back, his legs, etc., on the bark of the tree. I got lots of pictures! I even took a video because I thought that would be better than mere photographs. That was by far the highlight of the trip. It would have been wonderful to see a tiger or leopard, but it was nice to see an elephant up close.

-One of the many beautiful views of the water and trees from the boat

-The first elephant we saw!

These are a couple pictures I took of the birds. I have tons more, but they aren't the best pictures. I liked the contrast, especially in the second picture, of the tree and the clouds. We saw herons, osprey, kingfishers, snake birds (they dive into the water and swim for awhile before poking their heads above water to breathe and see around them! That was exciting to see...), hornbills, eagles, and many others.

-an egret
-the jungle road

-Spotted deer! The males had magnificent antlers! This is just one of the many herds that we saw that morning.

-Here everyone is taking a picture of the truck stuck in the mud.
-This is the elephant that scared them out of their vehicle...

-Monkeys!

-A pretty tree

-Katrina and I are so excited for the Jeep safari!

Sambar

Wild Boar

Here are a couple of elephant videos. The first is the elephant that chased the people from their vehicle, and the second is the first elephant I saw.

The food at the resort was amazing! It was a buffet of Indian food. I am still trying to get used to the spice, as it is in everything, but I am certainly enjoying the experience of eating new food. I am amazed at how many different ways there are to cook potatoes.

We ended up leaving a day early because we had "done all there was to do", (though how that's possible in a new area I'm not sure). We stopped in Mysore on the way home and visited the Mysore Palace. If you want more information about it, visit: http://www.mysorepalace.org/ I was not able to take pictures of the inside, but I did get a few of the outside and grounds. It is an impressive place, to be sure. There is a lot of history there. For 700 years while Mysore was still an independent State, though the British occupied the rest of India, the same family ruled. A 700 year monarchy is a great feat, especially in light of the conquests of the British and Portuguese. The palace was built out of fire-proof materials (100% fire-proof, the guide said, although there were quite a few wooden doors...) and contains many imports from Britain, Belgium, Italy and France. We discovered that Mysore was the first city in India to have electricity, thanks to the nearby dam. Mysore was also the first city in India to have indoor plumbing! It seems it has been at the forefront of those technologies in India because of the affluence of the area. Apparently there was a rather large gold-mine there for some time.

We attempted to find another palace between Mysore and Bangalore, but we managed to only find the fort in that area. We stopped to ask for directions near a man-made hill that I assume was a watchtower of sorts when the fort was active. There were these darling children at the top of the hill who tried to hide when I pointed my camera toward them. I don't know why they initial shy reaction, because as soon as I was about to put my camera away, they all posed for me. They all wanted to shake Cindy's and my hands. They were adorable.

General Update

2008-10-06T09:52:00.000-07:00

Cindy and I stopped by the Light House this morning, without calling ahead because we didn't have the number, only to find out that it's closed this week! Of course it's closed. Last week Thursday was the celebration of Mahatma Gandhi's birthday, a national holiday and this week is Diwali. I'm not sure what this holiday is, but all schools have Thursday and Friday off. Many have taken these two weeks off. School will resume at the Light House on Oct. 15th and I will go back then to help out.

Since we were already in the city, we decided to find the new YWAM building. It wasn't too far from where we were, and very easy to find. It's in a bright orange building! We stopped in to chat at the office and were told that most of the YWAM teams are on outreach right now. In fact, the last one leaves tomorrow, so it will be a very quiet building for at least the next month. There will only be five people there! We have received an open invitation to come for lunch anytime. I will certainly take up that invitation. It would be wonderful to hang out with people my own age. So, on Mondays and Wednesdays during the lunch break that I will have between 12 and 2, I will take an auto (rickshaw) over there for lunch before heading over to the orphanage. I'm really looking forward to that.

On Thursday we are taking advantage of Katrina's four day weekend and heading southwest to Kabini! I'm really excited about that :) We get to see wild elephants! Sandeep said that we will be chased by the elephants, although I'm pretty sure he was joking. They are formidable creatures and I know I would most certainly be overtaken by one if it actually did chase me.

Volunteering at Katrina's school has been amazing. Last Friday I was able to work with two boys who knew very little English. I can't imagine trying to learn math in another language. Even though math itself is universal, the explanations of how to do it are not easily understood for some even in one's own language. I'm glad for the opportunity to help both of them understand because I think that if I am able to explain math to students who know little English, I'll pretty much be able to explain it to anyone..at least in theory. I am eager to work with both of them again tomorrow. It is such a good feeling to be able to help someone understand something he/she has not been able to understand. That really makes me want to be a teacher.. hmm...

On a different note, I have decided to take advantage of the clubhouse in the neighborhood. I have been to the gym several times this week and am looking forward to continuing. I realized as I was walking over there today that I had spent quite a fair amount of the day in the car, and when I wasn't in the car I was sitting down. I was really glad to do something active.

Nandhi Hills

2008-10-03T08:25:00.001-07:00

This is mostly a pictures post. I went to the Nandhi Hills last Saturday and took a few. There were a lot of monkeys! I took lots of pictures of them. It was so fun to be able to get close to them, like at the zoo, but without the cage getting in the way of the view.. Although, when one of them started to come toward me I went around him as quickly as possible. I hear they bite. That's not something I want to let happen. My pictures of them are at the end because I posted so many. I didn't want their cuteness to take away from the rest of the post. However, the very last picture is my favorite.

Apparently there used to be an old British Fort on the Hills. These pictures are from that part of the area. You can see part of the wall is still there, hidden by the foliage. It was quite beautiful. I'm in one of the pictures. I was trying to sit properly there, but if I scooted back to be more comfortable I would not be here to write this as I would have fallen a few thousand feet. Yeah, perhaps not my brightest idea yet, but I tried to be careful.

Here is the place where mosquitoes are bred. There were a few water areas like this. Cindy and I weren't quite sure what their purpose could be other than to populate the area with blood-thirsty insects. Although, this one looked pretty from far away.

Monkeys aren't the only animals to be seen on the Hills. In this first picture there are some adorable puppies, strays. Their mother is trotting off, no doubt looking for more food for them. She just dropped something off that they are devouring eagerly. There were quite a few strays on the Hills. Because the Nandhi Hills are such a popular resident and tourist place, the animals are sure to have plenty to eat. The second picture is of a cow. Yes, he is hiding in the bushes chomping on grass. He's not a wild animal. I'm not sure who he belongs to, but he did have a rope tied to him and there are plenty of people that do live up on the hill there. I tried to get a better picture of him when he was blocking the path by the wall, but he relieved himself as I got closer so I decided that I should just move along in the opposite direction.

I thought the view was quite lovely from the top. It's 1,000 steps up to the top, so it was a bit of a trek, but that didn't take too long. King Tipu lived in these hills while he was hiding for awhile. From one of the locations that I took a pictures he used to have criminals thrown off. It's called "Tipu Drop". I looked over the edge in some places, but I never did see a spot where, if thrown, someone would actually die, so I'm not too sure where it was exactly. I saw a sign pointing toward this famed location, but there was no sign at it, so there's no way for me to be sure.

Monkeys!

This little guy was watching all the kids playing in the park at the top. He was just curious. I thought it would be adorable if he actually went down the slide, but he didn't. I think it's a good one to end with.

The House

2008-10-03T07:34:00.000-07:00

Hey! I thought I should add a few pictures of the house and yard. It's actually a pretty cool place we're in. It's like a little slice of home.. except that it's bigger, feels a bit more like California, and the power goes out at least once in the morning and evening for an unspecified amount of time. The latter, I must say, is fantastic when I'm trying to talk to people in the U.S. You'd think the power would have the courtesy to wait until I'm done with my conversation before it decides to cut out ;)

-First, notice the size of the door.. yes, it is about half the width of a normal door. There are normal size doors to the other rooms in the house, but not to mine. I think it's kind of cool. Also.. I didn't notice that it wasn't a normal size until about a week after I got here. I'll blame that on jet lag.

-This is my room.. It's actually the office, so I don't have a real dresser. I get to put all my things into drawers and onto shelves. It's pretty neat.

-At the end of my bed there is an entrance onto the small balcony. By small I mean 2x8. It has a nice view though. This is the house across the street. Most houses are like this, some are a LOT more fancy.

-This is the kitchen. By Indian standards, it's HUGE! I think it's rather large by American standards too. You can comfortably fit four people in here, all doing things. Unless of course you're all trying to use the stove. Our cook has shown us that the toaster oven bakes cookies and bread quite well. :)
- The front room..between the entry and the dining room. We haven't spent much time in here yet, the couch really isn't that comfortable and the dining table is far more convenient to play games at. But this room is pretty. The doors at the far end open to the patio where there are a couple of chairs and a table. Those are perfect for sitting at in the afternoon. We can watch the sun go down behind the houses, which is quite nice. Then it's time to go inside because the mosquitoes become friendly just before the sun sets.

In the yard we have at least three different fruit trees: guava, banana!, and something that tastes a bit like brown sugar which I have decided would taste much better baked with apples than it does raw. I'm pretty excited for the bananas to get ripe. I've never had them fresh like that before! On the way to CIS in the mornings we drive through a whole orchard of banana trees. I feel like I'm in the jungle!

- These are some of the weird brown sugar fruit.

- Here is a pretty flower from the yard.

-If you look real close in the middle you can see a clump of bananas!

Volunteering

2008-09-30T05:49:00.000-07:00

This is a post about me this time, sans pictures. I just found out yesterday that I will be volunteering at Canadian International School three days a week. I'm quite excited! I'm helping out in a math classroom (or as they say it here "maths classroom"). I'm helping a teacher who instructs five levels of math she and is desperately in need of assistance. Yesterday she told me that she was beginning to wonder if she would be able to get all the work she had to do done. She sent me home with three classes of quizzes, which took about five hours to mark - in part because I told her that I did not need the answer key and thus needed to answer all the questions myself first. But I thoroughly enjoyed myself while I was correcting them.

I was thinking, on the way home from helping out today, how much I enjoy math and there are those that really don't get it. It's like a language, but it's a universal language. Though what we call them may be different, the numbers and the symbols say the same thing all around the world. It's pretty amazing. I enjoy helping people learn and understand. Understanding is a beautiful thing. I am definitely looking forward to helping out this year. In fact, I think the next nine months are going to be pretty fabulous. I get to tutor an amazing young woman who is "doing better than they expected" as of her progress report yesterday(!!!). I get to help students who are having a hard time understanding math and correct their papers. And I get to be in India. Really, what could be better?

Random Photos

2008-09-26T21:29:00.000-07:00

This is one of the many buildings being constructed around Bangalore. I should have taken a picture of the workers. If you look closely you can see them in front of the building. They aren't wearing protective gear.

Here is the local tire repair shop... I would trust them with all my flat repairs ;) Although, I did get to thinking about where one might go if they needed work done on the car, and I believe that ponderance was answered in my last post: Tyre Empire. The one in Whitefield looked quite nice when I drove by yesterday. It was very clean and the employees were all in uniform.

Here is where the less fortunate (monetarily) reside. Yes, those are tarps. And the room underneath is very small. I don't really want to think about where they cook or relieve themselves.. I think it would be easier for me to work with their children than to go visit in their homes.

This is a camel! Due to my lack of research before coming here I didn't realize that camels existed in India. For some reason I thought they were only in the Middle East and at the zoo. But, there were four walking down the street accompanied by people the other day. Just one more thing to add to the congestion... It was quite the sight :)

Billboards

2008-09-26T20:32:00.001-07:00

I heard someone say recently that it is impossibly to get anywhere in the states without coming across enough advertising to be visually overwhelmed, even if you are consciously aware of it. I laughed a bit when I heard that because in India, at least in Bangalore, I could see more advertising in one day than I see in the US in about a month. I have added some pictures as an example. Again, they are mostly taken from the car as that is how I get anywhere, so they aren't the most fantastic pictures you can see.

-This is MG Road.. one of the busiest commercial streets in Bangalore.

-I don't know what Thandu is either.. but if it's edible I'll try it at some point since the sign tells me coke is good with it.

-This is another shot of MG road. All levels of the buildings have shops in them. I guess that would make it a bit like a mall, but it doesn't have a North American Mall feel.

-If you look closely at the blue sign, I'm not sure if you can see it because the pictures are small, it read "What's narrower than Shirpa's waistline? MG Road post Metro construction." It's an advertisement for www.bangaloremirror.com. I haven't been to the site, but it's where people from Bangalore can post their opinions about what's going on in the city. I find their signs rather humorous now that I've been here long enough to understand what they are getting at.

-Kingfisher. The richest man in India.. I think. He has his own airline that now flies international. Apparently he's the King of Good Times. He owns half of Richmond (an area of the city) and is currently having a very large mall constructed on some of his property in another area of town. It's amazing how much money the alcohol industry can create for one man!
-This is one of about five Economist advertisements I've seen. I got a couple other boards in with that one too.

-This is one of the building fronts along Old Airport Road. I go past here almost every day to get into the city or to Bonasvati where I help out at the orphanage.

-Another common billboard in the city. There are several varieties of this one. I have yet to understand what they are for or what they are trying to say with them.

-Embarrassingly enough, I needed this one explained to me. Apparently the man's head and the tires had something in common. They are both bald! And tires is spelled t-y-r-e-s in England, thus Bangalore needs to spell it that way.

Lalbagh

2008-09-24T20:38:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I went to Lalbagh. Our driver took me over there and I hopped out of the car and went to see the grounds of the lovely botanical garden. Honestly, I wasn't all that impressed with the flowers. I was expecting a beautiful rose garden, because I had heard there was one, as well as other flowers and plants. I guess I haven't spent enough time out in the city to actually understand that everything is dusty. The plants that were, I'm sure, a vibrant green were dulled by the dust that had coated them. They were still pretty. The flowers, I think, were at their peak about a month ago. I did not feel as though any pictures I took could have made them look better than they were. I did see some that were nice and almost took a picture, but then I became distracted by the huge dragonflies and the blue bees. At least, I think they were bees. As soon as I raised my camera to take a picture of them a few birds flew close to the flowers which caused all the insects to scatter. Ah well. Perhaps I will see them again.

I walked through an area that had at its entrance two tall wire giraffes. Along the drive were other animals: a heron, a cow, a pig, etc. I walked through this area that appeared to have shaped trees and other bushes and after I had seen almost all of the creations, I realized that the wire animals at the entrance were one day going to be bush animals, once the trees or plants had fully grown. I thought that was pretty neat.

I also saw a monkey! I was walking along the path by the water and was passing under trees that had unusual looking pods (another picture down below) hanging from them and enjoying corn on the cob ahead of me was a cute little monkey! I got out my camera to take a picture of him on the fence and he jumped up into the tree. He finally rested in a branch out of the way of the people around to enjoy his corn in peace. He may have stolen it from the vendor down the path who was roasting corn for the locals. I've only seen monkeys at the zoo so I thought it was really cool. I asked the driver about it on the way back and he said there are a lot of monkeys there... I'm glad I was able to see one.

The path by the water was my favorite part about the park. There were palm trees and bamboo shoots and so many others kind of trees I had never seen before.

With Pictures!

2008-09-21T17:23:00.000-07:00

I am still fascinated as ever by the traffic. It is so fun to look outside the window when we're driving around and see all the beautiful colors and the people and the busyness yet slower pace of life. That contradiction seems weird to me, but that's how it appears to me. There are so many people on every street. Because there are very few traffic signals, they wait for the right opportunity to walk across the street. Now, in the US, that walk would be rather quick, but here, it takes forever. There are times when there are people crossing the street in front of us and I wonder if they will make it to the other side before the cars go crashing into them. I'm so surprised I have not seen anyone get hurt yet. I am also very thankful for that.

One thing that really made me laugh when we were driving yesterday was the gas truck. The back of it displayed the "petroleum" warning but also made mention that it is "highly inflammable". Unless my definition is wrong, the petroleum here in India will not catch fire! I asked Cindy about that and she said that "inflammable" here means the same as "flammable". I still thought it was really funny. I took a picture. It was from inside the car, so there is a bit of a glare.. and the windows are tinted so that makes everything seem a bit more hazy.

Saturday we went into the city. That was exciting. Actually, I've been in the city quite a bit. We have to go through there, or around there, to get to the orphanages. Everything seems like a city. But, I'm used to that so it's not a huge shock. The downtown area reminded me a lot of Vancouver, BC in look, the not so nice parts, except that it is more dense and perhaps a bit more run down. Cindy and I were walking down on of the main commercial roads and there were, of course, stray dogs wandering around - though I've noticed that they usually lie around until they think someone will give them something. Well, one of them when we passed it got up and started following us. We walked a bit quicker to try to lose it, but it went right past Cindy and tried to get my attention. Apparently it thought that I had food I wanted to give it. If I had food scraps, I probably would have obliged. But I had nothing on me that even resembled food. Maybe I shouldn't look at them as I pass by anymore. But they are so cute and ignored that I just want to say hi. Oh well.

Today I am going to see Lakshmi again. We will have our first official tutoring session. She has had a couple of tests since I last saw her, so I don't know if she'll have much homework, so I'm going to bring wiht me the best 3/4 math book that I've ever seen in my life, and a couple of short novels and we'll see what she wants to work on. I'm looking forward to that part of my day.

Here are a few extra pictures for you to enjoy.

A lot of the buses, vans and tractors are painted amazing colors and designs.

Look closely at the woman in the background.. see the bundle of sticks?

And... this is a billboard for the construction company doing a lot of the work around the city.

My first day

2008-09-18T18:52:00.000-07:00

I have arrived! I came in on time yesterday morning, just before 4am. My intention was to stay up for the flight to London and sleep the whole way to Bangalore, but that did not work out as well as I had hoped. I slept for about three hours total for both flights. There was a bit of a mixup at the airport because the internet was providing people with misinformation about my flight which resulted in my ride not showing up until an hour after I landed. But, it was fine, because she arrived. I knew she would. I have learned though, that the worst question for me to be asked when I am overwhelmed is "How are you?". I break down in tears. That was interesting. I plan on getting more sleep from now on.
There are so many people on the roads. On the way back from the airport there were mostly truckes on the main roads, but when we went to the orphanage in the afternoon there were so many people - LOTS of people - walking along the roads, going in and out of shops, crossing the road... there were cyclists, scooters, motorcycles, buses, trucks, cars, vans, all trying to fit five lanes of traffic into the three marked lanes. I am amazed at how well the drivers know the size of their vehicles. I was thinking that if people back home knew that, or had the confidence of Indian drivers, I-5 traffic problems may soon be solved.. of course, there is still the whole police and rules thing.. I don't know if there are many rules here. Everyone drives on the left side of the road. That was quite the experience. I mean, the whole driving in traffic was an experience. There wasn't anything familiar about it.
I saw a waterbuffalo meandering on the side of the road yesteday while we were driving. That may have been the most shocking thing I saw because it was so unexpected. There were a lot of stray dogs on almost every road. Cindy said that they expect either to be beaten or ignored and that made me very sad. If I wanted to make friends with any of them I probably could, but they are diseased and I shouldn't want to touch them.
We went the the orphanage yesterday where Lakshmi lives. I will be tutoring her this year in English and Math so it was nice to meet her the day that I arrived. She is very sweet. All of the kids at the orphanage are sweet. I tried to help her with her math. She's learning long division. I learned that I'm terrible at explaining things especially when I think there is a language barrier. I need to refrain from thinking that she does not speak the same language as me. She knows English fairly well and I shouldn't think that she can't understand what I'm saying. After she finished her homework she read me a story in Kanata. She translated it for me, but I felt like I was missing something. I knew what was happening, but I didn't know why things were happening in the story. But the language was beautiful.