Long OVERDUE update.

Alright, so I have been at my internship for the past few weeks….we DO have (limited) phone service, BUT no internet!!...and NO English newspapers…so no real connection to what is going on in the world…don’t worry though, I heard that Obama won…I am not that disconnected. Plus I am living with TWO VERY BIG Obama supporters…so they were SCREAMING and jumping when they found out. It is interesting being here in India while the elections are going on back home…EVERY Indian that I have talked to thought that Obama was definitely going to win because the newspapers here tear McCain apart and glorify Obama…so there is NO way that an Indian would even think that McCain had a chance….anyhow enough about that….

My internship is wonderful. (although I am excited to be home soon) The name of my NGO is Gravis. I am at the NGO with two other girls from my program, which is nice because we can laugh about things together.We are living at one of their centers in a village that is about a 2 ½ hour bus ride outside of the city Jodhpur ( so I am about 10 hours from the city of Jaipur) There are a few families that live at this center and all the men that work for this center live here on work days, while their families live in villages that are at least an hour away. All of the men that live here are very nice and laugh at us all the time because I guess we do funny things. I have sooo many funny stories so I will just highlight a few of them….

1. There is a well on the Gravis’ campus (as they call it)…so the women from the surrounding areas come and get water every morning and evening. The first day that we were here there was a camel cart filling up with water and THEN a bunch of ladies came to get water and approached us by saying “namaste, namaste, namaste”….so we sat there and they began to pick at us…yes, like moneys pick at each other. I was wearing a pair of linen pants and a shirt…normal outfit right?...WRONG!...haha…no its just that the women here all wear skirts with petti coats underneath them and TWO shirts…so this women (actually a girl that is my age, but married so she seems like a woman to me) named Kabu, she was laughing at my pants and then picking at my shirt, she even LOOKED down my shirt to see what I was wearing underneath…haha…and she lifter up my sleeve so I FLEXED!!!...my HUGE muscles and she thought that was really funny…haha…they laughed at the fact that we had our hair in buns and pony tails…our hair was supposed to be in BRAIDS!!!...duh!!...and why didn’t we have earings in and bangles and necklaces and anklets???? They were freaking out because we did not have JEWELRY on !!!...baaaaaaaaaah…I DON’T wear jewelry!...haha…they are changing me here…I wear jewelry everyday! Crazy huh?

2. We usually take jeeps out into the field…which ACTUALLY feel like the Indiana jones ride…(Disney did a great job)…BUT ONE TIME…we took a tractor…yep, a tractor!!!...haha…it was SOOO painful!...supposedly we will take a camel cart one of these days. (so they say)

3. It is a regular activity in the evening to go to the sand dunes near by and run up them…which is O SOO tiring!!!...and then we watch the sunset over the desert and then jump off the sand dunes and see who can jump the farthest down the sand dunes and take pictures, and laugh and pull countless POKEYs out of our feet.

4. We drink chai at village homes that we visit everyday.

5. I sit with the kitchen lady in the morning or evening and pull the skin off of garlic or onions…sometimes we get into minor food fights. She ALWAYS tries to get me to eat chiles everytime that I go in there. She likes to have me sit with her and roll the chipati dough with her and make the chipatis…while bugs and rats run by us on the floor.

6. We probably have worms because we are drinking the ground water here, well water, basically anything that any villager gives us…haha…don’t worry I will take parasite medicine when I get home to kill whatever might be growing in my stomach.

7. We often DREAM about Christmas dinner and Christmas treats and in-n-out and sushi…basically ANYTHING…haha…our meals whether it be breakfast, lunch or dinner consists of vegetables cooked in LOTS of yellow oil and chipatis (kinda like tortillas but not) and dal (lentils)…I am still not a fan of eating vegetables in the morning for breakfast but I get it down.

8. The children that live here LOVE hanging out with us…and it can be rather TIRING…and they ALWAYS want us to give them gifts…haha…because previous students that have been here have given them gifts…so sometimes we share a little something with them.

OK, enough stories…there are SOOO many. I think that I will just tell you what a typical day looks like for me and then I will be done.

-wake up at 7:30 for prayers…which is a prayer to all gods and then there is a short

meeting of what tasks the day consists of. Everyone shows up in their pj’s and all of the

men’s hair has yet to be combed.

-tea time

-breakfast around 8:30

-take showers and sweep our rooms

-leave for the field around 9:30…usually includes a trip to a few places where they have

implemented water harvesting devices…talk to a few self help groups..and ask lots of

questions to learn about the impact of these things that Gravis is supporting

-come back for lunch

-usually rest from 2-4…because it is WICKED hot and no one else does anything during

these hours

-play with the school children (there is a school for the village children on the campus that

we are living)

-tea time at 5

-walk to the sand dunes, watch the sunset, jump off the san dunes

-come back and help Sita, the kitchen lady, with dunner

-dinner time around 8ish

-go to a cultural program or play with children or get henna done or watch a hindi film…so

many options…

-bedtime 10-11pm

I am learning tons by just interacting with the villagers and loving it. I am still healthy and alive so that is a good sign. I get more and more excited about going home and seeing all of you and being able to go to church, but until then I am doing my best to take in Indian village life at its fullest!!!...and let me tell you there is A LOT to take in. Love you guys!!!! I definitely will not be back to internet for another three weeks…so until then…ENJOY LIFE! J

Internship!!!

ALright, I am heading to my internship on Monday morning. I have NO idea what it will be like, how many hours i will be working, if i will have internet access, what type of accommodations i will have....hahaha....but i am EXCITED!!!...basically this message is just to tell you that if i dont update this for forever or respond to e-mails that i am STILL ALIVE!!!! :)

Thunderstorms, Tibet, and Terrible Transportation…but a marvelous trip.

SO this past week was a LONG festival, holiday celebration for India. It was basically a NINE day holiday that ended with the burning of HUGE statue of the Ram god. Because of this holiday we were given 6 days of travel time. I chose to head up north (with a group that I have been traveling with to all the other places) to a place called Dharmsala where the exiled Tibetan government resides, including the Dalai-lama.

Lets just say that the train ride was the WORST train ride that I have been on. In the past it has been REALLY easy for us to get train tickets and this time we had to get a SPECIAL ticket (pay extra) because the train was booked…and IT WAS DFEFINITELY BOOKED. One berth on the train is meant for six people and then across from the berth on the other side of the isle way are 2 beds…meant for two people. At one point (WHEN WE WANTED TO GO TO BED) there were 18 people in our berth…18!!!...a place meant for 8 people. Then we finally got the point across to these Indians that we were going to put the beds down…and we ended up with two men sleeping on the floor, one man on MY bed while I slept, and 3-4 more men sitting on the bottom beds…it was SOOO hot…and our fans for out berth DID NOT work…but by now THAT did not surprise us. Along with MANY other things, it worked out to being the WORST train ride….but we survived nonetheless. From our train station we took a public bus to Dharmsala…which was ALSO a hot, and crowded and rough ride, but we made it to Dharmsala nonetheless.

Once we arrived it started POURING…mind you this city is at the base of the Himalayas and we have been living in DESERT weather the past two months…so basically it was cold and we were wet and NOT prepared for rain…ALL of us looked like a dirty mess by the time we found a guesthouse to stay in. While we were in Dharmsala, we SHOPPED, ate MARVELOUS food…I had a chocolate pancake, hot chocolate, PESTO PASTA!, Tibetan food, omelets, toast that was NOT white!...it was like heaven….we walked the Tibetan prayer walk, went to the place where the actual Exiled Tibetan government resides (I think that place was the highlight of my trip), went to a Tibetan museum, saw a dog with RABIS, took a short hike to a waterfall, met TONS of Muslim shopkeepers that were from the North (I just say Muslim, because we did not meet a single Hindu and that is pretty unusual but I guess its not in the North). It was gorgeous up there and the weather was a WONDERFUL treat…NONE of us wanted to leave. It felt like we had been on some kind of retreat…people were not trying to make us take their rickshaw (in fact people said NO to us when we asked for a rickshaw ride…which is UNHEARD of here in Jaipur)…shopkeepers were not walking the streets and PULLING us into our shop…it was just wonderful.

THENNNN we had to leave….and the craziness began…we had to wake up at 3:30 AM!!!!...in order to catch a bus…when we walked outside it started to THUNDER, and LIGHTNING and POUR!!!!...then we get on a bus and it is still DARK outside and we are driving down a narrow, windy, steep road…and OUR BUS DRIVER IS BRUSHING HIS TEETH!!!!!!!! From Dharmsala we headed to Amritsar, which is known for its Sikh temple, known as the Golden temple.

Once we arrived in Amritsar, we immediately realized that we had returned to REALITY…men got on the bus while we were stopped in traffic and started to BUUUUG us about taking their rickshaws and hotels and blah blah blah….we ignored them and said NAHI! (no!) Our first adventure in Amritsar was a trip to the Pakistani boarder crossing!!!...I WENT TO THE PAKISTANI boarder crossing…this is a HUGE attraction to Indians and foreigners alike because the soldiers of both countries perform a ceremony EVERY night at sunset and open the gates and take their flags down…this ceremony is actually REALLY funny because it consists of soldiers doing high kicks and grunts…and funky outfits…I don’t even know how to explain it. (Tammy if you are reading this you should ask David if he has ever been to this ceremony in Pakistan.) Then we ventured back to the Golden Temple….which is gorgeous at night!...and rather impressive. The next day we headed back to Jaipur…OF COURSE our train was late so we arrived at 9:30 am and went STRAIGHT to school. The trip was FABULOUS!!!

SOO a lot of things have changed lately…. I have a new homestay that I have been living in the last few days. It is REALLy nice…we have internet sometimes, our own rooms, hot water, two bathrooms, and a little couch room all to ourselves (Molly and I)…it’s a lovely set up. Our new mom eats everything including meats and onions and garlic…and she STUFFS US!!!!!...i can not even lay on my stomach when I go to bed because she piles SOOOO much on our plate!!! (I actually REALLY miss our old food, it was so simply Indian, healthy, and just enough…but this food is pretty good too. Just know that I have YET to feel an ounce of hunger since I have arrived in this house. In addition to the new homestay…. I leave for my internship on MONDAY…this coming MONDAY!!!...baaaaaaaah. I will be heading to a village to work with a non-profit called Gravis in a village that is 1-2 hours outside of Jodhpur. I have NO idea what it will be like, but I am supposed to be working with some micro-finance women’s groups in the surrounding villages. There are two other girls from the program that will be working in the agriculture sector of the same non-profit so I will be with them. In addition, one of the boys from our group, Jesse, will be working in the city of Jodhpur…so I will have a few people around me.

I can not believe that I am already moving onto my internship phase….i have less than TWO months left!!!!...that is sooooo crazy to me. I am looking forward to coming home, especially for the holidays!!!…but I am excited about this new phase. I think that I am ready to get out of the city…I hope that I can build some more relationships with people and HOPEFULLY play some soccer with kids….something I have yet to do here. I will miss seeing all of my fellow programmers every day…but I think that I can manage. Anyhow I am missing you guys…don’t worry there are NO Indian people replacing your spots in my heart…

Taj Mahal in a TRUNK.

Alright…so I gave you guys the WRONG information this past post (or you can just take it as evidence of how life works here in the India) Sooooo I THOUGHT I was going on a camel safari last weekend, but I ended up going to the Taj Mahal!!!

FIRST I must tell you about our field trip that we took last week. This trip was to a unique area in Rajasthan called Shekawati…it is unique in that it is just the name of an area that is a part of three different territories. We were accompanied by a man, Shri Rambir Singh, who grew up in the area during the British rule and his family is very visible throughout the area. This is because his family was an estate family that owned the surrounding lands, so they had lots of land and close ties with the British. We received many connections throughout our trip from him…his family owns the PALACE in town so we were able to stay in the palace one night and our second night we stayed in refined MUD huts (modeled after the ones used in the village). Here on this field trip we learned about the British rule sooo much. One day we just sat in what would be equivalent to the living room of the fort and talked to Shri Rambir Singh about his life growing up here and his relationship with the British. (his family still lives in this fort)

In addition to this we visited two organic farms to learn about the organic farming that takes place and their new techniques. It was cool to see and learn about, but honestly that is not my topic of interest so I found my mind wandering as we stood in the HOT sun looking at a pile of compost being digested by WORMS!!

There is just SOO much that I learn and experience each and every day that I almost find it frustrating or intimidating to write about it, because I don’t know how to narrow it down for all of you guys…so please realize that I am only hitting the top of the icebergs with these posts…if I told you guys about everything then I would not have time to go and explore, I would just sit in my room and TYPE…and that’s NOT an option….haha.

So once we arrived back in Jaipur we had class and THEN… Saturday afternoon I left with 7 other people to visit the Taj Mahal. We stopped in a hotel on the way to spend the night. This town is known for its bird sanctuary so we woke up early and rode bikes through the bird sanctuary at 6 in the morning. It was a delightful morning ride…and we saw LOTS of birds, monkeys and a horse/cow looking animal. I am SO glad that we did this in the morning because it has been SOOO hot here recently and it would have been straight up miserable to do that during the day. Let alone the birds and monkeys probably would not have been out for us to see. After our BIRD excursion we headed to the TAJ!!!...

When we arrived at the Taj parking lot, we were hassled by SO many people to buy whatever cheap little thing that they were selling…yesssssss…I finally gave into a young boy…I just couldn’t resist him…he was riding his bike up next to us on the way up, trying to show off and then talked to us when we came out…SO I JUST BOUGHT a keychain. (We are hassled ALL the time NO matter where we go…so don’t think that this is anything different than normal…I guess the only difference is that this little boy…(he likes to go by bobby) actually had a conversation with us and it was sweet of him, but also his plan ALL along so that we got SUCKED into buying something.) In order to get into the Taj, of course, you have to buy a ticket…the CRAZY thing is …if you are an INDIAN then you only have to pay 20 rupees…if you DON’T LOOK Indian then you have to pay 750 rupees…like 20 dollars versus 50 cents!!!!! Getting into the Taj was kinda SKETCHY!...but we survived…I think people here are SOMETIMES scared of white people so they let us do whatever we want to do…other times they just try to take complete advantage of us. Then we headed back to school/home on Sunday afternoon. We had the option of going to a fort on the way back, but we were all WORN out from the sun and the early morning bike ride, so we just went home. It was a lovely trip and I am REALLY glad that I went.

PS…our mode of transportation was a tazi, which was an Indian SUV with NINE people in it…2 in the front, 3 in the middle and 4 in the back…basically they stick FOUR people in the trunk of a small SUV…and then they drive as crazy as they can! And hit every bump so that our bones BREAK…and we no longer have tailbones.

It is OFICIALLY festival season here in India. We have had SO many holidays…its kinda unreal. This week coming up we have four days off…and this past week we had two days off. For this upcoming week I am traveling up to northern India to the base of the Himalayas which I am REALLY looking forward to. Supposedly its supposed to be cooler up there…but who’s to say that, because it rained for a MONTH longer than it was supposed to and its BLAZING hot right now…so the weather is not on track here.

On top of all these holidays, Molly and I were thrown a curve ball!!...we were told yesterday that we are going to have to move homestays. It was NOT the best of news…and I was overwhelmed at first and SAAADDDD, but I learned today that I get to EAT eggs at this new HOUSE!!...woo hoo!!! I guess what happened was that our mom signed up to host some other students from another program also, and when she said that she would host them she did not realize that she was not allowed to host us at the same time…basically it’s the OTHER program’s fault. Our mataji has LOTS of integrity and she did NOT want to go back on her word, so she set us up to live down the street at her best friend’s house. Our new host mom and our mataji go on walks every morning together…and our mataji has told her what we like to eat so I think it will be a smooth transition. I am still REALLY sad that we have to leave, as is our mataji. Our mataji said that we can still come by WHENEVER we want and come eat at her house, we just have to warn her!!...so I will definitely do that. I am getting all choked up writing this because Molly and I have LOVED living here, and they have taken such good care of us…and they have become like family to us (including the servants)…BAAAHHH!!! But its all in the Lord’s hands (thankfully)!

I LOVE ALL OF YOU GUYS!!!! I cant believe that it is already OCTOBER!! I have been here for TWO months and I would not change it for the world! The first month time went by somewhat slow, but this past month things DEFINITELY flew by. I hope that this blog finds you healthy and jubilant!...haha. I know that it is getting pretty crazy over there with the stock market and all, BUT know that the Lord is in control in EVERY aspect of our lives, BIG or small. It also has been pretty crazy over here in India. Bombings are continually being found or going off in cities. In the last week and half, I think that there has been at least three bombings. In addition, there was a HUMAN stampede at one of the temples in Jodhpur in which 180 people died from being trampled on. The cause of the stampede is unknown…but I cant even begin to imagine being trampled to death. With all that said, please keep my safety in your prayers! Like I said, I LOVE YOU ALL!!!!

No hurry, no worry, no chicken curry! -The wise words of an Udaipur Rickshawvala

Sorry that I have been SOO awful at keeping this thing updated! It has been SO wonderfully busy since all the other MSID students have arrived. There is always an option of doing SOMETHING after class whether it is visiting someone’s house, walking to the ATM, going to the grocery store, attending Yoga classes (which I do NOT do), doing homework. The problem is that we don’t get out of class until 4 in the afternoon!!! (unlike before when Molly and I were done by 1:30 and had SOOO much time to kill) Our classes start at 10 in the morning and continue until 4, with a short tea break, a lunch break and another “whatever break.” The fact that everything in India takes longer than in the US is SOO true. Like I mentioned above, going to the ATM is a task that takes up the whole afternoon, so you cant really plan to get more than one task done each day. Classes are great and our professors are SOO intelligent. The head of the program here teaches one of our courses about India and she has published a 3-inch thick book about the history of Rajasthan (the state that I am in). You can look up the book on the internet and be impressed for yourself…her name is Rima Hooja and the book’s title is The History of Rajasthan. We continually have guest speakers that are SO interesting sharing about the farming and grazing patterns of villages, or government regulations, or water control…people are just SO smart. We basically have THE hook-ups!

We are beginning to research our internships. I have to look for ones that interest me and they recommend a few from the past. Of course I am doing an internship with alternative economics or micro-finance so I just basically have to pick the NGO that I like the best. I will probably be stationed outside a major city and then travel to various villages in Rajasthan, which sounds SOO great! J Please keep me in your prayers while I am in this decision process, so that I may choose the place that God wants me to be.

Like I said….WE HAVE THE HOOK-UPS!! Mostly every Friday (until the internship phase) we have some kind of field trip. One Friday, we went to a blue pottery factory, block printing factory and a hand-made paper factory. It was QUITE the experience. I have explained it as something that you hear so much about, but yet it you NEVER get to experience it. WELL, I experienced it. The paper factory had the biggest impact on me. We were not allowed to take pictures in the factory, because basically they did not want pictures floating about showing the conditions of their factory. NOT that the conditions were AWFUL (like rats running around and dirty floors), but they were monotonous and I am guessing the hours were long and the motions were repetitive. The paper made here was shipped all over the world to stores such as Wal-Mart and private boutiques in the U.S. It was crazy to see them making things that are on the shelves at Wal-Mart. They are in the process of making things for Christmas, so I got to see things for Christmas BEFORE they were even on the SHELVES of wal-mart…HA!...I was able to talk to some of the girls working there through broken English and broken Hindi. It was overall crazy because the process of paper-making was so interesting, yet the conditions were shocking.

Our other field trip was to a village. It was RATHER empowering and exciting because we basically just sat and talked to a women’s self help group (micro-finacnce group…MY KIND OF WOMEN!...ha.) and listened to what they have done for their village. Basically every improvement in the village is accredited to them!! They told us that when they wanted to build this small dam like structure (but its not a dam) that has helped raise the level of the underground water the men did not want to join them, so they decided not to fix the men meals until they agreed to help with the manual labor!...isnt that great?...because men CANNOT cook here…like they just DON’T!...(well unless they are a servant, but I don’t think that the villages really have servants)

Two weekends ago I traveled to a city called Udaipur…aka THE MOST ROMANTIC CITY!...ha. It was GORGEOUS! It had SMALL little streets where we risked running into cows, donkeys, elephants, camels, people, scooters, other rickshaws, cars, shopkeepers…you name it we probably ALMOST hit it. All the buildings are SUPER tall because they are all competing to be the tallest one so that they could calim to have the best view of the palace out in the middle of the lake. At night, all of the palaces in the town are lit up with lights…so GORGEOUS! We went to a palace called monsoon palace that was placed on the top of the hills and it overlooked the entire valley/city of Udaipur and then on the other side it overlooked PURE green land! We rode in the MOST ridiculous rickshaws!...these drivers think that they are invincible (and I am beginning to think that they are)…and they LOVE to get a reaction out of us, so they would drive out of control just to hear one of us squeal (I don’t know if that’s the right noise, but it will do, you never really know what noise will come out of your mouth when you think you are going to HIT a donkey!) Some of the rickshaws had some BANGING music…and by banging I mean like there is NO volume control…its either LOUD or off. Others had banging music WITH black lights. We were busy the WHOLE time that we were there…but a good busy NOT an overwhelming busy. ALL of us LOVED the city!! In order to get there we took a train late Friday night and arrived there in the morning on Saturday and then took a train back late Sunday night and arrive EARLY Monday morning BEFORE classes. (just enough time to take a short nap, shower, and eat breakfast.)

SOO the trip was great but the aftermath of the trip was NOT the best. I think that I caught some kind of cold on the train or during that weekend. For the past week I have been sick with a head cold. It started with a sore throat on Monday and then worse on Tuesday and somewhat feverish and now I am just CONGESTED!! I was MORE than blessed with a package from some of my friends from college, and it was SOO encouraging, the Lord’s timing was PERFECT! J ...You know how when you get REALLY congested you cant TASTE anything??...well, I don’t know if I have just never been this congested to experience this LACK of taste or if I never realized that my taste was GONE because I already knew what EVRYTHING tasted like in the States…well ANYHOW, I cant taste ANYTHING right now…and I REALLY don’t know what things taste like when I eat them. For example I went to a restaurant on Saturday and I got a dish that I have eaten at other restaurants and my friends asked me if it was better than the others that I have had…and I realized that I had NO idea because I could NOT taste it…ha! The only way I knew if it was spicy was if I felt the stinging sensation on my lips. Crazy huh?

Because of my little sickness, and HOMEWORK (can you believe they are giving us homework here?) I decided not to travel this past weekend, along with the majority of the rest of the group, so we just explored Jaipur…which mostly constituted of walking around the Old City and get attacked by the shop keepers…if you are going to shop DON’T go to the old city in Jaipur…they are ridiculous!

FUNNY story…my mataji is a RATHER funny character. She told Molly and I a while back that the WHOLE world was going to EXPLODE in two days, because of that scientific tube that they were going to turn on in Switzerland. She said, “Where is the US? They wont let other countries have atomic bombs that only destroy a country and this tube is going to destroy THE WHOLE WORLD and the US is doing NOTHING about it!!!???” Later she heard that the tube was not a threat and that we would survive through the week…I think I need to start keeping documentation of my mataji’s one-liners…like a quote board…yeah K2N??...she is SOO funny!

I AM ALIVE!

For those of you that follow international news and know that there were bombings this weekend in Delhi...I would like you know that i am ok and alive. Delhi is about 4-5 hours away, so everything is OK here in Jaipur! :)

GReen GOA!

DAY ONE…half day of hindi, made tea and it boiled over, ate warm curd for lunch, went to the train station, WAITED FOREVER!!!, sat on the train for 20 HOURS!, slept on the train

DAY TWO…arrived in Mumbai (TWO hours late…haha…o India time), walked around lost for a little, ate at Mc Dondals (for the first time here), met up with Reverend Diwakar and drove in the RAVI-mobile, took a WARM bucket shower, ate a deliciously spicy lunch, watched Diwakar’s daughters wedding on DVD, chilled at the house with the house helper that was our age, Alka, saw RAVI (and he remembered MEEE!!), Diwakar shared his testimony and we ate ANOTHER delicious meal.

DAY THREE…breakfast, Diwakar and his wife attended the funeral of the mentally-ill child that attended their church, Sneha picked us up and we had lunch at their house, LAUGHED A LOT with them about our Point Loma trip last summer, had dinner, went to the bus stand and waited for the bus for an hour, left for a 12hour bus ride to Goa.

DAY FOUR…went to a sketchy-McSketch-Sketch bathroom at 2 am with the bus stopped, arrived in Goa, asked around to see which bus to take to Anjuna, found our guesthouse “The Orange Guesthouse,” settled in, went to the grocery store, walked around town, watched T.V., went to bed.

DAY FIVE…apple & peanut butter for breakfast, walked to the beach, bombarded by ALL the shopkeepers, sat at the beach, took pictures with Indian boys (UGH!), ate lunch (well I had a breakfast plate for lunch, cause it just sounded SOO good), found internet, bought ali-baba pants, peanut butter sandwiches for dinner, watched TV, went to bed.

DAY SIX…woke up and it was RAINING, peanut butter sandwiches for b-fast, walked to the ali-baba pants shop in the rain to exchange because they HAD A HOLE!!, packed up our stuff, went to Dominoes for lunch, paid 35 rupees (less than a dollar) for an individual pizza, blessed with PERFECT timing to catch the bus to Mapusa and then to Calangute (another beach), found our guesthouse with the help of a friendly man (otherwise we were wandering around and in people’s yards…hah.), Johnny’s Place, not the cleanest of places but it would do, walked the beach of Calangute to Baga and back, walked around town, found internet, took awhile to find a place to eat, walked back in the dark because they took FOREVER to give us the BILL!!!...but the Lord is watching over us, right?

DAY SEVEN…searched for a loaf of bread, walked to Baga on the beach, had lunch, found a place with a loaf of bread, sat on the beach for awhile (fully dressed), watched the Indians LOVE the beach, girls in full attire and boys in their little briefs (such a crack up), was attacked by all the ladies selling jewelry and men that were giving semi-permanent tattoos, MOLLY got REALLY sun-burned, bought a DELICIOUS milkshake!, went to the internet place again, walked the streets to shop, ate PB sandwiches for dinner, packed up our stuff, went to bed.

DAY EIGHT…went to the MOST delicious breakfast place, it was like a bakery at home, I got a chocolate chocolate chip muffin!!!!...soooo good, PS. This day was Ganesh’s birthday I think, caught a bus to Panjim and then to Vasco, ate a little samosa snack, took a taxi to the airport, checked in, flew to Delhi, in which the plane was like ONE-FOURTH full!!!!!....it was SOOO empty, there was lightning while we were in the air and a REALLY sweet sunset, talked to these two goofy guys while waiting at the airport, drove to the hotel that all the NEWBIES were staying at.

DAY NINE…arrived at the hotel at like 2 am in the morning, woke up and went to breakfast and began to be introduced to the other 21 students, SOOO EXICITING!!!!!, learned that one of the guys here is from DUARTE!!!...my town and we live like a block from each other and know some of the same people!!!, and here we are meeting each other in India, sat through MULTIPLE orientation lectures, went swimming, sat in a room and just talked to everyone, went to bed.

DAY TEN…woke up, knew more names of the people than then day before when I woke up, breakfast, more orientation, more laughing, more getting to know each other, more similarities and differences discovered, sat out by the pool and laughed a lot, I LOVE THAT THERE ARE MORE PEOPLE!!!...so much fun, sat in a room with a few girls and just talked (girls are usually good at that).

DAY ELEVEN…delicious b-fast, became really excited for everyone else to meet their families!! J, took a short drive-through tour of Jaipur with the group in our taxis, went to the MSID office for the first time with the group, sent off everyone to their house, and returned to our humble abode, in which our mataji was waiting patiently when we opened the door.

BIG mistake!!!

the zip code is 302004!!! SOrry if you have sent something.

1st IMPRESSSIONS...gone.

SOO…A LOT of first impressions and expectations have changed since I first got here.

FOOD—the food is delicious here!!! (for the most part, the other night I had some concoction that did NOT even seem Indian) I actually said the other day that I don’t know if I will be able to go back to normal American food. I know, crazy huh? My biggest nightmare at the beginning has turned into the biggest blessing. And even if I OVEReat EVERY meal, I will probably still loose weight by the time I get back. Haha…I am living THE most organic life that you could possibly live. They buy EVERYTHING they make like 30 minutes before they cook it. ALL the vegetables and fruit are SOO fresh. Lunch is definitely my least favorite meals during the week at school but during the weekends we eat at home and its DELICIOUS! This just proves that God will provide for you and will NOT give you something that you cannot handle…haha…veggies! (that’s so lame that I cant handle veggies, BUT I CAN NOW!)

WEATHER—so its supposed to be REALLY hot this past week and the next weeks or so, but we have only had like 2 REALLY hot days!! Otherwise GOD is filling the skies with clouds and keeping us cool. I mean I still SWEAT when I walk outside and I still need the fan on when we go to bed, but at least its somewhat cooler!

HINDI—ummm, well I guess you could say that I can read Hindi script now. We only have two-three more days of Hindi. When I am reading a book in Hindi class it reminds me of sitting at the round table in the back of Mrs. Lofftus’ classroom reading the paper thin books that would rhyme and once you conquered the first book then you would get the next one. I have to sit there and sound out EVERY letter and then I STILL don’t say it right. I am the WORST Hindi speaker in my class (there’s only two of us). Our teacher makes ME do MORE of everything and always tells me to listen to Molly, because he knows that I am WORSE! Its sometimes VERY frustrating, but then there are times that I am not as frustrated, because I am having a good Hindi day. Ha. SOME of our homework these past few days have been to learn to make tea and khir (a sweet dish) in HINDI…so I have the recipes WRITTEN IN HINDI if anyone wants them. HAHA. I am encouraged when I think of how long it took me to learn the alphabet in Kindergarten and how LITTLE time it has taken me to learn the Hindi alphabet. Haha, but other than that I get rather discouraged with Hindi.

KIDS—there are poor children that sleep on the corner that we pass every day at school. EVERY morning and afternoon that we walk by they RUN up to us usually half undressed and wearing clothes that are WAY too big or WAY too small and wave to us and say “Hiii!” “Hello” “Hi.” Hello” “Hiiii!” “Hi, Hi, Hi, Hi”…all different ages, while there moms just sit there and smile at us as we walk past. One day I tried to exercise my Hindi and I asked them the simple question of “how are you?” and they just stared at me as though I was speaking English. So that went over well…haha. I am determined to be their friends. They are poor, but they do not come up to us and beg us for money like all the other poor families do and so it is nice to be able to begin a friendship with them.

WALKING—We walk everywhere unless its really far away OR we don’t know where we are going. The language barrier is annoying (all the rickshaw drivers want to cheat us) and its easier to avoid it by walking. So while we walk…the most common smell is either the OVERflowing trash can, URINE (being heated by the sun, EVERY man here PEES on the street and somehow they KNOW where to pee because ALL of them pee on the same walls, and its AWFUL!...sorry for the details but I am just taking you on a walk with me), the closest vendor’s food or just BLACK air. EVERYONE stares. You know how your mom always told you to “Stop Staring” when you were younger…WELL, that is not ever said here. People just stare (mainly men, but don’t underestimate the women they stare too). Their necks are like OWLS and turn 180 degrees while driving their motorcycles…it DANGEROUS! There is NO doubt that if we walk10 yards, we will be awkwardly stared at, even if they have seen us walk by every day since we have been here. We will be asked by ANY rickshaw driver (bike or auto) if we need a ride. Molly and I discovered that if we walk the opposite way of traffic A LOT less rickshaw drivers bug us. May times we are TRYING to cross the street and a rickshaw drives up to us to ask if we need a ride and BLOCKS us from crossing the road and then we have to wait for the nest WAVE of traffic. SO FRUSTRATING! Lastly we have to strategically cross the street wherever we go, which can be really easy sometimes and really hard other times, but adventures nonetheless.

TRAVELING—SO like I said Molly and I only have a few more days of Hindi and then they gave us a week to travel!! As we have been trying to find out what we want to do and how we want to get there and all of that, we have discovered that although India has MANY options to get places, it takes FOREVER. We are traveling towards the south to a beach community in the smallest state in India, Goa. On our way there we are stopping in Mumbai to visit with some of the people that I met in India the last time that I was here. I am VERY excited to see them! They are great and they offered us to stay the night so we will be in Mumbai for one night on our way down there. Please pray for our safety…we should be fine, especially with the Lord watching over us. We will then fly back and meet up with the rest of the students and stay at a hotel with them I am rather excited to meet all of the students! Our faculty says that the office will transform when all of the other students get here…haha. I like it to ourselves but I would not mind having a few more faces. Its comforting that Molly and I have been able to settle in and learn some Hindi before all of our schooling starts and all.

RELIGION -- So I ALMOST committed a MAJOR sin the other day!...Our hindi class (meaning Molly and I) took a field trip to the Wednesday market (which Rishiji says not even Wal-Mart would be able to compete with this market). As we walked around Harshji (our teacher) and Rishiji (faculty member) told us how to say different things in Hindi and about the market and just typical knowledge. We had stopped and we were translating signs with our notebooks in our hands (totally typical…and don’t worry, NO one was staring…Kidding!). ALL OF A SUDDEN, I felt something biting me in the middle of my back, so I reached back and I could feel through my shirt something hard like a little pebble…Well, OF COURSE, I pinched it to make sure that it if it was a bug then it would not continue to move around in my shirt. I was RATHER convinced that it was just a pebble because it was SO hard. I QUICKLY tell Molly to hold my notebook, and I reach up the back of my shirt and pull out a BUG!!!...as hard as a ROCK! At this point BOTH Rishiji and Harshji are staring at me…and Rishiji (without hestitaion) informs me that I JUST COMMITTED A SIN(cause he thought it was dead)!!! …mind you we were standing outside the white temple…So, he goes on to inform me that if I was IN the temple it would have been a DOUBLE sin! LUCKILY the little thing was actually still alive. GOOD THING, or else I might have killed Rishiji’s second cousin twice removed. I hate to break it to you, but I do NOT hesitate to kill the GIANT black ants that crawl around our room or any other type of bug or spider that we find. I guess I should be more careful next time, and YOU should consider NOT killing the next bug that you find in your house.

On a more serious note, Molly and I were just discussing how crazy it was/is that they abide by such a rule. Rishiji told us that the life of an Indian is very hypocritical. He said it in a way that made it sound as though it was almost inevitable that life here is hypocritical. For example, he told us that he eats meat, but his mom does not know that and when his mom comes to visit he has to clean the kitchen out to make sure there is no evidence of meat-eating. If this is true that he eats meat, then how can he get mad at me for killing a small bug. Whether he is eating cow or a chicken, he has to kill something in order to eat meat and therefore he is doing the same thing that I did when I was killing the bug. I also remember the last time that I was here in India, our driver was Hindu and while we were in a circle praying (I’ll admit, my eyes were open) a tarantula was walking within our circle. Since he had no idea what we were saying in English, he had his eyes open and he saw the huge spider also, and walked over and stepped on it. I am not sure how the whole Hindu thing works, but I am pretty sure that if I cant kill a bug, then our driver was not allowed to kill the tarantula and Rishiji is not allowed to kill an animal to eat. This concept is something that I guess I will have to figure out while I am here, but it seems as though the younger generation is ignoring the strict rules of Hinduism, which then goes completely against their religion. Sooner or later they are not going to be able to justify their beliefs because they will be breaking all the rules.

*****CORRECTION…all of you math majors (Mom, Ruth, Megan F.) probably ALREADY realized that I did the math wrong in my post awhile back with the 2 rupee shoe man…2 rupees equals 5 cents, not .8 cents.

I think about you all VERY much. If anyone (RACHEL) knows how I can respond to your comments easily just let me know, otherwise I have NO idea how to do it, but i truly enjoy getting them.

I CANT believe that all of you LOMA people are starting school!!!! HOW EXCITING! I am sad that I am missing all of you guys being together but I am content being here and being pushed out of my comfort zone to something new and different. But PLEASE attend PANCAKE BINGO for me!!!!...theres NO reason why you shouldn’t! TELL me about how it is and all the changes, I would love to hear from you! J

PICTURES!!!

Here are a few pictures, but i will put MORE up in the near future!











One of the MANY forts the surrounds the hills of Jaipur! We have yet to go to that fort, but when we do, we will ride an Elephant to it.













HANG OUT day! Shefail, Molly, Agana, and me.


















Shefali and I in front of the white temple. (two minutes walk from our house)














Here is a picture of one of the MANY monsoons that we have experienced in the last few weeks, but supposedly monsoon season is done, so no more rain.

YES, you can mail me stuff through snail mail to(for those of you that had asked me about it), but i will only be at this address until mid October.

B39 Devi Path
Near Soni Hopital
Kanota Bagh Jaipur 302004
India

The zip code is questionable so you might want to look it up.
SOrry it took me so long to tell you the address.

TWO holidays in ONE weekend.

Let’s just say that weekends here are A LOT more interesting than my normal weekday/school day.

First HOLIDAY…Friday was India’s Independence Day, so we had NO school and that was about the only benefit of the whole holiday. I don’t know if “younger families” do more, but there were no fireworks, supposedly there was a parade, but we were told not to go near big crowds or crowded shopping areas…sooooo we just went to the grocery store and then cyber café (we are regulars there). Compared to the US’s celebration, India did nothing from what we experienced. The only difference in normal day life was that the poor people on the street were selling flags and some people had put them in their cars and then the servants and our mom watched a Bollywood film. We opted out of the film, because it was in Hindi and luckily we did opt out of it, because the film was WAY looooooooooong!...for those of you that know me, I PROBABLY would have fallen asleep. Long movie, mid day, and IN HINDI…definitely an equation for me to fall asleep!

SECOND holiday…Rakhi holiday…it has a longer name but I have NO idea how to spell it. So this holiday is ALL about tradition between a sister and her brother. First, the sister feeds the brother sweets and salty snacks or lunch in some cases. Then the sister puts tikah on his forehead which is red stuff and rice…this act is to say best wishes in life, may you be victorious and then ties a bracelet around the brothers wrist to say that I love you, and the brother gives the sister money. WELL…we don’t have a brother in our family, BUT we do have the servant’s son. SOOO, we told our mom that we wanted to give him a bracelet and she LOVED the idea. She bought some bracelets for like 5 cents each. On the holiday, we went to our dad’s mom’s brother’s house (basically his uncles house but they NEVER call it that) for lunch. It was pretty darn good. We had these puffy tortilla like things and then green chilies and this BEANY dish…SOOO beany…it was made with LENTILS AND CHIK PEAS AND GARBANZO BEANS….BEANS BEANS BEANS….and theeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeennnnnn I ate it!!!!...I know crazy…and they gave me TWO servings!!!...and I finished them both…it actually tasted good, but the texture was not the best but I just covered it up…(for those of you who don’t know…I HATE beans…of ALL types, except edamame)and they gave us a salty snack and Khier (a sweet dish). After lunch we went home to our house and Reka (the servant) came and grabbed my wrist…SOO excited and pulled me into their SMALL little home. This was an eye-opening experience by itself. Their home for four was a small outside and then a room that was seriously 3 feet by 5 feet. I had NO idea this whole time that they were living in such a small space right next to us. Quite humbling. Then we completed the tradition and Rahul gave us a delicious sweet instead of money, which was GREAT!!! His BEAMING face just pulled on my little heart strings and I could not stop smiling. Afterwards I invited them into our room to play cards with us and I introduced them to the game of BLINK (for those of you that played it at my house this past summer Chelsea, Peter,). It was a lot of fun. Going into their house and putting the bracelet on Rahul has been the BEST experience for me thus far.

On Sunday Molly and I ventured to this mall that we had heard SO much about. We took a bike rickshaw which was the WRONG idea!!!...we should have taken an auto. Besides the fact that the rickshaw driver SAID that he knew where he was going, he really DID NOT! (he knew the general direction.)…so we biked around WAY more than we should have and it seemed like he was struggling and THEN once he found out where we were supposed to go he had to bike up a bridge!!!....I wanted to get out of the bike and walk up the hill so he did not have to bike us there. He was NOT sweaty when we got in the bike and by the time we got there he was DRIPPING sweat and his shirt was DRENCHED. Oops. Don’t worry we gave him a little extra tip. Molly and I then walked around the mall, ate lunch for two dollars each (a FULL meal) and then went to McDonalds for a soft serve cone that was only 30 cents ( and OOO so good!) While we walked around the mall we found a store called “the one dollar store” which did NOT make sense because they don’t have dollars…AND it was basically that EVERYTHING was 99 rupees which is MORE than 2 dollars. It was actually VERY American there was Kraft Mac n’ cheese and chewy granola bars and Campbell’s soup…so one day that store might be invaded when I am sick of Indian food. While we were in there one of the store employees came up and started making us smell EVERY SINGLE body was scent!!!...he would open it up, squeeze some out and then put it up to my nose. EVERY SINGLE SCENT…no joke. The problem was that all I could smell was cigarette smoke on his hands…so NONE of the scents smelled good. On the way home, we decided to take an auto rickshaw and we made it home safely and quickly!...another successful weekend. God is good.

Typical weekday in my shoes…

6:30-8:00am – I wake up any time between these hours and I will do a Bible study, journal, read a book…

8:00-9:00 – Shower (without a shower head) and get ready time!...Showers here take me WAY longer than at home (kind of disappointing).

9:00-9:30 – Go into the house and have breakfast…maybe read the newspaper if there happens to be one in English on the table

9:30-9:40 – Take meds (without fail) and brush teeth.

9:40-9:50 – Walk to school and NOT get hit by a car but get honked at by EVERYONE. If it is raining then try and avoid ALL the puddles which is basically impossible.

9:50-10:00 – Set-up our computers so that they are ready during our breaks.

10:00am-1:30pm – HINDI CLASS!!!...(if it is raining them most likely class will not start until at least ten minutes after 10) This is the time to fill our brains with words without vowels and script that looks like art. We usually get 2-3 breaks that total 30 minutes all together, and Raguji brings us the MOST delicious tea at 11:00 sharp.

1:30-3:00 – Try to eat lunch…haha. Ok, it’s not that bad, but we just eat lunch and lounge around the office and use the computers and walk back home.

3:00-5:00 – Free time, we usually rest or walk to the market if it is cool by this time. We don’t know what to do here because all the kids are still in school, so we can’t play with them.

5:00-6:00 – TEA TIME!!!...this time is NEVER skipped at our house or our mom would be SOO sad if we did not come to tea. While we have tea we usually watch the Olympics together, but I don’t think that our mom really cares about them, but if our dad is there then he watches them with us and comments on EVERYTHING. It’s great. I like it.

6:00-8:00 – Sometimes we stay in the house and watch more Olympics, but sometimes we have homework that we have to do or we type out blog entries (as I am doing now) or emails in our room, so that we can send them when we get to school the next day.

8:00-9:00 – Go back into the house for dinner while our mom and the servant’s children glue their eyes to the TV to watch two soap operas. I thought soap operas in the US were ridiculous (sorry to those who watch them), but the ones here in India are TRULY dramatic. Now, if I could only understand what is happening, it would be great.

9:00-10:30 – Head back to our room and to write and read and get ready for bed, so that we get 8 hours of sleep!!!

Hopefully I will get some pictures up soon...it just takes forever to load them and i don't usually have enough time.

Molly and I BASICALLY own this town now!...WHAT NOW KIRSHNA??!

So our program really wanted to take us to the main temple of their god krishna, therefore we went to go see it on Saturday with Rekaji (our homestay coordinator) and Cathy (a women from the US that has done a lot of work here in the US). It was quite the experience and I am sure that there is more to come because they are crazy about all their gods here and there are temples EVERYWHERE!!...and they look like anything from a shack to a HUGE WHITE building. As we entered the temple we of course had to take our shoes off…the majority of the women had their heads covered (we did not) and everyone was crowded up against the fence that was in front of the god. We went at a specific time to see the “unveiling” of the god, which happens 7 times a day, and it provides an opportunity to see krishna and for krishna to see you. I was thinking of Christianity in comparison to this and it made me realize how amazingly great it is that we have 24/7 access to God Almighty and that we do not have to travel to a temple and complete rituals in order to see our God. So when we walked in there was LOUD Hindu music being played (some specific song) and then gongs were continually hit for the 15 minutes of the revealing of the god. There are two curtains and so they SLOWLY open each and the audience gets REALLY excited and everyone pushes you towards the god and you are up against the body in front of you and in back of you. They start chanting and when the priest puts the torch thing towards the audience then everyone lifts their hands up into the air and swoop the presence of krishna on them. After we stood there for like 8 minutes (TOO long in my opinion) and I had a headache from the continuous gongs we walked around the god and left. Let me just say that it was quite the experience.

From there Molly and I took a rickshaw by ourselves to go to lunch…we wanted to go out to lunch so that we did not have to have yellow vegetables and chapatti again. We found the restaurant easily… the food was exceptional. I was able to get my FAVORITE dish (paneer butter masala) and cheese nan with a sprite. We also walked around this part of the city to try and find a DHL place that we had read about in one of our guide books…SUPRISINGLY we were able to find it AND an ATM that actually works with our cards. Then we headed back to our home in which we had to describe to the rickshaw driver where to go and he went the wrong way at first but I was able to correct him…so we ACTUALLY made it home. Overall our Saturday was a success!! Hence why I say that we now own this city!

On Sunday Molly and I visited another temple that is like a 3 minute walk from our house with our maid’s daughter Shefali. It is huge and white!!...so it is commonly known as the white temple. This experience was a little less intense as the last one. The building itself was VERY impressive, A LOT more impressive then the other one that we visited. We did the same thing as last time…walked to the idol and walked around it and then left. The other visit took about 20 minutes this one was only like 5 minutes. Before we went into the temple we had to take our shoes off (like we had done the previous time)..BUT this time when we went back to get our shoes they asked us for 2 rupees!!...and we brought NO money...NONE!...not even an American penny…so we were stuck...we could not just grab our shoes and run because there were guards EVERYWHERE and its pretty easy to spot two white girls in a crowd here. Then a kind man who barely spoke English (I guess he could tell by our facial expression that we did not have money) kindly paid for us!!...he was our SHOE HERO!( just so you know 2 rupees is .8 of a penny…so a penny would have been convenient!)

Later in the day, Shefali brought her friend over, Agana, to do Henna on our hands. It was very fun. All four of us hung out for a few hours and played cards and took pictures and laughed. They know a decent amount of English so we can talk to them. I LOVED hanging out with them and I hope that it made them feel more comfortable with us. O MAN…funny story!...We had told Shefali that we wanted her to teach us how to dance, so she started talking about dancing and her and Agana showed us one of their dances and then asked Molly and I to show us one of OUR dances? THERE IS NOT A SINGLE DANCE THAT COULD MATCH THEIR DANCE!...Molly and I sat there trying to figure out what dance we could possibly do…ANY IDEAS? Yeah well we busted out the good ol’ electric slide!...haha. It was boring and they were not nearly as impressed as we were with their dance…but WHY should they be? HAHA.

For dinner on Sunday we went to some religious dinner with our parents. I guess there was tons of food but I did not see it and we were told that there was going to be tons of people but there were probably like 40. Basically I had the wrong idea in my mind when I thought of this dinner…but it was good food. They said that it was traditional Rajasthan food, so that was the first time that we had experienced that type of food…AND we ate exactly what the Indians were eating. They did NOT make any special type that was less spicy for the AMERICANS. I liked that.

Sunday night I slept the WHOLE night without waking up!!! (that’s a first!) With all that said, I am adjusting and learning. I will be Indian in no time! (minus the hindu).

love you guys!

I hope that this blog finds you well and happy…I am doing good here in India. I have not explained that I am here with ONE other girl from the U.S. (her name is Molly)…We were placed in the same homestay and therefore the same room…I get along with her just fine. She is from outside of Philly and goes to UNC..so neither of us knew anyone else in the program. I am so thankful that she is here because it takes a lot of effort to talk to all of our faculty and our host family so it is nice to split the attention. Therefore whenever I am saying we I mean Molly and I for the most part, because we do EVERYTHING together.

1. SO, Wednesday was the beginning of our Hindi classes. Lets just say that if I wanted to ask you your name in Hindi the format of the question would be: Your name what is? And then you would answer: My name ________is. I mean its REALLY EASY and I am ALMOST fluent…they only have 11 vowels and some symbol that relates to the vowels that means empty. Not only are there 11 vowels, but each vowel has its own script if the word starts with the vowel but if the word does not start with the script then there is a matra (a different sign) that is added either after or before or above of below the word so you know which vowel to use. If that didn’t make sense then ummm….you are in the same place that I am. Haha. On top of all of that...the majority of the single letters in the alphabet use MULTIPLE letters to make their sound such as dh, ch, th, ph,…and there are TONS of words that do NOT have vowels like gml, glm, jr, jg, ghr…YEP!!!...those are words! OOOOR there are such words as chhh which means 6. Like I said SOO easy! ...haha...I told our instructor that it should not be allowed to have 3 h's in a row and then he just laughed. Our instructor is very nice and it is very enjoyable to only have TWO of us in the classroom learning the language so he can correct us EVERY TIME…(which is every single time). ANNIE…(in case you are reading this or any other India Loveworks 2007 member…HE HAS LIGHT EYES…aka: TIGER EYES!!!...hahaha…you would be soooo jealous)

2. We walked to school on our own WEDNESDAY. It is only 5 minutes away from our office, but that is only true when you are an expert at crossing the street otherwise it takes A LOT longer!!..hahaha But we survived….eventhough Molly’s shoe fell of in the middle of the road. I hope to film our walk to school someday and post it on the post so that you can ALMOST get ran over by a rickshaw WITH US!!...haha.

3. EVERY TIME is TEA TIME…I cant express to you how delightful it is to be served chai tea during our hindi course and not only be served it but it also tastes SOOO good!!!...the best tea that I have had is what we are served at the office….tea at home is only ok.

4. Our host family is very nice. The doctor is pretty much never around, but he did take molly and I to go get Molly a cell phone. He is supposedly known for being a very generous doctor..he opens his clinic every night and it is somewhere where there are MANY Muslims(most which as poor) and he will charge VERY little if anything at all…so he has a very generous reputation around town. He is also a YOGA MASTER! The life of an Indian is NOTHING compared to that of the chill Costa Rican lifestyle(sadly). Everyone is pretty much ALWAYS on the go…unless, of course, you are our host mom who MUST be in her 70s and has bad knees and bad eyesight…so whenever we go into the house to say hi, she is sitting on the couch. She is a very nice lady and she insists that we call her mom, she wants us to tell her ANYTHING that we want!! She does not want us to go hungry…but all she eats is green vegetables!!!...She has high blood sugar so she does not eat sweets, she is a vegetarian and that entails NO EGGS L…and she does not eat CHEESE!!!!!....so that pretty much leaves vegetables. If anyone knows me well enough, vegetables are the last of the food chain that I like to eat…Fruit, LOVE IT…BREAD, LOVE IT…MEAT, LOVE IT…VEGGIES…I prefer them raw and they are cooked and BRIGHT YELLOW here!! O’ yes…we HAVE to eat pretty much EVERYTHING with our RIGHT hand ONLY…and because of that our fingernail beds are died yellow.

5. We were given a little tour by one of our faculty yesterday of Jaipur….Lets just say the city has TONS of history. EVERY mountain pretty much has a fort built on top of it from who knows when…We drove up a windy hill to the top of one of them yesterday…and it had a GREAT view!

6. I have THREE fresh bug bites!!!...LARGE ONES…Tracy Le, you know what I am talking about. And I wake up with more EVERY morning.

7. Beds here in India are SOO small!...Dad would NOT fit, MY toes fall of the edge, Marisa and Lindsay T. would LOVE IT…haha.

8. I exploded the surge protector that I brought today…YES, there was FIRE!!...but don’t worry Molly and I are ok. Now I think that I am going to get electrified EVERY time I plug something in.

9. I find myself laughing to myself, SO much here…when our host mom is talking to us about her cooking and her spices I get the urge to just break out in laughter because Molly and I are nodding our heads even though we have NO idea what she is saying, or when the Hindi instructor expects to write ONE letter in their dialect, or when we are driving in our host’s family car that is about to break down and we continually jerk forward, or when we are in the cell phone with our dad and Molly is trying to get a cell phone, or when I just think of the fact that I am in India, trying to make it my home for 4 ½ months.

There are so many random things here that make me think of you guys back home and I wish that I could remember them, but I cannot right now. I hope that all of you are enjoying your BURGERS and RED MEAT and CHEESE and AVOCADOES and JAMBA JUICE and PEANUT BUTTER M&Ms. Thanks for reading…or as they say it Hanks for reading! J

God is good.

-Renee

Arrival!!!

OKKK...so I am Here!!!...I made it!!! It was a long journey...my flight to Chicago was a measly 4 hours while my flight to New Delhi was around 15 and then once we parked the plane the gate could not line up so we sat in the plane for an extra 30 minutes...but whats 30 minutes when you have been on a plane for 15 hours...ya know? Anyhow we then went to a hostel for the night, traveled 6 hours to Jaipur in the morning , had a quick orientation and then met our family, moved into our room, ate dinner (not my favorite-est of meals) and talked to our VERY talkative mom...all while we were half awake and struggling to keep our eyes open. Our room is VERY nice and the program is very personal and relational which I love! We have yet to do much exploring because we have been trying to catch up with the time change. But anyhow we here safe and sound and trying to get used to the Indian way of life. I am sorry, but I do not have much time so I cant write anymore but hopefully in the future I will be able to tell you more. Please continue praying for safety and health. I love you all and I think about you often!! :)

Departure....

Alright, sooo I leave tomorrow morning...and I can't believe that the day has come. Although, I am ready to go...if you would have asked me that three weeks ago, I would not have been mentally ready, but I am now. I have been able to say my good-byes, see you soons...to ALMOST everyone. If I did not say good-bye to you, thennnnn GOOD-BYE!!!! I am going to miss sooo many people...well, ALL of you! I love seeing all of your sunshine-ing faces. I should be in India Sunday morning around nine..BAAAAAAAHHH, so crazy. SO think of me then, and pray for me ALWAYS!!! I am comforted to know and say that I am in God's hands and He will protect me and guide me while I am there. HE IS GREAT!...and then next time that I update this I will be in INDIAAAAAAA!

Sidenote: I am sorry ahead of time for not writing with the correct grammar...I just prefer to write as though I am talking to you...so hopefully you will be able to hear my voice in my little posts! Enjoy!:)