Gasp!

I only have nine days left in India? Inconceivable! No really, I am having serious trouble comprehending the fact that I'm leaving here and going back home in less than two weeks. I will never forget the first day I spent here, and my family will probably never forget the first time I called home and couldn't stop crying long enough to form coherent sentence. For those first couple of days it felt like four months was forever, but then somehow I got caught up and lost in all of my work and in the joy of the people I was meeting and interacting with and the beauty that wasn't hard to find once I stopped crying long enough for my tears to dry. I never would have thought that living in a country on the other side of the world could teach me so much about myself. I knew that I would have the opportunity to learn many things about India's history and culture, as well as learning more about the rest of the world of which I now feel I belong. As my dad keeps telling me, now that I've made through this I know that can make it through anything! Not that its all been fun trips to the beach and sari shopping . . .

Things I Will Not Miss

• Squatter toilets
• Over-sized crows
• Squeaky Chipmunk/Squirrel things
• Boiled ochre twice a day
• Open sewage systems

Things I Will Definitely Miss

• All of my new Indian friends
• Streets lined with bushes that blossom every day
• Spending nights under the stars on the rooftop
• Swimming in the Indian Ocean
• Play cards on the second floor balcony and enjoying the night breezes

So a few weeks ago my camera battery died, and then my camera charger disappeared, and then my camera was either lost or stolen. So I went a bought a replacement and got a little picture happy and took tons of photos, some of which I'll post here. Some of my favorites are pictures of all of the cool houses in between the house where I sleep and the Program House, were I have Telugu class and where the cooks live and prepare and serve all of our meals.

Field Work

So here are some pictures from my most recent group meeting. My translator and I went and met with the women right outside their homes, so I got to meet and play with all of the children while the women were filling out the surveys. It was the Indian version of a cul-de-sac, with two and three story buildings on three sides, making a U-shaped area facing onto the street. All of the children and the women and the old people and the animals all sit outside in the little common area in between the houses, and there was really a great community, neighborhood feel to the whole place. Anyways, nearly all of them begged to have their pictures taken, and I was more than happy to oblige. Also included is a picture of all of the women in the group whose meeting I observed.

Another Adventure

Well it seems a little silly, but on Saturday we finally went to the beach! We had stopped and wandered on the sand a little before, but never gone and spent a whole day there. We drove FOREVER so that we could get far enough outside the city to find cleaner water and beaches, and fewer people to stare at us. It was so exciting to run into the water and not have it be bone-numbing cold! I had a blast with my friends, wading out further than I've ever been, and actually going underwater and swimming around a little. We had fun bobbing in and diving under the waves, and I even accidentally did a little body-surfing at one point, although that didn't end too well. Turns out once you start riding the wave, its pretty hard to control when or where you stop. It was a beautiful day though, and I ended it by walking up and down the shore with a very sweet little old Indian man who helped me pick out some beautiful seashells. Unfortunately no one really thought to bring a camera, so I've only got one my picture to share from that glorious day. Below that are a few pictures of me and my favorite of our cooks, Durga, with our little Diwali lamps lit us next to us.

The Festival of Lights

Saturday October 17th was India's favorite holiday, Diwali! And just like with every other festival here in India, people started celebrating it about a week before it actually began, and have yet to stop. To celebrate, we were all invited to the community center of a group of Muslim people that one of our students (John) has been working with and befriended in the course of his research. At the start of the evening all of us girls were cajoled into playing some 'throw-ball' with all of the women and the older girls. Its really as simple as it sounds; you have a team on either side of a volley-ball net, and you just toss the ball over and they catch it then throw it back. You score points and rotate just like volleyball, except you serve by throwing the ball over the net instead of hitting it. It sounds like a pretty mellow game, but boy were we wrong! All of the women started changing into their tennis shoes, and showing how to tie our scarves across our front like a sash so that it doesn't fall off while we play. These women were so intense! And they made it look so easy to throw the ball from the far end of the court to other, but the first time I tried it my ball didn't even make over our side of the net! It turns out there is a definite technique to throwing correctly in throw ball. After I figured out the game though I did pretty well, and they seemed pretty surprised that a little weakling American could keep up with them at their own game. I definitely earned some respect for my throw-ball skills!

After we finished the match- my team won 2 games to 1 :) -the men took over the court and played real volleyball, except with a soccer ball! Ouch! While they played, the women sat around and talked about life and gossiped with each other. It was fun getting to know them and they were eager to include us in their group and help us feel at ease. So many of the women there had advanced degrees, children, and a professional life. It is also amazing to me how many languages people here now. Many of them speak English, Hindi, Telugu, Arabic, Urdu, and other languages as well. It makes my little 2 and 1/2 seem pathetic. Anyways . . . Once the men finished their game we all sat down to dinner, where I was excited to see some chicken! Our cooks are all Hindu and vegetarian so they only cook meat once in a while. The fact that the chicken was so spicy that my lips went kind of numb and tingly didn't detract from the excitement.

Once dinner was finished and cleared away, we got to the real celebration of Diwali; fireworks! Here they call them all firecrackers, but Indian firecrackers should really not be confused with our measly little USA fireworks. They only things they passed out to us Americans were little sparklers -People are always worried that we're too delicate and can't handle the same things they can- but even their sparklers were bigger and more powerful and had further flying sparks. Here in India all types of fireworks are legal everywhere, including the big mortar ones that we normally only see in professional shows. And the people here seem to love this one kind of cracker, not sure what the name is, that does nothing but make a huge booming noise. Its probably the same kind of flash bomb the CIA uses to disperse protesters, thats how loud it is. The scariest part of the whole thing is how young the kids are that they let light off the fireworks! Some of them could not possibly have been older than 5 or 6. Kids that I wouldn't even let play with a sparkler on their own are given free reign with a lighter stick and whatever kind of firework they can get their little hands on.

Regardless of the danger, it was definitely a very very fun night! Their little community center was such a peaceful little retreat, with lush trees and flowers everywhere, and their beautiful mosque. Its in the middle of the city, but its surrounded by a wall thats at least 12 feet tall so you would never know it. Its just a beautiful little oasis in the middle of a rather hectic, loud, raccous city and I really enjoyed our evening there.

The next night, one of our sweet cooks Durga shyly asked me if I would help her get the Diwali lamps ready. I was so excited that she wanted me to help her! She had pot thirty or forty shallow little clay dishes/pots, which we filled with sunflower oil. We then twisted strands of cotton into wicks and placed on in each little dish. We then placed the lamps all along the half-wall that closes in the porch/balcony which runs all across the front of the second-floor program house. She found a wax candle for me, and then let me light all of our little lamps. It was such a beautiful sight! All of the little lights flickering in the dark, it was a very fun project and a very happy night. Durga and I were very proud of our work, and called everyone out to see it. One of the students, my friend Dan, took some pictures of the lamps and of Durga and I, which I will post soon.

I'm keeping busy with my research, and I absolutely cannot believe how quickly my time here has gone by! I am definitely excited to come back home and see my family and take a real shower, but I will be very sad to leave here. I certainly hope this is not the last time I will get to be in India, I have a feeling it will pull me back again eventually.

Pictures to follow shortly!

Pictures from Hyderabad

Eating a fresh pomegranate in front of Charminar. That was a happy day!

The main mosque near Charminar, named Makkah Masjic, and me! See, I was really there!

I really like this picture, with the arches all lined up. It was definitely worth jumping into the middle of the street for.




The Best Western Hotel, that's actually a super awesome castle! You can't even see all of the towers and turrets and what not. Very nifty.

Hyderabad

Sorry for the lengthy gap in posts, I've been keeping pretty busy out here in India! I've been back from Hyderabad for

about a week, and its been a super busy week! But here's the story!

We took a 'sleeper train' there on Sunday night, and not gonna lie it was pretty nifty. It was air conditioned which was glorious, and we each had our own little bunk against the wall. It was so much fun!!! It was like the knight bus combined with the hogwarts express, and on the way there I was so excited about the train that I took forever to fall asleep. Our hotel was good; very clean, air conditioned, not a whole lot of decorations or foofiness, but definitely clean and safe. We spent our days going around the city, led by one of our group's two boys (John). He actually spent six months of his mission in Hyderabad, so he knew the city really well and knew a lot of people living there. The whole city is built around this man-made lake that was created in the 1700 hundreds, and in the middle of the lake is a giant rock with a giant statue of . . . you guessed it, Buddha! We went to a park right at the edge of the lake and part of our group went out on boats and got to get off at the rock the statue is on and walk around for a while, but my stomache was feeling a little unsettled and I didn't think a boat ride would help much. Later that day we went to another Hindu temple, but this one was way cooler than any of the other ones we've been to. It was a really big temple with lots of different levels and stair cases, and when you went ot the very top you could see the whole city spread out around you as far as the eye could see. I was really upset that we weren't allowed to bring cameras into the complex, but when the temple guards carry ak-47s you tend to do what they tell you to do. The whole temple complex was built of pure white marble, and it was amazingly clean! Usually the temples are just as dirty as the rest of the town, but this place was sparkling clean. Granted, we did have to take our shoes off before we could go inside. And on our way from the park to the temple we walked past this huge castle and it turned out to be a Best Western Hotel! On the other days we did a whole lot of shopping and eating (the food there was SO GOOD!!!), and went to a few museums. But the coolest thing we did was to go to the Old City District, to visit Charminar (look it up on wikipedia, its pretty cool). It was really cool because we got to go there on the last day of Ramadan, when all of the Muslim people were celebrating and gathering with their friends and family to celebrate. We went back again a few days later. The streets were packed with Muslim men, and most of the women were dressed in head to toe black burkas. Some of them even had black veils on so you couldn't even see their eyes like you normally can. The city was built centuries ago by Muslims who had conquered the Hindu Indians at that time, and it is considered the Islamic center of India.

Anyways! I bought four fabulous pairs of shoes, so I'm fantastically happy! I also bought a whole bunch of perfume, becasue in Hyderabad they make it in a special way so its unique throughout the world. Because Muslims aren't allowed to drink alcohol, some of them take it further and say that no alcohol should even touch their bodies, so some Muslim men started making oil-based perfume instead of alcohol-based perfume, and he set up shop in Hyderabad and people there have been copying him ever since! The don't really sell perfume the way we think of it either. They sell individual scents, like I bought Jasmine, Sandalwood, Amber, and this wildflower stuff, but they are all in their individual bottle. I got a couple others but I can't remember what their English names are. I just liked the way they smelled! ALSO! I bought a pearl necklace. Like a real string of pearls that came with a certificate of authenticity, ivory/cream colored, round pearls. Its just a single strand, very simple, very elegant and classy, they're not too big and they're not colored funny and they're glorious!! I feel like a grown-up lady now, and it makes me very happy. Thats the update for now! I'll post pictures next time, probably later today.

More Pictures

I saw this sign at a local academy for girls/women that we visited, and thought it was fun how it sounds like the first part of BYU's motto; enter to learn, go forth to serve

And then when we came back down the staircase and I saw THIS sign, I started wondering what kind of copywright laws India has . . .

Ok so this is fairly random but its very pretty. It was just near one of the places we were visitng, and I liked it. I actually think my friend John took this picture.
We visited a nearby village that has a weaving co-op set up, and we got to see them card, spin, dye, and weave the cotton and other fabrics. Pretty nifty!
This is the lovely Lova in yellow, and her beautiful older sister Durga behind her.

The Apple Pie that Wasn't Quite Right

Our beloved cooks overwhelmed us with a gesture of their love the other night, and attempted to make an apple pie in a toaster oven. It was definitely not apple pie as I have ever seen or tasted it before, but it was so sweet of those girls to do that for us! I really love them, and sometimes it’s very hard for me to interact with them the way I’m expected to. Our program directors, both Professor Nuckolls from the US and Professor Krishnaya from India, want to us interact with the girls the way they both do. They treat them well and they respect them, but they treat them as servants. Not as employees or subordinates, just as servants. They don’t approve of how all of us students are becoming friends with them and how we like to help the girls with their work when we have nothing else to do. I know it’s the way things have been done for centuries and I’m not mad at our professors for the way they treat the girls, it just makes me sad.

What does NOT make me sad is how adorable and funny and sweet the girls are! There’s Lova, Durga, Jaya, and Donna Lakshmi. Lova is the youngest at 15, and is sisters with Durga who is around 20. Jaya and Donna Lakshmi are both a little older than us and more reserved, but Durga and Lova are so much fun! They tease us and play with us and guilt us into eating as much food as is humanly possible, and are the sweetest girls I have ever met! I will try and find some pictures to post soon. The four of them cook all of our meals and do our dishes, and keep the houses in order. I would say they clean them, but the Indian idea of cleaning anything is just tossing some water on it. They work very hard and take their job seriously, and more than anything I want to think of things I can do for them or give them that might make their lives a little easier. They always have all day Sunday off, so they like to go visit family or go to the beach, and we are always invited to the beach with them!

And speaking of Sundays . . . because the girls have Sundays off we are left to fend for ourselves. We usually just have fruit, and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, and whatever leftovers are in the fridge for breakfast and lunch. For dinner, we either go to a hotel/restaurant or sometimes students volunteer to cook for everyone. This week, my roomy Tiffany and I went down to the Pizza Hut that we had accidently discovered a few days before and we picked up pizzas for the group! I was a little nervous to be ordering pizza in India, but as soon as we walked in and I started smelling the cooking pizzas I knew it would end well. The pizzas were delicious, and made me feel just a little bit more American. Some days here I just start losing a little bit of my identity, like when I go somewhere with one of our translators and I’m the only white person as far as the eye can see. Or when I go into my bathroom and I don’t even bother to shriek or throw heavy objects at the latest spider to take up residence in the corner. But having cheese pizza and cold soda tonight definitely helped remind me of what I like!

Before I end I’d just like to say thank you once again to everyone who is so good about keeping me in their prayers and in their correspondence. It really makes it much easier to not be homesick when I think about how easy it really is to stay in touch with everyone I love!

Random but cool pictures

First of all, I now know my address so anyone who wants it just shoot me an email or leave a comment and I'll get it to you. I thought it inadvisable to just post here for the whole world to see! These picture were taken at different places through-out our city. We took a little trip to see the fishing harbor so I snapped a few shots of the boats, but I really did not enjoy that particular excursion. I just really don't like fish, dead or alive. I like eating it, but not seeing it until its been cleaned and cooked. And there were dead fish and mostly dead fish EVERYWHERE, and people waving their dead fish in my face thinking that this would influence me to buy it when it actually was influencing me to lose consciousness to avoid the sights and smells. The giant gorilla statue is one of several random over-sized statues that sits along the main road that goes past the beach front area of the city. Next time I will post a picture of the giant baby that's only a little ways down the road! The flowers are just some that I saw while walking from my house to one of our other program houses. I thought they were interesting because they were tiny, but so detailed!

No way has it almost been a whole month!

I honestly can't believe that on Saturday I will have been here for four whole weeks! Its almost impossible for me to comprehend that my trip could be almost a quarter of the way over. I've certainly learned a lot about myself so far, and I'm definitely tougher than I thought I was! Now I know that I can handle using something that I would never call a toilet but people here seem to believe is one, I can survive and even enjoy showering without hot water-or a shower head for that matter. I can now navigate my neighborhood and get pretty much anywhere in the city I want to go, and I can almost always tell when the auto-rickshaw drivers are trying to charge me way too much. Oh and lets not forget, I can successfully clear my plate three meals a day even though I have no idea what I'm eating!

No major events happened this past week, although life here in India is never what one would call dull. On the 21st I and a few of my friends here in the program began celebrating Ramadan, the Muslim holiday during which one abstains from eating and drinking, as well as immoral or impure thoughts and actions from sun-up to sun-down. It is seen as a time to focus on building one's relationship with Allah or God, and to learn restraint and discipline. I have wanted to try and participate in Ramadan since I first read a book about the story of Shah Jahan, the Mughal Muslim emperor of India, and his family and I am excited to be participating in something that is so important and special to millions and millions of people around the world. The three of us who are doing it are fasting from all food and drink except water during the day, since we're still not used to the heat here and we sweat ALL THE TIME it seemed a prudent idea.

Also exciting, but far less significant, my friend Tiffany and I finally took our sari material to the tailor and they will be ready by Thursday night! I'm really way too excited to wear them, I got one fancy one with gold embroidered flowers on top of a deep maroon color, and one less fancy but more comfortable one thats a black and white pattern with a brown and black border. I'll post some pictures as soon as I get them back, and figure out how to put them on! We had to have them done by Thursday night, because Friday morning we're leaving for another little excursion, this time to visit some Maharajahs who have invited us to their palaces. It sounds cooler than it is, since these kings aren't actual rulers but just descendants of people who used to be rulers. I'm sure it will be an interesting two days, and it will be fun to stay in a hotel and dress up in our saris! As soon as we get back I'll be sure to post again and tell all the new stories and adventures we'll have along the way!

Kakinada

What an adventure I’ve had these past couple of days! I still can’t believe everything actually happened. Our main program director, Professor Charles Nuckolls, was invited to speak at Jawaharlal Nehru Technical University as a part of their annual Internationalization Day and when they learned that we were all here the university’s Vice Chancellor invited all of us as his special guests as well. The adventure started when the university sent two nice, air conditioned vans to pick us up and drive us down to Kakinada, a town about three hours south of our town Visakhapatnam. We had been told to bring our nicest clothes because we were special guests, but also told to bring sheets and towels because we may be staying in a youth hostel. To my sheer joy, when we arrived at the university we were ushered into the official guest house and shown to our air conditioned rooms! Including en suite bathrooms with western toilets and working shower heads and semi-hot water. JOY!! For every meal we were taken to the finest restaurants in town, which were surprisingly nice and always air conditioned with cold, bottled water available. After we rested for a few hours, we were taken to a near-by village that used to be a French colony, and taken out on the river (not too sure which one ) in a boat of questionable seaworthiness. We were also shown a lovely fountain of two huge elephants and a Shiva lingam, which was over-sized and super cool. The way the water came out of the fountain, it splashed over the sides and on to the ground, kind of like an umbrella. And it was built in such a way that there is a dry spot where you can get underneath, and then walk around the circumference of the fountain, which we all did. And apparently that means we will be blessed with many children. Thank goodness I only went around it once, I think 40 children might be a bit much for me. After enjoying a LOVELY night’s rest in the air conditioned room on the fabulously comfortable mattress, we were awoken at the luxuriously late hour of 9:00 am to a knock on our door from an attendant with tea cups containing their delicious equivalent to hot chocolate. After we returned from the restaurant where we were fed some kind of breakfast that I didn’t relish but by no means hated, we met with the Vice Chancellor and all of the heads of department. We were then carted around to lecture halls all over campus where we were introduced to and interacted with students from the different colleges (Electrical, Mechanical, etc.). Later that afternoon we were informed that each of us would now be asked to speak for about a minute about internationalization, and our experience at the university. At the big event that evening, we were all introduced by name and subject of study and called up one by one to receive bouquets of roses. This was made all the more exciting by the fact that we received the same treatment as our professor, as well as two other professors from MIT and Texas A&M. Unfortunately we have some born entertainers in our group who, after the speeches were over, volunteered our group to perform something as part of the cultural performances that followed. Students from the university were singing, performing dances and skits, and somehow we got talked into going up on the stage and doing some ridiculous line dance that seriously hurt my dignity, but I survived. When we tried to leave the program at 10:00 to go and get dinner, we were basically mobbed by students wanted to take our picture or take pictures with us. After we escaped and had eaten our dinner, I was more than ready to enjoy a nice warm shower and then go to bed. Unfortunately, as I was drying off from my shower, a cockroach of truly epic propotions skittered across the bathroom floor right in front of me and wedged itself in the space between the bottom of the door and the floor. After screaming my head off, I finally calmed down enough to tell the girls in our room what was going on. I’ve been in pickles before, but never like this. There I was, stuck in the bathroom with a cockroach longer than my index finger. If I opened the door, he would get into the other room and might skitter away somewhere that we couldn’t cath him. But if I didn’t open the door soon, he might turn around and skitter back at me! I wanted to vomit and cry at the same time. Eventually, we all calmed down enough to decide that the girls on the other side of the door would get a bucket and try and drop it over the cockroach as soon as I opened the door. After mustering every ounce of courage I possessed, I took a deep breath and opened the door. The cockroach didn’t move!! He just sat there, twitching his disgusting little antenna at us. After some serious coaxing on the part of my roommates, I slowly inched passed the creature and made it over the threshold, at which point I ran across the room and jumped on to the bed and curled up in a ball. After some creative thinking and serious heroics on the part of my new hero Megan, the cockroach was evicted from the room. Later that night, we discovered a frog and a baby cockroach in the bathroom, but were too tired and allowed them to live. The next morning the Vice Chancellor and several of the heads of department came with us to breakfast, and then we all said goodbye at the restaurant. We then headed back to VIzag in our air conditioned vans, although some of the girls were feeling a little worse for the wear. It had been a long couple of days and we were all pretty exhausted still, so we were a little less than thrilled when we stopped every half hour or so to be shown random things on the way home. It wouldn’t have been bad at all, except the university had sent along a newspaper photographer with us to take pictures of us seeing all the sights. It’s bad enough that people here stare at us and take picture of us on their cell phones where ever we go, but to have an annoying little man with a big camera following you around and telling you to move over there or over here so he can get a better candid shot was more than I could handle. I think I now have a better understanding of why famous people punch paparazzi and smash their cameras. By the end of the trip I was pretty surly looking in most of the group pictures, and when I saw him aim his camera at me I would turn around or hide behind someone taller. The beachside mini-temple and the hilltop temple were both beautiful and interesting, by all means, but we were more than ready to get safely back to our city.

Kakinada

What an adventure I’ve had these past couple of days! I still can’t believe everything actually happened. Our main program director, Professor Charles Nuckolls, was invited to speak at Jawaharlal Nehru Technical University as a part of their annual Internationalization Day and when they learned that we were all here the university’s Vice Chancellor invited all of us as his special guests as well. The adventure started when the university sent two nice, air conditioned vans to pick us up and drive us down to Kakinada, a town about three hours south of our town Visakhapatnam. We had been told to bring our nicest clothes because we were special guests, but also told to bring sheets and towels because we may be staying in a youth hostel. To my sheer joy, when we arrived at the university we were ushered into the official guest house and shown to our air conditioned rooms! Including en suite bathrooms with western toilets and working shower heads and semi-hot water. JOY!! For every meal we were taken to the finest restaurants in town, which were surprisingly nice and always air conditioned with cold, bottled water available. After we rested for a few hours, we were taken to a near-by village that used to be a French colony, and taken out on the river (not too sure which one ) in a boat of questionable seaworthiness. We were also shown a lovely fountain of two huge elephants and a Shiva lingam, which was over-sized and super cool. The way the water came out of the fountain, it splashed over the sides and on to the ground, kind of like an umbrella. And it was built in such a way that there is a dry spot where you can get underneath, and then walk around the circumference of the fountain, which we all did. And apparently that means we will be blessed with many children. Thank goodness I only went around it once, I think 40 children might be a bit much for me. After enjoying a LOVELY night’s rest in the air conditioned room on the fabulously comfortable mattress, we were awoken at the luxuriously late hour of 9:00 am to a knock on our door from an attendant with tea cups containing their delicious equivalent to hot chocolate. After we returned from the restaurant where we were fed some kind of breakfast that I didn’t relish but by no means hated, we met with the Vice Chancellor and all of the heads of department. We were then carted around to lecture halls all over campus where we were introduced to and interacted with students from the different colleges (Electrical, Mechanical, etc.). Later that afternoon we were informed that each of us would now be asked to speak for about a minute about internationalization, and our experience at the university. At the big event that evening, we were all introduced by name and subject of study and called up one by one to receive bouquets of roses. This was made all the more exciting by the fact that we received the same treatment as our professor, as well as two other professors from MIT and Texas A&M. Unfortunately we have some born entertainers in our group who, after the speeches were over, volunteered our group to perform something as part of the cultural performances that followed. Students from the university were singing, performing dances and skits, and somehow we got talked into going up on the stage and doing some ridiculous line dance that seriously hurt my dignity, but I survived. When we tried to leave the program at 10:00 to go and get dinner, we were basically mobbed by students wanted to take our picture or take pictures with us. After we escaped and had eaten our dinner, I was more than ready to enjoy a nice warm shower and then go to bed. Unfortunately, as I was drying off from my shower, a cockroach of truly epic propotions skittered across the bathroom floor right in front of me and wedged itself in the space between the bottom of the door and the floor. After screaming my head off, I finally calmed down enough to tell the girls in our room what was going on. I’ve been in pickles before, but never like this. There I was, stuck in the bathroom with a cockroach longer than my index finger. If I opened the door, he would get into the other room and might skitter away somewhere that we couldn’t cath him. But if I didn’t open the door soon, he might turn around and skitter back at me! I wanted to vomit and cry at the same time. Eventually, we all calmed down enough to decide that the girls on the other side of the door would get a bucket and try and drop it over the cockroach as soon as I opened the door. After mustering every ounce of courage I possessed, I took a deep breath and opened the door. The cockroach didn’t move!! He just sat there, twitching his disgusting little antenna at us. After some serious coaxing on the part of my roommates, I slowly inched passed the creature and made it over the threshold, at which point I ran across the room and jumped on to the bed and curled up in a ball. After some creative thinking and serious heroics on the part of my new hero Megan, the cockroach was evicted from the room. Later that night, we discovered a frog and a baby cockroach in the bathroom, but were too tired and allowed them to live. The next morning the Vice Chancellor and several of the heads of department came with us to breakfast, and then we all said goodbye at the restaurant. We then headed back to VIzag in our air conditioned vans, although some of the girls were feeling a little worse for the wear. It had been a long couple of days and we were all pretty exhausted still, so we were a little less than thrilled when we stopped every half hour or so to be shown random things on the way home. It wouldn’t have been bad at all, except the university had sent along a newspaper photographer with us to take pictures of us seeing all the sights. It’s bad enough that people here stare at us and take picture of us on their cell phones where ever we go, but to have an annoying little man with a big camera following you around and telling you to move over there or over here so he can get a better candid shot was more than I could handle. I think I now have a better understanding of why famous people punch paparazzi and smash their cameras. By the end of the trip I was pretty surly looking in most of the group pictures, and when I saw him aim his camera at me I would turn around or hide behind someone taller. The beachside mini-temple and the hilltop temple were both beautiful and interesting, by all means, but we were more than ready to get safely back to our city.

Week Two

Well this week was quite an adventure. Telugu is coming along, although I really feel like I'm just fighting to keep my head above water when it comes to understanding my teacher when she speaks it. I'm learning tons of new words and doing my best to write the alphabet. Also this week I started making a little bit of progress on my research project! I met with some great, helpful people and went to some actual micro-finance meetings and met some of the women who have participated in the program. Also, I got some of my new Indian clothes made! My laptop's battery is about to die so I will have to post pictures next time, but for anyone reading this I'm alive and well!

Week One!

Its turning into quite an adventure out here! The other night there was a full moon, and our telugu teacher told us that we all had to go to the beach and see how beautiful it was with the moonlight on the water and the especially strong waves. Naturally, we all trooped down to the beach, which apparently is frequently used as a trash can and occasionally as a toilet. We were able to find a nice stretch of clean beach eventually though, and most of us went at least part-way in. I only went in up to my knees, but got splashed up above my waist! I still can't believe how warm the water is, or how strong the current is. Classes and research work have been keeping me pretty busy, no doubt about it. But I love the people, they are all SUPER friendly and happy, and want to give you things and help you with anything at all. I was at the church building the other night, thats where we hang out whenever possible because its air conditioned and has super powerful western toilets, and I beat a couple of the members at ping pong! It was really fun, and now I feel more of a connection to them. The men seem a little less intimidating after playing ping-pong and seeing them get happy and sad over a game just like I do, and the women were just excited to meet another girl who likes to play ping pong! I saw a monkey the other day just wandering around on the rooftops of the main street, that was pretty crazy. At the moment I am waiting for the tailor to bring me finished outfits, made from the fabric I went and bought on Monday. It rained for a tiny bit today, maybe 5 minutes tops. But what rain! It sounded like somebody was dumping a barrel over the side of a building it was coming down so hard and fast! And right afterwords it felt gloriously cool, a fabulous relief from the constant heat and humidity. Thats all for now!

Well here are some pictures of our apartment/house place. We have no kitchen, just two bedrooms, a living room, an entry foyer thing, and two bathrooms, in the loosest sense of the word. There are also pictures of my bed and the view from the window right next to it. The first picture is a close-up of that view, so you can see the bananas growing right outside my window! The second one is a picture of the view from right outside my front door, and the building going up right there. On the first afternoon that we were here two of the girls and I went up on our roof so as to best enjoy the sudden downpour, which is super cute and cool with benches and trees growing right over it, and the construction workers on the building were staring at us like we were crazy. Hope you all enjoy the pictures, I'll post more as soon as I can!