Sit beside a mountain stream--see her waters rise Listen to the pretty sound of music as she flies.

Phil here with an editorial note: the lyrics above are from the Beatles' Mother Nature's Son. This song was written while the Beatles were in India and were inspired by a lecture given by the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. Since, as you will see, this blog entry is kinda of a potpourri of things Indian, it seemed like a fitting title. Sort of. Anyway, here's Rae.

My part of this week’s blog will be a bit rambling, but I have some random pictures that I want to share and I think they might help to paint a picture of some of the different sites and things I’ve experienced.  These pictures make up part of what I feel is interesting, amazing and sometimes strange.  A lot of what I see as we drive around is hard to capture from a moving car, but I will try to explain some of what I’m not able to get pictures of.

  

These are some pictures that we took while out at the resort we went to for girls’ camp.  The first picture is of some of the places some of the workers and their families live.  I always feel a bit strange taking a picture of people’s homes if they are by them so this particular one was just one type of houses.  This one as you can see is mostly made up of tarp type roofs and walls.  I tried to get a picture of some that seemed to be patched together with pieces of tin, wood and a bit of whatever, but it didn't turn out.  The next two are of some of the women who were working there on the grounds. I find it fascinating that these women work in saris.  They do all kinds of manual labor in these lovely colored saris and they never seem to look dirty or disheveled.  One picture is of them removing grass and weeds along a path.  The other is of them collecting and bundling the grass after it’s been mowed.  I have also seen women working along the road as walls are being built and they are carrying pallets of mortar or mixing mortar.  They always look so colorful.  Being a person with crumby knees, I’m also amazed at the way they can crouch down and just sit like that for so long.  I wouldn't be able to walk if I had to sit like that.

I think we mentioned that there was a Hindu holiday last week.  I had our driver pick me up and take me to have lunch with Phil.  The traffic was considerably more congested that usual.  I took a few pictures along the way.  These two are of a cute little family who were willing to let me take their picture.  I thought her sari was so pretty.

I’m always captivated by the women dressed in the beautiful saris, riding side saddle and holding a child or two.  In this picture you will see that there are 4 riding on the motorcycle.  Also, you’ll notice that this women has her entire head veiled. I think this is a Hindu practice that is practiced in western India and this type of veil is called a Ghoonghat or a Laaj.  Right after I got this picture a family of five passed by on their motorcycle.  There were 2 children in front of the father and one between the father and mother. 

I’m always amazed at how many people you can cram into a car or truck or bus.  I know this picture doesn’t show clearly how many people are in this small white car just beyond the motorcycle, so, you’ll have to trust me when I tell you there were 8 people inside.  The driver is on the right, with a passenger on the left and a teen age girl on her lap.  The back seat had three people sitting and two on their laps.

It isn’t common to see children in car seats or people wearing seat belts, so, I took this picture because this baby was just standing on its mom’s lap, looking out the window at the sights.

This black car I took to help illustrate how close we are sometimes.  I know I've mentioned that more than once in the past.  It was taken from my car window.

This random picture is of an Indian broom.  This is actually our broom, and the one that is used to sweep our floors.  It measures about 36 inches.

This is a picture of our washing machine that is located just outside of our kitchen door.  The other picture is of it with its cover.  We have to keep it covered or it would soon be covered with the black soot that covers most anything that is left out.  The cover has a zipper around the top that we just unzip to access the washer.  Notice the switches on the wall behind it.  We have to flip the switch to turn on the electricity to the machine.

Well, there are a few other things that I could share, but I think I’ll add more at a later time, and give Phil his turn.

Ahoy, hoy! Isa Phil hai (this is Phil). It is interesting that Rae chose to talk this week about a holiday and clothing (among other things). We usually don’t coordinate our topics, it’s more a matter of what has smacked us upside the head that week. Likewise this week we haven’t discussed what’s on our minds but those two topics are front and center for me too. In the past two weeks I have posted about Eid and Independence Day. Well, August is the month of holidays here in India. Some are national/political such as Independence Day. Some are Muslim such as Eid. Some are Hindi such as Janmashtami (coming up next week). Some started out as a religious holiday and have morphed into broader cultural holidays observed by everyone.

Last week’s holiday that Rae mentioned was one of those: Raksha Bandhan. As near as I can figure out, Raksha Bandhan started out as a Hindu holiday in which brothers publically covenanted to support and protect their sisters. This has now been both somewhat trivialized (at least for some) and broadened. Trivialized because now the deeper meaning of the covenant are gone. Now girls tie threaded bracelets (rakshi – sacred threads) such as the one shown below on the wrists of their brothers and are given money, saris, or other gifts in return. Broadened because “brother” has now morphed to include all males. So, girls run around tying tread bracelets on boys and getting cash or other gifts from them.

 Picking up the topic of clothing, I want to go back to last week’s Independence Day. As part of the celebration for that day our campus held a contest for who was wearing the best traditional clothing. A word about that. A few women on campus routinely wear traditional clothing; many wear mostly western clothing (no, not boots and cowboy hats); many wear a combination such as kurta tops and jeans or tights. Men almost always wear western clothing. I am not sure why women are more inclined to wear traditional clothing in the workplace than men, but there you go. Anyhoo… as I said we had this contest. Men and women wore traditional outfits. There were some amazing outfits. I have asked our HR head to send me some os the pictures that were taken. I haven't gotten any yet but if I do, I will pass them along.

Everyone seemed a bit disappointed in me that I came to work just wearing a suit. I do intend to buy a traditional outfit (those who have known me since childhood know I love a costume). But that is for another day.

I actually think traditional Indian clothing is beautiful (for women) and handsome (for men). Women’s clothing includes the sari everyone has heard of. What you may not know is every part of India has its own method of wrapping and tying a sari. So that at a glance someone who knows what’s what (not me) can tell where the woman is from. In addition to saris, other traditional clothing for women include ghagra choli (long pleated skirt with a fitted top and usually a scarf), salwar kameez (loose trousers combined with a tunic top; now a days many women wear tighter, western style tights rather than the loose trousers), and churidar kurta (leggings that are loose to the knee and then tight with a tunic that hangs to the knees). Fabrics range from the richest, most luxurious silk to simple cotton. Here are a few pictures:

Traditional clothing for men is most often a masculine version of the churidar kurta, sometimes worn with a sleeveless jacket. For more formal wear, sherwani (long button tunics that hang to mid-calf; usually made with elaborate embroidered cloth and worn with tight fitting pants) are also popular. Anyone who remembers the Beatles’ “Indian period” will recognize the sherwani.

Well, there is also a lungi, which is a simple sheet of cotton or silk wrapped around the waist and worn with a shirt. I am sure very comfortable but not too practical for modern day to day wear. I may be wrong about that. You occasionally see laborers, particularly old men, wearing them while hauling rocks or performing other heavy labor. Pictures of men wearing lungis are below.

Well, I think I am going to put on my lungi and go to bed.

Namaste.

I think I'm going to Kathmandu, That's really, really where I'm going to...

18 Aug 2013

Rae here.  Since I am starting the blog this week, you might think the post title applies to me. No, no, it doesn't. Phil went to Nepal and he will be writing about it later in the blog. I guess I’ll start this week by writing about our first house guests.  Tuesday afternoon we had two young women from New York come to stay with us for a few days.  We did not know them, but were asked by the Pullas, who had been serving as missionaries here for a while, if they could stay with us.  The girls had already been in India for about 6 weeks, and had done some travelling to different areas.  They wanted to come to Delhi an d then also go to see the Taj Mahal.  The Taj (as they call it here) is around 3 hours from here, of course that depends on the ever popular traffic.  They went to the Taj on Wednesday and had invited me to go with them, but I decided to stay home for a couple of reasons and so didn’t go.  When they got back they said it was beautiful but so very hot (one of the reasons I didn’t want to go quite yet). 

As you know, the church makes our world smaller, which is how these girls became acquainted with the Pullas.  The Pullas have a son who is serving a mission in New York and so he’d met Carolyn there at church.  The girls are 22 (Carolyn) and 16 (Isabella).  They  had been staying mostly in an ashram (kind of a religious retreat with hostels) on the outskirts of Bangalore, so they were pretty excited to have a soft bed, a shower (instead of a bucket), ice, constant Internet, television and a few other things they hadn’t had for a while.  I was in awe of them and their courage to come here and travel all around for 7 weeks.  They were having such a good experience and seemed so grateful to have this experience. It was fun having them. Here is a picture of them.

Another reason I didn’t go to the Taj with the girls is because I had girls camp coming up and had some things to get done for that.  It turned out that it was a good thing that I didn’t go because we ended with another issue with water in the basement. I ended up dealing with that a lot of the day.  I know that there was no water in the basement Tuesday night because the girls had gone down there that night.  When I went down Wednesday morning there it was. It is just such a mystery.  The water seems to be clean water and we had had no rain for a few days.  Some men came to investigate, but I don’t think they figured anything out.  Thursday was a holiday (Independence Day) and so they said they would come back on Friday to see if the water level had gone up or down.  I knew there was no way it would go down and even if it went up I didn’t want it setting down there for 2 days, only to add more moisture and probably mold to the already very warm very humid room.  So they had the poor girl from upstairs come down and haul bucket after bucket of water out of there.  I felt bad for her, but didn't want that water just setting there.  I hardly dare say this too loud, but no new water so far.  

Now about girl’s camp. This year we didn't have an overnight, but I think the girls did have a good experience.  Friday afternoon and evening we just met at our church building for some activities.  Camp was supposed to start at 1, but didn't really start until about 3.  We had a lot of girls who couldn't come at the beginning because of school.  We served lunch to those who were there and then dinner at the end. (See some pictures below.) I had to speak to the girls about the yearly theme and the camp theme.  I created a frog (below) and then put it together as I talked to them about our theme: Fully Rely On God. his theme was fun for me because it made me think of my grandkids. I used to tell them Froggy Frog stories that I would make up for them.  I thought they might like to see Nana in her froggy t shirt.

It is a bit crazy because they seem to think that because I am from the US, where the church is stronger, that I should be able to do anything at a moment’s notice.  I haven’t gone to girl’s camp in several years, but they thought I should be able to teach them all the camp songs just off the top of my old rusty head. Somehow I managed to come up with a few things and they seemed happy. We gave them an activity to do where they worked on their values and then later worked on a service project.  We put together some hygiene kits that will be delivered to a girl’s orphanage.  I was so impressed with how hard the girls worked on these projects and happily they did them.  They really are such sweet girls, and I am so impressed with them.  I love them already. Here are two pictures from our Friday activity.

Saturday morning we woke up to heavy rain.  We were to be at the Vasant Vihar building to catch the bus by 7:30 AM.  We were going to a resort about 1 ½ hours away.  After we all got on the bus one of the young women gave a prayer and one of the things she prayed for was that the rain would stop so we could enjoy our camp. I’ll tell you the rest of that story later.  The drive to camp was an interesting experience in so many ways.  I’ll try to describe some of what I saw and felt.  I know I've talked many times about all the traffic and all that comes with that, now put yourself on a big bus and your perspective changes again.  

We travelled SW of Delhi.  After travelling for a while we turned off the main roads and travelled on a very narrow, poorly maintained, water soaked road.  We shared this road with oncoming traffic of all kinds not to mention people on motorcycles, bicycles, on foot and LOTS of cows, a few pigs, donkeys, and don’t forget the dogs.  The cows that we usually see are kind of white, you’ll see a picture of a typical one, but we kept seeing these cows that were not quite black, and their horns were kind of curly.  They seemed to be more prevalent in this area.  I even saw a man giving one on his cows a bath.  The donkeys we saw were very small and I thought they were very cute.  Also along the way we saw all these very small mud huts with thatched roofs.  They were so small I could hardly imagine a person being able to lie down in it and I’m sure that they weren't built for just one person to use.    We kept trying to take a picture of them but none of them turned out, because of the rain on the windows and the moving bus.  The area we were in was clearly agricultural, but then we would come to a small village and then a larger business or factory would appear. Here is a picture of the aforementioned cow,(this one happens to be standing right in front of the gate to the church) and scenery in the area where we were.

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The resort we went to was called Botanix and it was quite a lovely setting.  It was probably not quite like a resort that you might be picturing.  It was a basically a large nursery, working farm, with a few cabanas and meeting rooms.  When we got there we gathered in a large open ramada and had some breakfast, a devotional and then divided into groups for our activities.  One of the pictures you'll see is of a ride on a cart pulled by one of the typical cows we see around.  I was fortunate enough to get to set at the front of the cart, right at the business end of the cow, and got to be flicked with the end of its tail a few times. 

After the cart ride we tried our hand at forming some pottery.  When you see the picture, it is hard to tell, but the man who is working the wheel gets it to turn by twirling it with a big stick, no motor. It would start out very wobbly, but then it would even out.  I really wanted to see what it was mounted on that it could spin long enough to form a small pot before it had to be twirled again.  After pottery we went to visit one of the large green houses, and were shown a few things about plants and planting.  We then went to a large area where there was a rope bridge, a hanging bridge, a climbing web, a tire obstacle and a couple of other things.  While we were doing these activities they brought us some much needed water to drink.  I thought the way the water was packaged was interesting; there is a picture of that too. After these activities we had lunch, and then Phil spoke to the girls about the importance of education. Here are some pictures of our great time.

After Phil spoke, and let me just tell you he did a great job, the girls went swimming.  Swimming is not something that these girls get to do often and it was quite entertaining watching them.  Some of them were trying to swim, some were a bit timid about putting the face under the water, but clearly they were all having a great time and were really enjoying the opportunity to cool off after the very hot, very humid, and rain free day we had thus far had.  After the swim we gathered again for closing.  Pres. and Sister Sackley, the mission president and his wife, spoke to the girls; there was a testimony meeting; we gave awards; had a closing prayer; a snack; and then headed to the bus for our adventurous ride home.  If you remember, I talked about the prayer that was offered before we left, well, it worked.  

Our day was very warm and very humid, I know I already said that but I really want you to know that it was very warm and humid, so much so that those who didn’t swim were soaked too.  Well, just as the closing prayer was being said, it began to POUR rain.  It rained really hard for about 10 minutes and then stopped. It was like the Lord held off the rain until girls’ camp was over. Perfect timing.

I’ll turn it now over to Phil.

Phil here in second seat - it’s nice to be the co-pilot today. I won’t write about much this week but I did want to say a little about Nepal. If we are friends on Facebook, you probably saw that I was in Nepal for two days this week. I was invited to speak at an education fair for students there who were interested in leaving the country for college. Since I represent a US education with a campus in India, they were able to kill two birds with one stone. Nepal in general and Kathmandu is somewhere I have wanted to visit since I was a little boy. I don’t know if it was the Hope and Cosby “On the Road to Kathmandu” (okay, I think that is one of the few places they didn’t go in their movies) or if it was from when I used to spin the globe, dragging my finger until the globe stopped, and then saw where my finger stopped and saw the name. For whatever reason, Kathmandu has always seemed exotic and exciting to me, so I was excited to go there.

Unfortunately, I didn’t have time to do much in Nepal other than work but I have to say I was impressed with what I saw flying in and during my drives around the city. Nepal is cooler than India, at least cooler than Delhi this time of year. It is very green, which I knew, with beautiful mountains, which I also knew. I couldn’t see that much of the mountains since it was cloudy for much of the time I was there, but when the clouds cleared, voila! The thing I didn't know about Nepal was its extensive water resources. When I was flying into the Kathmandu Valley, as we broke through the clouds, I was impressed with the green and by the number of rivers, streams, and canals. There was a web of water systems everywhere. It turns out that Nepal is second only to Brazil in terms of water resources. I guess that makes sense now that I think of it...Snow and covered mountains? Check. Twenty thousand foot drop from the highest point to the lowest? Check. Natural drainage network to the Sea of Bengal? Check. Yup, they would naturally have extensive water resources. I definitely want to go back on holiday and take Rae with me.

Their water resources are extensive but their human resources have been taking a hit for years. Many parents want their children to go the US, UK, India or elsewhere for their college education. It is not that there are not good colleges there, but these parents see a foreign education is the key to economic success for their children. So most of the best and brightest leave for college. Unfortunately, most never come back. The brain drain is over 80%. The vast majority of these students just never make it back for more than a visit.

Rae mentioned above Thursday the 15^th was Indian Independence Day. It was 1947 when India and Pakistan won their independence from the British. There are still some alive who were freedom fighters at the time; there are obviously many who are the children and grand children who made Indian independence possible. I thought about what it would be like to be alive in the US sixty some years after our revolution. It has caused me to reflect on subjects like freedom and democracy. Deep thoughts with Jack Handy.

Well, I think that is it for this week. Tune in next week at this same bat time, same bat station for more adventures of our daring duo.

Namaste

That's the night the lights went out in Georgia (err New Delhi)...

11 Aug 2013

This has been an interesting week. Well, that’s not truly fair; the weeks are almost always interesting. This one was interesting in a couple of unique ways. It’s been an interesting week at work and Friday was Eid, the last day of Ramadan. In addition Rae has a calling (that she knows about and another one in the works) and we are getting settled in at our flat. I’ll talk about the first couple of items and leave the other two and whatever else she wants to talk about to Rae.

First work: there are changes afoot. Sukanta, who has been our COO, was asked to resign but allowed to retire. He has been with MAII for nearly three years and during his time the performance has gotten worse each year. I have known, actually, that this day was coming for some time. It would have happened sooner but our CEO was trying to give me time to get fully settled in and get a better grasp on the unique aspects that come in the Indian context. However, after another quarter of decline she and the board decided that it was time to make the change. He announced his resignation to the management team on Thursday and Charu sent an email to all employees and to key people in Stratford University later that day.

I have some mixed emotions. It has been clear to me for some time that Sukanta, despite his strengths, was not the right person for the job. I feel sorry for him. It is never easy to know you have failed and frankly at his age this is likely his last job. In fact he mentioned he was thinking about relocating to the UK where his son lives, so maybe he actually will retire and not just “retire”. I am not too worried about the reaction of the campus management or staff. I have developed good relationships and having been here for a few months I am a known quantity. It’s not like someone brand new is coming in. The one thing I am worried about is if some will think I orchestrated Sukanta’s ouster, and if they believe that if they would hold that against me. Again, I think I have built a good relationship with everyone and don’t anticipate any problems from the change in role.

In some ways it will now be easier for me to do what I was hired to accomplish. I was hired to come in and make the changes necessary to bring success. With Sukanta in place I sometimes felt like he was a brake on what I needed to do. On more than one occasion he gave directions to managers that countermanded directions I had given. That always caused panic and confusion and I had to settle things back down and re-establish the direction we needed to go.

I wish I could say with Sukanta gone our organisational changes are over but I am sure there will be at least one more round. There are several factors at play. One, we have too many employees for the number of students we have and project through the end of the year. Two, our academic department is terribly unorganized. There are not clear job responsibilities, several people have overlapping duties. I think we are probably overstaffed in some areas and understaffed in others but it is hard to sort it all out. As my father would say, right now it is a mare’s nest. Finally, we still have several people performing at unacceptable levels in admissions. We are working our way through the performance improvement process with several folks, and I am sure there are more changes yet to come. Any one of these changes would not be terribly disruptive in and of themselves but in aggregate it creates a fair amount of organizational stress. At least I am aware of that as an issue and what it takes to help alleviate that stress, starting with open, honest, and reliable communication. That will be novel here. Sukanta has had one employee meeting in three years. People did not know how to react because it was so novel. At some point they may think we have too many employee meetings but they won’t think we are keeping them in the dark.

Shifting to Eid. You probably have heard of Ramadan but you might not be aware of Eid. Ramadan, of course is a month long religious observance during which Muslims fast each day from dawn to sunset. It is to be a time of purification, spiritual growth, and recommitment to the principles of Islam. Eid is the first day of the month after Ramadan and it is a celebration. Family and friends get together for parties, feasts and festivals. There are also special religious observances on Eid: special prayers are offered and charitable contributions are to be made to the poor. As I mentioned, it is a time for gathering with family and friends. Sometimes this entails people returning home from some distance or gathering in a central place. Mehndi, our driver, is Muslim and his extended family have all gathered in Agra, which is the location of the Taj Mahal. He was very excited about getting together with his immediate family, aunts, uncles, and cousins. He has been about as animated this week when he talked about his plans as I have seen him. He left Thursday evening and will be back to Delhi this evening. While he has been gone, we have been getting around by cab. It has worked out okay but our freedom of movement has been somewhat restricted.

Well, I think that’s it for me. Heeerrreee’s Johnny, I mean Rae….

Rae here.

This week has been uneventful as far as water in the basement or anywhere else, but it hasn’t been without some electrical issues.  Besides the usual outages that seem to come with the downpours, we have had a couple of other interesting, and by interesting I mean puzzling, electrical issues.  Last night we had just gotten home and were going to work on getting our computer set up when all our lights went out.  We checked our breaker panel and could get the lights to come on for just a few seconds and then they would go off again.  There were also some outlets that worked and some that didn’t, for instance, my night stand light worked, but Phil’s didn’t.  Our bedroom TV worked, but not our living room. Our AC units were still working, thankfully.  After some tries we were able to communicate with the guard that we had no lights. They took a shot at our panel and eventually an electrician was called.  Turned out it was an exterior fuse in the main electrical panel.

 In various places in the house there are these stabilizer boxes that are mounted on the walls.  Before I got here there had been a problem with the one in our bedroom which meant that the AC units and some outlets in the two bedrooms don’t work.  Well, last night the stabilizer in our bedroom kept making clicking noises and so we had some question about whether it was going out.  That question was answered when we got home late this afternoon from church.  Yes, it was failing and had finally died.  So, right now we have no AC and no outlets in the two bedrooms.  The electrician has just arrived and so we’ll see how this plays out.  Luckily we don’t have to pay for all these weekend electrician visits.  I’m not sure that there are such things as weekend rates, since Saturday and Sunday don’t mean the same to them here. 

Phil mentioned that we have had alternative travel arrangements this weekend, as our driver has been away.  Yesterday we had our driver take us to Select City mall to see if we could get a few of the things we still needed.  This driver was much more patient and much less aggressive than Mehndi. He did however take us to a different part of the mall than Mehndi usually does so I took a couple of pictures of the entrance that I’d not seen before.  This mall area has 2 or 3 different malls kind of all together.  There are a couple of car dealerships inside the mall also. 

In order to enter the mall you must go thru security.  If you are carrying a purse or backpack they go thru a scanner. Sometimes you are ushered into a booth and they “wand” you.  I’ve never been “wanded” before, but yesterday both Phil and I were “wanded” a couple of times as we went from one mall area to another.  We arrived at the mall about 1:00 which is early by Indian standards, so there was no line to go thru security when we entered.  We left the mall around 5 and as we walked out there were just a few light sprinkles, but as we waited for our driver to arrive the sprinkles turn to mild rain then to heavier rain, and then to a real downpour.  It took our driver a bit of time to get us because the traffic into the mall was very heavy and I noticed that the queue into the mall was quite long.  Glad I wasn’t waiting in the queue right then.  The mall is a noisy crowded place, so don’t let the quiet tranquil exterior picture of the mall throw you.  I should have taken some pictures of the queue and the inside.  Maybe I’ll be smarter next time.

Phil mentioned that I have a calling.  I was actually called 2 weeks ago but have yet to be sustained.  In spite of that I have been given some assignments and have needed to move forward even though I’m not official.  My new calling is 1^st counselor in the District YW’s.  The reason they are having me move forward with things is because we are having girls camp next weekend.  Girl’s camp here is quite different from what I’ve ever experienced, so I will have more to tell you about that after next weekend.

Well, that’s a few of this week’s events.  Hope you all are not taking for granted your constant flow of electricity.

      

Namaste, almost

PS. The electrician has us fixed temporarily and so here’s hoping we hang in there until they can do the necessary repairs.

How high’s the water mama?

04 Aug 2013

Those of you who know the Johnny Cash song from which the lyrics in this week’s title is taken will know the response starts at “two feet high and risin’”. The call and response keeps increasing from two feet up to “five feet high and risin’”. Well we didn’t reach that level but Rae and I could have sung our own version:

Phil: How high’s the water mama?

Rae: It’s half inch high and risin’.

Phil: How high’s the water mama?

Rae: I say it’s one inch high and risin’.

Friday, as I was coming home from work, I got a call from Rae who told me our basement gym was flooded by a half inch of water. It might have been worse: the gym is dropped a full inch from the rest of the basement, so the water was at least contained. I called Rajesh, our work contact who is the interface with the landlord. He called back and said the landlord’s manager would be at our flat at 11:00 in the morning. Well, when we got up the next morning, the one inch barrier had been broached. We had water throughout the basement!

Well, the landlord’s manager was here at 11:00 sharp but he was as confused as we were about where the water came from. He thought it might be from the washing machine drain. The only problem is we hadn’t done a load of wash in three days. He thought it might be condensate from the basement air conditioners, which had been repaired the week before. Really? Condensate? Using my high school physics, I calculated there was over 216 gallons in the basement. Even if I was off a bit (and judging by the number of buckets we watched the manager and his “crew” of the neighbor’s driver and cleaning lady carry out of the basement, I don’t think I underestimated) that was not condensate or even the couple of gallons at a time our little washing machine uses. So now we have a sparkling clean basement floor but we still don’t know where the water came from. We are to watch the basement and see if our flood returns.

It won’t dampen our enthusiasm!

The good news of the week was we were asked to come sign our furnishings shipment through customs. We were not able to take any pictures so I will try to describe customs center and the process for clearing our furnishings through the same. This is one of those times I don’t think even my sparkling narrative will do justice to what we experienced. It wasn’t bad, actually it went fairly smoothly, but the scale was astonishing.

The shipping agent would not give me an address for the customs center. Rather, he said we should have Mehndi call when we were on the way and he would give directions. So, as we got in the car I called the agent and handed phone to Mehndi. After five minutes of discussion, Mehndi hung up the phone, handed it back to me, and said, “Very dangerous directions!” I was really hoping he meant difficult not dangerous. It turns out that seems to have been the case because getting there was a fairly convoluted process but nothing seemed very threatening.

As we started to get closer to our destination, the foreshadowing of what we would experience was the number of trucks lined up on each side of the roadway. The closer we got, the more densely parked were the trucks so that by the time we got to the turn off into the customs center (which we missed the first time we went by it) there was a concentration of trucks two or three deep at each point of the intersection. Round two making the turn found us going down a narrow road made more so by an endless train of bumper to bumper trucks leading right up to acres and acres of shipping containers stacked on top of each other and end to end as far as one can see. We had to get out of the car and walk into the customs center; prove our identity through our passports; get temporary passes; and then walk a quarter of a mile into the belly of the beast passing even more cargo containers and loading docks that entered into a hall that was as big as two football fields. Then we waited. At least there was air conditioning. It was clear that everyone there, the customs employees and the shipping agents know each other well. They were all cordially chatting and joking whilst we waited.

Finally our agent came and got us and took us into the hall through a maze of boxes, crates and other articles that had been shipped. Finally we got to our lot, which seemed pretty insignificant both in size and number compared to everything else in the hall. Each box in our shipment was numbered and there was a numbered manifest with the contents of each box that the customs agent had. He had the box with our computer in it opened and two more boxes at random (those of you who know Rae will not be surprised that one box held her shoes the other hangers). Then laying a finger to the side of his nose, and giving a nod up the...no, no wait that’s wrong. Then with the ever popular head nod, he had me sign the manifest and we were done.

Our furnishings had cleared customs but they were still not in our possession. That’s the rest of the story and I will leave it to Rae to tell it and other highlights of the week.

Rae here,

One of the things that Phil didn’t mention which struck me was that this big mass of Cargo, trucks, warehouses, and lots and lots of men waiting to either drop off, pick up or help move cargo, seemed to kind of be out in the middle of nowhere.  In the middle of this nowhere was this whole little world.

When we left the customs center the agent told us we would hear from him before 5 that same day about when our shipment would be delivered.  I’m sure you won’t be any more surprised than I was, if I tell you that that didn’t happen, we didn’t hear Monday, but did finally hear late Tuesday evening that it would be delivered on Wednesday at noon.  Given previous experience, I wasn’t holding my breath that that would actually happen.  To my surprise, at noon on Wednesday an agent showed up at my door with about 6 or 7 helpers to deliver our goods.  The first step was for them to unload the truck onto the driveway, then from the driveway into the house, and into the various rooms of the house. As each box was brought into the house it was checked off the log, until all the boxes were accounted for.  After the boxes were dispersed thru the house, they began unpacking them.  By 2ish the boxes were unpacked, removed from the house and the crew gone.  I didn’t know where I wanted all the items put, so some are still on the bed in the guest room and pictures are still waiting to find their places on the walls, but the kitchen is unpacked and the clothes are crammed into the limited closet space that we have, (Saturday we went out and bought 2 more wardrobes, that will be delivered on Thursday.)  The added storage will be good since I’m not feeling too comfortable about storing much downstairs at this point.  Here we thought having a workout room could be handy, now I’m wondering about the possibility of water aerobics instead.

Monday after Phil got home from work we thought we’d have our driver run us to the mall to see if we could pick up a few things for the house.  Well, the normally 20-30 minute ride to the mall took us about 1 ½ hours so we only went to one store and only managed to get 2 items.  Luckily the drive home went much faster, so our poor driver was back in time to catch his train home.  The interesting thing about our drive home was that we came up behind a wooden cart that was loaded about 15 ft high with large blue barrels.  They reminded me of the 50 gallon water barrels we have back home, but maybe a bit larger.  Mehndi our driver moved over to go around it and I realized a couple of things.  One was that there were 2 carts and the other was that each cart was being pulled by a large Brahma bull.  After we passed the carts Mehndi pulled back into the lane the carts were in, when I say lane, I use that term very loosely.  Shortly after passing the carts we had to stop at a light.  I turned around to see how far behind the carts were, and was surprised to see that they were right behind us.  The bull’s nose was right at the back of our car.  I could look into his eyes, they looked tired.  I always find it fascinating to see all the ways they have of moving things.

Well, our new car is not so new anymore.  I’ve been pretty surprised by the lack of accidents considering the crazy mass of traffic and “anything goes” attitude about lanes and space. One day last week as Mehndi was bringing me home a motorcycle cut in front of us and clipped our front right bumper.  Mehndi caught up to him and told him that he needed to go around the corner and stop so we could talk (not sure if anyone here has insurance and even if they do, I don’t know what that means). We went around the corner, pulled off the side of the road and waited, but he never came.  Don’t know where he went.  The next day another motorcycle ran into the back left bumper.  None of these mishaps did much damage, just a few scratches.  Today coming home from church Mehndi decided to move to the right, but didn’t wait until he had cleared the car that was next to us and so clipped our right rear bumper on the car’s front left bumper.  He didn’t stop, but kept going (I gasped, but didn’t say anything).  When we arrived home he got out to let me out and looked at the bumper, said one of their favourite cuss words (shite) and then told me, “no problem”.  When Phil got home from church I asked him if Mehndi had told him about the accident.  He hadn’t, but as we looked out our window at the car parked on the driveway, it appeared that the paint or scratches or whatever had been there earlier had been dealt with, amazing!  We still have the rear left bumper to be initiated.  I have no doubt its day is coming.  I actually amaze myself with my lack of gasping.

Well these are just a few of our week’s highlights, but I’m sure you are tired of reading by now.  More adventures are sure to come our way, so.....    

Namaste, for now.

When life is too much, roll with it baby....

28 Jul 2013

Those of you who know me best know I have a tendency to adapt to my environment – to go native. When we lived in West Texas, I adopted a drawl and started wearing boots and a cowboy hat. When I was on my mission in Japan, I couldn’t see any difference between me and the million people around me, although I was a foot taller than them, had whiter skin, lighter hair and a much bigger nose. When I worked with the Gila River Indian Community, again came out the boots and I considered growing my hair into a pony tail (I was much younger with more hair!). Anyway, now that we are in India, I know some of you are probably concerned the same thing will happen again. Based on this picture that was taken of me last week, I guess those concerns are justified.

Actually I took this picture at an assembly hall just before one of the most interesting experiences I have had in India. Our university is offering English classes in conjunction with Modicare, the MLM company owned by the Modi Group (our parent company). I was invited to one of their meetings to present the program to their representatives. It was an interesting amalgam of a Mary Kay rally and Indian culture: four hours of overly loud, driving music; awards; people being carried on to the stage; hundreds of orange chrysanthemum “leis” being placed around peoples necks and arms (an increasing number as the level of recognition increased; flower pedals being thrown over and at honorees; and overly enthusiastic speeches. I did pick up a great earworm: the song played on a loop while the representatives filed into the auditorium. Here is the link:  

 May it haunt your dreams as it has mine. You are welcome.

On a little more serious note, the arrangement with Modicare is only one of several arrangements for education and training. We are looking at arrangements in New Delhi, Mumbai, and Bangalore. I am using these activities as a beachhead strategy to expand the number of campuses we have. We start with training (English, critical thinking, strategic planning, etc.); move to onsite MBA programs with key corporations; finally, with that base of students in various cities we can launch campuses. The process of developing these arrangements with key corporations is starting to pick up speed and we have discussions going with several. Two related key challenges we are facing are shortage of resources and the expectation corporations have regarding timing. We are at that ragged point where we have too much work for the curriculum development people we have but not enough yet to justify hiring staff. This is related to the second problem since it is difficult with our current staff to modify even existing curriculum quickly enough to meet the timelines the corporations have. Developing new classes is even more difficult. Still, these are nice challenges to have.

Now, here’s Rae. 

Well, let’s see what I want to share about this last week. First I guess I should tell you that the Monsoons have arrived.  That means cooler temperatures, but also much higher humidity.  It is not unusual to have the windows totally fogged over.  That also happens to your glasses when you walk outside, or get out of the car, instant blindness.  I have to remind myself to put in my contacts if I’m going out.  Yesterday we went to a very large mall in Gurgaon, a city about 40 minutes away.  On the way home it was very hard for our driver to keep the windows in the car from fogging up.  Given how crazy traffic is here, having clear windows seems to me to be pretty important.  I however didn’t necessarily mind having my window fogged, because sometimes it’s better to not see just what chaos is going on around you. Cars pass so closely that it would be very easy to reach out and touch the car next to you.  Another thing that seems to be a part of Monsoons is power outages.  There have been a couple of days where the power has gone out 5 or 6 times.  There is a generator for our flat, but the guard has to turn it on.  I don’t think there is any electricity to his small, (about 3x3) guard stall, so I don’t think he is always aware of the stoppage.  So, sometimes you have to open the door and call out to him to please turn on the generator.

I think I’m getting closer to finally getting my phone set up.  Friday a young man from Airtel came by. He didn’t speak English, but did keep saying “sim card”, but when I brought him my phone he looked confused and finally said “never mind” and “come back in morning”.  He didn’t say what morning however and so far hasn’t come back.  I assumed that he was going to come back with someone who could speak a bit of English.  Well, you know what happens when you assume, in my case, it means I’m wrong and who knows when they will come back, and if we will ever really get things sorted out.

We also heard from the moving company about our shipment.  We are supposed to have to go to the customs office sometime in the next few days and then who knows how much longer it will be until the shipment is actually delivered.  Hopefully it won’t be too long.  It will be nice to have some of our things.  I’m thinking it will be nice to have more than the four plates, and minimum kitchen tools that I sent with Phil when he first came.  I’m sure that there will be some things I sent that I will wonder what I was thinking in sending it.  Anyway, looking forward to having our things.         

If the day should come that we get our shipment, I finally get a phone, and our oven gets repaired or replaced then I think we will finally feel a bit more settled and a part of things, and maybe not so much like we’re temporarily here and just camping.  One thing I’m learning is that things here take time and patience, something that I guess I still need to learn. One thing about India is it will give me plenty of opportunity to hone that skill.

Namaste