Missing Home

Pancho and I have been feeling particularly homesick today.  There are parts of this lifestyle that are incredible (getting paid to live and work in other countries) and there are parts of this lifestyle that are at times hard (living and working in other countries).  India has been wonderful so far but for us country kids from rural Pacific Northwest, the constant crowds, buildings for days, pollution, lack of freedom for women, and the isolation that comes from not being able to drive ourselves anywhere starts to take its toll.  We daydreamed today about owning our own home in the country, living within reasonable travel distance from family (ok, half way around the world might be just a little too far!), and enjoying a slower-paced life.  We got on the computer and looked through pictures from the last seven years and could almost feel the Yakima River.

That said, at the end of the day I sat outside with Thumper and watched kids clean themselves off from the Holi celebration while the call to prayer wafted through the hot evening air from the local mosque and I was overwhelmed with happiness.

Ups and downs....

We welcome any pictures of the Pacific Northwest you have lying around as we decorate our space and try to remind ourselves of home!

Allergies and the Crazy Girl

A few quick notes to make you smile.

#1:  Our driver says they just burn leaves here but the piles of burning trash I see everywhere indicate otherwise.  I realized today that I'm not getting sick, I don't have a cold, I am just sensitive to the extreme car pollution on the roads and all the smoke in the air from the burning piles of garbage.  I thought I was just allergic to pollens!  On a similar note, they fumigated the courtyard of our building and I looked out the window to see nothing but fog and thought the apartment was on fire.  Don't worry, just spraying for mosquitoes.  Our air conditioner caught on fire last weekend and that wasn't nearly as smokey. 

Burning Trash

#2: On the way to work this morning I saw a girl I'd seen before sitting on the median of the road next to a burning tire.  I asked our driver why she's always sitting there and if she asks for money.  He laughed and said, "No, no, no, she is not asking for money, she is crazy!"  I asked if she stays somewhere nearby and he said, "No, she is not staying anywhere, even she does not know what she is doing!"

#3: There is a new cafeteria at work operated by a nearby restaurant and I can get a huge plate of rice, noodles, chicken, or Chinese vegetable ball things for $1.  Street food cooked in a totally sanitary kitchen at the Consulate.  A.mazing.

#4:  Thumper is really trying hard to say "fork," "Foster," "fan," "sit," "shirt," and "sure," but it just isn't working for him yet... he can, however, say "I like juuuuice," and he runs through the house screaming it over and over :-)

It's late and I can't pull together a coherent blog post so I leave you with those pearls from our Hyderabad experience.  Next time Pancho or I will write about Thumper's Kangaroo debut, our trip to Golkonda Fort during which Pancho experienced a pickpocket attempt, and our first Holi festival which will happen next week.  Missing you all!

Legs

Oh, India.

This morning I left for a short 5 km run to a local park.  It was early, so traffic wasn't too bad; however, I did have a car, driving the wrong direction on the road, cut me off, then stop right in front of me so they could load up some supplies from a store.  As they got out of the car, they looked at me like I was the crazy one because I was running for no apparent reason.  A few minutes later I had a Tuk Tuk cut me off in the same manner so that he could give me a ride.  He yelled, "Sir! Sir!" as me motioned to the seat with his hand.  I shook my head and kept running, and I think I literally blew his mind.  He's probably still sitting there trying to figure out what had happened, and perhaps thinking he should find a new job since he couldn't even talk a Westerner into his taxi, who, clearly, was in desperate need of a ride.

Like we've said before, India is full of extremes in every direction.  Poverty meets luxury.  Chaos meets tranquility.  Beauty meets trash.  On the way to the park this morning I ran by all sorts of people sleeping on the side of the street, just waking up to start their work day.  Having grown up in the United Sates, it seems so foreign to see people who work a full day cleaning, or in construction, or perhaps trash removal, and they have no place to go but to the small grassy median in a round-a-bout.  They get water from a large tanker truck that stops and opens a faucet for them to fill their water bottles, and they likely work all day so they can afford a meal that evening.  

As I pass all of the homeless workers outside and step through the gates to the park, it's as if I cross some threshold into a different reality.  Inside the park, well-dressed Indians are everywhere practicing yoga, or doing odd exercises as they walk along the well-manicured gravel path.  I could hear people in the distance laughing and yelling as they played some game, probably cricket.  The park was like a sanctuary from the injustice outside.  It was almost depressing as I neared the gate on my way home, and I knew that I had to leave this safe, blind, oblivious place and, once again, run through the smoke from burning trash, run past the people lining up for water, run through the wafting urine.

I'd be lying if I said that I didn't dislike the portion of my run from our house to the park.  It's as if I'm a little kid getting ready to sprint from one 'safe base' to another.  It's hard to face the reality that we live in such luxurious conditions while people struggle to get through each day.  The worst part of it all is that no one here seems to strive for anything better for themselves.  Just as the wealthy people blindly go about their day in the pockets of solitude, the poor people go about their day everywhere else.  It seems as though no one here has any desire to 'learn to fish', they just want 'fish'.

Happy Travels!

Pancho